(THE CONFIRMATION OF THE CHURCH AT OBIAKPU EGBEMA) Preached on SATURDAY, 16TH JUNE, 2001 At HOUSEHOLD OF GOD OBIAKPU EGBEMA By APOSTLE PETER ODOEMENA THE SUPREME INTELLIGENCE” “Truth has no substitute” © BRIDE OF CHRIST MINISTRY WORLD-WIDE
1
THE OMNIPRESENCE OF GOD
I have authority. All the authorities in heavens and on earth have been conferred to Me. Whatsoever I bind here on earth is bind in heaven. Whatever I loose here is loosed in heaven. If you like believe it, if you don’t like, don’t believe it.
2. Know that wherever you go to, you will be pointed back to Me. You search the scriptures, you think in them you have eternal life: but they testify of Me.
3. You don’t know Me but the scriptures will testify about Me. God is Omnipotent and Omnipresent. His Eyes runneth to and fro all over the earth. He knows what is happening everywhere.
4. Psalm 139 verse 7. “Where could I go to escape from you?
5. If you want to escape from God, can you outrun your heel? If you came first, did your buttocks come first? You will be running with your heel while your buttocks will remain at the back.
6. I don’t know whether somebody is getting what I am saying! Where will I escape from thee? You say, “This man is troubling me too much! He is monitoring me everywhere. In short, let me run away. I want to run to Germany, I want to run to Russia, let me run to Jericho.”
7. You can run, but before you get to Jericho, He will say, “You are welcome to Jericho”. There, you will behave like Ahab. Ahab thought he was running away from Elijah. Before he knew it, Elijah appeared, “Have you found me oh my enemy!”
8. Elijah looked at him and laughed: “Ahab, were you not running away?” Have you escaped from Elijah? Ahab, the runner, can you outrun Elijah? If you run for one hundred years, one step that God makes, He will pass you. He that seeth the whole earth.
9. Run for one hundred years, let God be in one place; one step God makes, He will overtake you. Since you know that, what are you running for? It is like a kid of two or three years whose parent wants to flog, and he starts running. He wants to run away. But when the mother makes a step, she catches him and draws him back. The mother will lift him up with one hand and his legs will be hanging on the air.
10. …Where could I go to escape from you? Where could I get away from your presence? If I went up to heaven, you would be there; if I lay down in the world of the dead, you would be there.
11. If I flew away beyond the east or lived in the farthest place in the west,you would be there to lead me, you would be there to help me.
12. I could ask the darkness to hide me or the light around me to turn into night,but even darkness is not dark for you, and the night is as bright as the day. Darkness and light are the same to you.
13. He that has no night, where are we running to since we know we cannot outrun Him? Something you know you have no power to force out, what do you do? Learn to accommodate it anyhow.
14. Let Me just help you. If somebody ties a rope on your waist, ties you to a vehicle and asks the driver to move forward; by and by, the strength of the vehicle is greater than your strength. Whether you like it or not, it must pull you.
15. Now, if you don’t want to wound yourself, what do you do? Corporate. I say, cooperate. How do you co-operate? Once the driver starts the engine, keep on marking time, immediately he moves, run forward.
16. I say, run. You would have no wound. But if you stop to see what would happen. Once he zooms off, he would pull you contrary. Once you touch the ground and he is still moving, he would be dragging you on the ground like that until wound would be everywhere on your body.
17. You are just a small Church. I think Papa Ikwuagwu and Elder Davidson knows what I am going to say now. In the good old days when women used to put on peteri, the man may be disturbing every time, every day trouble, until any day the women would be prepared for the man.
18. There is a place the woman would hold the man, you see the man shouting. If the man tries to drag it with the woman, he would be in trouble. All he has to do is to follow the woman, pleading until she leaves him.
19. This is exactly what this message is all about. This message doesn’t touch somebody and go away. It holds somebody on a bad junction (point). That is why, even if you desire to go out, no way.
20. You say, you will resign, you will be troubled outside until you come back. Take a decision against this faith, before you know it, you will be crying, saying “God, I am sorry for what I did”. Why? If you resist, you die. Na die be that? If you want to live, follow it anyhow. Even if saliva is coming out of your mouth, follow it anyhow. Because it is holding you on a bad junction.
21. If not where this thing is holding us, I would have been number one to leave this faith. I am preaching it as a strict obligation. Whether I like it or not.
22. I don’t preach to get favour. Nobody pays Me a kobo and I am not interested. Whether I like or not, I must preach, because He is holding Me on a bad junction.
23. If you don’t know what I am saying, go and see Pastor Emeka Umana. Because of where the message held him, when he came to My door, he fainted.
24. With one of his hands on his head, I said, “Brother, what is wrong?” He knelt down crying. I said “No, I don’t want it. Did you receive angelic visitation? Did you have a dream? Any vision?” Because when he said he was going, I told him to go.
25. One thing is clear, if you are a seed of God, He knows what to do. I am saying from where we read that a true seed of God knows that there is no way he could escape from the Presence of God.
26. All the thoughts he had in him to run to the East, to the West, to the farthest part of the earth, he himself concluded that it was just wasting of his time. Then he decided to take the whole thing the way he saw it.
27. The problem we are having is that we invited the Spirit we cannot worship. Any community that makes the mistake of inviting a spirit they cannot worship, the spirit destroys them. Go and ask your forefathers.
28. Any community that makes the mistake of bringing the spirit greater than the one they have, that community must be reduced in size. If time is not taken, all that brought the spirit will all be killed until the survivors plan to take it back.
