An excerpt from the book, “From Bleak to Bliss” by Gbile Akanni.”
Whatever allurement the devil advertises, it is only to steal, to kill and to destroy. A slight degree of deviation from God’s purpose for your life may eventually become thousands of kilometers away from your course. A brief trip into backsliding may actually trip your feet into the bottomless pit of woe and confusion. The merciful Father stands with an outstretched hand gazing, looking and longing for His prodigals to come back home. The devil employs anything available to derail God’s people.
A drowning man cannot be purged while still in the waters. He must be taken out of the mire before any work of cleansing can begin. There is no change of raiment out there in the far country for the prodigal son. He must rise up out of that place to return to his father.
Friend, it is possible that you went to sojourn in that strange country where sin reigns supreme. You may have been having feelings of remorse and a desire to change your life. It will not amount to anything until you arise to come out of that place of sin. You must rise and take a step of repentance towards God today. You cannot cleanse yourself out there. You cannot change your internal raiment there as well. Your saying, “I will change” will not amount to anything until you actually arise to walk out of that wrong relationship. You must change your location before you can find the newness of life you are longing for. That girl ‘friend’ with whom you are falling into sin is that ‘Moab’ and unless you deliberately rise to get away, she will always overpower you.
Your first step towards restoration and redemption is to arise and take your leave of that environment. Do not prepare any more to leave; just leave. No preparation you make can be sufficient; your best resolve, you will only break. Stretch out your hand to the Saviour who is holding the rope of deliverance to you today and just come out. Leave everything behind. You will not need all those rags in your Father’s house. Just come as you are. Your Father in heaven says, “Come now! Let us settle the matter.” Go and settle the matter with Him and Him alone. There are the good things your Father’s land produced while you went down to that far country. You will eat freely if you will come back in repentance and obedience.
The way a man takes to go away from the Father is still the way he must take to return home. The Father did not look out for the prodigal son from another route. He looked for him daily on the way by which he departed. To have a genuine restoration, we must retrace our steps and do the first works we learnt to do when we first met the Lord. Nothing changed for the prodigal son until he came to himself and made that personal declaration that turned his life around and relocated him away from the far country.
Every backslider is indeed besides himself. It is a delusion that would make a man leave the loving arms of the Father in heaven for a far country under the scorching heat of the sun. The prodigal son arose and came to his father. You must also arise and return to God. You must set out from the place of backsliding where you are. You cannot remain in the place where you are in sin and hope to make progress with God. You must set out of that place and come on your way to return to the land of your destiny in Christ. The prodigal son also arose to come to his father.
Have you made a personal decision to follow the Lord? Have you not known that it is not where you were born or how you were born, that determines your placement in the purpose of God now on earth and then in eternity? It is your decision now that determines your location in eternity. Have you been bold enough to answer these questions: Where will you spend your eternity? With whom will you go in life; the Lord Jesus or the god of this world? You must come to this point of personal decision, you cannot be neutral. You are either going with Him or going away from Him. And it is this decision of yours that will determine your place in the purpose and plan of God in your own generation.
Jesus would not make any man anything in His kingdom who has not taken a definite decision to follow Him in discipleship. It is not enough to want to be with Him for the benefits and the miracles we can easily derive from Him. Each man must come to this point of personal choice to follow Jesus. It is not a call to come, wine and dine. It is rather a call to come out of the self-life and all its allurement for death to occur. It is a decision that must be voluntarily taken to follow into all that God has in store for us. It is not a group decision. It is personal. This is the first decision every genuine disciple must make. It is the decision to lose preference of location. A follower does not decide where to go any more. He simply follows wherever the Master leads. He has no choice where to lay his head any more. He has also lost the choice of where to settle. I must not become accustomed to any place as to make it difficult for me to relocate when the cloud of His presence is moving. Every true disciple must come to this point where he is willing to belong to God’s people implicitly.
Have you resolved to follow Him come what may? Is there anything that has come between you and the Saviour? Are you ready to cleave to the Man of Calvary? Though the world system preaches and pursues human rights, I have lost my right, content to be lost in Him. I only live for Jesus. I have no reason to be alive if not for Him.
I have seen the glimpse of that country and its power to hold a man back. To go down is the easiest thing, but to come up again is like climbing a perpendicular wall. To go down in one’s consecration is usually a rapid slope, but to climb back to the height is a difficult matter. Many started out right, but shortly before the Bethlehem of their restoration, they deviated and dived into confusion, obscurity and darkness.
