Of Obedience as Bait

I write this to get us appreciate that God calls on us to obey Him simply because He is the Lord and not for what He does to and for us.

Over the years we have heard, read and seen ministers plodding people to do this or the other act of obedience because then God will be bound to do something for them.

The prosperity (I call it poverty) gospel did not start with our generation. And it is activated when we teach obedience as something we do to compel God to do something for us.

We obey because He demands our obedience. We worship because He is the only One worthy of our worship.

If you worship to feel good, how different are you from the drug addict who does it for the same reason? If you give so that God multiplies what remains, what is the different between you and the one who corrupts to get undeserved services?

We are very unscriptural. And it is because we do not care to consider what obedience cost Bible characters?

Do you remember Joseph was thrown in prison for choosing obedience as opposed to feeling good and accessing favor? Do you remember Paul and Silas being thrown in prison and fastened on the stocks for their obedience?

We obey because God who created us is our Master and therefore demands our unwavering obedience.

That is the running thought of the book of Leviticus; I am the Lord.

No other reason is worth our obedience because it would then stop being obedience. No other reason is worth our worship, because it would not be worship to the Lord.

Whatever He does after our obedience is none of our business.

Lack of that is the reason we cringe at persecution, even creating doctrines to explain it away.

But it is a very short lived doctrine. Reality always trashes those doctrines.

You will vehemently argue the doctrine until it comes to your doorstep and the choice becomes plain; sin or suffer the consequences.

Say for example you are looking at a promotion then the boss brings a condition; sleep with them or lose it. You refuse and instead of just missing on the promotion you get the boot. And you do not get another job quickly. The same boss continues to pester you to give in to get back the job and promotion.

I remember a song we used to sing as children.

I am a soldier in the army of the Lord. If I die let me die in the army.

That is what obedience means.

Obedience does not insulate against persecution. It actually attracts it.

Jesus said something I think we never want to consider. If the world loved Me, they will love you.

Why do you expect our obedience to Him to attract favor from the world that killed Him?

We struggle in our Christian life because we are not willing to take our obedience to the cross. We want our obedience (if it can be called so) to bring us to great comfort. We want it to attract more than enough resources. We want it to make us favorites to everybody.

In short, we want God to be obedient to our obedience. We want Him to submit to our submission. We do not even care to look at the implications of our distorted theology.

When God orders, we have only one choice as His children; unwavering and unquestioning obedience.

Paul is one person who exemplifies this.

The first questions he asks Jesus on the Damascus road are, ‘who are You, Lord?’, ‘What do you want me to do?’

The second question becomes the driving force of his life and ministry. No wonder he introduces himself in the epistles as the bond-slave of the Lord. Just look at this statement

Then Paul answered, What mean ye to weep and to break mine heart? for I am ready not to be bound only, but also to die at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus. (Acts 21:13)

Comfort to him was secondary and not even a consideration for obedience. That is why he is able to sing in prison when he was bound on the stocks, probably the most uncomfortable position one can endure. And instead of running from prison when God opens it, he starts sharing the Gospel to anybody who had ears, even baptizing a family past midnight.

That is why when he is stoned for dead and is prayed back to life he just moves to the next town to do what he was stoned for.

Remember in Hebrews 11 where we have some refusing to be released from prison?

We obey because Christ is the Lord, period.

We do not get baptized for a new experience, a new thing. We get baptized because Christ commanded it. What He does with our obedience is none of our business.

Remember Mary choosing infamy to be the Lord’s servant? Remember Joseph taking a girl expecting a child who was not his as a wife?

Zechariah lost his voice because he sought to debate with the Lord’s messenger.

We struggle with guidance for that simple reason. Our obedience is conditional on its outcome. We will only obey when it brings us profit. And we still expect God to guide us!

Many times I am invited to teach on how to hear God’s voice. And I teach lordship because God will only speak clearly to someone completely sold out to His commands. He will not speak so that you hear His voice. He will speak to the one who is rearing to follow that voice irrespective of where it leads.

That is why I will always challenge many of the popular doctrines and practices of our days; they are man-centred and have no place for that lordship.

It is also the reason I continue to assist believers to consistently read the Bible and not portions because they will get the whole picture as opposed to the dicey portions their teachers serve them. Only then can they know how to evaluate any voice to know whether it is God’s. And of course they will have enough examples to encourage them to full obedience.

We will experience God’s full life’ victory, joy, fulfillment when we are sold out to His Lordship.

Otherwise we may have everything we want and still die a life of complete emptiness and futility because we lost His spark in our lives.

