IT IS ALL ABOUT RELATIONSHIP:
A man goes down on his knee to pray to God and God acknowledges his prayers, sends an Angel to him. The Angel comes down and says, Cornelius, your prayers, your alms have come before the Lord as a memorial, and then the angel sends him to another man for solution. Just imagine, you are praying to God, you are serious with Him. He gets your prayers and sends an Angel to you. The Angel brings a message, "just send some people to Joppa, to call for one Simon Peter who is staying in the house of some one called Simon the Tanner, his house is by the sea, to come and tell you what you ought to do.
What you need from God is already packaged in another person's life. God has prepared help for you; it is in another person's life. You don't exactly know that person, where he lives and what he does but the Lord knows him. Or they might just be the person next door, your acquaintance, the one you have always seen and known. Only God knows His person of the hour for you. When you pray He links you up with that right person and your problem is solved. He knows how to stir them up for the encounter. We call this divine connection. The problem, it might be the person you don't like to see, the person you lowly esteem.
Three men are in a prayer retreat, they are praying and fasting, trusting God for a breakthrough, they have needs that only God can meet. God hears their prayers but refuses to answer them; God wants some one else to pray for them and He will hear. So, God sends them to this man called Job for prayers and instruct them to carry with them an offering (I whish they were sent to me). It is not that God could not hear and answer their prayers, but because God wanted to build their relationship with Job which was badly riddled with false accusation, blame and confusion. The person they accused and blamed for all the sins in this world, is the person God has ordained to pray for them. The person they considered evil and sinful is the man God has chosen as an instrument for their answered prayers. God has put value on good relationships. Job agrees to pray for them and right away a miracle of unprecedented restoration unlocks for Job, as he prayers for his friends. And the Lord turned the captivity of Job when he prayed for his friends; also the Lord gave job twice as much as he had before. Job 42:10.
Awesome. The restoration of job's fortune did not happen because of some 40 days prayers and fasting period, or some casting out of demons of captivity. It happened when Job willingly, obediently and submissively yielded to the inner prompting of the Lord to build his otherwise destroyed relationship with his friends turned accusers. The people you hold as your enemies, who accused you falsely and destroyed your reputation may be the very people who are holding your fortunes from manifesting forth. Release them from your heart and move on with God. You may not be friends again, but holding the grudge will not do you any good. Forgivingness, good relationship, refusing to hold grudge with people is key to your destiny. God loves relationship. He has put values upon it.
A man has a barren wife, they are well stricken in age, and they have no children. But he has a promise from God. Several years ago, the Lord promised him a child but it is really taking long to happen. But then he is willing to prayer for another gentle man and his entire family who have a similar situation. God hears his prayers for his one time enemy and opens the wombs of all females in his household. They have barrenness in their marriage but they are willing to pray for another family suffering the very thing they are suffering. As that family begins to receive their miracles Abraham's family also get the same miracle they were praying for others; so that it might be fulfilled that which was said, "What you make happen for others, God will make it happen for you. It is so amazing to see how the scripture is arranged, in Genesis 20: 17,18, so Abraham prayed unto God: and He healed Abimelech, and his wife and his maid servants; and they bare children, vs. 18 for the Lord had fast closed up all the wombs of the house of Abimelech, because of Sarah, Abraham's wife. We close Chapter 20 with Abraham praying for his erstwhile enemy to receive a miracle and we open chapter 21 with this reality, "And the Lord visited Sarah as He had said, and the Lord did unto Sarah as He had spoken. For Sarah conceived, and bare Abraham a son in his old age, at the set time of which the Lord had spoken to him. The time for God to fulfill His promises to Abraham had arrived, and Abraham had to do something about it. He had the keys in his own hands. How you handle the people in your life, which might have even treated you badly, could be the ignition key you need to start the engine of your life. You need working relationships. (See notes on when your enemies are brought at your feet).
Wee see Elijah the prophet camping near the brook Cherith. He is being fed by ravens every day. The river begins to dry and there is lack of water approaching. On the other side of the District of Zarephath, a feeble malnourished widowed woman is scratching her head on what to do with her situation. Both the prophet and the poor widow woman have needs. Elijah needs a shelter, the poor widow need food. Elijah has the miracle the poor widow has the key to ignite that miracle. When they collided head on, a great explosion went off; both of them lived a life on the first lane a life of affluence for as long as the dry season existed in Israel at that time. It was like, "scratch my back I scratch yours situation". I promise, you need a working relationship.
Apostle Paul leaves Athens for Corinth, he joins up with Priscilla and Aquila and they get into some business of tent making. Life is just ordinary; the ministry is at its lowest ebb, nothing significant seems to be happening. There is opposition to the Word everywhere. What excites my heart is that during all the time he was there, the bible says, "He reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath and persuaded the Jews and the Greeks, Acts 18: 3 and 4. Verse 5 brings in a new dimension, "But when Silas and Timotheus were come from Macedonia, Paul was pressed in the spirit, and testified to the Jews that Jesus was the Christ. The arrival of these two gentle men ignited something in Paul. Look at verse 5 carefully. It says .....Paul was pressed in the spirit (spirit with small letters). He got energy in his spirit to testify that Jesus is the Christ. Before the gentle men arrived he felt, weak, and may be lonely, but when they arrived he was stirred in the spirit. You will not succeed much alone; you need some one in your life to support you. You need a fellowship. When two or three people with the same heart comes together, you must feel the heat of whatever they are doing. When we break relationships/ fellowships we do great damage to many important causes.
