Here is another benediction related to giving. The benediction is in verse 8 and 10, but let’s look at the context.

But this I say: He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. So let each one give as he purposes in his heart, not grudgingly or of necessity; for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for every good work. The Cheerful Giver

But this I say:He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. So let each one give as he purposes in his heart, not grudgingly or of necessity; for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for every good work. As it is written:

“He has dispersed abroad,

He has given to the poor;

His righteousness endures forever.”

Now may He who supplies seed to the sower, and bread for food, supply and multiply the seed you have sown and increase the fruits of your righteousness.

– II Corinthians 9:6,7,8,9,10

He says not to give reluctantly or under compulsion. When Christians don’t understand giving, they will give grudgingly and sadly. People should not be coerced into giving either.

God will make grace abound towards you – this means that God’s ability, strength and power will be given to you in multiplied measure for every need. Grace can be understood as ‘power, strength and ability’. God is essentially saying that may you have strength, power and ability to handle every thing. When God gives you ALL grace, you will have ALL sufficiency in ALL things ALWAYS. When this happens, you won’t have to look at the price column in the menu when you go to a restaurant, you won’t be worried about paying rent or school fees, you won’t feel sad that you don’t have enough money to give for ministry or for a good cause. But some people like to be in want and lack. They feel that it is a sign of holiness. They refuse to accept this benediction of God.

The seed in verse 10 refers to giving and money. It says that God will do two things – He will 1) supply and 2) multiply. The seed multiplies when it is sown. That is why the Bible says God gives seed to the sower. When God gives you money, there is money to be used as seed and money to be used as food. Some people don’t have a heart to give; they eat everything. God can multiply only when you sow, when you give. We must believe that God is able to both supply and multiply.

In verse 8 says – ‘that you may have a abundance for good work’. ‘Good work’ is what God leads you to do. God has called you to do a good work that may be different from the good work that He has called another person to do. God will give you the ‘desire’ to do that good work and he will supply you with the resources to do that good work. I have seen that there is always abundance for good work.

Speak this as a benediction into your own life. It will happen when you believe in it and speak it. Call it forth. What you speak is important. That is how faith works.

The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen. – 2 Corinthians 13:14

Paul is talking about how the father son and the Holy Sprit have achieved something through the church. God the father on the basis of love sent His Son. Jesus, by His grace has done everything thought the Cross for us. The Holy Spirit brings these things home to us by ministering to us.

Become complete. Be of good comfort, be of one mind, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you. – 2 Corinthians 13:11

Paul blesses them saying, ‘Become complete’. Doesn’t this sound like God when He spoke fullness/wholeness to emptiness at creation? We already saw how God spoke fullness, order and light to emptiness, darkness and chaos. Now, Paul is applying the same principle to man, the new creation. If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation.

Today’s pastors have to speak to their congregation, just like Paul spoke to the church. In Ephesians chapter 5, we read the instructions to husbands to love their wives the way Christ loves the church. How does Christ love the church? He washes and cleanses the church by the word of God. Jesus knows that the church is imperfect. You cannot see a single church that is perfect. Even the Bible says so. It consists of people with various flaws. They have been saved by the grace of God, but they still have problems. That is why God has given the pastor to the church to help wash and cleanse them with the word of God so that they may be presented to God one day, blameless and faultless. When the word of God is spoken in the church, a transformation happens in the lives of the believers. Just like Paul said, the pastor should say to the church – Become complete. Be of good comfort, be of one mind, live in peace.

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Now may the God of peace who brought up our Lord Jesus from the dead, that great Shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you complete in every good work to do His will, working in you what is well pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen. – Hebrews 13: 20,21

I’ve heard some preachers give this benediction to their churches. It is a wonderful benediction because it mentions – the resurrection of Jesus, that He is the Shepherd to us His sheep, the blood that was shed on the Cross for us, the everlasting covenant, the new covenant – all these things assure us that we will be made complete in the end. God finishes what He starts. He will finish this completion work in us till we are made whole to do His will. God is able to take us sinners and make us perfect. God is able to take us, flawed as we are and make us wonderful and be of use to Him and to others.

A preacher once went to see a lady who was dying. He wanted to make sure that she was ready to meet the Saviour. He asked her, “Are you ready? If you died, are you sure that you will go to heaven?” She replied, “If I don’t make it, shame on God! He saved me by dying on the Cross, He made a covenant, He shed His blood, He made all things mine, He sent the Holy Spirit, He gave the Word, He gave the church – all this to work on me and make me blameless before Him. I have no doubt that I will go to Heaven.” The preacher still had his doubts and asked her, “Have you held on tight to the Lord?” She said, “No, I haven’t. He has held on to me tightly.” If we depended upon our holding him and our faithfulness to Him, we would fail miserably. We can make it, not by our works, but because the hand that will never leave us or forsake us is holding on to us.

