‘For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek’ (Rom 1:16)
This is a true story. On the day of October 8, 1871, the great evangelist D L Moody was holding a crusade in the city of Chicago. Thousands were in attendance. He preached a powerful sermon on the need of salvation in Christ alone. His friend and co-laborer Sankey, sang as beautiful song called: ‘Today the Savior calls’. The presence of God was there…
Suddenly there was much noise outside. The fire trucks sounded their sirens all over the town. Then the great bell in the city courthouse tower started ringing announcing danger.
The thousands of people in the Revival Tent became restless. Moody did not know what was happening outside but because of the noise he decided to forget the altar call. He told the people to go home and think about their souls and their need for salvation. He also said that they should all come back tomorrow if they want to surrender their lives to Christ. He then dismissed the crowd. Going outside he saw the night sky red from fire. The city was burning. That was the greatest tragedy Chicago has ever experienced. More than 300 people died that night. Many could not come back the next day for the crusade.
This story so touched Moody that he wept openly and asked God for mercy. He said that if anyone attended his crusade and died that night, his soul in hell will blame him. Then he made a vow to always preach Christ and to always make an altar call in all his crusades. He also vowed to God that he will try his best to lead each person he meets to Christ.
God used him mightily. He was not a very educated man but lead multitude to the Cross.
Once, when walking down a certain street in Chicago, Mr. Moody stopped a man, a perfect stranger to him, and said: “Sir, are you a Christian?” “You mind your own business,” was the reply. Mr. Moody replied: “This is my business.” The man said, “Well, then, you must be Moody.” Out in Chicago they used to call him in those early days “Crazy Moody,” because day and night he was speaking to everybody he got a chance to speak to about being saved.

These are some serious questions for you:
Do you share the Gospel of Christ Crucified with the people around you?
Are you ‘ashamed’ or shy to open your mouth and tell people they need salvation?
Do you study the Word of God so that you can preach the true Gospel of grace?
Do you pray for an increased wisdom and anointing, so that you make the preaching of the Gospel attractive to sinners?
Do you pray for the salvation of others?
Do you have a burden for the souls of men?
Are you ready to humble yourself and to pay the price for an increased harvest for the Lord?
Do you pray for revival?
Do you rejoice when a sinner repents and gives his life to Christ?
Do you weep when a sinner rejects the Gospel?
Do you understand these questions?
May God bring the fire of the Holy Ghost in your heart!
May God anoint your lips with His fire!
May the power of the Holy Ghost descend on you as you faithfully serve Christ by preaching His Gospel to others!
May God bless you and your family!
In Jesus name,
Amen!

‘Rejoice always… Rejoice at all times!’ (1Thess 5:16)
A wise man of old said that ‘Christian joy is like a flag on top of the castle announcing to all that the king is in his residence’. For example, when Queen Elizabeth II visits any of her palaces, her personal flag is raised on the roof, telling all that she is inside.
Joy is not a natural gift. Only the born again believer has joy. No one else has it. Joy is a slice of the fruit of the Spirit.
A good definition of Joy is this: God’s given gift to freely enjoy Him without any inhibitions.
According to the Westminster Shorter Catechism, ‘The chief end of man is TO GLORIFY GOD AND TO ENJOY HIM FOREVER’.
Like the flag on top of the castle, joy cannot be hidden. It expresses itself especially in praise to God, which in turn, increases the joy. In other words joy and praise are twins and cannot live separately one from another.
Joy is very different from what the world calls ‘happiness’. Joy is deep, is a fruit of the Holy Spirit growing in the human spirit. It grows and matures, becoming fruitful. Joy is independent from outside circumstances. Happiness is superficial, unstable and it depends on the circumstances.
It the presence of God there is ‘fullness’ or harvest of Joy.
Joy is very expensive. Jesus paid with His blood for our joy!
From time to time, we the believers, experience this joy in God’s presence. Then why is it that we are so slow in pay the price for more of it? The answer is SIN! It is sin that separates us from God! It is sin that kills joy! A backsliding believer cannot lose his salvation, but he can lose the seal of joy associated with his salvation.
If you are a born again and you are sad, then come to the Cross and see the Joy Jesus saw! Pay the price! Humble yourself and repent of sin! If you say that you have repented, but you are still sad, then you have not repented well. Your religious repentance was not accepted by God! For true repentance is always stamped with ‘inexpressible joy and full of glory’.
Joy is the visible stamp of true ministry. As servants of God we introduce ourselves to others by a ‘CV’ filled with joy in the midst of trials!

