Tuesday 10 February 2015

HOW TO TELL THAT YOU ARE CONQUERING A WEAKNESS



As human beings, we have so many weaknesses, and that is why we cannot depend on ourselves in relation to having no weaknesses. Jesus came to this world and died for us to set us free from all our sins, weakness, bondages and many other shortcomings.    I am glad that He died for me a sinner so that I can be set free once and for all.  You can imagine everyday someone dying for me so that I can be made whole! Many people would have died for me and for us all.  So, actually no one would be in this world if we were dying every day for one another’s sin.  But for so God loved the world that he gave his only Son, Jesus, so that everyone who believes in him may not die but have Eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to be its judge, but to be its savior.  Jesus died for us once and for all.  Our work is to work out our salvation with fear and trembling knowing that he does not love people living in sin but conquering the sin through his death and our daily repenting and walking away from the sin.  

A friend of mine once told me, Christianity is the hardest life to live. If we are to live the way we ought to live as the Bible reckons, then all of us we could be living in a Holy place.   I would say that is true but you know in this world not all of us are born again and so we have so many people who do not believe in Jesus. That does not mean God does not love them. He loves them and that is why he died for each and everyone one so that we can all have life and enjoy it to the fullest.  But remember, this is not the home for those who love him.  He has a home for them that he has prepared for them.  In this world we are just passersby and thus it is not for the righteous but for the evil one who has taken dominion over it.  That is why you see some people have heard about the gospel and others not.  Others have but have ignored it and followed what they feel is good for them.  As in, we all have a free will and a choice to make in everything we want to do.  The fact here is that, there are two forces, one, the force of the evil one which is the prevailing one in this world and the force of the good, that is the Spirit of God which has been embraced by a few. The rest just walk in blindness as they do not know the mysteries of salvation and what it entails having eternal life.  Happy are those who have known the truth and the truth shall set them free.  

We are all in a position to make choices as for what force to follow and not to follow.  Of course for the choice of the darkness there is a pay of hell and the choice of light there is a pay of heaven.  Which one have you chosen?  This is a question you should answer yourself because it is a personal choice, no one can do it for you.  I thank God I chose the light not because I am perfect  but I acknowledge the life I live, I live in faith by Christ who died for me and died for me and has a great purpose for me.  It is a joy to have Jesus as your friend and brother because you share all what God has in store for you as his child. 

But as much as I am saying this, salvation life is not that easy i agree with my friends sentiments.   What the Lord taught us to do, most of the time in this world, you feel like it was never meant to be.  Can you imagine Jesus telling us when someone slaps your cheek you give him or her the other one to do the same?  How many would dare tolerate that in real sense.  I guess not many in any case, that sounds not applicable because what we always see around ourselves is that, if one slaps your cheek you always jump on them and give them a blow instead and make sure they pay for it as they started it anyway. Laughs!  That is what the world entails.  But Jesus taught us otherwise that we should not be people that revenge.  As Christians we find ourselves struggling with many weakness that we all have but as we are always told, salvation is a process. You will not get saved today and walk in righteousness of your own.  You walk and stand because of the righteousness of Jesus our Lord and Saviour and that is why we are saying even if you sin, you have a chance to repent and continue having a fellowship with Him, as he will not judge you eternally.   Your sins were died for once and for all, but you work out your salvation so that you will live a righteous and godly life.  But that is not as easy as we may think because, a lot is expected from you especially when you confess Jesus as Lord and Saviour of your soul.  You know many people try to judge us Christians with our small mistakes or big ones that we make and say, “If that is what you call salvation, then, I will not get saved”.  The thing here is not about others, but it is about you and your God.   Stand on your own and make the confession and walk personally with him as a person, working out all your weaknesses one by one as days goes by without comparing yourself with anyone.  Everyone will stand before our maker and we will give account of our good and bad.  Will you be with anyone to do that?  No!  You will be alone and you will not use any scape goat.  So, work out your own salvation.  As you get on, you will find you will be conquering each weakness accordingly and you will be reaching your perfection.  Many people fear to make that decision for the fear of feeling they will never be holy because of the struggles they have.  There are many people in that dilemma.  But I will tell you my dear friend do not look at your weakness now and the days to come. The Lord knows them very well.  What you need to do is to accept him and other things will be corrected as time goes by as you continue walking with Him and Him revealing to you all what is good and evil and how to go about each and every weakness and strength you have.  Remember, God uses both the good and evil for His glory.  Who are you to judge.  Just walk in his righteousness and guidance through the Holy Spirit and he will surprise you of His mysteries that you could never have  known if you did not accept Him as your Lord and Saviour.   

I will talk about a struggle that I have been having for ages since I got born again. I am one person who gets angered so easily and I can blow it out of proportion.  But in the recent past I told God to help me conquer that struggle.  It is anger that most of the time I do not really like as it makes me look sometimes like a mad woman when i vent in my worldly way (when not guided by the Lord).  Yes! For real.   I can imagine the look on your face on my confession.  That is not a place I have always wanted to be especially when i found myself there.  Getting annoyed and causing does not pay one anything.  Actually people really look down upon you as much as you feel you want to vent and make the person who has offended you look very wrong and seek for forgiveness. I have learnt it the hardest way that the best thing to do is to keep cool, calm and collected and allow the Holy Spirit speak to you and tell you exactly what to do in such a scenario.  As I have said I have struggled with anger for a long time and until I identified it and noted it to be a bad thing, then I would have lived like that, thinking I am right and thus, I am very wrong.  I am not trying to say I will never get mad, no, but I am saying nowadays I listen to myself more than just vent out any how and say anything that will hurt many and myself too. I am at a place that I am working it out daily and telling God to help me.  This is not the only struggle I have, but I am working on each as days’ go by and I know God will perfect me and make me whole so that I walk in total peace and a freedom.