This benediction about ‘completeness’ is such a wonderful blessing. But in most churches, the words of benediction are said at the very end, what comes before it is confusion. Pastors ask – are you sure you’ll go to heaven? will your prayers even reach the roof? The church has failed to present this certainty of salvation.

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You may have not thought of this verse as a benediction. But it is. It even ends like one.

And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus. Now to our God and Father be glory forever and ever. Amen.

– Philippians 4:17

Paul is at the end of his letter to the Philippians and is pronouncing his benediction over them. It was his habit to end all his letters with a benediction, as we have seen in the examples of the verses above. These were people who had given him financial assistance. None of the other churches gave like the Philippian church. He commended them for their spirit of giving. And after appreciating them, He blesses them saying that God will meet all their needs according to His riches in glory. Not according to their needs, but according to God’s riches. When God meets our needs according to His level, not according to our level of need, everything will be fine.

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…to be continued…

We’ve been learning about the principles of faith for about a year. Faith is a spiritual principle that works as well as physical principles like gravity. We have been taught about the law of gravity in school. If we drop something, it will fall to the floor. We know that because we have studied the law of gravity. We don’t doubt it. When we drop something, we don’t wonder whether it will fall to the floor or float. We just know and believe that it will fall. We believe that the law of gravity will work. The laws of God are similar. They have unfailing principles. Some Christians don’t understand that God has unchanging spiritual laws and principles. They think that God wavers. So they wonder – who knows what will happen? who knows what God will do? He may do this or He may do that, God only knows, I wonder if He will grant me my wish? But no! God has instituted spiritual laws. He does not override them. Laws and principles are meant to be learnt and understood. We already learnt two important principles faith – authority and confession from several instances from the Bible including the story of Roman centurion.

Last week, we saw that by our confession we frame and shape our life and future. We saw examples from the Old Testament of benediction, of how people learnt from God to speak blessings. Let’s look at one more example from the Old Testament.

The Lord shall preserve you from all evil; He shall preserve your soul. The Lord shall preserve your going out and your coming in from this time forth, and even forevermore. – Psalm 121: 7,8

Speak preservation. Don’t speak destruction, disease, poverty and failure. Speak that God will preserve you. Let me tell you something that happened. A pastor in the US in the 60s used to teach about faith. He was a mighty man of God. There was a 39-year-old minister in his church. All of a sudden, he fell sick. The whole church prayed for him. The pastor also prayed. During this time, God spoke to the pastor saying that He cannot change the laws that He had established even before the beginning of time. The pastor didn’t know what God was referring to. The young man’s health became worse and he died. A few days after the burial, he was with the family and they were talking about him. They remarked about how he used to say that he would not live to see 40. His parents and siblings all said that he used to say that often. God reminded the pastor about what He had said earlier – that He could not change the laws that He has established. The young man got exactly what he had believed and spoken about.

God will not change that laws that He has established. It is we who have to change the way we think and speak, in accordance with God’s laws.

We may not speak such drastic things like the young man above, but we say things like – “I have peaked out, I can never earn more with my educational qualification. I cannot go forward any further. This is the end. I will fall sick, because I’m getting old”. They set the ceiling by their thoughts and words. The law of faith says that it will be unto you according to your faith. People are where they are, because they have believed it and spoken it. What you hear and what you believe is important. That’s why the Bible speaks about the necessity to renew the mind constantly.

BENEDICTIONS IN THE NEW TESTAMENT

Let’s learn from some examples of benediction from the New Testament.

Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit – Romans 15:13

Paul is speaking joy and peace and hope as a blessing in their life. This sounds exactly like God speaking light, order and fullness into darkness, emptiness and chaos. This blessing speaks joy, peace and hope into a world full of sadness, tragedy, evil and despair. When this blessing is spoken, joy, peace and hope will come into the lives of whom it is spoken.

Let’s look into the context of this verse. In those days, the Jews and the rest of the world called gentiles were two very distinct separate groups. The Jews would not even drink a glass of water from the gentiles. In Ephesians 2, Paul calls the distinction ‘a middle wall of separation’. The Jews thought that salvation was reserved only for them. Paul was referring to prophetic Old Testament Scriptures that included the gentiles in the plan of God. But now, the gentiles had become members of the church and sat alongside the Jews, treating one another as brothers and sister and even eating together. The church was a marvellous phenomenon in the New Testament times. Something that no political peace treaty could achieve was achieved in the church. Though the Bible was written when it was surrounded by a culture of oppression of females, slaves and other classes of people, the Bible itself does not teach such differences in people. The Bible treats everyone as equal. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus – Galatians 3:28. Even 2000 years ago, Peter writes that men should honour women. In the same way you married men should live considerately with [your wives], with an intelligent recognition [of the marriage relation], honoring the woman as [physically] the weaker, but [realizing that you] are joint heirs of the grace (God’s unmerited favor) of life, in order that your prayers may not be hindered and cut off. [Otherwise you cannot pray effectively.] – I Peter 3:7, The Amplified Bible. The Bible is strikingly different from the existing culture. The Bible is not a cultural book; it is the word of God representing God’s system. The writings may reflect the existing culture of those times, but the Bible does not promote those cultures.