29. Even to take it back will not be easy. Even they plan to take the spirit back because of the killing, the question is, “Who will be the one to carry the spirit back?” Who will accept to receive the spirit? This is our problem.
30. We went and invited the Spirit we cannot worship. To appease the Spirit is no longer easy, and the Spirit has started killing people. Then let the living take it back, no way. Who will carry it? The remedy lies in taking it the way they see it, for they must see the end of it.
31. Truly speaking, our fathers never saw it this way in their day. Do you know they enquired about this type of faith and the people that would get it and God told them that it was not for them. It is for us. In your own day, in my own day, unmerited favour appeared.
32. If you ask Me a question, grace and Law, which one is easier? I would say that the Law is easier than grace. Because the Laws are specific, you can see them, you can interpret them, you can avoid them. That is why under the Law, God and Devil are one. Somebody is shocked by the statement.
33. Brother, do you believe it that under the Law, God and devil are one? It is truth. You will believe but you do not understand.
34. As long as the Law exists, punishment is always there. What is more, the reason why people obey the Law is because of the punishment that follows disobedience. Is that not true?
35. Any Law without punishment will not be obeyed. Because it is like a dog without teeth. Once the Law is there, God is also afraid of Law because of the punishment. Satan is also afraid of the Law.
36. If a child of Satan comes here and hears the Laws governing this place, he obeys all those Laws, will you punish him? If a true seed of God hears those Laws and obeys them, will you punish him? Has it not become one?
37. When a woman obeys the husband in all things, will the man rebuke the woman. The two will eat as equals. But when the woman disobeys, the man will exercise authority. Why?
38. NOW, IT IS GRACE THAT BRINGS OUT A MAN’S NATURE. FOR THE LAW SUPPRESSES HUMAN FEELINGS. AND SUPPRESSION OF FEELINGS IS NOT A CHANGE OF MIND.
39. That is why if you want a pig to be very clean, put it in a protective custody. It will remain clean with its suit and white dress. As long as a pig is under protective custody, under cage, it would remain neat.
40. But open that protective custody, liberate a pig with his very nice suit and perfume, including powder, it will carry all of them to the dustbin, because that is its nature.
41. Did you get the message? The Law kept us under protective custody. Everybody became an emergency child of God. Because of the imposition of the Law, people were suppressing their feelings lest they be punished. Then God and Devil fellowshipped together.
42. Then one day, the protective custody was removed so that the true nature of everybody would be made manifest. Whatever you are manifesting now is your original nature. Maybe you don’t know that the Law is against human nature.
43. Let Me read two more scriptures. Remember I am introducing to you to the nature of God that you have come in contact with today, that you know the type of person you are having dealings with.
44. Psalms 11 verse 4, “But the Lord is still in his holy temple…
45. Now, you know what a temple of God is. In Acts of the Apostles chapter 17 from verse 24, the Bible said that God does not live in a temple made with hands. Is that not Bible? Don’t you believe it?
46. Don’t you know that the commission is to build the true temple? Don’t you know that? Now, the Lord is still in His Holy Temple.
47. But the Lord is still in his holy temple; he still rules from heaven. He closely watches everything that happens here on earth.
48. God is in His holy temple. His sanctuary, His dwelling place and still rules from heaven, and watches whatever that happens here on earth. This is the God you are worshipping. You know where He is dwelling; you know His sanctuary from where He grew out of Himself.
49. If you are asked to point where God is dwelling, His temple, His sanctuary, are you sure you can take somebody there? Are you sure you can get to His temple where He is dwelling, from where He can travel out and then come back? Are you sure?
50. If you are sure of His holy temple and He is ruling from heaven, you know where heaven is? It is here, from heaven He is ruling. And from this heaven, He watches whatever that happens all over the earth whether they be good or evil.
51. It is because the Lord is always in heaven, dwelling in His Holy Temple. When David’s feet nearly slipped away, he never knew he had already strayed away until he got to the Holy Sanctuary, he heard what made him to chill: That the prosperity of the wicked is a great temptation to the righteous.
52. Yes, the prosperity of the wicked is a great temptation to the righteous until you are tempted to ask God why: “After all my labour, after all this and this, what is my reward?”
53. Your reward is your wife. The Bible said of all your labour on earth, the only reward on earth is your wife. This is difficult to believe. But what of those that threw away their labour by divorcing their wives? It then means they would remain in labour till they die. Amen.
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THE LORD IS IN HIS HOLY TEMPLE
Please bear with Me in My foolishness. If I sound foolish, bear with Me. But I know in My foolishness, I am wiser than the wisest man here. If you doubt Me, go to the message titled, “The Foolishness of God”.
2. IT WILL TAKE A FOOLISH PEOPLE TO WORSHIP A FOOLISH GOD. IF YOU MOVE WITH FOOLISH PEOPLE, YOU BECOME FOOLISH. SINCE GOD CHOSE THE FOOLISH AND DESPISED THINGS OF THE WORLD TO WORK WITH HIM, THEN GOD MUST BECOME FOOLISH SO THAT THE FOOLISH WILL WORK WITH THE FOOLISH.
3. DON’T BOTHER YOURSELF ABOUT THAT STATEMENT. YOU WILL UNDERSTAND IT BY AND BY. THERE ARE TOO MANY THINGS WE CANNOT UNDERSTAND IN THIS LIFE NOW, BUT WHEN THE TIME IS OVER, WE SHALL UNDERSTAND ALL THINGS.
4. CONTINUE WITH ME. I SAID, CONTINUE WITH ME IF YOU CAN. BUT WHERE YOU CAN’T, GOD BLESS YOU FOR THAT; AT LEAST, FOR HELPING ME TO ACCOMPLISH MY MISSION UNTO THIS EXTENT. YES. SOMEBODY MUST HELP ME TO ACCOMPLISH MY MISSION.
