KINGDOM SERVICE IS AN OPPORTUNITY TO CHANGE LEVELS IN LIFE AND IT IS AN OPEN-ENDED OPPORTUNITY.
SERVING GOD IS BETTER THAN WHERE YOU QUALIFICATION WILL TAKE YOU. IT IS BETTER THAN WHERE YOUR INHERITANCE WILL PUT YOU.
- Pastor John Izebere at International Youth Alive Convention.
Day 3 Morning Session
Abraham was delightsome in obedience and this is what defines his servanthood. “Go”, you are serving but are you delightful in serving? Are you pleasing in serving God? Are you excited at it? Abraham will not negotiate any of God’s instructions, are you delighted, aren’t you happy that the great God has brought you and I to be His representatives? If your service to God is not delightsome, I doubt if it will yield any result (Romans 6:16).
Whatever God says in scripture is not a dialogue, it is an instruction. Are you ready to follow through? One straight path is obedience and service to the Lord. Church Gist. Be happy when God’s instructions come your way, be happy that you are serving God. Unfortunately this generation, they prefer to be identified with men than with God. It is in the service to God that your blessing can be eternal. Every time you hear God’s instruction, be excited at it because that’s what brings about the blessing that you are desiring and God will answer you on this mountain.
Also under Abraham, Abraham was prompt in obedience and it is this promptness of obedience that sustains servanthood. If you obeyed yesterday and today you say I am tired, are you sure God will come back to you again? Our God is a good business man and He is ready to decorate your destiny as long as you align yourself to his instruction. Church Gist. There is no employer that wants to do away with a good employee. God doesn’t want to do away with you. Prompt obedience simply means timely obedience, you don’t follow instructions at your time because this is what you must know; when someone gives you an instruction, in the person’s mind, that thing should be done now. Many people have lost their place with God because of delayed obedience. You want to sustain your service with God, be quick to obey.
Genesis 12:1-4
The promises that God gave to him, they were coming to pass one by one. Church Gist. Abraham departed at 75 and God told him I will make you great, if anyone curse you, I will curse. If anyone bless you, I will bless. Abraham said amen, took his bag, his wife and they went. Down the line, he had cattle and everything and he was making money. He had servants and at 85, ten years after, there was no child. Sarah suggested and he entered his servant, Haggai and when Abraham was 86, Genesis 16:16, Ishmael was born. No wonder when God came in Genesis chapter 17 to Abraham, at this time, Ismael was already 13 years old because Abraham was 99 and God told him; walk before me and be perfect – that’s after 24 years of the call.
There are persons under the sound of my voice today who assumed the ways of God in service but God is sounding an alarm, you want to see that promise come to pass, walk before me and be perfect. Let your service to me be wholeheartedly and God said, my promise will not fail but for us to enter this promise, we have to strike a covenant and that’s how God visited him in Chapter 17. God said the covenant is this; you must engage in circumcision of all male child in your house because the body that brought Haggai is not the body that will bring about the promised child, new wine must be put in new wine skin and so Abraham circumcised himself same day. We are looking at prompt obedience.
Whatever God must have told you my brothers and sisters, God is still committed to it, He will bring it pass but the cheapest way for it to come to reality is your service. Just sell yourself to God’s service, be a pleasant child to God, then you’ll begin to enjoy the faithfulness of God. When you serve God, things fall in place on their own by the hand of God.
We just heard a testimony about a brother who prayed and his mother’s menstrual cycle that was ceased for so many years was restored, his father and mother came back together, just by service. I hope you know that prayer is a service. Church Gist. All these eyes service, let men see me, all these grigri, the highest you’ll get is the applause of men. A servant does not owe himself, he is bound to the instruction of the master. You don’t have the audacity to begin to negotiate the time of obedience. It is obedience to the Word of God that God calls love. Ladies will describe love as somebody who is giving them money, buying clothes for them, taking them out, giving them shawarma. When you do that they will say you love them. For a man when you give him everything, that is not love. What man describes as love is your respect for him. But for God, what God calls love is your obedience. No matter your tonguing, your dressing, no matter the devil falling, if God says go and you said God give me twenty minutes, you have disobeyed.