Now may the God of patience and comfort grant you to be like- minded toward one another, according to Christ Jesus, that you may with one mind and one mouth glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. – Romans 15:5,6

In such a background of differences, Paul speaks a blessing saying that they ought to be like-minded toward one another. He says that these differences must not be present. He speaks equality and unity to a divided crowd. When Paul spoke it, it happened. They forgot their differences and got together and treated on another with equality, love and brotherhood. What we speak comes to pass.

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…to be continued…

Jacob blesses his grandsons

Gen 48:13-20 contains the story of how Jacob blesses his son Joseph and his grandsons, Ephraim and Manasseh.

The blessing of increase: And let them grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth. His descendants shall become a multitude of nations.

The blessing of success: Let my name be named upon them,

And the name of my fathers Abraham and Isaac. He also shall become a people, and he also shall be great. “By you Israel will bless, saying, ‘May God make you as Ephraim and as Manasseh

Aaronic blessing

God teaches them to bless regularly. One day, while they were travelling the desert, God called him and told him that He had something important to teach him. He taught him some words so that Aaron and his sons could speak those words so that the nation would have abundance, plenty and success. He tells the priest to pronounce benediction on the people.

And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying:

“Speak to Aaron and his sons, saying,

‘This is the way you shall bless the children of Israel. Say to them:

“The Lord bless you and keep you;

The Lord make His face shine upon you,

And be gracious to you;

The Lord lift up His countenance upon you,

And give you peace

“So they shall put My name on the children of Israel, and I will bless them. – Numbers 6:22

Priesthood is supposed to speak blessing on the people. God taught them this in the wilderness, even before they entered the Promised Land.

Some Christians are still like Old Testament believers. They want someone special to come and pronounce the blessing in their house. The New Testament calls each believer a king and a priest. So the blessing doesn’t have to be spoken only by the clergy. God taught this to Adam. Every person needs to speak good words to produce good things. But we delegate this job to the clergy. We think ourselves unworthy.

You are the High Priest in your house. Speak over your family, you finances, your health, the work of your hands, you business, you life.

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Blessing is merely speaking good things to make good things happen. All these saints learnt it from God and they followed it. This is what a ‘life of faith’ is about. Speaking a blessing is not a one-time affair to be spoken exclusively at important occasions like weddings. Sometimes, people don’t understand the necessity to ‘speak’ the blessing. Some people thing that it is enough to believe in the heart and that there’s no necessity to speak what we believe. In that case, we can omit the benediction that the priest says at the end of service. Is it not?

God framed the world by His words. Speak good words of faith. That is why the promises of God are given. Speak them forth. Have a faith-made life. Have a word-framed life.

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The second part of Hebrews 11:3 contains an important truth.

So that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible. – Heb 11:3

The things we see are not made by the things we can see.

The things we see are made by things we cannot see.

Nothing that you see in this world can produce good things for you. Nothing! Everything here was produced by something else. Nothing came about by what you can see. It came about by the word of God. If you put your hope in the things around you that you see, you will be disappointed. Even today, only the word can produce. When the Pharisees were upset that Jesus had called Himself the Son of God, He told them a deeper truth – the Bible called their forefathers gods. Why were men called gods? – because they had the word of God. Every one with the word of God is a god. You can rule and dominate everything that comes against the fulfilment of God’s purpose in your life. By speaking, you can produce good things. You can do what God did. With your word, you can change the darkness in your life to light, the emptiness to fullness, the chaos to peace.

Then God said, “Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs and seasons, and for days and years; and let them be for lights in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth”; and it was so. Then God made two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night. He made the stars also. God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth, and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness. Genesis 1:14-18

God specified the purpose and the function of the sun, moon and stars. They are created as signs and for seasons. He specifies the location of the sun and moon; He tells the sun to provide light in the day and the moon and stars to provide light in the night. By speaking the word, He sets them in their place and makes them function according to His will. Night and day, all the four season come and go without fail, because God has said so.

