Immediate Obedience

Immediate Obedience

Sometime ago God said to me “I need you to do something”. I said to Him “Yes I will but I just need to do something first”. That was the warning sign that my relationship with God was not where it should be. When God gives you an instruction the natural response should be immediate obedience because that which God wants you to do is aimed at placing you in a certain position where God wants you to be. So when you delay you move away from God’s voice and it becomes difficult to hear him and thus give effect to his instructions. Now you find yourself vulnerable to attacks in the spiritual that eventually change your mind and place you in a position where you are no longer aligned to God’s will.

When you accept God into your life you die to yourself and a new man IN him is born. Therefore, it is important to live by the saying “none of me but all of you Lord” to show that God is in complete control in your life. For God to have complete control in your life you need to TRUST Him but to trust Him you need to LET GO of certain things that hinder your full commitment to God. It is with COMMITMENT that you are able to live according to God’s will and do what is pleasing to Him. An example of such commitment is Jesus Christ, God wanted him to give up his life for all of us and as you can imagine it couldn’t have been an easy thing to do but instead of backing down, He said to the Father ‘not my will, but your will.” (Mark 14:36 NLT).  Through salvation we become Christ-like so we must also seek to give effect to God’s will and not our own. When we know who we are in God we will understand that his instructions/ commandments are not burdensome (1 John 5:3) and furthermore they are not beyond our reach (Deuteronomy 30:11). It is true that God will never place us in a situation that we cannot handle because and Philippians 2:13 reminds us that God gives us the DESIRE and the POWER to do what is pleasing to Him.

So next time God asks you to do something your response should be “I will hasten and not delay to obey your commands” (Psalm 119:60)

Part 4: Jesus did not die on the cross for us in vain so our hardships as born-again Christians are not in vain

Suffering for the sake of Christ

Jesus was persecuted, the disciples were persecuted and so will we. I feel that in this day and age that we live in people look down on you for being a believer. The world makes it seem like it is a problem when you decide to live your life for God. People are so quick to judge your actions- watching your every move and waiting to pounce on you when you make a mistake, just so they could sneer at you: “we thought you were a Christian”.  I feel that people are just waiting to remind you of where you had been before you accepted God and are waiting for you to slip up and go back to the person that you used to be.

I have come to realise that not everyone is open about spirituality– I feel that it is that humanly nature of ours to compartmentalise things. So we have made spirituality something ‘private’. People do not believe that it is something that needs to be out there or if it is out there it is appropriate on Sunday only. We have made God have a certain time and place in the world so it is seen as something strange when Christians step out and become radical about their faith.  As soon as you step out the “world” goes on attack- they question your spirituality and criticise you.

However, this is what Jesus said would happen. In John 15:18-21 Jesus says: “if the world hates you, you know that it hated ME before it hated you. You are not of the world so the world will hate you. If they persecuted ME, they will persecute you… because they do not know Him who sent ME”. It is said that the world hates you because the cross separated those that accepted the Lord as their Saviour from the world. Thus, I believe that Jesus dying on the cross for us was not in vain. Through this He freed us from the world and its clutches. He also gave us the strength that we need to stand our ground because we know that He has went through it too. His strength is made perfect in our weakness (2 Corinthians 12:9).

We need to have the understanding that “blessed are those who are persecuted” (Matthew 5:10). The choice to follow Christ means that we not only share in His promises but also His suffering, keeping in mind that “the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us” (Romans 8:18).  Therefore showing that our hardships as born-again Christians are not in vain either.

When we face challenges and persecutions we must hold the scripture in 2 Corinthians 4:7-11 close to our hearts:

"We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are in doubt but not in despair; persecuted but not forsaken; struck down but not destroyed. We will always carry in our mortal bodies the death of Jesus, so that His life also may be manifested in our body"

Part 3: Jesus did not die on the cross for us in vain so our hardships as born-again Christians are not in vain

We need to stand our ground even when we are thrown in the deep end

We need to go through certain phases and process for God to bless us.  Knowing that, we need to be WILLING to go through challenges. I believe that God will never throw us in the fire without a plan to take us out. Yes, He might not come in the physical to take us out but our faith will. He wants to see if we will stand our ground regardless of the circumstances.

