His Voice Devotional

Text:  Luke 4:13.  And when the devil had ended all the temptation, he departed from him for a season. We established yesterday that as a child of God, you can't avoid temptation. Infact,  James 1:2  says you should count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations; because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance.James 1:3. God expects you to know that temptation is the testing of your faith and it is expected to produce endurance in you. Invariably, temptation offers you the opportunity to be promoted, so, embrace it like a valiant warrior.  Now, taking a clue from Jesus Christ, our Master and Lord, you'll recall that the devil tempted Him three times while He was in the wilderness.  Jesus was able to overcome these temptations because He submitted to the leadings of the Holy Spirit that was on Him and because He was a good student of the Bible.   *The word of God is the sword the Holy Spirit uses in helping you to fight th...

Text:  Luke 4:13.  And when the devil had ended all the temptation, he departed from him for a season. We established yesterday that as a child of God, you can't avoid temptation. Infact,  James 1:2  says you should count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations; because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance.James 1:3. God expects you to know that temptation is the testing of your faith and it is expected to produce endurance in you. Invariably, temptation offers you the opportunity to be promoted, so, embrace it like a valiant warrior.  Now, taking a clue from Jesus Christ, our Master and Lord,  you'll recall that the devil tempted Him three times while He was in the wilderness.  Jesus was able to overcome these temptations because He submitted to the leadings of the Holy Spirit that was on Him and because He was a good student of the Bible.   *The word of God is the sword the Holy Spirit uses in helping you to fi...

Text:  Esther 2:17. The king loved Esther more than any of the other women, so he favored her and was kinder to her than he was to any of the other virgins. He put the royal crown on her head and made her queen in place of Vashti. *Beauty can open some doors for you, but you will need more than beauty to remain in the room.*  If it was only beauty that took Esther to the Palace, even if she managed to win the crown as the queen in chapter two, she would have opened herself up for death by chapter five. Life will always present you with difficult moments that only God can rescue. For Esther,  she needed to go to the king without being summoned.  By their law, any man or woman who goes to the king in the inner court without being summoned will be put to death. Such one shall only be spared if the king holds out the golden scepter to him, only then shall he live. (Esther 4:11). The onus was on Esther to speak with the king urgently or the whole of isreal will be annihil...

Text:  Esther 2:17 ISV  The king loved Esther more than any of the other women, so he favored her and was kinder to her than he was to any of the other virgins. He put the royal crown on her head and made her queen in place of Vashti. When you think of Esther, what readily comes to your mind, beauty or favour? *It wasn't the beauty of Esther that earned her the crown, it was God's favour. Seek favour over beauty always.*  Chances are that, Esther may not be the most beautiful lady of her time, but she was obviously the most favoured. The favour of God on her made her stood out among others. While others were busy paying attention to their makeups and makeover, Esther was careful to obey God's commands through her Uncle Mordecai. (Esther 2:20). She was also submissive to Hegai the man in charge of the Harem. (Esther 2:15). When you pay attention to God's commands with the aim of obeying them, He will grant you favour before men and cloth you with His Glory and beauty. In...

Text:Luke 14:12 Then He also said to him who invited Him, "When you give a dinner or a supper, do not ask your friends, your brothers, your relatives, nor rich neighbors, lest they also invite you back, and you be repaid. Jesus said to the chief priest who invited Him for dinner, "Do not  ask your friends, your brothers, your relatives, nor rich neighbors, lest they also invite you back, and you be repaid" This is a hard saying, because man would naturally like to do good to people they are likely to receive something from. Look at the people Jesus is asking you not to invite for dinner: your friends, your brothers, your relatives, rich neighbors. These are all the people within your circle. They are the people that are likely to pay you back for every good deeds you do to them  one way or the other. Jesus said, "...when you make a feast, call the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind: And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you; for you shall be repaid a...