5. Psalms 11 verse 4. “The Lord is in his holy temple; he has his throne in heaven. He watches people everywhere and knows what they are doing. GNB.
6. He watches people everywhere; He knows what they are doing. I am not reading these scriptures for reading sake. I think I have a target. To impart the type of Faith that will change your life, that will help your Church grow, so that you will worship God as individuals.
7. Wherever you are, you have your individual revelation of the type of God you are worshipping. For I am not sent to come and raise a big congregation for God, but I am sent to raise individuals for Christ. And you can never serve God as an individual until you have this revelation sure and settled in your heart. Then you can worship God alone even in hell. Where others will fall out, you will not fall out. This was the vision that sustained Antipas.
8. If I know that the all-seeing eye of God is on me, I dare not behave myself unseemingly before Him or before anybody. Because I know He is seeing me, He understands me more than I understand myself; even if I try to fool myself, I dare not fool Him.
9. When a man has this type of revelation within him, don’t you know that his attitude to life will change? Don’t you know that? He wouldn’t need any man to come and compel him to go to Church or obey the Lord or do things he knows he should do by personal revelation.
10. But when a man lacks this revelation, he becomes a wheelbarrow believer. Everybody will be pushing him about. Fellowship days, he must wait until He is reminded.
11. If he wants to come, he will come late. Some will even come thinking they are doing a service to their pastor: “I know the pastor is benefiting from my worship.” It is because he lacks this revelation. They don’t know that they are worshipping God individually.
12. Once I come to worship God, I am the only person in the Church. That’s why we don’t have any register where we write our names in the fellowship. If you want to worship God, worship God, if you don’t want, go your way!
13. “The Lord is in His holy temple; the Lord’s throne is in heaven.His eyes see, His eyelids test the children of men. AMP.
14. Proverbs 15 verse 3. “The Lord sees what happens everywhere; he is watching us…
15. The Lord sees what happens everywhere; “He is watching us.” Brother Philip, do I have this message in tape? I want to play it when I get to Onitsha. I don’t think I have handled this message in recent times. I only handled this message during Ohuba meeting but not in this mood.
16. The Lord is in His Holy Temple and He watches what happens everywhere.
17. The Lord sees what happens everywhere; he is watching us, whether we do good or evil.Amp.
18. Amen. If you believe it, say Amen. Doctor Brown, I hope you are hearing what this message is saying? Because it has picked you from there. It says, stop wallowing in your mind here and there, but tell yourself the truth. That settles all.
19. SELF-EXAMINATION IS THE BEST EXAMINATION. SELF-INVENTORY, EXAMINE, TEST, AND SCRUTINIZE YOURSELF. DON’T SAY “GOD KNOWS MY HEART, GOD EXAMINE ME”. NO MAN KNOWS WHAT IS IN YOUR HEART EXCEPT YOU. THE NEXT PERSON IS GOD.
20. “GOD KNOWS MY HEART.” YES, GOD KNOWS YOU AS AN UNBELIEVER. HE KNOWS YOU AS A HYPOCRITE. WHEN A MAN WANDERS OUT OF THE WAY OF TRUTH, HE COMES BACK AND SAYS, “GOD KNOWS MY HEART.”
21. God knows your heart that you are stubborn and disobedient. It is sure and certain, because He reads everything in your heart. For every disobedience, there is a defence. Put it down at the table of your heart. For every disobedience there is a defence. Man is always full of excuses, and God rejects all his excuses. For you are inexcusable Oh man. For there is no reasonable excuse before God.
22. After all, Eve had good reasons why she disobeyed. Adam had good reason why he listened to the voice of the wife. Don’t you know that Judas had good reasons why he betrayed Christ? There is no man that has no good reasons why he acts in one way or the other.
23. The question arises: How many of those reason have God ever considered to be very reasonable enough so as the set the culprit free?
24. Check your scriptures. To give excuse is man, to reject excuse is God. If God entertains one excuse, He must entertain the rest. Thus, if He must refuse, He must refuse all. If he wants to entertain, He will entertain all. If He had entertained the excuse of Eve and Adam, He would have set a nice space for entertaining excuses. Then, He will surely lose His credibility as God.
25. Hebrews chapter 4 verse 13. “He knows about everyone everywhere…
26. God knows about everyone everywhere. The God I am declaring to you is both the Old Testament and New Testament God. Do you know that God knows your dwelling place and He can call you by your name?
27. That is why many of you have encountered Him at one time or the other. Even where He called you your name, you just looked at Him, you feel you don’t know Him, you were moving your way, He will call you again. You just wait and even go closer. He will laugh and then continued His way.
28. You will remain troubled until you get to your destination: “Somebody called me. I went closer, I have not met him before, I continued my way. But to my greatest surprise, He called me again. I wondered, I came closer, instead of talking to me, he laughed”.
29. Has it happened to somebody here? Well, don’t mention names, stop there. Don’t call names, we allow these experiences to be personal. And it doesn’t happen in vain.
30. That same day it happened to that man that way, something happened. And then, he that met him came to him and said, “WELL, IF I GIVE YOU INSTRUCTION WHEN YOU ARE GOING AND YOU DON’T OBEY, WHEN CALAMITY WILL COME UPON YOU, I WILL LAUGH AT YOU.”