Sometime ago I heard a true story. It happened in Uganda, during the time of Idi Amin. He was an evil man and killed many Christians and pastors. One day, three of Amin’s terrorists came to a church. They were sent to kill the pastor. They went to the Pastor’s office with a question: ‘The widows of the Christians men we killed, why are they not weeping? Why are they singing and rejoicing?’ The pastor told them that it is the Joy of the Holy Spirit that helps them to be strong. Then suddenly they changed their mind and refused to kill the pastor. They even asked for prayers. The pastor prayed for them, for God’s grace and mercy to be manifested. Later they helped the pastor escape abroad. Some years later, the tallest among the three terrorists came back as a born again Christian. He now serves as a deacon in the same church where he saw the widows rejoicing.

Do you know this joy? Did you sacrifice such an expensive, Blood- bought gift on the fake altar of sin?
Come back to the Cross! Look long into the face of the Crucified! Let the Shepherd restore your soul!
After God restores your joy, use your testimony to draw other to Jesus!

Pray like David:
‘Purify me with hyssop, and I will be clean.
Wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.
Let me hear joy and gladness,
That the bones which You have broken may rejoice…
Hide Your face from my sins,
and blot out all of my iniquities.
Create in me a clean heart, O God.
Renew a right spirit within me.
Don’t throw me from Your presence,
and don’t take your Holy Spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of Your salvation.
Uphold me with a willing spirit.
Then I will teach transgressors Your ways.
Sinners shall be converted to You’
(Gal 5:22; Ps 16:11; Heb 12:2; Is 59: 2; Jam 1:2; 2Cor 6:10; 1Pet 1:8; Ps 51:7-13)
(in the picture: Queen Elizabeth’s personal flag on top of Windsor Castle in UK)

There is a very beautiful flower growing in the forests of South America. These are heat producing plants. Their temperature can rise up to 45*C, higher than the normal human temperature, even if the surrounding one is much lower. This plant’s ‘fever’ attracts the insects (especially the beetles) to come and pollinate the plant. The insects are rewarded with heat energy. Another reason for their heat is to prevent tissue damage in cold seasons.
These are poisonous plants. If consumed by humans, they produce painful swelling, stinging and burning effects to the mouth and throat. The patient cannot talk or eat for up to two weeks. These symptoms can lead to death.
Another characteristic about these flowers is that if they are cut off, they do not look beautiful again. They give off a very pungent and foul smell, often resembling a rotten, dead animal. That is why with all their beauty these flowers strangely are called ‘dead horse’.
The dead horse flower is a symbol of sin. It is very attractive from distance. It produces its own heat and attracts ‘followers’ to partake from its pleasures. But this is the truth: once a man sins, the very chemistry of his heart and mind changes. The sweet fragrance of Christ is changed into the smell of death. A backslider is always accompanied by the smell of death. All the seduction in the world cannot wash the disgrace of sin. The only solution is to come back to Christ in true humble repentance, for forgiveness and restoration. The God we serve is the God of the Living and not the God of the dead.
Sinner, forget the dead horse and come home!
‘For the wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord’ (Rom 6:23)

“You will show me the path of life.
In Your presence is fullness of joy.
In Your right hand there are pleasures forever more” (Ps 16:11)
We were given a glimpse of heaven: over there, no more preaching, just worship God forever in the beauty of His holiness.
The more we pray for revival, the more difficult it is to find strength to preach. The more we pray for revival, the more the Holy Spirit has access to move freely amongst us.
This evening is another service that proves God is moving. We started with prophetic prayer, then praise; then we worshipped:
‘This is the air I breathe…Your Holy Presence, living in me…And I…I am desperate for you…I am lost without You…”
Then the call was made that we should repent of doubt and religious spirits. Everybody obeyed! Then we invited the Person of God the Holy Spirit, ‘to come down and stay’ with us. Each person should invite the Holy Spirit; that we should not depend on our neighbor for this congregational invitation. Everybody was ‘busy’ praying….
Then suddenly the Holy Spirit came, in His strength, in His fullness and in His own special way. There is something about the presence of God. All doubts disappear in a twinkling of an eye. Faith becomes easy and normal. Nothing hard…to pray is easy as drinking water…to prophesy is easy as breathing air…to do warfare is easy as playing ball…
Then the word came that we should ‘not waste this great anointing for small requests’…’why pray for 100 naira when you can pray for a house you did not build’…after all it is the promise of God…we prayed for revival in our lives, in this church and in Warri.
Then we sang, danced and shouted the name of Jesus…the shout of victory was inside the chest, pushing to come out and express itself with words no man can teach…praying is English…praying in tongues…some eyes close….some eyes opened….then the Lord gave us a Word: ‘Warri shall favor you’…we improvised songs and invented new steps of dancing in the Spirit…the chaos was so much that we were either mad or saved…I believe we are saved and drunk with the new wine made from the royal grapes of Jesus…
Lastly, we sang again and again: ‘God bless you…God bless me…God bless you…God bless me…’Blessings covered all of us…joy unspeakable and full of glory…no wonder that the wise get confused when the foolish are led by the Spirit… It pleases God to pour His love in our hearts…humble and expectant…no need for money, no need for connections…just Jesus, just Jesus!
“Halleluiah…Halleluiah…Halleluiah…” (That is all I can say…)

