Cares Global Network
Divine Connection
TOPIC: Mature and Single in the Church… You Are Original
I thank Pastor Omorho Obo of RCCG Jubilee International Center New York for the invitation. Being invited to minister, speaks of relevance. It is a blessing for one’s calling or career to be relevant. I pray that you and yours are blessed and those who need healing receive healing in Jesus name.
You are TREASURED:
1. No other human has your finger or palm prints
2. No other human alive has your eyeballs
3. No other human alive has your footprint
4. The chance of genetic compatibility is 2 in 6.4 million, you are rare
5. Though humans share 99.5% of same DNA, .5% equals millions of differences; even twins have different .25 genetic identity.
Another thing that makes you originally special is that you are graced. Matthew 25:20-30 mentioned talents and how this multiplied via investment; you have the ability to multiply.
You are THEMED:
When they want to bring out a new car, it would be given a brand to tell a story. Many things run through the Bible from the story of creation to the story of ascension. If I am to give a theme to the Bible, my calling or my life, I will say, GRACE. You are GRACED.
1. Grace saved me, delivered me, healed me, sustains me and to make heaven I still need grace. I am not a sinner but I sinned, and grace came through. When I found myself homeless after a season of having a family in a beautiful home, hosting at one point 13 people under our roof, it was grace that changed my story. When after suffering a miscarriage I went in for surgery and 2 hours became 6 hours and two days after I was told I was bleeding internally and would be returned to the theatre, it was grace that came through. Ephesians 2:9 puts it succinctly; “For by grace are you saved…. It is a GIFT… Not of works, lest any should boast. You are GRACED.
2. Grace terminates disgrace and humiliates enemies
3. Grace draws resources – time, talent, token, treasure, temerity
4. Grace dominates places, situations and environment
5. Grace creates conducive atmosphere for growth and progress
6. Grace celebrates the carrier, it moves you from obscurity to celebrity
7. Grace sustains, enables and strengthens
8. Grace restores; whatever you may have lost, grace restores
9. Grace refines. The grace of education and knowledge makes you refined
10. Grace beautifies; no one reckoned with Ruth but grace beautified her life
You are TIMED:
No one is on earth forever. Also, we all have 24 hours DAILY. Time should not be wasted. If you realise you only have 57 years to live, you probably would have said YES to someone. What does John 2:4 say? Mine hour is yet to come. Ecclesiastes mentioned a time to be born and a time to die. When people ask how I can combine being a preacher with being an advocate I tell them that the time of peace comes after a time of war and the time to speak comes after silence in the Bible. If we won’t war with guns, then advocacy matters. It is the evangelism of John the Baptist, war of Deborah, advocacy of Rev. Martin Luther King that has made many free today. Ecclesiastes 9:11 talks about time and chance; the race is not to the swift BUT time and chance happens. May time and season work to favour you, AMEN.
How can you be beautified by grace to show forth your originality?
I believe we are already beautified but there are different levels of beauty and different levels of grace. Panda (adulterated) earrings are earrings. Gold earrings are earrings. If of same size, shape and design, which do you think would reflect, “Beautified by Grace”? Of course the gold earrings because it is refined and would glow.
To be beautified by grace you need to understand that as a woman or man you are created beautiful (Psalm 139:14). Wonderfully made as a masterpiece. Men are created from rare raw materials while women are fashioned delicately from refined products. Look at your hands? In your hands are special lines; there are no other like yours. You are specially designed by grace. It is essential that you consciously show forth grace. The question is how?
1. In Worship
2. In Words
3. In Ways
4. In Wealth
5. In Wisdom
6. In Warmth
7. In Wellness… Each is a sermon but we have limited time. When youdo1-8…
8. In Wonder When graced in 1-7, insults, shame and disgrace would be terminated.
1 Peter 5:10 - But the God of all grace, who hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while, make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you.
It is because of that “suffer” that I avoided using this as text for our Graceful Women Conference. I couldn’t ask people to keep reading, “suffered a while” on our flyer. Suffering can be trauma inducing. You will not suffer beyond what you can bear in Jesus name. Amen.
