TODAY’S DEVOTIONAL (Saturday 5th December 2020)
“Now when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour.
And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?” which is translated, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?”
Some of those who stood by, when the heard that, said, “Look, He is calling for Elijah!”
Then someone ran and filled a sponge full of sour wine, put in on a reed, and offered it to Him to drink, saying, “Let Him alone; let us see if Elijah will come to take Him down.
Then Jesus cried with a loud voice, and breathed His last. Mark 15:33-37 NKJV
WELCOME TO THE 338th DAY OF OUR YEAR OF REJOICING
We slept and we woke up because the LORD kept us. He has added another day to our existence today, glory to His name. But like I have always made us know, we should not waste the day. We should use it to fulfill why He gave it to us.
Maybe someone may be wondering why He gave us another day to live?
Well, it is to fear God, keep His commandments, serve our generation according to His will, and keep the faith looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of Jesus Christ. It is the blessed and most ultimate hope of the redeemed of the LORD. That was what drove the faith of our fathers, and fueled it to remain faithful to the LORD irrespective of what they faced.
It made those who fell into sin to return back to the LORD without seeking encouragement from anyone. It kept them walking and burning in the Spirit. It drove the single among them to take the gospel of the Kingdom to different nations of the earth, instead of sitting down and waiting for the day they will get married.
It shaped their Christian lives and got even us saved. And like I have always said, if the blessed hope and glorious appearing of Jesus Christ is not your hope for being a Christian, then you need to return to God’s salvation class to meet Jesus in Spirit and in Truth.
These men and women, burnt out for the LORD, and spent their days doing His blessed will because that was what drove them. Sadly, our generation has gone far from the paths they walked in and seems not to know how to return. But it’s my prayer that the LORD speak to us this morning using this devotional.
Today we will be looking at few things that are involved in doing God’s will, drawing virtues from what happened to our LORD on the cross.
One of the major things the Holy Spirit will drive you to do on daily bases, if He lives in you, is the will of God. This is one major reason why people who are ruled by the spirit of this world cannot receive Him.
A person who is ruled by the spirit of this world, cannot do the will of GOD; in fact, they do not live to do the will of GOD. They live to do their own will. Hence no matter how the seek it, cannot even receive the outpouring or baptism of the Holy Spirit.
If you find them in Church, you will find them worshiping GOD primarily to help them do their own will. When you serve GOD to help you fulfill your own will or carnal ambitions, you will end up being filled with another spirit, masquerading as the Holy Spirit.
THE TRUE HOLY SPIRIT WAS NOT SENT TO HELP US DO OUR OWN WILL. HE WAS SENT TO HELP US DO GOD’S WILL BY LIVING FOR IT AND DYING IN IT.
Doing the will of God is not cheap. It is not cheap because it runs contrary to the system and culture that our bodies and souls have been structured to align with. That is why doing God’s will involve a dying; dying daily like Paul did.
Now, there are categories of God’s will. There is the category I will classify as simple will of God. This one is not always costly. It is very simple and less demanding. That is the category that most Christians will prefer. There is the second category I consider difficult and complicated. In some cases, this one can cost us even our lives, depending on what need to be done.
For instance, answering a call of God could be cheap, especially when there is no price to pay at the beginning. That can be classified as a simple will of God. But staying in the call of God can be very difficult, especially if you want to do it right and faithfully. So, you see the two categories, or aspects of doing God’s will in one’s calling and assignment on earth.
Also, it is God’s will that we all get a good Church and plant ourselves there for our spiritual wellbeing. This could also be very simple to do.
But staying there after you have fund it can be difficult to do, especially if crisis arises or if the pastor gives you no attention, like what I do sometimes when relating with some. That is when you find people saying “maybe I was wrong” and walking away from God’s will for their lives, and going to establish what suits them.
To many immature believers, if it is the will of God there should be no crisis. But that is false. If it is the will of God, there should be not retreat and no surrender, no matter the crisis that may arise will being in it. That is the ideal position.
You don’t use signs to check if things are God’s will these days. You will be misled. You must have a deep conviction of the Spirit like Paul heard. You must be fully persuaded by the Holy Spirit living in you. The reason is, we are not in the days of Gideon; we are in the days of Christ in you the hope of glory.
SO, WE SHOULD BE GUIDED FROM WITHIN, NOT FROM WITHOUT.
Whatever happens from without should only confirm what we have being convinced of within. Before the cross, people were led from without because no one could receive the Holy Spirit. But now the Holy Spirit have been given. We are no longer guided from without but from within. Whatever happened without only happens to confirm to us of what has happened from within.
