The Road to Obedience (2)

The Road to Obedience (2)

The human nature we were all born with is the fallen nature all mankind inherited from the original sin of disobedience of our forefather, Adam. 

A disobedient nature that is predestined to always have the propensity to crave for and follow Satan's manipulation of this fallen world and therefore perpetually fall into sin. 

The Road to the obedient nature that is ours in Christ Jesus, which is a supernatural inclination to obey God's Word, His will and His ways which is His good, pleasing and perfect will for our lives, that far outweighs any outcome we can ever decide for ourselves, is based on choices we make on a moment by moment basis; to let the dictates of the Spirit of God rule our thoughts, speech and actions rather than our innate human desires, that are diametrically opposed to God's will for our lives.

The Road to Obedience requires a moment by moment, conscious effort to imbibe God's word by meditation and prayer so that we beat our bodies and make it our slaves, and by so doing subject our flesh to the dictate of God's Holy Spirit resident within us, so that we may not be disqualified from the ultimate prize of making heaven as a result of our lack of self control. 

God's promise of our deliverance from disobedience, that we can anchor our hope on and keep confessing till we begin to see it's manifestation in our daily lives as in Ezekiel 36:26 to 28, goes thus: 

26. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. 

27. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. 

28. Then you will live in the land I gave your ancestors; you will be my people, and I will be your God.

In this ironclad promise that God made, He not only assured us of: 

1. giving us His Holy Spirit which is the only remedy that can empower us to overcome sins allure, to reside in us but also that 

2. He will - by Himself, supernaturally cause us to follow His decrees and be careful to keep His laws that we may fulfill His hearts desire of being His people, like the people of Israel are and He will indeed show Himself to be our God. 

Why, you may ask? 

Because the God who gave the command is the only one that can ensure it's fulfilment, simply by our faith in His pronouncements concerning it, as in 1 Thessalonians 5:24, "The one who calls us is faithful, and he will do it."

Ezekiel 36:26 to 28 however is a Covenant as in many other pronouncements God has made concerning His promises to mankind, and as a result requires an action on our own part, which is not only for us to have total believe in his capacity to bring what He has said to pass but also to constantly feed His resident Holy Spirit within us, with His Word so that the Holy Spirit will constantly have the upper hand over our fleshly desires to ensure our victory over sin, the world and the devil. 

Receive the grace for obedience as you consciously feed your spirit with God's Word, as you ought, in Jesus name. 

Shalom

The Road to Obedience

The Road to Obedience (Empower your Spirit).

When we can wrap our minds around the concept that Obedience to God begins and ends with our understanding of God's paramount hearts desire, which is to have a loving personal fellowship with each and every one of us - His creation, throughout our lives, and we then cultivate that relationship on a daily basis, then and only then can we begin to master our ensuring our bodies are obedient to Him. 

Obedience to God's will and His ways is by no means anything we can achieve by our own will-power or anything we can come up with by ourselves.  

There's only one road to Obedience for all who are serious about living the overcomers life that Jesus Christ wrought for all mankind on the cross. 

Just as Jesus Christ overcame sin, the worlds evil system and the devils manipulation over His creation, that the sinful nature we were born into would be done away with, so also can we overcome   the evil desires of our flesh by empowering God's Spirit within us to subdue our innate sinful nature.

In Psalm 119:1 to 3, it is written: 

1. Blessed are those whose ways are blameless, who walk according to the law of the Lord. 

2. Blessed are those who keep his statutes and seek him with all their heart  

3. they do no wrong but follow his ways. 

From this we can deduce that the Road to Obedience so that we do no wrong but follow God's ways, as is His will for us and that should also be our ultimate hearts desire, is thus: 

1. To seek him with all our heart, by constantly meditating on His statutes that we may be abreast with what He desires we do per time, and 

2. To keep his statutes by choosing to walk according to His law of love concerning our relationship with Him and  our fellow men,, rather than following our selfish fleshly desires, that we may be blameless. 

I'm sure we all remember the account of the time our Lord Jesus visited Martha and Mary, and how Martha well-meaningly went about dutifully preparing to entertain the Lord in a grand style but was annoyed at how her sister Mary chose not to help her but instead sat at the feet of Jesus, that she may learn from his wealth of wisdom.  

