God’s touch is never destructive, it is ever constructive. He may let you pass through the fire but you will not burnout. He has the picture of your future taken even before you set out. He takes you through the bends and the sharp curves so you can grow to be a master rider yourself. He allows you to go through the plow-room so you can be a befitting specimen for His Show-room. If only you know the ‘fire’ you are in is God’s agent to take you to your promise land then you will cry out ‘More of it Lord!’ My prayer for you is that, at the end of the day, you will be what He had in mind when He first began with you. You will finish strong. You may start out weak but you the Lord will accelerate your speed and cause you to go the last mile all the way. I love this hymn:
Gbenga Owotoki
Statistic
Archive for God’s Refinery
An old Scotsman operated a little rowboat for transporting passengers. One day a passenger noticed that the good old man had carved on one oar the word “Faith” and on the other oar the word “Works.” Curiosity led him to ask the meaning of these oars. The old man, being a well-balanced Christian and glad for the opportunity to testify said, “I will show you.” Then he dropped one oar and plied the other called Works, and they just went around in circles. Then he dropped that oar and began to ply the oar called Faith, and the little boat just went around in circles again – this time the other way around, but still in a circle. … After this demonstration the old man picked up Faith and Works, and plying both oars together, sped swiftly over the water.
You will never know how great you are until you discover your true identity. Learn from the story I am about to share. An eagle’s egg was placed in the nest of a pampas chicken. The egg hatched and the little eagle grew up thinking it was a pampas chicken. The eagle did what the pampas chickens did. It scratched in the dirt for seeds. It clucked and cackled. It never flew more than a few feet because that is wh…at the pampas chickens did. One day he saw an eagle flying gracefully and majestically in the open sky. He asked the pampas chickens: “What is that beautiful bird?” The chickens replied, “That is an eagle. He is an outstanding bird, but you cannot fly like him because you are just a pampas chicken.” So the eagle never gave it a second thought, believing that to be the truth. He lived the life of and died a pampas chicken, depriving himself of his heritage because of his lack of vision. What a waste! He was born to win, but was conditioned to lose.Some of us are like this eagle; we live without realizing our identity in Christ. We are born champions but the environment and the people around us have conditioned us for failure. Some lay the blame of their present fiasco on their family they or the country/environment in which they were raised. But the truth remains; success is not the exclusive right of a privileged few. God created you for a purpose. You are a success story even right from the very day you were born. Heaven rejoiced because a champion had arrived. God has empowered us like the eagle- the king among the birds- don’t see yourself as a chicken. Champions recognize who they are in the Lord, they don’t just talk the talk; they also walk the walk. They have been toughened by the challenges of life. They smile at the storm because they see the silver lining beneath the cloud. They invade uncharted territories leaving their footprints in the sand of time. That is whom God has made you; living less is a waste of God’s resources upon your life. Step out in faith. Run that race. The honors roll is not filled yet; there is still a place for you. You will conquer what has not been conquered. Failure will not be your credo. You will never capitulate; weakness will not be in your heart. Heaven will not deny you; the devil – though he tries – will and cannot defy you because you are connected to the same endless Power that framed the world. That power has moved continents and nations; It will take you through that battle unscathed. Don’t give up! You are only a few inches away from ‘breasting the tape.’ You will be celebrated. God bless you BIG.
Who is your standard? When you make God your standard consistently, one day you will become a standard to the world. Nuclear submarines consist of some of the most amazing technology on the planet. These incredible military vessels can stay underwater for ninety days, but every ninety days the submarine must resurface to maintain proper alignment with the North Star. While underwater, the submarine’s navigational system is affected by the earth’s magnetic forces. Because the submarines carry missiles of mass destruction, they must pay close attention to keeping the navigational equipment aligned to the true reference point of the North Star There is a lesson to learn here. We cannot perform at our highest level or complete our mission without maintaining proper alignment with our God. The day you become self sufficient marks the beginning of your decline. Don’t be carried away by the fact that you are winning every race. Take out time to withdraw and refuel. Your life does not consist of the abundance of treasures you have acquired but rather how you can remain relevant in God’s agenda. Your heart is the navigational equipment that keeps you on track with God. Guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life. Your name may ring from shore to shore on earth but you should be concerned whether it is known in heaven because that is our ultimate destination. Whatever we do, let’s do it with heaven in view. Think about it! God bless you big
A well-known speaker started off his seminar holding up a $20.00 bill. In the room of 200, he asked, “Who would like this $20 bill?” Hands started going up. He said, “I am going to give this $20 to one of you but first, let me do this.” He proceeded to crumple up the $20 dollar bill. He then asked, “Who still wants it…?” Still the hands were up in the air. “Well,” he replied, “What if I do this?” And he dropped it on the ground and started to grind it into the floor with his shoe. He picked it up, now crumpled and dirty. “Now, who still wants it?” Still the hands went into the air. … “My friends, we have all learned a very valuable lesson. No matter what I did to the money, you still wanted it because it did not decrease in value. It was still worth $20.