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Then God said, “Let the waters abound with an abundance of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the face of the firmament of the heavens.” So God created great sea creatures and every living thing that moves, with which the waters abounded, according to their kind, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. And God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth. – Genesis 1:20-22

He created the animals, birds and fish and spoke their function and purpose. Verse 22 is interesting. This is the first time that the word ‘bless’ is mentioned in the Bible. Another word for ‘blessing’ is ‘benediction’. What does ‘blessing’ or ‘benediction mean? ‘Bene’ is ‘good’; diction is ‘to speak’. When God created the animals, He blessed them by speaking good words over them. Every time God spoke, the words of His mouth were constructive and good; they created and framed. He spoke purposefully. Right from the beginning of creation, He spoke good words and created good and purposeful things. Out of emptiness, void and darkness, God framed a beautiful, purposeful world by the good words of His mouth.

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And God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth. – Genesis 1:22

His good words to the creatures of the world are words of increase and purpose. By His word, He gives them the capacity to increase. He speaks to them to multiply and fill their habitats. People think that when they give birth to a child, they have to start accumulating wealth so that they can give it to their child when he or she grows up. But what is more important is to speak good words into the life of the child – words of increase and blessing. When you start a business, speak good words of increase and blessing into it.

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Then God goes on to create man.

Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth. – Genesis 1:26

What is the image and likeness of God? It creates by the word; it dominates over every thing that goes wrong. God created everything by His word. God took dominion over darkness, void and emptiness by His word and framed a full, beautiful and purposeful world. God made man like Him to have dominion and to create beauty and purposefulness out of emptiness, darkness and chaos.

In verse 28, we read God ‘blessed’ them and ‘spoke’ good words to them to them – be fruitful, multiply, replenish, subdue and dominate. Faith is the ability to speak words and produce good things. God demonstrated faith in the very beginning at the creation.

TWO KEY ELEMENTS OF BLESSING

In every part of the world and in every community, blessing is known. Some things are common in all cultures; blessing in one such thing. God taught it to the first man and it has spread to all cultures.

Let’s focus on the text of the blessing. We see that blessing can be split into 2 parts:

• The blessing of increase – to multiply, grow and expand.
• The blessing of success – to subdue and dominate over every wrong thing, to succeed against all odds.

This pattern can be observed over and over again in the Old Testament.

Blessing at Creation

At creation, God blessed man with the words – ‘fruitful, multiply, replenish, subdue and dominate.’

The blessing of increase – to multiply, be fruitful and replenish the earth.

The blessing of success – to subdue and have dominion over the earth.

The blessing of Abraham

Let us look at the blessing of Abraham. We must remember that this is the very first time that God spoke to Abraham.

The blessing of increase: I will make you a great nation; I will bless you And make your name great; And you shall be a blessing. – Genesis 12:2-3. When he was just a single person, God blessed him saying that he would become a great nation.

The blessing of success: I will bless those who bless you, And I will curse him who curses you; And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed. – Genesis 12:2-3

In just 2 verses, God mentions ‘blessing’ five times. God taught him the value of blessing; He blessed him and told him what that blessing would accomplish. He spoke the same blessing that He gave to Adam to Abraham. Though the words are different, the essence of both the blessings is the same. It looks like Abraham has understood the meaning of blessing. Moreover, he seemed to have spread the concept. All his relatives knew it.

Rebekah’s family blesses her

The context is Abraham wanted to find a bride for his son, Isaac. He sends his servant to find a bride among his relatives. He goes and finds the bride. The bride’s family was ready to send their girl along with the servant to Abraham. During her send-off, they blessed her. Though the words are different, the same elements are present.

The blessing of increase: May you become the mother of thousands of ten thousands – Genesis 24:60.

The blessing of success: And may your descendants possess, the gates of those who hate them – Genesis 24:60

Live bountifully! And your children bountifully – Genesis 24:60. The Message Version.

Many Christians have not understood God’s blessing. They glory in their poverty, lack and failure. I usually preach this verse at weddings. Recently, after I had spoken at a wedding, a man asked me, “Where do you get such verses from?” Most people only preach about the wedding at Canaa during wedding. They don’t preach that properly either. They just say that Jesus went there, He’s here also. And they give advice to the couple not to fight, to give in to each other and such regular stuff that they already hear everywhere else. What did Jesus do at the wedding at Canaa? There was a problem of lack. They ran short of wine. He solved it by providing plenty and of a better quality.

Isaac’s blessing on Jacob

Going further down the story, we see how Isaac blessed his sons. Jacob believes in blessing. He saw how his grandfather and his father succeed in life. He realises that they succeeded because they had blessing. So he decided to get the blessing by hook or crook. Of course, blessing cannot be got be robbing it. He later repents. But the point here is that he realises the importance of blessing for his life.

Look at Isaac’s blessing on Jacob.