31. Please, understandeth thou these statements. Have you heard any encounter like this? Now is My turn to laugh at you.
32. He knows about everyone, everywhere. Everything about us is bare and wide open to the all-seeing eyes of our living God;
33. Everything about us is naked, wide open before the eyes of the Lord who we are having dealings with. This Commander-in-Chief of the heavenly army, knows Him very well.
34. I am declaring the nature of this God we have now imported. This God we imported, we have imported Him so that we will know whether we can worship Him or not. If we cannot worship Him, we will collectively agree now and ask Him to go in peace. And maybe give a ram as gift to appease Him.
35. When the Philistines captured the Ark of God, they rejoiced exceedingly, they thought they had captured God. Really, they captured God. They carried God to their home.
36. You see, they had imported the God they never knew. The God of Israel, the Commander-in-Chief. The God of heavens and earth was captured in the battlefront and the people rejoiced and made ceremony: “This is the great God of Israel. He is now in our territory.”
37. They placed that God before their own god, to know the one that is most powerful. The God of Israel said, “I will not share My glory with any graven image”.
38. What did He do? He started His work. When everybody went to bed, He looked at the Dagon, held the molded hand and the thing fell off. He held this one, the thing fell off. Something that has not happened before.
39. The following day, the people came to know how Dagon had dealt with the God of Israel. But they saw that the strength of their god was already gone.
40. They carried that their Dagon, because their god had legs but he cannot walk, they called brick-layers: “Come and mold the hand of our god for us”. They remolded the hand, and went to bed.
41. The next day, God of Israel stood up; “My glory, I will not share with anybody”. He pushed that thing down: “You are a structure that is lifeless”.
42. Before morning, Dagon had already broken into pieces. The people couldn’t believe their eyes. They separated God from Dagon, and carried that God to the capital territory. The place called Gath.
43. God started acting on the people, because they don’t know how to reverence God. Were they not the people that imported the God of Israel? And they couldn’t worship Him in the right way, for they didn’t know Him, they couldn’t understand His ways. He became a torment to them.
44. They said, “No, no, no, if we allow this thing, we are finish. Let us agree to send Him back. God of Israel, we are sorry for capturing you. We want to appease you. Take these seven rams, take this turtle dove and everything. May your anger calm down against us. We have brought two asses here; we will place you on their back. We will escort you to the wilderness; from there, you can find your way back to your people.”
45. God found His way back to His people. Nobody helped Him because He is a living God. I am saying that if a people collectively send out a spirit, the spirit cannot harm anybody. If a community collectively agrees to push out a spirit, he harms nobody because the community collectively agreed and pushed him out.
46. I am saying that after explaining to us the type of God we invited, and we see that we cannot worship Him, let us collectively tell Him to go, whenever we are ready, we will let Him know: “In order not to kill us, we are using this thing to appease you. Go.”
47. Gently, He will go. Because the whole people jointly asked Him to go. I am saying this because it is not easy to worship this God I am introducing.
48. It is not easy. Joshua told the people of Israel; “I tell you most solemnly, you cannot worship this God for He will destroy all of you”.
49. The people said, “All the Lord said we must do, we must worship Him.” Joshua said, “You cannot worship this God, for I know you. You are stiff-necked and stubborn people. You will provoke this God to jealousy and He will destroy all of you.” Did it fulfill? It happened.
50. People invited God that will destroy them. They will bring Him to save them but instead, that God will now destroy them. They will not rest until they use cow and send him back. The spirit will demand two cows from them. They will do it, use night and send him back and the land will rest again. I have come for you invited Me. The problem is not to bring Me, it is to send Me back.
51. If you check and see you cannot send Him back, allow Him to stay. But if you see that if you allow Him that He will kill everybody, you better know what to do earlier. That’s all.
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ALL THINGS ARE NAKED AND DEFENSELESS BEFORE GOD
THE ALL SEEING EYES OF GOD WILL MONITOR YOU FROM TODAY. BECAUSE ONCE I COME DOWN FROM THE PULPIT AND PERFORM MY CEREMONY, I WILL INITIATE YOU INTO MY BOSOM. YOU WILL BECOME A PART OF ME, I BECOME A PART OF YOU, THERE IS NO WAY WE CAN PART AGAIN. THERE IS NOW A LIFE COVENANT. AND WHOSOEVER THAT WILL OFFEND IN THAT COVENANT MUST RECEIVE THE WRATH.
2. And God has not failed on His own side for one day. Thus, if you are not prepared to go into this everlasting covenant, LISTEN TO WHAT I AM SAYING. I AM SENT FOR A COVENANT OF GOD’S PEOPLE. GOD IS ON ONE SIDE, YOU ARE ON ONE SIDE. I AM BRINGING YOU AND GOD TOGETHER. I AM SENT FOR THE COVENANT OF THE PEOPLE.
3. What you call Hallow or Pillar of Cloud; I call it Bow of His Covenant. For when He shall come, there is something that is going to be on Him like a rainbow but it is not a rainbow and that same thing that is like a rainbow is around His throne. Let Me stop there.
4. You have not ripened for this revelation you are hearing now. Let your teachers continue to nourish you.
5. How I wish that the cares of this life will enable Brother Ben to recognize who he is. And the more he is seeking, the less he is getting. Ever working and never becoming rich. Because he doesn’t know that prosperity cometh from God. That a man is never rich by his strength. Whosoever God wants to make rich, He will make rich.
6. You are only struggling to eat. You cannot get rich by struggling. You only struggle to eat. Whoever God wants to make rich, He makes rich. Can you struggle more than a barrow pusher?