If we can, then I'm sure we can also recollect the reply the Lord gave Martha when she confronted Jesus about his lack of concern of how Mary wouldn't help her wait on him, as their guest. 

Jesus, in his reply to Mary gave this profound reply to not just the shock and amazement of Martha but to many, like I, who came across the story when he said in  Luke 10:41to 42, “Martha, Martha,” you are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”

This helps us understand that God's command as recorded in Psalm 110:1 to king David, “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.” is all we'll  ever need to adhere to as disciples of God, to overcome and win the battle we are all facing against our sinful nature, the world and the devil. 

In Leviticus 19:1 to 2, it was also recorded that Lord said to Moses, “Speak to the entire assembly of Israel and say to them: Be holy because I, the Lord your God, am holy." 

While this, like many other commands God expects men to adhere to, may seem outlandish and a mission impossible to a lot of us because of our inordinate belief in the sway that sinful nature holds over  mankind, the truth is that as in 1 Thessalonians 5:24, "the one who calls (us) is faithful, and he will do it."

We have to believe that the God who gave the command also has the ability to empower us to attain the level He desires us to operate in, only then we can truly be rest assured that our complete confidence in God's word concerning His desire for us to perpetually choose to live in obedience to Him and His Word will be matched by His empowerment through His Holy Spirit,  resident within us to be faithful to His Commandments. 

Shalom!

True FASTING

True FASTING. 

How one should fast has been a controversial issue for generations and still is in our time.

Some of us are conversant with the biblical account in Esther 4:16, of how queen Esther told her uncle Mordecai to gather together all the Jews so that they could fast for her. 

She commanded them not to eat or drink for three days, night or day.
She led by example letting the people know that she and her attendants would fast as they did, willing to lay down her life for her people, at all cost.

God rebuked the people of her times who had gone against the type of fasting he had laid down for them when he said according to Isaiah 58:5 thus:
"Is this the kind of fast I have chosen,
only a day for people to humble themselves?
Is it only for bowing one's head like a reed and for lying in sackcloth and ashes?
Is that what you call a fast, a day acceptable to the Lord?"

I was brought up by my parents and the local Church I attended to believe that fasting was a time period of sacrifice when one would: 

1. Abstain from eating or drinking in order to deny one's flesh of it's natural cravings but instead feed one's spirit with the Word of God so that one's Spirit would be empowered over one's flesh, to subdue it and bring it under the control of God's Word, and 

2. Pray and meditate on God's Word in order to know Him and His Word more and gain revelation about issues that was bothering one and therefore the empowerment one needs to overcome them.

True fasting however, as God has prescribed for mankind, that goes beyond what a lot of us have been taught, made to believe and practiced, can be appreciated by going through what God prescribed through his prophet in Isaiah 58 verse 6 to 7 and verse10, so that we can understand exactly how God would have us go about fasting, in a way that is acceptable to Him, so that the inherent blessings may accrue to us for our accurate and faithful participation.

In Isaiah 58: 6 to 7 and 10, it is aptly written thus:
6. “Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke?
7. Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter - when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?
10. and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday.

Most of us have been erroneously taught to fast by humbling ourselves before God, merely asking for the blessings God has already promised to provide for us, while leaving out the significant role God desires we do on behalf of the needy and oppressed to obtain those blessings.

True fasting, of frequently spending out of what we own, on behalf of others who are not as privileged as we are, as prescribed in Isaiah 58 requires that we:

1.) deprive and spend ourselves on the behalf of the hungry and

2.) satisfy the needs of the oppressed at our own expense,

so that, in turn God will:
- cause our light to rise in the darkness,
and
- our night to become like the noonday;  which has to do with us getting revelations from God concerning gray areas in our lives that we are having difficulties in, and negative issues we were experiencing before being dealt with and oberturned by the Lord, as a result of our faithfulness in fasting.

Now that we have been enlightened about what true fasting is, let us ensure that when we fast by abstaining from eating or drinking in order to deny our flesh but instead, praying and feeding our spirit with the Word of God, the end result of our sacrifice will be that needs of the hungry and oppressed around us, are met by us, as God has prescribed, so that in turn God Almighty will meet our needs and wants, and bless us as he has said He would do for our faithfulness.

Shalom!