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Learn and Grow with Jesus EVERYDAY.
Today's Topic is: The Essence of Life Part II
Date: Sunday, January 31, 2021
Bible Reading: Luke 12:16-21 NIV
And he told them this parable: “The ground of a certain rich man yielded an abundant harvest. He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.’ “Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store my surplus grain. And I’ll say to myself, “You have plenty of grain laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.” ’ “But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’ “This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich toward God.”Luke 12:16-21 NIV
Discussion Question: Are you rich toward God?
One fundamental thing we always seem to forget is that God blesses us so that we can be a blessing unto others. In Genesis 12:2-3, God said to Abraham, "I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse, and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”
When God elevated Joseph to become the Prime Minister of Egypt, it was so that Israel might through Joseph be saved and not be consumed by the unimaginable famine that was to come. God meticulously prepared Joseph for this role using the most nerve-wracking adversities, and Joseph persevered through them all. Joseph was faithful and righteous in obscurity and God made room for him in the palace of Pharaoh the King of Egypt.
When God gave David victory over Goliath, He didn't do it because King Saul promised his daughter, riches, and tax-free life to whosoever would kill Goliath, but rather, God did it to end the reproach, slavery, and mistreatment Israel suffered at the hands of the Philistines on account of Goliath.
In all these examples, these men used by God as vessels and channels of His blessings were equally blessed in unprecedented proportions for allowing God to use them to carry out His purposes. It is impossible to spray a bottle of perfume or cologne on others without having a few droplets on yourself and oozing with the same fragrance.
I have come to understand that God was very intentional in the way He designed this world. God made laws and principles to govern everything He created. I have come to understand that there is not a single person in all the world that is successful that wasn't helped by someone at one time or the other. We are all products of another person's benevolence. We are all beneficiaries of someone's act of love, compassion, and kindness at one point or the other in our lives. We may do our best to deny it and pretend we achieved success on our own, but deep within, we know we were helped by someone who had a certain advantage or privilege of access that changed our trajectory in life.
We are all destiny helpers. God assigned to each of us people whose success in life is predicated on our benevolence. There is a destiny helper for everyone God created and it is so by design. In other words, there is an untold number of people who may never amount to anything meaningful in their life without your help. Their success in life is contingent on you. Your role in their life does not necessarily have anything to do with giving them money or anything financial but could be just a word of advice that would change the course of their direction in life and bring them to that path on which their success is inevitable. Remember the case of Naaman and the little maidservant. She simply gave Naaman a vital piece of information she had and Naaman's life was changed forever.
If you refuse to play your role in someone else's life, you stunt their growth, you delay their success, and eventually cause them untold hardship. One thing I have also learned is that we are not told beforehand those we are destined to help or assist. No one has that foreknowledge. But one vital piece of information Jesus gave us is to love our neighbors as ourselves and to do unto others as we would like done to us. What is good for you is also good for your neighbor. What will elevate you in life will also have the same impact on your neighbor. So spray goodness and mercy like a fragrance. Dispense compassion and kindness like a billionaire intent on going broke.
Many have found their own victories in life while being compassionate to others. Remember David's battle at Ziklag. If David hadn't shown compassion to the dying sick man by the roadside while in hot pursuit of the raiders of Ziklag, he may never have known where they camped to recover all.
Jesus is teaching us today that the Lord's blessings on our lives are not just for us to meet our won needs. We are first stewards of his blessings. We are given a trust with the blessings of God. And it is required that those who have been given a trust must prove faithful. 1 Corinthians 4:2.
Wealth is a very beautiful thing, but it is also very deceitful. The greatest deception is to be deceived without even knowing it. The essence of life is serving God not just with our hearts, but by also allowing ourselves to be extensions of God's outstretched arms to reach our brothers and sister who we are better than by the privilege of His grace and election. By so doing we heap treasures in heaven where there are no thieves, no rust, no locust and cankerworms.
Remember that we all are like eagles with one wingspan each. We need each other to fly and soar.
Stay uplifted in Christ always and live Cheerfully every day.
Leader Chinedu Nicholas Obodo for EXOLOM Fellowship, Maryland, USA. Find us at Exolom.com
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