READ: MATTHEW 16:1-14
“And it came to pass in the meanwhile, that
the heaven was black with clouds and winds, and there was a great rain. And
Ahab rode and went to Jezreel” (1 Kings
18:45). After three and a half years of drought, the rains fell. After your
years of dryness, your rains will fall. Have you been barren? Your rain of
fruitfulness has just begun. Have you been meeting with failure and
disappointments? Your rain of continuous success has just started in Jesus name.
The preceding verse before this could be deceptive. Having prayed seven times for rain, Elijah’s servant came to tell him he saw a cloud as big as a man’s hand. Yet a heavy down pour was imminent. You need to be very sensitive to the Holy Spirit. Sometimes, the greatest down pour is heralded by an insignificant cloud. Looking at the physical signs, we can mistake the preliminaries of God’s blessings of storms. Sometimes when blessings come, you may think they are problems. This is why you need to be able to discern the spiritual skyline as Jesus told us in our reading today. Jehoshaphat had this encounter in 2 Chronicles 20. When confronted by three powerful kings, Jehoshaphat thought he faced extinction. By the time he called on God, the kings killed themselves, leaving behind a heap of spoils which took Jehoshaphat’s army three days to gather. Many blessings come disguised as trouble.
A young man once met me and offered to be one of those to sponsor our Annual Convention. He asked me to pray with him. I did and two weeks later, he was sacked. He ran to me with the ‘sad’ news but I told him I had expected it because there was no way he could sponsor the Convention with a salary of seven hundred naira. God has to close one door before opening another. The following year, he came with ten thousand naira from a new opening. To see the blessing in the storm, calls for a closer walk with God and sensitivity to the Spirit. It also calls for concerted prayer and heartfelt praise and worship. See events from the eyes of the Holy Spirit. In that sack lies your promotion. In that test lies your testimony.
The preceding verse before this could be deceptive. Having prayed seven times for rain, Elijah’s servant came to tell him he saw a cloud as big as a man’s hand. Yet a heavy down pour was imminent. You need to be very sensitive to the Holy Spirit. Sometimes, the greatest down pour is heralded by an insignificant cloud. Looking at the physical signs, we can mistake the preliminaries of God’s blessings of storms. Sometimes when blessings come, you may think they are problems. This is why you need to be able to discern the spiritual skyline as Jesus told us in our reading today. Jehoshaphat had this encounter in 2 Chronicles 20. When confronted by three powerful kings, Jehoshaphat thought he faced extinction. By the time he called on God, the kings killed themselves, leaving behind a heap of spoils which took Jehoshaphat’s army three days to gather. Many blessings come disguised as trouble.
A young man once met me and offered to be one of those to sponsor our Annual Convention. He asked me to pray with him. I did and two weeks later, he was sacked. He ran to me with the ‘sad’ news but I told him I had expected it because there was no way he could sponsor the Convention with a salary of seven hundred naira. God has to close one door before opening another. The following year, he came with ten thousand naira from a new opening. To see the blessing in the storm, calls for a closer walk with God and sensitivity to the Spirit. It also calls for concerted prayer and heartfelt praise and worship. See events from the eyes of the Holy Spirit. In that sack lies your promotion. In that test lies your testimony.
MEMORIZE: 1
KINGS 18:45 –And it came to pass in the meanwhile, that the heaven was black
with clouds and winds, and there was a great rain. And Ahab rode and went to
Jezreel.
