TODAY’S DEVOTION (FRIDAY 26TH AUGUST 2022)
“But you have been anointed by [you hold a sacred appointment from, you have been given an unction from] the Holy One, and you all know [the Truth] or you know all things.
I write to you not because you are ignorant and do not perceive and know the Truth, but because you do perceive and know it, and [know positively] that nothing false (no deception, no lie) is of the Truth.
Who is [such a] liar as he who denies that Jesus is the Christ (the Messiah)? He is the antichrist (the antagonist of Christ), who [habitually] denies and refuses to acknowledge the Father and the Son. No one who [habitually] denies (disowns) the Son even has the Father. Whoever confesses (acknowledges and has) the Son has the Father also.
As for you, keep in your hearts what you have heard from the beginning. If what you heard from the first dwells and remains in you, then you will dwell in the Son and in the Father [always].
And this is what He Himself has promised us—the life, the eternal [life]. I write this to you with reference to those who would deceive you [seduce and lead you astray].
But as for you, the anointing (the sacred appointment, the unction) which you received from Him abides [permanently] in you; [so] then you have no need that anyone should instruct you. But just as His anointing teaches you concerning everything and is true and is no falsehood, so you must abide in (live in, never depart from) Him [being rooted in Him, knit to Him], just as [His anointing] has taught you [to do]. 1 John 2:20-27 AMPC
WELCOME TO THE 238TH DAY OF OUR YEAR OF AMAZING GRACE!
This is the day the LORD has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it. He has kept and given us another day to be alive, let us give Him praise.
God has a history of doing things for man that he does not deserve. He also has a History of making sure things we deserve do not happen to us except we resist His will and mercies.
Everyone on earth is alive today because God is a Heavenly father who does not give us the judgment we all deserve.
Yes, we are alive because He gives us the blessings we do not deserve. If God’s justice system were to apply without mercy, there will be no man alive. But thank God for the mercy seat, Jesus Christ, whom He has sent to help us.
The Bible says;
“My little children, I write you these things so that you may not violate God’s law and sin. But if anyone should sin, we have an Advocate (One Who will intercede for us) with the Father—[it is] Jesus Christ [the all] righteous [upright, just, Who conforms to the Father’s will in every purpose, thought, and action].
And He [that same Jesus Himself] is the propitiation (the atoning sacrifice) for our sins, and not for ours alone but also for [the sins of] the whole world.” 1 John 2:1-2 AMPC
One of the beauties of this scripture is the words “My little Children.” This is very remarkable in the light of our 31-Day journey with the Cry of the Spirit on fathering. Only those with fathers will understand what that expression means to a child.
Sadly, because of the battles of life, there are people who have never heard anyone address them that way. They have never had a father in life. But apostle John, who the LORD inspired to pen that scripture down, presented to us why GOD will never give mankind what they deserve; Jesus Christ is the reason.
HE WAS ALSO A SPIRITUAL FATHER TO THOSE HE WROTE THE WORDS TO.
Which tells us that in the early Church, spiritual fathering was a standard but it was pure and clean. There was no witchcraft or manipulations attached to it. It was built around the Tree of life; that was why John pointed those he fathered to Christ and presented Him as the atoning sacrifice for their sins.
I have heard of spiritual fathers who ask erring spiritual sons and daughters to sow seeds as the atoning sacrifice for their sins, especially what they call sins against them. Some do not ask, but what they will do will make you sow a seed for sins committed against them or GOD. But John the beloved was of a different breed of spiritual fathers.
The man of God was part of the original apostles whose lives were built around the Tree of life when they were here. They made Jesus Christ the center of people’s lives not themselves, not oil, not holy water, not salt, not stones, not miracles, not sowing of seeds, and etc. They made Christ the center of people’s lives and made sure He was formed in their character.
If you are a Christian under a spiritual father who builds your life around him instead of Christ, you will never have Christ at the center of your life. The purpose of spiritual fathering will be defeated.
Yes, our spiritual fathers may be the most powerful influence in our lives but that should be if they are influencing us to put Christ at the center of our lives.
