HORM Devotional

Hebrews 12:1

Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us.

DAILY READING – Luke 19:1-27; Genesis 32-33; Psalm 25

 Having the proper attire is crucial for a marathon race. For comfort and performance, having the right gear is very important. In such a long race, wearing even the wrong fabrics can cause chafing and blisters, which can cause discomfort, distract you and negatively affect your performance. Also carrying extra weight during a race will hinder and slow down your movement. Therefore good, proper running gear is very important. It’s a long race and you don’t need anything to distract or slow you down.  The race of life is similar, you don’t need weights and distractions, Rather you need to run focusing on the Word who is Jesus. It is a race we run with patience.  Patience is waiting on The Lord; it is waiting for God’s time and waiting to hear from Him before we take any significant step. We do not rush into battles or quickly take rash decisions, we first of all sit in The Word and patiently  hear what the Lord will say to us. We access His guidance through patience. And as we hear we judge, or take actions. Jesus said in John 5:30, ‘I can of my own self do nothing as I hear I judge’.

For us to run successfully the race of life, we must wait for God to lead and guide us. Those who lack the patience to wait in The Word and hear the next instruction are prone to run into ditches in life, but divine instruction delivers from death and destruction.  Not every open door is for you. Hear first what God is saying before you make a move. Some so called ‘open doors’ could be traps in disguise. So depending only on your physical senses and your wisdom is not enough to guarantee that you will not fall into a trap. Do not be in a hurry, take time to seek God.   Depend on the guidance of The Holy Spirit, He is The one who knows the end from the beginning and is able to search out the secrets of men’s hearts. Let Him guide you in all your decisions, and as you follow His guidance you can be sure you will end well in this race of life. .

PRAYER:  Lord please help me to wait upon you, to receive instructions from you on what to do, before I ever make any move.

 quote

To get into the next level of your life, God will always give you a specific instruction. – WORDBITE 222.

 [ADAPTED FROM THE BOOK FAITH CLASSICS]

Luke 6:48 KJV

48 He is like a man which built an house, and digged deep, and laid the foundation on a rock: and when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently upon that house, and could not shake it: for it was founded upon a rock . –

DAILY READING Luke 18:18-43; Genesis 31; Psalm 24

Foundation matters. Though it may seem a simple part of the overall construction process, getting the foundation right is incredibly important. The biggest reason for this is that any mistake you make in the foundation will only get worse as the building goes up. In engineering it is known as compounding defects and it means that mistakes keep growing. Here’s an example: if you notice that your slab foundation is out of square when you start framing, and you decide to go ahead, by the time your metal roof shows up, everyone can see that the roof is out of square. The simple mistake in your foundation has ruined the look of the house. It was a “simple” mistake but it just got worse and worse as the house went up in the construction process.

Your foundation deserves the highest focus and attention to detail, because  your entire house sits on top of it!

The same way the foundation upon which we build our lives matter. If you don’t get the foundation right, things will only keep getting worse; compounded defects. Spiritually the deeper and stronger your foundation or roots, the higher and stronger your life can go up. And our foundation is in the Word. The more rooted and grounded you are in the Word, the higher and stronger you will go in God. This is true in any form of construction or development venture. If you are going to rise up and stay up, it is important that you dig your foundation deep and make it firm in The Word of God. What this means is that you ensure everything you say and do stems from The Word. Be guided by scriptures, and not by your feelings or the advice of others. Always base your decisions on what The Word of God says. That is how you make The Word your foundation. And when you do that your life will be built on a strong foundation, where you enjoy unending heights of exploits.

PRAYER:  Lord please help me to build my life upon the solid foundation of Your Word in Jesus name.

 quote

You’ve got  to seize the moment of The Word of God now, you  must make The Word of God top priority in your life.

Nothing liberates like truth, the truth you know and act upon will make you free. – WORDBITE 222. 

 [ADAPTED FROM THE BOOK FAITH CLASSICS]

1 John 5:3 KJV

3 For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous.

DAILY READING Luke 18:1-17; Genesis 29:31-30:43; Psalm 23

During World War II, it was a total risk for the Ten Boom family to obey God’s Word, in the face of Nazi opposition. However, being a devout Christian family Corrie ten Boom and her family made the costly choice to honor God’s Word despite the risk. As the Nazis killed thousands of Jews, they turned their home into a hiding place to harbor Jews from arrest. Corrie ten Boom became a leader in the movement to protect Jews, overseeing a network of “safe houses” in the country. Through these activities, it was estimated that 800 Jews’ lives were saved.

