People are just missing the point of that AGO's video
They called him holier than thou
He accepted
Now they are angry he accepted a title someone else gave him
To say he gave himself the title so he is proud
Comprehension seems to be a luxury nowadays only a few can afford it
@JoshuaOladiti_@RasineIrem Pray tell was Paul talking to believers or unbelievers?
No one is saying they don’t have life and that is the very reason death is possible
@JoshuaOladiti_@RasineIrem It is well o
The other side of being born is not to be unborn sha it is death
For to be carnally minded is death~Paul the Apostle
If you find prayer tough, welcome to the club.
Prayer was not designed to be compatible with carnality.
When Jesus said “the flesh is weak” with relation to prayer, the people he was describing had just had dinner. Logically speaking food is meant to make you stronger.
But when it comes to the ways of the Spirit, whatever necessarily makes you stronger in the flesh will often make you weaker in the spirit and vice versa.
What you should not do is stop praying because you find prayer tough.
Tell your flesh that in this battle only one person is coming out dead, and it is you.
So if you find it tough, do it tough.
You find it tough to pray for one hour everyday? Pray for six minutes ten times a day.
Keep showing up.
One day six minutes will become twelve minutes without you knowing.
Build stamina.
God’s grace is sufficient to assist you.
“O the Spirit filled life; is it thine, is it thine?
Is thy soul wholly filled with the Spirit Divine?
O thou child of the King, has He fallen on thee?
Does He reign in thy soul, so that all men may see
The dear Savior’s blest image reflected in thee?
Spirit-Filled
After they had prayed, their meeting place was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly. The multitude of believers was one in heart and soul. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared
gathered on the hillside, that a revival broke out that day and spread through all Wales.”
The greatest question that can be asked of the “twice born” ones is, “Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye believed?”
This was the password into the early Church.
Back to the 63rd psalm.
Sorry, like the 4 lepers said, when we see something good and do not tell others about it we do not well.
The first verse of that psalm harbours a very important desire from the heart of the psalmist, he says “early will I seek you”.
Knowing the kind of world the world we live in and has become, this is easily a prayer of his priorities.
There’s the ‘what’ the Psalmist is doing; “seeking God”.
Then there’s the ‘when’; early.
We can come at this from different points.
Man’s relationship with God is meant to be like that of a treasure hunter with hidden treasure. To find God, in a manner of speaking, the one who is seeking him must be willing to devote all of his life to the course and make it his sole vocation. Because like a wise man I respect once said “God is not missing but you need to seek him to find him”.
Like with hidden treasure, God is hidden in plain sight such that he is not in your face so that you wouldn’t accuse him of imposing himself on you but he’s not hidden in the clouds so that you wouldn’t accuse him of being out of reach.
So the psalmist says “…I will seek you”. In saying this he puts the responsibility of seeking God on himself and not on anyone else.
Like on the morning Zacchaeus woke up and decided that today is the day he will see Jesus, there were multiple factors that were going to work against him that day; he was not exactly everyone’s favourite because he was a man who amassed wealth by dubious means. A stark contrast to our day where all you need to be everyone’s favourite is to amass an insane amount of wealth however you can.
Secondly, there was always a crowd around the Lord, a crowd of people that did not like a man like Zach so he could be sure he’d receive no preferential treatment from that crowd.
Thirdly he was ‘down to earth’ in height. So he couldn’t impose himself on the people like a young King Saul the son of Kish could do.
If you ask me, all these factors are enough to make someone sit at home and say like they say in Nigeria “I cannot come and kill myself”; but the responsibility to seek God lies in the seeker himself and not anyone external to him.
David here after calling God “my God” does not say “we will seek you”.
It is easy to hide with the crowd and outsource our individual responsibility to seek God.
I have seen people blame their local churches or family backgrounds for their spiritual complacency.
The fact that in your church, nothing serious is going on will not be legitimate enough reason to give (as you’d definitely find out), why you are absolved of the personal responsibility of seeking God.
If your church doesn’t organise prayer meetings as they’re more interested in social events, who has forbidden you from holding your own personal prayer meetings?
