God’s Idler 5

Allow me to sum up God’s Idlers, if that is possible.

God requires His servants (I am talking about choice servants) to be idle on His purpose and intent.

Let me say another thing as we look at a few other examples.

I think for the most idlers, God requires them to idle to develop them into massive powerful instruments for His express use.

What do I mean?

That idling is meant to prepare them for the huge assignment that God has for them.

It therefore means that in that idleness there is intense warfare in the spirit for and through that idler.

And it is so because the devil knows that God is setting in place a plan that will demolish his kingdom through that servant. He knows that what we call idleness is detrimental to his kingdom.

Do you think God took Elijah to Jezebel’s hood simply to eat a widow’s food? Could God not have made sure that that brook never dried or prepared another source of his provision, knowing that even in Ahab’s palace was His servant who had rescued a hundred prophets?

God sent him there because there was something there for him to do. He sent him there because there was a battle to be waged. He sent him there because his spiritual muscle needed some building to handle the assignment we see him handling when he left that idling.

Many people have speculated and even come up with crazy narratives of what Elijah was doing in Sidon. But for me I always deal with what I read in the scriptures.

But from my study of the scriptures I am sure there was something major that made God send him to Sidon, the first being to build his spiritual muscle. I do not need to read between the lines to see it.

Look at Job.

Do you think that God took him through all that hell simply to multiply his wealth? Could He not have done it without inciting the devil against Job? Couldn’t He have done it without allowing His servant to go through all that persecution from his friends and even desertion from his wife.

The assignment God was preparing for Job was the reason he fought those battles. No wonder he had to live a hundred and forty more years to complete that assignment.

Do you think God could not have taken Joseph straight from Canaan to Pharaoh’s palace? Why did he have to go to prison, of all places?

He needed that idling experience to be ready for that assignment.

Why did Moses need to go to Midian, and for a whole forty years?

Why did God who had preserved him from the killing whose sole focus was Moses not have started him directly on his mission?

Moses needed to experience God enough to develop enough muscle to handle the challenges that would arise in the forty years of his leadership.

The idling experience was therefore not a time-wasting experience. It was a training experience God had put in place for His servant.

The Bible rarely writes about what happens in that idling season. It just shows the explosive release out of that experience.

We read Paul’s letters. We read the Revelation. We read about Joseph’s promotion. We read about Elijah’s explosive dealing with idolatry.

But God does not allow us to walk with the idlers in those idling times.

We are not able to know how Joseph was able to see sadness in those other prisoners. We are not able to see John in the process that released the book of Revelation.

We are able to have a sneak view of Job’s idling time. And I believe so that we can be able to appreciate the same when God decides we are His choice servants as well.

But there is no other servant God has allowed us to see during those idling times.

We are not allowed to see the process that made Ezra so instrumental. We are not allowed to see how Nehemiah, a eunuch, was prepared to lead in that huge rebuilding. We are not able to see what made Daniel and his three friends, also eunuchs, so confident of God’s intervention that they dared the king’s dieticians to give them vegetables and water instead of the carefully and professionally prepared food. We are not able to see what made David confident of facing the giant that the giant of Israel, who was the king, was so scared to face. We are not allowed to see how was he able to turn the hopeless rejects into an army that killed the giants of Philistia.

We are only allowed to see the product of that idling.

Why am I using such a negative word to share such an instrumental message? I know many are wondering.

One reason is that God uses the mundane for great purposes. He uses the apparently foolish for mind shattering purposes.

I am therefore using the word intentionally to get us to think about God and His training regimen for some of His servants. I use the word because He does not use that method for the run of the mill servants but on those He has set apart for great exploits in the spirit.

It is possible that this message does not relate to you as that servant. And that is why I have also addressed you as a supporter of the same to help you appreciate that you may not be able to understand what God is doing to His servant so that you do not trash him and thus invite judgment on your person.

Please stop talking about Elijah staying with a heathen widow if you do not have the whole picture. Please stop talking about Moses running away from responsibility by becoming a wife of sorts to a Midianite priest. And do not talk of David’s pride like his brother when you find him asking questions like his elder brother did.

I have said it many times and will repeat it.

Job’s three friends quoted the scriptures correctly. The only problem was that those scriptures did not apply to Job since he was in his idling season.

God’s Idler 4

 I want us to deal with another aspect of idling for ministers, this time using other examples.

Paul was a very active minister

To imagine that after being stoned to death and revived by prayer he, instead of taking a well-deserved rest to recuperate, simply moves to another place preach the Gospel for which he had been stoned!

I therefore suspect that it was impossible to hold such a person down, even for God. And this because he probably could never have heard any voice telling him to rest.

What does God then do?

He orders him to Jerusalem where he was to face persecution.

Even that could not slow him down.

He is then arrested and rescued from a lynching mob by a Roman general.

From then he becomes a guest of the Roman empire as a prisoner.

Interesting enough there are no real charges on him, yet the governor, hoping for a bribe from this man of God and pleasing the Jews in the process, keeps him idle for a whole two years.

Was he in God’s will? Make a guess.

Then he is taken to Rome and continues his imprisonment for another two years.

Four years of idleness is not a short time, especially as he was under armed guard all the time. This means he could not have made any movement without the express permission of the guards, some who were chained to him.

You will argue that it was from that that he was able to write these very encouraging letters we love.

But I do not think that is what Paul felt, being the action man that the Bible paints him as. I am sure even the church in general did not easily see it as God’s express will.

Yet it was.

Or what do you think God will do when we will not stop or take a rest. What do you think He will do when our energy levels are too high for our benefit?

I understand Paul’s situation because for the most part I am someone with quite some energy.

Until very recently, sleep was for me a bother as I could comfortably sleep adequately for two hours a day for a week or two without feeling a thing. I could move from a mission to another, a preaching point to another without needing even a tea break. I could travel for a whole day and still be as fresh as someone who slept soundly the whole night when called to minister.

Even now I struggle to slow down.

But a few years ago, God taught me this about Paul and I learnt to slow down, not because I was feeling tired or worn out but because God needed me to slow down.

I therefore do not feel guilty turning down a preaching invitation since I can be able to accurately sense whether He needs me to go or not as opposed to when turning down an invitation led me to guilt as my system is not wired for being idle like Elijah was ordered to be.

I can comfortably turn down an editing or publishing ministry opening because I can be able to know when God does not need me to be busy on such matters.

I can stay at home the whole week or month without being scared that people are going to hell because of my negligence.

Or, simply said, I can be comfortably idle on God’s orders.

Whereas Elijah was idle to be prepared for a new assignment, Paul was idle, first to rest and second, to be released into a new dimension of ministry.

I doubt Paul could have written much had he continued ministry the way we read. He needed to be made an idler for that to happen.

And it is possible for God to make you such for His purposes.

Do you think John could have written the book of Revelation if he was comfortably in Jerusalem?

He needed banishment to experience that.

God’s Idler 3

 Why did God order His servant to be idle for three and a half years?

Did He not have anything else for Him to do that He had to condemn him into idleness and obscurity? Or had He given up on His servant?

We of course know that God does not operate that way.

He therefore had to have a very important reason to put such a visible prophet as Elijah on that idle list for that long. And we know that it was related to the assignment He had for him after that long idling time.

With hindsight we now know that He was preparing Elijah for probably the most momentous chapter of his life. He therefore needed all his spiritual muscles to be at their peak before he was released from that idleness.

Allow me to use a verse we love to quote.

But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint. (Isaiah 40:31)

What is waiting?

