1.
Scripture
Is 60:1 "Arise, shine; for your light has come, And the glory of the LORD has risen upon you.
Is 60:2 "For behold, darkness will
cover the earth And deep darkness the peoples; But the LORD will rise upon you And His glory will appear upon
you.
Is 60:3 "Nations will come to your
light, And kings to the brightness of your rising.
Is 60:4 ¶ "Lift up your eyes round
about and see; They all gather together, they come to you. Your sons will come
from afar, And your daughters will be carried in the arms.
Is 60:5 "Then you will see and be
radiant, And your heart will thrill and rejoice; Because the abundance of the
sea will be turned to you, The wealth of the nations will come to you.
Is 60:6 "A multitude of camels will
cover you, The young camels of Midian and Ephah; All those from Sheba will
come; They will bring gold and frankincense, And will bear good news of the
praises of the LORD.
Is 60:7 "All the flocks of Kedar will
be gathered together to you, The rams of Nebaioth will minister to you; They
will go up with acceptance on My altar, And I shall glorify My glorious house.
Is 60:8 "Who are these who fly like a
cloud And like the doves to their lattices?
Is 60:9 "Surely the coastlands will
wait for Me; And the ships of Tarshish {will come} first, To bring your sons
from afar, Their silver and their gold with them, For the name of the LORD your
God, And for the Holy One of Israel because He has glorified you.
Is 60:10 ¶ "Foreigners will build up
your walls, And their kings will minister to you; For in My wrath I struck you,
And in My favor I have had compassion on you.
2. Introduction
- As we have gone 26 days into the year 2014 which is 7% leaving us with 339 days or 93% of days left
- You have a responsibility to set the tone and determine the direction of this year and all your life
- The decisions you are making today and those that you will make this year may determine your course of life and your eternity
- How you look at yourself will affect your actions for the year
- Our theme for the year is “Walking in the newness of life in Christ”
- View yourself in light of scripture, see yourself as God sees you
- Watch what you think, meditate on, talk as these will consequently affect your actions and what you become
- Decree and pursue what you want this year and rest of life to be
- There are doubtlessly things that will want and try to hinder, discourage and frustrate you
- But you must refuse to be discouraged and rise above anything rising against you
- Today I want to talk about the topic “Rising Up”
3.
Why Arise?
(Scripture Interpretation & Application)
·
From the
scripture we read, we find out that:
i)
We need to rise
and shine
·
It is our/ responsibility to rise & shine.
·
This means you
have the capacity to rise and to shine or else God would not say to
·
Many a times we
see ourselves as weak, helpless without power to do anything
·
Some people in
their faith are so harmless they seem not even able to kill a fly!
·
Hey, arise, you
are a king!
ii)
Darkness and
actually gross/deep darkness will cover the earth and people.
·
We are to
anticipate troubles
·
God here does
not promise that things will be all well around us
·
He actually
says in the world or rather in the natural, things will be bad
·
Therefore
Zimbabwe and world being in dire situation(s) is not a surprise
·
For the economy
to be bad is not out of this world, it is not something new
·
For your
finances to be in bad shape, for there to be high unemployment, for you to face
situations, or whatever it is that you are facing is not an anormally
·
For you to face
things and situations means you are in the natural world and scripture knew
that
·
But, you do not
need to stay there, you need to arise
·
You need to
arise above those situations
iii)
The Lord will
arise on us and His glory appear on us
·
If we arise and
chose to move on and walk or stand in the light of the Word by faith
·
Then we will
see the victory of the Lord
·
Its like God
only appears after we appear!
·
He says Arise
and the Lord will arise upon you
·
The Lord and
His glory only appears when we take the initiative
·
Like I normally
say, Christianity is two way, there is our part and God’s part
·
If you do not
do your part, God cannot and will not do His part
·
People have
argued about the sovereignty of God, yes I understand that but there are laws
that God put in motion to guide our relationship with Him
·
If things happening
were depending on His sovereignty, then we would need not to have
responsibility about anything
·
Do you want God
to arise and His glory to appear in your life and situations?
·
Then you need
to take the initiative, arise yourself by faith and take a stand against
anything in your life that is contrary to the Word
Example
·
In the story of
Peter walking on water:
i)
Peter asked to
be commanded to walk on water
ii)
Peter stepped
out the bout on his own and stepped onto the water
iii)
When Peter
began to sink, it is him that cried “Lord save me”
·
In all the
above Peter took the initiative, Jesus seems passive, even when Peter is
sinking, He waited for Peter’s cry
·
This should
help take away the myth and error about leaving everything on God in the
pretext of His sovereignty
Ps
20:8 They have bowed down and fallen, But we have risen and stood upright.
·
In Psalm 20v8
the bible says:
i)
others will bow down and fall
ii)
But we have
risen or need to arise and stand upright
·
So it means the
things that affect the rest of the people negatively in the world should not
affect us
·
When others fall
and stumble, we should arise and stand upright
·
When others
fail in their health, finances, etc we need to stand upright in health and
prosperity!
