NOT EVERY OPEN DOOR IS GOD’S DOOR AND NOT EVERY OPEN DOOR IS A DOOR YOU SHOULD ENTER AT THAT TIME.
IF YOUR PRAYER LIFE IS DEAD, YOU WILL FALL INTO MANY TRAPS CHEAPLY.
EVERY TIME YOU GET OUT OF THE WILL OF GOD, IT WILL TAKE MERCY TO REDEEM YOU.
- Apostle Joshua Selman at Koinonia on ‘DISCERNING THE WILL OF GOD’
(PART B).
2). The Wisdom that comes from the Word of God (Psalm 119:105) – The Word of God provides both guidance and direction (Hebrews 4:12). The Word of God is an instrument of discernment, it can pierce into the heart of a man and fetch out what is hidden in there. That means we can know what is in the heart of God by studying what is written in the World.
Luke 4:18-20
Your destiny is hidden in the Book, the will of God is hidden in the Book. When you close the Book, you stop seeing. The reason why you have not seen is because the Book given to you is closed. Church Gist. There’s a relationship between sight, discernment and the opening of the Book. There is something in the Book written concerning everybody, it is your assignment to take the Word of God and find where it is written concerning you.
The Word of God reveals the ways of God and the principles of the Kingdom and gives you the opportunity to be able to understand the character of God and that is able to filter all the opinions that come around your life. Knowing the ways of God can help you to know what God cannot say. Church Gist. Your thoughts are powerful weapons as far as translating the voice and the speakings of God to your life. Your thoughts are so powerful, medical science tells us that a man can think his way to high blood pressure until there were people who thought themselves to death. Many of us have believed many things that are inconsistent with the way God talks and works. In this end time, we need a personal revelation of the Word of God. You must become an intentional student of scripture if you want to survive the times that are coming.
One of the principal ways that God speaks to us is through His Word and if you do not have the Word of God hidden in your heart, you don’t have the instrument to be able to discern the will of God; the devil will play with your mind until he destroys you.
3). Through strategic prayers, particularly praying in the Spirit (praying in tongues). This is one of the principal ways that the Bible provides as an instrument of discerning the will of God. There are two levels of the will of God:
a). The will of God as far as the blueprint of your purpose and destiny is concerned.
b). The moment-by-moment dealings in your life that will lead you ultimately to that greater goal.
You need to hear the voice of God per day, per moment. You need to be in the will of God every time. Church Gist. God will not be speaking to you about your destiny and your life every day, but you need His will to know what He wants you to do per time, per season. Prayer provides that platform to be able to buy into the mind of the Spirit, to know what God is thinking at the moment for you (1 Corinthians 2:6-16)
Through the ministry of prayer, one can pray and ascend to tap into the wisdom of God and can see negative things that want to happen. Many of us have ruined precious moments because we are interpreting things just from the earthly realm.
- May you never be in the dark again!
Isaiah 30:21, Jeremiah 33:3
Many years ago, when we had our first crusade, after that crusade, because we usually would organize a crusade in partnership with PFN or at least, some of the Church body there. After the crusade, I remember some of the PFN leaders called me and said, why don’t you come and establish a branch of the ministry there, we will give you some pastors, you can train them and have it. Church Gist. For most believers, that look like breakthrough. Be careful when doors open, even the prison has doors. So, when a door is opened, you better find out where you are entering. Nobody enters the prison except through a door; every trouble has a door that leads to it. Our obsession for opening doors without discernment will land us in trouble. For many of you, it is not closed doors that cause your trouble; it was open doors.