For the most part real waiting can be equated with idling.

What can you be doing when you are waiting for an important call from the owner of a company that has employed you? What will you be doing when you are waiting for a someone to pick you up for a very important meeting? What will you be doing when you are waiting for milk to boil?

And ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their lord, when he will return from the wedding; that when he cometh and knocketh, they may open unto him immediately. (Luke 12:36)

Idling is that time between receiving two major orders from our Lord and King.

It is a difficult time, a time that for most looks completely and unreasonably insane.

It is a time when the best of our friends will desert us because we are convincingly out of our spiritual connection. We may have deserted the faith according to them.

But it is even more difficult for the ones who are idling.

Imagine Elijah in Jezebel’s hood, since that is where Sidon was! Do you think it was easy for him to ‘settle’ there?

If Jonah had issues taking God’s message to a heathen nation, what do you think Elijah might have felt when he was ordered to go idling in a heathen nation, especially the nation that had produced the greatest fuel for the idolatry of his nation? What do you think he felt when ordered to stay with a heathen widow?

What did he think his friends and ministry partners would feel if they got to learn where he had gone?

I say this as someone who had to deal with such orders at least thrice in my ministry (I probably am in one such season now).

But they were not as radical as Elijah’s was. And they were direct ministry opportunities. Only that they were screamingly outside the norm. Of course, they rubbed my mentors and believers we were in fellowship with the wrong way.

But Elijah’s was not a ministry opportunity. It was a simple order to idle in a heathen nation with a heathen woman.

Elijah’s idling was a time to wait on and for God.

It was a time to know God in an entirely new way. It was a time to experience God beyond the narrow confines of the faith he had had all his life

For since the beginning of the world men have not heard, nor perceived by the ear, neither hath the eye seen, O God, beside thee, what he hath prepared for him that waiteth for him. (Isaiah 64:4)

That is what Elijah was doing.

And that is what all who are on God’s idle list are doing.

So, before throwing those stones; before calling that press conference; before calling that church board meeting; before calling that prayer meeting, please establish whether you are dealing with a rebel or God’s precious servant.

Otherwise, you will be like Job’s three friends who, though they were right with their theology, were completely off concerning God’s servant.

You will avert judgment on your person if you prayerfully engaged that idler or rebel because you might in your zeal seal your damnation.

God deals personally and directly with every person He created. He does not have supervisors or brokers to His revelation, and especially on the orders He issues to His servants.

He therefore will order His servants to do eccentric things for His purpose, even if those things are completely outside logic, without consulting any of us or even informing us that He will be doing so.

Among those things is idling for His glory.

We might use spiritual terms like waiting upon the Lord but I doubt any of us would have called Elijah’s idling waiting upon the Lord, especially knowing that it was in a heathen nation in the same house with a heathen woman, a woman without a husband for that case.

Why am I writing this?

It is very easy to use my experience to judge someone else’s servant. It is very easy to use my doctrinal position to judge somebody else’s obedience. And it is very easy to use my convictions to pour contempt on someone else’s convictions.

And in nothing is this most pronounced than on a believer waiting upon the Lord, or what I am calling idling on God’s orders. No wonder the rewards for the same are beyond mind boggling as we have seen in the verse above.

Am I saying we should never seek to intervene when we think or suspect someone is wrong?

Of course not.

But it is wise to seek to understand someone’s standing with God and especially the orders they are dealing with. And this because God will never consult us when He is giving orders to any of His servants, even if those servants are our children, biological, spiritual or otherwise.

Listen to them before talking about them. Allow him to pour his heart to you before seeking to intervene in his situation. And you should listen to understand instead of looking for evidence to correct him.

Will we give God the chance to idle any of His servants without forcing them to work for the same God who has ordered them to idle? Will we shut up when we hear of someone sharing their weird testimony just because it does not fit into our well pressed experiences.

God’s Idler 2

Allow me to add another dimension to this quest for true and lasting wisdom, this time focusing on ministry support.

How many of you would have sent support to Elijah had you known where he was? How many would have thought or spoken positively about him if you learnt that he was living in the house of a heathen widow? How many of you would have stood for him if he was called by the Sanhedrin to explain his desertion of the faith and ministry?

Would it not have been easier to call for a prayer meeting to call down damnation on this rebellious once used servant of God living in sin in a heathen nation? Wouldn’t you have organised an intervention team to rescue him from his rebellious craving for heathen women?

Let me bring us home.

How many of you will support someone who does not send progress reports of the ministry they are doing? How many would write that cheque or send that money to a person because they hear a small nudge from the Holy Spirit? How many would support a minister who was not ‘ministering’ in the way they know ministry should be done?

How many of us care to know why someone who was so visible in ministry has suddenly disappeared from the radar of visible ministry? How many would send support without waiting for flowery reports from them?

You see, it is much easier to pass judgment on someone before looking to understand their situation. It is much easier to support someone who cooks good ministry reports than it is to support one on God’s idle list. It is much easier to pour praise on a visible ministry than an idle one. And I use idle on the terms I have used on Elijah.

Why must someone prove their worth to deserve your support? Is He serving you or God? Is he accountable to you or God who called him?

(By the way I am not ruling out accountability, only saying that all accountability should be directed to God)

Like I always ask, can you allow God to issue orders on your money without first needing to explain why you must release it?

Must you know the specifics of the ministry God is challenging you to support or even partner with?

Can you, like Philip, go to the desert, deserting a vibrant revival ministry without needing to know why to the desert in the first place?

You see, we are very academic in our proclamations. We know all the verses to quote when they are in line with what we know or have experienced.

But God always trashes those course books and the experiences proceeding from them.

God is about removing all those fences our limited understanding of who He is have erected.

That is what He did with Elijah those three years. And that is what He always does with someone who is willing to go bonkers on His orders.

Or you think Isaiah walking naked and barefoot for three years was conventional? What do you think his wife and children, even forgetting the royal family that he belonged to, think was happening to him?

Why do we want to box God into our experiences? Why do we want Him to fit in our narrow interpretations of who we know Him to be? Why must He follow our doctrinal and theological persuasion?

What am I saying?

Can God entrust something as bizarre as He did with some of the characters He uses to instruct us into His ways when we read His word? Can He confidently send us to crazy places to share His word and love? Can He allow us to swim into those moral sewers to snatch people from the fire because He knows we will remain unstained by the world?

How unconventional is your faith? How radical is your obedience?

Once again, I will ask

What is God’s will in your current situation? How obedient are you walking in that will?

That is wisdom

 

God’s Idler

Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is. (Ephesians 5:17)

It has dawned on me that the essence of wisdom is not the application of knowledge as the world believes and teaches.

It is knowing and understanding God’s will.

Knowing God’s will means pursuing the knowledge and performing or doing it just like in the Bible hearing is equated with obeying what we hear.

The example God gave me to understand this is extreme.

Do you realise that Elijah was an idler for three and a half years?

What I mean is that he was doing nothing in our understanding.

Let us go to the Bible.

Go to the brook. Ravens will feed you and you will drink from the brook. Meaning? Do nothing.

Later, go to Zarephath and a widow will feed you.

Do you realise that he was given no other order to complement that?

Apart from the raising of the widow’s son from the dead what else did he do of any importance?

Is that not the reason Ahab was unable to trace him though he sought him in all the neighboring (and I believe far off) nations? And we know he was in Jezebel’s backyard for that matter.

He was simply idle, idle for God.

He was idle on God’s orders.

For some of us who love activity; for those who equate activity with work and impact, this rubs us in the wrongest of ways.

