TODAY’S DEVOTION Friday 30th October 2020)
“Now it happened as they journeyed on the road, that someone said to Him, “Lord, I will follow you wherever you go.” And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.”
Then He said to another, “Follow Me.” But he said, “Lord, let me first go and bury my father.” Jesus said to him, “Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and preach the kingdom of God.”
And another also said, “Lord, I will follow you, but let me first go and bid them farewell who are at my house.” But Jesus said to him, “No one, having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.” Luke 9:57-62 NKJV
WELCOME TO THE 302ND DAY OF OUR YEAR OF REJOICING
This morning, we will be looking at the blessing of fully following the LORD. If we look at the scriptures it is covered with stories of people who fully followed the LORD and got blessed and those who did not and got wounded.
There are those who compromised and became captives. If we look at their lives, we can easily discover that one of the easiest ways to come into captivity is through compromise. It is through compromise that some kingdom warriors fall in battle.
How beautiful it is to follow the LORD with the whole of your heart and not compromise anything in your “walk” and “talk” with Him.
Compromise does not really hurt God (though it grieves His loving heart). Compromise hurts us; and sometimes without redemption.
Sadly, mankind is yet to come to terms to what a GODLESS and UNGODLY lifestyle does to a human. Even many of us in the faith are yet to come to terms with what one moment of not fully following the LORD does to our Christian lives!
I remember sharing the story of a man of God who was fully following His LORD until the enemy used his wife to bring him to the valley of spiritual weariness.
He was married to a very terrible woman. Whenever he closes from the Church (a Church his wife does not attend), he would drive around town to make sure the woman has slept before he enters the house. Because whenever he meets her awake, she would give him hell on earth.
Now there was this day that he drove around town and pick a lady by the road side that seems to be in need of help.
He was a kind hearted man of GOD and due to his kindness he decided to while away the time by taking this lady to her destination. But the lady did something terrible when she got to her destination. She took advantage of his vulnerability and seduced him successfully into an illicit affair with her that night.
THE FOLLOWING DAY THE MAN WOKE UP TO SEE A NOTE BY HIS SIDE READING “WELCOME TO THE WORLD OF AIDS.”
The lady was gone! This incident happened when there were no anti-viral drugs. He knew his days were numbered, and started going from church to church to share his testimony in repentance. Finally, he died. I believe God allowed the disease to kill him so he could come home and rest having repented genuinely.
One moment of compromise can cause us a life time of joy and peace in the Holy Ghost! It could be all the enemy needs to bring us down. That’s why it’s important that our faith fails not and re remain strong in the LORD.
As earlier stated, compromise hurts us not the Church or minister of the gospel that may be urging us to live right. Compromise hurts us not even those the enemy may be using to seduce us into it.
A Child of God who is fully following the LORD will lose much more than a sinner any moment he compromises divine standards. The reason is simple; the sinner has nothing to lose. He is already lost, and without the LORD! But we have everything to lose, if we compromise.
When I look at the grace and mercy of the LORD on my life and how he saved me from the consequences of my moments of compromise, I appreciate Him for His marvelous deeds.
Today when I speak to fellow believers in the faith, I do that sometimes with tears in my eyes, and many times just in my heart, hoping that people will heed to what I could not heed to in my own time of rebellion – at least to escape what I went through.
You see, not everywhere comes out successfully from the consequences of a moment of compromise. It is always important to avoid the troubles of a moment of compromise, by positively responding to the LORD regularly.
FULLY FOLLOWING THE LORD IS PART OF POSITIVE RESPONSE.
It remains a chief salvation key in the Christian faith. It is stronger than fasting and prayer, much stronger than sacrificial giving. That was why God spoke to king Saul through His prophet, Samuel saying;
“Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams.
For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, He also has rejected you from being king.” 1 Samuel 15:22-23 NKJV
We live in a Church generation that is more interested in prayer, fasting, giving, sacrificing unto the LORD to be free from some ancestral forces or get married but we do not know that obedience or positive response to the word of the LORD, remains much better than all that.
In my moments of compromise, those early years, I was still fasting, praying, sacrificing, and even preaching but there was no glory. I just had the anointing yet I did not know God was not pleased with everything I was doing.
If God could use a donkey without taking it to heaven, then we must be careful. Because being used of God is not a sign that you will make Heaven. When God is pressed to do a thing, Sometimes He can lay His hands on an animal to do it. If He can lay hands on an animal, then He can do the same on any of us. That was why Jesus said to his disciples,
“Behold, I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you.
“Nevertheless do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rather rejoice because your names are written in heaven.” Luke 10:19-20 NKJV
In other words, He was telling them, do not be carried away by the exploits you are seeing in ministry, rather live a life that will make sure your name that is written in Heaven is not erased. Our devotional text today makes that even clearer.
A MAJOR HIGHLIGHT IN IT SAYS
Then He said to another, “Follow Me.” But he said, “Lord, let me first go and bury my father.” Jesus said to him, “Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and preach the kingdom of God.”
And another also said, “Lord, I will follow you, but let me first go and bid them farewell who are at my house.” But Jesus said to him, “No one, having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.”
We have always said that the Grace of GOD is free but it has standards. Yes, grace has principles we must line up with.
It teaches that when we have put our hands to the plough of repentance from dead works, to follow the LORD, we must do it fully. We are ‘condemned’ not to look back because if we do, we will become unfit for the Kingdom of God. I believe Abraham our father and all who followed GOD previously knew this. That was why the Bible said,
“And truly if they had called to mind that country from which they had come out, they would have had opportunity to return.
But now they desire a better, that is, a heavenly country. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them.” Hebrews 11:15-16 NKJV
I believe with the whole of my Heart that if the true CHRIST dwells in our hearts by faith, we will lead a Christian life style that will reflect the very life these men lived in their time because it’s the same LORD that we are all dealing with.
We will be fully following Him and not stop, even when sin is thrown at us. We will repent and quickly go back to Him. It was in the light of all this that Paul the apostle (the only true apostle of grace) said,
“Therefore I run thus: not with uncertainty. Thus I fight: not as one who beats the air. But I discipline my body and bring it into subjection, lest, when I have preached to others, I myself should become disqualified.” 1 Corinthians 9:26-27 NKJV
We can become disqualified if we do not commit our hearts to fully follow the LORD.
Fully following the LORD will involve putting out bodies under – subjecting the flesh to daily spiritual discipline – so that we will not profess born again and then be cast away in the next life!
It’s a new day for you!
MAKE THIS SCRIPTURE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION FOR TODAY!
“For if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful expectation of judgment, and fiery indignation which will devour the adversaries.
Anyone who has rejected Moses’ law dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing, and insulted the Spirit of grace?
For we know Him who said, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the Lord. And again, “The Lord will judge His people.” It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Hebrews 10:26-31 NKJV