Finding the Wisdom of Solomon - Eccl 12:13,14

Fear Not! 2 Chron

The Spirit of Man

Nothing is Impossible for God

 

Nothing is impossible for God.  When you know that nothing is impossible for God, it means you trust God and you believe that no matter what happens, you will be a winner because God is there for you. 

We all like miracles and we all want to see miracles, even when we pray we keep asking God to see changes to get something we don’t have. “Lord protect us, heal me, give me peace, joy, money, job, salvation for my family, I trust you God, you are the only one who can give this to me”.  No one prays to God and says, “I don’t need anything from you”.  God created those needs in our life so we can always go back to Him and remember that nothing is impossible for God.

Before Jesus left, He shared bread and wine and the message, “Do this for remembrance, remember me, it is a symbol of remembering me”.  What do you remember about God in your life?  What pushes you to stop and think about what God has done for you.  Have you stopped and thought about all that God has done for you throughout your life? 

We must first remember from our creation, when God created a human beings it was on the 6^th day and everything was beautiful.  He created just using His words.  In my tribe we believe that if you have eye problems then look into the sun at 5:30am and then you will see a change in your eyes like a miracle.  When you have pain in your eyes let the fresh air from the river to heal your eyes.  We don’t wear glasses in my tribe because we use the nature that God has created.

On the 6^th day, God took the dust and made a body.  He was an artist that day.  He gave the mud a shape and it looked good but the difference was that He didn’t want to speak as He created the rest of the world.  God didn’t make a tree from dust or the sky or the sun or even a lion.  He preferred to use His hands to make a human being and He gave you and I life.

He said, “We are going to make a human being that will be like us”.  He decided to take a portion of Himself to make something new that will look like Him.  That portion is not my body but our soul.  God is eternal and only a soul is eternal.  Our body can easily die but the soul doesn’t die.  He chose the nostrils of Adam and breathed.

When you try to breath, you breath in and out.  For someone to feel your breath, you have to push it out and when you feel it, feels like a wind.  When it reaches you, it rests on you.  God took a soul that is you and me and divided in 3 parts.  First part came out of his lung, mouth and lips.  The second part is the wind that left his lips and the 3^rd part is where the breathe rested.  From those 3, the human being has life.  If one of those steps is missing, there is no life. 

God put that in you.  By putting that in you, it means that you become someone who resembles God.  Do you believe that you look like God?  Most of the time we don’t think so because God is maybe rich and I am poor or He is handsome and I am not or because He has everything and I don’t.  What we see outside is not what He looks at, He looks at our souls.  Does your soul they reflect God?

One day God will take back the soul He gave us.  The body will go back to dust but the soul will come back to God.  He didn’t hide it, it was clear.  The most important thing to God is that when He breaths out and you breath in, you will have to one day breath out the soul and He will take it back.

How can you explain the soul and how it works?  Nothing is impossible to God.  When our mothers become pregnant, something will start to grow in their bodies, the baby.  The baby has eyes but can’t see, they have nostrils but can’t breathe, they have ears but can’t understand, they have mouth but can’t speak until they come out.  When they reach this world, breathing starts, eyes open and ears open and they can start to eat.

The life in us is like a pregnancy.  There will be a time when there will be a rebirth and everything will be open in heaven to us and we will understand everything.  Although God has given us the soul, He said you have to live on the earth where you will face challenges and problems. 

God, you created me in your image but you don’t face problems.  We all like miracles but remember a miracle will only happen when there is a problem.  If you want a big miracle then accept also a big problem.  Once the problem doesn’t find a solution that is when miracle comes.

For example, someone can tell you that they want to be healed.  God says yes, I will open the path.  First step, your pain will be multiplied by 3 and you will go to the Dr and they can’t help.  You might be disappointed and find it so hard, “Lord heal me”.  During that time, you may see someone coming to you and praying then you are healed.  If you did not accept the problem, you could not accept the miracle.

The storm comes into every person’s life.  The devil is here and storms don’t choose what foundation you have, you can be a believer or not, the storm will come and you will face it.  As children of God, we know that problems are there but we forget most of the time that nothing is impossible for God.  All your problems are temporary and nothing is there for eternity.  If you are sick, that sickness has an end.

