FAITH CAPSULE: Pride did not announce its partnership to Naaman in its attempt to terminate Naaman’s healing.

2 Kings 5

Pride can be described as a personal way to self-destruction. Among the spirit that destroys man, there is none like pride. It is built on the word ‘I” with its foundation on self. It is stated in Proverbs 8:13, “Pride and arrogance and the evil way and the perverse mouth I hate.”  As a believer of the Word of God, have you thought about how destructive pride can be? Proverbs could not relent from exposing the evil of pride when it also revealed, “Pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall.” (Proverbs 16:18) Having a haughty spirit, which means to be scornfully arrogant, is also a partner to pride. As a matter of fact, every word that describes wickedness is hardly separate-able from pride. Which of all the words that describe pride do you consider present in you? Often times it is difficult to be able to see the plank in our own eyes rather than others eyes. Pride actually does its best in bringing down people low just as it is written in Proverbs 29:23, “A man’s pride will bring him low, but the humble in spirit will retain honor.” Naaman was described as the commander of the army of the king of Syria. He was also described as a great and honorable man in the eyes of his master because by him the LORD had given victory to Syria. He was also a mighty man of valor, but also a leper. (2 Kings 5:1) He needed to be cleansed from his leprosy and was thus directed to Elisha. When he arrived at Elisha, he received message from Elisha’s servant to go and wash in Jordan seven times. Having received the message, “Naaman became furious, and went away and said, ‘Indeed, I said to myself, He will surely come out to me, and stand and call on the name of the LORD his God, and wave his hand over the place, and heal the leprosy. Are not the Abanah and the Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Could I not wash in them and be clean?’ So he turned and went away in a rage.” (2Kings 5:11-12) Inhabited in Naaman’s response were the agents of pride such as, furious, I, me, arrogance, self, and rage. Pride did not announce its partnership to Naaman in its attempt to terminate Naaman’s healing. Naaman would have been down as a leper all the days of his life if he had not went back with pride now laid outside of him. Could it be true that pride, a silent and deadly cancer, is quietly hibernating inside of you?
Prayer for today: Father I ask to let the spirit of pride not have a place in my life. 

FAITH CAPSULE: Failure to keep eyes from the past will pass any believer into a self–destruction. 

Numbers 14:1-35

Revelation 22:18-19 gave a strong warning about adding or subtracting from the Word of God. God is not a joker and His command is not to add or subtract from His Word. Disobedience to the Word is equal to deciding for a personal destruction. After God had decided to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah because of the sinful nature of the land, He sent warning to Lot and his wife. “…Escape for your life! Do not look behind you nor stay anywhere in the plain. Escape to the mountains, lest you be destroyed.” (Genesis 19:17) An escape from self-destruction demands setting off sight from the past. The command was obviously too difficult for Lot’s wife to obey because she decided to disobey the Word of God. The Bible records that Lot’s wife looked back behind him and she became a pillar of salt. (Genesis 19:26) What is in your past that cannot be forgotten and has caused you not to move forward when God commanded you to move? Looking back comes in different ways. For example, the inability to forgive, forget and move forward is an evidence of looking back when God repeatedly command us to forgive. Also, when God moves you forward to a different ground for your deliverance purpose and you allow complaint to occupy you, it becomes a failure to letting go of the past. The children of Israel were taken out of the bondage of over four hundred years, but their bond with the house of bondage held on to them. The children of Israel vigorously complained, “Now the mixed multitudes who were among them yielded to intense craving; so the children of Israel also wept again and said: ‘Who will give us meat to eat? We remember the fish which we ate freely in Egypt, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic; but now our whole being is dried up; there is nothing at all except this manna before our eyes!’” (Numbers 11:4-6) Complaining does not settle well with God and they did not stop in their complaining. At a point their complaining turned to negative confession before God. God responded in Numbers 14:28, “Say to them, ‘As I live,’ says the LORD, ‘just as you have spoken in My hearing, so I will do to you: The carcasses of you who have complained against Me shall fall in this wilderness, all of you who were numbered, according to your entire number, from twenty years old and above.’” (Numbers 14:28) When God says move forward, your looking back is disobedience to His Word. Failure to keep eyes from the past will pass any believer into a self-destruction. 

Prayer for today: Take my days O Lord and let them be concentrated unto Your Word.

FAITH CAPSULE: Stop decaying, stop deception and go ask God for His deliverance in your life.