It is amazing to me to see that neither death nor life should come between me and the Saviour. Even life must not sever my heart from the Lord. Height or depth must not come between me and the Lord. Height of achievement or depth of failure must not come between me and the Lord. Life is great and it is what many will give everything to keep, but my life must not become anything to me if it seeks to separate me from the Lord.
A drowning man cannot be purged while still in the waters. He must be taken out of the mire before any work of cleansing can begin. There is no change of raiment out there in the far country for the prodigal son. He must rise up out of that place to return to his father.
Friend, it is possible that you went to sojourn in that strange country where sin reigns supreme. You may have been having feelings of remorse and a desire to change your life. It will not amount to anything until you arise to come out of that place of sin. You must rise and take a step of repentance towards God today. You cannot cleanse yourself out there. You cannot change your internal raiment there as well. Your saying, “I will change” will not amount to anything until you actually arise to walk out of that wrong relationship. You must change your location before you can find the newness of life you are longing for. That girl ‘friend’ with whom you are falling into sin is that ‘Moab’ and unless you deliberately rise to get away, she will always overpower you.
Your first step towards restoration and redemption is to arise and take your leave of that environment. Do not prepare any more to leave; just leave. No preparation you make can be sufficient; your best resolve, you will only break. Stretch out your hand to the Saviour who is holding the rope of deliverance to you today and just come out. Leave everything behind. You will not need all those rags in your Father’s house. Just come as you are. Your Father in heaven says, “Come now! Let us settle the matter.” Go and settle the matter with Him and Him alone. There are the good things your Father’s land produced while you went down to that far country. You will eat freely if you will come back in repentance and obedience.
The way a man takes to go away from the Father is still the way he must take to return home. The Father did not look out for the prodigal son from another route. He looked for him daily on the way by which he departed. To have a genuine restoration, we must retrace our steps and do the first works we learnt to do when we first met the Lord. Nothing changed for the prodigal son until he came to himself and made that personal declaration that turned his life around and relocated him away from the far country.
Every backslider is indeed besides himself. It is a delusion that would make a man leave the loving arms of the Father in heaven for a far country under the scorching heat of the sun. The prodigal son arose and came to his father. You must also arise and return to God. You must set out from the place of backsliding where you are. You cannot remain in the place where you are in sin and hope to make progress with God. You must set out of that place and come on your way to return to the land of your destiny in Christ. The prodigal son also arose to come to his father.
Have you made a personal decision to follow the Lord? Have you not known that it is not where you were born or how you were born, that determines your placement in the purpose of God now on earth and then in eternity? It is your decision now that determines your location in eternity. Have you been bold enough to answer these questions: Where will you spend your eternity? With whom will you go in life; the Lord Jesus or the god of this world? You must come to this point of personal decision, you cannot be neutral. You are either going with Him or going away from Him. And it is this decision of yours that will determine your place in the purpose and plan of God in your own generation.
Jesus would not make any man anything in His kingdom who has not taken a definite decision to follow Him in discipleship. It is not enough to want to be with Him for the benefits and the miracles we can easily derive from Him. Each man must come to this point of personal choice to follow Jesus. It is not a call to come, wine and dine. It is rather a call to come out of the self-life and all its allurement for death to occur. It is a decision that must be voluntarily taken to follow into all that God has in store for us. It is not a group decision. It is personal. This is the first decision every genuine disciple must make. It is the decision to lose preference of location. A follower does not decide where to go any more. He simply follows wherever the Master leads. He has no choice where to lay his head any more. He has also lost the choice of where to settle. I must not become accustomed to any place as to make it difficult for me to relocate when the cloud of His presence is moving. Every true disciple must come to this point where he is willing to belong to God’s people implicitly.
Have you resolved to follow Him come what may? Is there anything that has come between you and the Saviour? Are you ready to cleave to the Man of Calvary? Though the world system preaches and pursues human rights, I have lost my right, content to be lost in Him. I only live for Jesus. I have no reason to be alive if not for Him.
I have seen the glimpse of that country and its power to hold a man back. To go down is the easiest thing, but to come up again is like climbing a perpendicular wall. To go down in one’s consecration is usually a rapid slope, but to climb back to the height is a difficult matter. Many started out right, but shortly before the Bethlehem of their restoration, they deviated and dived into confusion, obscurity and darkness.
It is amazing to me to see that neither death nor life should come between me and the Saviour. Even life must not sever my heart from the Lord. Height or depth must not come between me and the Lord. Height of achievement or depth of failure must not come between me and the Lord. Life is great and it is what many will give everything to keep, but my life must not become anything to me if it seeks to separate me from the Lord.
No comments :
Post a Comment