Some weeks ago, while having my morning devotion I heard in my spirit and also felt an urge to fast. Initially, I questioned what I heard because I felt the voice wasn’t very audible, overwhelming or stimulating. Also, fasting meant I was going to starve for a period of time and I felt it wasn’t convenient at that time as I was very busy (don’t get me wrong, i do fast). Anyways, the purpose of this post isn’t to give you an update about my life, I’m driving somewhere.
Prior to this day, I had been praying to God for his leading in ministry because God told me there is more. I didn’t know why I was praying intensely about ministry when I wasn’t even doing anything related to it at that time, I mean i was in the middle of preparing for an exams. You know the Bible says that the Holy Spirit leads us on how we ought to pray (Romans 8 vs 26), now I think that was it. The day God told me to fast was God answering my prayer. On that day, I was led to read Hebrews 12 and when I read it, I saw God wanted to teach me how his discipline was necessary for ministry. The writer of Hebrews admonished the brethren to be attentive and focused on the Christian race. To achieve this focus, distractions (what the bible describes as weights) have to be ignored or removed, this is discipline. He goes further to say that we are God’s children and he disciplines the child he loves! We must allow ourselves to be disciplined by God as dearly beloved children.
There are many ways God disciplines his children and most importantly it’s by his word. God’s discipline can also be him training you to hear his voice when he speaks and not just to hear but act on what you’ve heard. The issue about this is that if you hear God speak to your heart and you constantly ignore or dismiss it, it becomes difficult to know when he is speaking in the future. God also speaks to us when we are tempted because he intends that you are able to resist and character is built from it. For instance, have you noticed that as a believer, if you have a bad habit, the Holy Spirit brings it to your attention but many people take his subtleness for granted. As an example, God wanting to discipline you may be the Holy Spirit asking you not to lie to your sibling after you drank or ate something they kept in the fridge but rather own up and apologize and not to keep a straight face while pretending to be busy when you see them helplessly asking around.
Over time, I’ve come to realize that small errors add up to cause something bigger. Small lies here and there can end up hardening one’s heart that they lie more with no remorse or reflection. If God is preparing you to handle his business he will need an accountable man/woman, you are representing him and he wants your integrity preserved. God wants to groom you as early as possible with the “little” things and not yielding on time is delay itself.
Another example, a colleague at work talks down on your outfit and the Holy Spirit tells you to ignore or to be kind with your response but you go ahead to remind them of their family problems and how curses are affecting their promotion at work. Meanwhile, God could be training you to have self control and not to beat up the treasurer of the church you would pastor in the future because he couldn’t account for a two thousand naira loss from the church account or how to handle criticism and even persecution as his child. I know It may be necessary sometimes to be stern when warning people but let the Holy Spirit guide your choice of words. Asides the fact that God may be preparing you for an assignment, we are his righteous children and we must be like him in our daily living. There are harder parts to discipline which I haven’t spoken of here and I believe God wouldn’t take you through what you can’t handle.
Quit dismissing those subtle corrections from the Holy Spirit, it may be a subtle nudge to you, but it’s a big deal to God and for our your own good. Ignoring those subtle nudges has cost a lot of people their kairos moments, they didn’t pay attention to God’s leading.
Photo credit - Unsplashed.
This is apt. When we ignore in the little, we are bound to miss the greater. Thank you.
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