Take the story of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, found in the book of Daniel, as an example.  The king Nebuchadnezzar ordered everyone to worship a Gold statue. However, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego refused to bow down to this statue. This angered the King and he asked them if he were to throw them into a fire will the God that they believe in save them. The three men replied that God is able and that He will save them from the fire but even if He doesn’t save them they will still not bow down to that statue. So the king ordered for the furnace to be heated and for the three men to be tied up and thrown in the furnace.  As the king looked on waiting for the men to be consumed by the fire, he noticed that there were four people in the furnace instead of three.  They were protected by an angel of God and as a result Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego came out of the furnace unharmed. This shocked the king but this led to the king praising the God that Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego serve.

How many of us have such faith that when we are tested against all odds, we will stand our ground and believe that God is able? I’m one of those people that have faith but there’s always that niggling element of doubt at the back of my mind- that limits the impact of God’s work in my life. Because I do not fully trust Him in those tough times, I will not be able to experience the full measure of His blessings as He delivers me from my struggles. What we don’t realise is that exercising our faith is not just mere obedience but we set an example to the people around us so that they can be encouraged to praise the God we serve. Thus, when “life” strikes- that is the ups and downs- we need to be able to stand firm and refuse to give up on God or even give up on ourselves. You can be assured that “life” will strike and no matter how hard it is we should not let our circumstances get the better of us because that gives the devil a foothold in our lives.

In the words of Pastor Mark Gungor as inspired by the story of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego we must maintain the mantra that “God is able and He can but even if He doesn’t , we will not bend nor bow down- we will remain firm in our faith!”

Part 2: Jesus did not die on the cross for us in vain so our hardships as born-again Christians are not in vain

We are not the first to go through challenges

So often when we face challenges we tend to question God and ask “why me?” or we lament that we don’t deserve it. But the question is, if we don’t deserve it then who does? We need to remember that we are not the first and only people to go through challenges. Even the greatest men of God have gone through challenges and it is because of these challenges that they were highly favoured. God said that He WILL test us. Every one of us has to go through ‘the process’ where, like precious jewels, God will refine us and mould us into the men and women we are intended to be (Zechariah 13:9).

Take the story of Job as an example. God went to the devil to “brag” about the goodness and faithfulness of His son, Job. The devil questioned God that if he takes away everything from Job, will Job remain as faithful or will he curse God. God said to the devil that he can do anything to Job but he cannot take his life. The devil wreaked havoc on Job’s life. Took away his family, his riches, his health and all he had. However, Job remained steadfast. In the scripture Job 23:10 Job said “God knows every step I take, if He tests me He will find me pure like gold”. Clarke’s commentary on the Bible on this particular verse stated that if something that is said to be Gold is put into fire, if it is genuine, it will lose nothing of its quality or weight. Therefore, if it went into the fire as gold, it will come out as gold- meaning that the strongest fire will neither alter nor destroy it. Similarly with Job, he was a righteous man when challenges struck his life but he remained faithful and his character, if anything, was strengthened even when the people around him told him to shun God and give up. Job understood that God doesn’t make bad things happen but that He LETS them happen and ultimately it is for OUR greater good. This attests to the saying that “God will never put us through something we cannot handle”.

When we face challenges we need to hold steadfast to God’s word and His promises. We need to remember that we are sufficiently equipped and God just wants to renew us- we are getting an UPGRADE. We need to come out of the furnace of affliction as stronger beings in Christ. When challenges come, we need to rejoice because we know that God is working in our lives. He has got bigger plans for us and those plans are surely not to harm us (Jeremiah 29:11). Yes, the process might be painful and you may feel like giving up but that is where faith comes in: faith is holding on even when the circumstances around you force you to give up.

I know it is really easy to say ‘remember this…’ or ‘do that…’but when you are going through tough times it is really hard to do anything but let the circumstances get the better of you. However, today I encourage you to just call on God and say “God I need you”over and over again until you believe that He is there and that He hears you. That’s all it takes… Then, God will definitely make a way where there seems to be no way!

