Daily Devotionals

By Pastor Dr. Aggrey Soyekwo

Philippians 2:3-5 "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others. In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus…" - NIV

In following in the footsteps of Jesus our Lord and Savior, developing the same mindset He had is key. Apostle Paul advices that this attitude should manifest in our relationships with others. Attitude is the reason we see, interprete, say or do things the way we do them. It is the underlying motive beyond the superficial cover ups and hypocritic pretenses. And it is what God looks at, because it is the true reflection of the heart. Attitude determines everything else, good or bad.

Anyone can claim to be godly or good. This may be covered up for a while. But the true character of a person can’t be hidden. It soon somehow somewhere shows up especially in times of adversity. But when the attitude of Christ reigns in those called by His name, they will manifest it at all times. The fruit of their lives never lies, in all seasons and times. People’s mindsets are influenced by several factors; cultural backgrounds, education, religious systems, values, etc. Best of all should be a mindset the God, Who created us, intended for for us. That’s what we should pursue.

We should thus see people and things from His perspective. Developing this attitude is enhanced by the Holy Spirit working in each of our lives. None of us in our own human abilities can do so, given the influence of the sinful nature. It was the reason the Holy Spirit came, to help us become Christ-like including in our attitudes towards others. But the Holy Spirit requires our obedient corporation. Will you allow Him transform your attitude?

Colossians 3:9-10 "Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator."

Shalom children of God.

By Pastor Dr. Aggrey Soyekwo

John 12:26 "Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves me."

As Jesus moved about in His ministry, the first call He would make to His would be disciples was to follow Him. Following is a mark of discipleship. John records how Jesus made it a condition for whoever wanted to serve Him to first be willing to follow. In following, you express the willingness to go wherever He goes. A service offered to God from a point of submission honors God through and through.

When Jesus calls us to follow Him, he knows where he is taking us. He is not guessing. In Him is direction, purpose, protection and provision for life. Following requires humility, a willingness to let go your own ways and embrace what He tells you, even if it may not be pleasant all the time. After all, He is our Creator and knows it all. This does negate the rightful use of our God given intellect and abilities, but channeling them to His glory.

So many are in His service, but are not willing to follow His way. They want to serve their own way, fulfilling their desires alongside God’s. But God, Whom we serve, has prescribed how we do it. Ours is to obediently respond and follow, knowing that He never misleads, knows it all, and always has our best interests in mind. His footsteps are clear and straight. They lead to absolute fulfilment and to life eternal. To this path, He calls us all. Will you follow?

John 10:27-28 "My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand."

Shalom children of God

By Pastor Dr. Aggrey Soyekwo

Colossians 3:10-11 "… and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator. Here there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all."

Paul names the different categories people are placed such as race/tribe, language, gender, economic status and a host of others. God made us different for various reasons and for His good purposes. Such categorization, when applied negatively, determines how one considers and treats others, as superior or inferior, favourably or not. This is how evil is hatched and orchestrated in the world, when our differences become weapons and reasons to propagate evil against those different from ourselves. This has unfortunately affected those within Christ.

It wasn’t God’s will from the beginning that our differences divide us. Apostle Paul said as the believer’s  new nature in Christ is renewed in knowledge in the image (or likeness) of its Creator, God, we overcome these humanly made boundaries and we see people as God would see them. In Christ, no one should be discriminated against, from ethnic,  gender, economic or other view point. As long as they are in Christ, they are your brother or sister. Even if they are not in Christ, they are God’s people, created in His image and precious to Him. Love as God unconditionally loves.

How wonderful the world would be, if we all saw each other from God’s point of view, expressing His love and treating everyone with respect and dignity. Unfortunately, Satan has capitalised on our differences to promote hatred and wars, and many have fallen victims. I pray we focus on the more that unites us than the little that divides us.

Acts 17.26 "From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live."

Shawwlom children of God.

