MADE WITHOUT MISTAKE

_”I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvelous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well.”_ (Psalm 139:14) 

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The best gift God could ever give out to man was His likeness. Man owes an unending praise to God for sharing His identity with us, and not even with the Angels who are at His services all the time. He has created us fearfully and wonderfully that no creature bears resemblance with us, and those who are as human as we are, can’t resemble us in any way. Others call is uniqueness of humankind. 

God sacrificed His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, because nothing else is as important enough to replace the blood He came to shed for us. Had it not been that we were fearfully and wonderfully made, would He have come to shed His precious blood for us? This is why the best in us is the fear of God which we need to define in strict compliance to God’s Word. 

This will bring out our original and divine nature and this shall be a wonder in the eyes of people and Heaven shall testify of our qualification to occupy in God’s Kingdom. If you know how precious our souls are, you won’t allow any body to be responsible for your downward looking. Your limitations are challenging you to prove with the Spirit of God in you that, you are so fearfully and wonderfully made, and your soul knows nothing apart from the nature of God by which you are known. You are not a mistake. Every thing about us is wonderful like the God who created us to be a marvel in all circumstances. Nobody can take this knowledge acquired by the soul in you.

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*PRAYER*: Lord, I appreciate how you made me without mistake. *AMEN*

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RESTITUTION AND RESTORATION

*👤MINISTER: _PASTOR MOSES AMETEPEH_*

👉MEMORY VERSE: _”Leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift.”_ (Matthew 5:24) 

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Restitution is the act of bringing something to its original state or the process of restoring an object. A large number of Christians are ignorant about the knowledge of restitution. Out of the extreme emphasis they place on the grace of God by which we are saved, they refuse to do the work which goes hand in hand with the Christian faith. That notwithstanding, some Christians are knowledgeable about the essence of restitution but they don’t put it into practice. Salvation comes after one has repented from his sins. For this reason, faith with the work of restitution is a surest evidence that we have repented (James 2:26).

Restitution isn’t a new introduction into Christianity, neither is it one of the Mosaic laws as grace preachers regard it. It is so divine that it was in practice before the dispensation of the law, and it became included in the laws but still holds up to now. Among the examples of the instances of restitution in the Old Testament can be found in Exodus 22:1-9, 2 Samuel 12:5-6, and Genesis 20:7,14. When we sinned against God, our Saviour Jesus Christ restored us to God even when we were at the guilty end. Zaccheus showed a typical example of restitution by restoring in four fold all that he dubiously took from people (Luke 19:1-10).

One who has understood the Christian doctrine of restitution is making all his crooked paths straight before the Lord (Proverbs 19:2, 1Corinthians 14:6, Romans 13:8). God’s Word is telling us not to owe anybody in cash or offence for the sake of our soul’s eternal well being and complete prove of our readiness to be holy as he is holy. Restitution is one of the indications that nothing of Satan is still with us in the aftermath of our salvation. Ask yourself these questions: did you steal anybody’s item when you didn’t know Christ, did you do any false certificate for employment and admission, killed somebody, made false accusations against a prisoner or a person who lost his job, impregnated a lady and escaped, or aborted a baby of your husband? Maybe you have committed adultery, stole school and work properties, lied to someone, and many others. Know that if you have truly repented and accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour, then you have no choice than to do so. Don’t be accused by Satan on the day of judgment.

If we sin and we don’t uncover them, it shall be open before God, and this attracts eternal punishment (Mark 4:22-23, 1Peter 1:14-17). Restitution is our real announcement to the world, as well as to God that you have turned into a new leaf. Part of the fruit I need to bear for God after being saved by the grace of God, is to win my family, colleagues and others for Christ Jesus. We will know from the lives of Christians who fail to restore things to their rightful owners that they are not able to speak against the sinful character which used to captivate them until came to know Christ Jesus (Luke 17:3-5).

People can’t make restitutions because of fear, pride and the lack of understanding about it. However, those are all parr of the devil’s tricks to keep you in bondage forever but this comes with an unbearable destruction which cannot be spoken about. May the Lord assist us with the divine boldness and strength to do our restitutions as the Lord expects from us.

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*PRAYER*: Lord Jesus Christ, permit me to recollect all the past offences that call for my restitution. *AMEN*

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DO YOU PERSONALLY KNOW THE LORD?

“For Jacob my servant’s sake, and Israel mine elect, I have even called thee by thy name: I have surnamed thee, though thou hast not known me”.
Isaiah 45:4KJV

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When God was addressing His words to King Cyrus, he called him by his name and surnamed him ‘his anointed’, though he had never encountered Him. God promised him so many things including the riches of secret places that he may know that He is the God of Israel. It’s one thing having knowledge about God and another knowing Him in personal terms. Many people know something about Christ but they don’t really know who he actually is to them and had never encountered Him.