So, how do you know that you are getting a change from your anger weakness like mine?  You will understand you are conquering your anger through experiences that you will come along with that warrant a lot of getting bitter and angered.  The way you will react that is what will determine that you have overcome it or you are still struggling.  If you keep cool, calm and collected, you  have dealt with it but if you react and vent it out by making things look crazy, then you are struggling and  you need to work it out. 

I will give an experience that I had on the 27th January 2015. The day before that material day,  I was going to the shop, I saw someone had double parked in front of my car.  What came in my mind is that, that person might not wake up early to remove the car before I woke up and that signaled to me that, when the morning comes, there would be a problem.  Without giving it so much concern, I just went to my house and hoped that the person will have left before I woke up.  But something kept on telling me that, that person did that intentionally. Anyway, I brushed that and said, let me wait and see what will happen in the morning.  Morning came and for real the person who had parked in front of me had not left as the car was still blocking me confirming what I predicted earlier on that there would be a problem truly came to pass.  That morning I over slept and that meant hurrying from my morning preparations and dash out very fast to drop my baby to school as we did not have so much time left.  When I found the car blocking me, I asked God to help me not get annoyed.  I saw people that live around there, were waiting for me to react because a scenario like that had ever happened and it did not end up so well.  Thinking I will do the same, this time round, they got a rude shock as I chose to listen to God and depend on him as I had all the reason to get annoyed and create some drama so that the person can learn a lesson or those who have the same tendencies can learn their lesson too.  The Lord told me to be cool and calm.  The people around started surrounding and behaving like I am not reacting and I should react.  I said, I will not listen to what the people are saying or the signals that they are trying to send but depend on God.  I called one of the caretakers and asked her, if she knew where the person lives.  She told me she does not know.  Equally I did not know where she/he lived and so one of the caretakers decided to ask and she was told the house number.  She went knocked the door but no one was answering and the door had a pad-lock.  When she came back to tell me that the door was locked and no one is responding, I nearly got annoyed as in I wondered how would one double park and leave for good and not caring about the person they have blocked.  The Lord spoke softly and said “do not react Rose.  Just walk in there and knock the door so loudly so that the person can wake up if they are in deep asleep”.  That is exactly what I did.  I went there and knocked the door so loudly so that the person can wake up.  To my shock, the lady opened the door and said “hey, you do not need to knock my door so hard, I am coming to remove the car”.  I was so shocked that all these time she knew what she was doing and she only wanted to see how I will behave when she did that.  I could not believe my ears and eyes.    I realized this is something she had planned because even the way the people were behaving outside, they were waiting for drama.  I did not utter a word I just walked away and went to my car.  She did not even tell me she is sorry for what she had done.  To her she took the offence that I knocked her door so hard forgetting she also had offended me by blocking me.  I am not saying i am trying to revenge here, but i knocked the door hard thinking she did not hear the other knocks.  Anyway,sh   She called someone to pick her keys to remove the car but they did it so reluctantly in a way to suggest, we wanted you to react and you are not and you should.  I kept my cool and the car was removed.  I did not say anything I just left the place.  I left everyone in awe as how come this time round I did not cause?  I wish they knew the transformation that is taking place in my life that I am working on in relation to my salvation, through getting rid of getting angered and reacting like someone who does not reason or has no control. 

The Holy Spirit kept encouraging me and telling me to keep cool.  To be honest I realized that I am now conquering my anger day by day.  As I went a few meters I saw a friend and I gave her a ride and I shared with her the whole ordeal.  She told me, ‘Rose, I thank God you hear him speak to you and you listen.  As for me, I do not think I would have reacted the way you did.  That truly is God’.  She told me she would have really caused because that was very unfair.  I told her, I thank God it happened because it is an evidence to me that I am outgrowing my weakness of anger every day.  I know that is not the only scenario that will come my way but that is a point that tells me, I am going to work it out and it shall be well with me.   I dropped her near her office and  proceeded to my son’s school.  Of course I was just thinking about the whole drama and how I behaved, but I kept asking God, ‘why would someone do such a thing to someone and they do not even feel sorry about it?”  And the Lord told me in a soft voice, “it is a matter of choice, you do good or you do bad.  You chose to do good and that is what I call for, for I am the l light and not darkness.  I will say, in our daily undertakings, we will find ourselves in very awkward situations, but if we allow the Holy Spirit to minister to us, then we will always do the right things opposing the wrong doings.  Even if we do the wrong things, He will always prompt us to ask for forgiveness and work it out and try not to do it again. 

I dropped my baby to school and while going I saw another parent who dropped her child walking to work.  I offered to give her a ride to as I knew from the school to get the public transport is hard.  So I decided to be good to her and extend my love and concern to her by giving her a chance to ride with me as I was so happy for what I did.  To me it was a victorious moment and I said I will celebrate it by sharing it with her as much as I knew she is a stranger to me.   I happily shared and she was very encouraged and really blessed me for sharing with her my testimony.  I also want to extend to you the same as I share my story, you feel intimidated, humiliated, frustrated and so forth, do not give up.  Do not get annoyed or vent uncontrollably, but ask the Lord to fight your battles and give you the Grace to move on and live at peace and love everyone whether they love you in return or no.   The Lord knows you with all your weaknesses and he is ready to help you out.  Do not depend on your own understanding but ask of him to take control through your surrender to him.  Remember, God loves you and he will always repay your good works and deeds at His own time.  Be encouraged and remember it takes the Spirit of God to guide us in the light and it takes the spirit of the evil one to walk in sin and darkness.  Embrace Jesus and he will never let you down.  Be blessed and have a wonderful time.