THE GOOD NEWS

THE GOOD NEWS

His words and you 006 Aug 10 2013

What is The Good News?

Let us view the good news as expressed in these bible passages - 

• "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life. John 3:16 
• In this is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son as the atoning sacrifice for our sins. 1 John 4:10  
• But all things are of God, who reconciled us to himself through Jesus Christ, and gave to us the ministry of reconciliation; 2 Corinthians 5:18  

The good news is that God made provision for our reconciliation to Himself. Haven all sinned through Adam.

• "For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God" Romans 3:23  
• "Therefore as sin entered into the world through one man, and death through sin; and so death passed to all men, because all sinned." Romans 5:12. 
• "For if by the trespass of the one, death reigned through the one; so much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one, Jesus Christ. Romans 5:17  
• "So then as through one trespass, all men were condemned; even so through one act of righteousness, all men were justified to life." Romans 5:18

So that is what the good news is all about. Jesus Christ was sent to reconcile us with God. The gap Adam created between us and God was filled by Christ. As man was driven out of God's presence from the Garden of Eden so Christ is today pulling us back to Him.

Our salvation is of importance to God, so God has done His bit.

Accepting the Good News is not by force, but rather by choice. You are free to embrace the Good News and therefore your salvation or reject it and perish.

If we embrace the good news, then what is expected of us?

Just as Apostle Paul said 

• "For I am not ashamed of the Good News of Christ, for it is the power of God for salvation for everyone who believes". Romans 1:16

You cannot be ashamed of something that you cherish and hold at high esteem. If you appreciate something very much you are proud of it and you flaunt it, you want to be recognized with it. You want to be identified with it. You preach it. You appreciate the source.

You are therefore expected to -

1, Glorify God daily, hourly, for being kind and magnanimous to consider man for reconciliation with him.

2, Thank him daily, hourly, for personally counting you worthy of consideration to salvation.

Consider this

• "Because, knowing God, they didn't glorify him as God, neither gave thanks, but became vain in their reasoning, and their senseless heart was darkened." Romans 1:21.

Do not kindle God's anger by refusing to do or neglecting that which is expected of you.

3, Live it. Let you life be in accordance with God's will. What you do, say, wear. Where you are, your association should signify you as a child of salvation. The fruits of the spirit must be seen and read on you. 

• "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and lusts." Galatians 5:22-24

4, Preach the Good News. Let the world around you at least, know about the good news.

• He said to them, "Go into the entire world, and preach the Good News to the whole creation. He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who disbelieves will be condemned. Mark 16:15,16

For those who reject the good news -

• "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known of God is revealed in them, for God revealed it to them. Because, knowing God, they didn't glorify him as God, neither gave thanks, but became vain in their reasoning, and their senseless heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and traded the glory of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of corruptible man, and of birds, and four-footed animals, and creeping things.  Therefore God also gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to uncleanness, that their bodies should be dishonored among themselves, who exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. For this reason, God gave them up to vile passions. For their women changed the natural function into that which is against nature. Likewise also the men, leaving the natural function of the woman, burned in their lust toward one another, men doing what is inappropriate with men, and receiving in themselves the due penalty of their error. Even as they refused to have God in their knowledge, God gave them up to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not fitting;  being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, malice; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil habits, secret slanderers, backbiters, hateful to God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenant breakers, without natural affection, unforgiving, unmerciful; who, knowing the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but also approve of those who practice them. Romans 1:18-32

Meaning God has left them to the control of Devil himself.

Man, be wise. Make the right choice, the Good News is worth considering.

Olufemi Samuel Ogundele

His Words and You Ministries

www.hiswordsandyou.com

e-mail – olufemi@hiswordsandyou.com

JESUS’ AUTHORITY

JESUS’ AUTHORITY

Jesus came to them and spoke to them, saying, "All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth”. Matthew  28:18

Jesus expressed His new status, after He rose from dead.

ALL AUTHORITY IN HEAVEN AND ON EARTH.

All authority.

Authority over creation and the created.

Authority over principalities and powers.

Authority over Satan and his kingdom.

Authority over the opressors and the opressed.

Before He declared that All Authority has been given on to Him. While He was here on earth

Jesus commanded the sea, the winds –

"He awoke, and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, "Peace! Be still!" The wind ceased, and there was a great calm. - Mark  4:39".

He commanded sicknesses, illnesses –

When Jesus departed from there, two blind men followed Him, crying out and saying,"Son of David, have mercy on us!"