The blessing of increase: Therefore may God give you Of the dew of heaven, Of the fatness of the earth, And plenty of grain and wine. – Genesis 27:28

The blessing of success: Let peoples serve you, And nations bow down to you. Be master over your brethren, And let your mother’s sons bow down to you. Cursed be everyone who curses you, And blessed be those who bless you. – Genesis 27:28

…to be continued…

And since we have the same spirit of faith, according to what is written, “I believed and therefore I spoke,” we also believe and therefore speak. – 2 Corinthians 4:13

We learnt that Christianity is a great confession – a great positive confession. We also learnt about negative confession. People do it in the name of spiritual humility. But it is actually false humility. Worse still, it is a form of ‘pride’. People who speak like this dare to contradict God. While God calls us a royal priesthood, a chosen generation, sons of God, heirs of God, joint-heirs with Christ; they prefer to call themselves worms, sinners, and deserving nothing. They challenge God’s opinion of them.

The right confession is positive confession that is based on who we are in Christ, what we have in and through Christ, what we are because of the new birth in Jesus, what we are to God the Father, what Jesus is doing for us, and what His word can accomplish in and through us. For several weeks, we have been learning about the reasoning behind confession. We saw many reasons already. Let’s look at one more reason.

By confession, we frame and shape our world and our future.

We give shape and form to what we will be and what our future will be by the confession of our mouth.

Hebrews chapter 11 speaks of faith. It talks about heroes of faith, setting them forth as our forerunners to inspire us so that we can learn from their examples.

Hebrews 11: 1 contains the definition of faith.

Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

There is a lot of misunderstanding about faith. When someone else is working in a big company and I’ve left my job, it means I’m living by faith – without a job and without an income. Faith life is usually misunderstood as having nothing and ‘wondering’ where the next meal would come from. But the Bible definition of faith says that it is the ‘assurance’ for something that you are ‘hoping’ for. You can’t see it yet, but you know for sure that it is yours and the evidence is in the word of God. Faith is ‘simply believing what God says’. Your circumstance may say exactly the opposite. What do you believe? You don’t believe what you can see. You see what God says. And this is faith.

Hebrews 11:2 says – For by it the elders obtained a good testimony. All these people lived on the basis of God’s word. They had a good testimony. Their life is evidence to the fact that they succeeded living like that. They didn’t fail while living trusting in Gods’ word.

Verse 4 onwards tells us about many personalities who lived by faith, and demonstrated faith to us. Each person’s testimony teaches us one chief characteristic of faith.

By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible. – Hebrews 11:3

Verse 3 teaches us something very important – that the world is a ‘faith product’, a ‘word product’. How did faith ‘make’ the world? The world was made by the ‘word of God’. Faith is the thing that has brought everything that we see into being. Everything was framed by the word of God. A person living by faith lives by the word of God. The great saints of God in verses 4 – 40 lived like this. They knew how to operate by faith. How does faith operate? How did God create the world? By speaking the word. Living by faith therefore doesn’t just mean that you left your job and that you are wondering where the next meal will come from. Living by faith means that you are speaking good words every day that produce good things. Every thing that God made was good. Everything good came about by good words that came out of the mouth of God.

FRAMING THE WORLD BY THE WORD

God ‘framed’ the world means not just that he ‘created’ the world, but that He “formed and shaped every thing in the way He wanted them to be, and specified their purpose and function.” Hebrews 11:3 is a commentary on Genesis 1. Let’s go to Gen 1 to understand how God ‘framed’ the world.

Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. – Genesis 1:3-5

This is not just creating. If He had merely created, we wouldn’t know what to do. He ‘framed’ – He created and specified their purpose and functioning. He created light and separated light form darkness. How? By His spoken Word. He ‘calls’ the light day and ‘calls’ the darkness night.

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Then God said, “Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.” Thus God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament; and it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. Then God said, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear”; and it was so. And God called the dry land Earth, and the gathering together of the waters He called Seas.
– Genesis 1:6-10

He not only created the firmament but also divided the waters above from the waters beneath and He called the firmament Heaven. And He spoke to the waters on the earth to be gathered together and called them as seas, and the dry land was earth. He gave them their purpose and function.

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Then God said, “Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb that yields seed, and the fruit tree that yields fruit according to its kind, whose seed is in itself, on the earth”; and it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, the herb that yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that yields fruit, whose seed is in itself according to its kind. – Genesis 1:11,12

These verses speak not just about the creation of plants, but tells us exactly how they should work – having their seed within themselves, and being able to produce after their own kind. God specified these things by His word.

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…to be continued…

WHAT IS GOD PLEASED WITH?

For I also am a man under authority, having soldiers under me. And I say to this one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and to another, ‘Come,’ and he comes; and to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.”

When Jesus heard it, He marveled, and said to those who followed, “ Assuredly, I say to you, I have not found such great faith, not even in Israel.

