We are all welcome this morning to today's Leadership Fellowship. We bless God for His ever abiding presence and we thank God for everyone of us. I believe none of us is here by accident, in fact, if I begin to ask everyone of us why we are here; each one of us will tell us at least one reason. So, that tells us that we are not here purposelessly and aimlessly. And so, because we are here for a purpose, God is here to actually fulfill His purpose in our lives. We are welcome in Jesus' name.
Listen To MP3 Podcast: HOW TO GET A PRETERM MIRACLE OR BLESSING FROM THE LORD
This morning, we are looking at something that could be a bit funny. But let us not be smiling with the title but rather, fix our gaze on what the Lord has for us. It is going to be a combination of both assurance and prophecy, it all depends on the side that we belong to. For some people, this word this morning is going to settle their heart and all that they have been praying for, would be settled. Some people may not need to worry again, wherever they could be watching from, we say you are welcome and those who would listen to the message later. We thank you for the gift of your time and we believe God has given you this opportunity to hear something and I want you to be excited about it.
Today we are looking at How To Get A Pre-Term Blessing From The Lord. You can call it miracle if you don't want to use blessing: How To Get A Pre-Term Blessing From The Lord. It is a word for somebody. We are going to start from the book of the prophets, so that we can understand that there is a prophetic side to this word and there is a teaching side to it. Zachariah 10 from verse 1 to 3, the Bible says, and I want us to note every word:
"Ask the Lord for rain In the time of the latter rain. The Lord will make flashing clouds; He will give them showers of rain, Grass in the field for everyone. For the idols speak delusion; The diviners envision lies…"
That is why it has been said that let the Lord be true and every man a liar, whether the man is a sorcerer, is a witch or he is an enemy or he is a demon. Let God be true and every man a liar.
"For the idols speak delusion; The diviners envision lies, And tell false dreams; They comfort in vain. Therefore the people wend their way like sheep; They are in trouble because there is no shepherd. My anger is kindled against the shepherds, And I will punish the goatherds. For the LORD of hosts will visit His flock, The house of Judah, And will make them as His royal horse in the battle."
We will go back to that verse one. It says "ask the Lord for rain." If we stop with that, the quiet implication, the literal meaning of ask the Lord for rain is, if we want to use it in our contemporary time, pray to the Lord about rain. You are in need of rain it says ask the Lord, pray about it. He now says ask the Lord for rain in the time of the latter rain. Whether it is the former or the latter rain, it is the time of rain. It is the time of rain and you are asking in the time of rain.
There is a place we are going to that’s why we are having this foundation. It is possible for you to ask God for something in the time of that thing, but it is also possible to ask God for something when it is not time for that thing and yet God will give it to you. So our focus this morning is to discover How To Get A Preterm Blessing Or A Preterm Blessing Or Miracle From The Lord. Perhaps somebody has said somewhere in your village, in your family or in your office, "you won’t get this until you have spent 10 years here. It will never happen until it has becomes so and so years."
The word of the Lord this morning for you is that you can get it even now. The question is: how can you get it? And that’s what we want to look at. The word "preterm" is a word that is often used by the medical people, and they normally use it to describe, for example, when they say preterm, sometimes they use it with preterm birth; to signify a child, a baby that is born before a specific time. Now, the normal time is forty weeks. Another good time by the medical people is 37. So, any child that is born before that 37 weeks, they call that child preterm. But is that child not a child? So we will discover something.
So, the preterm is a term that is used to signify something or a baby you receive before the weeks are fulfilled. So, how can I for instance, get a blessing, a miracle from God when my time has not come? That is what we are looking at. So, we are moving out of the medical term now, we are going straight to what the Lord has for us today. Let’s quickly go to the book of John chapter 2. We are looking at a matter that we have all known about and we are going to be reminded and God would be showing us new things there. John chapter 2, and I will start my reading from verse 1.The bible says:
"On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. Now both Jesus and His disciples were invited to the wedding. And when they ran out of wine, the mother of Jesus said to Him, They have no wine. Jesus said to her, Woman, what does your concern have to do with Me? My hour (another word for time)has not yet come. His mother said to the servants, Whatever He says to you, do it."
John 2:1-5
His hour has not yet come. But there is a secret to getting from Him, the Lord; what you desire even though the time has not yet come. We are going to begin our meditation from verse one. The Bible says "the mother of Jesus was there." There was a wedding in Cana of Galilee and the mother of Jesus was there. Now, if the Scripture had stopped there. Should there be a need for wine in the course of that wedding and only the mother of Jesus was there without Jesus, then the situation is compared to a situation of a people who have a form of godliness but they lack the power thereof.
