LIFE IS SPIRITUAL

Sunday 26th February 2023- First Service

Genesis 1:26-27 Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness;... So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.

John 4:24 God is Spirit,....

Both Male and female came out of God and the material from which He created them was the spirit. This means that man is a spirit.

Hebrews 11:3 By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible.

The invisible was framed by the word of God to the visible (what we see).

When God created us, He formed the physical body out of the dust (Genesis 2:7). The material that makes up your body is dust and what makes up your spirit is the word.

Read Matthew 4:1-11

When satan showed up, Jesus replied, "it is written....."

The strength of every believer is proportional to the amount of word they have in their spirit. The real-life of a man is in the spirit (James 2:26).

Galatians 5:16 I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.

We must go back to the original material (spirit) from which we were made because that is the only place from which we will be able to do wonders and live a life God has called us for.

John 16:7 Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you.

As long as Jesus was in the physical body, He was limited because He had to be in one place at a time. He therefore had to go and come back in form of the Holy Spirit.

That is why you need to be in spirit because that gives you unlimited grace and until you become conscious about your spiritual life, you will not fulfill destiny the way God wants.

Read 2 Kings 6:15-17

The servant of the man of God was reading the script using the physical eyes but Elijah was using the spiritual eyes.

When the servant's eyes were open, he began to see. Physically, Elijah was in the house but on revelation, he was on the mountain full of horses and chariots of fire.

If you do not discern like gods, you will function like mere men (Psalms 82:7).

Ephesians 1:17-18 that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened;....

I appeal to you to pay attention to your spiritual life; you will stop interpreting life from the physical but like someone from heaven.

Further Study

Job 1 In one day, Job lost everything. All the manipulations took place in the spirit.

John 6:63 You are not helping God by studying the word because your life is in the word.

STAY BLESSED AND HIGHLY FAVORED, WE LOVE YOU. PASTOR BEN OCHOLA.!

ENFORCING OUR VICTORY THROUGH PRAYER 

Wednesday 22nd February 2023

Isaiah 45:19(AMP) I have not spoken in secret, in a corner of the land of darkness; I did not call the descendants of Jacob [to a fruitless service], saying, Seek Me for nothing [but I promised them a just reward]. I, the Lord, speak righteousness (the truth--trustworthy, straightforward correspondence between deeds and words); I declare things that are right.

You can not seek God in vain because whatever He speaks happens. Prayer is one of the best investments you make on earth. It is better than investing in US stocks because these fail but prayer will bail you out.

Prayer goes into your future and prepares the way for you, that's why some of the things you pray for will happen twenty years from now. Don't be only locked in the "now" because the moment you step in prayer, you become omnipresent. 

Joshua 21:45 Not a word failed of any good thing which the LORD had spoken to the house of Israel. All came to pass.

Every word that God spoke to the Israelites came to pass. If God did it for Joshua who was living under the old testament, what about you who is under the new covenant?

There are certain things we are not aware of but God is working on them; these things sustain us. So don't base your faith on only what you feel and see, there is much more going on than you know that's why you should not drop prayer.

Exodus 34:6-7 And the LORD passed before him and proclaimed, "The LORD, the LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing [the guilty,] visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children's children to the third and the fourth generation."

You can bring an end to inequity and guilt by clinging to the mercies of the Lord. He is only waiting for you to be broken and accept that you sinned, stand in the gap like Daniel and interceded for a nation (not that he sinned but he took responsibility and interceded). We suffer, not that there is no help but because we do not know the God we serve.

James 2:13 For judgment is without mercy to the one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment. 

Every judgment that has been responsible for the evils going on in your life can be stopped by the cry of mercy because it silences judgment. The devil is always fighting so you have to make sure you enforce your victory (Hosea 4:6, Proverbs 11:9).

Colossians 2:11-17 In Him you were also circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the sins of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, buried with Him in baptism, in which you also were raised with [Him] through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead...

This truth must be inside you because if you do not know your position in Christ, it will be difficult to enforce your victory. Knowing your position in Christ will drive devils out of your life even before you pray.