It is inconceivable for a prophet of Elijah’s stature to be just idling around doing nothing.

Worst of it was that it was in a heathen nation where his ministry could have done so much good.

Imagine the number of people who could have turned to the God of Israel if Elijah had decided to release the lion that was him! Imagine the throngs of people that could have submitted to the God he served if he had decided to share his faith with them! Couldn’t he have done what Jonah had reluctantly done to Nineveh?

That is our thinking.

No wonder God says that His foolishness is wiser than our wisdom. That His wisdom is foolishness in our eyes.

It is impossible to wrap our minds around a minister of Elijah’s stature in a heathen place doing nothing, for three whole years!

Yet that was God’s order.

We would like to think that he was backslidden to hide in such a place.

But God astounds us with the amount of power he leaves that idleness with.

Imagine confronting a despotic king with his eight hundred and fifty prophets (on the king’s payroll) in a nation totally sold out to idolatry!

Therefore, allow me to ask, was the prophet really idling around?

Yes and No.

Yes because he was doing nothing in the eyes of everybody who saw him.

And No because God had sent him to idle there for His purpose.

But I suspect it also astounded Elijah, being the man of action we know him to be.

I imagine him wrestling with himself and wondering whether he really was where God wanted him, the only consolation being that he really had nowhere else to go due to the famine.

But I am sure of one thing, though. He never once questioned God’s order.

It would be folly to imagine someone who could distinguish God’s still small voice amidst the racquet of earthquake, fire, etc, questioning an order he had received.

What am I saying?

The primary task facing everybody on the face of the earth is knowing God’s will.

God’s people will know and follow through in obedience. The others will either surround themselves with so much noise that it becomes impossible to hear, or refuse to listen, or in other words respond to what they hear.

God’s voice has been released to all creation because He is the One who has created the same. Incidentally I will treat will and voice as the same thing because they require a response, I am sure the same response.

Lest you think I am overstretching this truth, allow me to give another verse

The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding. (Proverbs 9:10)

And there are several other verses like it.

What is the will of God? You may be asking

First is knowing who God is and what He stands for (His attributes) and what He expects of us.

We sure can’t know His specific will for us before we allow His person to influence who we are.

As an example, it would be preposterous to be asking God to guide you to your marriage partner when you are experimenting with sex. It would be outrageous to ask God to guide you to a hardworking and reliable partner when you are a lazy scoundrel.

Knowing the will of God starts with knowing who God is.

It automatically starts with knowing His word. We must crave His word so that we spend a good amount of our most precious time reading, hearing and meditating on it.

We must create time to know God’s word.

That is the beginning of knowing His will because we will know who He is and what He expects of us.

Then we must decide to unashamedly and furiously do what the word tells us.

It is as we are pursuing that that He will start releasing His specific will to us, many times using the same word.

What are some of the implications of this message?

Do you know that spiritual or ministry burnout is sin that should be repented of?

Why do I say so?

Can God really lead you to a breakdown if you are following His leading? It therefore means that I ministered outside God’s will. And we know that God is bound to those He is leading. Meaning I will be outside the reach of His grace by the time I am burning out.

Or do you not remember what happened when the same Elijah was out of his wits and probably energy after that confrontation with the forces of evil?

God led him, fed him and gave him a journey that must have refreshed him so that he could then face his new challenges.

Second is the fact that we are very narrowminded when we argue for ministers working side by side with ministry. We are very shallow when we shout that one must work to eat.

What work was Elijah doing for those three and a half years. Or do we call idling work?

We must define work for the believer.

Though generally work produces food (and I am now a mini farmer of sorts), it is not right to assume ministry does not qualify as work. For my case I am doing it because God has ordered me to do it and He is using it to give me very valuable lessons on ministry.

My farming does not give me money or food. It is God who does. For the time I spend in that enterprise, I could as well be wasting my time. Except that I am doing it on God’s orders. I will dispose of the same if God ordered me because I am His servant.

In fact, ministry could be the only work in God’s economy.

Otherwise, what does this mean?

But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you. (Matthew 6:33)

If seeking the kingdom of God is the primary duty of man, what does it mean for the person whose responsibility is to guide people in that pursuit?

It is like saying that farming is work yet calling the farming consultant idle! It is like saying sports is work but calling the coach an idler!

Yet is that not what we do all the time?

What do people who preach from the rooftops about tentmaking teach?

It is vain to serve God. It does not pay to serve God wholeheartedly. Serving God exclusively is a vain pursuit.

Could it be the reason many ministers are perishing because ministry cannot sustain them and they must pursue a plan B? Could it be the reason ministers are sinking into depression and alcoholism because the ministries they serve under insist they must as part of the assignment either look for supporters or make tents? Could it be the reason ministers are committing suicide since nobody seems to appreciate or understand their situations? Could it be the reason ministers are despairing and falling back into sin and the world since ministry is an unachievable goal? Could it be the reason preachers are peppering and seasoning their sermons, songs and other messages to be able to access that elusive support?

Sorry I must be this bold.

But it is important to learn from this example that listening and obeying God can never be idling.

Elijah, God’s idler was not idle. He was not doing nothing of importance. He was not running away from responsibility.

He was simply where God had wanted him to be, though idling in our eyes.

I have been chased from ministries because I insisted on doing what God was ordering instead of what the ‘ministry’ or ‘church’ dictated. I have been confronted for having backslidden because I had decided to go where God had sent me. I have been removed from leadership because I insisted that what God’s word said was final and not subject to second opinions. I have had my salary frozen because I refused to attend staff meetings in clubs. I have had ministries I started killed because I insisted on following God’s orders.

Do you know God’s will for your life? Do you know God’s will for your career? Do you know God’s will for your marriage? Do you know God’s will for your money?

That is wisdom

Will you determine to stop everything else so that or until you get to know God’s will?

Why Serpents?

 Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves. (Matthew 10:16)

I have harboured this message for a long time and feel that time has come to share it.

Have you ever wondered why Jesus would advise His servants to be like snakes, of all animals? Why not a lion or a deer? Why not even like a bear that hibernates or a chameleon that camouflages?

These are some lessons God is giving me as He takes His school (of this servant) to the farm, if you must understand. This is one reason He directed me to a farm and is slowly turning me into a farmer, however mini it may be.

Do you know that the snake is probably the most defenceless animal in the whole world?

Yet it is the most dreaded, by most people.

Allow me to explain.

A snake has only its mouth as its weapon, a majority of which are completely harmless (except in Australia where most are venomous).

A snake cannot see or hear.

A snake’s eyes are movement sensors of sorts and they do not have ears.

Their belly and tongue are their only active connections to the outside world (there are a few who also possess heat sensors on their heads).

Due to its physiology, a snake can ‘run’ fast only for brief moments. This means that it is unable to flee danger as far as it would need to. That is why for snake hunters only the sight of one is enough to capture it. It cannot spit or bite many times as the release of venom is limited to a single effective time. This means that after delivering that venom it is unable to effectively flee the scene since the delivery completely exhausts it.

A wounded snake is unable to heal because there is nothing it can do to that wound, meaning that flies and other insects can comfortably start laying their eggs on that open wound even as infections thrive therein.

What does this mean.

It means that a snake MUST learn to be as invisible as possible. It has to keep its distance and make sure that no other animal can even suspect of its whereabouts.

 A friend recently told me that you can live in the same house with a snake for a years if you have a predictable pattern. It is then able to plan its activities accordingly so that it can hide before you come.

You will only see it when you change that pattern as you will probably find it looking for food or basking.