However on February 28, 1944, betrayed by a fellow Dutch citizen, the entire family was arrested and imprisoned. Miraculously though, the Jews hidden in their home were not found by the German soldiers despite thorough search, and later escaped to safety. Corrie and her sister Betsy were taken to the Ravensbrück concentration camp, a deadly women’s labor camp in Germany. Even there they still held worship services using a Bible Corrie had miraculously sneaked in, undetected. Though Betsy later died from illness, Corrie was released by divine intervention, due to a ‘clerical error’, where her name was wrongly placed among those to be freed, but before her captors could realize their mistake she was already gone. A week after her ‘wrong’ release, all the women in her age group were killed in the gas chambers.  She started a worldwide ministry and later told her story in a book entitled The Hiding Place.

 When you honor God, then you also honor His Word. It is a contradiction to say you honor God, and yet dishonor His Word. God is one with His Word. Anybody who genuinely encounters the Word will respond to God in humble service. Even when obedience may not be convenient, we ask God for the grace to do what is right. Obedience is proof that we love God. When it comes to taking decisions we must let God’s Word guide us. Let God’s Word always have the final say.

No matter what you think or what you feel, let what The Scriptures say always be final. Become someone who is guided by The Word of God in all you do. Let your anthem always be ‘Not my will but yours be done’ In your business, marriage, career, let God’s Word have priority. That is how you honor God through His Word. And when you honor God He promises He will in turn honor you. In 1 Samuel 2:30 God says ‘for them that honor Me, I will honor,  and they that despise Me shall be lightly esteemed.’

Begin to honor God with your life, and you will find that He will in turn honor you and elevate you to become a wonder to your world. .

PRAYER: Lord, please help me to obey you always, even when it seems difficult, may Your will, only be done in my life . 

quote

When you make God your priority, God automatically makes you priority in His own plan. – WORDBITE 222.

[ADAPTED FROM THE BOOK FAITH CLASSICS]

1 Corinthians 9:22 KJV

22 To the weak became I as weak, that I might gain the weak: I am made all things to all men that I might by all means save some.

DAILY READING Luke 17; Genesis 29:1-30; Psalm 22

George Washington, the first President of the United States of America. was a remarkable man of God. When he was leading the Continental Army and helping the American colonies to become free of British rule, he prayed often.  He would go into the woods to pray. Several miracles show that God heard his prayers.

In 1755, after a battle he wrote, ‘I had four bullets through my coat, and two horses shot under me yet I escaped unhurt, although death was leveling my companions on every side of me!” George Washington was successful as a General because he honored God, and God in turn honored him.

One key learning you must have is to use every position God has granted you to serve Him and expand His Kingdom. Wherever you are in life use the opportunity to serve God. Don’t be a secret service Christian, where your Christian identity is kept undercover. Let your dedication to God be known to all men. You may not literally carry the Bible everywhere, but your stance and defense of the gospel are testimonies of your allegiance to God. And this is indeed honoring God. Use your position to preach the gospel and expand God’s territory. Don’t be ashamed to preach the Gospel. Jesus said if you are ashamed of Him before men, He will be ashamed of you before God. Learn to Honor God by serving Him in all your endeavors.

Live a life worthy of the Gospel you preach. Do not bring mockery to God by how you conduct your affairs. Men are constantly watching you to see if your life measures up to your claim to be a Christian. And when they see you are genuine, it will be an added reason for them to follow Christ.

You are where you are only by God’s grace.  And the more you uplift Him before men, the more He will also elevate you to higher positions so that you can keep proclaiming His name.

PRAYER: Lord, please help me to make your Word top priority in my life, help me to lift up your name always  before men,  using  every available opportunity to preach The Gospel… 

quote :

The purpose of prosperity is for you to proclaim the Gospel. – WORDBITE 222.

 [ADAPTED FROM THE BOOK ESTABLISHED BY GRACE]

Isaiah 48:17 KJV

Thus saith the LORD, thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel; I am the LORD thy God which teacheth thee to profit, which leadeth thee by the way that thou shouldest go.

 DAILY READING Luke 16; Genesis 27:46-28:22; Psalm 21

In the Exodus  when the Israelites departed from Egypt they had two options of routes to take. There was a shorter route they could have taken; it was  a few days journey of not more than about 200 miles, but because it led through the chief towns of the hostile Philistines, The Bible says “The people would probably have repented when they saw war, and would have returned to Egypt.” So God led them through a longer route.

It was on this longer route that they saw God’s wonders as He led them through the Red sea, destroyed Pharaoh and his host, and brought them into the wilderness where they were taught the laws by Moses. However the Israelites, did not fully appreciate God’s choice of this route, nor submit to His good intentions for them on this path, so they continuously rebelled. As a result of their rebellion what could have been a few weeks journey of only about 240 miles, ended up taking them 40 years. For the older rebellious generation it became a journey of death..  .

