Thursday, 10th December, 2020
Bible Reading: Matthew 4:1-11, Isaiah 43:1-2
Memory Verse: Look, I have refined you, but not as silver; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction. Isaiah 48:10 (CSB)
Walter Brueggemann said, “Wilderness is a place, in biblical rhetoric, where there are no viable life support systems. ‘Grace’ is the occupying generosity of God that redefines the place…” Adam was formed. Adam was not born of a woman. Consequently, he didn’t pass through a refining process of his attributes and character captured in a wilderness experience before he entered into Eden. The result? He was eventually chased out of Eden.
It is sad but true to know that the children of Israel also were chased out of Canaan when they erred. You see, it is one thing for God to pass a man through a training in preparation for his ultimate plan for his life, and it is another thing for the person to diligently continue in the training he/she has received. Break God’s laws and reap its attendants consequences. Our God is not a respecter of persons. Study diligently and observe painstakingly the lessons from your wilderness experience throughout your life time. Take note of the following points:
1. There is a specific time frame for your wilderness experience in the calendar of God for every life.
2. A wilderness period could be extended if you don’t take responsibility. 400 years became 430 years of wilderness for the children of Israel. The fault is not God but man because of the hardness of their heart.
3. A man who has entered the glory phase of his life having successfully passed through the wilderness can still go back again into the wilderness if he errs. David returned back to the wilderness when Absalom his son threatened to kill him because the latter was under the influence of a curse from God when David his father killed Uriah and slept with his wife.
4. If you do not forget the responses and the evil deeds of some persons during your wilderness experience, it may negatively affect your future. Let love reign. 5. Your wilderness experience offers you the opportunity to deliberately present yourself as a living sacrifice unto God.
Quote:
A. “The wilderness has a way of curing our illusions about ourselves and teaching us to depend more and more on God. When we first enter, we’re convinced we’ve entered the bowels of hell. But on our pilgrimage, we discover that the desert drips with the divine. We discover that desert land is fertile ground for spiritual activity, transformation, and renewal.” – Marlena Graves.
B. “No words can express how much the world owes to sorrow. Most of the Psalms were born in the wilderness. Most of the Epistles were written in a prison. The greatest thoughts of the greatest thinkers have all passed through fire. The greatest poets have “learned in suffering what they taught in song.” In bonds, Bunyan lived the allegory that he afterwards wrote, and we may thank Bedford Jail for the Pilgrim’s Progress. Take comfort, afflicted Christian! When God is about to make pre-eminent use of a person, He put them in the fire” – George Macdonald.
Prophetic Decree: You shall come out refined as gold, in Jesus name.
Prayer Focus
1. Thank you Father for your ways are mysterious.
2. I receive grace to locate what God is saying in my wilderness, in Jesus name.
3. Say: I refuse to be an ex-champion. I refuse to return back into my wilderness.
4. Lord, perfect your work in our heart so that our future will not be worse than our past.
5. O Lord, cover me with your glory by your restoration power, in Jesus name.
BIBLE IN ONE YEAR: Romans 11-13