Remember whatever storm you are facing, will only be there for a short time but you must prepare your soul for eternity.

Luke 1:37, the angel came down and said to Mary, “You are going to conceive and give birth to a child,” and Mary was confused, “Who are you”.  “I am the angel of the Lord, God has sent me to you”.  Imagine someone walking in here, “God has sent me to you, I am an angel of the Lord”.  We will not believe them.  “Don’t be afraid, I am an angel of God and I have a message for you.” We might doubt because the angel didn’t come to Mary with wings but as a human being.

The angel said, “Nothing is impossible for God”.  You can’t exclude even small things.  Your biggest problem, your heaviest one, it is not impossible for God.  When you have no money, it’s not impossible for God.  When you say I want to go to heaven, that is not impossible for God.  When you say, I want my family to be saved, nothing is impossible to God even when they are dying as a sinner.

That day on the cross, the man next to Jesus said, “You are the son of God, why are you crucified next to us, if you are son of God do something”. The other one said, “Don’t forget me when you go to your kingdom”.  Jesus said, “Today I will be with you in paradise”.  Who could believe that man could be saved and in paradise the same day.  He didn’t go through repentance, He just told Jesus that He recognised who He was and don’t forget me.

When was the last time that you said to God, don’t forget me?  When I am in pain, do I tell God to not forget me or do I forget?  A lot of problems surround us.  The first thing you see is problem, maybe your body is in pain.  The first thing those who need glasses do is to find their glasses. Others who are smokers, must have a cigarette as the first thing they do.  If they don’t, they will feel sick. 

Others sing and praise God.  Others don’t have time to praise God, they have to eat first.  Maybe we bring all our problems so God as the first thing.  We start with all our issues before starting our day.

Once we have the answers, we often forget to come back and say thank you to God.  I was lucky to get there on time.  I woke up early and I was the first person in the shop and everything was 70% off and my credit card was approved.  We feel like we are capable but we couldn’t without God.

Once you have solution to your problem, do you thank him or do you just think it is your right.  Once you believe that it is your right, God will tell you no, that is not your right.  Come close to me.  by coming close to God you have to carry all your burdens.

1 Peter 5:7, cast all your anxiety on God because He cares for you.  All your problems, whatever makes your anxious cast them on God, not on a person but all your burdens to Jesus, not to a counsellor or doctor but tell Jesus first, “Here are my problems Jesus”.  God created everything by words meaning our words are also powerful.  I prefer to pray out loud because my words have power and I can change things.

Moses blessed his kids using words.  God blessed us with words.  Jesus used His words to heal.  We need to use our words to tell God our problems.  He wants to hear from you and hear what you will say.  If your problem is big, keep talking about it. I’ve seen people cry in front of others and tell them about their problems but they don’t have 4 minutes to spend in front of God to cry to God.  They quickly pray and then leave it so they can watch a movie.

God is saying, “Come close to Me”.  The father saw the prodigal son and he welcomed him back.  It was up to the son to come close to the father.  When you bring your burden to Jesus, He says, “Come closer to me”.  For that reason, I gave you the example of the man on the cross next to Jesus.  None of the crowd shouting to Jesus met with Jesus in paradise that day only the one close to Jesus who expressed Himself came to Jesus.

You have to carry your own cross and talk to Jesus about your situation.  You can’t leave it to others to pray for you.  Your first enemy is your body.  Your body will push you to become angry, steal, commit mistake, and you feel bad but praise the Lord for reconciliation.  How often do you reconcile with yourself, God, and your soul?

Life is short and none of will live for 160 years.  Yesterday it was someone’s turn and tomorrow maybe mine.  You won’t know the time.  My father used to say, even if you are wealthy, when death comes it won’t accept to take your money to leave you alive.  Your soul will say hallelujah it is my time now to live in eternity.  Your body can fight and they don’t want to leave but the soul will say no, I must go back to where I came from.

We prefer to be in this world to suffer but Jesus wants us to rest in heaven.  If your burden is too heavy, is there no solution to your problem, if yes, now is the time to pray to God and remind him that nothing is impossible to God.

Holding on to Faith

Encouragement - 2 Thess 2:16

Your body is the enemy of the soul - 2 Cor 20:17

2 Cor 20:17, “ You will not have to fight this battle. Take up your positions; stand firm and see the deliverance the Lord will give you, Judah and Jerusalem. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged. Go out to face them tomorrow, and the Lord will be with you.”