7. Any hard work does not give money. The hardest job attracts little revenue. There is no hardest job more than barrow pushing. Can you mention any barrow pusher who has a house in Aba? Do you know anyone living in a flat? Upon all the struggles, some are living in caves; some are living in a batcher. There is no job that is tough than truck pushing? Can you see any who is a landlord in Aba? No sir.
8. Any job tougher than Okada riding? How many of them have storey building in Aba? All his struggling can only earn him money for food and shelter. Talk of building an upstairs or buying a trailer, na lie. It can never be in Okada riding. I am telling you the truth.
9. If you watch palm wine tappers, it is not easy to climb with the head and come down with buttock. Any community that specializes in cutting of palm fruit and tapping of palm wine is poor and wretched. You can never be there and be planning of raising a mansion.
10. I am saying that you can never specialize in palm oil business without your family being part of it. Any day you want to cut the palm fruit, nobody will go out that day. Everybody must be involved in the activities. The day it will be processed, everybody must be involved. After processing it which may take three to four days, you get four tins, you will be jumping for the four tins of oil.
11. How many days did it take you to produce four tins and you are rejoicing? How many people were involved in the processing? Now, if you want to know the amount you made, sell the four tins, distribute the money among the people that worked according to the number of days they worked. You will notice that one person can hardly get up to one naira a day. Check the food they ate and the time spent.
12. Others do not know that they are unemployed. They are just wasting their time there. Wetin I dey talk? I dey talk say, oyibo people sabi say you be Jackie. They come give you one kind job which is very hard. You use your head to climb; you use your bottom to come down. Do you think it is easy?
13. That was what I saw yesterday while I was coming. I was amazed. I then said that time has come for bonesetters living in this town to make money. The time has come when bonesetters living in this town will make money more than those staying in Aba.
14. A bonesetter staying in Aba will be making money because of Okada people. But here, bonesetters will be making money because of Ada-Palm. If they want you to survive, they can cut down weak palm trees.
15. Otherwise, you will use your head to climb and fall from there for the sake of money. That is where Bro Ben is working and he is expecting to become a millionaire. For that ministry, his ministry is suffering. He is blind. You are really blind.
16. I can volunteer to work everywhere but not in Ada-palm. It is primitive. It is unprofitable. That place is sited because of domestic wives and our parents who were farmers, so that after farming season, that time they will use in staying at home, they will just be going there and be collecting the petty, petty pay which they will use during raining season.
17. Women will use that place so that they will give them free land where they can plant cassava in between the palm trees. Brother Ben I think you are at home for one thing; keeping watch over your wife so that Brother Leo will not take her. That is why you are at home.
18. I am telling you the truth. He is jealous over his wife with carnal jealousy. For that reason, he will find it difficult to stay at Aba or Owerri.
19. If he dares stays there, every weekend, he will be at home. I am not saying what I am ignorant of. He knows whether it is true or false. Am I saying the truth? Yes Sir. Shake Me! Halleluiah.
20. Hebrews 4 verse 13, He knows about everyone, everywhere. Everything about us is bare and wide open to the all-seeing eyes of our living God; nothing can be hidden from Him to whom we must explain all that we have done.
21. That is exactly what I want to get. There is a man you must explain all you have done in this flesh to, if it is not today, it will be tomorrow. And since you know that He knows everything about you, and He calls you for explanation, what do you think you will say? Somebody you will come before Him to narrate your dream, He will remind you areas you forgot in your dream.
22. You are telling Him your dream, after everything, He will give you the interpretation: “Hold your peace. Look at what you saw which you forgot to tell Me. look at the way it happened, look at it. You forgot this one.”
23. You reply, “Na true ooh.” Then He will explain the interpretation.
24. I am serving the God that revealeth secrets. If you are not ready to worship this God in spirit and in truth, not in spirit and in dishonesty; in spirit and in truth, please, let us agree now and ask Him to go. It is not late yet.
25. But you must appease Him. He can’t be sent away anyhow. If you want Him to go anyhow, He will bend down there and empty one big faeces. And everybody knows that faeces do not come alone. It will either come with fart or urine. It comes with escort. I am telling you the truth.
26. If you watch our God, you think He is not around us, He is around us. My God does not sleep. When a dog is thinking, people will think it is sleeping. But to show you that it is not sleeping, if you come closer, it will bark at you.
27. You better be careful. Is He sleeping? How can He be sleeping and still discussing with you. Both day and night are the same before Him. The two are one. Our God is always at home. It is true that His house can be open.
28. The Tortoise said and I quote, “Why I open my door while inside is so that my enemies will not know that I am around.”
29. Are you getting what I am saying? If you watch tortoise, the shell is always open. No matter how you try to see him, you can never see him. Yet he is there.
30. “Tortoise, are you around?” You won’t hear any comment. Both the legs and the head will be inside and yet you can never see him. It is true that the door is open, yet you cannot enter. Thus, bringing out his head is a way of locking the door. If you can understand Me, understand Me.
31. If you move before God, you get tired. The type of God we have invited to this Obiakpu Egbema, we want to have dealings with Him. We want to enter into a covenant with Him.
32. He doesn’t want to destroy us. Thus, He will tell us His characteristics. If an idol fails to outline the procedures on how to appease him, people will worship him anyhow.
33. When you bring an idol to your community and the idol fails to tell you procedures to worship him, you can worship him anyhow. If the idol fails to tell you his “dos” and “don’ts”, anyway you praise him is acceptable.
34. But the moment he reveals the procedures by saying maybe that nobody should come to him with dog, bringing dog means provocation. You are indirectly looking for trouble.