To be refined as gold, to be beautified by grace you must pass through fire. This is the part many do not like about grace - the element of fear and the element of suffering. If raw gold could complain, it would ask not to be thrown into fire. It could not have been easy when Esther was groomed for the beauty contest. It could not have been easy when Ruth was widowed. It could not have been easy when the Shunammite woman was wealthy but had no child to call her own. After these women had gone through “fire”, they broke the walls of limitation to show forth God’s beauty!
Have you heard me say anything about marriage or children? Grace is how you exude relevance. When you are graced many will stop asking for what they consider as blessings as they would see your relevance. You will be established, strengthened and settled in Jesus name. Pandemic will not make you panic in Jesus name. Divine grace is undeserved favour from God, from Divinity, from the Trinity. How many have remained at peace in this panic-inducing pandemic; I won’t insist you answer individually. But, if you know the God who serves divine grace, should you panic? Grace is unmerited favour but it does not just come.
I will wrap up by sharing three stories with you.
1. The story of Rebecca and Isaac. It is the story of matchmaking by the most improbable person – a senior special assistant who journeyed 450miles in search of a divine connection. Rebecca’s parents did not want her to leave but she asked not to be delayed. What was the most important thing they gave her? It was not a thing but a person, a nurse. That nurse was to equally serve as her mentor, her guide, her special assistant and her caregiver but all we heard of her was that she was assigned and then she died. Little wonder Rebecca’s marriage became rooted in bitterness. She met a man who was depressed from loosing his mother and what did they do first – SEX. Sex puts your head in the cloud and takes your brain away, if it is not shaped by the right approach.
2. Next is the story of Boaz. Who says men are not in the same boat of marital delay! I counselled a man of means recently, he was talking about sex he had about 30 years ago…. He jumped over 20 years of marriage to talk about a girl he met on the roadside. Why? God led me to the root of his bitterness - he was bitter about his “messy” divorce. Boaz had his own issues. He was successful but unmarried. He had to be matched to a woman who had lost all measure of societal grace. Having mentors positioned him.
3. My third story is what I call my potted pepper plant story. God asked me to share on Thursday, when I was thinking about this programme. When God wants to bless His elects, He puts together a programme, event or situation. My son met his bride, when a lecturer put them in same group in final year. The lecturer ended up not grading the project. Today is your own day of visitation. Grace found you. I bought EXPENSIVE red bell peppers. I decided I should no longer pay so much for pepper I can grow. The pepper was what colour – RED. I scooped out the seeds and planted. I nurtured it, watered it and watched it grow. Two came out green and I said to myself, it would soon be red. Brethren, after about two months, during which all other buds that were blooming stopped growing, I watched my pepper become greener until I decided to pluck. What could I have done, post 5 options – trash it, thrown it out in the yard in annoyance, trace where it was bought and go and make noise, start research or start advocacy about how store owners must be injecting fruits with colour. Now that I am sharing it, I remember that when I blended that pepper, it stained the cover of my blender and I washed and washed to no avail. So what did I plant? Red pepper. What was I expecting? Red pepper. What did I nurture? Red pepper? What did I picture in my mind? Red bell peppers that will save me from having to pay exorbitantly for pepper. But what did I get? Disappointment! Translate that to men and women and you immediately see why and how many relationships end in one of three options – disappointment, divorce or death with having joy. Perhaps it may have turned red the next hour or day or month; I will never know. I plucked the two, cut them up and put them in the fridge. I put one in my mouth and realised it was sweet green pepper; perfect for fried rice – then I smiled. I had not cooked fried rice in a while because when I buy green pepper, within two days, they turn red. Now I have what? Green pepper. But this is because my perspective changed. Talk about making lemonade out of lemon.
Once have I spoken, I pray the Holy Spirit would activate the Power and Grace of God in YOU to expand my words into wisdom and wonder in your lives in Jesus name
Brethren, I have one more thing to share if time permits but first I will open the floor for Q.
