TODAY’S DEVOTION (THURSDAY 20TH OCTOBER 2022)
“Woe to him who strives with his Maker! Let the potsherd strive with the potsherds of the earth! Shall the clay say to him who forms it, ‘What are you making?’ Or shall your handiwork say, ‘He has no hands’?
Woe to him who says to his father, ‘What are you begetting?’ Or to the woman, ‘What have you brought forth?’” Isaiah 45:9-10 NKJV
WELCOME TO THE 293RD DAY OF OUR YEAR OF AMAZING GRACE!
We give God thanks for giving us another day. He is faithful and kind. We will ever be grateful for all His beautiful attributes and deeds towards us.
Today we want to look at one of the secrets of living a blessed life. The secret of not striving with God.
There are people who strive with God and accuse Him of responsible for their problems. To start with, I want to say it is when hell sits in a person’s heart that he or she does that, and even goes ahead to call GOD wicked and unkind.
There are people who actually do that.
They blame God for their predicaments and call the GOD who is capable of no wickedness, what He is not. Sadly, the more they do that, the more they sink into problems.
You cannot be angry, and striving or arguing with God and see good in life. The Bible says;
“Every good gift and every perfect (free, large, full) gift is from above; it comes down from the Father of all [that gives] light, in [the shining of] Whom there can be no variation [rising or setting] or shadow cast by His turning [as in an eclipse]. James 1:17 AMPC
Look at the first lines of this verse. How can you strive with the Father or source of all good, perfect, free, large and full gifts of life and succeed? He is the very essence of life itself. How can you strive with the very essence of life itself and live a healthy, peaceful and prosperous life on His earth?
There is nothing that is in us that came from us. We did not create ourselves.
Even the laws that facilitated our birth were created by Him. It is the mis use of them that results in children who are born into suffering. How can you strive with the God who made the laws that resulted in your being born on earth and think it shall be well with you?
The first person to strive with God was Eve. The result is where the human race is right now. All the diseases, the destruction, wars, curses of life, crisis in marriages, families, nations and etc., the eternal condemnation and everything mankind faces now came from there.
Before then the earth was the most peaceful realm in the natural scheme of things.
MEANING, STRIVING WITH GOD CAN OPEN A DOOR OF DESTRUCTION IN YOUR LIFE.
It can open a portal of hell over your life. And when a portal of hell opens over a life, that life will be experiencing terrible things. There will be nothing peaceful about the life.
If the person touches anything for example, it will turn to trash.
If he or she touches marriage, by trying to go into it, it will turn to trash. If he or she touches business it will turn to trash. If you place the person in a very prosperous place, it will turn to trash. Even honoring the person will bring shame on you. You will ever regret bringing the person to the place of honor.
May no one do anything that will make hell open over his or her soul.
But that is exactly what striving with God does to a person over time. It brings four forms of destruction, especially when we strive with God through persistent unfaithfulness.
Yes, you can strive with God through persistent unfaithfulness. It’s one way we strive with God. But how Eve strove with God gave us another of the many ways people strive with God. She ate a fruit from a tree God has said no one should eat of; she disobeyed God.
Apart from persistent unfaithfulness, one other way we strive with God is through disobedience. When people disobey God, they are striving with Him. When we walk in rebellion, we are striving with God. Like I said, God should be the last person we strive with.
Our devotional text says;
“Woe to him who strives with his Maker! Let the potsherd strive with the potsherds of the earth! Shall the clay say to him who forms it, ‘What are you making?’ Or shall your handiwork say, ‘He has no hands’?
Woe to him who says to his father, ‘What are you begetting?’ Or to the woman, ‘What have you brought forth?’” Isaiah 45:9-10 NKJV
Sadly, those are the things some of us do when things are not okay with us, and the spirit of hell take advantage of it to further alienate us from God.
We strife with our maker, we say hard things to God, who though up there and down here at the same time, is not responsible for our predicaments. We rage against all wise counsels and isolate ourselves from Him in the process, seeking our own selfish things.
NO ONE WILL EVER LEAD A PEACEFUL LIFE STRIVING WITH HIS OR HER MAKER.
We have presented two ways we strive with our maker, persistent unfaithfulness and disobedience. The next way I want to highlight is resisting or disagreeing, instead of conforming with His will.
When we resist or disagree with His will, we are striving with Him, and it will be hell for us; we will never be at peace and prosperity, or great good, will never come to us.
It is when we acquaint ourselves with Him, or agree and show ourselves to be conformed to His will and ways, that life will become what God intends it to be for us; beautiful. That is why the Bible says;
“Acquaint now yourself with Him [agree with God and show yourself to be conformed to His will] and be at peace; by that [you shall prosper and great] good shall come to you.
Receive, I pray you, the law and instruction from His mouth and lay up His words in your heart.
If you return to the Almighty [and submit and humble yourself before Him], you will be built up; if you put away unrighteousness far from your tents,” Job 22:21-23 AMPC
This scripture contains on of the greatest secrets of having a blessed life. No one who receives instructions from God’s mouth and lay His word in their hearts will not lead a blessed life on earth.
It will bring us to a harmony in the Spirit that is required for a prosperous life on earth.
I reiterate again that no one will ever succeed in life striving with His maker. If you want to live a prosperous life, or if you want to come out of your problems, God is the last person you should strive with. You must come into harmony with Him.
On the other hand, your personal conclusions or the devil are the last you should agree with. Because you will always be wrong until the Holy Spirit shed the light of Truth into your heart.
That brings us to the third way we strive with God that I want to share with us; we strive with God when we do not have friendship or a healthy relationship with the Holy Spirit.
THERE IS NO WAY THAT OUR PERSPECTIVES IN LIFE WILL BE RIGHT WITHOUT THE BLESSED HOLY SPIRIT POURING GOD’S LIGHT INTO OUR HEARTS.
He will have to shed the abundant Light of God into our hearts, for us to be able to see things well, then live right and allow God to bless our lives.
This light comes in so many formats; they come as friendly counsels, amazing insights into the issues of life, like what Daniel had, rare foresights, scriptural revelation that tells us which step to take when we are in the cross roads of life, and etc. I call them the different colors of the Heavenly light that we need on earth to walk through darkness.
Child of God, if your heart is flooded with God’s Heavenly light, by the power of the Holy Spirit, you will live a Heavenly life on earth.
Yes, you will live a life that is full of progress, prosperity, peace and what may be eluding people around you. You will not be struggling through life. But that Heavenly light is the exclusive preserve of the Holy Spirit. It proceeds from the depths of God and comes to our spirits through the dynamic work of the Holy Spirit.
But understand that when we strive with our maker, we quench this work of the Spirit. When we quench this work of the Spirit, our hearts will be Baptized with darkness, making it impossible for us to make way in life.
We have been on a 31-Day journey of faith with the Cry of the Holy Spirit as He share with us secrets about Himself. We pray that this piece that we have received today, will add to the building blocks of our faith in Jesus precious name. Amen!
LET THIS SCRIPTURE BE AN ADDITIONAL MEDITATION FOR THE DAY!
“But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory: Which none of the princes of this world knew: for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.
But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.
For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God”. 1 Corinthians 2:7-11 KJV