Beloved in Christ Ministry

ISAIAH 28:11–12 For with stammering lips and another tongue He will speak to this people,  to whom He said, “This is the rest with which you may cause the weary to rest,” and, “This is the refreshing”... To counter stress, many people resort to tobacco, alcohol or tranquilizers. These things, besides having harmful side effects, are costly and often lead to addictions. God has something better for us. It is powerful, costs us nothing and has no harmful side effects. He calls it “the rest” and “the refreshing”. What is He referring to? Speaking in tongues—“For with stammering lips and another tongue…” One of our church members was on medication for nine long years for a host of problems: severe depression, suicidal thoughts, insomnia, chronic sinusitis, gastritis and panic attacks. Every day, he had to take up to 30 tablets to keep these conditions under control. He suffered from such bad sinusitis that he had to visit the hospital regularly to drain the mucus. He could n...

The moment the Spirit came into my life I no longer had to battle my adversaries. They were still there, but the wrestling and the worry seemed to vanish. What happened to me was the same thing that was spoken to Israel centuries ago through the prophet Ezekiel. Living in a time of political upheaval, he was given a message from the Lord to the people of Israel: “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them” ( Ezek. 36:26 ,  27 ). Today, millions of people are in a daily fight to keep the laws of God, and they are losing the war because they do not understand the Father’s battle plan. His strategy could not be more succinct: “I will put My Spirit within you,” says the Lord. And why is that His agenda? He wants to “cause you”—from deep inside your heart—to fo...

And there shall be no more curse; but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it; and his servants shall serve him. —Revelation 22:3 The Bible indicates that heaven will be a place of great understanding and knowledge of things that we never learned down here. Sir Isaac Newton, when an old man, said to one who praised his wisdom, “I am as a child on the seashore picking up a pebble here and a shell there, but the great ocean of truth still lies before me.” And Thomas Edison once said, “I do not know one millionth part of one percent about anything.” Many of the mysteries of God-the heartaches, trials, disappointments, tragedies, and the silence of God in the midst of suffering-will be revealed in heaven. Prayer for the day All the questions will be answered, loving Father, when I take my place in heaven to praise You.

EPHESIANS 1:3  Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ,   Some people think that the term “spiritual blessing” refers to only non-visible and intangible blessings like peace and joy. To them, God’s promise of “every spiritual blessing” excludes the tangible blessings of health, provision, a healthy marriage and so on. They say things like, “Don’t expect God to remove this tumor because our blessings are only spiritual.” Beloved, do you know what the word “spiritual” here means? In the original Greek text, it is  pneumatikos , which in this context means having properties and characteristics belonging to the Spirit of God. So if you have the  pneumatikos  blessing of health, for example, it means that it is of the Spirit of God, and therefore does not depend on your exercising or dieting. A church member had high blood pressure which did not normalize even a...

 posted August 21, 2014 And I said to you, You have come to the hill country of the Amorites, which the Lord our God gives us. Behold, the Lord your God has set the land before you; go up and possess it, as the Lord, the God of your fathers, has said to you. Fear not, neither be dismayed. —Deuteronomy 1:20–21 Parents, teachers, and other role models can teach children how to fear or they can teach them to be bold. A mother who is fearful herself will transmit that fear to her children. She will be overly cautious about many things, and a silent fear sinks into the heart of her children. We should not teach our children to live recklessly, but we should teach them to be bold, take action, and to never be so afraid of making mistakes that they won’t try things. I believe we should teach our children and those under our authority to take chances in life. If we never take a chance, we will never make progress. Progress always requires stepping into the unknown. Experience gives ...

ROMANS  4:16 Therefore it is of faith that it might be according to grace, so that the promise might be sure to all the seed, not only to those who are of the law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all…   God’s grace is His undeserved, unearned and unmerited favor. And because it is undeserved, unearned and unmerited, all of us qualify for it. But how do we walk in it? Just as a password gives you access to a computer program, faith enables you to walk in God’s unmerited favor. Now, faith has nothing to do with what you do or what you can do. Faith is simply believing and declaring what God has done and is doing for you. When you believe that the favor of God is on you because of Christ’s finished work, His promises of provision, healing and restoration become sure to you. They are not just sure to the Jews, but also to you and me because we are “of the faith of Abraham”. Ruth was a Gentile widow who put her faith in God’s gr...

