GOD IS NEVER LATE

By Noel Omukubi

Believe even after you have fasted, prayed and waited for long and do not give up. Hold onto the hope that God will come through for you. Remember, though it tarries, it will surely come to pass. God is never late, he is always on time, if only that you would believe in him and wait upon him. In your place of waiting, do not despair, hold onto your faith, believe his word for you. The bible says that his promises are yes and amen.

2 Corinthians 1:20 says that surely he is a God who answers prayers. He is not deaf; he hears your cry and sees your tears. He is preparing your testimony and surely you will rejoice when you see what God will do. He will put a new song on your lips, a song of praise in your heart. He will pick you from the miry clay and set you up on the rock to stand. He will surely turn your life around.

You have endured the shame, the pain, the tears, the torture, the lack, the barrenness and the wilderness. The bible says that God will give you a crown of beauty for ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. He says you will be called an oak of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor.

Look at how beautiful this is, the testimony that God is putting on your lips. The turnaround of your life that God will display to the whole world; even for your enemies to see. Remember what he says in Psalms 23:5 that he will prepare a table before you in the presence of your enemies. Surely God is not a man that he should lie nor the son of Man that he needs to repent. Has he said and will he not do it?

Numbers 23:19 (KJV) says:

 God is not a man that he should lie; neither the son of man that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? Or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?

Isaiah 45:19(NIV) says:   I have not spoken in secret, from somewhere in a land of darkness; I have not said to Jacob’s descendants, ‘Seek me in vain.’ I, the Lord, speak the truth; I declare what is right.

Isaiah 55:11(NKJV) says, So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; It shall not return to Me void, But it shall accomplish what I please, And it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.

The scripture goes further to say in verse 12-13, ‘‘for you shall go out with joy, and be led out with peace; the mountains and the hills shall break forth into singing before you, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.  Instead of the thorn shall come up the cypress tree, And instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree; and it shall be to the Lord for a name, for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off.”

You will laugh again

God has already declared this in his word; that you will rejoice, you will know peace, you will laugh again. Surely you will live again in abundance, amidst plenty, you will rise again, there will be celebration in your house. God has promised you this. Hold onto his promise and he will surely deliver you the same way he delivered the children of Israel after 400 years in bondage in Egypt.

You may say that the situation is so big, so deep, so troubling and there is no way out. You are wondering, ‘how will it be?’ remember nothing is impossible with God, he knows the end from the beginning.  Nothing is too big for him. He parted the red sea to create a road for the children of Israel to cross through. He stopped the river Jordan from flowing so that Joshua and the children of Israel could cross; what is so difficult for him? The bible says in Matthew 19:26 that with God all things are possible. He is the creator of the heavens and the earth and the sea and everything that is in them. What can he not do? Our God is a great God. He is a God of second chances, he will create anew that which is destroyed. He will lift you up beyond your expectations. He glorifies himself in such situations, to him be glory and honour.

You are important to God

by Noel Omukubi

We live in times of isolation where people no longer find it necessary to socialise. It is now normal for people to live next to each other for years and not know each other. Everyone for himself and God for us all is now the motto we live by. People are now lonelier than ever. In this mess that we have created, it is possible to feel like you are not important, that you are not significant, you have no value and that you do not matter to anyone. I have good news for you, you may not be important to man but you sure are important to God and he loves you so much.

People may ridicule you, laugh at you and judge you saying that you are not good enough, you are not beautiful enough, that you are not qualified to be amongst them. Some people with plainly tell you that you are ugly. Let me ask you a question, how can you be ugly if you are created in the image and likeness of God? You are God’s highest creation, actually, you are his latest model.

Psalms 8:4-8 says, "What is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you visit him? For you have made him a little lower than the angels, and you have crowned him with glory and honor. You have made him to have dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet, all sheep and oxen; even the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea that pass through the paths of the seas."

Genesis 1:27- "So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them."

Genesis 9:6- ""Whoever sheds man's blood, by man his blood shall be shed; for in the image of God He made man."

Child of God, stop feeling rejected and inferior. God holds you in very high esteem. You are so important to him and he loves you so much that he gave his only son to die for your sins so that you would not perish but have eternal life with him forever in heaven. How cool is that! 

Does God care about the little things that happen in my life?

