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WORDS NEVER TO BE FORGOTTEN BY GOD’S PEOPLE.
A – 51st Anniversary Speech By
Rev. Prof. P . C . Nnaocha at Miracle Valley Nigeria March 2018.
(A Time Is Coming When Me And You Will Remember This Message Unless We Do Something Now).
Personally for you or me:
God called Abraham when he was 75, and made a covenant of circumcision with him when he was 99. In his life he was obedient to God and God called him a friend ( Isaiah 41:8, 2 Chr. 20 :7). He handed his faith to his descendants, who faltered here and there . And to you and me we have been adopted or grafted as a seed of Abrabam. How faithful have we been to the call?
Then the message to us today :
God called Abraham when he was 75 years old and the wife Sarah 65. Before God made a covenant with him he was called Abram.
“Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, unto a land that I will shew thee. And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing. And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.” (Genesis 12 : 1 – 3)
Now after 24 years and at the age of 99, God was ready to make a covenant with him. Time means much to men, but with God, what looks like a long time could be but just one day.
” And when Abram was ninety years old and nine, the LORD appeared to Abram, and said unto him, I am the Almighty God; walk before me, and be thou perfect. And I will make my covenant between me and thee, and will multiply thee exceedingly. And Abram fell on his face: and God talked with him, saying………..” (Genesis 17 : 1 – 3).
TRUSTWORTHINESS MUST BE TESTED
All great footballers, wrestlers and boxers are tried before they go for an international contest. All great men of God may have gone through their own examination before the Lord. God had weighed Abraham and never found him wanting and it took Him 24 years in the eyes of men to do this. I guess God uses yardsticks to weigh His servants in our contemporary times. I ask this question to all believers ” HAVE YOU OR ME BEEN WEIGHED AND NOT FOUND WANTING? YOU HAVE YOUR OWN ANSWER, IF YOU EVER KNOW IT. BUT A MAJORITY OF US DO NOT KNOW HOW GOD HAS RANKED US. SO TELL ME YOUR SCORE IF YOU KNOW!
What should be our concern about being weighed by God?
We just have to remain committed to God and doing proper things before Him and leave His judgement which is always based on His compassion on us to Him.
For every true child of God, there will be a new name. In my village today, those who carried heathen names prior to their conversion, had reason now to change to names, which makes meaning in association with God. What is the situation in your tribe? Have we taken new names after conversion? The followers of Christ were called Christians ( like Christ ), first in Antioch (Acts 11 :26).
What is our testimony? After the call and after the covenant, Abraham’s descendants went to Egypt for a surgeon and tarried there for 400 years, where they served as slaves. God sent Moses to bring them out of Egypt back to Canaan.
All the children of Israel did not know of the God of their fathers and needed to be told. And God said to Moses :
A REMINDER:
“And Moses said unto God, Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say to me, What is his name? what shall I say unto them? And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you. And God said moreover unto Moses, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, the LORD God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent me unto you: this is my name for ever, and this is my memorial unto all generations.” (Exodus 3 : 13 – 15).
THE HISTORICAL DRAMA
This drama was not unusual, because after 400 years many of them did not know either Abraham or his God. And the people in Canaan never knew them or their God. Even in a shorter time, a generation that abandons God for a decade will have no Godliness in their land. They would have bred many heathens.
They left Egypt with great wealth, signs and wonders and in the wilderness they ate manna from heaven (Exodus 16 : 3 – 9 ) and drank living water from the rock (Exodus 17 : 3 – 7 ) , but even while in this journey and in the midst of great mysteries they made a god for themselves to worship (Exodus 32:3-14).
After long fellowship with God in our time, have many not become apostates even denying Him , not minding His many mercies?
And because of their transgressions in the midst of revealed truths, God destoyed them, so that none of them that left Egypt entered Canaan except Joshua ( Numbers 27 : 18, Numbers 34: 17, Deut. 1 : 38 and Jishua 1 : 1 – 3 ) and Caleb ( Numbers 26 : 65, Numbers 32:12 and Deut. 1 : 36), and it is true that even Moses the law giver saw Cannan, but did not enter.
When we know this let us meditate over our relationship with God.
Let us be warned to be more careful with our God. Let us watch over our Christianity, as a man will watch over his treasury.
God’s covenant to Abraham stood the challenges of time and remained unbroken by God, notwithstanding the aforementioned events. This means his descendants and me and you, who have inherited the promise made to Abraham, must walk before God and be perfect each time, and wait for a restoration, if we ever fail. Even, because of disobedience the ark of covenant which was a testimony , between Israel and God, had been been taken once, by those who they had conquered when entering Canaan. What a great absurdity! (1 Samuel 4 :11).
God had promised them a reward for obedience (Deut. 28:1) and punishment for disobedience (Deut. 28 :15), but they went into spiritual harlotry or idolatry (they chose disobedience and not obedience) and returned to bondage under the erstwhile kings, who they had conquered. Many christians had been conquered by satan due to complacency, thus groping in self created darkness, while in the house of God.
