A Tip to maximise your Mid-Week Truth Turn Up …
Your Mid-Week Truth Turn Up is a 'meaty' devotional that can re-centre your heart on Jesus as you go along in your week. The devotional is slightly lengthier than a daily devotional and that is because I post them only once a week and they are meant to be your repeat meditation for the next 7 days till you receive the next Truth Turn Up. My tip is therefore that as your week goes on, you visit and re-visit your Mid-Week Truth Turn up and meditate on the Bible Meditation passage, my write up as well as the Further Study at the bottom of the devotional. Take the whole week to meditate on it and get it into your spirit. Do not try to compress the whole devotional into one reading. Enjoy (* wink *) Coach Toyin
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Arise! Shine! 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥Your light is here! God’s GLORY is in you! No, it’s not what you think. This is not a cheap feel-good message. If you ever hear someone say to you, “Arise! Shine! For your light has come! And the glory of the Lord has risen upon you!” This should not make you feel good for a few minutes, puff out your chest and then go about life as usual with no real shift in the state of your heart towards God. Arise, shine! Your light has come! God’s glory is upon you! His original design for your life is calling out to be fulfilled! He placed His DNA inside you. He made you in His image and likeness to display His glory, His power and His presence in this world. His original design is for you to reign with Him in glory, not for your own self-endorsement, but rather for the Glory of His Name and advancement of God’s Kingdom. Wow!
So then how do we respond to this wonder?! Like David, my response to this has to be: “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too great for me to understand!” (Psalm 139:6). We respond by falling face down, our hearts rended in worship and surrender to Him, to this One, True, Living God! This Glorious One who is indescribable, and yet, He LOVES US with an unfathomable love. He has called us to be His co-workers in the world. His original design is for us to be His hands and feet in the world, implementing His way and His fixes to the many troubles that people are facing around us. For many of us, the people that we live with, love and do life with, will never ever know who Jesus is, talk less of experience His glory, unless we rise and represent His glory to them, the way God originally intended us to. Like the words of “The Last Jesus”, a song by Kirk Franklin, “You just may be the only Jesus they see.” (Find this song in the Heartsongs link on my YouTube Channel).
Arise! Shine! God’s Light and life is in you! This is a call for you to shake off the mundane and the ordinary! Guys, do you see that there is no longer any room for that? The stuff that’s going on in these times, on the God-side, are mind-blowing! God is moving powerfully in the hearts of those who hunger for Him. He is moving mountains. He is causing walls to fall. He is delivering people from impossible situations. He is introducing Himself to people whose culture and political circumstance bars them from ever uttering the name, “Jesus”. Our God is showing His face to people. He is turning lives around. This is a swelling river that is taking along anyone who plunges in. These are the days of God lovers boldly and audaciously declaring God’s Word with the kind of power that will pierce the hearts of the many anti-Jesus people out there. These are times and seasons when things in our lives that have been long dead are rising up and declaring Jesus, the Lamb of God who took away the sins of the world, who is alive and now glorified, still drawing all men to Himself. These are the days of passionate-pursuers of God’s presence, surrendering their everything for the service of the King! These are the days, can you feel it? Are you keyed in?
Our feature Bible passages:
Joel 2:28-32 And that’s just the beginning: After that “I will pour out My Spirit on every kind of people: Your sons will prophesy, also your daughters. Your old men will dream, your young men will see visions. I’ll even pour out My Spirit on the servants, men and women both. I’ll set wonders in the sky above and signs on the earth below: blood and fire and billowing smoke, the sun turning black and the moon blood-red, before the Judgment Day of God, the Day tremendous and awesome. Whoever calls, ‘Help, God!’ gets help. On Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there will be a great rescue—just as God said. Included in the survivors are those that God calls.”
The New King James Version puts verse 32 like this: “And whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved”. Hallelujah! These are days when God is calling those who are passionate about Him as well as those who desire to become passionate about Him. God is calling us to arise and shine, and to embrace His original design.