Tennis superstar Arthur Ashe died of AIDS, which he contracted from a blood transfusion during heart surgery. More than a great athlete, Ashe was a gentleman who inspired and encouraged many with his exemplary behavior on and off the court. Ashe could have become embittered and self-pitying in the face of his disease, but he maintained a grateful attitude. He explained, “If I asked, ‘Why me?’ about my troubles, I would have to ask, ‘Why me?’ about my blessings. Why my winning Wimbledon? Why my marrying a beautiful, gifted woman and having a wonderful child?”
Is your heart on fire for God or is it as cold as an iceberg? When you say you are a Christian, people look over your shoulder thinking you are talking about someone else. Gone are the days when people say they are Christians and you would not need to doubt them because their lives preached Christ. But today we fill our churches with people and yet the same sets of people are the reason for the moral decadence in our society. It wasn’t so in the days of Peter; when the Fire fell; Peter rose up and preached a message and three thousand souls were added to the Kingdom but today particularly on Sundays over three thousand messages are being preached but where are the souls? Today, we speak in tongues but it is all empty and a mere mumble jumble. The fire is gone; it’s all gimmicks and pulpit theatrics. Oh! How we need the fire again. How God sought for men that will dare the devil. Men that will fear less for their liv…es for His sake. He is looking for those who will be dead to self and alive in Him; those that will not put their personal interest before His. God is constantly seeking out those that He will use for this end time move. Enough of the lethargy. You have slumbered for too long. It is time for you to be quickened and set ablaze for God once again. It is only what is done for Christ that will last. Be stirred up in your inner man. Now is the time to seek the Lord until He pours forth His righteousness in our lives and nations.
Please read the description of the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster in northern Ukraine: “There were two electrical engineers in the control room that night, and the best thing that could be said for what they were doing is they were ‘playing around’ with the machine. They were performing what the Soviets later described as an unauthorized experiment. They were trying to see how long a turbine would ‘free wheel’ when they took the power off it. … “Now, taking the power off that kind of a nuclear reactor is a difficult, dangerous thing to do, because these reactors are very unstable in their lower ranges. In order to get the reactor down to that kind of power, where they could perform the test they were interested in performing, they had to override manually six separate computer-driven alarm systems. “One by one the computers would come up and say, ‘Stop! Dangerous! Go no further!’ And one by one, rather than shutting off the experiment, they shut off the alarms and kept going. You know the results: nuclear fallout that was recorded all around the world, from the largest industrial accident ever to occur in the world.” This city, which formerly had 55,000 people, is now largely abandoned.
I read an article by Bryan Doyle. It talks about hummingbirds. Hummingbirds have race car hearts that eat oxygen at an eye-popping rate. Their hearts are built of thinner, leaner fibers than ours. Their arteries are stiffer and more taut. Their hearts are stripped to the skin for the war against gravity and inertia, the mad search for food, the insane idea of flight. … They are tiny little birds and their hearts beat 10 times a second. So even if you put your huge ear to its chest, it would be hard to discern the heartbeat.
Francois Fenelon was the court clergy for King Louis XIV of France in the 17th century. One Sunday when the king and his attendants arrived at the chapel for the regular service, no one else was there but the preacher. King Louis demanded, “What does this mean?”
Fenelon replied, “I had published that you would not come to church today, in order that your Majesty might see who serves God in truth and who flatters the king.”