It is very clear to everyone that the game has changed. The Church has left the building and it's in the streets. The change we have all longed for is here. The transition of things, spiritual and physical is here. The possibilities and opportunities are boundless and only our imagination will stop us. We all agree that Church, the way we have known it up till now, has changed. It seems that God is pushing the fact that the church is not just a building but an organism that He has set up in the earth to influence it to reflect the kingdom of Heaven as against the desires of the enemy of mankind, the devil. However, I would like to submit to you that there must be some apostolic action backing all these prophetic declarations we have received. There must be some divinely instruction that we carry out to make these wonderful prophetic words a reality. The truth is that God doesn't just give us great dreams or allow us peek into the future of possibilities just to excite us and give us an adrenaline rush.
Mantles are dropping and anointings are being released in these days we find ourselves but the purpose must be made clear. These spiritual graces and platforms are for repairing the breaches and restoring the broken down walls of society. The cities must be rebuilt and the streets must be restored so that the solitary will find families to live in. The focus of my post today is to encourage us to begin to receive instructions on how we can become active players in the society we live.
Jesus called us both salt and light in Matthew 5:13-16. One of the main qualities of light is that it
illuminates. Light cannot be in a place and not be seen. It will always dispel darkness. As lights, we are meant to provide leadership to our world. We are meant to be the ones to show them what is right and what should be done. Before now most of us have been afraid to shine our lights. What do I mean? We have taken the path of political correctness.
What is political correctness? It is simply when you try not to be offensive with a truth you have to tell someone. It is when you say that Jesus is not the only way and that other people have other ways to get to heaven. The reason for being politically correct is because we don't want to look intolerant and disrespectful of other people. In the end the price you pay for political correctness is COMPROMISE. We end up being like Lot, a righteous man who gradually allowed the perverse world around him to squeeze life out of him. Ultimately Lot lost his entire family to the evil culture of Sodom.
One of the things that light does very well is dispel darkness. To dispel or repeal darkness, light must shine. What does that mean? Let me illustrate with a small story. Just this morning I heard that a petrol station close to my house was selling fuel. I hadn't even taken my bath before I quickly bounded to the place. You needed to see how many people were there. It wasn't surprising considering that for about a 3-5km distance there were no other places selling petrol. As is it a standard in Nigeria, you would meet all kinds of guys at the filling station with cars, motorcycles (okadas) and all kinds of plastic kegs to buy fuel. The unspoken rule is that we should all line up but as corruption and indiscipline has entered into our society, there were some people who were shunting and making a mess of all of us lining up. To cut a long story short, I had to confront one of the guys who wasn't willing to wait to buy less than 4 liters of petrol. He didn't flinch and I was miffed. However my action led to many of the people there, mostly men, speaking about the lack of patience most Nigerian are known for (when we are in Nigeria, that is).
Initially many of the men, even though they were angry about the whole issue, they didn't do anything. However when I began to speak out, they had some courage to fight the corruption that was brewing in this filling station. Finally, we rallied ourselves and enforced some form of order in the filling station. Imagine what would have happened if there was no light in this situation? Lawlessness and chaos would have reigned supreme.
My final submission? Be the light. Speak up against lawlessness. Don't just turn the other way and pretend as if you didn't see it. Make an attempt to speak up. God will give you the courage and wisdom to shine as lights.
