FAITH CAPSULE: This month, occupy me, Lord God.

Joshua 1

Matthew 7:7-9 records the encouraging word of God for one with a desire to gain from God, to retain the presence of God, “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks, it will be opened. 9 Or what man is there among you who, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone?”
What is your desire that is good as asking for the presence of God to occupy the life He has given you?
With a desire, ask to be occupied by the presence of God. 
PRAY BEFORE GOD:
From this moment, through the new month, the days God bestowed upon you, ask for the presence of God to occupy you.
God is a prayer-answering, a caring father.
Revelation 3:20 records the caring of God wanting to enter, to occupy anyone with the desire for His presence, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come into him and dine with him, and he with Me.”
Are you with a desire to be occupied by God?
Psalm 119:130 identifies one with a desire to be occupied by the presence of God shall experience the entrance of God into the life of such states, “The entrance of Your words gives light; It gives understanding to the simple.”
The word of God is God. (John 1:1)
God is light. (1John 1:5)
Ask from God to occupy you that His presence shall take over your life from this moment.
Proverbs 6:22 records what to experience when one is occupied by the presence of God, “When you roam, they will lead you; When you sleep, they will keep you; And when you awake, they will speak with you.”
Know God, a position to be occupied by the presence of God.
One that knows to gain and maintain communication with God meditates continually, keeping the presence of God day and night.
God told Joshua, “No man shall be able to stand before you all the days of your life; as I was with Moses, so I will be with you. I will not leave you nor forsake you.” (Joshua 1:5)
God with one is the evidence of one that carries the presence of God.
Word of God testifies that He was with Moses.
Moses meditates the word of God day and night. Like Moses, Joshua also receives a command to meditate, “This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in it day and night, that you may observe to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.” (Joshua 1:8)
In this new month, are you with the desire to be occupied by the presence of God?

Prayer for today: Pray to give self to meditating the word of God, doing according to the word of God. 

FAITH CAPSULE: Embrace the hand of God not to miss His promise.

Deuteronomy 1:1-22

God shall see you through. 
God is a faithful God; lying is not in His character; deception does not have a place in Him or before Him.
Whatever God says He will do is a done deal. 
God is faithful to His Word. Jeremiah 29:11 records the word of God, “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not evil, to give you a future and a hope.” 
God that promises will purposely build one and not turn around to pull such down. 
The children of Israel had deliverance from the bondage of over four hundred years, evidence of God as a mighty Deliverer. 
The hand of God was carrying the Israelites to fulfill the possibility of His plan (Promised Land) but, the Israelites constantly fold up their hands not to receive and embrace the hands of God.
The sins of the Israelites folded their hands not to embrace the deliverance hand of God.
Moses encouraged the Israelites, “Look, the LORD your God has set the land before you: go up and possess it, as the LORD God of your father has spoken to you; do not fear or be discouraged” (Deuteronomy 1:21) 
The response of the Israelites to the encouraging of Moses was in vain.
They had a different mindset of getting to their Promise Land. 
They did not take to heart the word of Moses, the mouthpiece of God. The children of Israel were nearer to the Promised Land but, they were too far in the heart not to claim the promise of God. 
As the Israelites were supposed to be looking up to God, they turned to look at their challenges. 
In the journey of life, a challenge to claim the promise of God can be a distraction in life.
Without a doubt, distraction will deny, delay to destroy, and not claim the promise of God.
Why not unfold your hand to embrace the hand of God to carry you and see you through? 
Package your word with positive to ask for His intervention when negative comes like a storm to destroy. 
God will perform His promise with perfection. 
Do not look away from the promise of God not to miss out on the promise of God.
The Israelites did not respond to the direction of Moses that states, “Let us send men before us, and let them search out the land for us, and bring back word to us of the way by which we should go up, and of the cities into which we shall come (Deuteronomy1:22).”
The plan and direction of God were to take the Israelites to their Promised Land but not to be paying attention to their world.
Has the Lord God spoken and not come to pass? 
Allow God to take you through just as He promised.

Prayer for today: Ask that the mercy of God shall answer for your life not to miss out on the promise of God.

FAITH CAPSULE: A lie of years is expose-able in a day.

