As You Vote

Talk no more so exceeding proudly; let not arrogancy come out of your mouth: for the LORD is a God of knowledge, and by him actions are weighed. (1Samuel 2:3)

The fear of the LORD is to hate evil: pride, and arrogancy, and the evil way, and the froward mouth, do I hate. (Proverbs 8:13)

And I will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; and I will cause the arrogancy of the proud to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible. (Isaiah 13:11)

I want to write about the Kenya elections. I have restrained myself from writing or responding to all the heat being generated from all the conversations.

But I just want to post what I am praying for so that I may get some partners in the same.

Remember Nebuchadnezzar? I am praying that God deals thus with pride in some of these leaders we have. I do not mean eating grass and the sort, though it won’t hurt if it happened.

But I want God to humble the proud Kenyans, from the leaders to the voters and bloggers and commentators, so that they get to know that The LORD is God.

I am praying that God will humble the proud in such a way that they will see His finger print in it. And I want it to be unmistakable to whoever sees.

From the president and the governors (oh governors!) to all the other positions; I want pride to be dealt with.

Why do I pray like this?

Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble. (James 4:6b)

I want to see that resistance. And I want all Kenyans to see it too.

Our chest thumping has to stop. And only God can conclusively do it.

I want our children to grow out of the folly we inherited from our parents. They must learn that praying for leaders is not praying for the ones we prefer to win. They must learn that prophecy is not about their preference winning. They must learn that God does not speak just to affirm our choice. And they must learn that the vote is not bigger than the sovereignty of God.

So will you pray with me that God will shock us out of our folly?

The Closet, the Source

In the first year of his reign I Daniel understood by books the number of the years, whereof the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah the prophet, that he would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem. And I set my face unto the Lord God, to seek by prayer and supplications, with fasting, and sackcloth, and ashes: (Daniel 9: 2, 3)

We have looked at the closet and its importance in our faith.

But what are the contents of the closet? What makes the closet powerful? What gives the closet life and delight? What makes it fulfilling?

Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth. (John 17:17)

The closet is the place where we transact with the King of kings.

Let me tell you why the word is essential to the closet. And I will use a king as an example.

Whose word has power when you meet with a king? Whose, between your word and the king’s carries the day? Whose word has the capacity and ability to move things?

Our talking in the presence of the king can only serve to make him speak, because a king’s word has power. Remember Haman coming to meet the king had to listen and do what the king wanted irrespective of what he was coming for.

Where the word of a king is, there is power: (Ecclesiastes 8:4a)

It is not any different when God is the King we are addressing; His word is the one with power and not ours. Our prayer is therefore as powerful as the King’s word we are receiving.

We do not boast about the quantity and quality of words we have spoken to God. We can only boast of the single word God spoke. There is no short cut

Is it not surprising that these days prayer experts are known for the amount of words they speak? That they teach people the right words to pray? And yet they do not teach them to spend adequate time in God’s word to know the releases from God.

I pronounce. I prophesy. I declare and decree. As if God ever delegated that prerogative to man!

Whatever happened to ‘Thy will be done on earth as it is being done in heaven’? Whatever happened to ‘Seek first His kingdom and righteousness’?

Just imagine approaching a king and declaring that he will knight you. How will it appear?

Yet that is what many of us do when approaching God in prayer. We approach God with declarations of what He must do for us. We forget that He is the one who declares and that no declaration of ours can accomplish anything if He has not decreed it.

Keep thy foot when thou goest to the house of God, and be more ready to hear, than to give the sacrifice of fools: for they consider not that they do evil. (Ecclesiastes 5:1)

Our closets are dry because we approach the King with our words instead of waiting for His word. Our prayer lives are dry because we approach him with our bottled water instead of asking to drink from His eternal well. Like the Samaritan woman we gloat over what we have instead of cry for what He has. That can make the closet really difficult.

That explains why we love to make noise in prayer. We think God answers our prayers depending on our decibels. We even hide under tongues to justify our affinity to noise forgetting that God knows what we need long before we even realize the same.

