INDISCIPLINE IS ONE OF THE COVENANT HEDGES BROKEN THAT HAS GROUNDED MANY PRINCES.
YOU DON’T WAIT TO BUILD CAPACITY, YOU COMMIT TO BUILDING IT.
WE BUILD UP PRINCIPALLY IN THE WORD.
LEARNING BECOMES A LIFESTYLE FOR ANYONE WHO IS GENUINELY COMMITTED TO DEVELOPING CAPACITY
NOTHING NEW EXISTS ON ITS OWN WITHOUT DRAWING FROM THE OLD.
DIRECTION WITHOUT KNOWLEDGE WILL EQUAL FRUSTRATION
YOU WILL BE AT THE SAME SPOT FOREVER UNTIL YOU LEARN THE WAY OUT OF IT.
– Bishop David Oyedepo on DEVELOPING SPIRITUAL CAPACITY TOWARDS YOUR DESIRED NEXT LEVELS || NEXT LEVELS || 2023 International Ministers’ Conference || Day 2, Evening Session || Covenant University Chapel || 10th May, 2023 || PART D
So, you learn the how towards the delivery of your assignment, the how, the how. It’s a long journey, it’s a long journey, the how is a long journey. Ecclesiastes 10:16. Discipline, indiscipline is one of the covenant hedges broken that has grounded many princes making them to walk on feet as servants.
So, you need direction, you need wisdom to learn the know-how, you need discipline and then verse 18, you need to be diligent. So, mark those four things, direction, knowledge, discipline and diligence, you will get on your horse back. You will enjoy a majestic ride, stop waiting for it to happen. You don’t wait to build capacity, you commit to building it!!!
How to build spiritual capacity.
1. Spiritual capacity increases with the knowledge of the Word, the knowledge of the Word. Those who do know their God, they shall be strong, they shall develop capacity to do exploits, they shall be strong and they shall do exploits. I commend you to God and the Word of His grace which is able to build you up, so we build up principally in the Word, we build up principally in the Word!!!
Our dedication to the Word is the mystery behind our spiritual capacity, spiritual capacity. Spiritual capacity is enhanced by in-depth revelation of the word. When I say the word, I mean the Bible and every resource material that enhances our insight to the Word, our insight to the Word.
I hosted New York Times one time to an interview, when they said “uhh, what do you do with your time?” It was an impromptu question, I said “I read and I think.” They said, we learnt you have read quite some books, I said by the grace of God. Which one and I listed them, I have read all the books that Hagin wrote, all that this one wrote, all that this one wrote, some, most that this one wrote, some that this one wrote.
They are not guesswork sir, they are not guessworks! You can’t develop capacity wishing, learn to sit up working. You have to sit up working! One of our ministers’ conference here, I brought in some materials, my diaries that I used my hand to write and a number of our Pastors here came out and brought them out. They are hand written, they are not guessworks. I took about 6 pages note here in the morning during the teachings. Learning becomes a lifestyle for anyone who is genuinely committed to developing capacity, learning becomes a lifestyle.
2. Engage in spiritual exercises. Exercise thyself rather unto godliness. Engage in spiritual exercises. 1 Timothy 4:8. Engage in spiritual exercises which includes fervency on the altar of prayer for continuous access to help, direction and answers to our questions.
Fervency on the altar of prayer for continuous access to help according to Hebrews 4:16, direction – Jeremiah 33:3, answers to our questions.
3. To develop spiritual capacity, we study the lives of those that have gone before us in our area of callings. Study the lives of those that have gone before us because there is nothing new under the heaven, what has been is what shall be and what was done before shall be done, there is nothing new under heaven. Ecclesiastes 1:9. This generation needs to be awake to this reality sir, you need to be awake. You need to be awake, there can’t be a new generation without a root in the old.
It is the seed from the old that gives birth to the new. Nothing new exists on its own without drawing from the old, nothing! One generation shall serve you to another, it’s a relay, you draw from one to move to the next and they draw from the next to move to the next. Hebrews 13:7. Study them to find out what and what they did to command the kind of results they have obtained and you are in interested, you plug in. You plug in! Today, God speaks to me the same way He speaks to Hagin, clean, on virtually everything I ask, clean. Without a mentor, you don’t have a ladder to climb, without a father, you don’t have feathers. Mentors show the way to go, fathers proclaim blessings that cause men to prevail where others travail. Praise God! I mean and you find the generation that is mentorless and fatherless, what a frustrated generation, mentorless and fatherless.
Let me close with this practical examples and then we will share the goodness, I had a bright vision on Church growth but I need to learn how to see Church growth and sustain the growth.
I got the vision,1984, clean. He walked me out of the prayer room, I followed Him and it was a drama, a broad daylight drama but 1983/1985 He connected me to Yonggi Cho and I saw the practical dimension of the vision I saw. I pursued after him. I will photocopy whole books, whole because there were no internets then, I will photocopy a whole book. I will photocopy a whole book and photocopiers then too were not that bright so… and by the time you mark one or two, you have cancelled the statement.
I was eating the materials, eating! We were not 100 people when I got this material, I don’t know, we were 100 or 150 when I got hold of Yonggi Cho’s materials, I became addicted to it. Thank God for the impact, Amen! Thank God for the impact.
So, direction without knowledge will equal frustration. We don’t only need vision, we need the knowledge to pursue the vision to deliver. We need it.
We needed to see our cell system grow and I said “look, let’s find out how they did it in South Korea.” So, we got building successful home cells – his book, I bought 400 copies and gave to our 400 Pastors, let’s study it, come out with what are we doing that we should not be doing, what are we not doing that we should be doing, what are we doing that we are not doing well enough. We did that and the cell system just boom! Jerked up! Birth Over 7,000 cells within a year, within a year!
We got to a point and I now discovered that we have exhausted what we learnt from there, so we carted some materials out online on cell growth research works, we went on it and the cell group, wao! went up! Knowledge is sweet, the Bible say light is sweet, it’s a beautiful thing for the eye to behold the sun.
You will be at the same spot forever until you learn the way out of it, until you learn the way out of it!!! There is no apartheid in knowledge, settle for it.
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