Text:Luke 14:12 Then He also said to him who invited Him, "When you give a dinner or a supper, do not ask your friends, your brothers, your relatives, nor rich neighbors, lest they also invite you back, and you be repaid.  *Do not give help to people with an ulterior motive to receive recompense in any form in the nearest future.*  One of the Pharisees had invited Jesus for a dinner in his house on a sabbath day. Jesus began to teach the people present some basic principles for living and giving from kingdom perspective. Jesus, being a respecter of no persons, said to the chief Pharisees,  "When you give a dinner or a supper, do not ask your friends, your brothers, your relatives, nor rich neighbors, lest they also invite you back, and you be repaid." May we become more and more like Jesus who is never afraid to speak the truth. Well, He is the very truth Himself. (John 14:6). He is never afraid to speak the truth to anyone, even to the very one who has invited him for t...

Text :  2 Corinthians  13:14. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all. Amen.    *Grace is not what we share absentmindedly after a meeting, Grace is Jesus Christ, and without personal relationship with Him, you are not graced.*  The only one that is full of Grace is Jesus Christ. John 1:14 says  And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) *full of grace and truth.*  Verse 16 of the same chapter, made us to know that we received our grace from the fulness of His grace.   _And of his fulness have all we received, and grace for grace._ John  1:16. So it's clear that without Jesus, you are graceless. Grace is the basis for the Christian faith. *For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:* Ephesians  2:8. God's grace is usually defined as und...

Text : 1 Corinthians  10:10   Neither murmur ye, as some of them also murmured, and were destroyed of the destroyer. Murmuring opens one up to the destroyer. It's a sin that God frowns at, and a sin you must frown at too. Every sin man commits gives the devil a foothold to operate in his life. This is why James 4:7 says *Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.* For the devil to flee from you, you've got to do two things-  1.) Submit to God 2.) Resist the devil. One way to resist the devil is by not giving him a foothold ( through sin) to operate in your life. Now, it's clear from our text that murmurers give the destroyer a license to operate in their lives. None of the Isrealites who murmured in the wilderness made it to the promised land, they all perished in the wilderness. Numbers 26:64-65. These things happened to them to serve as an example, and they were written down as a warning for us in whom the culmination of the ag...

Text : Matthew  17:20   And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you. Yesterday, we saw how people with little faith cannot receive anything from the Lord, because little faith is tantamount to no faith. Today, Jesus is saying to us from our text that if we have mustard-seed kind of faith, we can move mountains.  Undoubtedly, the mustard seed is one of the smallest seeds ever. So, why will Jesus use such seed to depicts the kind of faith His disciples should have in Him? Well, He gave us the reason for His choice, He said in Mark 4:31 that the kingdom of God is like a mustard seed planted in the ground. Although it’s the smallest of all the seeds on earth, when it’s planted it comes up and becomes larger than all the garden plants. It grows such large branches that t...

Text : Luke 16:28 For I have five brethren; that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torment. One of the messages we hardly hear from the pulpit today is on Hell fire. The few preachers that preach about it seems to often missed out the essence. They always see their fellow believers in hell. They throw the message of hell fire at their fellow brethren as if they themselves have been immuned or they  are the only special messangers from the Lord. Today, the Lord would have us start considering the matter of hell fire as He rightly taught about it in the gospel. Our Lord Jesus Christ gave a narration or story in Luke 16. Infact, the Bible did not tell us whether it was a story or parable, Jesus just opened up the discourse.  However, it is certain that it wasn't a parable. Jesus must have painted a true scenario of what had happened, what was happening or what would happen in the future. The learning points from the story are:  1. Hell fire is ...

Text : Matthew 16:26 For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?  "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose." Jim Elliot. This is one of Jim Elliot's quotes that has lived on for many decades after his death. He died alongside four others. They were killed in an attempt to evangelize the Huaoroni people of  Ecuador on January 8th,1956. As if these five missionaries knew what exactly they were living for, one of them, Nate Saints also wrote before his death in Ecuador - , _"People who do not know the Lord ask why in the world we waste our lives as missionaries.They forget that they too are expending their lives… and when the bubble has burst, they will have nothing of eternal significance to show for the years they have wasted."_  One question you may need to ask yourself is, "What eternal purpose am I investing my life on? Just like Nate ...