One time we had rats in the house that resisted everything we tried; from poison to traps.

Then they started reducing, eventually disappearing.

It was then that my daughter found a snake, a big one, as she was rearranging the furniture. And they killed it. Then we realised that it was the one that had decimated the rats.

Incidentally, we would hear some strange sounds at night and conclude it was the rats rummaging.

By the way we are talking about months.

What am I saying?

A snake has many enemies for the simple reason that it is a snake.

Birds will start screaming when they see a snake. I for one will kill a snake before finding out whether it is venomous or not. And I know many people are like that.

It is a known fact that snakes are very useful in the control of pests like rodents. Yet no farmer will hesitate to kill a snake when he finds it on his farm.

That guides the reason Jesus used the snake as our example as believers.

Do you realise that in the scriptures we have only one offensive weapon? Do you know what it is?

It is the word of God. And that is the teeth we have to defend ourselves from our enemies.

Knowing the word and how to use it therefore makes it possible for us to live.

That is the only way we can also respond to a hostile world seeking to swallow us.

You see, even snakes without venom behave as if they have by pretending to lunge at enemies so that they think they have and leave them alone. Others have tails looking like heads to confuse an enemy so that should they be struck, the least useful part is hit. Others will move with that tail raised for the same purpose.

I recently saw one such. It looked as if it was crawling in reverse until I looked closely and saw the ‘tail’ flickering and realised its ruse.

Believers have enemies; more enemies than they even imagine.

It therefore befits us to know that fact even as we navigate this enemy infested world.

It is also important for us to realise that we, like serpents, only have one weapon at our disposal to deal with all these enemies. And that is the word of God.

Another truth with a snake is that it does not just move. It has to have its environment safe before it moves. That is how it was able to live in our house for months without anybody noticing until the environment was changed.

Many times believers rush into situations without knowing the dangers they are exposing themselves to.

Ministers have become drunkards because they had decided to share the Gospel in bars without God’s express order. Some have become whoremongers because they had decided to reach out to harlots, again without their teeth being polished. Still others have become moral sewers because they thought that corruption simply required their presence and conversation to stop.

They did not go to their Lord to get His orders before launching out into the deep that is confronting the world against God.

Others have gotten lost because they thought that information is all they need to change the world without realising that there is a context for that information.

I remember a time I took a team to visit Hindu temples to interact with and understand Hinduism.

After the visits we were so exhausted that were it not for God’s restoration we could have simply cancelled the whole week’s program. Some people literally became sick and withdrew from it.

That is how marriage counsellors become casualties of the things they guide people against. That is how moralists become as immoral as those whose vices they expose. That is how apologists become the things they are fighting to get others out of.

A snake not only knows its environment. It also knows its limitations.

You must get near a snake for it to bite or even spit at you. It must get near enough to be able to eat. And it must do the same with stealth. Otherwise, it will never be able to catch anything.

Yet look at the bravado ministers employ to announce their move into another territory! Look at all those announcements and advertisements announcing to the devil that his territory will soon be overtaken by these brazen ministers!

And we wonder why evangelistic meetings are disrupted. We wonder why ministers are framed to destroy their credibility. We wonder why equipment fail.

A snake will never bite remotely. Yet we think that we can.

A snake never advertises its presence. In fact you will never see a snake showing off unless it is its mating season for some, and even then it is in a safe place away from enemies. It will also only boast to the snakes it is interested in.

Are believers like that?

I have gone to places and the minister wonders why nobody notices that a bishop or pastor is in the house, insisting that he be treated special. I have been in meetings where I felt some shame as a minister when I saw the ‘noise’ some ministers were making for not being seen.

And we wonder why such ministers rarely amount to much, if anything, in the spiritual realm.

You see, a snake announcing its presence is signing its own death sentence.

It is not much different in the spiritual realm.

And this also applies in the social media and internet realm.

Unless God expressly orders you, do not apply advertorial gimmicks on God and His methods. Do not publicise your achievements in the spirit. And do not seek to be seen to be ministering.

That will be like the snake exposing its whole body for viewing by everybody, including enemies.

To a snake, a display of any sort is an exposure to destruction. That is why you will never see snakes in places where their bodies are easily seen. The bigger the snake, the bigger the cover under which it must operate.

A snake never moves for the fun of it. It is either looking for food or shelter or a place to bask since as we know it is coldblooded. There are no gyms for snakes even when they are in captivity. They never compete like other animals are made to.

You must make a snake pit open if people have to see them even in snake parks. You have a burrow and all of them will choose it over anywhere else because to a snake, security is only in obscurity.

That is how God wants us to live. He does not want us pursuing publicity, especially the publicity of the ministry He has prescribed for us.

We must allow Him to decide when and where He may want us to be exposed as then He will have the required security for us when that exposure draws enemies as snake farms have.

We are supposed to limit our interactions with the world limited to very few senses as opposed to exposing our spirits to the whole panorama of the world since like the snake our lives are continuously at risk from the same world.

Pornography is not the entry point but advanced stage in our entrapment. Very few believers will choose to delve in it just like that.

They are slowly drawn into its grasp through interactions with other mediums

From TV to movies to internet movies to pornography, through many other enticing and simply irresistible traps.

Nobody feels safe in pornography just like nobody feels safe in drugs. Nobody will thus choose the same for the fun of it.

As such, nobody will dangle them into your eyes to experiment with.

But they can easily and stealthily allow you to sip and sample the same in small bits until you then become entrapped.

I have seen how many young people got trapped into smoking

They were given cigarettes free for years. Then the media was screamingly loud about the vice that it appeared ‘cool’ to smoke. Movies also had all the cool guys smoking.

Until someone got addicted.

They would then spend their last coin buying that smoke. They would rather buy that stick than food.

And I have seen the same with alcohol.

Incidentally, the entrapped will not be restricted to those addictions as they will have borne children.

To satisfy that addiction will require a lot of ‘creativity’ as they will not satisfy on their own.

This person who can forgo food for a smoke must somehow eat and so must have some way of getting food, especially since addictions are costlier than food. This means that the consumer of those addictions must be able to produce at least three times what a person without addictions produces to be at par with them.

That is why God needs His people to be wise enough to avoid them before they are dangled as temptations just like a snake will not attempt to swallow anything that won’t fit their expandable throat. It will not therefore attempt looking for prey beyond their capacity.

But we preach about ambition differently.

Dream big and other gimmicks train the saints (are they truly so?) to aim at things outside God’s revelations just because they are seeing others swallowing them.

Living within one’s means is treated as lack of faith when God has not expressly said so. Greed is therefore painted as a positive trait just because it is spiritualised.

Just like a snake, we should know our limits and only stretch within those limits.

I hope to develop this soeme more as God continues releasing His revelation.

 

Demystifying Acts 2:4

I am sure that some of you have raised their aerials higher on seeing that verse.

I will not disappoint you, though for most of you reading this may cause you some pain, especially if you want to walk according to what God’s word says.

I will start by using some real-life examples.

I spent my childhood on the slopes of Mount Kenya.

This means my early education was wholly done by teachers of the language group I was part of, especially because we learnt the vernacular in our first years. I can fluently read the Kimeru Bible to date due to that.

One day, a cute new teacher came to our class and this is what she said as an introduction.

Tonday we wiru mbi running ambout the shash

We laughed, but inwardly because in those days nobody dared challenge a teacher in any way.

Why did we laugh?

We laughed because she mispronounced the word church.

Why only the church when her whole sentence was ridden with pronunciation errors?

