TODAY’S DEVOTIONAL (Tuesday 24th November 2020)
“His foundation is in the holy mountains. The Lord loves the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob.”
“Glorious things are spoken of you, O city of God!” Psalm 87:1-3 NKJV
WELCOME TO THE 327TH DAY OF OUR YEAR OF REJOICING
The gracious GOD has given us another day, yes He has given us another life. It’s a fresh day from the LORD and we are glad to see this new day. This is another day we are given to fear the LORD and serve our generation according to His will.
Life may not be easy with us this morning, but we should not forget that God commanded us to REJOICE ALWAYS. He knows we can’t rejoice with a sad heart that is why He gave us His Holy Spirit to help us. Paul and Silas must have experienced that in the prison. Hence were able to sing and rejoice, in spite of their pain.
Whenever God ask you to do any humanly impossible thing, He has silently asked you to call on the Holy Spirit for help. Don’t forget that and don’t mix it up!
The Holy Spirit is the replacement of the physical presence of Jesus Christ. He is the fuel of a perfect Christian life. When He is not there to run our lives, we run into trouble. If you find anyone who is always in trouble, you have found someone who lack the Holy Spirit in their lives.
You have found someone that the Holy Spirit is not running every aspect of their lives. If we will allow Him to run every aspect of our Lives, our lives will become Heaven on earth; even if you are being killed for doing God’s will, He will enable you to die smiling.
The command to rejoice always can only be obey with the Holy Spirit running our lives. He is the one who enables the manifestation of the glorious things spoken concerning us. There may be so many gory things happening, but as soon as He steps in and starts running our lives, glorious things will begin to manifest!
You see, there are two classes of utterances in the spirit realm in an inactive state. These utterances are ready to manifest in the lives of men. We have the gory things spoken concerning mankind, and the glorious things spoken concerning mankind.
THE SPIRIT THAT RUNS OUR LIVE DETERMINES WHICH OF THE SET OF UTTERANCES SPEAKS IN OUR LIVES.
If the Holy Spirit is running our lives, the glorious things spoken concerning us will be manifesting. But if the human spirit or the spirit of hell runs our lives, gory things will one speaking in our lives. Our lives can only be peaceful in a trouble world if the Holy Spirit is running every aspect of it.
The gory things speaking in the realm of the spirit are products of the impact of the fall of man upon the human race. They are also created by the plans of the devil against us. But the glorious things spoken concerning us, are the benefits of redemption and creations of the glorious plans of God for our lives.
Life has a way of activating the gory things in the lives of men if the Holy Spirit is not allowed to run it. It has a way of forcing into our lives the manifestation of the gory things that sprang up in the human race after the fall of man. It has a way of forcing the plans of the devil into our lives if the Holy Spirit of the glorious God is not running our lives.
For instance, to get and not stay married is a gory thing. When the Holy Spirit is running our lives, that will never happen. To be pregnant and go to abort the Child is a gory thing. Except for health reasons, it is when the human spirit, the spirit of this world or the spirit of hell is running our lives that we do that.
To be sick without receiving healing is a gory thing. It is when the Holy Spirit is not running our lives that it happens. That tells me, whenever my health fails I should ask God to forgive me of any sin I may have sinned and request that His Holy Spirit returns and restore my health. Sometimes He even shows us the medication to take.
I remember a situation where a child of God was sick and the doctors could not tell what was responsible. The Holy Spirit became the doctor. He revealed what was responsible and showed the people the medication to take. They did it, and the person was made whole. Some people preach against using medication when you are sick. Those are extremities’ that prolong adversities.
THE HOLY SPIRIT CAN GIVE US PROPER DIAGNOSIS AND ADVICE ON WHICH MEDICATION TO TAKE IF YOUR PROBLEM IS WHOLLY NATURAL.
He is there to run our lives not to ruin our lives. He is there to implement the glorious things spoken concerning us and stop the gory things! To be sickly is a gory thing. He can deal with that and return us back to sound health.
To be stupidly poor is a gory thing, and before I tell you what the Holy Spirit does about this, let me share with you what I consider as THE MYSTERY OF POVERTY. I am sure no one on has heard this. Preachers will even be afraid to preach it.
But if you are a preacher reading this, I permit you to start preaching this truth. It will help the saints. An I want to admonish that you don’t use it as a manipulating tool. God will judge you of you do.
There are three kinds of poverty. There is the poverty of the righteous, where we make ourselves poor for the purposes of God to prosper on earth. Jesus introduced that aspect of poverty and Paul lived it for us to see. The Bible says He became poor so that we may be made rich. That is the poverty I enjoy as a Christian.
I love it because it helps me to have treasures in heaven. The Bible speaks of those who make themselves poor for others to be made rich. That is an aspect of apostolic Christianity. When the Holy Spirit runs your life, He will lead you into that kind of poverty. This type is not gory but glorious.