The faithfulness of God was extolled when the ark, which had been taken by their enemies was returning to Jerusalem and he said :
“O ye seed of Israel his servant, ye children of Jacob, his chosen ones. He is the LORD our God; his judgments are in all the earth. Be ye mindful always of his covenant; the word which he commanded to a thousand generations; Even of the covenant which he made with Abraham, and of his oath unto Isaac; And hath confirmed the same to Jacob for a law, and to Israel for an everlasting covenant, Saying, Unto thee will I give the land of Canaan, the lot of your inheritance; (1 Chronicles 16 : 13 – 18).
God is not man that he should change or lie; if He has spoken will He not bring it to pass? (Numbers 23 : 19 – 20 ).
Many of us might be alive today so to say, after we had failed God, but because He might have taken an oath to give us long life, so our enemies have stumbled and will continue to stumble, as long as God’s hand is over us. Let us thank God for there is reason to do so.
It is quite amazing to note this :
“The secret of the LORD is with them that fear him; and he will shew them his covenant”. (Psalm 25 : 14)
Israel completed the return to Canaan under the leadership of Joshua. They conquered all the kings and took over the lands given to them in the covenant. They remained in control throughout the leadership of Joshua, and the elders after them. But when all these elders have died Israel forgot their God (Judges 2 : 7 – 15). After several years they got mixed up again and God sold them back again to their enemies and they went into several levels of exile and captivity and lost the promised land again. You can read these in the activities of some kings of Israel and with particular reference to the Prophets: Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Elijah etc. Have many christians not returned to bondage, because while in the house of God many of us went whoring, and in the midst of set backs, fail to be open up ( i e confess) about the truths of living our lives our own way, just as many unfaithful men and women, will prefer to die, than let the cat of infidelity out of the bag.
ISRAEL RETURNING TO THE PROMISED LAND.
Contemporary history holds that Israel began returning from various lands of captivity from 1947 -1948. Israel will in May 2018 mark 70 years of returning to the promised land.
Is Christianity Not Going Into Captivity?
Modern christianity in Nigeria and the world at large, are another typology of the Israeli experience. Are we not going into gradual slavery and captivity under some faiths? Are you aware that those who teach same sex marriages
( homosexuals and lesbians), are likely christians? Are christians not committed to high street preaching and teaching, which is lipservice, while the faith is going down the drain? Are christian leaders in Africa and Nigeria, not of the believe that unless we join politics, we cannot take our national cake? And the national cake is money and not righteousness. Many in the course of this feeling have compromised their christian stand.
Are Other Faiths Compromising Their idiology and unfounded agenda? No!
They are on with their programme meanwhile, acting like an undercurrent, and washing away the foundation of the faith of many christians. Money has become every thing . High level showmanship of christIanity in many religious leaders, is making the .christian faith not effective.
The supposed christian slogan of bringing down every stronghold that exalteth itself against the truth, is not sought after, please read this:
“Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ;” (2 Corinthians 10 : 5), had been traded for money, fame the greed so to be recognised by men.
In recent times in Nigeria some servants of God had vied for the presidency, leaving the flock of God scattered. In Britain and France today many Christians are turning to other faiths, because our faith to them has become lipservice.
Remember that the battle in Israel today, is more of the threat of one religion or the other wanting to be the only religion on earth. This threat is to have a religion of dominance and not creating a righteous world. Christians must be awake to worship the Lord, who has the power to bring down all strongholds. This awakening should be to increase the tempo of commitment and of righteosness.
Are Christians aware that they are under threat in Nigeria? Are christian churches not more concerned with trying to dominate other churches, to have one mega church and doing all which is possible in that direction, as a campaign strategy for new members? The slogan “we are a big church” is not the answer to the global threat on christianity. The answer is creating more christian platoons to have a large army.
NOW OUR INDIVIDUAL CHRISTIAN POSTURE.
Let us remember this :
” To be personally saved and get to heaven is a priority and to win souls, even for a church without walls, should be a one world concern. Knowing that many are caged in large buildings, without knowing that their own salvation is a major and personal program and to win the souls for Christ , who you may never meet again in this life is of great concern to Christ. (Acts 8 : 34 , 36 the Ethiopian Eunuck).”
Many are caged, not remembering that the other brother or sister in that other church, who is doing the will of God, is a fellow combatant of Christ’s large army.
I will warn all concerned believers not to be negligent and get back into the hands of the Amorites and the Amalekites, who had been conquered for us by Christ, by driving into the corridors of mammon/ money- grubbing, hate of true Christians of other fellowship places or using money power as substitute for righteous living, fame and all sorts of sins.
May God have mercy on us. Amen.
An anniversary Speech At Miracle Valley March 2018.
website : www.mvgmng.org, email : oureach.mvgm@yahoo.com. +2348037179735.
Kindly leave your questions and comments below.