LUKE  1:37 “For with God nothing will be impossible.”   You may have heard from friends or seen in Christian books the popular question, “What would Jesus do?” It is a question Christians are taught to ask themselves when faced with a problem. But when you ask yourself, “What would Jesus do?” in any situation, it is subject to your own interpretation and theology. For example, if you are from a church that doesn’t believe that Jesus heals today, you may think that this is how Jesus would pray for the sick, “O Father, give him patience to endure his sufferings,” and proceed to pray that way for a sick person. So when you try to think of what Jesus would do, you are going back to your flesh! Maybe the reminder should be, “Watch what Jesus does”. When I preach, I watch what Jesus is doing or leading me to do. If He prompts me to say or do something, I say or do it. I know that I am not in the pulpit to manifest Pastor Prince or his flesh, but to manifest Jesus Christ, wi...

1 PETER 5:8–9 Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.  Resist him, steadfast in the faith… When I was a teenager, I was taught that if I wanted to resist the devil, I had to rebuke him. So whenever an evil thought came to my mind or I was tempted, I found myself saying, “I resist you, devil, in Jesus’ name! I bind you, devil! Go away from me, devil! I rebuke you in Jesus’ name!” This went on until God showed me one day that though I had “resisted” the devil, I had spent more time talking to him than to God! I was more conscious of the devil than of God throughout the day. I checked the Word of God and realized that we resist the devil not by focusing on resisting him, but by being established in  the faith  that we are made right with God through Jesus’ blood, that we are the righteousness of God in Christ. (2 Corinthians  5:21 ) Yes, the devil will continue to remind you of your ...

JOB  5:19 He shall deliver you in six troubles, yes, in seven no evil shall touch you.   God will deliver you from all your troubles. (Psalm 34:19, 2 Timothy 4:18 ) But deliverance is actually not the best that God has for you because it implies that you are in trouble. God’s best for you is the place where no trouble or evil can touch you. And with His help, you will come to that place because the Bible says, “He shall deliver you in six troubles, yes, in seven no evil shall touch you.” This does not mean that God will only deliver you six times. It just means that as you keep believing God’s promises of protection, after some time, you will come to a place where no evil will touch you! So when trouble comes, God does not want you to be discouraged. He wants you to know that it is only the devil trying to steal His Word from your heart. The devil is afraid of leaving God’s Word in your heart for even one second because he knows that it will lead you to a place where ...

ISAIAH 61:7 Instead of your shame you shall have double honor, and instead of confusion they shall rejoice in their portion. Therefore in their land they shall possess double; everlasting joy shall be theirs.   God says in His Word that you will receive double for your trouble. If the devil has given you one trouble, then for that one trouble you can expect to receive a double-portion blessing! And if that trouble has caused you to experience shame, God’s promise to you is this: “Instead of your shame you shall have double honor”. God wants to give you a  double-portion  blessing for every trouble you go through! And don’t think that God is behind your troubles. The devil is the real culprit. Sometimes, it could be the one you see in the mirror every morning! But the moment you respond to God in faith, He gets involved in your restoration. And He does not restore to you the same amount that you have lost. You always get more than before, if not in quantity, then in...

TODAY’S SCRIPTURE “The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still.” (Exodus  14:14 , NIV) TODAY’S WORD   All through life, the enemy tries to stop us with a yoke of bondage — a yoke of depression, a yoke of low self-esteem, a yoke of compromise. He’ll try to burden you down so that everything is a struggle. You may be working hard, but you can’t get ahead because you have all these yokes controlling you. Maybe you’ve been living with a yoke your whole life. It’s been passed down to you. Maybe you don’t realize it. You can’t seem to get ahead. You’re struggling in your marriage. Your children won’t do what’s right. Low self-esteem, that’s all you’ve known. But God said to the Israelites, “I have seen the affliction of My people, and I am coming down to deliver them.” God sees every yoke, every unfair situation, everything that you struggle with. He doesn’t just sit back and say, “Well, too bad.” No, He says, “I’m coming down to do something about it.” Y...

TODAY’S SCRIPTURE “And it shall come to pass in that day, that his burden shall be taken away from off thy shoulder, and his yoke from off thy neck, and the yoke shall be destroyed because of the anointing.” (Isaiah  10:27 , KJV) TODAY’S WORD   A yoke is something that is put around the neck of an ox to help control the animal. It limits its movement. If the ox starts to get off course, the yoke is used to pull it back. Even though an ox is very powerful, this small yoke keeps it from doing what it wants to do. Some people don’t realize today that they’re living with a yoke around their neck. They wonder why they can’t get ahead or why everything is a struggle. It’s because of the yokes that are dragging them down. Negative words that were spoken over you can become a yoke. Every time you start to step out, you hear that voice, that parent, that coach saying, “You’re not that talented; you don’t have what it takes.” It plays again and again. Eventually, you sh...