By Noel Omukubi

Yes he does!  Consider the following scriptures:

Luke 12:7 says, “Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don't be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.”

Matthew 6:26 says, “Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?” If God even meets the needs of birds who are not made in His image, who have no will to choose Him or reject Him, how much more will he care for your needs in detail? Because of God’s love, you can trust Him: “Your Father knows what you need before you ask him” (Matthew 6:8).

God not only cares about every little detail of your life, he cares for you and wants to know who you are, more so, he wants you to know him. Because once you know him then you will know yourself.  You will realise that God has always cared about you. Can you count the number of hairs on your head? Yet God knows how many they are. Can you tell how your day will turn out? You don’t yet God knows every path you will walk and he says that his word is a lamp to your feet and a light to your path. Do you know when you will get sick? No, yet God has already healed you since by his stripes you are healed. Do you know what your future holds? No, yet God says he knows the plans he has for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, to give you a future and a hope. Even when you are faced with danger, he says he shall deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the perilous pestilence. He shall cover you with His feathers, and under His wings you shall take refuge; His truth shall be your shield and buckler. You shall not be afraid of the terror by night, nor of the arrow that flies by day, Nor of the pestilence that walks in darkness, nor of the destruction that lays waste at noonday. A thousand may fall at your side, and ten thousand at your right hand; but it shall not come near you. Only with your eyes shall you look, and see the reward of the wicked. Because you have made the Lord, who is my refuge, Even the Most High, your dwelling place,
No evil shall befall you, Nor shall any plague come near your dwelling;
For He shall give His angels charge over you, To keep you in all your ways. In their hands they shall bear you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone. You shall tread upon the lion and the cobra, the young lion and the serpent you shall trample underfoot. “

What is it that God does not know about you that he has not taken care of? Jesus became poor that you may be rich. He knew that poverty would look for you so he took care of it in advance that you may enjoy abundance. What about your sin nature, he knew that the only way to restore your relationship with him that had been lost through sin would be if he took it upon himself. That is why he says that while you were still a sinner, Christ died for you. You now have assurance of eternal life because of Jesus. God knows every little detail of your life, every storm you go through he is there with you. He says that when the enemy comes in like a flood, God raises a standard. A standard to shield you, to raise you up above the raging storm that seeks to hurt you in then he hides you under the shadow of his wings where the enemy cannot find you. What is it that he cannot do for you? He knows you very well and he loves you sincerely.

BEYOND LABELS

By Noel Omukubi

Have you ever found yourself labelled? Called names that bring out a negative image of who you are? Have you ever labelled someone? How did that feel? We all label others whether we want to admit it or not. The real question you need to ask yourself is:  What are the labels that I give to others that I need to be aware of in my own life? Many times we overlook and bypass people who have a lot of potential just because we have labelled them as losers or non-achievers. Thank God that he often chooses the ones that we tend to overlook.

The bible also brings out this concept of labeling others very clearly. David had a label on him. To his father, he was almost a non-entity. When Samuel was sent by God to anoint one of the sons of Jesse as the next King of Israel, David was not paraded before the Prophet Samuel as one of the eligible candidates. In fact, Samuel had to ask Jesse, David’s father if he had any other sons since God had rejected all the able bodied good looking young men who were David’s older brothers that had been paraded before him. David according to his father was only good enough for tending sheep. Samuel thought that he found the next king based on the physical look but God had other plans. Good chose to look at the heart and David’s heart was in the right place, it was inclined towards God. God looks at the heart. If the Prophet Samuel operated in carnality, he definitely would not have chosen David since the label on him was that of a nobody.

We do the same thing even in ministry, don’t we? This one sings better, prays better (read louder) so we assume they deserve a position that they truly do not.  May God continually remind us to see others as God sees them – at their heart. Because it would be a true tragedy to skip over the ‘Davids’ in our midst because we are looking and labelling on our own. No one person can be summed up with a simple category, yet we attempt to define others and ourselves in these simplistic and one dimensional labels every single day.

Child of God, you need to remember that God sees so much more than the things that the world is choosing to define you by. God also sees those things in you that others are simply blind to because of the ways that they have chosen to label you. God does see the richness of each and every person and He has such amazing things planned for every person if they simply allow Him to be the one who defines who they are in Him. God wants to give us new labels that He gives from seeing who we really are.