Now, there is the poverty of the wicked. This is the next type of poverty. This one is the one that the enemy make you rich successful or famous by you trading your soul or consecration. This makes you naked, wretched and poor in the Spirit realm. This is the poverty that many of the rich of this world are trapped in. They call it prosperity; it is actually the prosperity of the wicked.
This is the poverty that qualifies you for eternal damnation in the lake of fire. It is a poverty that is also described as being poor in the things of GOD.
Then there is the third kind of poverty that is simply an absent of money in your pocket. This is the one that everyone knows. It simple a life of financial oppression, a life of debts, lack, begging and borrowing.
This takes away the power to get wealth and take care of your physical needs from you. It is whatever happens when we do not have the power to get wealth at work in our lives.
This is the poverty that most money spinning preachers claim God called them to kill. And I have always said, if anyone deceive you, please do not deceive yourself. Those are claims by charlatans who themselves are looking for your money and all that.
NO ONE IS SENT TO KILL ANOTHER PERSON’S POVERTY.
Only the Holy Spirit running our lives can bring us to the place of financial prowess. He is the power to get wealth and was sent to, among other things, deal with the last two kinds of poverty and establish us in rich fulfillment.
To be poor in the things of God or in the aspect of not having money is a gory thing. Only the Holy Spirit can stop it.
To sin against God and man is a gory thing. Jesus was made manifest that He take away the power to live in sin. He was made manifest to deal with this gory thing. If His Holy Spirit is running our lives, we will not be leading a life of sin.
There are so many gory things we would have gone into, but the bottom line is, everyone on the face of the earth is either manifesting the glorious things spoken concerning him or the gory things spoken concerning him. There is no middle ground!
The spirit or Spirit that runs our lives is what determine what we manifest. If you look at the life of Samson in Judges 14 – 16 you will discover this truth in full manifestation. When the Holy Spirit was running His life, none could ruin it. No force from earth or hell could dare it.
He was simple aflame. That is what happens!
You find this burning man taking on the gates of the City of Philistines and defending Israel from the clutches of their human enemies. It was a manifestation of the glorious things spoken concerning him.
But when He started going after harlots, sleeping on the laps of Delilah, having his consecration shaved, and becoming a prisoner in the camp of the enemy, the gory things manifested. The Holy Spirit ceased from running His life, He came into ruin.
He manifested the glorious when his consecration was kept and the gory when his consecration was not kept. The Holy Spirit has a way of departing from us if we do not use our will to keep our lives consecrated and separated from a life of sin.
THAT IS ONE LESSON WE CAN DRAW FROM THE LIFE OF SAMSON.
However, God did not allow the enemy to have the last laugh. That was also a glorious thing spoken concerning him. He came through for Him and pulled him out of the shame of losing His Holy Spirit to a life of sin.
Because of His covenant of grace in our lives, God will never allow the enemy to have the last laugh. Except we reject Him altogether, it will never happen.
May the covenant of grace speak in our lives in Jesus Precious name!
Our Devotional text says, “Glorious things are spoken of you or City of GOD.” Historically, this was referring to the nation of Israel – specifically Jerusalem. And one of the glorious things spoken concerning that City is that there will be a New Jerusalem in a New Heaven and a New Earth, where righteousness dwells. Hallelujah!!
That Jerusalem is going to descend on the very spot where the Current Jerusalem lies and it will have a throne of David with Jesus sitting on it as KING of kings and LORD of lords, ruling and reigning for a thousand years.
May the LORD help us to make it there!
However, prophetically speaking Jesus further demystified the City when He looked at us, (the redeemed from sin, Satan and self) and said “You are a City set on a hill that cannot be hidden” (Matthew 5:14)
In the light of that, Children of God are the City. Hallelujah!
By the covenant of grace, Glorious things are spoken of us not gory things. We must learn to accept the glorious and contend with the gory by the grace and mercies of the LORD. Yes, we must contend with sin, Satan, and self else we will unleash the gory and not the glorious!
As you embrace this day, I want you to understand that the will of God is that you uncover those glorious things spoken of us and fix your attention on them. Paul said God will reveal them to us by His Spirit, for the Spirit searches all things, yes the deep things of God!
LET THIS SCRIPTURE BE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION TODAY;
“How can a young man cleanse his way? By taking heed according to your word. With my whole heart I have sought You; Oh, let me not wander from Your commandments!”
“Your word I have hidden in my heart, that I might not sin against You. Blessed are You, O Lord! Teach me Your statutes.”
“With my lips I have declared all the judgments of Your mouth. I have rejoiced in the way of Your testimonies, as much as in all riches.”
“I will meditate on Your precepts, and contemplate Your ways. I will delight myself in Your statutes; I will not forget Your word.” Psalms 119:9-16 NKJV