35. “And not a creature exists that is concealed from His sight…
36. Not a creature exist that is hidden from His sight.
37. But all things are open and exposed, naked and defenseless…
38. Naked and defenseless. How I wish that when we read scriptures, we understand it. All things are naked, exposed and defenseless. No matter what you think is your defence. And I told you for every disobedience, there is always a defence. But in the eyes of God, everything is defenseless.
39. There is no place you can run to and say that place will be your defence if God is pursuing you. If God is pursuing you, you have no defence. Even if you run into hell, He will even ask you: “Who is that coming?”
40. He will come there, and carry you out. That is why; no man can resist the voice of God. You are resisting it because God has not called you. It may be that He wanted to call you, and later changed His mind. But once God bids you to come, whether you like it or not, you must answer to His call. If you refuse to come, you will be parceled to Him. I am telling you the truth.
41. I remember My experience far back 1983. I did not forget that experience. Where I was told that if I fail to come, I would be parceled down there. I said okay.
42. I watched to know who was talking to Me, I couldn’t see anybody. My name continued ringing. If I am asked to come, I will say, no, I am not coming. The voice will tell Me, if you fail to come, you will come by force. And truly speaking, I was forced to that place.
43. That is why, whenever you are entering into a covenant with God, you must be very, very careful. The way it is to God, the same way it is to Satan. Whoever that is into covenant with the Devil, you either answer to his call or you must be forced to it.
44. And once you die in the shrine, you will be buried in the shrine. If you die in God’s presence, you will be buried in God’s presence. I am always in the presence of God. We are always in the presence of God. Yes, so clear and simple.
45. Every man must go to his original source. Wherever you come from, there you must go back to. Yes, all things are naked, exposed and defenseless before God.
46. But all things are open and exposed, naked and defenseless to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.
47. When we are worshipping this type of God, the Great Jehovah, the Great I AM, with this great revelation of the personality of God, who has revealed Himself in the personality of a man; who could work, could go to warfront, could also to go His people, wearing dress, talking with them and discussing with them, standing here on earth, His voice being heard everywhere; if you are worshipping that type of God, who you know knows everything about you, by revelation, won’t your attitude change?
48. If you have this type of revelation, won’t you change your life? Let Me tell you, there is no way you can serve God acceptably without having this as a revelation from the beginning of your success journey in your ministry. Once a man of God, a true seed of God has this revelation as personal, he can never walk in a way that would offend God.
49. If time had permitted Me here, I would have shown you something, that you are worshipping a God that takes record of sins. That He doesn’t punish you today, doesn’t mean that you have escaped. He takes record of sins, and He will not tell you how many times He has purposed to take your own record.
50. THERE IS NO EQUALITY IN HIS RECORD. HE CAN DECIDE TO PARDON THIS BROTHER ON TEN OCCASIONS, AFTER TEN TIMES HE WILL NOT SPARE HIM AGAIN. HE COMES TO THIS SISTER, HE WILL SAY, “AFTER THREE TIMES, THE FOURTH TIME, I WILL NOT SPARE.”
51. THUS, IF YOU SAY BROTHER HAS COMMITTED SIN NINE TIMES AND YOU COME AND JOIN HIM SO THAT YOUR OWN WILL REACH NINE AND YOU DID NOT KNOW THAT YOUR OWN IS THREE, THAT MEANS YOU HAVE DESTROYED YOURSELF.
52. How I wish I have time, I would have drilled you from scriptures. I have left something for the ministers I will leave behind. I gave them instruction that they should give you My foundational doctrines which are based on introducing God to you.
53. After introducing God to you, they should show you God’s mode of righteousness. God’s ways of putting man right with Himself. They should show you what God’s holiness is all about.
54. They will show you what God’s perfection is all about, then they will reveal the mystery of the Church to you.
55. These are things that will make you to be a strong Church and stand on the revelation of the Holy Word of God.
56. Let Me go to something that is more important than that. I believe all of you here are aware of the Fivefold Ministry; that in the Church are ordained offices.
57. If this Church is a Church, there must be an approved pastor, ordained by the Apostle that confirmed that Church. A Church without a pastor or a shepherd is like a ship without a captain. It will be driven about by the wind. It will lose its bearing.
58. When an aeroplane is flying in the midair and the pilot vanishes from the cockpit, the engine will not stop, but the aeroplane will not be seen in this life again together with all he is carrying. It will vanish in the air. For it will fly in the no-go-route. Instead of landing on the ground, it will now enter the ground.
59. Let Me tell you something about this life. There is a point in the air where you will get, and you land in another planet in the earth. You are no longer flying in the air. You think that you are flying in the air, when you are in the next orbit beneath the earth.
60. This earth is the fourth planet. And then, if we have nine planets or more than that, if this one is the fourth, and number one is counted from the sun, and this one is the fourth, where are the rest? They are all beneath the earth. Please stop there, you cannot bear it now.
61. The same way, if you are navigating in the high sea, there is a point where you get to, where it is completely prohibited. If your ship dares goes close to that point, you cannot see the sea again, it descends to another planet. You are now in another world that is not called the earth.
62. But there is one unfortunate thing there. There is no life there because there is no oxygen there. And once you get there, you become a part of this natural fuel which we are tapping from Obiakpu Egbema. We will tap you as fuel and then refine you in Port Harcourt, use you to drive our vehicles. If you doubt what I am saying, if you know any archeologist, go and verify. Amen.
4
AS CO-LABOURERS OF GOD, WORK WORTHY OF THE VOCATION WHEREBY YOU ARE CALLED
Now, I want to show you something. 2 Corinthians chapter 6, I want to read verse 1.
2. “We then, as workers together with him, beseech you also that ye receive not the grace of God in vain.” KJV.