Matthew 23

As an acclaimed believer of Jesus as Lord and Savior, how clean is your inside compared to your outside? It is important to know that what you present on the outside is not as important to what you carry in the inside. The Pharisees were one of the major sect or special – interest groups among the Jews during the days of the New Testament. Pharisees, meaning separated ones, believed that religious rituals and separation from sinners were the way to please God. Matters such as the laws of tithing and ritual purity were very important to the Pharisees. Jesus referred to them as hypocrites. He said in Matthew 23:25, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you cleanse the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of extortion and self indulgence.” Every believer has a need to take a close look at self from the inside to know how much of the spirit of Pharisees inhabits your life. Are you one of those who want to shine on the outside while the inside is dull and cannot be presented before the Lord? Are you a modern day Pharisees that will offer more than what is requested for the outside while the inside is not being attended to? By virtue of the days we are living, every believer does have a need for serious self-examination. Man can be deceived but God cannot be deceived. It is possible to come out on Sundays or on days of fellowshipping, presenting self on the outside as holy and neat while you are having a neglected inside that is dirty and rusty. It does not matter how long you have been getting away with your hypocrisy.  Just think of the fact that God does not and will not overlook sin. It is evil for any believer to think that inside can be neglected based on a flimsy excuse while the outside is being upgraded. Know today that “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.” (Ecclesiastes 8:11) If you can consider yourself as one that fits into the identity of the Pharisees, it is never too late to get out from the outside and begin from the inside of yourself for a thorough readjustment. Jesus said in Matthew 23: 26, “Blind Pharisees, first cleanse the inside of the cup and the dish, that the outside of them may be clean also. God will never look from outside to inside, but rather conducts examinations from the inside to the outside.  Stop decaying, stop deception and go ask God for His deliverance in your life.

Prayer for today: Deliver me O Lord and let Your loving-kindness and Your truth continually preserve me.

FAITH CAPSULE: See well; see through faith that your miracle is at hand.

Exodus 14, Jeremiah 1:1-12

When God speaks, His word stands. God’s words are active words which will not fail to deliver just as they are spoken. God testifies, “So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; It shall not return to Me void, But it shall accomplish what I please, And it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.” (Isaiah 55:11). When God declared that He has put His words in Jeremiah’s mouth, all that Jeremiah needed to do to be able to operate the Word was to be able to see what was not there as being there. God told him in Jeremiah 1:10, “See, I have this day set you over the nations and over the kingdoms, To root out and To destroy and to throw down, and To build and to plant.” What God said to Jeremiah was God’s representative of God. In order for the Word of God to come to be, Jeremiah would have to see what is not in place as being in place. God wants His children to exercise a creative faith by seeing what is not in place as being in place. The children of Israel, on their way out of over four hundred years of bondage, needed to breakthrough a confronting roadblock (Red Sea) in order to get to their Promised Land. The children of Israel allowed fear to rise and faith to sink. As a result of their state of mind, Moses resulted to a word of encouragement when he stated in Exodus 14:13, “And Moses said to the people, ‘Do not be afraid, stand still, and see the salvation of the LORD, which He will accomplish for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today you shall see again no more forever.’” God gave His Word to the children of Israel through Moses. The Word was with power and it will only work on condition. The condition that makes the Word to work and bring forth result is in the ability to see. Can anyone who is unstable and clouded with fear be able to see? With faith and no fear, man will be able to see deliverance and preservation inside the living Word of the living God. Fear, distraction, inconsistency and lack of commitment in serving the Lord are among the forces that will always deny a believer from standing still. Wherever you have been told that there is no way, say no to fear, stand still and begin to see a way in the Word of God. God has never gone to sleep and He will not fall asleep concerning your situation. Take to Moses’ advice in Exodus 14:14, “The LORD will fight for you, and you shall hold your peace.” See well; see through faith that your miracle is at hand.

Prayer for today: Open the eyes of my heart O Lord my God.

Faith Capsule: A failure to give God all the attention could be an avenue unto self-destruction.

Isaiah 45

Paying close attention to the first half of the Ten Commandments actually reveal how much attention God demands from His creation. God stated, “You shall have no other gods before Me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image—any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments. You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.”(Exodus 20:3-8) This portion of the commandments is about giving a jealous God all the attention that is due to Him. Indeed, a jealous God demands full attention. A failure to give God all the attention could be an avenue unto self-destruction. God is God that cannot survive where there is no attention given to Him. As a creation in the hand of God, what stops you from giving unto God consistent attention? God jealously yearns for our attention and He communicates this all through the pages of the Bible. He spoke in Isaiah 45:4-7 about His desire for us to know Him as the one and only Lord; to know that there is none besides Him. Every attribute of a jealous one is inhabited in God. Therefore, every way of giving Him attention is worth giving it. In His commandment, He did not ask for too much or for what we cannot do to give Him due attention. He is a good God who cares for His children and He expects His children to care for Him by constantly and diligently seeking Him. Are you giving Him attention only by mouth? Attending to Him just by mouth is not enough, but serving Him indeed and in truth is all that it takes to give and get His attention. Get a clear understanding in the Word, especially in the season we are now living because it is dangerous and risky not to be giving God His due attention. God spoke in Isaiah 45:7, “I form the light and create darkness, I make peace and create calamity; I, the Lord, do all these things.” Is that not scary enough to make you want to be on the Lord’s side? Isaiah 45:9, “Woe to him who strive with his Maker…” Denying Him His due attention is striving with Him.

Prayer for today: Lord I ask that You deliver me from every kind of spirit that takes away man’s attention from Your holy name.