Will you obey the Lord?

Gambling and the Believer

Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee. (Hebrews 13:5)

And he said unto them, Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth. (Luke 12:15)

I want us to look at greed in a broader way than just gambling. I want to relate the same with a life of faith to help us appreciate the reality and word of God to our lives.

I feel it is urgent because of the lives and times we are living in.

In the past, no serious person even wanted to be seen around gambling dens. It was the ne’er do well and those who were raised without any responsibility who would be found there.

Gambling was for idlers.

Yet today we even have pastors unashamedly boasting of the ‘breakthrough’ they have gotten from gambling, especially sport betting.

Is the Bible silent on gambling? Is there really scriptural direction to gaming?

Again I do not only want to dwell on betting. There are many other forums it is indirectly happening like manipulative trading; normally called speculative trading.

Let me be hypothetical for now.

Assuming God is fine with gambling. Is there a possibility for someone outside his side winning? Can His servant lose any bet?

You see, God not only knows about tomorrow, He owns it. It means He decides what will happen every moment of any day.

He knows the result of all the matches that will be played even ten years from today, in the minutest detail. It goes without say that His prophet will just need to plug into Him to accurately give the results of every single match all over the world, meaning that he will win all the jackpots in the world.

The lot is cast into the lap; but the whole disposing thereof is of the LORD. (Proverbs 16:33)

This makes it clear that if God supported gambling there really would be no gambling as His people would be winning all the bets since He determines the way everything turns out.

And it is the same with business. God not only knows, but He also determines what will sell like hot cake tomorrow or next year. He can add value to what we call trash today. And He can trash what is of inestimable value today.

It means that if He operated according to our thinking (being led by mammon), He will tell His servant to buy things on the cheap then manipulates the system so that the same servant sells them at a premium.  You see, He loves His servants.

But God is not like us. He created us to work as opposed to taking short cuts. He gave Adam Eden to till and not trade on its returns. And of course we know that farming requires time and effort.

God knows where all the gold, diamonds and precious stones are as He is the one who put them there in the first place. Won’t it be easy for Him to show His servants where they are so that they can buy those lands before leading them to discover them?

God, however, is not like that. Those are the operating methods of the god of this world. And we know that the god of this world is diametrically opposed to the systems of the true God.

Greed is therefore a manifestation of the god of this world. And that is why it involves guesswork all the time. You see he can only guess where God is going according to the signs he sees.

God is precise in what He does. And He reveals the same to His servants.

Surely the Lord GOD will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets. (Amos 3:7)

Why does that not include the bets?

In all labour there is profit: but the talk of the lips tendeth only to penury. (Proverbs 14:23)

God expects us to labor.

Incidentally that labor is not only a product of faith; it should really flow from our obedience to His leading, especially through reading His word.

Profit therefore takes another dimension, a totally different one from what mammon (the god of the world) operates in.

We trade for profit. Yet God places profit at a different place in priorities as the world places it.

Profit is king is the way the world operates. Profit is a slave is the way God operated.

Grace is king in God’s scheme of things. You just need to read through the Old Testament to see that.

One does not work for profit as an end. One works to obey God’s commands. Profit naturally comes when we obey.

Sabbath, Sabbath year, jubilee, harvesting on the fringes of the land, going over the sheaves again, storing meat for long, feeding the poor, needy, orphans and widows, keeping pledge from the poor overnight are all clear commands to tell us that God looks at profit in a totally different way we look at it.

Money is therefore not an object of desire for a person of faith. It is simply a tool God places in our hands to manifest His goodness to the world. Labor is an act of worship.

And it is because once money becomes the object of our trading, it becomes a god that must be worshipped; meaning that we must follow its methods.

You see, there are ministers who responded to the call of money to join the ministry. They are simply idol worshipers. It is only that they use their mouth to proclaim a different God.

I am talking about a pastor who haggles for a salary increase or he resigns. And the one who leaves a church because another one offers a better package. And the one who gets into writing as an additional income stream.

I am not even mentioning motivational preachers who are simply spiritual harlots who need to use the Bible to market mammon.

We should do what we do in response with what God has asked us to do. And the simple reason is that God, who owns tomorrow, will lead us to profit in a way that will bring glory to Him. And that can appear very foolish to the world systems yet bring the right profit, packaged by God who owns tomorrow.

Gambling is sin because it seeks provision outside work as well as feed greed and uncertainty.

God wants us to seek Him and walk in obedience to His word.

He expects us to walk in sync with His revelation and be at peace with whatever and however his leading offers.

Will you obey God?