– Matthew 8:9,10

Jesus marvelled at this man’s faith because the centurion understood the power of the word. As a centurion, he understood authority. He was aware of his authority over the soldiers placed under him. He knew about the power of a spoken command; it accomplishes what it is spoken for. So he understood the spiritual authority of Jesus. And Jesus was pleased with his faith.

The highest level of faith is relying only on the Word. People think that signs are more important than the Word. Some people pray like this – if two dogs cross my path from either side, it will be confirmed that this particular verse is from you, Lord; if the phone rings in the next 10 minutes, then I will know that this job offer is from you, Lord; if it rains today, then I will take it as a sign that I should marry this person, Lord.

I had once gone to a prayer meeting. It was one of a series of meetings that this particular preacher held. In the meetings, she would show her hand, and blood would ooze out of it. And she would say that it was the blood of Jesus. People were moved by it. Large crowds started coming to her meeting. She endorsed a particular church that was pastored by a very sincere young man and it grew. It was later proved to be a hoax. People were disappointed. The church membership dwindled. What I want to say here is that even if it was really the blood of Jesus, what is the use? Just a few drops of the real blood of Jesus in a few meetings – how would it be enough to heal all the sick people in the world? Let’s look at what the Bible says about the blood of Jesus. It was shed when He hung on the Cross. He took our sin; God’s judgment was on Him; He experienced death on our behalf. Then Jesus took His blood and presented it as atonement at the Holy of Holies to God the Father. It has forgiven our sins. It is not the literal application of the blood on our bodies. It is the spiritual principle that sinless blood was shed for our sins and that the Father has accepted this sacrifice and has forgiven our sins. What is the use of a little blood being shown as a miracle in meetings?

How do we apply the blood? – By the Word. Rev 12:11 says that the believers overcame satan by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony. Did they have a bottle of the blood that they threw at the devil? No. This is how they won victory over satan – the blood was shed by the Lamb, and they spoke their testimony (that they believed what the blood had done for them). Even if you have the real blood of Jesus in your hands, it’s no good unless you believe in your heart and confess with your mouth.

People want more and more signs. They want blood, gold dust, silver dust, money etc. The church is not a circus. It’s about the word of God. The word is powerful. Why do we need anything more? Even praying with oil is only for people who are weak in faith. The person may be edified in faith when elders speak words of faith and use oil. Everyone doesn’t need it. But the church has made the oil bottle a very important tool of faith. The church is emphasising the wrong things and has minimised the importance of the word of God.

Speak the word only. The word is enough to enough to heal any sickness. The word is enough to make everything thing all right. The word is enough to bring order into chaos. The word is enough to create a beautiful future. The word in your heart and in your mouth is more powerful than any object. Faith is changing the ‘seen’ and bringing about the ‘unseen’ to reality. Only faith pleases God. He blesses those who do not see yet believe.

FAITH OF THE CENTURION

Let’s look at an example of such faith.

Now when Jesus had entered Capernaum, a centurion came to Him, pleading with Him, saying, “Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, dreadfully tormented.”

And Jesus said to him, “ I will come and heal him.”

The centurion answered and said, “Lord, I am not worthy that You should come under my roof. But only speak a word, and my servant will be healed.

– Matthew 8:5-8

Jesus offers to go to the centurion’s house. How would you feel if Jesus offered to come to your house? Isn’t it fantastic to have Him over at your house! And how much more wonderful if He performs a miracle at your house! And yet the centurion answers saying that Jesus need not come to his house, but that He should just speak a word, and his servant would be healed. What a contrast between the disciples in John 20 and this centurion. The disciples believed only what they saw. But the centurion believed something he did not see.

What’s so special about his faith?Let’s look at verse 8 to understand it – “Only speak a word”.

Let’s look at verse 8 to understand it – “Only speak a word”.

Let’s take this phrase word by word.

ONLY speak the word – you don’t have to come to my house, you don’t have to wave at the person, blow air, throw your coat on the person. No, there is no need to do anything else. ONLY speak the Word. No need to come home and do any theatrics. There was no need to pull out some object of witchcraft from the wall. No need to sprinkle water all around the house. No need to pray over oil. I’ve already spoken about the verse where James speaks about elders laying hands and praying, and the use of oil. Nowadays, people skip the sermon or sleep through it, but they’re enthusiastically standing in queue to get a bottle of oil prayed for by the preacher. The centurion understood what healing, miracle-working faith meant. He asked Jesus to only speak the word.

Only SPEAK the word – The word has to be spoken. People know that the word of God is important. But they don’t know in what way it is important. So they carry around the Bible everywhere they go. They wave the Bible around in prayer. They hit people with the Bible. They rub the over the body of a sick person. Some people sleep with it under their pillow. But that’s not how the word should be used. It should be spoken in faith. The word should be declared in your life, over your situations and problems.

