Heralds Digest

  “ But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth .”” ‭‭Acts‬ ‭1:8‬ ‭NKJV‬‬ Planning for a good and laudable mission requires the gathering of strategies from people who are convinced to be motivated by the same vision statement. Whenever such personalities choose to gather in any corporate organization and institution, problems are bound to receive solutions. Unfortunately, the mission of liberating lost souls from the pit of sin and destruction cannot be accomplished by the collection of methods. More than anything else, the messengers of the gospel need the Holy Spirit as Mover and His power to get started. You don’t come upon the Holy Spirit with methods; but rather wait for Him to come upon you with power. Otherwise, all our strategies and methods of sincerely executing the mandate and mission will always attract fruitless frustration. And when the 120...

  “ Therefore, when they had come together, they asked Him, saying, “Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” And He said to them, “ It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has put in His own authority .” Acts‬ ‭1:6-7‬ ‭NKJV‬‬ The post-resurrected conversation between the messengers and the Messiah provided a clear example of the misplacement of missions in life. The disciples were concerned about the political restoration of Israel by the promised Messiah; while the victorious Messiah was concerned about the disciples’ responsibilities in extending the message of salvation and victory at the Cross to the world. Therefore, Jesus responded that “ It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has put in His own authority” . There is nothing wrong with understanding times or seasons of events, particularly championed by other people around us. The only problem has been the danger of getting distracted from our own ordained responsib...

  “ And all Mine are Yours, and Yours are Mine, and I am glorified in them .”‭‭ John‬ ‭17:10‬ ‭NKJV‬‬ Even though we know that unity or oneness in fellowship and family is a perfect demonstration of the glory of God, it is difficult for believers to ignore the pursuit of personal glory without divine assistance and entire sanctification. When Jesus said in His priestly prayer to the Father “ And all Mine are Yours, and Yours are Mine, and I am glorified in them ”, He was demonstrating this unity in the pursuit of selfless glory through the relationship between Him and the Father. And in order to emulate similar pursuit, disciples and believers are enjoined to constantly seek divine assistance for grace to keep focus on the glory of God in all their relationships in fellowship and family. As long as personal glory has become entirely irrelevant, there would always be no disgrace in the pursuit of God’s glory. Therefore, a fully sanctified disciple of the Lord is sufficiently glorifi...

  “ Indeed the hour is coming, yes, has now come, that you will be scattered, each to his own, and will leave Me alone. And yet I am not alone, because the Father is with Me. ” ‭‭John‬ ‭16:32‬ ‭NKJV‬‬ In the demonstration of an unalloyed focus on God for support and breakthrough in divine assignment, Jesus alerted His disciples of the inevitable offering of their scattering services. Even the overconfident Peter couldn’t see his denial of relationships with Jesus coming until the deeds were completely done. Notwithstanding, the salient takeaway in the offering of the disciples’ scattering services is that there is always a time when the disciples needed to move on ‘each to his own ’ interests, leaving Jesus to focus on the primary agenda of God on earth - the suffering for the sin of the whole world, death and resurrection from the grave for human justification. Every time personal interests deviate from divine interest among parties at home, and in all of life’s projects, there is...

  “ Most assuredly, I say to you that you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice; and you will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will be turned into joy .” ‭‭John‬ ‭16:20‬ ‭NKJV‬‬ In human governance and economy, everyone understands the difference between an unstable or developing system and a fully developed system. It is always preferable for anyone to have a sorrowful state in a stable system than enjoying a sweet state in a stumbling system. Likewise in God’s economy, the world system is a stumbling system; but the redeemed of the Lord are encouraged to accommodate its sorrowful state for the joy of their translations into a stable system. When Jesus told the sorrowful disciples “ Most assuredly….your sorrow will be turned into joy ”, He accommodates our sorrowful state in His stable system. Unfortunately, believers are often tempted to play along the stumbling system of the world with the card of dishonesty and deception in order to escape persecution and diverse unfavo...

  “ These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. ” ‭‭John‬ ‭15:11‬ ‭NKJV‬‬ Like the lifestyle of approaching fast-food restaurants for meals, the world is filled with huge sources for junk joy with limited satisfaction. For example, the joy of job satisfaction and career progression, the joy of a successful marriage proposal, the joy of child bearing, the joy of financial breakthrough and business proposition, etc. These joys are merely junk, temporal and not designed to bring full satisfaction, compared to the Jesus joy which needs to remain in us to regulate our relationship with the junk joy. Only Jesus' joy offers the life’s needed (1) justification from all condemnations; (2) excellence in our indescribable creativity; (3) satisfaction during the inevitable crisis; (4) understanding of the incorrigible cross; and (5) sweetness from the inexplicable curse. Little wonder, a man blessed with the abundance of the junk joy in life...

  “ By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples .” John‬ ‭15:8‬ ‭NKJV‬‬ If God is glorified by a believer's fruitfulness, it implies that fruitlessness is strictly the product of our unfaithfulness. Therefore, the context in Jesus’ exhortation emphasizes faithfulness in the believer's fellowship with God. Fruitfulness is merely the effect and not the cause - the main cause is always our faithfulness in relationships with the Father. While fruitfulness can be the explicit assessment of our follower-ship, faithfulness remains the implicit assessment of our relationship with God. That probably informed the reason why Jesus said “ so you will be My disciples ”…when “ My Father is glorified ”. In whatever we do or say in fellowship with family and friends, it is not enough to just be driven by fruit bearing. When we simply focus on the pursuit of the glory of God, fruits will naturally follow our faithfulness.