2 Kings 5, Acts 5:1-11

There is no small lie or big lie.
A liar is a deceiver, a manipulator. 
Have you been getting away with lying or perfecting deceiving others for so long?
Have you convinced yourself that lying and deceiving others is not of God? 
Lying and deceiving can be destructive to the one telling lies as a way of life.
To be telling lies to deceive others reigns outside of the church or inside of the church. Acts 5:1-2 records, “But a certain man named Ananias, with Sapphira his wife, sold a possession. And he kept back part of the proceeds, his wife also being aware of it, and brought a certain part and laid it at the apostles’ feet.” 
There is no indication that Ananias and Sapphira had to sell their possessions, and it was a demonstration of a voluntary move to sell their possessions. 
So, why lie? 
Are you a believer that will lie, fake, or deceive to get attention or to impress fellow believers? 
In life, every conduct of man is not hidden from God but accountable before God. 
Peter knew that Ananias and Sapphira were lying, faking, and deceiving. The Bible records, “But Peter said, ‘Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and keep back part of the price of the land for yourself?’” (Acts 5:4) 
What is worth doing for the Lord is worth doing truthfully in truth. 
Ananias and his wife might have engaged good intentions but lying as their garment exposed them naked and set them away from the presence of God. 
The bible states in Acts 5:5, “Then Ananias hearing these words fell down and breathed his last. So great fear came upon all those who heard these things.” 
Lying to deceive others took the life of Ananias and Sapphira. 
After the healing of Naaman, Elisha refused to accept gifts from Naaman. Without any direction from Elisha, Gehazi, the servant of Elisha, deceitfully went after Naaman to tell lies, “My master sent me to say, ‘Two young men from the company of the prophets have just come to me from the hill country of Ephraim. Please give them a talent of silver and two sets of clothing.’” (2 Kings 5:22) 
Gehazi accepted a gift from Naaman outside of the direction of Elisha. Elisha knew and about the action of Gehazi.
Elisha responded to the deceptiveness of Gehazi, “…was not my spirit with you when the man got down from his chariot to meet you? Is this the time to take money or to accept clothes—or olive groves and vineyards, or flocks and herds, or male and female slaves? Naaman’s leprosy will cling to you and to your descendants forever.” Then Gehazi went from Elisha’s presence and his skin was leprous—it had become as white as snow.” (2 Kings 5:26-27) 
Whenever lying and deceiving others goes unnoticed for years, it will only take one day for the truth to expose the years of telling lies. 

Prayer for today: Ask God to deliver and preserve you from the spirit of lying.

FAITH CAPSULE: Are you standing on the side of God?

Psalm 73

The psalmist could not look away from the wickedness activities under heaven when was provoked with the statement in Psalm 73:3-6, “For I was envious of the boastful when I saw the prosperity of the wicked for there are no pangs in their death, but their strength is firm. They are not in trouble as other men, nor are they plagued like other men. Therefore, pride serves as their necklace; violence covers them like a garment.” (Psalm 73:3-6) 
Are you one that finds it challenging to look away from wickedness or comfortable seeing wicked activities in your vicinity?
Are you being intimated by wicked ones, by their ways of life? 
Be restful and know that God is never asleep nor slumber but will separate the wicked from ones that are not wicked.
Look away from the wicked not to be envious of the wickedness activities.
The same God yesterday, today, and tomorrow will not overlook the wickedness of today. 
Matthew 13:30 records what the end awaits the wicked as the tares: “Let both grow together until the harvest, and at the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, “First gather together the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them but gather the wheat into my barn.’” 
Where do you stand? 
Are you a representative of wheat or tare by your ways of life?
Rainfall with all that contributes to growth for wheat and tares are in a position to be benefited.  
Also, tares can be appearing fat and better than wheat, but the intervention time to separate wrong from right, good ones from the wicked one is at the appointed time of God. 
In life, live by the word of God to be prepared for harvest time that is coming.
Wickedness is evil, and evil is sin evidence of not having fear for God. 
God can be a longsuffering God with His sentence against evil work might not be at speed, but God is in control, and He sees the affairs of all.
Ecclesiastes 8:11-13 is a warning for learning to all, “Because the sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil. 12 Though a sinner does evil a hundred times, and his days are prolonged, yet I surely know that it will be well with those who fear God, who fear before Him. But it will not be well with the wicked; nor will he prolong his days, which are as a shadow, because he does not fear before God.” 
A wicked can appear as growing fine and better under heaven but will not be excepted for wickedness before God.
God sees all, and at His appointed time, He shall come to judge.

Prayer for today: Ask for deliverance and not be a wicked one in all ways of life.