Text : Mark 11:24. Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive [them,] and you will have them. Today, we shall be looking at the last part of the text. Jesus said, "...believe that you receive them and you will have them" Having asked for what you need in prayer, you must believe that you receive what you pray for. At this point,  the transaction has already been concluded in the realm of the spirit. The scenario here can be likened to you receiving an alert on your phone, indicating that your bank account has been credited. If the sender of the money should ask if you have received the money, you will simply say yes! Though the money has not gotten to you physically, but you have received it all the same. In the same manner, Jesus want you to always believe that whenever you ask the Lord for anything (as it relates to His Will), that it is done, and that you have received what you asked for instantly (not when you have seen, felt, ...

Text : Mark 11:24. Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive [them,] and you will have them. Genuine believers in the Lord Jesus Christ are the most privileged people on earth. This is because they have direct access to the highest throne in heaven and on earth. We shall be x-raying our study text in order to draw out hidden treasures of wisdom from what our Lord Jesus is saying to us. Jesus said, "whatever things you ask when you pray..." because it is expected of you as a disciple to always come before the throne of God (God's presence) in prayer.  The first phase, "whatever things you ask" indicates that God is always willing to attend to every details of your request. Nothing is too small or too big to present before the Lord in prayer. The phrase, "when you pray" reveals that Jesus was only talking to those who have developed the habit of praying regularly. He said, "when you pray" not "...

Text : 1Kings 11:4  For it came to pass, when Solomon was old, that his wives turned away his heart after other gods: and his heart was not perfect with the LORD his God, as was the heart of David his father. God fulfilled His promise to Solomon by blessing him with exceptional wisdom and riches.  God gave Solomon wisdom and great discernment. His insights were as numerous as sand on the seashore, 1Kings 4:29. He was wiser than any of the eastern leaders and wiser than anyone in Egypt. Also, He was so rich that nobody's riches could be compared to his. However, despite his great wisdom, by the chapter eleven of first Kings, it was recorded that Solomon's heart was turned away from the Lord.  What and who turned the heart of someone so wise like Solomon away from the Lord? Well, King Solomon married many foreign women besides the daughter of Pharaoh: women from Moab, Ammon, Edom, and Sidonia, along with Hittite women, too. All of them are from nations that the LORD had ord...

Text : 1 Kings 17:4.  And it shall be, that thou shalt drink of the brook; and I have commanded the ravens to feed thee there. We did mention yesterday that even if God has led you to a place or someone, it doesn't mean that you should make them your Alpha and Omega. There's time and season for everything. It is your responsibility to know where God wants you to be at every material time. The water brook that God sent Elijah to got dried up eventually. Elijah could coil in and start complaining to God on how He allowed the water brook to dry up. He could also sit there and be digging unnecessarily in search of water. But thank God he didn't do any of the above. What he did is what you should also do when the going gets tough.  1.) *He waited.* God can only deal with waiters. He told us severally in His words to wait on Him. Psalms 27;14, Psalms 37:34. Elijah waited to hear what God will say to him after the water brook dried up. You should learn to always wait on God to hea...

Text : 1 Kings 17:4.  And it shall be, that thou shalt drink of the brook; and I have commanded the ravens to feed thee there. Elijah would have made the greatest mistake of his life, if he had assumed that the water brooks and the raven were his source and sustainer.  It was God who instructed him to go to that particular water brook in the first place, and it was God who also commanded the ravens to feed him there. Needless to say that the ravens are one of the most stingy animals known,  yet at the command of God, they were giving food to Elijah at a time when every creature had every reason to really be selfish.  If your good is in the hands of someone, no matter how stingy or difficult he may be, God will command it out of him. God can even make your enemy to bless you, He is God after all. Proverbs 16:17. However, you must be careful not to make a god out of anyone. Don't make the mistake of turning anyone or anything to your source, ultimately, your only sourc...

Text: 1 Cor. 8:12  But when you thus sin against the brethren, and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ.    *What you know will always puff you up when love is absent. It is only love that builds up.* Hence, 1Corinthians 8:1 says knowledge puffs up, but love edifies. Today, we shall begin to look at the possible outcomes of having knowledge in the head without love in your heart. First of all, I want us to look at the question the Lord is asking you through Apostle Paul's writing in 1 Corinthians 8:11. He asked the church, "... because of your knowledge shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died?" The New Livung Translation of the Bible puts it thus, "So because of your superior knowledge, a weak believer for whom Christ died will be destroyed." Your superior knowledge would simply be a destructive one if you will not consider your brethren whose conscience is weak. In other words, what you know and display may simply destroy your brethre...

