Power for Living

Saturday 4 July
READ: Acts 1:8
MORE LESSON: Act 2: 1 - 4

The forces of hell that are released against men in these end times are so strong that it is not possible to live a successful Christian life without the power of the Spirit. Weakness, sin and struggle become the order of the day when the power of God is lacking in a life. There was a young lady that literally couldn't live a single day without fornication. She was so much afflicted by the spirit of immorality that she wouldn't survive a day without having a man sleep with her. This spiritual torment made her go around each day begging her male class mates to come sleep with her: she just couldn't withstand the forces of hell that was contending with her. Finally she came to a crusade where I was preaching, she gave her life to Jesus and the power of the Holy Ghost came upon her. After seven days she came to me and testified, “I can't believe it but I have lived the past seven days without any man sleeping with me.” That was the beginning of her deliverance and she thereafter continued to live in holiness. It was the power of God that enabled her to live in holiness even though she had been a slave of sin. I want you also to know that it is absolutely possible to live a life that pleases God, all it takes is the enabling power of the Holy Spirit.
When a man gives his life to Jesus, the Holy Spirit comes to live inside him. Everyone who has accepted Jesus has a measure of the Holy Spirit inside them. However, you need to go beyond that measure and access an overflowing measure of the Spirit. The Spirit of God overflows your life when you receive the baptism of the Spirit with the evidence of speaking in tongues. The Holy Spirit is the power for living. He empowers you to live in holiness, power and miracles. In John 7:37-38, Jesus said, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. He was talking about the baptism of the Holy Spirit which is available to everyone who thirsts and desires it. When you ask, God will give you the Holy Spirit (Luk 11: 13).
It is easy to receive the Holy Spirit. A sister gave her life to Christ and then I began to make her understand that she needed the power of God with the evidence of speaking in tongues. She asked me, 'do you mean like this . . . ?' And then she began to speak in tongues. I didn't even lay hands or pray for her, she just received. She later told me that as I was speaking, she began to sense a language within her, and so she decided to speak it out and that was it. Today, receive yours.

Prayer/Action
* Ask for the overflowing power of the Holy Spirit to come afresh upon you and uphold you in grace.
* Ask God to rekindle the fire of the holy Spirit upon you and re-energise your faith.
* Lift your hands and pray in the Holy ghost.

PROPHETIC PRAYER
In 2015, I will sour higher, not by my power or might but by the Spirit of the Lord, in Jesus’ name.

The place of Vision

Friday 3 July
READ: Prov. 29: 18
MORE LESSON: Hab. 2: 2-3

The place of vision is very important in life. We need vision in every area of life to achieve success. If you don't have a personal vision for your life - academics, finances, home, family - one day you will collapse and perish, because he who fails to plan is planning to fail. As expressed in scriptures, Where there is no vision, the people perish . . .: Prov 29:18. Vision is prerequisite for planning: when you know your target and goal, you can start working towards it. Vision helps us develop strategies and a visionary person is not easily distracted. If you see men who wander to and fro in life; today they are in a ministry, tomorrow in another and next tomorrow, they move to yet another, the problem is that they don't have a vision. A visionless person doesn't know what he is doing, where he is going and where he belongs.
The beginning of vision is salvation, when you are reconciled to God, you can be reconciled to your purpose and vision, because your purpose is in Him. Howbeit, even after salvation, you still have to discover what God has saved your soul to do. If you discover what God would have you do, you also need to find the place where He wants you to do it.
Discover the location for your vision. Because for every God-given vision, there is a particular place where you most effectively fulfill what God has asked you to do. You don't just attend Church as a religious gathering, because the vision you have is what determines the Church you attend. When you see that your personal life vision matches with the vision of the people gathered in a Church, then you come in to achieve the vision with them. If you don't have that kind of mindset, you will not excel in ministry and service to God as you will have to be pushed and pulled before you serve God in Church. So vision is the foundation for excellence in ministry.
Vision is the bedrock for a successful marriage as well. When marriage seminars are organized, some young people don't take part because they think such seminars do not concern them. Some of these young people later find it difficult when it is time to make the right choice of partner. They find themselves in such situations because they didn't have a vision of a good marriage well in advance of time. Vision makes you start careful planning of your family, finances, children and career when other people still think it is still too far way.
Today is the day to get a vision for every aspect of your life from God; present your life to Him and discover what He wants you to do, where He wants you to go and what He fashioned you for. I pray you will not miss your place in destiny.

Prayer/Action
* Ask God to give you a vision for living.
* Pray against a vision-less living.
* Pray that every dormant vision in your life should come alive and strong.

PROPHETIC PRAYER
My steps are ordered today and I shall be guided to my green pastures with perfect accuracy, in Jesus’ name.

