Now on the first day of Unleavened Bread, when they killed the Passover lamb, His disciples said to Him, where do You want us to go and prepare, that You may eat the Passover?” And He sent out two of His disciples and said to them, “Go into the city, and a man will meet you carrying a pitcher of water; follow him. Wherever he goes in, say to the master of the house, ‘The Teacher says, “Where is the guest room in which I may eat the Passover with My disciples? Then he will show you a large upper room, furnished and prepared; there make ready for us.
Memory Verse: For You, O Lord, will bless the righteous; With favor You will surround him as with a shield. Psalm 5:12.
I have many times been graced to listen to amazing sermons and one of those is when during church services, the preacher speaks about people in the bible who enjoyed the favour of God throughout their lives. Despite all those great examples and evidence of God’s goodness being cited, I always naturally thought those people only enjoyed those benefits because they were God’s favourites.
I mean how can a natural person like me enjoy the abundance of God’s favour? Do I look like Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, or Solomon and co.? The preacher must only be saying these things because they are written in the bible with the main aim focused on strengthen our faith. Okay, let’s say they just say it for these reasons but have you really experiences Gods favour?
The little things some people do becomes really big deal and they get randomly tagged as “Outstanding” but is that just a natural born ability or where do we draw the line between God’s favour and how can it impact our lives?
The Holyspirt has the perfect answer, and this is written in so many chapters of the scriptures, one of which we read today in Mark 14. The disciples were followers of Jesus during His earthly ministry and even though they knew him and spent time with him, they were not too familiar neither did they make assumptions for Him. His disciples thus asked him, Lord where do you want us to go and make preparations for you to eat the Passover? Mark 14:12.
That question is what’s missing in most of our lives today! We no longer ask God for direction but simply make assumptions that because God is omniscient (Knowing everything), He will just show up and take over our lives but contrary to that, we see right from the beginning of creation that God is only near to those who call on Him and because Eve was capable of making her decision in the garden of Eden, God did not stop her from eating the forbitten fruit, Genesis 3:6.
Because the disciples asked Jesus, He directed them to a place that was furnished and ready, they only had to make a little bit of preparation and the Passover was set. The alternative would have been them having to stress in finding the place, making preparations for the place, arranging some furniture before beginning to make the actual Passover preparation. All that labour would have taken enormous time if they had failed to ask Jesus.
The favour of God is what makes our labour achieve outstanding result in a short time and for this reason King Solomon was able to build a temple for God and His palace at the same time. He was able to do these because He took of the instructions the Lord gave to his father king David, and He followed through.
God is not moved by the level of skills or knowledge acquired because “God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise”1 Corinthians 1:27. Even our inborn, natural abilities can become invalid but with God’s favour, we can really do mighty things.
PRAYERS:
- Father I thank You for being in charge of my life and for the gifts and talents given me
- Thank You for loving me and dying for me on Calvary
- Help me to live my life daily walking with you and building heavenly treasures
- Bless my labour with your favour, guide me always Lord and let me never rely on my own understanding.
- Bring me to the understanding to see you for direction always and not be self-reliant
- Help me to be kind and generous to others, fulfilling your commandment of love
- Forgive my sins Lord and answer my prayers, in Jesus’ name, Amen.
