TODAY’S DEVOTIONAL (TUESDAY 5TH JANUARY 2021)
“Therefore, thus says the Lord, who redeemed Abraham, concerning the house of Jacob:
“Jacob shall not now be ashamed, nor shall his face now grow pale;
But when he sees his children, the work of My hands, in his midst, they will hallow My name, and hallow the Holy One of Jacob, and fear the God of Israel.
These also who erred in spirit will come to understanding, and those who complained will learn doctrine.” Isaiah 29:22-24 NKJV
WELCOME TO THE 5TH DAY OF OUR YEAR OF HIGHER HEIGHTS
There are evils of the day that walks about seeking to consume or devour people. But I pray that this day bring a great blessing to our lives, in Jesus precious name.
David was a man who dwelled in the presence of the LORD with his harp as a young lad. He was a teenager who knew the presence of God (I wish God give us teenagers who will know the presence of the LORD like David). He grew up to become a king who wrote things he discovered in the presence of GOD.
That is why we have the Book of Psalms!
One thing about the presence of God is the spiritual animation it brings to our minds, leading to discoveries that would not have been possible if we had not entered His presence. That is why you should not read your Bible outside His active presence. It will only be a study that is based on either a religious or an un-regenerated mind.
If you read your Bible under an atmosphere of divine presence, you get things from it that can only come when the Holy Spirit animates our minds. Some of us can bear witness how it feels when you read your Bible during a Church service filled with the active presence of God. An understanding enters you that propels you to keep reading.
God does not want that experience to be a Church experience alone. He wants it to be an experience we have even at home, on the beach, in our offices, wherever and whenever we take time out to read our Bibles. That means He wants us to be carrying His presence; His active presence wherever we go.
FOR MANY OF US, THAT IS A TALL ORDER BECAUSE OF THE PRICE THAT IS INVOLVED.
Our lives are not disciplined enough to come to that kind of Christianity. Our faith positions are too weak to place us there. Our revelation knowledge too poor to make that possible. But God wants us to come to that kind of a walk and talk with Him. He wants us to be the dwelling place of His active presence, so that wherever and whenever we open His word, a portal will also open and we will begin to enjoy sweet communion with His Holy Spirit through His word.
That brings us to our devotional text for the day! The last part of the text says,
“These also who erred in spirit will come to understanding, and those who complained will learn doctrine:”
It seems to me this is one major prophecy that God strongly wants to be fulfilled in our days. Because a lot of us in the faith today carries the spirit of error; in other words, we lead our Christina lives erring in spirit.
That is why many are stuck with the oil standing on James 5:14-15 and Mark 6:12-12, instead of stepping into God’s replacement for the anointing oil depicted all over the Holy Scriptures. They will stick to Moses in James and the disciples instead of Christ in Paul and the rest of the Holy Scripture in matters of the use of anointing oil. That is why there is oil drinking, then feet washing, then blood sprinkling and etc.
People who err in spirit do not see the difference between shadows and substance. They will stand on Elisha praying with salt before the cross to pray with salt after the cross. They will not see that we are called to become the salt Elisha prayed with, they will keep using it to fool themselves and others, opening the lives of men to the unclean spirits.
If you have the knowledge of the 12 apostolic standards that were raised by the early Church, you will see the many sound doctrines we have buried in our days because we sat under preachers who preached to us with error in their spirits. We made Bishops, Arch-Bishops, apostles, prophets, pastors and etc. who err in spirit our spiritual fathers and may be, mothers. The results of all these is evident.
NOW WE HAVE BROKEN MARRIAGES EVEN AMONG US PREACHERS.
The divorce rate among us pastors is terrible. Most of these things are happening not because the preachers or their wives are evil, but because they do not know; many of us do not know because we were not taught. We just imbibed the Americanize gospel and forgot the gospel of our LORD and savior Jesus Christ.
I read a story last night with sadness of a preacher I love so much whose wife filed for divorce. I was weak at the story, I thought through it was really sad about it. But I did not blame her or him.
We were not taught how we preachers should marry and who we should marry. We were not taught that there is catalogue of people a preacher should not marry at all, and that if possible a serious minded preacher should not even marry. If he wants to get married, he must follow the marital principle of the High Priest.
If you look at the first five books of Moses with the eyes of the New Testament, you will see it there. But who taught us? Who made us to understand all these mysteries? None! They all said, “that is Old Testament, we are in New. Forget all that.” And we did! We forget all that, and here we are today reaping the consequences.