I went to God in prayer, it was sincerely a very nice thing; I went to God in prayer and I said, “Lord, this is what these sincere people are saying on account of what You did through our lives and I will repeat for You the exact words that God used for me; He said, “You will die.” It didn’t make sense for many years but now, I understand exactly what He was saying. At the time God helped us to start this ministry and I say this with all honour to Jesus, I will never forget that time, that was when ministries used to generate revenue principally from the media ministry, then internet was not really the way it is now, so you package your CDs, cassettes and then, it will be a major stream of income. Church Gist. I remember the Lord speaking to me and He said, “You will not sell any media material. You will put your raw audios online and my angels will take it to the nations.” It didn’t make sense but glory be to God, the foolishness of discerning the will of God. I told you that the will of God does not make sense in many regards as at the time His Word comes but if you can obey…
Mark 1:21-35
The reason for Jesus’ power was that, everywhere he went and everything he was doing was consistent to the will of God. Most of you do not know what you are missing out when you get up and start your day without praying. It is pride to get up and just start your day, the One who made the day, you will not find out how He designed all of these to be; you are not asking, “Lord, what is in it today?”
- I impart upon you by the Spirit of God, the grace to stay with God and only move when you understand His will!
I will never forget years ago, I was supposed to go for a meeting in Kaduna, I was already taking my bath and I was happy. In fact, they really had started the meeting but they would give me a two-hour gap and so, I was taking my bath because it will take about an hour to get to Kaduna from Zaria and while I was taking my bath, the Holy Spirit spoke to me expressly. He said, “Do not go for that meeting.” Church Gist. Not because there was anything wrong with the meeting, very since people; “Let someone stand for you.” I felt sad because these were people I love sincerely. I was going for that meeting to encourage the people; they love Jesus with all their hearts. I said, “How do I tell these people now? They had done the little and put posters and it was not like they had much.” I had to call two of my people in Kaduna and said, “Please, go for this meeting and go and stand for me.” When I called the people, they thought I was already around; “Apostle, are you around?” I said, “Well, I am really sorry, I don’t know how I am going to tell you this but, I may not be able to come. God has restrained me from coming.”
“What happened?”
For every time you hear God and walk in the will of God, there is a fearful blessing at the other side of your obedience. In fact, sometimes, that can literally open the next chapter of your life and destiny. You must obtain grace from God to pray; pray in the night, pray in the morning. You are man of God, don’t say this is how they are doing it, go to God and pray. They are many things that are wonderful, I have lovely friends in ministry in this nation and across the globe and some of them, I even share with them by the privilege of God’s grace, ideas to be effective in some of the things that they do. Church Gist. But I will never find myself in anything personally and corporately that has not been commanded by God. I learnt this from God’s servant, Bishop David Oyedepo, he said that years ago, they were in Ghana and they were in their season of expansion and all of that and they went to Ghana and they found out that they were struggling in the ministry, even though the mandate was speaking globally and everywhere, God was prospering the work but particularly in Ghana, it was like there was a resistance and he went back to God in prayer and God said, “I have not commanded it.” According to him, he said, he insisted immediately that they should close that church. Walk circumspectly as wise, not as unwise; walk knowing the will of God concerning what you are doing.
Everything good is not necessarily godly. If you follow things just because they are good, you will get into many troubles. Satan uses both good and evil to destroy. It is not only evil he uses to destroy.
4). Patience – patience will reveal the will of God for you and then when you find that will and do it, you will now obtain the promise. It is in this area of patience that I submit to you that satan has cheated many believers because there’s a narrative that we have been given in the Body of Christ that the moment it is God, He will speak expressly (Hebrews 6:15).
There are many reasons why sometimes in the life of a believer, it may take a very long time for the will of God to be revealed to you. It is a very difficult thing to live in the silence of God, but the glory that follows His season of silence is the glory that excels. Every time God is silent, beware of the voice you hear because when your desperation to hear and receive the will of God gets to the roof, satan will come and cash in on that moment and appear as an angel of light.
