RESPONSIBILITIES OF GOD’S CHILDREN I – Wednesday April 26th 2017
Memorise: As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby: 1st Peter 2:2
1 Behold,
what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be
called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it
knew him not.
2 Beloved,
now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall
be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we
shall see him as he is.
3 And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure.
Bible in one year: Numbers 20-21, Jeremiah 21:1-10, Hymn: Sing hymn 6
MESSAGE:
All
those who have accepted the Lordship of Jesus Christ over their life
are children of God, by the grace of adoption through Jesus Christ (Ephesians 1:5).
As children of God, while God has some responsibilities to make a
success of our walk of faith in this world, we also have some
responsibilities we have to bear in this regard. Peter, in today’s
memory verse, points out that one of our responsibilities as children of
God is to desire things that are beneficial to our spiritual growth.
When some new converts become children of God, due to zeal without
knowledge, they begin to nurse some good desires which are inappropriate
or unhealthy for sustaining their victory in the Christian race. For
example, some converts after giving their lives to Christ immediately
begin to desire the office of a pastor, evangelist or Christian minister
of any sort. Although these are good desires, they are inappropriate
and ill-timed. The first responsibility of a believer when he or she
becomes a child of God is to desire the sincere milk of the word so that
he or she can grow to maturity through it. It is after this that he or
she can think of rendering service to the Kingdom work. Open Heavens
2017. Physically speaking, when a little baby desires to eat bread, yam,
or rice, such desires could kill him or her. In the same vein, when a
newborn believer desires to be a pastor or an evangelist overnight, he
or she would not last long. This is the mistake some Christian
organisations make when they make converts out of Muslims and
traditionalists and immediately turn them into tools of evangelism. The
resultant effect is that such converts, without having depth in the word
of God, would begin to see themselves as evangelists. Based on my
experience and observations, more often than not, such converts don’t
last. For this season, children being born into God’s family must take
time to study the word of God and become well grounded in it.
In our Bible reading today, we see another responsibility of children of God, which is that they must keep themselves pure (1st John 3:3).
After being cleansed and purified by the Blood of Jesus, children of
God have the responsibility of not going back to their old vomit or
staining their garment of righteousness with the filth of this world (Ephesians 5:26-27).
Practically, you achieve this by measuring your action against the
standard of God’s word. Open Heavens Devotional 2017 Wednesday 26 April
2017:- Ressponsiblities of God’s children I. Anything that is contrary
to the word of God is filth that must be avoided. This is the more
reason why all children of God need to be grounded in the word first
before anything else.
Action Point
Make sure you read, study and apply the word of God to your day-to-day living as a child of God, and you will grow in faith.
Open Heaven Daily Devotional, written by Pastor E.A Adeboye,
The
General Overseer of the Redeemed Christian Church of God, one of the
largest evangelical church in the world and also the President of Christ
the Redeemer's Ministries.
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