And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear. (Isaiah 65:24)

We do not therefore pray to inform Him about our needs. We pray to connect to His solutions for those needs. That is what makes the closet so powerful, and necessary.

Moses spent forty days on the mount just hearing from God. Not only did he not eat or drink anything the whole time but came out with a glowing face. For me that is the ultimate of the closet, spending time with God that everything else fades into insignificance. And anyone who has spent time in a closet will confirm this.

The greater purpose of the closet is to give us undivided time to spend with God, speaking with Him so that we can get His take on our situation. The reason He requires to speak is to enable us hear His responses clearly enough as they will be in line with our thought flow.

That is why we see God using questions and analogies to teach as we read the Bible. He wants us to hear His message and understand it clearly. Then we will be able to respond with obedience.

A closet devoid of the word is not a closet. Just like a fast without prayer is a hunger strike, a closet without God’s word is a self-imposed solitary confinement. This is because one will just be making a conversation with themselves. And they wonder that they are not seeing much result!

It has nothing to do with our feelings, however powerful they may be. Feeling the presence may just mean that it is another presence that is floating around.

God’s presence inspires holiness, because He is holy. But even more important is that His presence drives us to His word because that is His revelation. And it is that revelation that that drives us to His holiness.

I will worship toward thy holy temple, and praise thy name for thy lovingkindness and for thy truth: for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name. (Psalm 138:2)

If the closet does not lead me to not just appreciate God’s word but read and obey it, I doubt we understand what Christ meant when He advised it. But it is worse because we are using spiritual words without meaning, what Christ called babbling like the heathen.

In defense of our unproductive spirituality, we argue that God gives three answers when we pray. He can say Yes, granting our petition. He can say wait, meaning that the answer will take some time before coming. Or He may say No, meaning He has refused to grant us our request.

I, however, want us to go farther. Do you know the answer He has given for your prayer?

We try to use God to defend our dumbness to God’s voice. By ascribing God to three answers, we feel safe in our lack of clarity from Him. Yet nothing could be farther from the truth.

God speaks, and speaks very clearly if we are listening. He will tell us the answer if we want to know it.

Remember Him telling Moses that He did not want him repeating a prayer? Remember Him telling Joshua to stop making ‘prayerful’ noise and take action? Remember Him telling Jeremiah to stop praying for his people?

Why should He be vague with you when you pray, unless your prayer is amiss? Why should you guess the answer when He has promised to clearly guide you? Why must you grope in the dark concerning His will when He not only created the light, He is the light.

But we have a problem with the light because we are not ready to follow it to the end. We are scared that knowing His will topple all our apple carts and mess our lives big time. He could even lead us to the desert (as if He will leave us on our own). And we have enough examples of people whose lives He has ‘messed’ by ordering them to do the strangest of things, from leaving stable employment to closing profitable enterprises to moving to the most miserable places.

Noah was told to prepare for the flood when he had never seen a drop of rain. Abraham was asked to leave the security of his people. Isaiah was asked to walk naked for three years. Daniel had to contend with hungry lions. The list is endless.

That is what many are scared of. It is easier to guess God’s direction because then it would leave me enough options should I find an order uncomfortable. I would rather deal with three answers than deal with what I know God wants from me, because then I would have no excuse for choosing otherwise.

The consequences of hearing clearly are what makes the closet a no go zone for many believers. Yet that is what makes it most attractive once one has dealt with that resistance.

I love to hear, uncomfortable as it is. I prefer dealing with obedience, however difficult it may be. This is because it brings such joy and fulfillment that can never be found anywhere else. And it also opens me up for God to manifest in my stumbling obedience because my heart is settled on that obedience.

There are people who do not like to tell me about their struggles because I ask them what God is saying about those situations. Saying that I will pray for them is more important for them, whether I will pray for them or not, than asking them whether they know what God is saying about their situation. They would rather guess God’s will than get it clearly.

And thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left. (Isaiah 30:21)

Hearing is one thing. Choosing to walk in where the voice leads is another. And that is the crux of the matter. We want to pray but do not want to hear God’s voice. We would love to share God’s good news but do not want those news to transform us completely.