In Mathews 25: 31 Jesus tells about what will happen at the end. He will come in His glory and all the angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the throne of His glory............all the people shall be gathered to Him, and he will separate them as the shepherd does the sheep and goats. He shall set the sheep on the right hand but goats on the left hand. Verse 34, "Then shall the KING say unto them on His right hand, come ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world, for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you took me in, Naked, and ye clothed me. I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came unto me. Then shall the righteous answer Him, saying, "Lord when did we see you hungry and fed you, thirsty and gave you water. When did we see thee a stranger and took you in, or naked and clothed you, or when did we see you sick and or in prison and came unto you? And the KING shall answer and say unto them, "very I say unto you, in as much as you have done it unto one of the least of my brethren, you have done it unto me. Amazing!!! What you make happen for others you make happen for the Lord. The others on the left hand are told a very heart wrenching thing. Depart from me you cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels for I was hungry and you gave me no meat, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink. I was a stranger, and you did not take me in, naked and you clothed me not. Sick and in prison and you visited me not. And when they will asked why they are sent to hell, the answer will be......"Verily I say unto you, in as much as you did not to one of the least of these, you did it not to me. Don't you feel like you should just remove one pair of shoes from your feet and give it to the one who doesn't have any? Don't you feel like you should just go and build bridges with those you lightly esteem? What takes these people to hell is simply what they did not do to those in a bad situation, which they were able to solve. It is about people and relationship. Staying aloof and being personal was not God's intention. The people on the right hand unlock the door for the poor and the poor unlocks the doors of eternity for them. We need each other.
Finally wee see Paul, before he is converted, on his way to Damascus, he is armed with some documents in his and, authorizing him to do damage to the body of Christ. Jesus meets him along the way in a powerful encounter that leaves him blind for three days. His conversion was extra ordinary. The rest of us have believed in Jesus by faith. We never saw any light, or some fireworks, or some angel dangling in the air with a sword in his hands. We simply believed the Word and received Jesus as Lord and savior. But here is a man who encounters Jesus live on stage. Every one around him stands speechless because they can hear a voice speaking but they don't see anyone. The man Saul, who is to be later renamed Paul is then instructed by the Lord to, "Arise, and go into the city, it shall be told thee what thou must do. We need each other. Jesus refers Paul to another person to be told what to do. Some people have withdrawn themselves from the church fellowship and are now staying alone at home during church services under the disguise that "God is everywhere", He is in my house, in my heart etc I don't need to attend fellowships, I can hear Him hear.. They have developed a mindset that says, "I will only listen to God". Yet God is always speaking to them through others and they don't hear. They are free to choose whatever they want; every person shall give an account of themselves. But The Lord has ordained fellowship and relationship. What you will get in the fellowship of the brethren you will not get when you stay back from the fellowship. Your Ananias is waiting for you at the church service, a rise and go. Your breakthrough is waiting for you in the person of the preacher who is ministering there at the church. People under estimate the power of the spoken word at the fellowships and church meetings, those words carry power and strength, they might be the very thing you needed to jumpstart your stalled life, ministry, marriage, job, health etc. I want to paste here below, some thing I have copied from my book, "The local congregation" which I think might be of help to you.
(The local assembling together in the name of Jesus is therefore God's set pattern for the church that is in the world. We are in the world but we do not belong to it. We will be here in the world for sometimes. While we are here we will always need to show unity, be together, grow together and have fellowship one with another. The local congregation provides the opportunity to exercise unity among the believers. God is everywhere; I know that. He is in your house, in your place of work, in your heart etc. But that same God has said that where two or three (not one) are gathered in my name I will be in their midst. Not just where the wife and the husband are gathered in my name. The husband and the wife is one thing/ I mean person, according to the scripture. It is where two or three are gathered in "my name".
Again; it says,"In the presence of two or three witnesses let a word be established. (Mathew18: 19), that is in a fellowship of unity. It means people must gather together in order for them to be two or three. It is only in that setting that a word will be established, according to the words of Jesus Christ, the head of the church.
Isolating oneself from a godly fellowship is not God's will. He does not like it at all. The shepherd had to leave all the ninety-nine gathered sheep to go and bring back the one, which was isolated from the rest. Just imagine. Whenever we break fellowship we hurt the heart of the chief shepherd, Jesus Christ. We should not break the believers' fellowship by either withdrawing from it or causing others to withdraw from it. God's people must be together in unity. They must meet together always in a particular place on a weekly basis. That place can be a conference hall, an auditorium, in individual's house, a tent, in a field, under a tree.)
May be the person you are fighting against is the one who holds some answers to your question. Could be the church you are trying to delink yourself from is the altar that carries your remedy? The tribe you hate, the race you don't like, that gender you loathe might be the one you need to end the circle of your current predicament. It is all about relationship. In my tribe they have terminologies they apply in reference to other tribes. Those terms are not good, they are abusive and demeaning. After traversing the country I understand that every tribe (ETHNIC GROUP) has got its own derogatory terms and references against other tribes. But very early in my Christian life, the Lord delivered me from tribalism; it has not affected me in the inner man as I see it does to others. Amazingly, some of the great blessings and resources that have come into my hands are from those who are not my tribes' men and women. Tribes have blessed my life, they have fed me. They have clothed and housed me. They have financed my needs and comforted me when grieved. The door I opened is the door that is working in my life. The door you closed is the door that is not working in your life. Some of us could be living in the best level of live so far, the problem is that the people God wanted to use to promote you to that height are the very people your heart resents. They can't get a clue of what God is saying to them about you because you have blocked your link with them. There is no network coverage between you and them in the spirit.
