Change

The only constant and sure thing about change is, well, change.

What does that tell us?

We must be prepared for change since we must deal with it one way or the other.

Our preparation and response to change determines how we will come out.

Allow me to state this

Most depressions, suicides, desperations are the product of change.

Change that has come or change that has refused to come.

I dare say that the motivational preacher, speaker and practitioner of any shade could easily be the greatest peddler for all these desperate measures I have just mentioned.

Why? You might be wondering.

The best is around the corner. Your best days are just ahead. I prophesy a promotion, a spouse, a new job, cancellation of debt, etc in the next …. days.

What happens when the prophesy does not come to pass, especially if the recipient of the same really believed in and claimed that prophesy?

What happens if they had discarded what they had to make room for what was coming? What if they had given everything to better receive what was coming? What if they had squandered what they had because what was coming would more that cover for the same?

Suppose they had resigned to prepare for the new job? Suppose they had burned bridges with the landlord because they had a better place coming for them? Suppose they had trashed their workmates and neighbours because they were leaving the country anyway?

That lack of change, call it negative change, becomes devastating, could actually be devastation itself.

These are things I have encountered and dealt with as a minister of the Gospel.

I have seen marriages break because a pastor advised a person to invest their family savings in a pyramid scheme in the name of revelation. I have seen churches break because a man of God gave similar directions to the church board and they invested church monies into sink holes. I have seen individuals lose their savings because a man of God prophesied. I have met people looking for rent and fare after they gave all their earnings to a man or woman of God after ‘anointed’ teaching.

Anticipated change is dangerous if the expectation is misplaced and I suspect is the reason many prophets are heading to hell.

Like I have said, wholesale prophesy is worse than soothsaying.

I can’t prophesy one thing to a hundred people. I doubt I can even for five.

I have said elsewhere that prophecy as many other spiritual things like promises is conditional and not absolute. That is why we see many ‘IFs’ in the Bible.

Or do you also not realise that salvation, though free is conditional? What does John 3:16 say?

But allow me to get us back to our topic, change.

In many cases, we do not and cannot anticipate change.

Change does not consult us.

Let us get to the Bible.

Do you realise that in a very short time Job went from being the greatest man in the East to a stinky and messy pauper even to his wife without advance warning?

From reading his story, it is very probable that his wife left him.

How many women do you know who can stick to a man who refuses to curse God who is punishing him? How many will stick to a man who not only has lost everything but is also hopelessly and helplessly sick? How many would stick to a man who defends his innocence against God’s punishment?

This happened to righteous Job and he didn’t know about meetings in heaven.

That is how change comes.

Sometimes, as was with Job, it comes as one huge hit.

But it also could come in instalments.

Look at David.

He is worshiping God as he herds his father’s sheep when he is called to be anointed.

Then his skill takes him to the palace where his audience changes.

He is loved for his skill. He is loved for his youth. He is loved for his worship. Above all he is loved for what his skill and worship does in the palace.

But war happens and he has to go back to his humble job once again.

That humble job requires him to visit the war zone, but not for military purposes.

As he does, he hears blasphemy that boils his zeal away that he could not let go.

That transforms him to a celebrity; a champion.

He goes into the palace again, but this time as THE MAN.

But that causes problems with the king and he had to run away and become a fugitive as the king who had loved him wanted to kill him. Even his wife is given to another man.

As was with Job, David was only in charge of his relationship with God. Everything else was sinking sand, so to speak.

And that is the determinant whether we will thrive or dive.

Change is due. Some of it will ambush you and dismember everything you know. It will thrash and trash all your preparation.

Look at Job to know how to deal with drastic change.

He does not blame his wife who (probably) deserted him at his hour of greatest need.

He does not blame his workers who were trashing everything he was telling them

He does not blame his ‘comforters’ who were trying their best to prove that he was being punished for his wickedness.

He places his case squarely in God’s hands.

That is what infuriates his three comforters because their theology had no place for God glorying over His servant. And it will happen to you when God does the same with you.

Unless you think Job was the only servant to undergo such an experience, it will be worse for you than it was for Job.

Sadly, that is what motivators will always preach.

It is called the prosperity gospel though nothing could be farther from the truth.

It is deception, cultic deception. Demonic deception.

It opens one up to desperation when unpleasant change occurs, as it will.

Or have you not read this verse and many others like it.

These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world. (John 16:33)

Losing favour with someone you value is one change anybody dreads, especially someone with authority over you.

Yet that many times must happen if we are to forge farther in our spiritual pilgrimage.

Faith demands the destruction of whatever props our life depends on so that we are only left with God.

I shared some other time about God opening my eyes to some of our prayers.

Do you know that asking God to increase your faith is actually to ask Him to disconnect you from all your support systems?

In short this is what this prayer is saying.

Disconnect me from my parents, my job, my spouse, my health, my savings. Let me be left ONLY with You.

Unpleasant change is how God answers that prayer. And the two men of God we have looked at are very clear examples.

In my journey of faith, I have seen things. As I have obeyed God, I have also experienced things, things that have really built my faith. Though they are things I would not have prayed for had I known.

Many times, as I share my testimony, people wonder at the kind of faith I have.

But it really is not about faith. It is about God taking me through change and managing that change for me. It is God leaving me no options and throwing all my props aside to allow me to see Him.

How do I raise six children in a city without a job, a business, a predictable support structure? How do I pay rent, and those many other bills by simply waiting upon God?

You see, God many times does not give me options. He leaves me no choice but to wait on Him as I do what I many times just sense was His will though it appeared the height of folly and madness. That is why I never argue with anybody who calls me insane as that really who I am but for God vindicating my obedience. I have done really crazy things in obedience to what God had led me to do, burning many bridges and alienating many friends in the process. But God has always supported me.

Change is what obedience brings. Change is what growth in faith is.

And it is not change as we would like. It is change packaged in a way that has the capacity to please God.

At the same time, flunking there may mean losing one’s spiritual identity and relationship with God.

People have fallen from the faith because change ambushed them. People have trashed their calling because change came. People have killed families and relationships because change came.

But people have also grown several notches in their spiritual position because of change.

A death might make you bitter. But it can also make you better.

 As we see with Job, the intention of the evil one for change was to make Job bitter with God.

But his alignment with God’s cause ensured that he came out tops, the primary reason God brought that change around.

How do you manage change?

Do you know why whatever change is happening has come? Does it cause you to question God or develop and even richer relationship with Him?

Because your relationship with God is not only the target for the change, but also the determinant of how you will come out as a result of the change.