And when He had come into the house, the blind men came to Him. And Jesus said to them, "Do you believe that I am able to do this?"

They said to Him, "Yes, Lord."

Then He touched their eyes, saying, "According to your faith let it be to you."  And their eyes were opened. And Jesus sternly warned them, saying, "See that no one knows it." - Matt 9:27-31

He commanded demon –

‘When He had come to the other side, to the country of the Gergesenes, there met Him two demon-possessed men, coming out of the tombs, exceedingly fierce, so that no one could pass that way. And suddenly they cried out, saying, "What have we to do with You, Jesus, You Son of God? Have You come here to torment us before the time?"

Now a good way off from them there was a herd of many swine feeding. 31 So the demons begged Him, saying, "If You cast us out, permit us to go away into the herd of swine."

And He said to them, "Go." So when they had come out, they went into the herd of swine. And suddenly the whole herd of swine ran violently down the steep place into the sea, and perished in the water.’- Matt 8:28-32

He commanded even death to release and the dead to rise –

When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, "Lazarus, come out!" He who was dead came out, bound hand and foot with wrappings, and his face was wrapped around with a cloth. Jesus said to them, "Free him, and let him go."(John  11:43,44.)'

Too numerous to count and they all obeyed Him. 

Imagine now that He has all authorities. Consider what the new level of authority will be.

You only need Him in your life and you have access to this authority. Everything needing correction in your life will start obeying the command from Him and you shall be free at last.

What is it that has been exercising authority over your life? Invite the greater authority in and they will all take their bow and let you be.

What are you waiting for?

Remember He says "I AM WITH YOU TILL THE END OF THE WORLD".

Olufemi Samuel Ogundele

His Words and You Ministries 
www.hiswordsandyou.com
olufemi@hiswordsandyou.com

AWAKE! OH ZION

AWAKE! OH ZION – 

His Words And You 004 - 29June2013

Awake, awake!

Put on your strength, O Zion;

Put on your beautiful garments,

O Jerusalem, the holy city!

For the uncircumcised and the unclean

Shall no longer come to you.         - Isaiah 52 1

Here we are talking to Zion

What is Zion? – a city.

Where is Zion? – Zion is a hill in Jerusalem, where the temple is, it is a holy place where they go to seek the face of God

Our Zion today is the church of God – this is where the presence of God is, this is where we gather to seek the face of God. Although God is everywhere, but this is where we gather. When we talk of Zion we are not talking of the building but our gathering. This goes to say that if ten of us gather to seek the face of God, where we gather is our Zion.

Awake oh Zion – I do not think it is possible for me to see a man working or walking and I will tell him to wake up, it is obvious that before we can tell a guy to wake up, something is definitely wrong, it is either the person is sick, sleeping, slumbering, sluggish or even dead.

In our bible verse we have about five points which we will divide into two. First one has three points while the second has two points.

Awake, awake oh! Zion. – Zion is sleeping

Put on your strength, O Zion;

Put on your beautiful garments,

With these three points we can diagnose three problems of Zion, it is either they are sleeping sick or even dead.

They were weak, they have no strength in them, that is why they were asked to cloth themselves with strength

They were unfortunate without their glory, which is why they were asked to put on their garment of splendor, of glory. They lost their glory

2          O Jerusalem, the holy city! – Zion is an holy place, a place that is holy is not supposed to manifest the three problems earlier mentioned. A holy place is not supposed to be sleeping, it is not supposed to be weak nor supposed to be without glory

Let’s see why it is so.

For the uncircumcised and the unclean shall no longer come to you. – The uncircumcised and the unclean has been gathering with them when worshipping.

Now tell me why there will not be problem when the place is constantly defiled. That is why many churches are sleeping. The world has entered the church and the church has entered the world. The uncircumcised and the unclean are the ones in the church, in fact they are the ones preaching, they are the ones in charge. They are also members, so there will be problem

Let’s look at the problems one after the other

Sleepiness – let’s look at the complexities of being asleep. No man can predict exactly when he will sleep it is not possible, you either sleep before or after, you can only give time when you’ll lie down, not when you’ll sleep. There was a time I was trying to time when I will sleep; I was concentrating on the watch that I could not even sleep, so I had to put the watch away, before I could get my sleep.

Let’s consider what could happen when we sleep, let’s see what God can do when we are sleeping, we will also look at what the devil can do when we are sleeping.