When it has to do with the mysteries of life and destiny, sometimes you need to be careful; experience can destroy. Experience is powerful but experience is only powerful if it is vetted by the wisdom of God. Experience is powerful but it must be guarded. Church Gist. You must obtain grace and stamina from God to be insistent on His will. This is where the stamina and the maturity of a believer is tested; your ability to remain in the last place of His instruction and stay there even when God does not make sense. For many years, God will not allow me buy a car. I felt that I needed it in ministry because the burden of mobility and movement and it was not that the resources were not there. I will never forget one time when I went to a car stand, I had bargained and talked about the money, I was going to pay for it when the Holy Spirit spoke to me, the people in the car stand insulted me and they said, you don’t have money and you came here bragging and all of that. How do I tell them, God prohibited me? Church Gist. For many years, as Koinonia was ongoing, it was a bike that I was using. It was not a product of lack. There were many gifts of cars that people would bring for me and I would say no. The Holy Spirit will say no; “Pray for them and give them back.” “Okay, God, so what is the name of what You are doing with me?” I am just using that to teach you something; how can I be going for a miracle service, winning souls, casting out devils, doing all of that; I go for an external ministration, there’s a convoy carrying me, I return back home and I am climbing a bike.
I remember one time, the protocol department, I think a woman donated her car or something and they came to pick me and I said, “Whose car is this?” I rebuked them and said, “Don’t you ever inconvenience anybody; they are not here to come and drive me. They came to listen to the Word of God.” Eventually, one of our dear ones started using his car to move me around and I said, “Lord, what is the meaning of this?” I mean, even if it is for responsibility’s sake – Patience. Can I tell you? Don’t hurry season, you will miss the season you are rushing out of now.
I remember the day I was preparing for a Koinonia service when the protocol came to knock my door. They know that once I lock myself like that, you don’t disturb me and they knocked the door and I said, “Who is that?” They said, “Please we have a message for you.”
Response: from who? Please leave me alone, I am preparing for the service.
They said, “Sir, a woman said the Lord instructed her to bring a car to bring for you.”
Response: From where?
They said, so and so place. This is it and finally, that peace that for many years, my heart just went down. I said, “Lord, is this car for me or it is for someone else?” And the Lord said, “No, you take it.” Church Gist. That was the first time God allowed me. I am teaching you this, so that you will learn. There are many testimonies we can share but there are two reasons why I don’t share testimonies:
a). Most people are not prepared to listen.
b). Some of this my precious social media people who promote my messages, their interest is, they caption nonsense and let me use this as word of caution; I love you all, I know that God has used my teachings to bless many people and I am very happy. Proposals have come; withdraw all your teachings from all these people. I said no, if God is blessing them with it and they are blessing the Nation, so be it. My only concern is, make sure that you caption things and present the message in a balanced way that bless people. Don’t be so obsessed to drive traffic that you don’t care whether you misrepresent what we are saying. You must fear God.
So, back to my story, do you know I stand by God to tell you; I passed that vehicle like that and I did not even look at it for once. It was when we were done with the Miracle Service, I returned back home after counseling very late, in fact, already into the morning, that was when I went and I opened it, it was a Siena and I said, God, so this is it? So, what was the whole goal? And among the many things God told me was that, I put you through this sacrifice so that you will mentor young people to teach them that, success is not just in getting things. I constrain you to help people know that the spiritual content within you, that you can excel even without fighting for some of these things.
From that day till forever, what God has done by reason of that sacrifice to wait, I will only give God the glory here on earth and even afterwards. Be careful when impatience begins to destroy your life. The all-wise God knows how to direct your life per time, per season.
How to interpret the silence of God:
It is true that there are times God can be silent, as far as revealing His will over your life and destiny is concerned. There is something called the season of the silence of God. Every time God is silent, it means three things:
1). He is working on you; you as the vessel that will be used to do His will, there is a work that He is doing in you and revealing His will to you will be a waste in that state and so, His silence means that you should continue the training of the building until He makes you the vessel that is able to do that will you want Him to reveal.
Luke 2:52
Don’t waste your moments of silence, when God is silent, rather than lamenting in impatience, focus on allowing Him build you. Most people do not focus on God making them, they just focus on God revealing His will. Every time God reveals His will, there is a version that will fulfill that will and if you have not become that version, He will withhold His speakings and focus on your training. Church Gist. Even in your confusion, God is still leading you. If God’s desire is for you to go this way and enter a door, if it is God’s desire for you to go left and enter the door to your destiny and in all honesty and sincerity of heart, believing Him, you move right, He will remove the door there and bring it here to make sure you do not miss His will. That is how determined God is.