The Lord had called us to be His children and we’ve been surnamed as “Christians” —Christ-likes. Most Christians after accepting Christ, never have any relationship with Him. They are convinced of being called by Him but they don’t know Him. Many are indeed called but few are chosen because the chosen ones are those who know the Lord personally in an intimate relationship. They had truly surrender all their hearts unto Him and forsaken the world and it’s alluring things which are very inimical to their salvation.

God says, “Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, let not the rich man glory in his riches: But let him that glories glory in this, that he *understands and knows me*, that I am the LORD which exercise lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness, in the earth: for in these things I delight, saith the LORD”(Jer. 9:23-24).
On the judgement day, the Lord will say to those who had a certain knowledge about him but neither knew him personally nor obeyed His words that, “Depart from Me, I never knew you”.
The more you love the Lord, the more you’ll desire to know Him.
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PRAYER: I need more of you, oh my Lord Jesus. Help me to have an intimate relationship with you. In your name I pray.
AMEN

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THE FATHER’S PLEASURE

“Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom”.
Luke 12:32KJV
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How encouraged we must be knowing that the very creator of the whole universe, who is burdened with the issues of all humans lives should yet command us “Do not fear”! He knows that we are worriers and fearers of everything and we daily need this antidote to activate His peace within us. Very aware of our weaknesses and incapabilities, He calls us little —for Christ’s flock in this world is a little flock; his sheep are but few and feeble. The church is a vineyard, a garden, a small spot, compared with the wilderness of this world. But He strengthens us to overcome the world through our faith in Him.

He is our Shepherd and we are his flock. He is the lamb who shed his blood for his sheep. Not only is He our good Shepherd who will never abandon His own, He is also very near, committed, affectionate, dependable, and able. He is the beloved Son of the father and we are His beloved children. The thing that our Father delights in is not that which benefits Him, but us. He gives generously and at great personal cost.

If there were anything worth having, it’d be the royal Kingdom— the one that belongs to the King of Kings. All things righteous, holy, noble and good are the very things He’s delighted to generously give to His little flock. God has a kingdom in store for all that belong to Christ’s little flock, a crown of glory, a throne of power, unsearchable riches, far exceeding the peculiar treasures of kings and provinces. If God so loved us that he gave us His only begotten Son, then it’s His good pleasure also to give us His Kingdom. And His kingdom will be inherited by those whose lives are pleasing unto Him.
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*PRAYER:* Father thank you for having a delight in giving me your kingdom. Please help me to be fearless and live a life pleasing unto you in Christ Jesus’ name.
AMEN

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FAKE GODLINESS AND HYPOCRISY

_”Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.”_ (2Timothy 3:5) 

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*”Nemo dat quod non habet”, is a famous Latin adage and a legal rule which means that nobody can give what he doesn’t have. Godliness cannot be faked. It is the nature of our Lord Jesus Christ with absolute holiness but without sin.* God has given us a holy vocation to come into His likeness the obedience of His Word with our whole hearts under the influence of the Holy Spirit.

*True Christians do not only bear the name of Christ’s followers but they have what it takes to overpower and overcome sin. This is the power of the Holy Spirit by which our Lord Jesus Christ never sinned, casted out demons, healed the sick, raised the dead and finally resurrected from the death to fulfill the Holy Scriptures.* *It is our turn to fulfill scriptures by walking in the holy examples of Jesus Christ in the power to overcome sin.*

Reading the Holy Bible from cover to cover severally, performing miracles all the time, preaching eloquently for hours, singing to glorify the Lord, and offering of great treasures and huge monies in the House of God, are not all that Christianity is all about. *If anybody does all the aforementioned acts of worship without the power to overcome sins, is a hypocrite who is merely an abomination in the eyes of God.* Such a person is the one who doesn’t allow the Holy Spirit to assist Him to surrender His whole life towards his or her obedience to the Word of God. 

*We are hereby advised by the Spirit of God to stay farther away from pleasing people and vainly glorifying them with some Christian practices to show off. This is the right time for us to fulfill the part of the Scripture which talks about our discipleship, and by so doing, our godliness will count in every regard. Don’t forget that God’s wrath against fake and feigned godliness, is equal to eternal punishment in the Lake of Fire without mercy.*
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*PRAYER*: Holy Spirit, please take my hypocrisy and give me your original godliness in Jesus name. *AMEN*

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HOLINESS IS GOD’S PLEASURE

 _”Traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God;”_ (2Timothy 3:4) 

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Life is so short for people to be occupied by the temporary pleasures of this world. *Every one is a slave to the very act which brings pleasure to him or her.* The god of this world is Satan. He is the brain behind all the worldly pleasures that Christians have no business enjoying them for the satisfaction of a person’s appetite for fun. *People aren’t able to do away away with their favorite television programs, movies, secular songs, clubbing, drunkenness, illegitimate sex, beauty contests, football, annual festival celebration and many more.*

The point of interest here is that, man’s pleasure is in rivalry with his total dependence on God. Jesus Christ is the author and finisher of our faith, who saved us from the sinful world, in order for us to focus on how to serve Him in obedience without any worldly pleasure. One dangerous thing about the love for pleasures is that, it makes you familiar and acquainted with the wants of the flesh, thereby feeding it at the expense of the spirit. The more callous people become with spiritual growth, the greater the consequence will become. 

