Saturday Motivation: February for Favor
1st February 2020
Title: Saturday Motivation! February for Favor! Winners Hear His Voice and Follow Him! Let`s Glow!
Text: 1. John 4v24; God is a spirit: and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.2. Philippians 3v3: For we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh.
Introduction
When we worship God in spirit and in truth, He begins to speak to us. He begins to show us great and mighty things that we do not know. He begins to reveal deep secrets to us. In fact we become His friend. He therefore confides in us. He shows us things to come. He becomes our advocate, our instructor and our guide.
God craves intimacy with us. He wants to speak with you and I. He wants our daily devotion and attention.
The voice of God is clearer today just as it was in the times of old. He hasn`t stopped speaking. He wants us to grow in the spirit and glow in His light. He wants us to learn how to hear His voice.
Since the outpouring of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost in Acts 2, the gifts of speaking in tongues and prophecy has been poured out abundantly over God`s people all over the world.
Acts 2 v 17 and 18 says: I will pour out my spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my spirit in those days, and they will prophesy.
The Spirit of God is realer than real. The Spirit of God is the voice of God! We are taught by the Holy Spirit who leads us into all truth.
How can God teach us and lead us into all truth if we cannot hear His voice?
John 16 v 13 says: However when He, the Spirit of truth has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come.
God is a speaking God. If it were not so, He would not have created the world by speaking everything into reality. In the book of Genesis 1 v 2-3, we were told that the spirit of the Lord was hovering over the face of the waters, and God said, let there be light and there was light.
God craves for intimacy with every of His creation. He wants to fill us with His Holy Spirit so that we can hear His voice, prophesy, see visions, dream dreams.
As a speaking God, He wants us to become vessels of His voiceso that we can encourage others.
How can we hear God`s voice? How can we be sure that we are not deceived by a wrong voice or by a deceiving spirit?
Key No.1 is Repentance
The key to hearing God`s voice is holiness without which no man shall see the Lord.
The key to hearing God` voice is to repent from sin and iniquity.
The key to hearing God`s voice is to repent from selfish living and adopt righteous living.
The key to hearing the voice of God is to carry our cross and follow Him no matter our condition.
The key to hearing the voice of God is to submit to His leading and direction.
The Lord wants the entirety of our being. He wants us to submit our life, our pride, our will, our emotions, our spirit to His Will.
When a man refuses to submit to God, he begins to hear the voice of deceptive spirits that imitate the Holy Spirit. Such a man is thereby deceived and when he acts on what he has heard from the deceiving spirit, the result is a palatial error which results in a gigantic fail.
Yahusha Hamashiach (Jesus Christ) came to set us free from the realm of evil spirits, deception and darkness and bring us closerto God. He is the way the truth and the life. No one goes to the heavenly Father except through Him; John 14 v 6.
Jesus is the light of the world. He who follows Him shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life; John 8 v 12.
Jesus conquered the grave and won the victory for you and I by paying the price for our sins on the cross. His death and resurrection paved the way for us to never be deceived again. Without Him reigning as King over our lives and in our hearts, we become exposed to spirits and spiritual powers that can mislead us.
Jesus came to shine the light of God into our hearts and shine through us so that we can glow and truly recognize His voice when He speaks.
We must deny every other spiritual source of influence and focus on God. We must slam the door shut in the face of all the evil that thrives around us. We must shine His light and close the door to every form of evil practice, evil communication, etc.
The key to hearing God`s voice is to repent from sin with all our heart. We must hate sin and flee from it; 1Thessalonians 5 v 22.
When we fail to submit to God due to pride or any other reason for that matter, we limit ourselves from enjoying the abundance of God`s blessings and His privileges.
God is not a man that He would lie neither is He the son of man that He would repent. God never fails, He is never late, He never disappoints. He is a great God.
He wants us to spend eternity with Him, to enjoy the abundance of His blessings. He is a faithful, glorious, marvelous, awesome God!
Key No.2 is to be filled with the Holy Spirit
The spirit of God is the spirit of truth. The spirit of truth leads and guides us to all truth.
Without being filled with the Holy Spirit, we cannot hear the voice of God. The Holy Spirit is the breath of God that dwells in man.
We are all used to talking to God through prayers but how many of us are actually patient enough to listen to God speak? God wants to talk to us as much as we want to talk to Him. He wants to connect with us. True friendship is in constant communication between two parties.
We all need to take time off to be with God. We need to stop talking so that He can talk to us. He wants to be the peace in our storm.
We must learn to trust God and know that He is still in the business of speaking things into existence.
Questions
How does God speak?
God can speak to us in different ways. The voice of God is powerful. He can speak with the voice of fire. He can speak with the voice of lightning. He can speak with the voice of earthquake. He can speak with the voice of the wind but sometimes, He may chose to speak to us in a still small voice orin a gentle whisper.
Let`s look at the account of Elijah in 1 Kings 19 v 10 – 12;
And the word of the Lord came to him: “What are you doing here, Elijah?”
10 He replied, “I have been very zealous for the Lord God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, torn down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too.”
11 The Lord said, “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.”
Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. 12 After the earthquake came a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper.
Real knowledge of God develops from our spirit not from our brain. Even though we have been trained to understand everything from our brains, God is not a set of brain cells. God is a spirit and those who worship Him must worship Him in Spirit and in truth.
The Bible is God`s way of speaking to His children. To stay in constant communication with God, we must become addicted to His Word. God longs to show us deep secrets from His Word. He wants us to dig deeper into His Word so that we can hear Him clearer.
God also speaks to His children through dreams and visions. But note that if it is a nightmare, it rarely comes from God.
God also speaks to His children through prophecy. We prophecy when we pass on the voice of God to others. 1 Corinthians 14 v 1 says: Pursue love, yet desire earnestly spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy.
We do God a disservice when we manipulate others by giving fake prophecies. This is common in our world today. We should pray for the spirit of discernment to recognize the spirit of truth from falsehood.
How do you know that a voice is not the voice of God?
There are different kinds of voices. It is therefore important to recognize the voice of God.
Voices that do the following;• Frightens you• Intrude on you aggressively• Chase you up• Cause agitation• Reminds you of your sinful past; etc are never God`s voice.
God is love and His language is love. God is a Father, a lover, a friend. I call Him my loving Shepherd, my advocate. Even when God corrects us, He does it in love. His desire is to bring each and every one of us more into His love.
Will we open our ears and hearts to hear God`s voice today?
In this month of February for Favor, God wants every one of us to be receptive to His voice. He wants us to discern His voice so that we can have an expected end and a glorious outcome.
Our end shall be greater than our beginning in Jesus glorious and powerful Name! Amen!
May the Lord bless the reading of His Word in our hearts! May we reap a thousand fold of harvest as we do His Will this month,in Jesus Mighty Name! Amen!
Shalom!