Beware when God appears to you and say you are highly favoured because sometimes what follows that statement is controversy. How do you explain that you are pregnant and yet, you claim you are a virgin? And instead of God to speak and defend you, He keeps quiet. When the will of God is manifested in your life, there are battles that become unnecessary, you have won. Church Gist. When God is speaking to end your seasons, He does not come as a still small voice. When it has to do with bringing your season to an end, He comes in majesty. He will do things that it will be impossible to doubt that He is the One that came. While you are waiting, don’t be regretting what you would have been doing. It is already in the plan; the compensation has already been built. Patience is powerful because it can help you to be able to gather together the kind of compassion you need through your pain so that you will sustain certain results when they come. When certain destiny things come too easy, there is no memory bank of pain, you will be careless over many great things.
2). He is working on other factors needed to help you do His will. Sometimes when God leaves you in His silence, it is because He is at the other end of your destiny, rearranging the people and the conditions that must make you to walk in purpose (Luke 1:39-43).
Every time you don’t understand God, give Him thanks and know that He is doing something, preparing a table, fixing things that you will never need to have any trouble about again in your life. For many years in Zaria, we were looking for a land for the ministry; no ministry will stay that long without at least having a property to start building and all of that and we looked around for land, I prayed and fasted and said, Lord, there has to be land in Zaria here for us. Church Gist. Every time You call people, You anoint them, there has to be one. But then when I learnt this, I knew that something was happening and I kept quiet. One day, one thing led to the other and then, I slept and I had a dream and I saw directly opposite the teaching hospital in Zaria, I saw myself standing there and there was an empty land there and the Lord told me, that one day, this will be the place that you will buy. They had done an excavation there to fix the road and that was where God kept that land.
3). He is fighting unseen battles and averting certain dangers that may befall you on your way to executing His will. When satan tries to stop your destiny and he cannot stop it, when he knows that it is sure you are moving the path of destiny, the next thing he does is to begin to program all kinds of war on your part to actualizing destiny. Church Gist. God seeing that can suspend that which is His will for your life and then deal with the obstacles you will be waiting for in future and then the moment that is done, He will release you to go (Matthew 2:20).
If God did not train Moses for the extra thirty years and simply because of the pressure to make sure prophecy comes to pass and He pushed Moses prematurely like that, He may have brought them out of Egypt but they will all die, even with all the training, it was only Joshua and Caleb in that generation that entered the promise land. Every time through ignorance you indict the integrity of God, He will let you have your way but you will be ready for the consequences of going out of His program. Church Gist. It is dangerous to wrestle with God. It is possible to wrestle with God and then you will be the winner but every time your will defeats the will of God, start being afraid for yourself, it will take mercy to redeem you when you get out of the will of God.
If your prayer life is dead, you will fall into many traps cheaply. Not every open door is God’s door or not every open door is a door you should enter at that time. Sometimes, it may be the door you will eventually enter. Many restrain is the love and the mercy of God so that certain battles will be fought. When Koinonia started, I started having an inspiration, should I come to Abuja, to come and set up Koinonia? I was in this same City, having a retreat and I saw a plane, the plane was written, ENI. The plane left Zaria and it was coming to Abuja, the moment it was about to land Abuja, it crashed and everybody within the plane died. Church Gist. I knew what God was saying, that don’t you dare do anything that is outside my timing. It was still in His plan that we will be here but timing is as important as the Word. The Word go and the Word go now are not the same. The word go and the word go later are not the same. So, just because God tells you; you are going to go left, you need to ask Him, “now that I know where I am going, when am I going?” Because if you miss one day or exceed with one day, it can corrupt the entire process of the journey.
PRAYER:
- Oh Lord, where I am at the edge of making a fatal disaster for my life, I obtain grace for a U-turn.
- Lord, grant me the grace and the staying power that all the days of my appointed time, I will wait until Your voice comes to lead me; destroy the spirit of impatience.
(Altar Call)
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