Luke 4:25-27

But I tell you truly, many widows were in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months, and there was a great famine throughout all the land; but to none of them was Elijah sent except to Zarephath, in the region of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. And many lepers were in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet, and none of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian.”

When Jesus went into His home territory, He had intended to help them know that God had remembered them at last; but their attitude was contrary to His expectations, their familiarity with His history hampered their understanding and receiving the message He bore for them. He expected them to receive Him, appreciate His elevation to the office of the Messiah by God Himself, but because Satan had blinded them to that fact they should not receive blessing from their very own unfortunately they went along with the devils will.

Many people have had the opportunity to hear the Word of God but their hearts are hardened by their own knowledge, assumption and analogy of situations. Some will be prevented by the knowledge of the speaker’s credentials and past life, they keep remembering how the speaker was in the time they knew him/her and this keeps them from receiving the message as clearly as it was intended for them.

I remember on 02^nd February 2004, the day I was ordained to be a pastor, I met a friend whom we had not met for nine years, who had been a workmate during my military service as I was coming from the ceremony wearing my dog collar and carrying my Bible. When he saw me he was astonished to see me dressed as such and carrying a Bible. I explained to him that I was a pastor now but he could not understand what had become of me.

The best way he thought to celebrate was to buy me a drink but I turned him down, a point he could not accept easily. I tried to explain to him that my life had been changed by Jesus and I no longer drank any alcoholic beverages. When I tried to tell him that he also needed Jesus to change his life and be the Master and personal savior he found it very difficult to believe it coming from me.

Through this encounter I was able to learn two aspects of the devil’s work among Christians and non Christians alike: one: Satan is constantly fighting losing war against the spreading of the Word of God; two: when he can’t stop the process he creates sideshows and diversion to diminish the effect of the same by discouraging recipients and the speakers alike.

He delays the speakers and makes them feel incompetently unqualified to speak about all or certain topics he/she ought to speak about. Satan emphasis on the past events to intimidate the speaker and uses the same influence to minimize the impact such word would have on the recipient. When I read the scripture about what Jesus was going through at that time I was amazed by the similarity of the situation that I went through and hence this devotion.

Through this we are able to see that to be blessed or not are choices we consciously have to make. Choice one: is to follow through speaker’s history and curriculum vitae and miss the essence of the meeting or choice two: is to receive the Word of God as presented and blessing in the process. I know that God has ways to seal His Word after it has come forth. The speaker is but only a vessel that God uses for His purposes and should be seen as such any other encumbrances should be left out of equation.

My experience with the former workmate awaked in me the knowledge of the kind of difficulties that many a minister around the world have had to go through at one time or another to overcome such challenges as well. The most humiliating being from their own kith and kin, former school/classmates mates, peers in the corporate and intelligentsia world who view serving God as a failure in life.

Contrary to this believe and misconceived notion that it takes a failure in school life to choose serving God, I want reiterate that God knew of this situation and He has purposefully spoken about it in 1 Corinthians 1: 26-29- For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty; and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, that no flesh should glory in His presence. Guided by the scripture above I wish to go back to the message of Jesus Christ.

Jesus was born not out of the prominent or influential families in His area but His connection with God was all that ought to have mattered. But for a lonely widowed lady in Zarephath to host the prophet of God while there were many people in Israel was unheard off during those times. Point to note is that Elijah he had prayed to God for the drought, a total closure of rain from heaven for a period of three and half years and God so granted.

Despite the fact God had commanded Moses that no Israelite save a prophet of God was allowed to share on daily basis a room with people of other races save a widow who was not an Israelite. God ordered Elijah to move to Zarephath which is Sidon territory, to a poor widow who was about to have her last meal and then wait for death by starvation, to be fed from her house through the entire time of the drought. This doesn’t make any sense at all? Common sense demands that we ask ourselves, were there no rich and affluent people or widows in Israel that God could have sent His prophet to?

The answer is that there were but God, for some unknown reason wanted to save that poor widow from the famine, God said that He had commanded the widow to feed His prophet but the reverse is actually true. God, for reasons better known to Himself wanted to use this widow to glorify His by helping her survive the famine. In this He would be showing to the whole world that He was capable of sustaining His own servants by means beyond human understanding, expectation or imagination.

Many a times I have wondered, can God contradict Himself? Saying this and doing something else? Seeing how He used ravens, bird that He classified as unclean to feed this same prophet prior to sending him to Zarephath which in itself is again another controversy, if viewed from a man’s logical eye.  But again if viewed from the understanding the God owns the earth and all that is therein. Psalm 24:1, 2 The earth is the LORD’s, and all its fullness, the world and those who dwell therein. For He has founded it upon the seas, and established it upon the waters. (NKJV).

This is a clear indication that God can use anything, whether or not opposed to His Word to bring glory unto Himself. This means that God is not restricted by our hatred, opinion, thoughts, standards of good and bad or any other contrary idea that human beings may have about His Word is all beside the point. No matter what our opinions are, it is the will of God that carries the day. God’s intentions are clearly based on how connected a person is to Him and no matter how ignorant one might be of this fact.

The amazing fact that Jesus is emphasizing on these events with such clarity, contradicting as they are, He is doing so for a purpose. He knew that they knew of such acts before through reading of the prophets because those deeds were fully documented and were before then. Jesus wanted them to see the futility of their rejection of Him, that He could help others even though they turned Him away others were in need of Him, this actually serves as a refreshing point to all servants of God who have undergone rejection, or other humiliating experience in the hands of those who thought they knew their previous lives.