God gives us the victory through Jesus Christ. In any area of your life where you need victory, it has already been given to you at calvary. We are not trying to be victorious but enforcing the victory that was already won by Jesus Christ. (1 Corinthians 15:57)

Further study

Numbers 23:19 God is not a son of man that He should lie.

Romans 16:20  You must take your stand for what Jesus has already done to find manifestation in your life.

Revelation 12:11 We overcome by the cross and what the Bible says about you.

STAY BLESSED AND HIGHLY FAVORED, WE LOVE YOU. PASTOR BEN OCHOLA

A CALL TO A LIFE OF CONSECRATION

Monday 20th February 2023

Romans 12:1 I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.

The Lord is calling us to the life of separation; from the things that contaminate and defile, from weights and sins that easily entangle us.  

Hebrews 12:1 Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,

If we are serious with our walk with God, if He means everything to us, wisdom tells us to agree with Him, and line up with His instruction for it is the fastest way to fulfilling our destiny. 

Stay and walk away from things, places, and people that bring corruption, delays, and detours in your life. 

Matthew 6:24 “No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other...

You cannot have two masters, you will obey one and despise the other. If Jesus (Holy Spirit) is your Master, it will be revealed by the instructions you yield to, and the one who is your Master takes the upper hand in your life. 

Let us be intentional and deliberate about obeying the instruction of the Holy Spirit. This is the best way we can walk this life and continue to live victoriously. 

Read Zachariah 3

Zechariah 3:1-2 Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the Angel of the LORD, and Satan standing at his right hand to oppose him. And the LORD said to Satan, "The LORD rebuke you, Satan! The LORD who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! [Is] this not a brand plucked from the fire?"

Though Joshua was chosen and called by God like you and me, the devil opposed him and God had to come and rebuke him. 

Why was Satan opposing him?

Zechariah 3:3 Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments, and was standing before the Angel.

When your garments are filthy, the enemy will always find room to fight you. Some of the filth may not be sin per say but maybe weights that are delaying you.

Ask God to free you of every kind of corruption and defilement, anything that contaminates you so that the enemy can have nothing against you to oppose you and this is when you will be able to fulfill destiny. (John 14:30).  

STAY BLESSED AND HIGHLY FAVORED, WE LOVE YOU. PASTOR BEN OCHOLA.

WHY MEN OUGHT TO PRAY

Sunday 19th February 2023- first service

Why should men pray?

1. PRAYER IS AN INSTRUCTION.

Luke 18:1 Then He spoke a parable to them, that men always ought to pray and not lose heart,

Prayer is an instruction which we ought to obey. Therefore, when we pray (obedience to instruction), it is proof that we love the Master (John 14:15).

2. FELLOWSHIP

It is on the platform of prayer that we fellowship with the Trinity (contact the divine) and it is during such moments that spiritual transaction occurs and there is a transfer of virtues that affects our being. 

During the fellowship, what is of God rubs on us making us carriers of His presence wherever we go (in our families, clans, at our workplaces, etc).

3. REVELATION

Jeremiah 33:3 ‘Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.’

Proverbs 20:12 The hearing ear and the seeing eye, The Lord has made them both.

Through prayer, we call on God that He may reveal to us what concerns us: the seeing eyes and the hearing ears are not for prophets only but every child of God (Joel 2:28).

Remember, in this kingdom, we triumph and rise by knowledge (Deuteronomy 29:29, Hosea 4:6, Daniel 11:32).

4. MANIFESTATION OF THE REVEALED WORD

Deuteronomy 29:29 “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.

The Lord has already determined every spiritual blessing concerning you but it takes priesthood to bring them into the physical manifestation (Ephesians 1:3).

Do not forget that REVEALED WORD. Pray to God to show you the direction He wants you to take inorder to walk into that revelation.

5. DIVINE INTERVENTION

Read 2 Chronicles 20

King Jehosophat knew that he was helpless. That is why he had to invite his Heavenly Father to help him and He (God) came through for him.