In the next life, when you will get into the realm of bye and bye, you will celebrate any spiritual father who is stirring you now to put Christ at the center of your life; you will also understand fully the eternal consequences of having one who replaced Christ at the center of your life.
Yesterday we saw the Elijah pattern of spiritual fathering, today we are seeing the pattern of John the beloved.
He was a man who made Christ and His Spirit of Truth to be at the center of spiritual fathering. His life and ministry tell us what we should be expecting from our spiritual fathers. The things he penned down for his spiritual children gave us an insight of what to expect from a spiritual father.
That means if we do not see those things in any fathering system we may be involved in, we should not submit ourselves to it. We should rather severe ourselves from it.
Yes, we should run away from it very fast and seek the LORD for an ideal fathering system.
One of the things we can find in the life and ministry of John the Beloved is a strong warning against the antichrist spirit. That is one of the major things to expect from any spiritual father today.
IF THEY CANNOT BUILD YOU TO RECOGNIZE, RESIST AND NEUTRALIZE THE ANTICHRIST SPIRIT IN CHURCH TODAY, DO NOT SUBMIT TO IT.
John through his ministry helped his spiritual children to understand that there is the spirit of error and there is the spirit of Truth, all in church. He spent most of his time warning them about what was happening in the Church then, vice-a-vice the world.
A spiritual fathering that will help you make Heaven today will do the same.
Sadly, we cannot find that in most spiritual fathering systems. They just look for your money and teach you about how to raise, silence, or break altars, how to fight all kinds of spirits and bring people under the yoke of slavery instead; they make people to constantly lead Christian lives that gives the fathers more relevance and revenue.
Friend, we need fathers that will build us the way John built his spiritual kids against the subtle and seductive spirits of lawlessness we all see today as of God’s.
We need fathers who will not say to us “no one is perfect” but those who say to us “by the grace of God we can all be perfect.”
We need fathers who will not say “there is no church without error” but will say “we should have a Church without errors.”
We need fathers who will not just warn us against the seductive spirit of the antichrist in Church today but give us the fitness to recognize, resist and neutralize it.
The man of God trained his spiritual kids not to put faith in every spirit they see. But We see our fathers doing the opposite today. They make people put faith in every spirit they see. Most of them do not even know what the doctrine of Christ is.
For instance, they put faith in spirits that teaches them that all problems they have are coming from an altar while the Bible says the opposite.
They put faith in spirits that tells them “the olive oil today is a symbol of the holy spirit” while the Bible says we are no longer in the days of symbols and that the olive oil has never been a symbol the Holy Spirit.
The olive oil was used to make the Holy Anointing oil that was a symbol of the Holy Spirit. If you understand English you will know both are not the same. It was one of the five ingredients that were used in making the Holy Anointing Oil which served as a symbol of the Holy Spirit under the law.
PUTTING FAITH IN SPIRITS THAT TELLS YOU OIL IS A SYMBOL OF THE HOLY SPIRIT WILL SEND LEANNESS TO YOUR SOUL.
John wrote to his spiritual children and presented to them the replacement of the Holy Anointing Oil that Moses made. He called it “the Anointing of the Holy One.”
Our devotional text puts what he said this way;
“But you have been anointed by [you hold a sacred appointment from, you have been given an unction from] the Holy One, and you all know [the Truth] or you know all things.
I write to you not because you are ignorant and do not perceive and know the Truth, but because you do perceive and know it, and [know positively] that nothing false (no deception, no lie) is of the Truth.
Who is [such a] liar as he who denies that Jesus is the Christ (the Messiah)? He is the antichrist (the antagonist of Christ), who [habitually] denies and refuses to acknowledge the Father and the Son. No one who [habitually] denies (disowns) the Son even has the Father. Whoever confesses (acknowledges and has) the Son has the Father also.
As for you, keep in your hearts what you have heard from the beginning. If what you heard from the first dwells and remains in you, then you will dwell in the Son and in the Father [always].
And this is what He Himself has promised us—the life, the eternal [life]. I write this to you with reference to those who would deceive you [seduce and lead you astray].