It is important to remember that such experiences should not serve as discouragement but as learning points for the servants who know their Master well. He personally said that ‘if they hated Me, you too they shall hate’ so we should be more encouraged than discouraged. Jesus wants us not to view such discouragement from the physical realm but from the spiritual point of view, the enemy who is operating inside such people is the one we should fight against and not the people themselves.

Surely there were thousands of lepers in Israel during the time of Prophet Elisha and yet only Naaman from Syria was healed of the same. Why is this? Because people don’t value what they have until it is taken away from them. Satan clouds their minds with the familiarity saying that says ‘familiarity breeds contempt’ fortunately human contempt never limits God from performing His will. What He does is that when one is filled with contempt He selects another and continues His programmes.

My humble request to you today for your own sakes is that in as much as you might be acquainted to the servants of God operating in your midst, may they have been play, class or school mates, it is in your own interest that you acknowledge them and listen to them without judging their previous actions whether good or bad because the One Who called them has already put such things into consideration before calling them to His service.

The people of Nazareth thought that knew everything they needed to know about Him; they knew his father, mother, brothers, sisters and even His family profession. Most of them had seen Him grow, from toddler to adulthood and this way they thought they had Him completely figured out. That such information gave them the right to question His authority to speak to them, does this sound familiar to somebody? Maybe you are thinking my experience exactly.

Jesus wanted to bless these people, He wanted to draw them close and lead them to eternal salvation yet their hearts had been completely closed up by their myopic shallow knowledge of Him. They unfortunately missed the most important gift their ‘son’ was bringing them home.

This unfortunately happens even today; many Christians world over would rather seek to know the full credentials of a speaker than the message he/she has to deliver. They are most likely to remember who the speaker was by qualification than by what message he/she had brought them or even which verses of the Bible he/she shared with them, a very sad and discouraging trend.

We need to revise some of these trends and maintain divine connections with the Word and men/women of God. Knowing full well that God does not send any person your way for no reason, with God there is nothing like luck or coincidence. He purposes every encounter and acquaintance you make. Therefore it is important to be spiritually sensitive, remember the father of faith Abraham, He received three people thinking that they were ordinary strangers but eventually he discovered that they were angels purposely sent to him to deliver the most important news in his entire life, that his wait for a son had ended.

Another problem we have is that we like to assume many things instead of following through the many spiritual urges because of selfishness. Sometimes we receive urges to do or give something we don’t feel like doing or giving, perhaps it is that new suit/dress or any kind of clothing that you bought and all of a sudden the Holy Spirit shows that it could fit a another person better than you but you go ahead and ignore and continue to cling to it, this way you close your doors to blessing. That was your gateway/connection to a life of abundance and plenty but you chose to ignore it.

We should not wait to cry over spilt milk, by this I mean wasted opportunity to receive God’s blessing by obeying the prompting of the Spirit. These are the kind of connections I am talking about. They do not arise on daily basis; even the Bible tells us that we should seek the Lord when he is available; this also means that there are windows of opportunity and appointed times for everything. Utilizing our opportunities as they are presented will help both spiritually, mentally and materially.

1 Corinthians 4:1, 2 Let a man so consider us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. Moreover it is required in stewards that one be found faithful.

Had the people of Israel considered that there was a true prophet among them, they could have averted the drought, misery and suffering of such a great magnitude that ensued as was in the time of Elijah. Had the people of Samaria considered that there was a man of God in their midst, by the name of Elisha, they could have received healing instead of Naaman from Syria.

Even in the time of the New Testament we find that Apostle Paul was undergoing similar trials here, people doubting or not following what he taught for they were more interested in his credentials. He is writing to the Corinthians to let them know that he was aware of their ploys. He wanted them to shed off their opinions of him and obey his companions as true servants of God. We all know that Satan was not happy with Paul’s work and he constantly sought to derail his efforts at every turn. He kept reminding all about how Paul had previously persecuted the church of Christ and therefore they should not take his word by face value, other thought maybe it was a trap or something like that.

In many instances people miss their connections because they have a preset attitude and misconceptions about the person who is preaching to them, this is to their individual detriment in long run. When one misses his/her connection because they feel superior to the person(s) tasked with shepherding them, it is very unlikely that such a person can continue in faith because faith takes obedience to God and His servants.

My humble appeal to all brethren across the world is that, kindly be submissive to the servants of God ministering to you for God has put them there for a purpose, His own purpose and not yours, mine or any other persons. God reveals to them matters pertaining to your welfare, physical, emotional and more importantly spiritual.

Always endeavor to be obedient to such people as entrusted by God to care for you, take them to be His servants and custodians of mysteries of God in your midst for your own sakes. As you move to your proper connections, may the Grace of God that surpasses all human understanding flow upon you as you connect yourself the true source of blessings both individually and collectively.

May our God Bless you abundantly through this year for your being connected to us through this vital link, for we know that there are many sites you would rather visit but God led you to chose and remain on this one: www.journey2joy.org. Amen

This devotional was written by Bishop Joseph Koburu Mukiira of Maximum Victory and Joy Worship Centre Nairobi, Kenya and brought to courtesy of Journey 2 Joy International Ministries Inc. USA

©All rights reserved by Bishop Joseph Mukiira