The problem with this people was their wrong perception of God. They couldn’t see Him as the loving God who had kept covenant with their fathers by coming to bring them out of bondage and to take them to a good land. Their wrong image led to mistrust, which birthed rebellion that eventually destroyed them.

To benefit in the journey of life you need to have the right image of God in your mind. He is a loving Father who is committed to leading you aright. Trust Him as the good God who is intent on leading you on the right way. If you cannot see this, you will keep wanting to go your own way, and eventually end up struggling on the journey of life. Understand God loves you, and whichever way He leads you, is the best way.  Do not try to lead yourself. Take the time to seek His counsel in all you do and no matter the route God takes you through, even if it is the longer route, trust that He is leading you to your own Canaan. Just trust and obey, and eventually you will come to your own land of milk and honey.

PRAYER: Lord, please help me to trust you with the journey of my life, no matter how I feel, may I always submit to only your  guidance  in all that I do. 

quote

God protects and shields us when we are being led by Him. – WORDBITE 222.

 [ADAPTED FROM THE BOOK SUPERNATURAL LOVE OF GOD]

1 Corinthians 2:10 KJV

10 But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.

DAILY READING Luke 15; Genesis 27:1-45; Psalm 20

During World War II, a British naval officer was evacuating troops from the beaches at Dunkirk in 1940 when he was captured by the Nazis. From the German prison camp, he sent letters home to his parents. The letters would always start with my dear mummy and daddy, and talk about mundane things like farming and the weather etc. Though on the surface they looked like simple letters, underneath were coded secret messages for the British military involving  fiendishly complex alphanumeric codes. The unsuspecting Germans who posted the letters for him, never knew that the coded words contained hidden war intelligence report. In one letter, he hid intelligence about the sinking of a British submarine by writing about the PoW [Prisoner of war] camp’s vegetable garden. From his letter, British intelligence experts were able to decode the message and learn about the sinking of the British submarine, the HMS Undine, which was destroyed in 1940.

In a similar way it takes The Holy Ghost to ‘decode’ the scriptures for you. God is saying so much more than you think, but you need revelation to fully grasp it.

The Bible says in Psalm 62:11 ‘God has spoken once, twice have I heard this that power belongs to God. .’ There is more than one hearing to every word in scriptures. The first hearing is general knowledge on the surface for everyone to see, but the second hearing is revelation, personal knowledge which The Holy Spirits imparts to you about your present situation. This is what brings solutions and revolutions in one’s life. You need to go beyond the letter on the surface and begin to hear the revelation of The Spirit. What is revealed to us, is what truly belongs to us.

PRAYER: Lord, by Revelation of Your Spirit, let Your Word  be made plain to me, help me to understand what you are really saying to me about my situation….. 

quote

Revelation from God will always  overcome  your  negative situation in life. – WORDBITE 222. .

 [ADAPTED FROM THE BOOK FAITH CLASSICS]

Matthew 5:16 

Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven

DAILY READING Luke 14:25-35; Genesis 26; Psalm 19

Archbishop Desmond Tutu was a South African social rights activist and Anglican bishop who rose to worldwide fame during the 1980s as an opponent of apartheid and  received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984.

He was asked by the British Broadcasting Company (BBC) to identify the defining moment in his life and Desmond spoke of the day in 1940 when he and his mother were walking down the street of his hometown of Klerksdorp, South Africa. Desmond was nine years old. A tall white man dressed in a black suit came towards them. In the days of apartheid, when a black person and a white person met while walking on a footpath, the black person was expected to step into the gutter to allow the white person to pass by and nod their head as a gesture of respect. On this day however, before a young Desmond and his mother could step off the sidewalk the white man stepped off the sidewalk and, as mother and son passed, tipped his hat in a gesture of respect to her! The white man was Trevor Huddleston, an Anglican priest who was bitterly opposed to apartheid. It changed Desmond’s life. When his mother told him that Trevor Huddleston had stepped off the sidewalk because he was a man of God, Desmond found his calling. “I decided there and then that I wanted to be an Anglican priest too. And what is more, I wanted to be a man of God,” said Desmond.

We honour God by using our position to serve God.

As a military officer,  banker, lawyer or politician, let your gestures reflect always the truth of the Gospel. That is what it means to serve God. Become a living epistle that people will read and turn to God; become the signpost that turns men to Jesus. As a believer your life is under constant surveillance by unbelievers. What you say or do may make the difference in a soul coming into the kingdom of God. Live always a life worthy of your calling.