Text: 1 Cor. 8:12  But when you thus sin against the brethren, and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. There are things you do because you have better knowledge and clear conscience, but such  could be destroying the faith of fellow Christians. (1Cor.8:11). Apostle Paul was writing to the church in Corinthians on his stand about eating food offered to idol. He mentioned first of all that idol is nothing in this world. Hence, some brethren eat food offered to idol with clear and strong conscience before God, due to their knowledge about the fact that idol is nothing in this world. Meanwhile, those with weak conscience do not know this fact. They however imitate those eating meat offered to idol, and thereby got themselves defiled. Apostle Paul wrote thus: "For if anyone sees you who have knowledge eating in an idol's temple, will not the conscience of him who is weak be emboldened to eat those things offered to idols? And because of your knowledge shall the wea...

Text :John 4:49 &50  The nobleman said to Him, "Sir, come down before my child dies!"Jesus said to him, "Go your way; your son lives." So the man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him, and he went his way. The nobleman came to Jesus with a request about his sick son who was about to die. He asked that Jesus should come with him to heal his son.  Contrary to this man's expectation, Jesus replied saying, "Go your way, your son lives" This response from Jesus could have received different reactions from different folks. But as for this nobleman, he chose to simply believe and obey the word of Jesus. The question that readily comes to mind is- why would  this nobleman not be so anxious to the point that he would insist on  going home with Jesus? The man obeyed and went his way because he believed in the potency of Jesus' Words. The nobleman rested on the integrity of Jesus' Word. How about you? What is your disposition towards God's wor...

Text : Matthew 7:5. You hypocrite! First remove the beam from your own eye, and then you will see clearly enough to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.”  *Our world is hungry for genuinely changed people. Everybody thinks of changing others, and nobody thinks of changing himself.*  No one can change another person. The only person you can change is yourself, you can only influence others. It takes the Spirit of God to change a man, and that had to be with the cooperation of the man himself.   *It's sheer deception when you enter into relationship with a wrong person with the mindset that you will change him or her in the process.* The truth is, if man can easily change, then you would have changed from such erroneous mindset.  While it is easier to see other people's error and judge them, God wants you to focus the light on yourself instead.  Jesus called anyone who is quick in spotting errors in others a hypocrite. When you notice a sin or inadequaci...

Text : Mark 16:4.  Then they looked up and saw that the stone had been rolled away. (It was a very large stone.). Very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had just come up, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices to go and anoint Jesus' body at tomb. While on the way, they kept saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?” Then they looked up and saw that the stone had been rolled away. (It was a very large stone.) While the women were still thinking of how  they can overcome the obstacle blocking them from seeing Jesus, God had gone ahead of them to roll the stone away. All they needed to do was to look up. A number of times, when faced with daunting, overwhelming challenges, you may be tempted to coil in and perpetually fix your gaze on the problem,  but if you receive enough grace to look away from the challenge(s), and look up to Him, you will discover that God had already gone ahead...

Text: Matthew  28:7   And go quickly, and tell his disciples that he is risen from the dead; and, behold, he goeth before you into Galilee; there shall ye see him: lo, I have told you. Easter is not just a weekend celebration. This season is only to commemorate the event. Easter is a lifetime celebration for every Christian.  The death and resurrection of Christ is the bedrock of our faith as Christians. The angel that spoke with Mary told her to tell His disciples that He is risen. *Your first assignment as a believer is to herald the good news to all around you, that He is risen.*  If indeed you have encountered Him, then, you have been saddled with the responsibility of witnessing to what you know and have. Again, the angel told her that Jesus will be found in Galilee. Jesus Himself told them the same thing in verse 10 of Matthew 28. Then Jesus told them, “Stop being frightened! Go and tell my brothers to leave for Galilee, and they will see me there.”Mat 28:...