Pleasures of the flesh are deceiving people to worship their flesh, renounce the earnest search for God by refusing to walk in His perfect will. *Eternal destruction is waiting for all those who waste their lives on worldly pleasures due to the fact that, our lives are made to complete the pursuance of the holy calling of God which is to do His will (1John 2:15-17).* The pleasure you seek to enjoy is coming from the works of the flesh which have already died with Christ during our baptism. If only we want to inherit Heaven at last, then we are all advised that friendship with the world is enmity with God. One is either on the Lord’s side or not. 

Enjoy listening to inspired gospel songs and sermons, meditate on the Word of God frethattly, and habitually love to extend unconditional love to all people without any favouritism. *With them, the pleasures of this world will have no compromising offer to present to us because our affections will no longer be found in the flesh but on the things above. God is love. Turning our hearts to love the pleasures of this world is like making unholy sacrifice to Him. Mankind has no pleasure to enjoy but there is only one person who can obtain pleasure, and His name is Jesus Christ. He is the one who is always pleased to see us walking in His ways and examples without sinning.* Our holiness pleases God, not the pleasures we tend to love.
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*PRAYER*: Lord Jesus Christ, let my life give you pleasure. *AMEN*

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EVIDENCE OF THE GREAT LIGHT IN OUR LIVES

*👤MINISTER: _PASTOR JOHNSON ADDAE_*

👉MEMORY VERSE: _”The people which sat in darkness saw great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up”_ (Matthew 4:16) 

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Law courts deal with evidences. The genuineness of your case is depending on the evidences to vindicate you. In like manner, there are evidences that are meant to confirm and buttress the total transformation of a new born Christian who is walking after our Lord Jesus Christ, the Great Light. The following are some of the evidences:

(a) *Perfect love*: This evidence will have to be presented by all Christians before God. God has commanded us to love Him, by loving our neighbours as ourselves even to the point of laying down our lives for them when the need arises (1John 3:16, 1John 4:16-21). This perfect love is not based on any condition. 

(b) *Right Motive*: It is an evidence for the people in darkness to know that we have now found our lives in the Great Light. Right motive is not complacent but rather calls for unity among our brethren. When the mind of Christ dwell in us, we can present ourselves to the people of darkness. Those with whom we dwell in the Great Light, must all be one with us in decision making. (Philippians 2:5, Hebrews 2:11)

( c) *Inward Victory*: Evidently, one will know that we are in the Great Light only when we demonstrate freedom from all forms of sins. ( Ephesians 5:26-27, Luke 1:74-75). Inward holiness will come out evidently for all people to know the state of a person who is in the Great Light of Christ. As time goes on, we should be examining ourselves to know the state of our lives. One important  question to ask ourselves is that, is my heart constantly yearning for the LORD? (Ezekiel 36:25-27) Is my heart longing for things of the world or the life in the light? One question that we are supposed to ask ourselves is, do we dress to the taste of the world or to please God? Bear in mind that the world wants you to appear like them but never compromise with them. (Hebrew 11:38), our conversation should also be carefully watched. It should not have any likeness with that of the indecent and like worldly people. (James 1:26)

*How to keep the Blessings in the Great Light*
1. Watch and Pray

(1corinthisns 10:12-13, Colossians 4:3, Isaiah 40:28-31, 1Thessalonians 5:5-6, 1Peter 5:7-10
(2) Abide in Christ

(Matthew 6:25-33, Job 1:20-22)
(3) Beware of Compromises

(Songs of Solomon 2:15)

Beloved, let these evidences be seen in our lives from today forward. So far as we have been blessed to remain in the great light of God, we need to do the best we can to prevent all compromises which will lead us into darkness.

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*PRAYER*: Lord Jesus, may your light never stop shining on me. *AMEN*

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RESIST SATAN, DON’T BE HIS PREY!