Now, because the mother of Jesus is the one that brought Jesus to the earth, so to say, and so, she can speak to Jesus and Jesus will listen. She has a way of getting things from Jesus. She knows how. But if she is the only one that is there, then it means that when there is a need for wine and there is no wine, she will tell them a way to get it but they may never be able to get it. So, you will understand that it is possible for a people who have been brought up under a particular religion, to know how to get things, but lack the will and the power to get it. It is not enough for you to have the knowledge of how to get a thing, you must have the power that gets it for you. Bible says "you will remember the Lord thy God for it Him that gives you power to get wealth."
It is not enough to have the knowledge of how to get wealth, you need a power to get it. You need an enablement. It was only Jesus who carried that power in that moment, the mother of Jesus didn’t have it. The best she could do was to guild them, she advised them. But if all we have as a people is advice, or we have guidance and counsellors, we will still be in need of the true change, the true blessing that we want from God.
Some people can be surrounded by doctors and doctors are giving them reports. They can surrounded by nurses, they can even be surrounded by friends and family members telling them "it is well, just do this, it will be ok." It is not enough to have people telling you what to do. You need the power that gets the blessing for you. So don’t just have a form of that godliness or a form of God, have the power of God. And so let’s continue. These people did something that we must not miss. The Bible says the mother of Jesus was there, and then the bible says both Jesus and His disciples; Bible didn’t say Jesus and His disciples were there. It says "they were invited." Another word for that invited is that they were prayed to.
For example, if brother Abiola want me to attend to something, he can just say "DD, come for that thing." But if you want Buhari to attend something, you don’t just say "Buhari come for that thing." You have to follow a protocol. You say "we wish sir that you attend." You begin to use all manner of words. And it could form a kind of prayer. The higher the authority you are seeking his/her presence, then the more you have to, I don't know the kind of words that I should use; package your presentation. You don’t want to miss out.
Is it not like praying? Jesus we have a wedding at Cana, in fact we have everything. Don’t forget when they started this wedding they had everything, they had their wine. In fact they had their plans. But I am sure there was something within them witnessing, this wedding will never be a successful wedding until you invite Jesus to it. Don’t just invite His mother, invite Him. Bible says "and Jesus was invited." So it means they invited Him. Many of us have learnt that God is all powerful, but on this earth, there are certain things God will never do until we invite Him. And we invite Him in the place of prayer and so there were certain things that was going to take place in that wedding even before time that only God could save them from, and these people were wise enough to have prayed to God, ahead of time.
Because you wonder, I have attended many ceremonies. I don’t when anything finish and they came to me that they needed something. The question is: Why did they go to Jesus that they needed wine? Why didn’t they buy, go to the market and buy wine? So it is sir, even though these people could be rich, they have gotten to a desperate mode. If God does not intervene in their situation at that wedding there would be shame. And that is when God loves to intervene. When you have no alternative. When you are not anticipating anything elsewhere, where you begin to think if I can get this, if I can get that I think I will be okay. In instances like that, I think God will not intervene because if God intervenes, you ascribe the glory to something else. The moment you get to a point that is only God, then God will show up so that when God shows up you will Know that it was God showed up for me.
These people got to a moment in their event that if God didn’t intervene, there was no wine anywhere, no shop to get it. No place. And so, let us continue again with our reading. And Jesus said to the mother: "Woman, what does your concern have to do with Me? My hour has not yet come." So the question is: How can I get a blessing from the Lord, a miracle from the Lord when my time has not yet come? His mother said to the servant "whatever He says to you do it." This is not a time begin to add logic or add feelings or emotions. Do as commanded. If you want to get something when your time has not come, then you must be a man or a woman who simply responds to the will of God. It's like a man who is following the tide of the flow.
There is a flow and you are following that tide. The Spirit of the Lord is moving and you being led by Him. In the book of Romans 8:14 the Bible says "for as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God" and it is the sons of God that can demonstrate the power of God on the earth. So, if Jesus is led by God, and you and I are led by Jesus, are we not led by God? That is it! So, whatever Jesus can command, we can command it. Problem arises when God is all powerful, God loves us and He has a great plan for us and He is trying to lead us in a certain way, and we want to follow a different way. So, let us continue. I am sure we know that Scripture very well, let’s keep to verse 9, we know the process that they went through.
"When the master of the feast had tasted the water that was made wine, and did not know where it came from (but the servants who had drawn the water knew), the master of the feast called the bridegroom. And he said to him, Every man at the beginning sets out the good wine, and when the guests have well drunk, then the inferior. You have kept the good wine until now!"
John 2:9-10
The good wine that was kept until now was a product of what they termed pre-term. The result that they got, that they called good wine; came in a process that they called pre-term. It was at the time when Jesus said "my time has not yet come, my hour has not yet come." It was in that moment when His hour has not yet come that He gave instructions that were followed and it produced a result that was even better than what preceded it. It is not enough for you to receive something from the Lord and just call it preterm. It is not even a good idea. And say "what God has given to me is not yet matured." You must be careful how you do that.
