THE GOSPEL FAITH MISSION INTERNATIONAL (GOFAMINT)
DAY 19: MONDAY 20TH JANUARY 2014
FOCUS: THE LOVE OF GOD THROUGH THE POWER OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
TEXTS: ROMANS 5:5; I JOHN 4:7-20
INSIGHT FOR EFFECTIVE PRAYING
Love, love, love, Love is an endearing and adorable virtue desired by all and sundry. It is an essential and a scarce commodity in our society. All Creature including, animals desire and understand the language of love. Everybody needs and wants it, but only few people have it to offer. On the other hand, God is an embodiment of it. God is love, inside out. His attitude and relationship with human beings are purely and fully in love. He loved the World so much that He gave us His only begotten Son. His love made Him to provide for the needs of all human beings. He made His rain and sun to fall and shine upon the good and the wicked. Our make-up and entire being is the product of His love. He made the earth and its fullness and handed it over to man without a charge. His love is higher, deeper and wider than human comprehension!
Human being is entirely opposite instead of love. Instead of love, man is full of wickedness against his neighbor, he hates, cheats, supplants, destroys, manipulates, degrades and disrespect fellow beings to say the least. Thank God for God’s greatest gift of love which is Jesus Christ. It is only in this divine gesture that the hope for love is restored to the fullest. It is through this divine love that sinners are restored back to God. It is in it that we pray and have answers from God. It is on this same platform that Jesus Christ sent the Holy Spirit to us as our counselor and comforter.
When the Holy Spirit comes, He arms Himself with this all-important virtue of love. When one becomes a child of God through Christ and is filled with the Holy Spirit, one distinguishing characteristics that must be glaring in the life of such a person is love. Why? When the Holy Spirit comes into our heart, He spreads the love of God abroad in our lives (Rom. 5:5). This love works both vertically (towards God) and horizontally (towards men). In the early days of our Church, love was the watchword among the brethren. The situation is not the same today again. Hatred, disunity, quarrelling and mistrust is the order of the day. All these are done under the guise of spirituality and holiness.
Majority of us in the Church today are very critical and judgmental. We are too legalistic when handling issues that affect the welfare of our brethren. All these are done under the pretence that we want to help the people to be holy. Many of us have adopted “holier than thou”attitude in our relationship with our brethren. Oh, how satan is using God’s children against one another. Paul said, in Gal. 5:13: “But if ye bite and devour one another beware lest you be consumed by one another”. This is not saying those who erred in the Church should not be disciplined, no. But where is love in the process of our activities as it affects those who erred and those expected to restore.
Can the members confess that they do enjoy love from the leaders as well as other members of the Church? Can all our Ministers in our districts and assemblies say with confidence that they are relating in love and unity? If love is not in full demonstration, let us not make any unnecessary excuse, let us seek for it and ask the Holy Spirit to baptize us once again. We need love!
LET US PRAY
1. We are sober today and unhappy that love is not in its rightful place among us again, please forgive us.
2. In whatever way that we and our leaders have failed to demonstrate love, please be merciful unto us.
3. We come to You today without excuse, that we are destitute of love, oh blessed Holy Spirit, baptize us with Your love.
4. We want to be like God as embodiment of love, dear Lord, fill us with the spirit and power of love in Jesus’ name.
5. Perform Your operation in our lives and remove every bit of hatred element from our hearts oh God.
6. Dear father, make me an instrument of love to demonstrate the agape love to the Church and the World.
7. Make GOFAMINT as a Church an emblem of love and make our assemblies love arena. Let love be visible in our midst.
8. We pray today for every family, especially couples who are destitute of love, overwhelm them with the anointing of love oh dear father in Jesus’ name.
9. In whatever way some people in our midst have not been considerate in administering discipline, to the detriment of the welfare of those disciplined, intervene and remedy the situation, Lord.
10. Whoever that might have been brutalized or felt offended through miscalculated judgment, heal and restore them oh Lord.
11. Help our leaders at different levels of the Church to maintain standard and balanced it with compassion in their ministrations, Oh Lord.
12. Help our leaders at every level of the Church to be models of love within themselves as ministers and with their members.
13. Gal. 6:1-3: Grant unto our disciplinary committee at every level of the Church to handle every case with the spirit and mind of God.
14. Holy Spirit of love, cover us all and fill our lives and Churches totally. Help us to know that we miss nothing when we love and gain nothing when we hate others in Jesus name.