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
As requested by Pastor Omorho Obo, let me address men. Those who desire marriage need to let go to and their personality desire and follow their heart if God lives there. You need a God-led woman for your destiny to bloom and blossom; you cannot facially know who.
Finally, I want to share this with you to help you with charting a purposeful course that will lead you to partnership in career, calling or courtship or couple-ship and to possibilities in any of these electives. The former DC committee member who referred me knows I charge for sessions, but when I have an opportunity to reach groups, I am happy to freely share in hope that God will transform them and count it as seeds worthy of fruitful harvest:
1. Who are YOU? When you understand that you are originally treasured, you will no longer let discrimination ruin your joy. Before getting married, I devised strategy for evading nosey family members. For instance, I follow my grandmother’s tradition of going to naming ceremonies at 7AM or 8AM. I pray for the baby, give my gift and leave. I also go to church for weddings and leave. If I decide to go to reception, I arrive early or around picture time. I make sure the couple see me but I don’t linger except I am busy with helping out, in which case no busybody will make me a topic.
2. Why are YOU here? Purpose. If God sent you here to earth to be a sex machine to someone, have children, nurture; fine. Don’t stress about aspiring. Children? You can acquire biologically via sex or insemination, adopt, admit or ask to be assigned.
3. What are YOU here for? If you are here to run a basic soup kitchen, be satisfied with mediocrity; no matter how tasteless it would work for some. But if you are to be Rosa Parks, knowing you are timed, you need to get on that bus SOON. Lives are waiting for your civil disobedience to break free from age-long enslavement. It took one man’s decision to give us light bulb. Mr. Steve Harvey, a father of 7, credits his wife, Marjorie Bridges for making him a better man. See this video: youtu.be/hpJTAAWPOjU.
4. Where are YOU going? A one-hour trip can be done with just anybody, live life loud and just be on the high – it is a sprint. But if your journey is for 10 hours, having a sleeper by you means you are by God doing all the driving or parking your car. Where you are going should shape who you invite to go with you. Agbani Darego may be cool, but when you need to build a campground with limited resources, you need a woman who can get her hands dirty as co-labourer.
5. When are you starting? If your plan is for beetle (Volkswagen) aka ijapa, you need not bother about starting early or starting now. A man at 70 bought a bicycle and named it jeje l’aiye gba – life requires calmness. If that is you, starting later is okay. Otherwise you need to pray the prayer I prayed at 38, “Lord I know that man is alive, if he has made up his mind not to marry, break his bone into subjection as you did for Adam and to Jacob.” Truly brethren, the man I married did not think of marriage until he had hip surgery and found himself alone and lonely. Before then, work and much money from work kept him busy and fussy.
6. When all the above is sorted then you need to figure out the how of your life alone or with your partner in progress. If you choose not to marry, how prepared are you? If you choose to marry but no children comes, how prepared are you? If you marry and husband dies or sues for divorce, how prepared are you? If you marry a loving man or woman who suddenly cannot do sex because of impotence or adhesion, how prepared are YOU? That will take us right back to #1. WHO REALLY ARE YOU?
7. When you know all the above about yourself then you need to figure out how to make your life count for something which is projection. Do you want to touch lives in your heart (imagination; soul travel to Andrew or Angela), or you want to touch real people in your home or real people in your homeland – what legacy would you like to leave behind. Pastor Ibidun Ajayi-Ighodalo did not wait for a miracle to happen, she birthed children from her heart. Wherever her story is shared, it will include motherhood. Why are you waiting for a man or woman if you love children? Many need mothers and fathers – you can foster or adopt formally or informally. If you treat them well, they will be insurance for your old age. Neither Mary nor Joseph was BIOLOGICAL PARENT to JESUS. They were both graced to be His parents.
8. When you know all the above about you, you will need to understand that you are nothing and can achieve nothing without the one who owns your life and can pull the plug even as you keep changing ideas, opinions, decisions and mates like towels. The God factor MUST be in.
Appreciation.
Closing Prayer.
09.26.2020