The battle you are crossing has two faces, one that belongs to me and the other side belongs to God.  When things don’t belong to you, before you touch them, you ask yourself if they really belong to you.  You can’t walk into a bank and take money from the counter or just take Tyrone’s car.  It is the same way for God. He puts us in a battle field and tells, “Remember that you have your portion of the battle and I have mine”.   

The first enemy of your life is your body.  Behind this body, satan acts and influences the body and that is what God calls battle.  I’ve never seen satan tempting a dead body.  He doesn’t need to.  As long as you are alive physically, then your body becomes a part of your battle.

You must know that your body is your main problem.  Because of our bodies, most of us will not enter the Kingdom of God.  That is why Paul said, “I want to do good but my body lets me down”.  Most of the time we pray, God protect us against satan.  What many Christians do to solve their problems, they try to protect their bodies through justification, defending your body, your feelings, your wrong doing so you can please your body.  We forget that the body will return to the earth.  If you already know that your body is a loser and isn’t worth it, why defend it.  Tell your body it is wrong.

Once you know that your body is wrong in a way, remember your problem is bigger than you.  Your body sometimes makes you feel so useless, how miserable is my life.  Your body will push you to believe you are miserable while your soul doesn’t suffer.  You will see someone crying and wishing they could be like Queen Elizabeth.  Do you know how much she suffers?  On one side, we want to appear like big people because our body likes glory and we want people to bow down.

I had the chance to talk to one of the most valuable men on the planet and he said that he only sleeps 4 hours because he has so many problems with people coming to see him and calling him and he must see the doctor all the time.

Michael Jackson also, had to have treatments because he was trying to make his body look a certain way and he had to see the doctor every day and now he is dead.  He was once great but now the young people don’t know who he is.  He forgot that the first enemy he had was his body.  The secret for salvation is whoever wants to gain his life will lose it, surrender all to Jesus then you will win the battle.

God is bigger than your problem.  When I don’t get what I want, what do I do?  Nothing.  If I want to buy this hall and I don’t have money, I just have to accept it.  But your body will tell you, it is time to break a bank, sell drugs and then you can afford the drugs.  Your body will not tell you that you will be caught.  If that thought comes up, the body will tell you a way around it.  Your body will have plans and strategies.

The body which is your enemy will tell you that you must win this battle.  What do you gain if you gain the entire world with everything it contains, gold, houses, money from the banks, aeroplanes.  What will you do with it all?  Good or wrong, you don’t need all of it but what you need most of all is your soul.

You should know that the most important thing for you is your soul, not what is in this world.  When I look for things that give me joy, ice cream, chocolate, I believe that this will help me.  Levi will tell you when you give him food, “mmmm that is yummy” and he talks like poetry because he is full of joy.  If only I could do that kind of poetry for reading the Word of God and joy from reading Word of God.

I can buy shirts. I once saw a bottle of wine for US$17,000.  I saw this man coming and asking for 6 of those bottles.  He paid with his card.  The man was rushing quickly and packing it with respect.  My heart was pounding.  The man gave bottles to different friends.  He gave the remaining 3 bottles to the man that served them.  More than $40K in wine.  Who is going to buy it from that man?  Where is he going to sell it?  He won’t drink it and he will fight day after day for a customer.  He won’t be allowed to sell it in the shop.

Our bodies will give us something that will give us more problems.  For example, you can feel like you are thirsty.  You search for water.  For those that drink alcohol, they can drink bottles of beer but can’t drink one glass of water.  Some need to drink alcohol or they start to shake.  He asks for money, and if you don’t give he starts to lie, I need money to take my mum to hospital.  He lies to get money and then once he has the money, he drinks and then he starts to swear and kick people.

I once saw him stumbling home, shouting, “Open this door you dog”.  He came inside.  Another day, he jumped into the back seat of his car and thought someone had stolen the steering wheel.  How do you try to drive your soul when the priority for you is your body?

If your daughter doesn’t respect you, you feel bad.  I feel shame on me.  It is the same with God, when we don’t respect what He says to us, we let Him down. He is disappointed, “I gave you everything for free and in return you tell your Father God that you don’t respect Him”.  We respond by saying, “I’m tired of you, I quit,” and you become rebellious.

