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Immediate
Obedience
The Way to Receive Blessing & Avoid Judgment
by Pastor John Hamel
"For people who hate discipline and only get more
stubborn, there'll come a day when life tumbles in and they
break, but by then it'll be too late to help them." (Proverbs
29:1 Message Bible)
Some people wrongly
believe that when the Holy Spirit
instructs them to start doing something or to stop doing something, they
have all the time in the world to obey Him. If the Holy Spirit is
instructing you to quit a certain sin, to talk to someone about something,
to fix a certain situation, to give something to someone, etc.,
consider this a loving warning.
Dragging your feet when He is
instructing you in any matter can be quite dangerous indeed. The more
you resist the Holy Spirit, the harder your heart becomes to His voice. Although He will
continue to speak to you, to guide you and to correct you,
you'll be unable to hear His voice clearly. You are
desensitizing your spirit to the voice of His Spirit by ignoring
Him.
This
is what happened to Israel in the wilderness.
God gave them clear guidance and direction continually and they continually
resisted Him in it. Almighty God was trying to guide them to the
place of great blessing, the Promised Land. He told them, in essence,
"Go in and possess it. It's all yours. All you have to do
is take it."
However, they balked. They dug their heels
in. They chose rather to focus on the negative, the reports of giants
in the land and froze in fear. Imagine someone believing that
the end result of immediate obedience to God would be loss or
destruction.
Immediate obedience never costs, it always pays.
God
understood Israel's
fear but He still required
their immediate obedience. Israel
ignored God's guidance and warning for so long that He finally went ahead
and honored their free wills, allowing them to just die out there in the
wilderness. They were so fearful, stubborn and stiff-necked, that
finally their lives "tumbled in" and it was too late to help
them.
God simply wanted to lead Israel
into the tremendous blessing He had prepared for them but they were too
afraid, rebellious, prideful and
stubborn to obey Him immediately.
Israel
wandered around in stubbornness and fear until they dwindled down from
over six million plus individuals to two individuals named Joshua
and Caleb. The Lord actually had to wait until He could raise up an entirely new generation of willing,
compliant, immediately obedient people before He could take them into the
Promised Land.
Israel
was stubborn. Israel
was afraid to obey. Israel
gave up everything for one thing ... rebellion! (Nehemiah 9:6-37)
We
can all learn a great lesson from Israel.
When the Holy Spirit says, "Stop that now" concerning a
particular sin or behavior, obey Him immediately. When He says,
"Drop everything and fix that situation", you'd do well to obey
Him immediately. When He says, "I want you to do something for
Me", it is always wise to obey Him, pronto.
It is always unwise,
even foolish, to tell Him, "I'll do it later" or "I'm
just not going to do that. I can't."
Imagine
telling God that you "can't" do something that He said you
"could" and "must" do. He does not mind you asking for help when His direction seems impossible.
(James 1:5-8) However, He will not long tolerate deliberate
disobedience or rebellion. (Genesis 6:3)
When
the Holy Spirit corrects us, it is always to bless us. When the Holy
Spirit directs us, it is always to bless us. When the Holy Spirit
instructs us, it is always because He desires to do two things for
us. He desires to protect us and
He desires to provide for us.
After
nearly 70 years in public Ministry, Dr. Kenneth E. Hagin
made the following comment in his book, "He Gave Gifts Unto
Men." "There is nothing more lacking in the
Charismatic Movement than commitment, consecration and respect for the
things of God." After over 30 years of
Christianity and over 25 years as an Evangelist, Teacher and Pastor, I have become more than
acquainted with Dr. Hagin's
observation.
No Christian
who expects to receive from God proficiently can afford the supposed
luxury of a lack of commitment, a lack of consecration and disrespect
for the things of God. This is the type of behavior that brings judgment from
God when we refuse to judge it for ourselves. (Isaiah 26:9; 1Corinthians 11:31,32)
Immediate obedience to the leading of the Holy Spirit is a sign
of spiritual maturity.
Disobedience to His leading is a
sign of immaturity and rebellion. Disobedience is yielding to the
spirit of lawlessness, the spirit of
anti-Christ.
Brother
Hagin, in one of his final prophecies before
traveling on to Heaven, decreed by inspiration of the Holy Spirit that the
year 2005 was to be a year of "... judgment upon individuals,
families and nations." Individuals,
families and nations who continued to refuse to be changed by God's warning
of pending judgment were changed by the actual judgment itself. That
judgment actually only began in 2005, even as the Prophet decreed.
You
don’t hear much about it in the secular media but India,
Sri
Lanka,
Thailand,
Sumatra,
Maldives,
all of Southeast Asia and
the entire Indian Ocean
rim opened themselves up to the Tsunami that occurred during that time. That entire
area is an absolute demonic stronghold of "Gay Friendly" ocean
resorts literally fighting with one another in competition for the
homosexual dollar. Muslims forbid homosexuality for themselves but
actually operate, for profit, many of the homosexual resorts that were
wiped out by the Tsunami.
They
literally brought this judgment upon themselves and their innocent
neighbors by refusing to change. It's only the beginning of a tough
row to hoe for those who are not immediately obedient to the Spirit of the
living God and His Holy Word. The
laws of sowing and reaping are set into motion against sinners by their own
sins. God set it up to work that way
so that we would keep ourselves in tow.
"Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy
backslidings shall reprove thee: know therefore and see that it is an evil
thing and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God, and that my
fear is not in thee, saith the Lord God of
hosts." (Jeremiah 2:19)
Personally, we
have been corrected by God's warning of coming judgment and we have been
corrected by judgment itself. We have discovered experientially that
being corrected by the warning of coming judgment is better. FAR BETTER. The Bible says that
when we foresee judgment coming and continue in disobedience, we are
simpletons. (Proverbs 27:12)
If your heart has been hardened through sin, disobedience or delay, we
believe this Bible study has caused your hardened heart to
be loosened up to obedience, IMMEDIATE OBEDIENCE, in order to avoid
pending judgment.
Israel
suffered horribly and unnecessarily, as individuals, as families and as a
Nation, for refusing to obey the Holy Spirit immediately. You
need not suffer horribly and unnecessarily by
being judged for your
disobedience. You can choose rather to be blessed and to be blessed
big time through obedience. Whatever the Holy Spirit might be telling
you to do or even not to do, obey Him immediately, now.
Train
yourself to always obey Him immediately. This will keep your heart
tender so that you'll always be able to hear Him. He simply wants to
protect you and to provide for you because He loves you.
IMMEDIATE
OBEDIENCE. It's the key to supernatural protection and
provision for
us, our families and our Nation.
Whenever
the Lord tells Barbara and/or me to do something, we like to say,
"Yes, Sir. Is there anything else we can do for
You?" Barbara will tell you, sometimes
I even salute Him when He gives me a command.
After
all, He made us, He saved us, He owns us and He has the
right to command us. We want Him to know He can always count on us to
obey Him IMMEDIATELY.
We're
confident you want the same for yourself, your family and your
Nation.
God
is wanting to fulfill your highest hopes and dreams beginning this very
year. He wants you to overflow with
His blessing.
Receive
His overflow blessing through immediate obedience.
Be Blessed … John and Barbara Hamel
How
to Be Born Again (Receive Christ as Your Savior)
How
to Receive The Holy Spirit & Power
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