Here are several very personal questions to help you know how severe we need to be with ourselves in order to "abstain from wickedness." Answer each one honestly.
• Are you regularly with a person of the opposite sex in inappropriate situations?
• Are you completely above reproach in all your financial dealings, including your taxes?
• Do you expose yourself to explicit sexual material?
• If you have a family, do you invest sufficient time with them?
• Do you tell the truth? How often do you lie (don't forget to count the little white ones)?
• How quickly do you say "I am wrong; I am genuinely sorry" when you have said or done something that hurts another?
• Do you hold grudges?
• Are you knowingly compromising in some area of your life, refusing to acknowledge the consequences that you will surely have to face?
• Have you formed a habit that is detrimental to your health or your job or your walk with Christ?
• Are you proud, selfish, arrogant?
• Have you taken credit for something that someone else did and should have been rewarded for?
• Do you return things you borrow?
• Have you failed to confess something to someone who should know of your wrongdoing?
• Are you abusing your mate or your children---physically or emotionally?
• Do you allow abuse to happen without seeking help?
• Do you regularly spend time in prayer and in the Scriptures?
Excerpted from Day by Day with Charles Swindoll, Copyright © 2000 by Charles R. Swindoll, Inc. (Thomas Nelson Publishers). All rights reserved worldwide. Used by permission.
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Saints with Arms?
I had awesome conversations during the period of the last crisis in Jos – one first hand and the other narrated.
During the crisis, I was talking with my neighbours who are Christians and one of them said “we Christians will not be able to fight like the other fellows do because the next time we are in Church our pastors will preach to us to embrace peace and love while the other folks are being strategically positioned to be alert to fight for their god.
A friend, who teaches at a Christian secondary school in Jos discovered during the first week of resumption of school after the crisis that there was a daily increase in students’ attendance but plunged dramatically on Friday. He asked the students what could be responsible for the remarkable drop in attendance, the students responded “when Christians go to their services they come out pious and armless while the others go and strategise on how to foment uproar so as to deal with non-adherents of their faith.
What immediately came to me after the second discussion was that are Christians suppose to come out of their meetings and services weak and jelly-like? Should we also include in our order of service issues of arms and attack? Are we supposed to sit back and be content with defending ourselves when this kind of event happened? Is there not a way we can also launch an attack at certain times and situation?
I answered in my thoughts, if Elijah had strategized on a physical note, would he have escaped the siege of the Assyrians? If it was just the regular meetings, would Elijah have been able to give accurate intelligence report to the king of Israel about the plan of the Assyrian army? Did David win the battle against Goliath in the flesh? Didn’t he take the advantage of Goliath taking the battle to the Spirit?
It is sad to say that the meetings we have in most churches are so weightless, laced with uneducated enthusiasm, open-ended celebration, story-telling that have no bearing on equipping the saints.
Saints are to come out meetings, services, conventions, conferences strong, armed and dangerous that the enemies will not be able to handle. Is it impossible for us to pick up the slightest signals in the spirit before the crisis and alert the relevant authorities? Are we not supposed to be trained to have unequivocal aptitude to engage the ministering spirits in all of these issues? Why have forgotten so soon that angels are still at work?
Isa 1:11 "Why this frenzy of sacrifices?" GOD's asking. "Don't you think I've had my fill of burnt sacrifices, rams and plump grain-fed calves? Don't you think I've had my fill of blood from bulls, lambs, and goats?
Isa 1:12 When you come before me, who ever gave you the idea of acting like this, Running here and there, doing this and that-- all this sheer commotion in the place provided for worship?
Isa 1:13 "Quit your worship charades. I can't stand your trivial religious games: Monthly conferences, weekly Sabbaths, special meetings-- meetings, meetings, meetings--I can't stand one more!
Isa 1:14 Meetings for this, meetings for that. I hate them! You've worn me out! I'm sick of your religion, religion, religion, while you go right on sinning.
Isa 1:15 When you put on your next prayer-performance, I'll be looking the other way. No matter how long or loud or often you pray, I'll not be listening. And do you know why? Because you've been tearing people to pieces, and your hands are bloody.