We forget that our bodies lie to us.  God can turn off our breath at any moment and our body can’t stop that.  Then God will ask you, what did you do during your time on this earth.  Did you look after your soul?

Adam was given the job to take care of the garden of Eden.  Your soul is your garden of Eden. When someone talks to you wrongly, you feel you need to fight.  When you become angry, it is a simple battle.  Don’t fight back.  Tell yourself, this is not my battle.  If my eyes see something that I don’t like, automatically I become angry.  Why did you put this here?  We must consider God’s position.

Once we open the door, our soul will be the first thing that suffers.  By serving your body, you are killing your body for eternity.  When I watch boxing on tv, it is a battle, a fight.  With boxing, people fight each other for others to watch, they fight for the glory and for the prize money.  They give up everything, including certain food and time and they train to win. How often do you train your soul to feel fit?

Do you hate to put on weight physically, do you also hate to put on spiritual weight?  When you don’t want to go to work, maybe people will call you lazy.  Life is about working and we need to do something but when it is about your soul, how often will people tell you to do God’s work? Children will tell you they are too tired to go to school but the parent will push children to go to the school.

Regardless of how good your sleep is, you have to get out of bed.  That is your side of your battle.  Now spiritually, how often will people tell you to wake up?  Many people will try to please others. E.g. singing for others.  Once I was invited to join a gang.  They encouraged me by saying they would protect me.  I told them I’m not strong to fight other gangs.  Many young people feel pride to belong to a gang and when they walk on the streets they feel like they are something.

Have you tried to join or make this connection with God to feel a part of God’s army where you can stand up and fight against evil and against those who try to destroy God?  When the battle comes, fight your part and let God fight His part.  E.g. “My thoughts, I will not give in”.  “My desire for wrong, this is not my part, what you are asking me to do is the battle of God”.  When you live such a life that you don’t have to respond to all temptations but give it to God, you will be a winner.

When you are tempted to steal, say, “No this isn’t my battle to possess this, God this is your role to get this for me”.  As adults we fight against our parents because we have our own way.  Sometimes we try to prove to God that we are grown up children and He can’t tell us anymore what to do and I will come back to God when I want, read my bible when I want and deal with my own problems.  The problems of my body are my own problems.

When someone dies the corpse remains but the soul has gone. So the dead body is not me. I should remember that when I’m tempted that this is not me, my body is not me.  I just have to decide, I don’t want to do this.  For example, we all know someone who decided to stop smoking.  She just quit.  She didn’t need a counsellor.  She didn’t cut down slowly.  It didn’t kill her.  It was a matter of decision.  God told the king, take your positions, and stand firm and see the deliverance.  What position do you take in life?  Do you stand firm?  Or do you go left and right and try again tomorrow.  How often do you stand firm in order to protect your soul?  When you stand firm, the battlefield belongs to God now and he will act for you.

A friend of mine, he was someone who always wanted to get everything.  One time he borrowed money and he was told he had to pay 40% interest per day.  He wanted to buy something to make him appear special.  After a few days he couldn’t afford to pay it back.  The lenders gave him a job to steal from people’s houses until the day that he finished to pay back the money.  If it was $10, 40% was $14 so it kept getting bigger.

In Congo, when someone is caught stealing, they will burn you alive.  When he was caught, people asked, “Where is the tyre?”  That is how they kill you.  They were punishing the body.  How often have you been influenced by people?  It will be good, just for today.  That is the time to tell God, “The battle belongs to you, I stand firm God, intervene.  I’m shaken by what I see, please God intervene”. 

In the gang, they were telling me that the longer you stay with us you will get a title.  I responded, “I have title in heaven that is bigger than yours and I can’t sacrifice what I have in heaven”.  Do you remember that at any minute you can die?  Where are you going to go?  Last time Ange was planning a trip and that trip was planned for many weeks ahead.

Usually people don’t just decide to go somewhere without planning.  If you do, you may not find a place to sleep.  We must plan our journey to heaven.  If not, you may find yourself in hell.  You can only plan by asking God to fight for us.  Please God do this battle.  When God fights, we have the victory.