Part 1: Jesus did not die on the cross for us in vain so our hardships as born-again Christians are not in vain

I think so many of us think that after we get born again its smooth sailing from there- doors of opportunities should just open, we will never have to face temptation or we will never have problems. Well the reality is far from that… Instead, like everyone else, we go through tough times but it seems worse because we are “Christian” and that shouldn’t really be happening to us or so we would like to think. We do not realise that when we go through these tough times this is when our faith is tested and put into action.

I know everytime I am faced with a situation I feel that I am equipped with the necessary tools to get through that situation. I know the relevant scriptures and I have bible notes and notes from church sermons to remind me of the word of God which is the tool that God has given me. So I need to put the word of God into action because faith without action is dead (James 2:17). However, during these times I find it hard to do as the word says and it is not because I do not know the word.  I have come to realise that it’s a matter of choice. Most people choose to let emotions take over rather than to use the word. We let our circumstances determine our happiness. We feel that sometimes maybe the word of God is asking for too much, how can we possibly just sit there and pray while bad things are happening to us?!

However, what we fail to realise is that Jesus was God in the flesh. He lived on Earth and experienced all that we are faced with as humans- the temptations, the loss of a loved one, the trials and tribulations. In those times and situations Jesus remained steadfast in His faith and always said to the Father “let YOUR will, not mine, be done”. Having accepted Jesus as our Lord and saviour we have been made Christ-like. Jesus lives in us and THROUGH us so as He has faced all these challenges so will we but because we are like Jesus we must CHOOSE to deal with these challenges like He did.

God never said that it would be easy. It wasn’t easy for Jesus so we can’t expect it to be easy for us as ambassadors of Christ. We need to go through what we preach to show that we really do believe in the word of God and in that way, we have testimonies. Testimonies show the work of the hand of God in our lives and thus will help to draw people closer to God as they will see the evidence of His presence in our lives.

“God did not promise the absence of storms, He promised us His presence through those storms…”

Point of Departure

It is really important that we have established our point of departure as having accepted Jesus as Lord and Saviour, as well as acknowledging that He is there.  I have realised that in the hardships that we are faced with as children in Christ we need to hold on to the promise that God is there and that He will never leave us nor forsake us, however that seems to be the one thing that we forget the most. I believe that if we constantly remind ourselves of this promise, we could avoid a lot of unnecessary feelings which deceive us and make us move away from God.

Lately I have been going through what I call a dry season. I did something I knew was wrong and as a result I let it create a gap in my relationship with God. I stopped reading the word. I stopped doing my daily devotion. I stopped praying. I stopped praising and worshipping Him. In its place came idleness and as a result I was filled with feelings of condemnation, discontent, jealousy and so forth. I felt lost, empty and purposeless. Things just didn’t make sense. Someone on Twitter said that “we cannot continue using God’s grace and forgiveness as a free pass to keep doing what we ‘know’ is not the right thing to do”. So I used that to justify what I was going through: that God is tired and that He deserves more than what I am doing to Him- He deserves praises and honour from someone who is worthy to be in His presence. I think most of us get caught in that trap where we answer for God and we forget that God is way bigger than we are and that He doesn’t answer to us but we answer to Him.

During this time there was an incessant stream of thoughts, that it was hard to recognise the voice of God but I could feel the battle raging within me as God fought for me.  I experienced this in the little things where someone would randomly share the word with me and it would be so relevant to what I was going through or I would just find myself singing songs of praise to the Lord. Through this my blog was born and this is what God used to speak to me. He made me realise that He is indeed there (here) and that if I’d acknowledged it, I would have not opened myself up to a wide range of feelings of not being good enough. Thus would have not moved away from Him because of the understanding that God being there (here) means that He loves me irrespective of what I have or have not done and as a result He will never leave me nor forsake me.

We need to realise that even if we have missed the mark, which is to sin, God remains ever faithful and He still deserves all the honour and the glory. It goes beyond what we think or what we feel.

