Month: October 2022

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FROM PASTOR'S DESK 2022

Rid your life of these things | By: J.O. Lawal | Date: October 30, 2022 | Series: From Pastor’s Desk | Number: Vol. 11, No. 26

Title: Rid your life of these things | By: J.O. Lawal | Date: October 30, 2022 | Series: From Pastor’s Desk | Number: Vol. 11, No. 26

Beloved: grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour. I am glad to welcome you to another week, which is the transition week between the months of October and November 2022. And I pray that God will cause His favour to overwhelm your life every day of the week, in Jesus’ name. Amen.

As we begin this week, let me remind you of the words of Peter that say, “Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander of every kind.” (1Peter 2:1NIV) What are the things Peter is asking us to rid ourselves of here? They are the works of the flesh. And he gives us examples of the works of the flesh that we need to rid ourselves of. He mentions malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy and slander. Of course, there are several works of the flesh that this apostle could have used as examples. But he used these ones, I believe, because they are major among those works of the flesh that often mess up Christian fellowship, ruin the church of God and hinder her growth and effectiveness.

For example, as terrible as adultery and idolatry are, they hardly result in church split or disintegration. But malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy and slander, if not addressed on time, can scatter any church in few weeks and fill the brethren involved with bitterness that may not go away for the rest of their earthly lives. And that is one of the reasons God is sometimes ruthless in judging these sins among His people.

Do you remember the case of Ananias and Sapphira? Why was God ruthless in judging them the way He did? Why did He kill these couples on the same day without even blinking an eye? It was because of deceit and hypocrisy. These people were trying to deceive the church of God about their offering, giving everyone the impression that they were giving more than they were actually giving. So, God judged them with death before they could get any chance to introduce other brethren to a life of deceit (Acts 5:1-11).

What this is showing us is that God cares about His church and will not fold His arms and watch anyone corrupt or destroy her, for the church is His temple. In fact, Paul tells us that God will destroy anyone that destroys His temple. All of this is why we need to take Peter’s admonition that we have in our opening text very seriously. We need to rid our lives of very kind of deceit, malice, envy, hypocrisy and slander, as we relate to one another in our various assemblies. Otherwise, we may bring down God’s judgment on ourselves. (Cf. 1Cor 3:16-17)

Unfortunately, many of God’s people are ignorant of these things. Therefore, they allow malice, hypocrisy, envy, deceit and slander to thrive and fester in their lives and among them. It is no big wonder, then, that we have many in our various Christian assemblies today that are battling with all kinds of sicknesses, poverty and distress that will not go away, regardless of how hard they pray or fast. What these ones need to do is to rid their lives of these terrible works of the flesh that they have permitted in them. And the healing of Jesus will begin to manifest in them.

Now perhaps the reason you too are facing certain problems that will not go away in your life is that you have given room for hatred, malice, envy, slander and hypocrisy in your life. You have allowed the devil to be using you to secretly or openly ruin the church of God. You need to repent now so that your life will be healed and made whole. Otherwise, things may go from bad to worse for you. My prayer is that your heart will be humbled to do the right thing without delay, in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Have a splendid week.

Copyright © 2022, Reality Desk, a ministry of Alaythia Bible Church –This material is the sole property of Reality Desk. It may be copied for personal non-commercial use only in its entirety free of charge. All copies must contain this copyright notice. Please direct any questions you may have to pastor@abcministry.com or call: 08037592851 (WhatsApp Number: 07085711280)

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Fire in my Bones Youth for Jesus

Don’t shut the door against His favour | By: J.O. Lawal | Fire in My Bones

fire in my bones
fire in my bones

Date: October 26, 2022 | Series: Youth for Jesus | Number: Vol. 5, No. 24

“Therefore the LORD, the God of Israel, declares: ‘I promised that your house and your father’s house would minister before me forever.’ But now the LORD declares: ‘Far be it from me! Those who honor me I will honor, but those who despise me will be disdained. The time is coming when I will cut short your strength and the strength of your father’s house, so that there will not be an old man in your family line and you will see distress in my dwelling. Although good will be done to Israel, in your family line there will never be an old man. Every one of you that I do not cut off from my altar will be spared only to blind your eyes with tears and to grieve your heart, and all your descendants will die in the prime of life.” (1Sam 2:30-33NIV)

Those were the words spoken to Eli the priest by the man of God that was sent to him. God, as we see in the text, said that He was changing His mind about the family of this priest. He had promised them before that they would minister before Him forever. But because of him and his sons He said that what He had promised would no longer happen.

So, if you think God never changes His mind about people, you are wrong. Yes, God will never change His mind about Himself. And He will never change His mind about His standards of righteousness and justice. But just as we have Scriptures that show us that He will not go back on any promise He has made, we also have those that show us that He can change His mind about people, for good or for evil, based on their attitude towards Him and His instructions.