2 Chronicles 20:22-24 Now when they began to sing and to praise, the Lord set ambushes against the people of Ammon, Moab, and Mount Seir, who had come against Judah; and they were defeated.

[23]For the people of Ammon and Moab stood up against the inhabitants of Mount Seir to utterly kill and destroy them. And when they had made an end of the inhabitants of Seir, they helped to destroy one another. [24]So when Judah came to a place overlooking the wilderness, they looked toward the multitude; and there were their dead bodies, fallen on the earth. No one had escaped.

There are so many times that we feel helpless when confronted with challenges and battles of life but when we invite God on the platform of prayer, He overwhelms us.

STAY BLESSED AND HIGHLY FAVORED, WE LOVE YOU. PASTOR BEN OCHOLA.

GENUINE DESIRE FOR THE HOLY SPIRIT 

Wednesday 15th February 2023

Just like you cannot separate blood from the fresh, we must come to that experience in our walk with God where we know that without the ministry of the Holy Spirit, our lives will fall short of the expectations of the Father.

There has to be a deep sincere innermost longing and a pursuit for Him. 

Acts 2:4 And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance. 

We must transcend a place of just mere saying things mentally and engage our hearts to experience His reality.

Luke 11:5-8 And He said to them, "Which of you shall have a friend, and go to him at midnight and say to him, 'Friend, lend me three loaves; for a friend of mine has come to me on his journey, and I have nothing to set before him'; and he will answer from within and say, 'Do not trouble me; the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give to you'? I say to you, though he will not rise and give to him because he is his friend, yet because of his persistence he will rise and give him as many as he needs.

What came from inside the house did not deter this man, he kept on knocking, and he didn't allow any word to discourage him.

When it is registered in your heart and spirit, no circumstance can stop you. All these giving up that we see is just proof that the desire wasn't real but fake.

If men and situations can cause you to give up, then you do not have a real desire burning in your soul.

Luke 3:21-22 ... Jesus also was baptized; and while He prayed, the heaven was opened. And the Holy Spirit descended in bodily form like a dove upon Him, and a voice came from heaven which said, "You are My beloved Son; in You, I am well pleased."

It is until the Holy Spirit rested upon Jesus and began to lead him and conform to His life that the sonship within Him began to manifest itself.

Romans 8:14 For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. 

You can't manifest sonship unless you are led. A person who is led has yielded their control and will to God.

This has nothing to do with your ordination but with every one of us who wants to reveal the reality of this sonship that we have been born into. Outside the Holy Spirit, you can never manifest it and that's why we have believers but when you look at their lives there is little that we can see of the finger of God in your life.

Throughout the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, anybody who was anybody was nobody but God took His spirit and placed it in them,  it is the spirit of the lord that He placed upon them that made them the way they were.

Probably many of you are strong, and your counting on your; natural wisdom, charisma, or physical structure but all those things will let you down. The reason why some of us pray, fast, and seek God is that we know He is our only advantage.

Romans 14:17 for the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

It is the Holy Spirit who brings the kingdom of God to life, there is nothing in this kingdom that you can do without the ministry and person of the Holy Spirit. Why don't we wake up and embrace Him?

Whether you are a father, mother, career person, businessman, etc, it is the Holy Spirit who brings a difference and gives you an advantage, He is the special one who will make you special.

STAY BLESSED AND HIGHLY FAVORED, WE LOVE YOU. PASTOR BEN OCHOLA!

SENSITIVITY TO THE MOVING OF THE HOLY SPIRIT

Monday 13th February 2023

1 Corinthians 6:12 Glorify God in Body and Spirit All things are lawful for me, but all things are not helpful. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any.

It is possible for God to be moving and you're unaware because of your level of sensitivity to the moving of the Holy Spirit. Often times we've got caught up in so many activities that we become dull, insensitive, and blinded to what the Spirit of the Lord is doing in that our visitation/time/season passed us by. 