3. Living Bible; “As God’s partners, we beg you not to toss aside this marvelous message of God’s great kindness.”
4. Good news Bible or Amplified. Please note the word.
5. “In our work together with God,…
6. In our work together with God. The other one said, “As God’s partners”. The other one said, “As Co-labourers with God”.
7. Then, we beg you who have received God’s grace not to let it be wasted.” LB.
8. Another translation. “Labouring together as God’s fellow workers…
9. Labouring together as God’s fellow workers which are kept by grace. That is what the Bible said. We shouldn’t waste this type of opportunity. What is in man that the Almighty could co-opt man in His labour, in His business? Who would like to be a partner with God? Who would like to be co-labourer with God?
10. Who would like to work together with God? This is a question. If God deemed it necessary, and till today, he still deems it necessary to work with His fellow human being; remember He is a Human Being. In His labour, He noticed that He cannot do it alone, He requires His fellow human being. He chose them, brought them to His side. And look at the word He has used: “As fellow labourers”. God is a labourer. You, whom He has invited, a labourer. No one is called chief labourer.
11. You know the Bible is a revelation. You may read it hundred times, for hundred minutes, hundred insights. Now this scripture should be a challenge to all ministers in this Faith.
12. Has it ever become a revelation to you one day, that you are invited by God Himself to be His co-labourer. That the person you are working with is God Himself, not mere man. Do you know it is by grace, unmerited favour, not that you are very strong or you merit it or you are greater than others.
13. This is just an unmerited favour. That a human being could be co-opted into God’s own work. And God said, “Do not abuse this grace”. How many of you can boldly stand up and say, “I have worked worthy of the vocation whereby I have been called”? Who among you can say this, both male and female from the day you were called to become a co-labourer with God?
14. St. Paul called Silvanus his yoke friend. Christ knows that there is no way He alone can bear the burden of this ministry. That is why the Bible said, “Seeing we have this ministry, as we have received grace, we faint not. But have renounced all hidden things of dishonesty.”
15. We have renounced all hidden things of dishonesty. Not walking in craftiness, not handling the word of God deceitfully. How many can say, “From the day I have been called to this ministry, not as ordinary member of the Church; but as a full labourer; as a workman, working with God, I have worked worthy of my vocation, I have fainted not?”
16. This must sound strange yet it is true. But that is where I am going. The time for assessment is coming. Do not be deceived, God is not mocked. Any seed a man soweth, that he must reap.
17. In those days, He told John to put it in writing, the word of that prophecy; “Lo, I come quickly, My reward is with Me, I will pay every man according to as his works shall be.”
18. It was a prophecy. Hence, he said, “Blessed is he that readeth and understandeth the words of these prophecies.” But I want you to know that today; this passage has come to pass. I am not expecting it to come quickly. He had already come.
19. From the Bible, “He came quickly. Because they were watching at the sky. Suddenly the Lord who they were expecting appeared in His temple.”
20. I am saying that scriptures are repeating themselves. Do you know that God was in the temple fellowshipping with Simeon?
21. Simeon the high priest was rejoicing with God in the temple with Mary, in the temple. While the Jewish Pharisees, the high priest were searching the scriptures to know when the Messiah would come. While the Messiah was already in the temple worshipping and rejoicing in the temple with Simeon.
22. But the rabbis of that day were busy searching the scripture to know the signs that would precede the coming of the messiah. Are they not doing it again today? Are they not searching the scriptures to know the predicted signs that will take place before the second coming, when the man is in the temple, addressing His people?
23. We, as co-labourers with Him, beseech you to work worthy of the vocation whereby you are called. We, as co-labourers with God, we warn you to be careful that you do not receive the grace of God in vain.
24. I thank God that I am a co-labourer with God and not with any other. What a nice thing to work with God, not with mere man. And I didn’t force myself into that work. He invited Me and I responded.
25. Are you happy with the work? Working with Him, is it giving you joy? Does it give you joy? Now, strive to end the cause of your ministry with joy.
26. St, Paul said, “I am struggling night and day to make sure I will fulfill my ministry and end it with God.” Yes, end it with joy. Because there are people that will fulfill their ministry very well but they will end it with sorrow.
27. If it is not so, St. Paul wouldn’t have been praying that God would enable him to end his own with joy. William Branham put it this way. He said, “I warn you as children of God, especially ministers. Be very careful. If you are not careful, all you have been struggling to build all these years, Satan can destroy all of them in one second.” Is that not true?
28. I have told you that to destroy a house is easier than to erect a house. Now, we go further in the scripture.
29. 1 Corinthians chapter 3 verse 9. KJV. “For we are labourers together with God: ye are God’s husbandry, ye are God’s building.”
30. We are what? Labourers together with God and the Church is our laboring ground. You are God’s husbandry, you are that farmland where we are sent as labourers to come and do the weeding, the watering, the trimming, the nurturing.
31. HOW MANY ARE ON THEIR DUTY POSTS TILL TODAY? SOME HAVE LONG, LONG TIME AGO ABANDONED THEIR DUTY POSITION. AND I HAVE TOLD YOU TIMES WITHOUT NUMBER THAT YOUR SALVATION IS TIED TO THE OFFICE YOU OCCUPY IN THE CHURCH; YOUR SALVATION IS TIED TO YOUR MINISTRY.
32. You cannot make shipwreck of your calling; you cannot make shipwreck of your ministry and expect to enter paradise. Impossible! Your salvation is your ministry. Why? Gifts and calling of God are without repentance. He called you, and brought you in. You are to justify the confidence that is reposed in you.