Because that was the only word in that sentence sounding weird, and that probably because she had gone to a college where the bulk of her teachers mispronounced the ch.

Had anybody else spoken that sentence, whether teacher or pupil, they would have done the same thing, only pronouncing the word church right in our ears.

Our English was thus weighted heavily with the Meru accent, and none of us saw anything wrong with it.

Take this young boy to a national school a few years later and the conglomeration of different pronunciation variances becomes an adventure.

But there was a real problem when the chemistry class started because another pretty girl fresh from India was our teacher.

My heavily accented ears from Meru could not make head or tail about what this girl was saying due to her also heavily accented Indian tongue. I therefore was unable to understand anything she was saying for the first term.

This for me made chemistry the most difficult subject because the clash of accents disconnected me from Chemistry. My foundation was therefore destroyed by that clash.

Yet both of us knew English since she spoke English and I could understand English.

Allow me to give another example.

I interacted a lot with the Congolese when I ministered to refugees. I therefore understood that their Kiswahili was queer, but I could understand it since they sought to customise it to our Kiswahili.

Then I went to minister in the DRC.

After teaching someone would make a comment or ask a question and I would wonder what language they were speaking. It would sometimes take a translator for my Kenyan Swahili ears to understand their Congolese Swahili tongues.

And another

One day I was invited to a seminar by a new church because they had teachers from the USA.

That first day an elder of that church was doing the translation. The problem was that he really could not understand American English but was not honest enough to admit his shortcoming.

He therefore said what he thought the teacher was saying as opposed to what he was actually saying. And the pastor was none the wiser because like I had been his ears were heavily accented to the Meru English.

After the first session, I approached the pastor and gave him my observation and he asked whether I understood the English being spoken.

I ended being the official translator for the whole time though I had attended initially to see what was happening in my neighbourhood, probably with no intention of being in the whole seminar.

It is important for us to keep that in mind when we explore Acts 2:4.

I will give a similar situation.

Now for a moment imagine with me that the king of the UK has a convocation for the subjects of his commonwealth.

We will have people from all over the world.

Suppose with me that we do not have these modern gadgets and services that we enjoy in most international meetings since that was the situation in Acts. We therefore have the king speaking to all his subjects using his British English, of course since English is the language of the commonwealth.

There is the Nigerian, the Indian, the Pakistani, the Australian, the Cameroonian, indeed all the nationalities that are former colonies of Britain and others like Rwanda that have recently joined the Commonwealth. Then we will have observers and journalists from across the world, from China to Papua New Guinea; from Guyana to Barbados.

How many in that meeting will follow what the sovereign is saying?

That is the context of Acts 2:4

And there were dwelling at Jerusalem Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven. (Acts 2:5)

If you need a refresher, there was an annual festival (harvest) requiring all the Jews to assemble in Jerusalem.

It was called Pentecost because it came fifty (gk. Penta) days after the Passover

These Jews of course understood Hebrew. But I am sure not exactly the kind of Hebrew a Jew in Jerusalem spoke. They had their own accents weighted by the places they lived.

Just like you will take long to understand a language from a different accent, I believe it was the same problem those Jews from around the world were experiencing at Pentecost as at any other time they came for those mandatory festivals.

That was the purpose of the release of the tongues of Pentecost.

Everybody then heard Hebrew being spoken in their accent as I also am sure those who may not have known Hebrew heard the Gospel spoken in the language they understood properly.

Now when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his own language. And they were all amazed and marvelled, saying one to another, Behold, are not all these which speak Galilaeans? And how hear we every man in our own tongue, wherein we were born? Parthians, and Medes, and Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, and in Judaea, and Cappadocia, in Pontus, and Asia, Phrygia, and Pamphylia, in Egypt, and in the parts of Libya about Cyrene, and strangers of Rome, Jews and proselytes, Cretes and Arabians, we do hear them speak in our tongues the wonderful works of God. (Acts 2: 6 – 11)

Associating unknown languages with Acts 2:4 is actually abusing the intelligence of anybody logical enough to understand Acts 2.

The fact that millions subscribe to that error does not make it any less grave.

The fact that myriads of denominations and congregations are guided by that single verse does not reduce the impact of that error.

I thank my God, I speak with tongues more than ye all: (1Corinthians 14:18)

I know some may use this verse to ‘prove’ their argument about glossolalia.

But allow me to ask a simple question.

How can you know how many languages you are speaking if they are unknown to you? How will you even know when you shift from one to the other if they are unknown?

Simply speaking, Paul knew many languages from being raised in a metropolitan context.

No wonder he was chosen to be the apostle to the gentiles because he could easily switch from one language, accent and dialect to the other to effectively share the Gospel with them.

The other apostles would have needed a permanent gift of the Acts 2:4 tongues to be able to do the same since they were only conversant with their local dialect.

Or do you not remember Peter being easily identified as Jesus’ disciple because his accent was Galilean?

That and the simple fact that they were uneducated and so unexposed to the world beyond the narrow confines of Judah, something that the international citizen, Paul, wasn’t. Not only was he highly educated, but he also had a very extensive education and exposure to the world.

Or do you not see him quoting Cretan poets or prophets, and of course arguing with the Epicureans on their own terms.

That for me is the context of Acts 2:4, speaking languages that the congregation can clearly understand the Gospel.

I do not dispute the usage of unknown languages since Paul wrote about them.

But it is wrong to use them to explain Acts 2:4.

Is the Acts 2:4 gift still there today?

I believe so. But it is in a very limited way since for today language has been demystified, especially by our progress and gadgetry.

You can take a computer or mobile phone and quickly shift from one language to the other.

Even the study of languages has been simplified.

But allow me to give an incident I have heard one time or the other.

A team from a university went to a remote and unreached place to share the Gospel.

Sadly, they did not have anybody from that community and so had to source for a translator from the community.

The person they got worshipped a different God and so decided to ‘translate’ what was being said to pour mud on the preaching and praise on his faith.

All of a sudden, the young man started speaking that language clearly that the translator had to sit down. When the meeting ended people came to him and asked why he did not tell them that he knew that language. He was as shocked as they were because he did not even know he was speaking it.

Is that not what had happened at Pentecost? Only that it was not preceded by sabotage, nor was it restricted to a single language group.

We will get into the arguments later.

 

Limitation of Miracles

 For I have five brethren; that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torment. Abraham saith unto him, They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them. And he said, Nay, father Abraham: but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent. And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead. (Luke 16: 28 – 31)

How much power is there in the manifestation of God’s power? How far does that power reach?

Have you like me wondered why Nebuchadnezzar, with all the evidence he had of the might and overarching power and wisdom the God of Israel did not believe in Him? How come that his proclamations and confessions of the same were unable to reach his person?

Again, have you wondered why, after Jesus raised Lazarus some of the witnesses went to report the miracle to the authorities? Why did the same authorities, after that clear demonstration of God’s power, thought it was prudent to kill the evidence (Lazarus) instead of allowing it to change their lives or influence their faith?

How come the authorities, after the soldiers who were guarding Jesus’ tomb reported what they had witnessed, decided to bribe them to change the narrative of what was clearly evident to them instead of believing in the risen Christ?

Why did Israel not return to God after the prophesied drought and later the great demonstration of the inability of the gods they worshiped to compete or even compare with the God of Elijah?

A miracle has no power of its own to transform a life.

I will compare a miracle to a display of some dramatic and exciting event.

Let me give an illustration of something I heard some time ago.

There was once an exceptional tight rope walker who could do wonders on that rope.