Every obedient child of God, promptly obedient children of God, they enjoy the presence and favour of God.
- From this mountain, every desire of the wicked standing against you, they will fall at your appearance.
Prompt obedience, I know there are many things you want to do but do my own first. That’s what God is saying then you will begin to see blessings.
Also under Abraham, tireless obedience is what further validates our servanthood. That is you are not tired in obeying, in the hand of God you are malleable.
Genesis 22:1-5, 16-18
God knows that Abraham loves this son, He said now Abraham, I just feel like eating some suya and it is your son I want to roast, take him there. God told him from the beginning and he chose to obey. Church Gist. He took his son early in the morning and walked for three days, at this age he was already 113 years old. A 113 years old man walked for three days and now saw where he will sacrifice his son; not where dollars and cars are waiting and he took him there.
When our obedience is fulfiled, we will begin to enjoy the fullness of God’s blessings. Be tireless because the more of God you obey, the more the world will obey you. Don’t tie your obedience to the gains you can have.
DEMANDS OF ACCEPTABLE AND PROFITABLE STEWARDSHIP:
Proverbs 14:23
- Serve God with righteousness (Malachi 3:3). There is a spirit that purifies, give your service with a clean heart, in righteousness. Let your service be tied to right lifestyle. Don’t serve because of any ulterior motive. You want to be a golden servant, ask for that purification. Church Gist. Whatever area of service you find yourself today, I pray that the Spirit of God Himself will help you to serve Him in righteousness.
Hebrews 12:28
You must serve God with respect. When you murmur or grumble, that service is not acceptable. God is not looking for people to serve Him, God is not short of hands to serve Him. God is giving everyone of us an opportunity to change levels in life and service is the avenue.
Don’t be something else outside; they know you as 419, drug addict and you come here, before you come to your service group, you are smoking cigarettes and then you put TomTom to clean your mouth – that doesn’t work. Church Gist. Men may not see you but God’s eyes are everywhere.
- Serve God faithfully (1 Corinthians 4:2). A faithful person is a person that is worthy of trust, you are consistent with the truth, you are a loyal person. Church Gist. If for any reason you own a company, and you are seeing everything happening in the company and somebody is serving you the way you are serving God, when the person comes for blessing will you bless him?
Hebrews 13:1-2
As you serve God, let your faith be tied to it because God is not a task master
- Serve God heartily; sincerely, with a warm disposition.
Ephesians 6:6 – anytime you are doing eye service, it is only men you are pleasing not God. Church Gist. Anytime you are doing it to be recognized by man, your reward has come and most time the highest any man will tell you is to say “God bless you” or give you a warm hand shake.
Jeremiah 17:10
God searches our heart to know whether it is from the heart or from the lips.
- Serve God cheerfully. The opportunity given to you is not because you are the best, it is to help you to change level. None of us qualify to meet God’s standard, God chose us to bring us to His quality (Deuteronomy 28:47-48). Serve God joyfully because it is a privilege, that’s the greatest privilege any man will ever have. Serving God is better than where you qualification will take you, it is better than where your inheritance will put you. Church Gist. Once your heart is made to serve God, the platform that service will bring you; your qualification will never take you there.
Service in the Kingdom is an open-ended opportunity.
Luke 2:36-37, Acts 6:4, Daniel 6:10, Nehemiah 1:4.
I trust God today that by the authority of the Scripture, your level is changing.
Kingdom stewardship is a life-long race, it is for eternity.
PRAYER:
-As the hand of God is visiting you, your story will change. You will not longer serve God in vain. The hand of God will do you good. As you key into this demands, they shall become testimonials in your life.
- I pronounce the blessings of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit to rest upon you in the name of Jesus Christ.
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