By Pastor Dr. Aggrey Soyekwo

Psalms 90:2,4 "Before the mountains were born or you brought forth the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God…For a thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night." - NIV

The Psalmist meditates on the greatness of God. The vastness of the universe is still beyond the reach of modern technology in exploration of outer space. The billions of galaxies each with billions of stars, make planet earth appear less than the smallest speck of dust. In comparison, the earth would be less than nothing (Isa 40:17). Yet God holds all these stars in His hand, calls them by name, set them on their course and none defies it and He sustains the universe by His word. So how great is God if the entire universe cannot contain Him and is in His control?

In terms of time, God existed from eternal past before he created time, and will exist into the eternal future beyond time. To Him, a thousand years is like a watch in the night which just passed by. He Himself is beyond time. That’s incomprehensible to our human understanding! Great as He is, God loves and knows you by name, and thinks about you!

Where from is the pride of man, and how does he question God? When men in their folly think they can challenge God, the Almighty just laughs. Whatever God has revealed to us, through His word and the scientific discoveries, is but just a little glimpse into the vastness of His greatness to enable us believe and put our faith in Him. God and His works are past finding out. Where, or mortal man, do you pick guts to challenge your your Maker? Fear and give Him glory. Leave the deception of Satan.

Psalms 147:4-6 "He determines the number of the stars and calls them each by name. Great is our Lord and mighty in power; his understanding has no limit. The LORD sustains the humble but casts the wicked to the ground."

Shalom children of God.

Trivializing the eternally important!

By Pastor Dr. Aggrey Soyekwo

Genesis 25:31-34 "Jacob replied, “First sell me your birthright.” “Look, I am about to die,” Esau said. “What good is the birthright to me?” But Jacob said, “Swear to me first.” So he swore an oath to him, selling his birthright to Jacob. Then Jacob gave Esau some bread and some lentil stew. He ate and drank, and then got up and left. So Esau despised his birthright."

Esau was a hunter for survival. That day he failed to make a kill. Hungry, he asked his brother Jacob for food. Jacob asked him to first sale his birthright. Esau said his birthright wasn’t of any use to him since he was about to die. He despised and sold it for a meal, ate and went his way. What was to earn him eternal blessings for all generations to come, was exchanged for a meal. Esau despised his birthright, and lost it, forever!

One of Satan’s schemes is to make salvation through Christ and the eternally significant things of God appear trivial in comparison to the immediate joys and pleasures of this world. ‘Indulge yourself, feel free to do what your heart desires, why bother with what you don’t even know whether they exist or not,’ he tells his victims. And so people despise God’s ways and principles and engage in things they delight in: make wealth, have pleasure, ignore God. They eat and drink and enjoy life outside God as it was in the days of Noah until the door was shut!

Dear friend, do not trivialize the call to repentance and living for God. Do not be blinded by the devil, to follow after fleeting pleasures of sin and the world which leave you empty and lost, even if one gained the whole world. In God are true riches into eternity. Seriously consider the state of your relationship with your Creator God. Softly and tenderly Jesus is calling. Will you heed His call, to live for Him? You will rejoice for eternity!

Mark 8:36-37 "Do people gain anything if they win the whole world but lose their life? Of course not! There is nothing they can give to regain their life."GNB

Shalom children of God.

Using your weakest points

By Pastor Dr. Aggrey Soyekwo

Luke 4:1-3 "Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, left the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing during those days, and at the end of them he was hungry. The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread.” - NIV

Jesus had fasted 40 days in the desert and was now hungry and physically weak. The devil identified that as a weak point and tempted Him in line with His biggest need at that time – food. When the devil wanted to cause mans fall from God’s glory, he came through Eve whom he easily confused and convinced. The rest is history. That remains his trick.