One morning Jesus walked along the edge of Lake Galilee and beckoned to a few local fishermen. He said, “Follow me” (Matthew 4:19). At that moment, everything began for them. ‘Everything’ had only been fish, and then it became people, action, and changing world history, with ever-increasing faith, ever-increasing effects. Jesus did not call them, you, or me, to switch off our smiles and to wear sackcloth. It was not to turn people into religious fanatics. He was not so conventional Himself! The disciples caught His bubbling spirit, which challenged the stuffy establishment. He showed them new things, especially faith and love, and by them they conquered the world. Receive today “out of His fullness.” God bless you. REINHARD BONNKE

ROMANS  8:28 And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.   Do you feel misunderstood and forsaken by the people you love? Have you been falsely accused and stripped of everything, without a dime to your name? Maybe today, you feel that you have hit rock bottom and you wonder if you can ever rise again. Joseph, who was sold by his brothers into slavery (Genesis 37:28), went through all these experiences and emotions. Still, he was conscious that God was in it with him every step of the way. Though his life was a “mess”, he believed that it was not an accident. Though the things that were happening to him were not good, he believed that God was making all things work together for his good. And it was indeed so—Joseph eventually rose to occupy the most powerful position in Egypt, second only to Pharaoh. (Genesis 41:40) Probably, this consciousness that God was in it with him was the reaso...

HEBREWS  4:15   For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin.   Do you sometimes wonder if God really knows what it is like to be poor, rejected by people or sick with aches and pains. Perhaps you are asking, “Does God really understand what I am going through?” My friend, Jesus was no stranger to emotional or physical pains, poverty or hardships. He was born into a poor family. He had a smelly manger for His birthplace. (Luke 2:7) From an early age, as a carpenter, He knew all about working hard with His hands, standing on His feet all day long and returning home with aches in His body. The religious leaders of His day made life difficult for Him. They challenged His authority (Matthew  21:23 ) and tested His teachings. (Matthew 19:3) They also called Him a glutton, winebibber, friend of tax collectors and sinners (Matthew  11:19 ), and blasphemer. (Mark 2:7) They ...

JOHN  6:28 –29 …“What shall we do, that we may work the works of God?”  Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent.” When I was a young Christian, I attended a seminar on what we must do to “work the works of God”. I was told that we had to pray more, fast more, know our enemy and so on. I came away from the seminar confused. Then one day, I found the same question in the Bible. But the answer was very different! In the Gospel of John, we find Jesus being asked the same question by the multitude who had been awed by His miracles—“What shall we do, that we may work the works of God?” The people had seen Jesus healing the sick, and feeding 5,000 men with only five loaves and two fish. Notice how Jesus answered them: “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent.” My friend, the greatest doing is believing—believing in Jesus the sent one, who has done it all for you at the cross! If you are asking, “...

TODAY’S SCRIPTURE “Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. ...” (Romans 12:2, NIV) TODAY’S WORD   My father grew up in a very poor environment. His parents lost everything during the Great Depression. He had no money, no education and no future to speak of. He had been programmed with poverty, defeat and mediocrity. He could have settled there. That’s all he had seen. He could have thought, “Hey, this is just my lot in life. We’re just poor, defeated people.” But at 17 years old when he gave his life to Christ, he started reprogramming his thinking. Deep down something said, “You were made for more than this. You’re not supposed to constantly struggle, to barely make it through life.” He could feel those seeds of greatness stirring on the inside. His attitude was, “This may be where I am, but this is not who I am. I may be in defeat, but I am not defeated. I’m a child of the Most High God.” Today, no matter what...

Oh, God, I need more power! Please…please…please give me more power, LORD! Have you ever prayed a prayer like that? I have. In fact, some years ago I was praying along those lines, earnestly beseeching God to give me greater power to minister. It was a fine, very spiritual-sounding prayer. But The LORD interrupted me right in the middle of it. ‘Kenneth,’ He said, ‘where would I go to get you more power?’ The question stopped me cold. ‘No one has more power than I do,’ He continued. ‘And I’ve already filled you with My Spirit. I’ve put within you the same miraculous force that created heaven and earth, the same supernatural strength that raised Jesus from the dead. Where am I going to go to find something greater than that?’ The point was clear. As born-again, Holy Spirit-filled believers, you and I don’t need more power. We simply need to more fully release what we’ve already been given. We need to allow the Spirit of God within us to flow through us in greater measure. ...