You need to be very sensitive in whatever you're engaged in: remember 'good' is not necessarily God. In what you engage in, does it edify you? 

Proverbs 20:12 The hearing ear and the seeing eye, The Lord has made them both.

There is a need to see and hear correctly because life is too short to be run like a lottery. We've wasted enough time in the past, we don't have the luxury to try and error. Spiritual precision and accuracy is the catchword for a believer in this age. 

This calls for a strong fellowship with the Holy Spirit especially immersing yourself in the Word and the Word governing your thought process and feelings (will and emotions).  (Romans 15:4)

John 1:4 In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.

Life is not about creativity but about discovery because everything God ordained, He has already put into place. Our biggest challenge is our eyes to see and we walk in there; to discover and manifest them for this is your only duty as a believer.

1 Corinthians 2:9 ...“Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, Nor have entered into the heart of man The things which God has prepared for those who love Him.”

Things have already been prepared, all you need to do is pray, seek the Lord, and fast yourself into the prepared. Locate that which God prepared and walk into it. We are not here for our will but His will.

When Jesus had just returned from the wilderness with great power, He had discovered, prayed, and fasted Himself into what was already prepared (already written in the book). Hebrews 20:7 

We don't have time for guesswork anymore, we have to hit the bull's eye: this calls for a certain level of precision. It takes alignment with/ yielding to the Holy Spirit. 

We are not in ordinary times and seasons, therefore,  our seeking, praying, and day-to-day living cannot be ordinary; make up your mind not to be ordinary.

Matthew 11:16-17 “But to what shall I liken this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to their companions, 17 and saying: ‘We played the flute for you, And you did not dance; We mourned to you, And you did not lament.’

There is a danger to being insensitive to what the Spirit of the Lord is doing because you'll look like one who is not born again or like prayers don't work.

But this is not so because God in His economy designed seasons and times. So you move by His timing and seasons. Nature has also got its times and seasons but God sometimes superimposes His will over the natural. Therefore,you don't have to be bent on the natural dimension but be sensitive to that which is of heaven. 

STAY BLESSED AND HIGHLY FAVORED, WE LOVE YOU. PASTOR BEN OCHOLA

DEEPER HUNGER AND THIRST FOR THE HOLY SPIRIT 

Thursday 09th February 2023

Isaiah 55:1 "Ho! Everyone who thirsts, Come to the waters; And you who have no money, Come, buy and eat. Yes, come, buy wine and milk Without money and without price.

What is that which a man can buy without money and his life is restored? What is that which satisfies this world without money?

This means that there is something we can purchase from God which will satisfy every longing and answer all the questions in our lives.

John 7:37 On the last day, that great [day] of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, "If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink.

That which cannot be bought by money is bought/ purchased by hunger, thirst, or soul desperation. How thirsty or hungry are you? What are you thirsty for?

Everywhere, people are thirsting and hungering for things that money can buy but there is a call from Heaven that money can't buy and when you get it, you get everything including that which money buys.

Psalms 46:4 [There is] a river whose streams shall make glad the city of God, The holy [place] of the tabernacle of the Most High.

The Holy Spirit is the ultimate answer that we can buy without money. You draw Him with your thirst and hunger and when He comes, everything is sorted.

Acts 1:4 And being assembled together with [them,] He commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the Promise of the Father, "which," [He said,] "you have heard from Me;

Do you know that Jesus never left the apostles with a single cent, a bank account, or property, and there was no physical material that they could hold on to for three and a half years? All He left them with, was a promise of the Holy Spirit. 

They stayed in prayer and on the tenth day, the Holy Spirit showed up and the rest became history (Acts 2:2). If we can get back to this place, we will be able to fulfill the mandate of God upon our lives. It will change our businesses, marriages, children, etc.

It is the ministry of the Holy Spirit in our lives that will answer everything that is questioning us. There is nothing new, let us get back to the original, authentic, basic, and precious Holy Spirit.

STAY BLESSED AND HIGHLY FAVORED, WE LOVE YOU. PASTOR BEN OCHOLA