Don't pity your God but put Him in a tight corner
Since ancient times no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who acts on behalf of those who wait for him. Isaiah 64:4
Prayer is the opportunity that God has given to you to say something about all the arguments going on about you in the spirit and physical. When you fail to pray, you have decided to surrender your life to the opinion of others. I know you are too wise for that.
We will deal with another serious matter today. Some people are out there fighting and killing people in defence of their God. That should not be the case with us. Some fear shame and reproach. If you are sure you are in God's will and are operating within divine program, you don't need to fear.
If all the glory will go to God, it is only fair that He should also take all the shame if it turns out so. If you are sure you have a god and you are sure that your god is alive, then it is time to set him up and challenge him to show up. As for me, Jehovah is my God and I challenge those that serve the God that I serve to read thoughtfully the following meditation.
*For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God…Instead, they were longing for a better country — a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them. Heb 11:10,16NIV*
The landlord of a Pastor threw him out along with his wife, children and church property. His offense was that he owed house rent for more than six months. To the amazement of the landlord and the neighbors, the Pastor just sat in the open with his children at the same spot their property were lying. This happened in the morning and when the sun began to rise, some neighbors offered to take in the Pastor and to provide him with temporal accommodation until he could get somewhere else but they were shocked when the Pastor turned down their offer. Towards evening time, the neighbors were no longer comfortable with the way a man and his entire family were just sitting in the open; for them it painted them as heartless people. They came out to beg them to relocate into any of their houses, but the Pastor answered them, “I am not angry with anyone, not even my landlord. He has tried by accommodating me and bearing with my indebtedness. I will not leave this spot until the God that called me provides me with my own land and house. This is our resolve and no one needs to feel sorry for us about this.”
Most neighbors had sleepless night as they thought how that man and his family laid out there. It began to drizzle in the night and some neighbors came out to beg his wife and children to come out of the rain but they insisted that they will stay with their father, siting that he had done nothing wrong by challenging his God to show up or they will continue to stay out there.
As early as 6am one of the neighbors walked out to the Pastor with the document of his landed property and handed it to the Pastor, “I offer this to your God. I have many of such and it was selfish of me to hold it while you were embarrassed”.
When others heard what the man did, some went out and bought wood and other building materials and started building a temporal structure for the Pastor’s family, by mid-day, there was a place for them to move over to. I am tempted to mention the exact city and place this happened in Nigeria but I fear I might embarrass some people, but just know that it happened in Cross Rivers State, Nigeria
You would have read my testimony of a village Pastor that raised the dead. This man of God had served God with his entire family in abject poverty. One day a man of that village that lived in Lagos city bought him a bag of Rice and a live-goat for Christmas. That marked the beginning of yearly provision of one bag of Rice and a live-goat for every Christmas season. Within some years, the Pastor heard that the man who was providing the Rice had died. In those days there were no GSM or any other kind of phone in that part of Nigeria. So it took days before his sister brought the message to the village. The Pastor asked her, “Have you told anyone else in this village about this?” she said, No.
He then instructed her to return to Lagos and bring the corpse of the man to him in the church. She obeyed him and it was another two days before the corpse arrived. Against the rules of his denomination, he asked them to take the corpse into his church hall and lay it on the altar.
The Pastor knelt beside the corpse and prayed, “Lord, I thank you for calling me into the ministry and you can bear me witness that I have never complained in spite of all the hardship I have faced for the several years I have served. Until one day this your son remembered me and began to provide my family with a bag of Rice and a live-goat every Christmas. We would manage them until around June of the next year and then begin to endure hunger until the next Christmas season when he will bring another one. Now, this man is dead. I am not questioning you because I don’t have the right to do so, but I just want to let you know that this man will not leave this altar until you tell me where the next bag of Rice and live-goat will come from”. Having said that he threw himself on the corpse and began to cry. To the shock of everyone present, the dead man came back to life
In my case, in the year 2015 I returned from my travel ministry to learn that my family have been evicted from the place we lived. The owner of the property had sold it to someone else. We were given quit notice but we did not have sufficient money to pay for another house. Instead of sitting down to worry I continued to organize programs and travel to preach. When I returned, my wife and children were inside our church building that had no doors, windows and the roof was makeshift. My neighbors came to my wife and asked them to relocate to a cheap neighborhood but they answered, “Our Daddy will build a house when he returns. I call Mrs, Chidinma Remy Okere, Prof Kontein Trinya, DSP Grace Ogbonna, and Pastor Ifeanyi Nwokedi among others as my witnesses to this testimony.
The lady that bought our former accommodation gave us two hundred thousand Naira which will barely pay for one bedroom flat.
Someone asked me, “What do you want to do next, Pastor?” “I want to start building my house” was my reply. Some thought I was joking.
We used the amount available to invite local builders. In fact, we were still living in that church hall when we hosted PNUR International Prayer and Revival Convention 2015 at Daffodils Hotels, Port Harcourt. Many people who were in that program in 2015 are reading this testimony for the first time now. Fellow ministers called me foolish for “wasting money” in hosting an international convention when my family was living in a dangerous environment. Today my family is living in a three bedroom flat we built after that season and the church looks better than it was. I want to use this opportunity to thank all PNUR partners that supported us in any way as we passed through that storm as a family
I repeat myself in almost all my preaching outings that I don’t pity or protect my God. I will not serve a God who cannot defend Himself. So I serve Him with all heart and I will not apologize to anybody about that. But when issues arise and it appears that it will take only God to resolve it, I don’t try to act on His behalf.
I want my reader to take note that all the men of God who dared to challenge God to vindicate them had something to present as grounds why they believe that God should and must do something. Understand that each of them have lived a dedicated and sacrificed to God’s service. I mean to warn my reader that you dare not take such hard stance if you have nothing on the altar.
I write this today to encourage all our missionaries on the field who are facing all kind of financial and social pressures. I want to also encourage all genuine believers and tell them not to quit in serving God no matter what they meet in this world. Even if men mock you today, don’t worry, they will hear your news as they are reading these ones.
Finally, please if you are the kind of person who is currently holding back the resources that God has provided for those who are serving in active ministry, please release them now. We will like to receive Seed Faith for the support of Deliverance Week 2023. As you already know we will be feeding and accommodating delegates for the programme
Remember to join the fast
Remember to set apart time and place for your private prayers
Remember to encourage others to join you.
When you pray, believe your prayers.
You know that we are praying for you.
Emma your brother pnurnigeria@gmail.com
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