Will you consistently and daily read His word?

Of Callings and Idols

For I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, and will smite all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgment: I am the LORD. (Exodus 12:12)

I have of late been reflecting on God’s call and someone’s past when it occurred to me that God’s call is many times so drastic that it seeks to bury our past in its excellence. A past with its own claim to glory that it seeks to lower the impact of that call is a hindrance to God’s workings in my life. The source of which is the pushing and shoving for prominence between the call and the past that it took one from.

It is imperative for us to accept the fact that not many are really ashamed of the past they came from. And I am not only talking about some of us who did not sink into depravity as we got saved in our childhood. Many were so defiled that the defilement attained a glory that seems to overshadow the deliverance from it. Or haven’t you seen people who will always dwell on what they were before getting saved as the background of their preaching though they got saved many years ago? Or did God deliver them from their past yet they refused to deliver that past from their mouths.

Must you always prove to people how professional you were as a prostitute or robber to convince people that Christ saved you? Must you go into the details of how you were raped to prove forgiveness? Must you remind people your wicked escapades to share the Gospel? What is there to remember anyway?

For when ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness. What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed? for the end of those things is death. (Romans 6: 20, 21)

A case in point is this former grave robber who is always at a street corner with a banner telling people his exploits before getting saved. You wonder what is there to celebrate about stealing coffins and hiding in one that it must be repeated every time, even with a CD on sale!

Do you remember why people who left Egypt as adults died in the wilderness? It was precisely that. They were preoccupied with where they came from. They glorified their slavery. They demeaned the experience God was taking them through.

When a past gains as much prominence as the present or future, it becomes a god that must be dealt with before we can progress. And many times it is us that God will deal with.

I compare this with a vehicle with a rear view mirror that is bigger than the windscreen. Imagine peering to see through the miniature windscreen as you enjoy unhindered view of where you are coming from?

It is impossible to grow with such a view of the Christian life.

Breakthroughs we will experience, again and again; But not only for the purposes of testimonies. Their main purpose is to help our focus on what God has for us ahead.

Paul had had a glorious past. His CV was the envy of most. Yet what do we see him saying about it? He describes it and then trashes it.

But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ. Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ, (Philippians 3: 7, 8)

We see him in 2 Corinthians 12 boasting of something else, his sufferings for Christ, but not as a badge of honor. It is simply the product of him walking with God.

For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified. (1Corinthians 2:2)

That is what he preached; the cross and its power to rescue us from our past. Any mention he did on the past was to direct people to that cross wherever the opportunity arose; from prison to the courthouse to the street to the Areopagus.

There are others who glorify their past above their present, the backsliders and those who have refused to grow. They are always talking about their past glorious experiences in obedience. They are always glorying in their past miracles, fasts, scripture memory, witnesses ad infinitum.

I know of a few motivational pastors who parade their scripture memory yet present no new verses memorized. In fact, some of the ones they quote have been quoted until they are incorrect. It seems that they do not learn anything new from their walk with Christ as even their sermons are recycled all the time. No wonder many have to have a sermon guide for the whole year, even pretending it is the word in season when it is really nothing but a pursuit of relevance over revelation.

God is glorified with a vibrant relationship with Him. The purpose of our past, and any other past for that matter, is to help this living relationship to thrive.

Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come. (1Corinthians 10:11)

The context of the verse, as well as 2 Peter 2, deals with the purpose of the past as aiding us in living the present.

It goes without say therefore that if your past is as prominent as your present, it has become an idol that must be destroyed. It means that you really are not worshipping God, the I AM but the experience He took you from or through.

If there is nothing new happening in your Christian experience, it is very possible that between you and God, one of you went ahead of the other. Your past is therefore a vestige of those times you walked together. That is why you must celebrate it. Why not just reestablish the connection?

How current is your testimony?

Do you realize that God can judge you for that testimony when its glory competes with His?

Sadducees

Now when they were going, behold, some of the watch came into the city, and shewed unto the chief priests all the things that were done. And when they were assembled with the elders, and had taken counsel, they gave large money unto the soldiers, Saying, Say ye, His disciples came by night, and stole him away while we slept. And if this come to the governor's ears, we will persuade him, and secure you. So they took the money, and did as they were taught: and this saying is commonly reported among the Jews until this day. (Matthew 28: 11 – 15)

We said that the Sadducees are concerned with the here and now. They will stop at nothing to enforce that belief on all. And it is because they are sure that their doctrine is temporal and has no substance beyond the present.

But that is not where he stops at. He must disqualify any evidence that proves his doctrine is false. He must fight to prove it is valid even if all evidence points to the contrary.