Will you choose the uncomfortable aspects of the closet to get maximum benefits from it?

If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you. (John 15:7)

In closing, let me give us this verse, trusting that God will give me an opportunity to develop this further as there is so much in the closet.

But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. (Matthew 4:4)

And this is where it was written

And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the LORD doth man live. (Deuteronomy 8:3)

Confused Conclusions

Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate day and night. (Psalm 1: 1, 2)

I want us to look briefly at the implications of the so called prosperity gospel though it really should be called a heresy. It is such because it leads its adherents to a lifestyle so removed from reality that it can be called alternate reality. And it is because it takes the Bible and wants it to say what they want to believe.

What is a blessing? What is the evidence of the blessed? How do the blessed behave?

This comes from some conversations you will normally hear from believers with some very interesting conclusions about blessing.

The other day a secular ‘gospel’ artist was asked to explain some of his scandals and his argument was that God couldn’t have blessed him as much if what he was doing was wrong. And his reference was his shows to his earnings to his media exposure.

In the doctrine, a blessing is directly proportional to earthly success. Thus a person driving is more blessed than the one walking, irrespective of their walk with God. It implies that a conman in the name of pastor who drives the latest edition SUV is more blessed than the missionary out in the doldrums preaching to an unresponsive unreached nation making do with the barest of necessities.

The plain teaching of the Bible is that a blessing is more of what we are in God than what we have. Blessing is more of what we do than what we have.

Look at the Beatitudes. Is there any scent of what we call blessing.

For example, ‘Blessed are those who are persecuted to righteousness sake …’, where do we fit it in our rotten doctrine?

Someone is blessed when they are rightly aligned to God and His purposes. They are blessed when they are in a right relationship with God. They are blessed when they are living according to God’s standards. And they are blessed when they are walking with God.

Job was as blessed when undergoing the trials as he was before and after. He was as blessed when he had nothing as he was when he was full.

And said, Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither: the LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD. (Job 1:21)

Whoever deceived us that a car, a degree, a visa, a house, etc. consists a blessing?

And if things define a blessing, what will we say about the wealthy wicked.

There is something else I want to refute.

Many of these superstars (and sadly some are pastors) use an argument when they are challenged about their doctrine or lifestyle.

They use an African saying that only a tree with fruit has stones thrown at it.

The implication is that they are being criticized for the ‘blessing’ they are.

If doing nothing is no big deal, why did Jesus curse the fig tree? It was doing absolutely nothing.

Sewage does nothing but nobody wants to be near it. A dumpsite also does absolutely nothing but everybody is complaining about it.

Could it be that you are a spiritual sewage and that is why everybody is complaining about the stench your songs, sermons, lifestyle is giving?

If you get your prophecy from news items instead of God’s word, you are emitting effluent. If your word of knowledge is got from social media trending topics instead of God’s word, yours is really sewage. If the TV defines your prayer life, you are also emitting effluent.

Do you defend divorce? Do you floss over sexual immorality? Do you have no problems with marital breakages? Are you fine when a wife is not submissive? Is it no issue when a husband is not spiritually responsible?  And do you really know what the Bible says about those things?

God’s word should define your life. It should define your convictions. It should guide you thoughts.

Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. (Colossians 3:16)

Is that where we get our songs? Is that where we get our sermons? Is that where we get our convictions?

Are you emitting the stench of death or the aroma of life?

To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them. (Isaiah 8:20)

If that is not the source of your blessing, stop deceiving yourself that you are blessed, because you aren’t.

The Closet, Our Solution

But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. (Matthew 6:6)

I have been praying, and wondering how people on fire for God can forget God, especially as God prospers them.

How could Asa forget how God fought for him against a million-strong army to even start living contrary to His laws? How could Solomon forget God who appeared twice to him and live life completely removed from His word and revelation? How could Jeroboam create alternative worship yet God had delivered the kingdom He had prophesied? And how come David did not go that route?

The only reason I can think of is the disappearance of the closet. We become too full of people, things and events that we slowly delegate that essential aspect of our faith to the periphery, and later forget it altogether.