One day he tied a rope between two tall buildings with his ever-increasing audience on the street below.

He asked them, ‘do you believe I can walk from this building to the other?’

‘Yeeeessss’, the crowd roared

He of course walked across easily.

‘Do you believe I can push a wheelbarrow across?’

‘Yeeesss’, again the crowd roared, even louder than the first time

Then he did it.

‘Do you believe I can push a loaded wheelbarrow across?’

The response was now deafening, ‘Yeeeessssss’

And he was able to of course do it.

‘Do you believe I can carry someone on the wheelbarrow across?’

The noise was now maddening, bringing the whole town to a standstill as people who had been unaware of the drama were drawn by the noise.

‘Who will ride on the wheelbarrow?’, he asked

The hush was louder than the most deafening roar.

A miracle draws many onlookers, none of who is ready to commit

Believing in miracles is easier than believing the source of the same.

You see, as long as it was someone else being on the wheelbarrow, it was very easy to believe in the skill of the performer. Being on that wheelbarrow required commitment, a commitment that had the capacity of hurling the believer to death should that faith be misplaced.

That is why Jesus did not just perform miracles. He only performed miracles as part of His teaching. Miracles were the fillers of His teaching.

We love miracles because we love drama; both are spectator events

Faith, however, is not like that.

Faith requires a commitment. Something deeper than drama must be present to activate that.

What then activates faith? What has the power to make faith alive?

The word has the power to activate faith.

Incidentally you realise that the power of culture is vested in the release of increasing doses of doctrine from the earliest age.

We do this, we don’t do this, we believe this, are all vomits (sorry I have to use such a word), of the message that has been seeping deep in a person’s spirit from the earliest moments of their lives. They have been indoctrinated by message after message of their culture, as of anything else that no miracle has the capacity to alter that ‘faith’.

Why does a doctor who teaches on the dangers of smoking or alcoholism sink into the same vices?

The message running their lives is contrary to everything they learnt in school. You can call it the operating system (OS) of their lives.

Only the word of God has the power to change that operating system to one that will operate on what pleases God and of course is most beneficial to man.

Why does a preacher (pastor, apostle, prophet, deacon) who preaches so powerfully against unfaithfulness become unfaithful?

Their OS has not been infused with God’s word enough to deter them. They know enough of the word to make a living but not enough to change their OS. They know enough to preach but that enough is not enough to turn their lives around.

Why do many minister’s children become children of Belial yet from their infancy they have been face to face with the Christian life, even miraculous life?

They were onlookers, spectators to the spectacle that was ministry and the God their parents served.

They are like those onlookers shouting the shrillest, yeeesss, but are unable or unwilling to commit to that tight rope walker’s wheelbarrow.

Yes, Jesus can do and does do. But I do not know enough about Him to commit my whole life to His transformation.

Ever wondered why the Levites were separated from regular occupations? What then were they commissioned to do?

The word, plain and simple.

They were the custodians of God’s word to Israel.

Why was Ezra called a scribe and not priest yet his family tree is plainly priestly?

The priesthood was a small part of the Levitical calling; the main one being the instruction of Israel on God’s word.

A scribe was a copyist of the scriptures. That is why we read this

For Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the law of the LORD, and to do it, and to teach in Israel statutes and judgments. (Ezra 7:10)

That was the Levitical calling.

Why did Solomon fail where David succeeded?

The word

And it shall be with him, and he shall read therein all the days of his life: that he may learn to fear the LORD his God, to keep all the words of this law and these statutes, to do them: That his heart be not lifted up above his brethren, and that he turn not aside from the commandment, to the right hand, or to the left: to the end that he may prolong his days in his kingdom, he, and his children, in the midst of Israel. (Deuteronomy 17: 19, 20)

His matchless wisdom was no match to the corruption prevalent in his success. And God knew that when He said this. Only a consistent intake of God’s word is able to help us defeat the onslaught of the forces of evil in the world.

His earlier devotion was again no match to the slithering and smothering allure of the world.

David could repent because he had hid God’s word in his heart (Psalm 119:11)

The word of God gave him balance in all his life, whether he was running from an enemy he respected highly or was sitting on the seat of ultimate power.

This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success. (Joshua 1:8)

Many people wonder why I am madly insistent on our need to spend the best of our times on the scriptures. Many wonder why all the fuss yet a verse a day for them does wonders. Many are puzzled when they find my messages always infused with the scriptures. Some are maddened by the fact that when we argue I insist on only the scriptures (all of it) is admissible in any argument we have.

It didn’t start here. It started long ago.

You see, I got saved as a child. I also had very many questions that those who led me to faith (EA Revival charismatics)were unable to answer, many times implying that my quests were the evidence of a lack of faith

But that did not reduce my inquisitiveness about my faith.

Incidentally, there were very few Bibles at that time and so it was not easy to even look for answers from the scriptures.

I became a rebel of sorts in my teenage, a combination of many other things.

Then, at eighteen I rededicated my life to Christ. I also had my own Bible.

That launched me into the greatest plunge in the Bible, reading the New Testament in a month. And I continued in that passion, to date. I do not know how many times I have read the Bible through because there are times I have read two and even three times through the Bible in a year.

At one time I thought to use reading plans but I found them inadequate for my daily scripture consumption.

What did that do to me? You may ask.

In a short while, I discovered that most of the questions I had been wrestling with since childhood were resolved. I did not even know when they were answered, only realising that they were no longer troubling my spirit.

That is why my greatest burden as a minister is to get God’s people to consistently read God’s word.

Another thing I realised as I continued to grow in the scriptures was that I started changing. Some grey areas became glaring black and white.

Even my character changed as people who have known me for a long time will tell you.

The word is transformational (John 17:17)

That is what the world needs to be able to believe in Christ.

Let us for a moment go back to our star performer, the tight rope walker.

I want us to apply a small twist on the tail (oops, tale)

As things stand, everybody in that congregation is convinced that the performer can easily carry someone on his wheelbarrow along that rope. They know that he will do so.

They can bet their life savings on the fact that he could carry someone ELSE along that rope.

Now suppose with me that in that great hush someone says that he was willing to be on that wheelbarrow?

The gapes in those aaahhs would have allowed someone to see through to their stomachs.

‘How many will pay me to be on that barrow?’, he would then ask

Everybody would of course be willing to stake everything they had to pay to see this spectacle of someone doing what they were all scared to risk.

Then he would organise for a finance team to collect all those offerings which would fill a few sacks.

They would then come back for more to of course encourage this foolish daredevil stake his life on a rope high above the ground.

Again, suppose with me that the performer was as shrewd as they come.

He had thus organised for this whole spectacle to fleece the spectators.

They guy thus goes up the building, apparently to ride on the barrow. But they have their own plan where they have made an image and dressed it like the person who had committed to ride that barrow.

He therefore places the image on the barrow and, due to the distance between the rope and the ground, nobody can see whether it was a person on the rope or not.

The crowd would therefore leave very pleased and the performer and his team very rich.

This of course takes us to miracles versus the word.

And they said unto Moses, Speak thou with us, and we will hear: but let not God speak with us, lest we die. (Exodus 20:19)

Is this not similar with what I have just described?

What did Moses have that would shield him from the death that Israel would have experienced had God continued to speak to them?

He knew God and had heard from Him consistently.

Israel was scared of staking their lives on the power resident in God’s word that they threw Moses in that fray to die on their behalf if his faith would have been misplaced.

Only that it wasn’t.

Many people hate me for pouring scorn on their dads and mums of the faith, calling them plain conmen, whether they are aware of the fact or not.