But as for you, the anointing (the sacred appointment, the unction) which you received from Him abides [permanently] in you; [so] then you have no need that anyone should instruct you.
But just as His anointing teaches you concerning everything and is true and is no falsehood, so you must abide in (live in, never depart from) Him [being rooted in Him, knit to Him], just as [His anointing] has taught you [to do]. 1 John 2:20-27 AMPC
Did you see the content of what a spiritual father in our age and time should be telling you? This scripture and other things John the Beloved wrote presents what we should be getting from our spiritual fathers today.
The scripture made it clear that if you have the real Holy Anointing Oil from the LORD, it will function as a sacred appointment and unction in your life and you will not submit to teachings of raising silencing or breaking of altars, or use oil to pray, or use salt, water and all that.
IT WILL BE TEACHING YOU AND GUIDING YOU IN THINGS THAT NO MAN CAN GUIDE IN.
It will teach you to be rooted in Christ and abide in him.
What John wrote in this scripture made it clear that he never gave his spiritual children oil as a symbol of the Holy Spirit. He never used it to pour in places, anoint their businesses so they can prosper, or smear on them calling it prophetic acts or timeless ordinances.
He never gave them trumpets to blow saying “it is a mystery that announces new seasons.” He was not involved in any of our charismatic games. He presented the substance to them.
Friend, that is what a spiritual father who will help you this end time will do.
Believers whose spiritual fathers are not truly helping them will be found with bottle of oil in their hands and other deliverance inventions in their possession. And they will be made not to care, waiting for eternity to sort them out, which is very dangerous.
An eternally unhelpful spiritual father will make you put faith in spirits that tells them to give you holy water, salt, and all the deliverance inventions to pray. He will not train you to be able to detect and neutralize the ministries of the many false prophets that have gone forth into the world.
He will not focus on forming Christ in you.
But as earlier stated, John the beloved was a different breed of a spiritual father.
He wrote so many things that tells us what to expect form fathers this end time, and our devotional text presented one of them. It is very important that we take these men who sat with the LORD and were made the foundation of the Church our standards not present-day preachers who try to replace the Bible with their own ideas.
THE OTHER SCRIPTURE FROM THE BOOK OF JOHN THAT I WILL LOVE TO BRING TO OUR ATTENTION SAYS;
“Beloved, do not put faith in every spirit, but prove (test) the spirits to discover whether they proceed from God; for many false prophets have gone forth into the world.
By this you may know (perceive and recognize) the Spirit of God: every spirit which acknowledges and confesses [the fact] that Jesus Christ (the Messiah) [actually] has become man and has come in the flesh is of God [has God for its source];
And every spirit which does not acknowledge and confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh [but would annul, destroy, sever, disunite Him] is not of God [does not proceed from Him]. This [non-confession] is the [spirit] of the antichrist, [of] which you heard that it was coming, and now it is already in the world.
Little children, you are of God [you belong to Him] and have [already] defeated and overcome them [the agents of the antichrist], because He Who lives in you is greater (mightier) than he who is in the world.” 1 John 4:1-4 AMPC
We cannot go through all that John the beloved did and said to his spiritual sons and daughters in his day, but you can find all that in the book of 1st to 3rd John.
Please read that before you decide on spiritual fathering today. And if you are under one, read that to see if that is what you are getting from him. If the answer is no, you are on a Broadway that leads to eternal death. Run for your eternal life!
It is my prayer that GOD will use what He has shared with us this morning, to further build us up and give us an inheritance among they that are sanctified, even as we fulfill the Malachi 4:5-6 prophecy for our age and time. Amen!
LET THIS SCRIPTURE BE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION TODAY!
“Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and terrible day of the Lord comes.
And he shall turn and reconcile the hearts of the [estranged] fathers to the [ungodly] children, and the hearts of the [rebellious] children to [the piety of] their fathers [a reconciliation produced by repentance of the ungodly], lest I come and smite the land with a curse and a ban of utter destruction.” Malachi 4:5-6 AMPC