Where do you stand

See, today I have set before you life and prosperity, death and adversity. (Deuteronomy 30:15 HCSB)

One of the most respected group of people, are those that clearly state what they have chosen to stand for. The reason it’s hard to fully trust politicians is because we don’t really know what they truly stand for.

“Therefore, everyone who will acknowledge Me before men, I will also acknowledge him before My Father in heaven. But whoever denies Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father in heaven.(Mat 10:32-:33 HCSB)

One of the reasons why confessing Jesus as your Lord and savior is a requirement for one to be born again is for the person in question to publicly declare they stand with Christ. That’s why your faith should not be a secret, political correctness doesn’t matter to us. God prefers to work with a good or bad person and detests those that are neither good or bad in their own eyes.

I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish that you were cold or hot. So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I am going to vomit you out of My mouth. Because you say, ‘I’m rich; I have become wealthy and need nothing,’ and you don’t know that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind, and naked,(Revelations 3:15-17 HCSB)

Taking a stand for what you believe in irrespective of the consequences you will face is one of the most admirable things on earth, because it let’s people know who you really are and also let’s God know what to do with you.

Ladies and gentlemen I encourage you to take a stand for the word of God and the principles it teaches us to live by even if we may become politically incorrect in the process so that Christ will also be proud to stand for us before His father.

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Illusions of the world: I have time

And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry. But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided?(Luke 12:19-20 KJV)

As much as it’s wise to plan for the future, we often assume in our planing that we have control of time to a certain degree. If you were to go around asking people how much time they have left in this world you will be astonished by the answers you’ll receive, because almost all of us see ourselves still having a great number of days ahead of us irrespective of how we live our lives.

This illusion of us having a lot of time in our hands leads us into postponing dealing with the important and only focusing on having fun and our selfish desires. Many thought they still had time to spend with their parents until the day the received the news of their parents death, many planned to start being committed to God in their late thirties and forties but an accident took their lives and subsequently destroyed those plans


From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. (Matthew 4:17 KJV)


For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night.1( Thessalonians 5:2 KJV)


Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them; (Ecclesiastes 12:1 KJV)

The fact that none of us know when Christ will come back should be enough reason for us to break free from the illusion that makes us think we have time, let us prepare our way by receiving salvation through Christ and be committed to Him so that we will not be found wanting in the last day.

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The illusion of appearance

There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death.(Proverbs 14:12 KJV)

I’m sure you have once heard someone say that “seeing is believing”, we come across such statements because humanity has put it’s trust in the eyes and as a result we value experience more than knowledge we are taught.

Today the there are a lot of people things that the world believes is right that time will prove to be wrong. Time is one of the tools God uses to reveal truth, this is why a time will come that they won’t be any doubt that Jesus came and died for us but if that time will be too late for many to acknowledge Him as Lord.

Appearance can create an illusion that can mislead us into thinking that something is wrong or right. The illustrations of appearance are often created by our desires and expectations, if you desire to be rich and famous you are likely to form an illusion in your mind that let’s you justify many of the things that the rich and famous do

Let not then your good be evil spoken of (Romans 14:16 KJV)

If you have expectation of a certain group is you will create an illusion that may end up get you hurt. As a Christian will have to mind our action to a certain extent because many of the new converts have a certain illusion of Christianity and carelessly breaking that illusion may lead to them backsliding.

For the next few weeks I will be sharing with you the illusions in the world and by the grace of God I hope to be able to show you how you can break those illusions

#softteachings

Counting the cost

For which of you, wanting to build a tower, doesn’t first sit down and calculate the cost to see if he has enough to complete (Luke 14:28 HCSB)

Everything has a price and I don’t just mean monetary price but anything that you sacrifice or loose in the process of obtaining or doing something is part of the price you pay for that particular thing.

Seeing that Jesus saw the importance of letting those that are thinking of following Him known that there is a price for them to pay if they are to follow him and went on to use the analogy of deciding to build a house to show the need for counting the cost, it means it’s very important to count the costs that comes with a decision before making that decision.

Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple. “For which of you, wanting to build a tower, doesn’t first sit down and calculate the cost to see if he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, after he has laid the foundation and cannot finish it, all the onlookers will begin to make fun of him, saying, ‘This man started to build and wasn’t able to finish.’ “Or what king, going to war against another king, will not first sit down and decide if he is able with 10,000 to oppose the one who comes against him with 20,000? If not, while the other is still far off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. (Luke 14:27-32 HCSB)

From the examples that Jesus gave we see that counting the cost is basically doing an assessment of one’s resources against the task at hand. The reason many of us end up making a lot of mistakes or end up overwhelmed is because we never do any assignment before we make decisions, we choose careers, partners and many other things solemnly based on how we feel, we never look at how that decision will affect other aspects of our lives.

For what does it benefit a man to gain the whole world yet lose his life?(Mark 8:36 HCSB)

If you don’t count the cost before you make a decision you will end up gaining temporary things at the expense of things that are eternal. Many lost their marriages, health and life among other things because they gave into their impulses and didn’t count the cost of  their decisions.

#softteachings

Being a good example

Let no one despise your youth; instead, you should be an example to the believers in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.(1 Timothy 4:12)

As much as I agree that you shouldn’t regard any person in such a way that your faith will be negatively affected when that person makes a huge mistake or backslides. With that said, we shouldn’t neglect being good examples of Christians and representing Christ the right way.

Mahatma Ghandhi once said ” I like your Jesus Christ but I don’t like your Christians”. Take a moment and imagine how different the religious scope of India would be if Ghandhi became a Christian and boldly proclaimed Him in front of the masses. Ghandhi and countless many others liked Jesus Christ but wee dissuaded by the lives and attitudes of the Christians around them.

For if your brother is hurt by what you eat, you are no longer walking according to love. Do not destroy that one Christ died for by what you eat. Therefore, do not let your good be slandered, for the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. Whoever serves Christ in this way is acceptable to God and approved by men. So then, we must pursue what promotes peace and what builds up one (Rom 14:15-19 HCSB)

Things that you will hear ‘preached’ everywhere today is putting your own happiness first before others, but God wants us to consider others the same way we consider ourselves, meaning with everything we do, we must consider the impact it will have on those around us, so long as we won’t disobey God in the process. He said to him, “ Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and most important command. The second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself.(Mat 22:37-39 HCSB)

Let no one despise your youth; instead, you should be an example to the believers in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.(1 Timothy 4:12)

As children of God we are supposed to conduct ourselves in a good and examplary manner (both inside and our church) because we are God’s billboards and banners which He uses to advertise His great love and grace that He has for the world.

Ladies and gentlemen let us portray the love of God to our neighbours without discrimination or being selfish.

#softteachings

Balence

A false balance is abomination to the LORD: but a just weight is his delight.(Proverbs 11:1)

One of the things we struggle with as humans is balance. We struggle to balance our careers with our family life, we struggle to balance work with rest and a lot more things.

As you grow in the Lord you will notice that one of the things the Word of God teaches us is balance. We are taught to balance our work of the ministry with the love and care we ought to give to our family. But if any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel.(1 Timothy 5:8)


If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?(1 John 4:20)

The proof of our love for God is in the love we portray to our brothers and sisters. If your friends and family can’t feel your love you are inbalance and your love for God is a lie and an abomination because it lacks evidence.


Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.(Hebrews 11:1)

For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.(James 2:26)

Everything God has done for mankind is characterised by balance and it also requires us to be balanced. God loves us and that love was balanced by a gift (John 3:16). Our faith/belief in Christ Jesus as the Lord and Saviour of the world is balanced by the need for us to confess it. When we allow God to balance our lives we allow Him to take away the stress and anxiety that comes with trying to put your life together, we receive the peace that he has given us.


Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.(John 14:27)

Receive the peace that Christ has left with us by learning to live a balanced life by the Holy spirit.

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Brother’s keeper

And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God love his brother also.(1 John 4:21)

In today’s world, we are taught to always first consider and look out for number one(yourself) and not care what happens to others, but the Bible teaches us to equate yourself with our neighbours, meaning that you shouldn’t do to someone what you wouldn’t want to be done to you.
One of the trademarks of Christianity is selflessness, we learn to be selfless from our master Jesus whom selflessly gave His life for us. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.(John 3:16). Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.(1 John 4:7)

No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His love has been perfected in us.(1 John 4:12)

One of the things that God cannot stand is hypocrisy and as a result He expects us to show the love that we claim to have for Him to our brothers. If you love your brother, you will never let your brother about to make a bad decision and keep silent. God used the apostles, our fellow brethren in the faith to teach, instruct and advice us and we ought to also do that for our brothers who are younger than us in the faith.

But if thy brother be grieved with thy meat, now walkest thou not charitably. Destroy not him with thy meat, for whom Christ died.(Romans 14:15)

It is our duty to protect the faith of God our brothers and sisters in the Lord and as a result we should forsake anything that will make them lose their faith.

#Softteachings

Friendliness

A man that hath friends must shew himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother.(Proverbs 18:24) 

Welcome back to softteachings, ladies and gentlemen. Wishing you a happy and prosperous New year. I want use to look at friendliness or being friendly. 

The bible says I. Proverbs 18 verse 24 that a man that has friends must first be friendly or approachable himself. In today’s world we have many people that demand from others what they are not willing to give. 

Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.(Matthew 7:12) 

One of the greatest commandments is to love our neighbours, the greatest way to show neighbourly love is to be friendly. Now the question is “how to be friendly?” and the and answer is found in the way you desire to be treated by others.

One of the things the Bible is against is hypocrisy, meaning the Word doesn’t teach us to expect from others what we are not willing to give, God wants us to love Him and as a result He first showed His love for us at the cross.


Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him. Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another. No man hath seen God at any time. If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us.(1 John 4:7-12)

Ladies and gentlemen it is God who teaches us how to truly love and as a result we as believers must demonstrate that that love to one another as children of God and to the whole world so that people can testify of the goodness of the world.

Ladies and gentlemen I hope you enjoyed today’s teaching, it is my wish that this year I will share with you the word on softteachings without interruptions and by the grace of God I believe my desire shall come true. Thank you for reading and please share with your loved ones.

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Men that unite people in order to cause a division

For you have said in your heart:I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God;I will also sit on the mount of the congregation On the farthest sides of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds, I will be like the Most High.’(Isaiah 14:13-14) 

Last time we locked at a once united nation that God ended up dividing. I want us to look at people whom brought people together in order to bring distraction. The first person to do so is Luficer(Satan) and we all know what he did in heaven that started a civil war. 

Then they said to Moses, “Because there were no graves in Egypt, have you taken us away to die in the wilderness? Why have you so dealt with us, to bring us up out of Egypt? Is this not the word that we told you in Egypt, saying, ‘Let us alone that we may serve the Egyptians’? For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than that we should die in the wilderness.”(Exodus 14:11-12)

We all know how the children of Israel complained to moses, but many of us don’t consider that a group that has just been freed after being slaves for the past 450 years doesn’t just start complaining without someone or some people planting those thoughts. Among the children of Israel there were people who didn’t like Moses or God if not both of them and they made a nation of about two million people prefer being slaves in the name of there are graves in our place of slavery. We can never be sure of their true motives because the bible doesn’t tell us, but we know the level of damage theses guys cost. These guys deceptive force was so powerful that they even got a priest of God to become a blacksmith and make an idol for them. 
Now when the people saw that Moses delayed coming down from the mountain, the people gathered together to Aaron, and said to him, “Come, make us gods that shall go before us; for as for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.”And Aaron said to them, “Break off the golden earrings which are in the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me.”(Exodus 32:1-2). 

When Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the Ammonite official heard of it, they were deeply disturbed that a man had come to seek the well-being of the children of Israel.(Nehemiah 2:10), in this story we have Nehemiah who automatically become the enemy of Sanballat and Tobiah just because he wanted to rebuild the wall of Jerusalem. Now it happened, when Sanballat, Tobiah, the Arabs, the Ammonites, and the Ashdodites heard that the walls of Jerusalem were being restored and the gaps were beginning to be closed, that they became very angry, and all of them conspired together to come and attack Jerusalem and create confusion.(Nehemiah 4:7-8), these people decided to spread propaganda  in order to cause confusion, and the only way to do that is to unite people against another person. When we look at recent history, we discover that things like holocaust was the result of one man uniting a nation against another race. 

Going back to Genesis 11, God had to divide the people of the earth because since they were not united with Him they could even start another war in heaven once they were done building their tower, because they were fueled by their ambition. Today the world is unequal due to the fact that others see themselves as more human than others, and this has been happening for hundreds of years and the church has always been affected even though it shouldn’t. Now I say this, that each of you says, “I am of Paul,” or “I am of Apollos,” or “I am of Cephas,” or “I am of Christ.” Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?(1 Corinthians 1:12-13)

and have put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him, where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcised nor uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave nor free, but Christ is all and in all.(Collosians 3:10-11) 
Today we Christians have divided ourselves through denominations and church constitutions, I’m not saying that there shouldn’t be denominations but the fact that we don’t attend the same church doesn’t mean that we should belittle each other’s pastors. Today Christians are mocking other Christians churches and pastors instead of praying for each other. We gain nothing when our breathren are being deceived in the name of the bible, so we have to pray for them and the Lord will rescue them. We can only be properly united in Christ. 
Never be united with any group or organisation that is not united with God, because one way or another you will end up working towards someone else’s selfish ambition.

From the two stories we looked at we can see that the group that united the people against one person gave the masses an insentive to complain or hate the person they were targeting. So be careful of people whom are good at organising people in order to start a rebellion. 

#Softteachings

Why do we need God

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.(John 14:6) 

On the previous teaching we started learning whether God allows bad things to happen and we learned that God has given everyone on earth the right to choose and this led us to question of why do we need God.

First of all our freedom choice doesn’t trump the fact that we need someone else’s assistance and since that’s the case how much more do we need the one who created everything. In order to understand why we need God we need to know the things that only He can give us. 

Things only God can give us 

1. Freedom of the imprisonment of sin. For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. What fruit did you have then in the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. But now having been set free from sin, and having become slaves of God, you have your fruit to holiness, and the end, everlasting life (Romans 6:20-22). It was sin that initially drove us away from God and God through Christ became the solution so that we can be close to Him again. 
2. Authority over everything. Behold I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you.(Luke 10:19) When you have received Christ, you now have control of what happens in your life or around you. Nothing have power over you, whether sickness, depression or whatever, it can’t control your life unless you permit it. 
3. Eternal life (a new life) For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.(Romans 6:23), Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. (2 Corinthians 5:17) 
4. The Holy SpiritBut the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you.(John 14:26) There is no one who simpflies, revives and sustains a person’s life like the Holy Spirit, He is whoever and whatever you need at any time. He will teach or advise you in what ever you want or need. If you want to make sense of your life and everything in the world you need to have the Holy Spirit. 
5. A place to live in after this world has ended.   “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also. And where I go you know, and the way you know.” (John 14:1-4) Nearly everyone today believes the world will end one day and our reasons differ from nuclear hailstorm to global warming, we each have our own version how the world will end. But for those who are in Christ are sure of that they already have a heavenly home waiting for them on the day of the Lord. 

We have now seen that indeed we need God by looking at things that only He can give us. No the next teaching we’ll conclude on this short series see whether God allows bad things to happen. 

Please like this teaching and share with your friends and family. God bless you. 

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