Every Christian who seek to authenticate if something is God’s will, by using the thermometer of the presence or absence of crisis will always make mistakes and walk in terrible error. Indeed, if it is God’s will, He will give us peace but that sometimes means there will be crisis for that peace to take care of!
Jesus went through a lot to do the will of God. Our devotional text says;
“Now when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?” which is translated, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?”
Some of those who stood by, when the heard that, said, “Look, He is calling for Elijah!” Then someone ran and filled a sponge full of sour wine, put in on a reed, and offered it to Him to drink, saying, “Let Him alone; let us see if Elijah will come to take Him down.
Then Jesus cried with a loud voice, and breathed His last.”
If you are part of those who say there should be no tears when we are doing the will of GOD, this scripture proves you wrong.
Jesus cried and went through terrible pains in His bid to do the will of God. His experience tells us that doing or being in the will of God, sometimes, will bring us mockery, shame, pain, rejection by men, and all unpleasant things.
It can unleash seasons called DARK HOURS upon us the way it did on Jesus; these dark hours do not last for seconds but from excruciating hours, or days, weeks, months and even years, depending on the quality of God’s will that we may be doing. That tells us why Jesus conditioned making Heaven on doing the will of God, and why some will miss Heaven for not doing it. The Bible says;
“Not everyone who says to Me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father Who is in heaven.
Many will say to Me on that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name and driven out demons in Your name and done many mighty works in Your name?
And then I will say to them openly (publicly), I never knew you; depart from Me, you who act wickedly [disregarding My commands]. Matthew 7:21-23 Amplified version
YES, WE ARE NOT GOING TO MAKE HEAVEN FOR RECITING A SINNER’S PRAYER BUT FOR DOING GOD’S WILL THEREAFTER.
For not acting wickedly and disregarding God’s commands. This should be driven into our spirits and established in our hearts. Reciting the sinner’s prayer will only be a poem if we do not live for our God after doing so. It is not the recitation that will take us to Heaven but the transformation that should happen in our lives.
As we bring this to a close, I want us to understand that ding or being in God’s will is not cheap. What our LORD Jesus Christ went through should tell us that it is not cheap. There will be pains to endure, trials to go through, adversities to embrace and so much to accommodate, trusting God to see you through.
Hear this; the enemy of our soul and all his men will use events we love, classical deceptions we will take for honest things, people we listen to, and all in his book to fight against us as soon as we start doing anything that will qualify us for Heaven.
There will be heart wrenching reactions from people who may not understand what is going on in our lives. They will mock us; they will even give us things we have no choice but to collect, all in mockery.
Jesus had this kind of people. He was given source wine while in great thirst. He had no choice but to collect it, but the people did not do it in love. They did it in mockery. They did it saying; “Let Him alone; let us see if Elijah will come to take Him down.” The same will happen to you if you find yourself doing or living in certain aspects of God’s will.
But the beauty of the whole things is, doing the will of God is a process that brings the elects to a glorious ending. Hallelujah! That is why we are to do it fixing our hearts on the final outcome. The final outcome is always glorious and eternally rewarding. If we fix our hearts on the present pain, we will give up, but if we fix it on the future crown, we will make it.
A final word from Peter says we should not count suffering for doing the will of man or the will of our flesh as part of suffering for being a Christian.
People take bad decisions, and do thing that attract troubles to them, and when they begin to go through the consequences, they begin to classify it as suffering for doing God’s will. If you did things that seemed right in your own eyes and they back fired with terrible consequences, please do not say you are suffering for doing God’s will.
People who suffer for doing God’s will take Spirit and Truth led actions, and they are to fix their hearts on the glorious outcome lying ahead of them if those actions brings sufferings to them.
There is so much we can write on this, but I believe the message have been passed.
LET THIS SCRIPTURE BE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION FOR YOU TODAY!
“Therefore we do not become discouraged (utterly spiritless, exhausted, and wearied out through fear). Though our outer man is [progressively] decaying and wasting away, yet our inner self is being [progressively] renewed day after day.”
“For our light, momentary affliction (this slight distress of the passing hour) is ever more and more abundantly preparing and producing and achieving for us an everlasting weight of glory [beyond all measure, excessively surpassing all comparisons and all calculations, a vast and transcendent glory and blessedness never to cease!],”
“Since we consider and look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen; for the things that are visible are temporal (brief and fleeting), but the things that are invisible are deathless and everlasting.” 2 Corinthians 4:16-18 Amplified Version!