PRAYER: Lord, please let everything in and around me, continually proclaim your Gospel; make  me a living epistle, an open Bible that all around  can read.  

quote :

The truth of God’s Word in the life of a believer is always reflective, the results can never be hidden. – WORDBITE 222. 

 [ADAPTED FROM THE BOOK FAITH CLASSICS]

EXODUS 14::28 KJV

28 And the waters returned, and covered the chariots, and the horsemen, and all the host of Pharaoh that came into the sea after them; there remained not so much as one of them.

DAILY READING Luke 13:18-35; Genesis 24; Psalm 17

Whitetail deer are known to be great escape artists. This is key to their strategy for survival. They have different styles of escape when being pursued by a predator, which  includes  high speed sprints,  remaining hidden until the predator is very near, and then making an explosive escape,  slinking away on their bellies or  crisscrossing their own  paths to create a confusing trail. There is however a  very remarkable strategy that they employ, and that  is to run  deeper  into water. They will walk in water to delete their trail, and lose their scent, or they will go deeper into the water to the point where their  pursuers cannot follow them. They can also  hide by submerging themselves in the water, leaving only their nose on the water surface, like snorkels , to breath, just as a scuba diver would.  A lion or tiger in pursuit would risk drowning  by  following  them into such deep waters.

There is a depth you can get to in the Word where the enemy cannot follow you           

When pharaoh and his army tried to follow Israel into the depths of the sea they were drowned. Freedom is to reside in the depth of the Word.

Getting into the depth of The Word guarantees freedom.

Every evil departs from you. It is a depth where any Egyptian after you will drown because you have gone too deep for them to follow. The way to get to this level of depth of faith is not by hearing the Word once or just occasionally. It is determined by hearing the Word repeatedly until something happens on the inside. “They that do know their God shall be strong and do exploits” Daniel 11:32.

PRAYER: Lord, please help me to go  into your Word until I can get to the  depth, where covered by Your glory, I become invisible  to every force of darkness.  

Quote

Your heart needs to be filled with The Word of God to the point of overflow. – WORDBITE 222.

 [ADAPTED FROM THE BOOK ESTABLISHED BY THE WORD OF GOD]

Luke 4:20 KJV

20 And he closed the book, and he gave it again to the minister, and sat down. And the eyes of all them that were in the synagogue were fastened on him.

DAILY READING Luke 13:1-17; Genesis 23; Psalm 16

When Alexander the great arrived to  conquer Jerusalem,  something strange happened.  According to the historical account given by Josephus, a Jewish historian, as Alexander approached,  Jaddua the Jewish High Priest went out to meet  him having in his hand a copy of the book of Daniel. He opened the scroll and showed  Alexander  the  prophesy concerning   him.   In Daniel chapter 8, Daniel had prophesied of the conquests of the he-goat from the Greek empire, representing Alexander,   which were so swift that his feet appeared to not even touch the ground as he devoured “the whole earth” (8:5). At that time Alexander had  with unprecedented speed  conquered  Asia Minor, Syria, Egypt, Mesopotamia, and all the way to India in only twelve years. With an army of only 30,000, he defeated Darius III who had 500,000 soldiers. His success was so extraordinary and  his  subjugation of the entire known world the most rapid humanity had ever witnessed at that time. Recognizing himself in that prophesy , Alexander marveled.  He was  so  impressed  that instead of destroying Jerusalem,  he peaceably  entered into the city  and worshipped at the Temple. Revelation humbled this great conqueror!

God knows the end from the beginning. It is in His Word that we see light to understand the mysteries of our lives. We can never understand our times and seasons and the reasons behind them except we come to The Word and allow The Holy Spirit to unravel truth to us. There is something written about you. There is a script to the drama of your life. There is a reason why things have happened the way they have. There is truth you need to uncover about your journey. There is a destiny to be discovered and recovered and it’s all in The Word of Life.  The Bible is no ordinary book.  It is God’s medium of communicating truth.  It’s our only true light in a world of darkness. To move forward in life, to fulfill destiny, you need to pay attention to what God is really saying in His Word.  When you begin to develop a culture of total regard for the Word, the Spirit of the Word will open up its content to you with depth of revelations you never imagined.  It will be the road map to your glorious destination.

PRAYER: Lord, please open me up to the revelation from your Word that will revolutionize  my life, so that I can begin to move into your great destiny for me..  

Quote

There is more to you than meets the eyes.  Don’t let anyone convince you otherwise. – WORDBITE 222. 

 [ADAPTED FROM THE BOOK FAITH CLASSICS]