An MBA graduate's thoughts from a place of prayer, study and waiting on God…
Have you ever been in a situation where you’ve been praying to God for something, it looks as if it’s all coming together but then you end up with nothing? Sometimes it takes the form of there being a lot of activity which looks as if God is finally moving but in the end you still end up disappointed?
One of the questions we often ask as we go through life is what should I be doing right now? For example, we could be believing God for something and we have such tremendous faith that we see the vision so clearly. The question then becomes what should we be doing in the interim? Pray, fast and just watch? Looking at a series of examples in the Bible, what is clear is that God often comes to people when they’re in an active state. In other words, they’re not simply lying idle and sucking their thumbs.
Perhaps the first thing to think about is: what is a lamp and when do we need one? A lamp in Biblical days is probably synonymous to what we call a lantern or torchlight 🔦 today. They’re used amidst darkness, to give a little light. Better said, the light from a lamp is sufficient enough to help us take the next step but never enough to completely clear out the darkness. In the dark, you must rely on the lamp to know the right step to take i.e. any step you take without it would likely be the wrong one. This also means that if you've been walking without a lamp, just start using it and you'll find your way back to the right track no matter how far off you had gone, but you need to use it consistently. Another analogy to use in thinking about this is the lights of a car.
The first time God used the word Be was in the creation story. “Let there BE light and there was light”. Be is an instructive word that calls into immediate or instant existence something that wasn’t. Be is a current state of existence. Be is real and solid. Be is now, not in future. All that God called to Be forever exists. The world may rotate and darkness may exist in places but the sun is forever shining. God calls us to BE. In Psalms 31:24, we are again told to Be...”Be of good courage”. Does this mean there is bad courage?
Exodus 16:4-5, 22-30; Leviticus 25:3-7. 20-22; 26:14-15, 34-35; 2 Chronicles 36:20-21; Isaiah 37:30-31 In studying the old testament, one time cycle that keeps jumping out at me relates to how and when God provided for His children. First thing to note is that God had daily and yearly cycles, and the time marks in these … Continue reading Time cycles in how/when God provides for His children. 💡🙏🏾
Psalms 1:2 says “Blessed is the man who delights in the law of the Lord, and in His law he meditates, day and night”. The common worldly understanding of meditation is that we’re either actively thinking about something or emptying our minds of thought. Biblical meditation is however different: it’s neither about emptying our mind nor simply just thinking. Keep reading, I'll explain.
The preparations for success at the top don't start from when you arrive at the top; rather, even in your lowly position today, you need to start exhibiting the characteristics required to succeed at the top and trust that God sees all and will reward you in due course, according to what you can handle. Matt 25:15. The life of Daniel is full of lessons for success and I hope you find these as a useful guide.
The story of Jesus walking on the stormy seas has some great encouraging lessons. It’s another story of where God moved suddenly. One needs to study the story across Matt 14:22-33, Mark 6:45-52 and John 6:15-21 to get the full picture. The context: on some particular evening, Jesus had just finished feeding 5,000 men with 5 loaves and 2 fish. Afterwards, the people were so amazed that they wanted to force Him to be king. Jesus made the disciples get in their boat and cross to the other side while He sent the multitude away.
The Bible says that of all the kings of Judah, there was none like Hezekiah who held fast to God and obeyed His commandments. In fact, God so loved his obedience that He extended his life by 15 yrs (2 Kings 20)! Even when he had pride towards the end of his life and showed off his possessions to the Babylonians, the punishment for this didn’t happen in his lifetime. Did you know he was also the one who destroyed the bronze serpent that Moses made? The Israelites had kept it and been worshipping it for all those years! One of his first moves was to clean up the house of God, followed by a series of “acts of faithfulness” (2 Chr 31:1) - all of which culminated in God moving quickly to turn around the situation of the people of Judah.
God who lifts man high also brings him down. In His word, God has given us the formula to unlock the windows of heaven and how to revel in His blessings. But He’s also often cautioned us about the risk of forgetting the source of our blessings. To help whip us in line is partly why God uses silent/wilderness seasons to refine us like gold, to re-calibrate our focus to Him when we lose track, or to prepare us for the next level of our walk with Him (e.g. Moses, Joseph, David, Job, Paul, Jesus etc.).
The Langford Files 