“He who seeks (God) finds (God)” (Mt 7:8)

CLIMB EVERY MOUNTAIN
Climb ev’ry mountain
Search high and low
Follow ev’ry by-way
Every path you know

Climb ev’ry mountain
Ford ev’ry stream
Follow ev’ry rainbow
Till you find your dream

A dream that will need
All the love you can give
Everyday of your life
For as long as you live

Climb ev’ry mountain
Ford ev’ry stream
Follow ev’ry rainbow
Till you find your dream

(Song from The movie ‘The sound of music, 1959)

“For we must die, and are like water split on the ground, which can’t be gathered up again; neither does God take away life, but devises means, that he who is banished not be an outcast from Him” (2Sam 14:14)

This is the story telling us how Absalom, the rebellious son of David came back to Jerusalem from exile. He killed his half-brother Amnon, because he raped his sister Tamar. He ran away from Jerusalem and for three years he stayed in Geshur, the land of his mother’s people. Joab, the commander of the army, knew that ‘the spirit of the king long to go to Absalom for he was consoled concerning Amnon’s death’ (2Sam 13:39). So he thought of a strategy, how to reconcile David to his runaway son. He called ‘a wise woman’ from Tekoa and thought her what to say to David. He literarily ‘put words in her mouth’.
This woman is from Tekoa, a town of the tribe of Judah. The word ‘Tekoa’ in Hebrew it means an enclosure surrounded by a strong fence where prisoners are kept. The wisdom of this woman probably comes from being ‘a prisoner of hope’ (Zec 9:12). In Tekoa, she was a prisoner of circumstances. When Joab approached her to intercede for the king’s son, she knew that it is her hour ‘to shine’. She trusted that the God who brought her before kings, shall supply words of the Spirit and will give her such wisdom that none can resist or reject. It is the privilege of the true believers to have audiences with kings and governors, and to present to them the Gospel of Christ (Mt 10:18-20).She had to combine the gift of a mother, the pain of a widow, the skill of an actress, the strength of a warrior, the anointing of an evangelist and the grace of a queen. David was known for his wisdom, so it will not be easy ‘to deceive’ the king, to change his mind for his own good. Like Esther before the king, she had only one window of grace, only one opportunity to win or to lose. Like Abigail, she spoke words of wisdom and life. She made him review his former decision and she pleads for mercy where there was only judgment.
She preaches the Gospel of Christ to David. There are three main doctrines revelaed in the verse above:
1 The reality of sin, death and God’s judgment
2 The reality of God’s sovereignty
3 The reality of God’s mercy and reconciliation of sinners
Joab was the one who had this strange idea of reconciliation. We are not studying Joab in this letter. But for this wise woman to be selected from among thousands, surely the grace of God was upon her. She trusted God for favor in this assignment. .Like the woman who wept at the feet of Jesus, she is a nameless face and a humble heart. But her story occupies a whole chapter in the Bible. She overcomes evil with good (Rom 12:21). This is a great achievement and an encouragement to us all.
The wise woman of Tekoa impressed King David. He decided to call Absalom back from exile. He forgave him and he gave him a second chance, as a son and heir to the throne. Absalom took his father’s kindness and grace for granted. He proved to be a traitor. He attempted to kill his father and take his throne. He stole the hearts of the people of Israel. He died like a common criminal and his story is a warning to all ungrateful traitors.
The woman of Tekoa, she may have looked foolish, for women were looked down in those days. But God is pleased to use foolishness to confound the so called wise and to use weak people to shame the strong, so that all the glory of goes to Him alone (1Cor 1:27)
But the truths reveled by this sister in Christ stand the test of time.
If any of you need supernatural wisdom, pray in faith and do not doubt, for God gives wisdom to the humble without finding fault (Jam 1:5-8)
Let every man be a liar or a traitor…But God will forever be true and faithful to all His promises!
May we always keep our eyes on Jesus!
May we always be grateful to God!