Don't be Ungrateful

Thursday 2 July
READ: 2 Tim 3: 1-2
MORE LESSON: Psa. 103: 1 - 5

One of the traits that the Bible gives to characterize the end-times is that people will become increasingly ungrateful (2 Tim 3: 2). It is necessary to know the attitudes that constitute ingratitude so that you can guard against such in your life.
The first is that an ungrateful man does not give thanks, either to God or to man. When you refuse to give thanks, you play down on what is done for you. Ingratitude insults the mighty works of God; it is like saying that the deed was not remarkable enough to be appreciated.
Another trait of an ungrateful man is that he is forgetful. If you are a person who soon forgets a good done to you, you are ungrateful. Ps 106: 1-12 speaks of all the amazing things God did for Israel, but then in verse 13 it describes their ingratitude . . . But they soon forgot what he had done and did not wait for his counsel: Psa. 106:13 (NIV). This is similar to how some people soon forget all the things God did for them and then behave as if He has never did anything before when they are hard pressed with a need.
The third attitude of an ungrateful man is that he is impatient. God has been faithful to him but because of one thing that he has not yet received, he becomes impatient. We have seen people rashly renounce faith in Christ because answers to their prayers were not forthcoming according to their own sense of timing (not God's sense of timing). That is ingratitude. An ungrateful person will not think twice before he deserts someone who did good to him.
Lust and greed are also characteristic of an ingrate. When you have so strong a desire for something to the extent that you can't praise God until you get it, that is gross ingratitude. Envious people also are always ungrateful people. Envy is when you see someone blessed by God and then wish that you, and not that person, are the one with the blessing. Envious people are ungrateful for the blessing they have, they want another person's.
Murmuring and complaining are also the language of an ingrate. The children of Israel during the Exodus were not grateful that God parted the Red Sea and fed them with heavenly food – manna, they started complaining about lack of fleshy meat to eat. In the Western part of Nigeria there is a saying that a person who goes around complaining, kills faster than a witch. Ingratitude is the beginning of the spirit of witchcraft. A person who always complains is digging his own grave.
An ungrateful man cannot be great: He is 'un-great-ful'. Uproot any manifestation of ingratitude in your life. Show gratitude for what God has done and He will do greater things.

Prayer/Action
* Give God thanks for all he has done this year and in the years past.
* Declare that the spirit of ingratitude will never have a hold upon your life-reject ingratitude.
* Pray that you will never murmur or complain anymore but give thanks for all things.
* Give thanks now!

PROPHETIC PRAYER
Today, with thanksgiving, I receive the gift of a successful second half of 2015, in Jesus’ mighty name.

The Covenant keeping God

Wednesday 1 July
READ: Gen. 12:2- 3
MORE LESSON: Exo. 2:23-25

The Lord is the covenant keeping God. From generation to generation, God has always related with His people by covenant. The covenant with Abraham was one example. There is a covenant of deliverance, greatness and prosperity that God made with Abraham. In Genesis 12:2, God said, And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing. That is a covenant- an agreement between God and Abraham that anything that is associated with him shall be blessed and in turn shall be a blessing. So you can get into a covenant relationship with God and you could even have specific covenants for specific areas of your life.
In Gen. 22, God told Abraham to sacrifice his only son and Abraham set out in obedience. When Abraham got to the place where he would sacrifice his son, God showed up and provided a lamb for the sacrifice instead of his son. Abraham named that place 'Jehovah Jireh' – meaning God the Provider. (Gen 22: 14). That was the beginning of God's covenant of provision with His children which guarantees that in every situation of lack, God will show up for them.
The covenant of provision is the reason why you must not be a poor man. This is because God has sworn that you will not be poor. Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospereth: 3Jn.2. Whatever attempts to make you poor is an enemy to the covenant of God. God's covenant cannot be broken for God cannot lie. Poverty is an enemy of God and God will definitely be victorious over the enemy and not the enemy over Him. When poverty ravages your life, invoke the covenant of God and declare that there is a covenant between God and Abraham your father, which guarantees that you will not be poor. God is bound to fulfil His covenant. There is nowhere God hears about His covenant and shuts down because that would amount to failing in his promise.

When the children of Israel were in bondage in Egypt, they got to a point where they cried out to God. Their cry for help caused God to remember His covenant with their father Abraham. So remaining under bondage is after-all a choice! The day you choose to cry out for the covenant to speak for your help is the beginning of a new dawn. Do not remain in bondage to poverty, sickness, oppression or any evil. You are the seed of Abraham by the reason of adoption through Christ Jesus. Remind God of His covenant today and He will rise up for you. My covenant will I not break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of my lips: Psa. 89:34.

Prayer/Action
* Command anti-covenant activities of the devil in your life ended now.
* Invoke the covenant of Abraham to begin to make way for you from now on.
* Ask God to remember His covenant with Abraham and war with every spirit of bondage in your life.

PROPHETIC PRAYER
Father, you have done it again. You have given me January-June and will do it again with July-December, in Jesus’ mighty name.