After I had spoken in a meeting, a young man came to me holding his Bible under his armpit. He asked me, ‘What is the word you have from the Lord for me?’ I pointed to the Bible under his armpit and said, ‘It’s right there!’ Don’t go around asking others if they a word from God for you. ‘You’ speak the word of God in your life; ‘you’ will become the prophet of your life.

Only speak the WORD – Speak what the word says. That is faith confession. Don’t speak what others think about a situation; don’t speak what the circumstances look like; don’t repeatedly speak the symptoms of your sickness; speak the Word. Speak the promises of God. Speak the blessing of God upon your life.

…to be continued…

Positive Confession

And since we have the same spirit of faith, according to what is written, “I believed and therefore I spoke,” we also believe and therefore speak.

– 2 Corinthians 4:13

Christianity is a great confession – a great positive confession.

We’ve learnt about negative confession. People do it in the name of spiritual humility. The book of Colossians calls it false humility. The sad thing is that this kind of negative confessions slowly destroys people – it destroys their happiness, their confidence, their assurance, their health and their finances.

The right confession is the confession that is based on who we are in Christ, what we have in and through Christ, what we are because of the new birth in Jesus, what we are to God the Father, what Jesus is doing for us, and what His word can accomplish in and through us. For several weeks, we have been learning about the reasoning behind confession. We saw 10 reasons already. Let’s look at one more reason.

THE CHOICE TO BELIEVE

Confession is important because it shows that you

have made the choice to believe in God’s word.

When people are in trouble, they usually speak about the problem. That is a natural reaction to their current problem. When you see a person who speaks God’s words at their moment of trouble, you see a “quality Christian”. Such a Christian will overcome problems and be a great witness for Christ and has a great future. Some people say that they don’t know whether they have faith in their heart. It’s very simple to find out if you have faith in your heart. Listen to yourself talking. Your words will show whether you have faith or unbelief.

Made in the image of God to create and sustain our world by our word

God ‘framed’ the world by His word. ‘Framed’ means ‘fitly joined together’. What created this perfect fit in the midst of chaos? – The word of God. God not only created the world, but also upholds everything by the word of His power.

What does it mean – ‘to uphold’? The word that He spoke sustains the world in the same condition that it became when He spoke it. The word is still powerful and making everything function harmoniously. Psalm 99 says that He will not change the word that He has spoken. The sun still rises and sets. Are we worried about it? We take it for granted. The four seasons come and go. Gravity still works. We are all standing and walking on the earth without wondering if gravity will one day cease to function and if we will all start floating ins space. The natural world functions as it has always been. We see that the word of God is still sustaining and upholding everything. His word has not changed.

God made us like Him. We are supposed to function by the word of God. Just like He made and is upholding the world by the Word, we also have to make and uphold our world by the word of God. That is why Christians must realise the importance of the words they speak. There is power in the spoken word.

UNBELIEF OF THE DISCIPLES

Then, the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst, and said to them, “ Peace be with you.” When He had said this, He showed them His hands and His side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord.

– John 20:19

The disciples were glad only after Jesus showed them His hands and His side. They believed only after they saw. Seeing and believing is the lowest kind of faith. When you see a chair with 4 legs, you don’t inspect it and see if it’s strong; you just sit on it without any hesitation. You see and believe that it will hold you. But if you see a chair with a leg missing, you won’t sit on it, because you see that it is unstable and you believe that you will fall. If I point empty space and say to you, ‘Please sit on the chair’, will you sit? You won’t because you don’t see a chair. This is seeing and believing. On the contrary, the highest level of faith is not believing what you see, but believing what you do not see, but just hear.

Now Thomas, called the Twin, one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came.

The other disciples therefore said to him, “We have seen the Lord.” So he said to them, “Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe.

– John 20:24,25

Thomas’ level of faith was even lower than that of the other disciples. He said that he would believe only after he touched. He had to see, touch and believe. There are several levels of faith. The Bible talks about little faith, more faith, growing in faith, exceedingly great faith and so on. These believers were in their lowest level of faith. It was the worldly level of seeing and believing. They didn’t believe in resurrection. They could not believe that Jesus would rise up from the dead. It’s not just about Thomas that had unbelief; it was the state of mind of all of the disciples.

And after eight days His disciples were again inside, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, “ Peace to you!”

Then He said to Thomas, “ Reach your finger here, and look at My hands; and reach your hand here, and put it into My side. Do not be unbelieving, but believing.”

And Thomas answered and said to Him, “My Lord and my God!”