Let’s look at Gen 2:21 “ And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall on Adam, and he slept; and He took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh in its place”.

This is similar to operations in the hospital, that is why before any operation is carried out in the hospital, they cause the patient to sleep, then they open up the belly remove things, put things and have the belly sewn back., with the help of almighty, the patient is brought back to life. He will then see the wound and feel pains thereafter. Unless told, the patient does not know what has been removed or added to his being..

We can see what God did to Adam, he needed a rib from him to create Eve, he did not remove the rib in Adam’s awareness, he caused him to sleep, and then he removed what he wanted. He was not dead, cause you may think it is only when one is dead that something like this could be performed, the bible says he was caused to sleep. So you can imagine what can be done to you while you sleep.

They were weak, that is why they were told to cloth themselves with strength. We can see this in the live of Samson, the strongest man on earth. The philistines could not defeat him, because of his strength they need to take care of his power first, what did they do, they cut off the binds of his hair while asleep. He woke up and found his power is gone.

They were unfortunate; they were wretched because their glory was lost. We can see this in the life of Joseph. When he told his brothers about his dream, they were determined to take off his garment of glory. They did not stop at that, but they soaked the garment of glory in blood.

The uncircumcised and the defiled shall not enter you again. Defiled means something dirty, unclean, not pleasant to God. Uncircumcised, his then was sign of gods covenant. Whoever is born is circum within 7 days, if not it means the child is not of God.

When you pray too much in the physical it affects the spiritual.

The influx of the uncircumcised and the defiled brought about the three situations above.

Circumcision today refers to the circumcision of the spirit – being born again.

What can we do about the uncircumcised and the defiled let us look at Is52 3, 11,12

Gen 2:21-22

Isa 52:3

3 For thus says the LORD: "You have sold yourselves for nothing, And you shall be redeemed without money."

Isa 52:11-12

11 Depart! Depart! Go out from there, Touch no unclean thing; Go out from the midst of her, Be clean, You who bear the vessels of the LORD.

12 For you shall not go out with haste, Nor go by flight; For the LORD will go before you, And the God of Israel will be your rear guard.

Now that we have known our problems, we have to make sure the uncircumcised are circumcised, and we must not torch that which is unclean. If we take out these two things the other three will not manifest. We have to take out those two things – the uncircumcised and the defiled.

Surely the world and the church are two opposite things, they operate in different way. If the clubbers come to the church they want the church to operate like club. They want noise like in the club, they want lively music and not spiritual music, and they expect to see harlots around. Bad influences will crop in and even the believers and the born again will start backsliding and before you know it the church starts sleeping.

We must therefore find a way of circumcising the uncircumcised and make holy the deified. Do not be surprised, even some preachers and the leader are among the uncircumcised, they may be unaware; they thought they are upright but they are not.

We must pray constantly for the uncircumcised to get circumcised and the defiled clean, then sleepiness will depart, strength restored and the garment of glory returned.

We all must search ourselves whether we are of the world or we are for Christ, whether we want to be hot or cold. We need to pray that God should cleanse us and have us repaired and make us whole, god should circumcise us spiritually.

Michael Oladipupo Ogundele

Sermon as Youth Pastor during Youth week 2013

At Grace Deliverance Bible Ministries, Iloye, Sango Ogun state Nigeria.

His Words and You Ministries

www.hiswordsandyou.com

e-mail – olufemi@hiswordsandyou.com

THE FIG TREE AND YOU

THE FIG TREE AND YOU.

His Words and You 003 22may2013

Jesus cursed the fig tree because He was disappointed at its being unfruitful.

St Matthew narrated this thus -

• ·         Early in the morning, as he was on his way back to the city, he was hungry. Seeing a fig tree by the road, he went up to it but found nothing on it except leaves. Then he said to it, "May you never bear fruit again!" Immediately the tree withered. - Matt 21:18-19
• ·         When the disciples saw this, they were amazed. "How did the fig tree wither so quickly?" they asked. -  Matt 21:20

St Mark also recorded this in his own gospel thus -

• ·         The next day as they were leaving Bethany, Jesus was hungry. Seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, he went to find out if it had any fruit. When he reached it, he found nothing but leaves, because it was not the season for figs. Then he said to the tree, "May no one ever eat fruit from you again." And his disciples heard him say it. - Mark 11:12-14
• ·         In the morning, as they went along, they saw the fig tree withered from the roots. Peter remembered and said to Jesus, "Rabbi, look! The fig tree you cursed has withered!" - Mark 11:20-21

Now let us consider the nature of a fig tree. Before a fig tree brings forth leaves, its seeds (buds) come out first, as the leaves advances the fruits grow and multiplies.  So for it to be seen with many leaves (flourishing), fruits are expected to be on it in abundance.