Go read the Bible, and find out for yourself. In the days of Moses, divorce was permitted, but no High Priest (representing those of us called into five-fold ministry) had a divorce case. Meaning if we had followed what the LORD gave to Moses, in the eyes of the New Testament, instead of just neglecting those glorious precepts, there would been no divorce case among those of us called to be apostle, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers today.
Even the lesser priests in the days of Moses had little or no divorce case. They all followed the word of the LORD on who they should not bring into their lives as spouses. The women or men could be fervent in spirit but will not be able to withstand the rigors of ministry. That was why God gave those laws that we have all neglected.
Among other terrible things that is happening today, is the cultivating of the spirit of jealousy and envy in the hearts of women married to preachers, with some ignorantly accusing their innocent husbands of things they know nothing about; calling them all kinds of names at home while appearing as saint publicly.
IF WE HAD FOLLOWED THE LAWS OF THE LORD FOR THE MARRIAGES OF THE HIGH PRIESTS, THESE SHAMEFUL THINGS WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN HAPPENING.
There would have been men and women wired by the Holy Ghost to live and serve the souls of men committed to them together. There will be no accusation of giving what is called undue attention to a female member who need serious help. There will be understanding and no worries.
But here we are today, moving from shame to shame. Changing wives and husbands like shoes; some not because they want to do so, because I have met those who did that not because they wanted to, but because they wanted to find the right person to help them fulfill their ministries.
But we seem not to know that it is hurting the gospel so badly, and that God will judge us because of these things. We cannot be doing all that and still be calling ourselves men of GOD, and expect God to be silent.
These things are killing me! We need to go back to the things God gave through Moses and look at them again and again through the lenses of the New Testament. Because there is no way that this divorce plague among us preachers will stop if the upcoming ones also neglect the word of the LORD like we did!
There is no way there will be no divorce or a situation of just managing the marriage because of the Church or the Children.
If we keep neglecting the laws of God for the marriage of the High Priest and following what we call the ‘Spirit,’ we will be doomed. God will never tell the High priest not to Marry anyone with an unclean thing in her life and He comes to tell you to marry, because of what you call grace. You will come out with either a divorce case or a trouble marriage.
Sadly, everyone seems ignorant; we just err in spirit in our choices of life partners. We convince the whole world that they are God’s choices for us and give great prophetic stories, but end up crashing. How can God give you what will crash after some times? Even the marriage of Adam and Eve did not. It was an error in our spirits that gave us. It was not GOD!
This devotional is more of a prophetic lamentation for us preachers because of what I tread yesterday. We must stop these things; we must stop following what we call ‘the Spirit’ and start following the word written by the true Spirit of God using the pen of men like Moses.
I realized that following what the Bible says is more accurate than following what you feel the spirit is leading you to do, especially when it comes to marriage. God wants His Church to come to understanding; He wants all who err in spirit to come to understanding.
If you have not come to scriptural understanding of things, you will keep erring in spirit in your prophetic hearing! You will never have an accurate prophetic hearing system. You will be criticizing people like us for presenting the truth of the Bible and calling us names. You will murmur discontentedly when we preach or teach things that confront the error in your spirit.
But thank God for His mercies. The prophecy says all that will come to an end. The knowledge of the glory of the LORD shall cover the earth as the waters cover the sea.
I therefore, look forward to a Christian generation where everyone of us will no longer be erring in spirit. I look forward to an age when we will all come to the knowledge of the truth and learn to accept instructions from the Holy Scriptures without criticizing or murmuring discontentedly.
I look forward to an age before the LORD appears to take us home, where we will be walking in sound Bible Truths on marriage matters instead of doing what we usually do; playing the-God-told-me game! I look forward to that day when the prophecy will be fulfilled.
MAKE THIS SCRIPTURE A MEDITATION TODAY!
“Therefore, the Lord, who redeemed Abraham [from paganism] says this, concerning the house of Jacob (Israel):
“Jacob will not be ashamed, nor will his face turn pale [with disappointment because of his children’s degenerate behavior]; For when he sees his children, the work of My hands, in his midst, they will sanctify My Name; They will sanctify the Holy One of Jacob and will stand in awe and reverent fear of the God of Israel.
“Those who err in mind will know the truth, and those who criticize and murmur discontentedly will accept instruction.” Isaiah 29:22-24 Amplified Version