“O give thanks unto the Lord, call upon His name, make known His doings among the peoples!” (Ps 105:1, AMP)
God is doing things!
God manifests His presence even thru miracles!
Prayers become testimonies!
Testimonies become praise!
Praise becomes ministry to increase God’s glory!
All this blessed holy chain starts with A PRAYER!
May the Holy Spirit remind you of the power and privilege of prayer done in the name of Jesus!

Johan Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) is one of the all-time greatest classical musicians. He was born in Germany. He played the church organ and the violin at a professional level. He composed many classical pieces, known for their beauty and depth of feeling. He has no equal in his filed.
As a young man he was employed in a chapel in Weimar. With all his great talent, his work was not musical. He was the cleaner of the church. Soon, he was called to a bigger church in the city of Arnstadt to be the organist. He was paid a good salary and life was better for him. But then he heard of a great organist and composer called Dieterich Buxtehude who lived in a city called Lubeck. He decided to go there to learn more skills. He did not have the money to pay for his transport so he traveled on foot, a distance of 250 miles (this is the same distance from Warri to Lagos). He submitted to that master and learned many musical skills that helped him to become such a great musician later.

The Queen of Sheba also traveled a long distance to come and listen to Solomon’s wisdom (1Kg 10). She could have been satisfied with the rumors or with his books, but she decided to go and listen to him. It was not an easy trip for her to visit King Solomon. Sheba was located in what is now modern Yemen in Arabia. That would make her trip about 1200 miles to Jerusalem (that is two times the distance between Warri and Maiduguri). A camel is said to be able to travel about 30 miles a day making the journey at least 40 days, providing the travel was smooth. The ground she covered was treacherous. Her caravan was large, carrying spices, precious stones and large quantities of gold, so it is safe to assume that her journey was much longer.
Jesus said that the Queen of Sheba shall stand up at the last judgment and she will condemn all people who are too careless or lazy to be mature Christians (Mt 12:42). They have the opportunity to read the Bible and to go to Church to hear the preaching of the Word of God, but they are not willing to pay the price to do so. We shall all be judged for any missed opportunity to listen and obey the Word of God.
This is a great lesson for all of us. Are you ready to pay the price for a greater anointing? The money you pay for fuel, for taxi, God knows about it for He provided it. Are you ready to leave your comfort zone and go to look for a place where the Holy Spirit is pouring on men, causing revival? The price for such an impartation is very small compared with the glory revealed. Nothing good comes easy! Do not offer to God ‘something that cost you nothing’ (2Sam 24:24). Praise is costly!
May divine wisdom be your portion today!

Queen Esther’s Jewish name, Hadassah, means ‘The Myrtle’. This is a very beautiful tree, especially when in bloom. It is an evergreen tree, not too tall, with star- like flowers of purple, reddish and white color and a delicate fragrance. Because it is evergreen, it does not lose all its leaves in the cold season; so it is never naked or bare, but always beautiful to see. The flowers last long, up to four months in a year; the changing of seasons do not affecting its beauty. The myrtle tree is hardy and resistant to disease. The strength and beauty of the myrtle tree is a sign of eternal blessings from God; they are a symbol of His favor and protection.
‘I will make rivers flow on barren heights and spring within the valleys. I will turn the desert into pools of water and the parched ground into springs. I (Jehovah) will put in the desert… the myrtle…so that people may see and know, may consider and understand that the hand of the Lord has done this, that the Holy One of Israel has created it’ (Is 41:18-20)
The above scripture is an encouragement to the humble and it refers to the grace shown to them. Their oppressors will be destroyed. The people of God will ‘bloom in the desert’. They will prosper in the most difficult circumstances. They are signs that God is alive, that God loves them. The success of a believer has no other explanation than the fact that God is with him and He alone receives all the glory. Like his Lord, the believer ‘will grow up before Him like a tender plant and like a root out of dry ground’ (Is 53: 2). The beauty is not seen by the natural eyes, but it will be revealed in a great harvest and eternal satisfaction at last. God has simplified our lives. He said: ‘My grace is sufficient for you’ (2Cor 12:9). The only thing we need is God’s favor. It is the greatest shield for man. Nobody can destroy the humble, obedient and faithful child of God for ‘God gives grace to the humble’ (Jam 4:6).
This is the secret of people like Joseph or Esther in the Bible.