Jesus was hungry when He saw the fig tree. He saw the fig tree blossomed and then the expectation was that fruit will be on it that will take care of His (Jesus) hunger. But alas! A blossomed tree had no fruits on it for Jesus’ hunger.

Therefore Jesus’ disappointment led to a curse on the fig tree.

Jesus even gave a parable according to St Luke -

• ·         Then he told this parable: "A man had a fig tree, planted in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it, but did not find any. So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, 'For three years now I've been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven't found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?'
• ·         "'Sir,' the man replied, 'leave it alone for one more year, and I'll dig around it and fertilize it. If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.'"  - Luke 13:6-9

There is a great concern when a plant that is expected to yield fruits refused to, the owner becomes disappointed. Just the same way a business set up to yield profit. If such business consumes resources without bringing out the expected profit, such business is surely going to shut down either deliberately by the owner, or as a result of bankruptcy.

So God as the owner of the garden here on earth, will not take it easy on His plants that refuse to be of benefit to him. Such plants are either cut off, made to wither or left to find its way to hell where it belongs.

• ·         Remember - The axe is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. - Matt 3:10

Are you fruitful? Will Jesus not be disappointed in you when he investigates your fruitfulness? Are you not risking a curse from your solicitor and advocate? If you are condemned by your solicitor and advocate, what will happen when you get to the judge? Are you not risking eternal damnation?

When you accept Christ as your Lord and Savior, and you are enjoying the benefits of being a born again, of being saved, are you not being selfish? Did you invite others to come and enjoy that which you are enjoying? Are you introducing Christ to others? How many people have you brought to Christ? How many lives have you saved? Have you ever gone through the pains of doing all in your power to increase the candidates of heaven?

Many people are waiting for God to bless them, before they can preach to others, before they can give themselves up to do God’s work. Which means, you want to blossom before you start yielding fruits. Good, but the risk is whatever you are not used to when you are still struggling, you may not be able to do at all or do very well when you blossom. And then when you blossom in Christ, and your fruitfulness can not measure up to your blossomness – to whom is given, much is expected – you stand the chance of being cursed when investigated for fruitfulness.

The fig tree was cursed because it blossomed without yielding fruit. When cursed, the curse was that nobody will eat fruit from it all its life, and it withered immediately.

Start yielding fruits now. No matter your status or position. Poor or rich, weak or strong, short or tall, thin or fat, stammerer or talkative, administrator or executioner, you have work to do in the vineyard of our Lord.

There is no one God cannot use –

• ·         Moses stuttered
• ·         David armor did not fit
• ·         John Mark deserted Paul
• ·         Timothy had ulcers
• ·         Hosea’s wife was a prostitute
• ·         Amos’ training was in the school fig tree pruning
• ·         Jacob was a liar
• ·         David had an affair
• ·         Solomon was too rich
• ·         Jesus was too poor
• ·         Abraham was too old
• ·         David was too young
• ·         Peter was afraid of death
• ·         Lazarus was dead
• ·         John was self righteous
• ·         Naomi was a widow
• ·         Paul was a persecutor of the church
• ·         Moses was a murderer
• ·         Jonah ran from God’s will
• ·         Miriam was a gossip
• ·         Gideon and Thomas both doubted
• ·         Jeremiah was depressed and suicidal
• ·         Elijah was burned out
• ·         John the Baptist was a loud mouth
• ·         Martha was a worrywart
• ·         Noah was drunk
• ·         Did I mention that Moses had a short fuse?
• ·         So did Peter, Paul, well lots of folks did

You are useful in the vineyard of Christ. So make yourself available and as you do it Christ will bless you and when you blossom, you’ll be able to do more, and more blessings will come your way. You will be like a tree planted by the river side (Ps 2)

Apart from preaching to others there are standard fruits expected of a good plant that can preach the word without you talking –

• ·         For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord. Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. - Eph 5:8-12
• ·         But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. - Gal 5:22-23

Let your life bear fruit that is pleasing to the Lord.

God helps you as you make up your mind to bear fruit in Him.

Olufemi Samuel Ogundele

His Words and You Ministries

www.hiswordsandyou.com

e-mail – olufemi@hiswordsandyou.com