If your church doesn’t baptize in water, who has forbidden you from being baptized in water?
The responsibility to seek him is mine. “I will seek you”.
Going further, he doesn’t just say the ‘what’, he also says the ‘when’.
This is crucial because this is what shines light on what his priority is.
It is possible to seek God as a final option, when all other preferred options have proven insufficient.
Sadly this is the story of too many. We’d try everything else; until “I’ve searched all over, couldn’t find nobody” then we come seeking God as a last resort.
There are folks who have told themselves that they’ll enjoy life to the full first and then only come to God shortly before they die.
David would have none of that, he says “Early will I seek you”.
What’s early?
There are many ways to look at this.
Early in the morning: before I seek my daily bread, I will seek you. Somewhere else David said, “in the morning will I direct my prayer unto you (after I have finished doing that) and I will look up.
This is a commitment that before I seek anything else in my day I will seek you because you’re more important to me than my daily bread.
I know I live in Lagos and I need to get up very early so that I will not go to work late but you’re more important to me than my daily bread, so I will seek you early.
You know this was the character of the God man himself? We’re told that rising up a great while before day, he would retreat to a lonely place where he would seek the father.
A believer who is personally interested in seeking God will not joke with his morning devotions.
“God you are my God, before I seek my emails, I will seek you.”
“God you are my God, before I seek my WhatsApp messages, I will seek you.”
“God you are my God, before I seek my DM for customer orders, I will seek you.”
Me Rasine, I will seek you, and I will seek you early.
It reminds me of the first Easter Sunday. Mary of Magdala was asked by the Lord “Whom seekest thou”? The Lord still asks funny questions like this, because it’s not everyone who finds himself in the presence of God that is seeking God. Many of the people who are doing early morning online prayers would have a completely different answer to this question.
Theirs might be: A husband, a child, a destiny helper.
It was early in the morning, she and a few women had taken spices to anoint the body of Jesus. A thing they hadn’t taken the time to think through because had they, they wouldn’t have left their houses and this interesting story would not had been painted.
It was on their way there they began asking questions they’d have asked from home.
But that’s the thing with seekers. The object of their expedition is more in perspective. They couldn’t wait until the other men roused.
They didn’t care about the soldiers at the tomb.
Nothing was going to prevent them from seeking him.
This thing cannot be forced. This level of enthusiasm is something only God can initiate.
When he tugs at the seeker’s heart, his intention is to pull him to himself.
Another way to look at ‘early’ is early in life.
The earliest time is from the womb. It is why God initiates the relationship from the belly.
David said “thou art my God from my mother’s belly”.
God told Jeremiah how that he had ordained him while he was still in the womb.
Paul says he was separated from the womb.
God prefers he be sought early.
If God will go for the child in the womb then your plan to seek him just before you die is misguided.
Your priorities are in the septic tank.
Teach the kids to seek him early.
The reason why we dedicate our children is because, Spirits do not forget what is theirs.
A Spirit will always come to claim his own.
Samuel was surrounded by children of wickedness. He was not even taught to know the Lord, but the One that he was offered to, one night when the child thought the day was over, the Spirit that he was offered to came to claim him.
I will seek you early.
I could go on but I’m constrained for time.
Let me wrap this up with pointing out that, whosoever seeks God is ultimately found by him.
I mean when we seek God, it is God that finds us.
I could show you this from complex passages, but there are simpler ones.
Zacchaeus sought to see Jesus but it was Jesus that found him eventually.
Luke tells us that “when Jesus came to the place he looked up”, Jesus found his way to where Zach was and looked at him.
The best our seeking God can do is bring us to the place where God will find us. Because it is him that unveils himself.
Mary Magdalene sought the body of Jesus, that she didn’t find but the risen Lord found her eventually.
If you seek God personally, you will find him because he will find you and reveal himself to you.
God wants to find people but many times the trouble is that many do not want to seek him.
Oh God, Rasine is my name, I came alone and it is you I want to seek.
Find me. Please find me.