What Elijah did was not Old Testament it is a walk in the Spirit. Gal 5:25 Since this is the kind of life we have chosen, the life of the Spirit, let us make sure that we do not just hold it as an idea in our heads or a sentiment in our hearts, but work out its implications in every detail of our lives. The greatest danger facing the 21st century saint is that tendency to take everything on a physical note.
The fact remains that the curfew has affected our meetings and strategic sessions to equip the saints. The days of baseless prayers are over. It does not make sense to be encumbered with our needs all the time when God has promised to meet them in His sovereignty. We should be concerned with principality and powers, rulers of darkness in heavenly places.
The battle for the soul of Jos City is not by might nor by power but by the Spirit. The fact remains that if we flow with spirit, the might and the power to execute judgement and engage principalities will definitely come.
This is a challenge for me and all the saints in the city of Jos.
During the crisis, I was talking with my neighbours who are Christians and one of them said “we Christians will not be able to fight like the other fellows do because the next time we are in Church our pastors will preach to us to embrace peace and love while the other folks are being strategically positioned to be alert to fight for their god.
A friend, who teaches at a Christian secondary school in Jos discovered during the first week of resumption of school after the crisis that there was a daily increase in students’ attendance but plunged dramatically on Friday. He asked the students what could be responsible for the remarkable drop in attendance, the students responded “when Christians go to their services they come out pious and armless while the others go and strategise on how to foment uproar so as to deal with non-adherents of their faith.
What immediately came to me after the second discussion was that are Christians suppose to come out of their meetings and services weak and jelly-like? Should we also include in our order of service issues of arms and attack? Are we supposed to sit back and be content with defending ourselves when this kind of event happened? Is there not a way we can also launch an attack at certain times and situation?
I answered in my thoughts, if Elijah had strategized on a physical note, would he have escaped the siege of the Assyrians? If it was just the regular meetings, would Elijah have been able to give accurate intelligence report to the king of Israel about the plan of the Assyrian army? Did David win the battle against Goliath in the flesh? Didn’t he take the advantage of Goliath taking the battle to the Spirit?
It is sad to say that the meetings we have in most churches are so weightless, laced with uneducated enthusiasm, open-ended celebration, story-telling that have no bearing on equipping the saints.
Saints are to come out meetings, services, conventions, conferences strong, armed and dangerous that the enemies will not be able to handle. Is it impossible for us to pick up the slightest signals in the spirit before the crisis and alert the relevant authorities? Are we not supposed to be trained to have unequivocal aptitude to engage the ministering spirits in all of these issues? Why have forgotten so soon that angels are still at work?
Isa 1:11 "Why this frenzy of sacrifices?" GOD's asking. "Don't you think I've had my fill of burnt sacrifices, rams and plump grain-fed calves? Don't you think I've had my fill of blood from bulls, lambs, and goats?
Isa 1:12 When you come before me, who ever gave you the idea of acting like this, Running here and there, doing this and that-- all this sheer commotion in the place provided for worship?
Isa 1:13 "Quit your worship charades. I can't stand your trivial religious games: Monthly conferences, weekly Sabbaths, special meetings-- meetings, meetings, meetings--I can't stand one more!
Isa 1:14 Meetings for this, meetings for that. I hate them! You've worn me out! I'm sick of your religion, religion, religion, while you go right on sinning.
Isa 1:15 When you put on your next prayer-performance, I'll be looking the other way. No matter how long or loud or often you pray, I'll not be listening. And do you know why? Because you've been tearing people to pieces, and your hands are bloody.
What Elijah did was not Old Testament it is a walk in the Spirit. Gal 5:25 Since this is the kind of life we have chosen, the life of the Spirit, let us make sure that we do not just hold it as an idea in our heads or a sentiment in our hearts, but work out its implications in every detail of our lives. The greatest danger facing the 21st century saint is that tendency to take everything on a physical note.
The fact remains that the curfew has affected our meetings and strategic sessions to equip the saints. The days of baseless prayers are over. It does not make sense to be encumbered with our needs all the time when God has promised to meet them in His sovereignty. We should be concerned with principality and powers, rulers of darkness in heavenly places.
The battle for the soul of Jos City is not by might nor by power but by the Spirit. The fact remains that if we flow with spirit, the might and the power to execute judgement and engage principalities will definitely come.
This is a challenge for me and all the saints in the city of Jos.
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