“And she said unto him, How canst thou say, I love thee, when thine heart is not with me? thou hast mocked me these three times, and hast not told me wherein thy great strength lieth”.
Judges 16:15KJV

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The desire of Satan like Delilah, is to know where our great strength dwells, by what means he can bind us with fetters of brass, put out our eyes, and cause us to grind in the prison house of this world as he did to Samson. The Bible says, “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walks about, seeking whom he may devour”. (1Pet. 5:8) Oh he has already rain many Christians’ lives for they like Samson revealed where their strength lies to Him.

Satan knows that the joy of the Lord is our strength and it can only be obtained in the presence of the Lord through a lasting and healthy relationship with Him; the reading, meditating and practicing of the word are keys to that. Fasting and daily prayers are also part of the keys of our strength. So he is doing everything in his power; making us busy for nothing, filling our minds with worldly and unnecessary things, just to keep us from abiding in Christ and having a relationship with Him.

The destruction of Samson’s strength led to the death of many. We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us. Another source of our strength is the Holy Spirit, He is the power in us, keeping us going in our Christian lives. The devil had caused many believers to grieve and quench Him, and he too had left them. Know that Delilah symbolises this world and its beguiling things.
When you love the world and the things of it, you become a prey to Satan, he destroys your strength and derail your purpose in life.
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PRAYER: Holy Spirit thank you for your words, please destroy any channel of the devil in my life. Help me to have an intimate relationship with you so I’ll not be a prey to the enemy in Jesus’ name I pray.
AMEN
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A LAODICEAN HEART

“And he did that which was right in the sight of the LORD, but not with a perfect heart”.
2Chronicles 25:2KJV

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Amaziah was twenty-five years old when he began to reign in Jerusalem.
He did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord; he worshipped the true God, kept the temple service a going, and countenanced religion in his kingdom; but he did not do it with a perfect heart. It came to pass that he went forth and smote the children of Seir and brought their gods, set them up to be his own gods, bowed down himself before them and burned incense unto them, thereby, kindling the anger of the Lord against him.

He started well but ended up being an idolater. He was not a man of serious piety or devotion himself, nor had he any zeal for the exercises of the words of God. He was no enemy to it, but a cool and indifferent friend. He didn’t whole-souled obey God.

Such is the character of many Christians in this Laodicean age: they do that which is good, but not with a perfect heart. A Laodicean heart is a lukewarm heart. The heart of many Christians of today is divided between the Word and the World. The Lord Jesus said to the Laodicean church that, “I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot: I would you were cold or hot. So then because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth”(Rev. 3:15-16).The Lord will throw up those with a lukewarm heart to hell for He utterly abhors such behavior. If you’re for Him, abide in Him, and if you’re not, then don’t pretend!
A perfect heart is not lukewarm, it hearkens to all the Words of the Lord

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*PRAYER:* Lord Jesus please take any lukewarmness from my heart and wash my heart to be perfect in your name I pray.
AMEN
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THE MIND OF CHRIST WITHOUT HIGH-MINDEDNESS

 _”Traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God;”_ (2Timothy 3:4) 

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*Enlightenment from the Word of God has made it known to all Christians that, the mind of Christ need to replace our old sinful lives.* The passion and affection with which holiness in our lives are indicated, must hail from the mind of Christ in us. Reception and performance of God’s Word in our daily lives must be triggered by understanding and excitement without thinking otherwise. One who has the mind of Christ is always producing the right outcome in the form of holiness experienced as a Christian’s culture or civilization.

*Our relationship with every one, be it a believer or not, the burning desire with which we attend Church services at any time without excuses, the openness with which we receive the Word of God, pray, evangelize and perform responsibilities assigned to us by God, will acculturate for us a solid Christian civilization with great joy (Philippians 2:5).* It is in this joy that we will frown at the high-mindedness of worldly affections.

High-minded people are emotionally satisfied by the culture or civilization which they create for their satisfaction, regardless of what the Word of God says. Traditionalists and so many religions are proud of their festivals, languages, chieftaincy systems, delicacies, code of dressing, heritages and many more. They are high-minded about them just as many youths are caught up lusting after games like football, partaking in beauty pageantries, entertainment programs on the television, ungodly songs and watching of popular satanic movies and even how they love to work for vane things like money. Do they even remember their Creator?

Don’t be lured by high-mindedness in place of the mind of Christ which has to richly dwell in you and make you poised to live in holiness. Holiness must bring excitement in us. Understand for good: Satan has blinded the minds and hearts of all high-minded people in order to captivate this generation with sinful pleasures and lead them to hell at last (2Corinthians 4:4). *He wants you to love and defend the habitual evil you do to attract the world to yourself. He wants you to do things in a manner that will please you, thereby being master of yourself and living your life without Christ.* Say no to any carnal occupation of the mind by feeling pleased with the instructions of righteousness from God’s Word.

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*PRAYER*: Spirit of God, send your fire to sweep away all sense of high-mindedness from my mind in Jesus name. *AMEN*

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