·
Notice the above
scripture also says we have risen and stood upright, it doesn’t say God raises
us up and makes us stand upright!
Mal
4:1 "For behold, the day is coming, burning like a furnace; and all the
arrogant and every evildoer will be chaff; and the day that is coming will set
them ablaze," says the LORD of hosts, "so that it will leave them
neither root nor branch."
Mal
4:2 "But
for you who fear My name, the sun of righteousness
will rise with healing in its wings; and you will go forth and skip
about like calves from the stall.
Mal
4:3 "You
will tread down the wicked, for they will be
ashes under the soles of your feet on the day which I am preparing," says
the LORD of hosts.
·
Malachi says a
bad day is coming, the wicked will suffer
·
But unto those
that fear His Name, a sun of righteousness will rise ...
·
Some people
remain indoors or shade when the sun arises
·
Again, the
scripture says: ...and YOU GO FORTH and
SKIP about ...
·
It is clear
that calves let from the stall do not wait for their mothers to lift them up
and make them skip
·
Calves let from
the stalls are not orderly, they are not calm!
·
Calves let from
the stalls skip about
·
We need to go
forth and skip for joy
·
We need to
tread down upon anything that rises against us
·
Challenges,
situations and troubles should be under our feet
·
No wonder Jesus
said:
Luke
10:19 "Behold, I have given you authority to tread on serpents and
scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing will injure you.
·
He implies that
we will face serpents and scorpions and the power of the enemy
·
He did not
promise to remove these things out of our way
·
He says, we
will have to confront them and trample them down
·
The problem is
when faced with these things, we fear, run away and cry out to God
·
We should rise
up, face it, confront it and trample it down!
·
I like what
Joshua and Caleb said of the giants in Canaan, they said; “…they are bread for
us…”
4.
Go against the
tide
·
As we have
discussed above, we need to rise against the tide
·
It is normal for
things to be bad in this world
·
It is normal
for situations to be gloomy and negative
·
It is also
normal to face situations and challenges
·
BUT we are not
normal!
·
We are not the
natural people, we are not of this world
·
We are children
of the most high God
·
We are children
of the kingdom
·
We are the
redeemed of the Lord
·
We are kings
and priests
·
We are gods
·
We need to rise
up, claim our light, glory and power
·
When these
normal situations come up against us, we
need to arise above them
·
No wonder
someone said:
Isaiah 59:19 KJV, So shall they fear the name of the LORD from the west, and
his glory from the rising of the sun. When the enemy shall come in like a
flood, the Spirit of the LORD shall lift up a standard against him.
·
So, when
situations or the enemy throws things on us, we need to position ourselves and
rise above the level
·
It is said that
when the eagle faces a storm, it positions its wings and the storm lifts it up
·
When other
birds cannot fly or are affected by the storm, the eagle would just stretch its
wings and rise higher
·
Normally, other
many birds flip their wings to fly, but the eagle would sour or just stretch
its wings, its like it does not struggle to sour or fly, its natural to it
·
We are supposed
to be like that, we need to just position ourselves and sour
Isaiah 40:31 But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.
·
When
situations and storms come, we need to just mount up!
Isaiah 40:30, Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men
shall utterly fall:
·
Do you see
again here that the bible says; the world people will grow weary and faith BUT…
·
We need to
renew our strength mount up
·
So, it is
normal for people in the world to grow weary, to faith, give up, etc
·
It is not
normal though for us to succumb to the same, ours is to rise up against the
tide and mount up!
Is 52:2 Shake yourself from the dust, rise up, O captive Jerusalem; Loose yourself from the chains around your neck, O captive
daughter of Zion.
·
We need to shake
ourselves from the dust and rise up
·
We need to loose
ourselves from the chains
·
We have the
capacity, power and authority to do so, Jesus did the rest for us
Is 26:19 Your dead will live; Their corpses will rise. You who lie in the dust, awake and shout for joy, For your dew {is as} the dew of
the dawn, And the earth will give birth to the departed spirits.
·
Your situations
that are dead need to arise
·
If you are lying
in the dust you need to awake and shout for joy
Eph
5:14 For this reason it says, "Awake,
sleeper, And arise from
the dead, And Christ will shine on you."
·
Paul says,
Awake, Arise!
·
He says Christ
will shine on you
5.
Conclusion
·
So, Arise and shine
·
It is your responsibility to arise and shine
·
When you arise, you release and activate the light and
glory of the Lord over your life and situations
·
Troubles will come but instead of making you fall and
fail, they need to help you to mount up
·
We need to be a people that if the devil were normal,
he would be scared to trouble us because of the consequences
·
Actually, the bible says to resist him until he flees
not us fleeing from him
·
So, do not accept anything less than what you are
supposed to be
·
You are supposed to walk in the full package of
salvation or gospel
·
Jesus came so that you be free from sin, sickness and
poverty
·
You are a success and not a failure
·
You are a victor
·
You are healed
·
Walk in the light of the Lord
·
Walk in His glory
·
Like God told Gideon, walk in this your might
·
May God’s best be all yours
·
Thank you!
