Dearly Beloved,

YOU ALSO CAN PRAISE GOD!

"The village musicians gather at the village well to sing of the triumphs of the Lord. Again and again they sing the ballad of how the Lord saved Israel" (Judges 5:11 TLB).

I was in a cybercafé one day when a young man just bursted into song of praise to God. He was even rolling on the ground as he was appreciating His Creator. All of us that were there surfing the Internet could not fathom the cause of the sudden praise. It was…

Dearly Beloved,

WAIT, AND MURMUR NOT

"Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord" (Psalm 27:14 NIV).

Little is known historically about the hymn "WAIT, AND MURMUR NOT" and its writer, W.H. Bellamy. However, the hymn is one of the comforting hymns for anyone who is passing through a difficult time. The writer referred to such a person as the "troubled heart" and reminded him that there is a home beyond the reach of toil and care where changes never…

Dearly Beloved,

THE PRESENCE OF GOD

"Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?" (Psalm 139:7 NIV).

The omnipresent nature of God is affirmed throughout the Bible. Psalm 139 is especially written for this purpose. God is everywhere. There is no hiding place from Him. He is the unseen companion of man wherever man finds himself.

This fact of the presence of God is both an encouraging and warning fact. It is encouraging to know that the…

Dearly Beloved,

LET GOD CONTEND!

The violent protests in Egypt and Libya over a US-produced film that demonstrators believe insults the Prophet Muhammad that led to the killing of the US ambassador in Libya and three other Americans and the rumoured proposed demonstrations in other Muslim-dominated areas especially in Nigeria made me changed the message that I intended to send out this week and delved into my archive to adapt this message titled "JERUB-GOD" initially sent out…

Dearly Beloved,

CAN YOU KILL?

"Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment: But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment…" (Matthew 5:21-22a KJV).

"Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him" (1 John 3:15 NIV).

We were having our supper that evening when my…

Dearly Beloved,

ARE YOU CONSCIOUS OF IT?

"For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever" (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 NIV).

Recently, I sent out a message in my Internet ministry…

Dearly Beloved,

BY THIS TIME NEXT YEAR

"Then the LORD said, 'I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah your wife will have a son'" (Genesis 18:10 NIV).

Wonders never end. Sarah and Abraham seemed to say when God told them that they would have their own child "about this time next year" (Genesis 17:15-16, 19-21; 18:10, 13-14). How would a man of hundred years impregnate a woman of ninety years? Naturally, it is impossible! Sarah laughed it off,…

Dearly Beloved,

TRUST IN THAT ROCK!

"The Lord is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge. He is my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold" (Psalm 18:2 NIV).

"There is no one holy like the Lord; there is no one besides you; there is no Rock like our God" (1 Samuel 2:2 NIV).

Some time ago, I was relaxing on a rock when I saw a man coming towards me with a knife. Since everyone was minding his own affair, I did not…

Dearly Beloved,

AMAZING GRACE

"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith — and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God — not by works, so that no one can boast" (Ephesians 2:8-9 NIV).

One of the most popular hymns of all time is John Newton (1725-1807)'s "Amazing Grace." Newton composed the hymn to express who he was before he was saved and who he was after his salvation experience. Newton was a wretch, moral pariah whose business was slave trade…

Dearly Beloved,

MAN PROPOSES GOD DISPOSES

"Many are the plans in a man's heart, but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails" (Proverbs 19:21 NIV).

Human beings have many plans both short-term and long-term that they intend to accomplish. Most of these plans even have definite times that human beings want to carry them out. The fact that human beings could carry out these plans as planned makes them take most of these plans for granted. It is only when such plans cannot be…

Dearly Beloved,

REPENTED, BUT...

"In [Manasseh's] distress he sought the favor of the LORD his God and humbled himself greatly before the God of his fathers. And when he prayed to him, the LORD was moved by his entreaty and listened to his plea; so he brought him back to Jerusalem and to his kingdom. Then Manasseh knew that the LORD is God" (2 Chronicles 33:12-13 NIV).

"I will make them abhorrent to all the kingdoms of the earth because of what…

Dearly Beloved,

ARE YOU ON THE LIST?

"These searched for their family records, but they could not find them and so were excluded from the priesthood as unclean. The governor ordered them not to eat any of the most sacred food…" (Ezra 2:62-63a NIV).

"If anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire" (Revelation 20:15 NIV).

The school bus was ready to convey some students in…

Dearly Beloved,

I HAVE FOUND A FRIEND IN JESUS

"I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you" (John 15:15 NIV).

The hymn "I have found a friend in Jesus" also known as "The Lily of the Valley" is one of my favourite hymns. Little is known about the history of the hymn apart from the fact that it was…

Dearly Beloved,

WILL GOD ANSWER MY PRAYERS? (Part 2)

"...God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose" (Romans 8:28 NASB).

Last week, I sent out a message on the above subject and emphasized it that God will answer our prayers ACCORDING TO HIS WILL in His own way and His own time. Expectedly, some people disagreed with that position. To them, God will answer whatsoever we…

Dearly Beloved,

WILL GOD ANSWER MY PRAYERS?

"This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us — whatever we ask — we know that we have what we asked of him " (1 John 5:14-15 NIV).

As I wanted to sleep recently, I received a message from one of my contacts on WhatsApp asking me whether God would answer his prayer or not. I summarily answered him that God…

Dearly Beloved,

IT IS WELL WITH MY SOUL

“But God will rescue me; he will save me from the power of death” (Psalm 49:15 TEV).

The hymn, “It is Well with My Soul” is one of the most popular Christian hymns. Horatio Gates Spafford (1828–1888) composed it. When Spafford was forty-three years old as a Chicago businessman, he suffered financial disaster in the Great Chicago Fire of 1871. He and his wife were still grieving over the death of their son…

Dearly Beloved,

HOW RESPONSIBLE ARE YOU?

"If anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for his immediate family, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever" (1 Timothy 5:8 NIV).

In many part of the world, the Fathers' Day celebration for this year will be celebrated this week. While I congratulate all fathers throughout the world, I want to ask each one of us that is a father how responsible we are as…

Dearly Beloved,

WARN YOUR EYES!

"I made a covenant with my eyes not to look with lust upon a [lady]" (Job 31:1 TLB).

The world is full of detestable things - things that can drive people away from their Creator. Unfortunately, people are the instruments that the devil is using to propagate these detestable things. Most of these things are what are appealing to the eyes. This was the strategy that the devil used to deceive the first woman, Eve. The…

Dearly Beloved,

YOU CAN BE SUCCESSFUL AND STILL BE HONEST

"The other men tried to find something wrong with the way Daniel did his work for the king. But they could not accuse him of anything wrong, because he was honest and faithful and did everything he was supposed to do" (Daniel 6:4 CEV).

There was a chat that ensued between one of my BlackBerry contacts and me. The person wanted to know if one can be successful in life without being dubious…