We all have weak and strong areas. Our weakness, or soft spots, make us most susceptible to temptation. Satan has used this trick to bring down millions. Samson, Solomon were weak in with women. Some women can’t resist any man. Gehazi, Judas Iscariot were weak in money and material things. Some are timid and fearful, have bad temper, can’t resist power, food, etc. The devil rides on these to drive its victims far away from God and leading to a downfall. Once down, he makes the victims wallow in guilt and self condemnation, or to resign to fate and throw off any restrain.

Our ability to resist this scheme of the devil lies in honestly identifying and knowing our weakness, seeking help and strength from God, using the word to resist Satan, and getting a confident to hold us accountable. Where you are weak, you need support from others. When you fall into the same thing, someone else will genuinely hold your hand and lift you up to your feet. You can rise up again and be what God intended you to be! The Holy Spirit helps in our weaknesses.

Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 "Two are better than one,  because they have a good return for their labor: If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up."

Romans 8:26 "In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans."

Shalom children of God

Fear and doubt (1/8/2022)

By Pastor Dr. Aggrey Soyekwo

Luke 8:36-37 "Those who had seen it told the people how the demon-possessed man had been cured. Then all the people of the region of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them, because they were overcome with fear. So he got into the boat and left."

Jesus had healed the demon possessed man and all the Garasenes came to witness. Instead of rejoice that a healer had come right to their territory, they were overwhelmed with fear and sent Him away. They missed the rest of the blessings He would have brought to them. Fear and doubt are weapons the devil uses to hold his victims captive and then manipulate to do anything.

Where fear and doubt is, faith is not. And faith is a shield, a weapon of our warfare to protect us from the fiery arrows that the devil is ever shooting at us. These include discouragement, hopelessness, frustration, despair… Once these fill ones mind, the devil can drive them in any direction, including suicides. The devil can only make inroads into your life by first causing fear. Fear opens you up to his maneuvers. That’s why he roars like a lion, creates scary scenarios to first instill fear, including forming up lies to devour his victims.

Millions are in the devil’s trap because of fear. Child of God, you are above the manipulations of Satan by your position in Christ. Refuse to believe his lies however real they may appear. Stand firm in faith in the finished work of Jesus on the cross, and believe the sure promises in His word. No weapon forged against you shall succeed, unless you circum to fear. You are victorious, more than conquerors through Him Who loved us. Get out of the net of fear. Walk with your head high in God your redeemer. Hallelujah!

1 John 4:4 "You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world."
Romans 8:37 "No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us."
Luke 8:50 "Hearing this, Jesus said to Jairus, “Don’t be afraid; just believe, and she will be healed.”

Shalom children of God.

Discord among brethren

By Pastor Dr. Aggrey Soyekwo

John 17:21-23 "That they all may be one; as thou, Father, [art] in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one:  I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me." - KJV

This was Jesus’ passionate prayer, that His disciples may be one as He was with the Father. The recorded repetitions are no mistake, but to emphasize the weight of the matter in God’s heart. Its God’s will for His church to be one, in perfect unity!

One of Satan’s biggest, and probably the most successful strategies against the progress of the church, is disunity. This has been largely fueled by denominational lines, personal or other interests. The only time we are commanded not to fellowship with anyone is on the basis of heretical teachings or living lifestyles contrary to the teachings and authority of scripture. 

We can never be uniform in methods of operation, the way we worship and do things, but we can be one in the common faith. Just because they are not with us, in our church/denomination or do things the way we do, is no reason to hate them. The disciples once stopped someone who was casting out demons in Jesus name because he was not ‘with them’. Jesus told them not to. He identified him as one of their own, despite not being in their company.

In today’s church, believers have fought, claimed superiority, scandalised and demonized each other over little differences that could easily be ignored – yet claim to serve the same Lord! Do they believe in the supremacy and teachings of scripture, the Lordship of Jesus and salvation in His name, and seek to promote God’s kingdom and live by His principles? Then they are our brothers and sisters regardless of other differences. May we be one, that our testimony to the world will bring Him glory! In this way, Satan will not outwit us.

Ephesians 4:3 "Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace."

Shalom children of God.