Jesus has risen from the dead. And the soldiers were eyewitnesses because the Sadducees had wanted to make sure the resurrection does not happen. That is why Rome was involved in sealing the tomb.

But Jesus will not be restrained by rocks sealing caves. He rises from the dead. And the soldiers who were to block it were there to witness it.

You would expect the priests to have reconsidered their theology after getting that evidence. You would expect them to have believed in Christ after sampling that evidence.

Yet what did they do?

They bribed the witnesses to corrupt their compelling witness. They even went as far as bribing their boss because the corrupted testimony could have exposed the soldiers to the accusation of unprofessional conduct as a soldier is not supposed to sleep on his watch.

All this because the resurrection had to be hushed!

And it was not because it was false. They fabricated a story to argue away the resurrection, spending vast amounts of money to fund the fabrication.

They therefore are not opposed to the resurrection because it is not true. They actually know that it is true and have the evidence.

They only refuse to acknowledge it because its acceptance would topple their theology. It would mean that they face their unbelief head on, a thing they were in no way ready for as it would have meant their changing how they lived and especially practiced religion.

They bribed to cover the truth about the God they superficially preached because the God they preached was not the same one they served; and they did not want that truth to come out.

Sadducees KNOW that they do not represent God. That is the reason they are rigorously opposed to any contrary opinion concerning their doctrine.

And we are talking about the twenty first century peddlers of their doctrine.

Try to challenge the prosperity gospel peddler concerning the spiritual poverty they visit on their adherents and you will be faced with very violent opposition.

My brother recently shared a video of a sermon trashing the doctrine to such a pastor. Incidentally this pastor rarely (probably never, from my experience) receives calls or responds to texts. But his response was swift and brutal you could almost feel the fire in the response. I remember the same brother asking a question in a church meeting concerning scriptural qualifications for leadership and the response was also swift, bitter and incoherent, until people wondered what the problem had been.

Truth is not the issue when you deal with the Sadducees. Their position is more important than truth.

Even the scriptures are not treated aright. They are only used to argue their persuasion. That is why a preacher or writer will use a dozen different translations because a verse must be forced to say what he wants said. Many time they will use just a portion of the verse as the remaining part does not support his heresy. The preacher is therefore akin to a lawyer using any trick in the book to argue for the side that has hired him.

Do not use logic to argue with the modern day Sadducees. Forget about logic if you want to convince them as they are not interested. Like I said recently, it is possible they are irredeemable as even Christ did not waste any time on them. And none of them got saved after the resurrection.

The Sadducee could very easily hire people to falsely accuse you of nothing you have not done when they think you may ruin their business. And it has nothing to do with your wronging them or sinning. Preaching the Gospel can very easily become a capital crime as it may open the people’s eyes to the truth about God that they are shielding. I have said that as I have tried to introduce discipleship to churches, I always get the most resistance from pastors yet they ought to be the ones with the greatest interest that their members grow and mature. But I now understand why.

I remember a pastor mentioning sin very lightly, yet scripturally in a mega church as he preached. The next thing is that he was called by the owners (elders, deacons) to explain why he was demotivating the flock. He eventually had to move to another church because of the pressure he experienced.

I also remember the pressure I went through when I decided to follow God’s leading instead of agreeing to be a poster boy for them. One time I asked the big guys a question, Am I doing what you had called me to do? Is what I am doing bringing fruit? They answered in the affirmative. But they insisted I must go, later killing the ministry (literally) to ensure none of that fruit remains. I guess it was because they did not want to meet people with the kind of spirit I had.

Many ministers will tell you of great ministry openings that the Sadducees requested for partnership only to hijack and kill. How many ministers have been requested to help set us ministries yet are dumped immediately it becomes visible or invites resources?

You see, Sadducees do not care that ministry is flowing. They just can’t stand people being connected to Christ. They will need people to be connected to Christ initially, until money or influence starts flowing. Then connection to Christ becomes a liability as His Lordship does not require proxies. And Sadducees are proxies.

That is the reason many churches have the inner circle that runs the church and the members who fund the system without knowing what happens when the clique meets.

I think it is safe to advise that we stop praying for the Sadducees and start praying for their flock that God may open their eyes to who Christ is beyond the shades they use to preach Him.

But confront them a number of times to be sure they are not just deceived or are being ignorantly recruited into Sadducceeism. Share a prophecy or message with them to know whether they are completely sold out to error. And be ready to be fought, especially if you do that when there are witnesses. But listen to God as you do it.