When God Shows Off

Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. (Psalm 23:5)

I am thinking of God showing off and what He needs to do it.

Do you realize that God can only show off when we give Him the chance to do so? Do you realize that He does not compete with us in getting glory? Do you know that there are some people who give God more glory than others?

God boasts with those who allow Him to show off. He releases those who compete with Him for that glory. In other words He leaves them to their devices when they are competing for space.

What am I talking about? You may be wondering.

In Matthew 6 we see Jesus instructing us to do things in secret so that God will show the results openly.

But today I want us to look at something else.

Why does the Bible instruct us to behave as if we do not have enemies? Why are we told to love our enemies and treat them as friends? Why are we instructed not to rejoice when our enemy is going down? Why are we ordered to restore an enemy’s ass when we find it lost?

God is looking for space to show off with us.

Human nature after the fall became vengeful and selfish. An enemy is therefore supposed to be vanquished, not helped. A normal person in his fallen nature will therefore seek to destroy the enemy at the first opportunity he got, or leave him to rot when he finds him down. We do not have second chances for enemies.

Then comes God.

He demands that we trash all those sentiments and values for His.

Give up everything, even your rights, and allow God to show off.

David has one bitter enemy who was his king. But then David, like God teaches, loved and was loyal to him. He can spare his life even when the same guy was looking for David to kill him.

He is loyal to his family even after he dies.

Remember his son overthrowing him? Yet even for that he still wants to offer him a second chance, even grieving when the said treasonous son is killed in battle.

No wonder that he was called a man after God’s heart!

As such God had no issues showing off in his life again and again. That is the reason he was always said to be fighting God’s battles.

The way we deal with enemies is one way we can give God a chance to show off.

Another key one is waiting for Him.

By waiting for Him I mean leaving our options out of the equation. We are telling God that we will be content with His prescription for our issues.

Read the Bible to see the wealth of promises for the one who waits for God.

But we are not talking about patience; just waiting. We are talking about waiting on the revelation God has released for us. Just waiting is not a virtue if there is nothing from God that you are waiting for. It is therefore not waiting for God if there is nothing God has promised you that you are waiting for.

Many have lost terribly when they waited without revelation.

How many have waited into their fifties for a spouse that refused to arrive? How many waited for a job that never materialized?

I call that waiting with an attitude.

Some girls I know followed the word of their pastor or bishop as opposed to God’s word and missed their season, or got burnt in the process. You see, you can only hold God to His word and not any other word. It is the same with waiting, even more so.

We are therefore talking about waiting on God, a waiting that is active as opposed to passive as most think. We are therefore serving Him even as we wait for Him.

You are therefore making a statement the God is everything you desire and so you will wait for Him until He ‘shows up’. Revelation is the key to that waiting.

Sometimes God will give a command that takes you to the desert with no escape route or even sensible explanation for the same. That is when our waiting is severely tested.

One of my most difficult seasons is when God called me from employment.

I was certain that God had wanted me to leave employment. I didn’t know what exactly He wanted me to do when I left that employment.

I therefore had a very hard five years of waiting.

Interesting enough is the fact that there were very many attempted diversions from that waiting period, including several offers of becoming a pastor of one church or the other.

But God would always demand that I turn those offers down.

But He eventually opened the door He had intended me to pass through though it is clear that He needed me to pass through that season of waiting.

And even that was a pathway to other orders that I had to obey to be able to get to where I am now.

Even now I continue waiting even as I follow His leading on His new phase with the ministry He has called me.

I still wait to see Varsity on the Hill functional. Yet at this point I am looking to see the seed starting to bud as I wait for a release to sow it soon. Please pray with me.

Yet waiting can be the most fruitful and rewarding of our lives of faith. This is because it is the process through which character is developed and gifts are nurtured.

That is where the roots of our Christian lives are developed long before the leaves and fruit is seen.

This explains why many ministers are unable to handle fame, money or success as their roots were not grown through waiting for God. Their gifts were exposed before their character had been grown through the waiting.

Joseph waited for a long time before becoming the man guy in Egypt. David waited for twenty years before becoming king yet their gifts were there even before the process started. The gifts activated that season.

The verse talks about enemies as they are the ones actively involved in sabotaging God’s promise or release. They are the ones whose resistance makes us dig deeper in our faith and seek more passionately for clarity as we pursue what God has released.

That is why they will be at the dinner table when God is showing off with us.

Incidentally some of those bitter enemies will after they see God showing with us become some of our most ardent supporters. And I say this from experience.

Remember Saul’s kinsmen (Benjamites) had a bigger army joining David than Judah before he was anointed undisputed king of Israel? Remember Joseph’s brothers must have instructed their children to make sure that Joseph is not buried in Egypt?

Yet some will not waver in their opposition though it will not mean much to one who has grown his waiting muscles. Remember Michal never fully submitted to David’s anointing?

I will repeat. Revelation is the key. If God uses someone to give the word, seek clarity from God concerning the same. Do not just accept a word that has been sent to millions to be your personal word. Do not even accept a word because it is apparently directed at only you. Do not accept a word because you dreamt it.

We are told to test the spirits. And God did not stop speaking when He gave that word. And God will never give a word that is contrary to His word, the Bible. And He never gives contrary word.

The young prophet from Judah is clear evidence. Even a prophetic word can be tested. In fact a true prophetic word should be tested. A true prophet opens himself to testing. That is what the Bible plainly teaches. And you can start by testing this message.

Whose word are you following? Are you giving God a chance to show off?