As we see in the case of Eli, God changed His mind about him and his family. First, He said that He would not allow them to minister before Him forever again. That means, at some point, this man would no longer have any descendant as a priest before God. Second, God said that He would no longer allow them to live long. Eli himself died at the age of ninety-eight (1Sam 4:14-15). But God said that he would be the last person in his family line to live as long as that. Others would start dying young, starting with his sons, Hophni and Phinehas.

Why, then, was God so mad at this man that He judged him in this manner? It was because he allowed his sons to desecrate the priestly office God had given to them as a gift. Of course, he was not the one that committed all the atrocities his sons committed with their office. But as the head priest in the land, he was in a position to punish them for their crimes. But he did not. He did not restrain them but allowed them to continue to abuse and misuse their priestly office and privileges. Therefore, he unconsciously shut the door of God’s favour against his family line and his descendants.

In like manner, if we are abusing whatever position of advantage or privilege God has given us, we may just be shutting His door of favour against our descendants. This is why certain individuals, who were wealthy during their lifetimes or who once occupied very great and important positions in the world died and disappeared with their names, wealth and honour. Yes, they may still have living descendants that bear their names. But when those names are mentioned, they don’t ring any bell in anybody’s ears. And that is because those who now bear those names are some nonentities or irresponsible persons that no serious person wants to associate with.

Now such things, as I already pointed out, often happen when people abuse their positions and shut God’s door of favour against themselves and their family line. And if we don’t want similar or worse experiences in our lives, we need to watch how we too use whatever position of advantage God places us in life. That is because it can go a long way in determining whether His favour shown to us will flow down our family line to our descendants after us or will end with us. And may God fill your heart with the humility and patience you need to use whatever position of favour He places you in life in ways that will not deny those coming after you a similar or greater experience of His kindness. Amen.

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FROM PASTOR'S DESK 2022

Has your love grown cold? | By: J.O. Lawal | Date: October 23, 2022 | Series: From Pastor’s Desk | Number: Vol. 11, No. 25

Title: Has your love grown cold? | By: J.O. Lawal | Date: October 23, 2022 | Series: From Pastor’s Desk | Number: Vol. 11, No. 25

Beloved: grace and peace be yours abundantly from God our Father and Jesus Christ our Lord. I am very pleased to welcome you to the last week of the month of October 2022. I pray that God will keep you pure and blameless, spirit, soul and body at the appearing of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen.

One of the things our Lord says will happen in the last days is that the love of most people will grow cold. Why will this happen? It is because wickedness will increase in the world. And is this not true today? Is wickedness not daily increasing all around us? (Cf. Matt 24:12)

Look at our country, for example. Look at the way banditry, kidnapping, terrorism, sexual immorality, swindling, money rituals, killing and misappropriation of public funds are daily increasing. Also, look at the way the use of hard drugs is becoming more and more widespread among our young ones. Yet most of our leaders don’t take these things to heart at all.

Therefore, many of God’s people have totally given up on righteous living. They now live and act as though they were never saved by the Lord. Many don’t even want anyone to demand that they live right again. Yet they call themselves Christians. And this agrees with what our Lord says about how increase in wickedness will make the love of most believers grow cold in the last days.

The question now is, “Has your love for the Lord not grown cold because of the increase in wickedness that the world is daily witnessing?” If you are no longer excited about the word of God and prayer, your love for Him has already grown cold. If fellowshipping with God’s people is now boring to you and you no longer look forward to it, your love has grown cold. If you now get upset each time you are confronted with the truth, your love has grown cold. Also, if you have become selfish and reluctant to give to God and to support others, your love for the Lord has probably gone cold.

Now if your love for the Lord has grown cold because the wickedness of this world has gotten to you, you are already in danger of being swept away with the wicked. Remember that the Lord says that it is only those who stand firm to the end that will be saved (Matt 24:13). That means those who are true believers in Him will never quit walking in His love and righteousness. Instead, they will remain steadfast to the very end and so be saved. But those who quit are showing that their faith has never been genuine at all. So, instead of being saved, they will be lost.

All of this is why the word of God says, “Therefore, my brothers, be all the more eager to make your calling and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never fall, and you will receive a rich welcome into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” (2Peter 1:10-11NIV) Do you understand what this means? Well, it means that it is our job to daily confirm that we are genuinely saved by remaining steadfast in the love God. That is what will make us, like Stephen, receive a rich welcome into His eternal kingdom (Acts 8:54-60).

But if we have given up on the life He has called us to live, then, our so-called religion is useless and will ultimately take us nowhere. My prayer is that your faith in God and your love for Him will not end up being seeing by Him as a dead and useless, in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Have a great week.

Copyright © 2022, Reality Desk, a ministry of Alaythia Bible Church –This material is the sole property of Reality Desk. It may be copied for personal non-commercial use only in its entirety free of charge. All copies must contain this copyright notice. Please direct any questions you may have to pastor@abcministry.com or call: 08037592851 (WhatsApp Number: 07085711280)