They are like that team the performer raised to fleece the audience because none in the audience was willing to take the plunge.

And nowhere are people unwilling to take the plunge than in the things of God.

I fear God will order me to leave my job.

I am afraid that God will order me to break my relationship.

I am scared God will ask me to become a missionary to Gaza or Ukraine.

I am scared God will want me to hate music and dancing.

These are all reasons (I will not call them excuses) for refusing to get on that wheelbarrow called submitting to God’s will.

That is always because we do not know God enough to stake our lives on His orders. And miracles are not the route to know God.

Only God’s word has the capacity of giving us enough knowledge of God to be in a position to make an informed plunge into God’s will and orders.

This is because in my illustration, nobody in the audience could have finally been persuaded to be on that barrow even if ten people had ridden on it.

The only reason someone could have ridden that barrow was adequate information and experience with the performer.

I am sure you have watched acrobats doing those stunts that had you swallow your heart again and again. I know some of you have watched magicians performing those crazy acts.

However, apart from giving them your heart or money, I doubt anyone of you would be crazy enough to stake their life on the guillotine or having someone doing those crazy acts over your head.

Those volunteers are part of the acts.

I am sure that even if you have watched that act unlimited times it would be impossible to take that risk.

Yet if the performer took you into his secret, you will very gladly take the plunge as it would cease from being such.

That is what the Bible does to the believer. It allows us to know God enough to stake our all in Him.

People prefer the tithe doctrine which is plain OT because giving 100% to God is too huge a risk to take. What if God orders me to fast for the whole month? What if God does not supply adequately for my needs?

We want to be called believers but we do not want (we fear) to trust God completely with our everything.

Yet that is what the spiritual broker and conman prey on.

They will pretend to be Moses willing to get into that consuming fire for us in exchange of our feeding their every fancy. You see, everyone in that audience was ready to pay dearly to watch the risk taker on that barrow.

Nowhere is this more evident than the faith realm.

Prophets in their Hoods

But Jesus said unto them, A prophet is not without honour, but in his own country, and among his own kin, and in his own house. (Mark 6:4)

I want to briefly take us to a different place to make you understand what Jesus meant here.

Do you realise that in David’s initial army his tribe (Judah) contributed the fewest soldiers? They were followed by Simeon who lived among them.

Judah - 6,800

Simeon – 7,100

Levi – 4,600

Aaronites – 3,700 (Total Levites 8,300)

Benjamin, the kindred of Saul – 3,000 (for hitherto the greatest part of them had kept the ward of the house of Saul).

Ephraim – 20,800.

 Manasseh – 18,000

 Zebulun – 50,000

 Naphtali – 37,000

 Danites - 18,600

 Asher – 40,000

Reubenites, Gadites, half tribe of Manasseh – 120,000 (1Chronicles 12: 24 -37, condensed)

Even the Levites, whose duty did not involve war, had more soldiers.

Only Benjamin had fewer soldiers because the big man belonged to their tribe, making this point even more poignant.

Remember Nabal, who insulted David when he went to look for food from him during his party time? He was from Judah.

Though he would hide on Judah’s territory, his tribesmen did not consider him their leader.

Remember Jonathan surrendered his armour to David even as his elder brother was rebuking him for running from responsibility to come and watch war?

To imagine the crown prince handing over his kingdom to David even as his own brother was rebuking him for pride. It actually means that the person with the greatest reason to reject David saw and acted on the reality of David as the anointed king he should serve under when the person who had all the time and reason to verify the reality was unable or unwilling to see.

Yet these are the same people who scrambled to possess him when Absalom was defeated, saying he was closer to them than he was to the other tribes.

What does it mean to us today?

Chances of your own joining you in your struggle are very slim. Yet the same people will insist on owning you when you succeed.

You must therefore be very careful in your struggle so that you avoid impediments to your progress just because you believe that blood is thicker than water.

Incidentally that is the leading reason for the failure of many politicians and political outfits. The leaders forget the grassroots people who poured their sweat and blood to get them where they are and instead chose closeness to people, probably moneyed, who, though they were not on their side, were able to convince them they had more to offer than the crowds. They will realise too late that the temporal power must have the grassroots all the time to be sustainable.

Sadly, it is also the same with ministry and ministers. I have seen many relocate from the slums where they built their ministry when they got one or two wealthy supporters and forgot the people who gave their ministry its validity. I have seen churches built on discipleship killing the same when they ‘succeed’. I have seen churches discard the youth yet they were built on the same youth when they discover people with more resources joining them.

Allow me to leave this message here so that you can reflect

When Servants Fare Better than their Lords

Jesus answered and said unto them, Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God. (Matthew 22:29)

I have been thinking of these big-name ministers who live large on the giving of the people they presumably serve who lead pitiable lives.

Then it dawned on me (God opened my eyes to this reality) that it is guided by some assumptions.

How do children normally treat their father?

He is the ever-present provider and protector that very few children appreciate or acknowledge.

A father never shouts to be recognised. A father never highlights the sacrifices he makes to provide.

You will realise in many family settings that it is the mother who gets the bulk of the gratitude because she is the visible reality, probably the one who draws the attraction of the children to her input.

Look at these examples.

A father pays school fees for a child, does the shopping (or provides for the same) and gives some pocket money, money that the child feels is inadequate yet the father has reached his limit.

In that argument (or whatever) comes the mother to resolve the stalemate.

What does she do?

She takes her shopping money (that the same man had given her) and gives the child.

Now the same child goes all over screaming how his mother is the life saver, the only one who can sacrifice for him, looking at his father as inadequate without considering that every single coin in that pocket of his came from the same man he thinks is ‘useless and uncaring’.

Or a father goes shopping and buys the ingredients to make a meal fit for a king.

The mother converts them into a meal.

The children fall over themselves to pour praise and gratitude for a meal well prepared and forgets the man who made it possible. He could have been a table cloth or dishwasher for all they care.

These are things I have seen too many times to count.

Fathers rarely notice that. Or it does not seem to affect them in any significant way since he is content to take the responsibilities God has laid on him without a fuss.

I know of men who were evicted from their property by their children because the said children had concluded that they owed him nothing since he had provided nothing in their lives forgetting that their father had been the sole breadwinner long before they developed those teeth to bite him. Yet the mother had been able to convince them that their father was worthless and had been worthless all along, yet they were evicting him from property his own effort acquired.

I have seen fathers beaten to pulp by their children at the instigation of their mother because the mother got fed up with him, probably because he lost his job or retired.

How many fathers are left to live alone in their sunset years while their children are scrambling to host their mother? How many are left fending for themselves even as the wife is shuttling from child to child to compensate for the ‘sacrifice’ she made to raise them up?

Just this morning I have learnt of a neighbor who has died of hunger since his wife visits to bring him food once a week as she lives some distance away with the children. The person who has told me once worked in his compound and had told me of the neglect even before his unfortunate death.

Sadly, this is one among many such incidences.

Someone equated a father with an earth mover or grader that is used to carpet a road which, after completing the task is unworthy to use the same road. It has to be carried by a worthy vehicle along that road.

A father’s usefulness determines his value. Once he loses his usefulness (loses his job, retires, ages, etc.) he is quickly disposed of. He was indispensable only due to his usefulness.

What am I driving at? You may be wondering.

Do you know that many believers treat God the same way?

We need God only when we have no other option. We need God because we know we cannot do without Him.

But we are not in the least interested in any relationship with Him, especially because we know that relationship will give us responsibilities we would rather not have.

