FRIDAY- 6TH JUNE, 2025
MORNING WINGS DAILY DEVOTIONAL - Olusola ADEJUMO
SAVED TO PREACH JESUS - Minding Your Calling Series 006
Luke 9:59-60, KJV
"59 And he said unto another, Follow me. But he said, Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. 60 Jesus said unto him, Let the dead bury their dead: but go thou and preach the kingdom of God."
As you follow Jesus, God will give you several adjustments in order to situate you correctly in His will. If you'll heed it, you'll always be in the will of God. When this fellow wanted to delay or postpone his call to discipleship, what does Jesus tells him? "Let the dead bury their dead: but you go and preach the kingdom of God."
That specific instruction to him is a love instruction to keep his feet from straying or else he would stray and he won't know it. Let me tell you something. Beware of the slightest of what has capacity to take you away from your calling. It won't first manifest as a stumbling block. It'll come in the form of an obligation - even a family necessity or need. However, there's a bait attached to it. If you ever heed it, it'll take you down a road where you'll miss the will of God.
What's wrong with going to bury one's father? However, time will not allow Jesus to release this man to that assignment. As far as Jesus is concerned, he should let the dead bury their dead. The dead are the people who are not spiritually attuned to God's things like that same called man. They are not spiritually alive so they can find it acceptable enough to engage in common affairs. They are the normal people who Jesus believes could give attention to the things of the earth. And as normal people who are not spiritually alive, they're looking forward to a party. They're looking forward to a ceremony. You can't organize a better party than those who specialize in it. Those Jesus refers to as the dead own a degree in helping you plan and making your event go well. They are in every family. They may even be amidst your relatives, friends or colleagues. Jesus was telling that man to release that responsibility to them. Even behind him, they'll give his father a befitting burial than he could have done.
However, there's an urgent assignment for him. It's to go and preach the kingdom of God. The way Jesus brought the preaching of the kingdom across to this man tells us that there's an urgency about preaching that kingdom. First, the Bible says, "do you not say in four months and there comes the harvest. Look at the field and see that the field is ripe" (John 4:35).
When Jesus said, "but go thou and preach the gospel", I want to believe his motivation were these verses above. The fact that the field is ripe and even that the labourers are few. If not, Jesus could have given this man a little time to just bury his father and return to Him. However, there's an urgency. Jesus is recruiting every man that he sees, especially those he could definitely mark for calling. He's not only recruiting them, He's putting them to work immediately. He's unfolding before them the very reason for which he has saved, called or brought them to Himself - to go and preach the kingdom of God.
In Series 001 of this teaching, I quoted lines from John Donne's poem, The Good Morrow that I can paraphrase as, "Let sea discoverers to other worlds have gone,
But we have ourselves, one for each."
It means irrespective of what the focus of sea discoverers are, we also shall focus on what is ours that we have found. The one Jesus has found for any disciple is to follow Him and preach God's kingdom. It's a holy call that can take the lifetime of anybody. It is enough work that can even be done on a full time basis.
My own prayer is this, may God open your eyes to what could entangle you and seduce you out of the calling that you should enter into when you get to that juncture of temptation. May you hear a voice behind you saying, "choose this above that."
As for the burying of the dead, it'll come and go. However, if your calling or what you should use your life to do or serve slips from your hands, you'll suffer and be held accountable at the judgement.
PRAYER: I shall not be seduced from the road of the calling.
1 YEAR BIBLE READING PLAN
John 20:1-18 & I Chronicles 20-22
Powered by Morning Wings Ministries. Click TRANSLATE on the blog & read in your own language. Enquire or counsel through +234 80 77 63 85 50 or +234 8137 04 68 12 II morningwingministry@gmail.com & Blog @ http://morningwingsministry.blogspot.com
No comments:
Post a Comment