The sad fact is that due to our earlier spiritual potency we might never be found out, in fact we may be able to deceive ourselves that we are fine. We may forget even about reading the scriptures unless as reference for our sermons and not realize it. I have heard pastors misquote favorite verses they claim to have memorized so consistently that you wonder whether they ever read their Bibles.

The closet is the place we see ourselves as God sees us since we are in His presence. We are unable to act up anything since we are speaking to God one on one.

We are in no position to impress anyone as we stand naked before God. As opposed to when we are praying before people or with them, we have no backward glance when we are in the closet. We have nobody to divert any message we receive in the closet to. We cannot tell Him how much we love Him in the closet since He knows it from the depths we can’t even approach. We can never try to demonstrate how much we are committed to Him in the closet.

We see blunders in judgment when the closet is neglected or forgotten.

Uzzah died because David and His team had assumed what God had wanted instead of reading His word concerning the same. King Saul went to a witch because he had neglected the closet for so long that he forgot its direction. Aaron and Miriam became jealous of their brother because they had neglected the closet. Joshua gave a promise to preserve the Gibeonites because he looked at external evidence instead of going to the closet. And the disciples panicked severally because they had forgotten that the closet was present with them.

What am I saying?

The closet is my interaction with God. It is the point at which I fellowship with the King of kings.

And in the morning, rising up a great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed. (Mark 1:35)

Jesus taught us by example.

My voice shalt thou hear in the morning, O LORD; in the morning will I direct my prayer unto thee, and will look up. (Psalm 5:3)

David also knew the power of the closet. Moses exemplified the closet because we see him asking directions for the most obvious of questions.

If we mess by neglecting the closet in our decisions, what will happen when we make it a habit? What will happen when we do not even realize that we have lost the closet for our busyness, especially in ministry?

The most dangerous thing is assuming that God values us for our performance instead of a relationship with him. We therefore celebrate our actions even as we neglect the small room that we meet with the God we are pouring all our energies to please.

Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity. (Matthew 7: 22, 23)

Then we are shocked that He does not seem to appreciate all our effort. Like Saul we wonder why He does not speak to us when we need it most desperately. Saul had forgotten to seek God’s voice for so long that He did not realize that He had ran off His agenda for the longest time.

Ministry is the most dangerous venture in this as we are enjoying His power and manifestation as we follow the motions of what we know He wants us to do even as we neglect getting deeper in our relationship with Him. We are enjoying seeing His power at work in us as we do things that we confuse it with His approval. And we can become so busy in ministry that we forget our personal responsibilities, especially the responsibility to grow our spiritual muscle through a rich relationship with God grown in the closet.

We can read the Bible as a text book we need to perform and teach instead of the word of the King and Lord of our lives. That is why you see preachers who are very eloquent on ancient texts who are unable to deal with sin, probably the first thing the closet draws our attention to. It does that because fallible and sinful man has the audience of a holy God. No one came to God and failed to see His sinfulness.

Psalm 32 tells us of David running away from the closet because of sin.

When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long. For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me: my moisture is turned into the drought of summer. Selah. (Psalm 32: 3, 4)

He had missed the closet because he had feared the confrontation his sin would have introduced. For the time he was hiding from the confrontation, his physical body was wasting away.

I think it is due to his craving for the closet that God confronted him. Once the barrier for the closet was removed, he gets restored immediately.

His psalms are clear indicators of a man who really enjoyed the closet. Many, if not all of them were direct products of the closet. That explains why they are so rich and illuminating. It is because they were coming out of the throne room of God through a servant enjoying His presence.

Do we have a closet? How often do we visit it? Are we still in the closet or are we making noise in God’s presence? Are we listening or we are treating our voice as the most valuable there?

Be still and know I am God is exemplified in the closet. We are giving Him the chance to show Himself to us as He wills instead of giving Him conditions about our situation.

I will build up on what else is needed in the closet later.

But in closing let me say that we quote ministers (even if it is me) instead of God because we do not spend enough time with God. We are listening to them more than we listen to God, especially in the closet. That we can fight for the statements and doctrines of our super star preachers and prophets is a clear indicator that we really do not know God or spend time with Him.