Let us look at another thing.

Have you ever wondered why children are closer to a mother than a father?

The simple reason is that their mother is the one who knows the right screws to turn to make this ‘stingy’ human to give.

They believe their father does not love them and only gives because their mother has compelled him.

There are situations where a husband used his resources to turn the children against their mother because the mother chose Biblical submission over feminism. Yet these are exceptions, very rare ones.

We know that God is the provider. But we look at Him as a stingy one who must be coerced to give.

That is where these spiritual brokers come in.

Have you ever wondered why someone would board a plane and incur hotel expenses so that their healing is prayed for? Ever asked why someone would sell their land to take the money to a prophet to release their breakthrough? Ever wondered why someone would disown and desert their family to move to a minister’s place? Ever wondered why a whole church would fast and pray for a pastor to get a guiding message for the coming year instead of doing the same to receive a personalised one? Ever wondered how a minister can be so immersed in sin, immorality and scandal yet his followers continue increasing instead of decreasing?

God is stingy, is the driving doctrine of their lives. They believe that God must be pushed to be gracious. He must be pushed to provide. He must be pushed to change things. He must be pushed to speak.

And that spiritual broker is the link. He/ she is the only one that knows the right keys to press to move God to step into their situations.

It therefore means that this spiritual broker must be bribed (say it with a spiritual accent) to speak to God on their behalf. The spiritual broker must be made to understand their situation to be able to convince God to step in.

Incidentally that is the whole doctrine of Mariolatry.

She, as our mothers, can touch her Son and His Father better than our feeble efforts.

All because God really does not want to be God in our lives that He must be convinced by somebody else.

Why then should I give God when the broker is the one who can move God to step into my situation? Why not give God through the broker in the first place. Or isn’t that the way we do when we think our fathers may not listen to us?

That is why a spiritual broker lives in the leafiest suburbs when those he brokers for live in the slums.

That is why a spiritual broker owns a private jet when those he brokers for walk to work, as they do everywhere else.

And the followers do not mind that disparity because they are convinced that God really must be pushed and they do not know how to push Him.

Incidentally, that is the reason some subordinate staff responsible for filing and files may be driving cars they could not afford even if they were given their salaries for a hundred years – they know where your file is and who needs to sign it for your situation to be sorted. That was prevalent before the digital age when files could disappear at will or a pen to sign them needed very expensive ink. Though I still hear of similar situations especially where a meeting must be convened to pass things and such.

I hope my point is getting across.

A faulty theology has the capacity of derailing one’s life completely

God is love. God loves us with an infinite love. God is concerned about us. God will step into our situations, not because of how much we have cried, but because that is His nature.

He does not need the pleading of any brokers, not even Mary, to respond to us.

Christ died so that we can have unfettered access to God. No wonder He is the ONLY WAY, ONLY TRUTH, ONLY LIFE.

He is the only one through whom we can access God’s ears.

And it is only as we submit to His Lordship that we can use Him as our access to His Father.

That does not nullify the need for spiritual leaders.

But spiritual leaders are not brokers.

They are shepherds who are sheep like the rest, sheep who have been given the shepherding role by the Chief Shepherd (Christ). Their role being to help the sheep under them to be able to hear the voice of the Chief Shepherd and allow Him to lead them.

They could be the ears of the sheep they lead in a very minimal way because their major role is to connect the sheep to the voice of their Shepherd.

But you see, having a spiritual broker is fun as I do not have to take responsibility for my spiritual life.

I can’t hear Christ’s voice and assume I have not heard. I can’t hear His command and behave as if I haven’t heard. And it really will not matter much whether I will assume or not because I know that I have heard.

But I can do that if I have a spiritual broker because then I can ‘receive’ and ‘possess’ only what agrees with me. I can even choose to divert what I do not agree with to the person seated next to me or even behind since we are very many. And the spiritual broker knows what I am willing to ‘possess’ and ‘receive’ and so will release just that.

That is why those brokers must have their palms very well-greased as they take the responsibility of all these rebellious sheep who must connect to God’s bounty.

Another erroneous doctrine about fathers is entitlement.

Many children behave as if it is their right to receive everything from their father. That it is their right for their father to starve for them to eat.

That of course means that they have very little, if any, gratitude.

A father’s sacrifice is treated as nothing special because a father does not think of himself when he is doing what he should do.

Let me give an example.

As someone who uses public transport, I have noticed that students will rush to the most expensive vehicles while their fathers will wait for the cheapest. Yet it was that same father who gave that student their fare.

You may even hear the same student saying something like this to the others

I do not understand my father. Imagine he can afford to give me all this money yet has to wait for the ugliest matatu because it is the cheapest!

That sacrifice is not worth a dime to the child.

Yet is it not how many of us treat God, and especially Christ’s ultimate sacrifice on the cross?

And again, we see this error when we look at the spiritual brokers.

Many believers would rather sin than offend their spiritual ‘dad’ or ‘mum’. They believe their lives will shatter if that broker gets offended.

I have made many enemies when I insisted on calling some of those conmen by their spiritual names (spiritual brokers) to their followers. I have been called names when I trashed the authority they wielded over their idiotic followers. I have been cursed because I dared touch those anointed when I tried to convince their followers that they were also anointed.

But I still stand. I am still ministering. My anointing is still intact.

In fact, as long as my relationship with Christ is intact, I am completely safe and will continue calling all believers to their priestly roles.

The other error is closely connected to the second.

A father is judged for his omissions while the mother is judged for her commissions.

A father is judged for what he did not do (or could not do) while the mother is judged for what she did.

A father will not be forgiven for not buying that bike for a birthday though he brings the ingredients for making a cake that the mother bakes.

The same man might be denied that cake and sneered at while the mother is praised generously for remembering the child’s birthday.

Isn’t that the way many believers treat God?

Have you listened to the testimonies people with spiritual ‘moms’ and ‘dads’ and ‘spiritual covers’ give after their ‘breakthrough?

If I will be as crude as always, it will appear as if that man or woman of God did what God was unable or unwilling to do. God had refused to answer their prayers but that conman did it.

But I will hasten to add that not all children are like that.

However, those who can see through the smokescreen are ‘hated’ by their mothers because they are not willing to bite the hand that feeds them, so to speak. Their level headedness will be treated as spite because to many a woman, anything other than adoration is treated as hatred.

A woman’s greatest desire as per the curse at Eden is to supplant a man (and who better than her husband?). It is thus in her element to use her children to do it.

Again, I will hasten to add that not all women are like that.

There are many (who are a very small minority) who have allowed the Holy Spirit to so fill them that they willingly and happily submit to their husbands as per the scriptures.

I remember my mother who, though neglected and mistreated by her husband never once answered back at him or allowed any of her children to treat him with nothing other than reverence. We were never allowed to do what many children with responsible fathers do to them yet we did not exist in his scheme of things as he had another family that he was responsible for. She fed him until he died yet he never provided anything for her or her children, who were all his.

But I am talking about God and the conmen who behave as if they are the only ways to access God’s bounty.

Look at the way their supporters fight to prove the innocence of these crooks even when evidence is tabled against them? It is interesting when you hear their defence for things that are done in private. You wonder why they cannot allow them to defend themselves.

They will defend the utterances of those conmen more than they defend the cause of Christ or even scriptures. To them the scriptures derive their inspiration from the broker’s mouth.

This is not restricted to cults (I do not write to cults) but is rampant in major denominations and congregations, especially where the man or woman of God has experienced a measure of success or has a very flowery testimony.

I do not know how you will respond to this message