Therefore, it is vital that we engrave on our hearts this promise that God is there. This will lift us up at our lowest times and keep us from moving away from God but rather be encouraged to praise Him all the more because we recognise that our hardships are meant to build us into strong women and men of character that He intended us to be.

Jesus did not die on the cross for us in vain so our hardships as born-again Christians are not in vain…

He is there

“I will never leave you nor forsake you”

It is not the fact that we are not alone. It goes beyond His promises to never leave us nor forsake us. Instead it is the understanding that He is within us. We have to realise that in Him moulding us as His children, He has given Himself to reside in us. This means that the Lord is not “there” in the sense that He is next to us and He can easily leave if He chooses to, but rather the fact that He is there dwelling inside each and every one of us. We have an intimate connection with the Lord thus He says He knows us more than we know ourselves, He knows our deepest thoughts and knows what we are about to request even before we do.  The presence of the Lord is not that which we need to invite because it is always there- we just need to acknowledge that the presence is there. We are never separated from Him because He not only has His watchful eye over us, however He is there living in us, around us, with us.

So often when we feel lonely we tend to question God. We look up at Him and say ‘God, you said that I need not feel alone because you will never leave me but WHERE ARE YOU?’ We start to think that God has broken His promise. Little do we realise that the one thing that is impossible for God is for Him to ever leave us. How can He? When He is within in us and within the people around us. Everyone is a representative of Jesus and so He will place someone at a certain point knowing that you need that person. He will also place you at another point knowing that you are what someone else needs and in that way He has not forsaken anyone.

The one thing that stands between us and fully acknowledging the ever-present presence of God is our thinking process. The devil tries to deceive us with our feelings of doubt, insecurities and loneliness. John 8:36 tell us that the Son of God has set us free. That means that we are set free from such deceiving thoughts that we are alone. We need to move away from determining our relationship with God based on what we are feeling. We need to see and believe what is there and what is there is the many promises the Lord has made to us that we shall never be separated from Him and the love that He has for us.

The Lord is called an omnipresent God for a reason, because He is always there- everywhere around us. He is there.

Meaning behind the Name

“Satori” is the Zen word for enlightenment. In his book “A New Earth: Awakening to your life’s purpose” renowned author, Eckhart Tolle, aptly calls it the uh huh moment which is a moment of Presence where you glimpse what is possible or what is already in you. In this state you recognise the true being that is God.

There was an insert on TV about the topic on the next segment of the Oprah Winfrey Show and in that insert Oprah quoted from Eckhart Tolle’s “A New Earth: Awakening to your life’s purpose”. That is when I believe I had my uh huh moment. It’s funny because it happened way before I even read about the uh huh moment but it is because of that, that I was drawn to the book and made it my mission to read it. Thus I included it on my gift list for my birthday, however only received it for Christmas instead and today it remains my ultimate favourite book because of the lessons it taught me.

By the time I had my uh huh moment I was already a born again Christian but this moment made my journey so much more personal. It increased my yearning to know God and want to live my life for God. “Satori” symbolises the moment that my life became about purpose. My purpose is to draw people to God so what better way to do that then to share my testimonies and walk with people in this journey of getting to know God…

The book that changed my life- a definite must read!

Small Beginnings

For most people the struggle is finding God. For me, the struggle has been maintaining my relationship with God. Five years along the line I can attest to the fact that it gets harder after you are born again but the favour is extraordinary as you feel the hand of God work in your life.

It hasn't been an easy journey. It’s said that you cannot be a "baby" forever when you are in Christ- you need to grow. I still feel like I'm taking baby steps as my life yo-yo's from one situation to the next. The world is out there for the taking- I want to experience, I want to explore but sometimes that comes with a price. I seem to lose myself in the world here and there but like the prodigal son, I return home. However, as a result I'm left wondering if God ever gets tired; if He still loves me as much as He says; if I could ever be the Ruth of our generation or even be the Proverbs 31 woman. There's just so many questions thus I invite you to take this journey with me as we discover God to get answers to our questions and most importantly to grow...

"do not despise these small beginnings, for the Lord rejoices to see the work begin..."- Zechariah 4:10