Now it all sounds well and good but perhaps you are waiting for me to translate all of this to every day speak, so that you know what to do in the next moment after you respond to the call and ‘arise’. Well, here’s the “how?” Partaking in God’s glory is not by your own goodness, or your own wheeling and dealing. It’s not a popularity contest, neither is it a competition for the loudest prayer warrior or the one who puts up the most hashtags with the name of Jesus in it. To partake in God’s glory is simply by making a continuous choice to love and listen for the voice of the Holy Spirit in you, and then to obey. The prophecy in Joel 2:28 was that these are the days when God is pouring out His Spirit on every kind of people. He is pouring out His power to experience indescribable things. Those of us who embrace what God is doing will dream and be directed by God through our dreams. We will see visions about others and about what is going on in the world around us – we will be equipped by these insights to encourage others to come along and embrace the original design of God. By the power of the Holy Spirit, we will call many into God’s kingdom, because of the life that God has placed in us. The Holy Spirit will be the One who ushers you into the light of God’s glory that is in you. As you relate with Him, He will draw you into a deeper intimacy with Jesus Christ; He will stir you up to love God more and to love His Word and His presence. The Holy Spirit is the door. Your passionate, honest and intentional surrender to the Holy Spirit is the key.
Let us pray:
Lord Jesus! I am so excited and encouraged that You would love me so much and have such an amazing design for my life! I am so grateful that You do not look at me and see what I am now or where I am at now, but rather You see Your original design for me, and You me restored to that design. Lord, I want it! I want all of it and more! Not for my own self-advancement. But rather so that I can be part of Your life and glory on this earth! I want to arise and shine so that I can advance Your kingdom and use everything You have placed inside me to bring many to their place, at Your feet. Help me Jesus. So many distractions. So many untruths out there. So many things take my mind off this focus. Help me to set my face like a flint and be single-minded in my love for You and in the work of glory that You are doing and that You have done in my heart and in my life. I love You Jesus. In Your name I pray. Amen.
A last word:
This week, I will like you to practice the presence of God. I speak about the presence of God so often and it always finds its way into my Truth Turn Ups because everything in life comes from there – our place in God’s presence. That is where we get to know God, that is where we receive power to embrace and live out His original design. This is the power seat. However, the Bible is clear that to live in the presence of God, one has to be intentional. So be intentional this week. Practice drawing near to the place of God’s presence, which by the way is where His glory is. There is no formula to this. It is all about a heart that is quieted before the Lord, listening, worshiping, adoring, meditating, feeding, adoring some more, journaling. I promise you that you will experience something new, if you make the time this week. Try for maybe 30 minutes a day, or every second day. Use worship music. Songs that are focused on the attributes of God.
This week, I would like you to make a list of three to five people in your life who you know are not likely to ever encounter the real Jesus, not the bubblegum Jesus. The Bible Jesus. Spend 5 minutes everyday praying for your list of 5 people. Ask God to make an opportunity for you to display the glory of Jesus to at least one of the people on your list this week.
And guys, I would love to get your feedback. So please do let me know how it went this week – practicing the presence of God and asking God for opportunities to display God’s glory to people. Email me on thenarrowgateway@gmail.com.
Critically, I end this by saying, I am Toyin Oladiran, fully convicted by my own words and very much still under construction in the hands of the Father.
Written by Toyin Oladiran, for The Narrow Gateway
Work with Toyin:Do you want to apply for an early spot in the B.O.O.M Walk Program? If so, please email me on thenarrowgateway@gmail.comDo you want to work with me One-on-One or with your Group (church fellowship or Bible Study or group of friends) to work through the B.O.O.M Walk Program or to work through and overcome trouble spots in your walk with God or to forge a more intimate and deliberate relationship with God from which you are living in God’s unique purpose and plan for your life? If so, please email me on thenarrowgateway@gmail.com