– John 20:26-28

It is the same situation as the first time that Jesus appeared. They were in a room, the door was closed, and Jesus comes inside. He tells Thomas to feel His wounds. Nobody had told Jesus what Thomas had said. But Jesus knew what Thomas had said and told him to touch his wounds. Thomas now realises that he was in the presence of God.

Then, we hear a fantastic truth about faith from the mouth of Jesus.

Jesus said to him, “ Thomas, because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.

– John 20:29

We have not seen Jesus. We have not felt His wounds. We have not seen Him die and resurrect; yet, we believe in Him. We believe that He died and rose again for our sins. We believe that He lives today. We believe that He is the Saviour and have received him in our lives. We are blessed, because Jesus said, ‘Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed’.

Faith requires deliberate effort

Believing is a matter of choice. Some people have predetermined not to believe. Some people are slowly convinced and then believe. Most of are raised to believe in certain things; to believe otherwise is a big effort. There is a culture within Christianity that we are used to – a culture that says we are nothing, that we are weak and unworthy, and that we’re unfit for blessing. It’s a culture of unbelief, a defeatist culture, a negative thinking culture. They can’t think or speak anything positive, they can’t believe for anything great. They need a culture shock to get out of such small thinking.

Jesus’ command to us is the same as his command to Thomas – “Do not be unbelieving, but believing.” This means that we have ‘a capacity to believe’. We have to make a choice. To get out of an attitude of unbelief into an attitude of faith, we have to consciously work. By faith, we have to reject a mentality of failure, worry, inferiority, unworthiness, poverty, weakness, inability and all negativity. We are used to our old thinking of unbelief. We have to make a deliberate effort to believe in the right things and receive the blessing that God has for us.

The worldly belief system is ‘believing what you see’. The Bible-faith belief system is ‘believing what God says’. Even if what you see is contradictory to what God says, you believe the Word, instead of what you see. You believe the word instead of what the circumstances seem like. You believe the Word instead of your experiences. You believe the Word and the Word only. That is the ‘faith’ that the Bible talks about.

…to be continued…

RECOGNIZING THE ENEMY’S TACTICS

The devil influences our mind through the prevalent mindsets and attitudes around us. When the attitude around us is that something will fail, we accept it. When the mindset is that something will not work out well, or that we will not prosper because there is an economic slowdown, or that a particular disease can never be cured, we accept these thoughts. The devil brands such failure in our minds. As a result, we end up saying that we are unworthy. Hence, Paul tells Timothy to be like Jesus. When Jesus stood before Pilate, He declared that He was a king. He had a spiritual kingdom. Pilate threatened him saying that he had the power to kill or release Jesus. Jesus answered Pilate that he had no authority or power over Him. So Paul tells Timothy to “follow the example of Jesus” when problems come. Jesus didn’t forget who He was, or where He came from. He didn’t give in to the situation by saying negative words of doubt. Last week, we saw how Jesus didn’t even give Pilate an inch. We must never forget and never stop confessing who we are. Timothy wasn’t facing life threatening problems. But Paul told him that he would definitely face other overwhelming problems in life. At that time, Timothy was encouraged to look at the problem and tell it, ‘You have no authority over me because Jesus Christ is my Lord’.

GOOD CONFESSION DESTROYS STRONGHOLDS

Some say that their colleague or boss or relative or neighbor is troubling them. The other person is not the problem. The problem is with us when we don’t believe who we are and what we have.

Satan orchestrates bitterness and anger in us. He causes us to believe failure. Even if everyone around us opposes us, we must believe that we will succeed in Jesus’ name. Nobody can stop God’s purpose from being accomplished. God will bring about His will only if we stand our ground and cooperate.

Some people say that they have always been poor. But we must believe that we have the blessing of Abraham. Jesus became poor so that we could become rich. We need to reorient our thinking so that the devil’s rule over us ends.

¹¹ Put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil¹⁴ Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, ¹⁵ and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace;¹⁶ above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one. ¹⁷ And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God;

Ephesians 6:11, 14-17

An evil day is when everything goes wrong in our lives and there are insurmountable problems. But we can prepare ourselves to face the wiles of the devil on the evil day. We can be encouraged that a new dawn will come in our lives and that we don’t have to give up.

The first weapon that this passage talks about is truth. If truth is our weapon for fighting, then it implies that we are fighting lies. Failure, defeat and fears are all lies. We must destroy the lies of the devil. No matter how powerful our strongholds are, we can bring them down with weapons that are mighty and not carnal. The other weapons include righteousness, peace, faith, salvation and the Sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. The Holy Spirit enables us to wield the Word. We must put it in our mouth, speak it and bring down every wrong thought and imagination that is holding us down. When we confess the Word of God, what God has done for us through His redemptive work on the Cross and what the Word is doing in and through our lives, it becomes a mighty weapon. It will destroy every stronghold and bring us victory.