The reason is this. God in His faithfulness, does not do things in a manner that we assume, No! If only you will do what He commands you. If only you will not be agitated. If only you will take water, and you will not say otherwise. Don’t forget these people, Jesus told them to fill the pot with water and He told them to carry the water and give it. If it were some of us; we would reason it out. We would say something like; "This doesn't make sense, won't these people slap us. They are expecting wine we are giving them water."
It's just like me expecting active juice, and you are giving me water. If I have the mind to slap you and I have the capacity to slap you I will. Did you miss your road or have you missed your mind? These people did not doubt Jesus because the mother said whatever He ask you to do, do it. At this point in your life when God is releasing His blessing to you, are you receiving specific instructions from the Lord and you are doing it or you are being agitated over it?
If what God is doing is going to be the best of them all, then it is not because whether it was preterm or term, it would be because you are doing what God ask you to do. It says you have kept the best wine until now. And so I use this opportunity to announce to somebody somewhere who gave birth to a child and the doctor said the child has not yet fulfilled the weeks. And you are now worried, I am here t to announce to you that that baby is going to be the best of them all. Why? Whatever He ask you to do, you are doing it.
What does it mean to do whatever He ask you to do? It means the only thing you want to do is His will. You are not trying to fulfil any desire of yours. In fact, this is a point taking you out of yourself; taking you out of your own glory into God's glory. What you seek is His glory. Why won’t you do what God is asking you to do? Sometimes we fear if I do what God is asking me to do He might just take the glory. Let me do it myself so that I can boast to men, "I woke up in the morning I did this, and that and all of that et cetera…." You don’t give glory to God. When you don’t do as He ask you to do. No matter what you desire from the Lord, even though you tell yourself it's not yet time, God is able to give it.
However, towards getting it, you must do whatever He ask you to do. The word looks so short and simple but If we continue with that story we would realize that the servant did not struggle with any part of it. It was a simple word. Whatever! It is not when He tells you things that are nice. It says whatever just do it. If you do what He is asking you to do then you will get His results. When the people of the world tells you things and you are doing what they asked you to do; you get their results if their results are not sure then what you get will never be sure.
If you want to command God kind of result, then you must listen to the word of God and do it. You must not entertain fear. I just imagine the bride groom. Bro B, I know when you did your wedding, you were never thinking anything will finish. The bridegroom too was never thinking anything will finish, because by the time people begin to carry the news around, they will say "he invited us, in fact almost more than half did not eat anything." You don’t want that because it brings shame to the person that organizes such.
So, it could have led to panic, and in panic, He could have been frustrated, he could even get to a point where he does not even know what to do. How can I get out of this mess? Thank God for the mother of Jesus who directed them to the right place. Even though the time has not yet come for miracles; because they believed, because they did what they asked them to do, they did not doubt, they got a defined result. The result was a wine that was superior to the ones that were before that wine. If you want to command a superior result then be a man that is daily doing whatever God is asking you to do.
Seek the will of God and do it. Don’t entertain fear. Some people; they have told them that until you reach forty years you will never achieve this. Nobody in our family ever does this. Until forty years. God can do it for you. But the same word is whatever the Lord is asking you to do, you must do it. Why is it that none of your siblings has ever done it? They don’t do what God is asking them to do, simple. It's not because you have a different head if God advances you. It is because you have a head, a mind, a spirit that listens to God; that follows God. Being God's favourite is not because of double head, it's because of being focused on God.
In the book of Zachariah that we read, God said He is "angry with the shepherds", why? Their influence on the sheep has not prospered the sheep. The way they lead the sheep, they are not leading the sheep the way He is leading the shepherd. So, let us follow the leadership of the Spirit. Let us do; Jesus said concerning the Spirit; it says "He will take of mine and give to you". So, when the Holy Spirit is taking of Christ and giving to us let’s take it from Him. Let’s do as commanded. And then we will get the result we desire. So, men can call the gift of God in your life preterm; but if you are smart, you will not assume so. Whatever the Lord does is perfect, and it is forever.
That’s the word that has been laid in my heart and I believe that somebody somewhere has received it. It is possible for you to ask for rain in the time of rain, some people could ask for a child when they are within the menopause years, but you could also get it, even after it. God is able to make all grace to abound. Some people have said to some people "because you have fibroid, they must stay so and so time, they must do this and that, then they may then conceive." God can do it. Are you going to be dancing around; chasing them, their opinion, following their reports or you will stay with Him, and do what He ask you to do and the results that you command becomes His desire; His perfect desire for your life.
I believe God we have been blessed. Amen!