33. It is you. If you are a faithful servant, that which is committed into your hand, your faithfulness will be measured in the absence of your master.
34. If he comes back and meets you doing that job, He will be very, very happy with you. He will give you honours. But if while He comes back, He comes to meet you and He starts hearing stories, how you have been wandering about, idling away your time in gossiping and things that do not profit, will He be happy?
35. The Bible said He will give you a place with the unbelievers. He will give you a portion with the unbelievers.
36. I know you are waiting for Me to quote scriptures. I am the scriptures. If what I am saying is not scriptural, say “I don’t believe.”
37. “For we are labourers together with God: ye are God’s husbandry, ye are God’s building. KJV.
38. Another translation. “We are only God’s co-workers…
39. We are only what? God’s co-workers. Remember the Church is one. The only way God can monitor the affairs of the Church very strictly is to have co-workers. He will station them here and there, all for the same cause.
40. We are only God’s coworkers. You are God’s garden, not ours;…
41. You are God’s garden, not ours.
42. …you are God’s building, not ours.” LB.
43. “For we are fellow workmen, joint promoters and labourers.
44. We are fellow workmen, joint promoters. Have I not told you before that once you are taking side with God, you are going to promote the cause of God? If the Head of State appoints you as a minister, surely, you will be defending his administration for you are also in power.
45. If the Head of State appoints you as an ambassador extraordinary or special adviser, you are also in authority. You are in the ruling power. You would be defending the government which you are a part of. You will be going about promoting the cause of the President thus, you are joint promoters.
46. But unfortunately some of the workers are not promoting. Instead of promoting, they are demoralizing people.
47. Well, I won’t say anything now, but in the end, I will say something. But for now, the battle is still on. I don’t want anything to distract My attention. Because Satan is acting on Me using some of you. His aim is to distract My attention from the purpose for which I am sent, so that you would be running round and round. God forbid.
48. I know his tricks. The Bible said, “We are not ignorant concerning the devices of the devil.” We are not ignorant. For every move he makes, we know his motive.
49. If Satan wants to attack Me, he will use one of you. Do you know that? No thief succeeds in a foreign land where he does not know very well. He can only do “try your luck.” He is doing “try your luck.” He will watch well before he steals anything, for if he is caught with ten naira, money is money. But to one who knows the ground very well, he knows when there is money in the house.
50. What I am saying is that somebody gave birth to a child and named him, “What people can say”, another person named his own, “When you get home”, another man named his own, “The home is bad”. Another man named his child, “Foreign is better”, that means people will love to appreciate foreign goods more than our own home made goods.
51. If a relation buys a car, they will say, “Your car is nice but I love the one I saw in Owerri. That one is better than this one.” Though the one bought by the relation might be better, he will prefer that of a foreigner. Another man named his own child, “Hatred is in the heart”.
52. What am I saying? There is no way I can preach this message without using Igbo proverbs, because this is a message meant for elders.
53. Proverb helps it to sink well.
54. Brother Columbus. Let’s leave the past to go by. If we insist on washing off the dark spots on our knees, the white soap would be wasted. If you consider the maggot in the fish, you can never use the fish in cooking your soup.
55. Let us continue forging ahead, until we get to the end. For the end will declare all things. Everything shall be made manifest in the end. And I don’t think I will be so foolish so as to pay attention to side attractions. That is why Jesus couldn’t pay attention to those nonsense.
56. He focused His eyes on His target, and then when they wanted to disturb His peace, He told them clearly, “Sufficient for the day is the trouble thereof.”
57. The trouble of today is sufficient for today. Tomorrow is another day. They wanted to trouble Him: “Herod is trying to kill you.” He said, “That was yesterday. Don’t we have twenty four hours in a day? Yesterday is gone; I am now in a new day. Go and tell the fox that I am coming today. If he wanted to kill Me, it was yesterday.”
58. They said, “If that is the case, let us follow Him and die with Him.” He went there and came back. Nothing happened.
59. St. Paul put it this way, “One thing I do is this, I forget the past, I press on to the future, to the mark of my high and holy calling in Christ”.
60. What is more, when I am pursing that cause, I pursue it wisely. I don’t beat the wind at all. I maintain the rule lest after helping to purchase that paradise; I myself will be a cast away.
61. The worst thing that can happen to you is for you to be destroyed together with one you preached to. Or for you to see one you preached to in paradise while you will be put in hell.
62. Or you see one who you preached to and he called the message devil, only to see yourself in hell with him. What will you say? Because it is the end that will expose our hypocrisies. Because immortality is the end of everything. That’s all.
63. Anywhere you find yourself at last, that is your reward. That is what you worked for.
64. Verse 9 of 1 Corinthians 3. “For we are fellow workmen…
65. Fellow workmen, joint promoters, labourers together with and for God. And the God who co-opted us, we are working with Him and also for Him.
66. You are God’s garden and vineyard and a field under cultivation. And you are God’s building.
67. There is no man that can erect this structure alone without hiring some other labourers. I cannot be the bricklayer and a carpenter and electrician at the same time. Is it possible?
68. The same way, in this Church at Obiakpu Egbema, whether I like it or not, if they have agreed that they must worship this God, please Brother Kelechi, ordain in the Church according to the command of the Holy Spirit, Pastor, Teacher and Evangelist, at least for now.
69. In due course, as the gifts manifest, other offices will follow, but for proper administration of this Church at Obiakpu, set in order things that are lacking and ordain these three offices.
70. If I should help you, My choice of a shepherd in this Church, I mean My choice of a Pastor, if it is your choice, confirm him before you will come back. I am committing it into your hand because when you are convinced that they have collectively decided to worship this God I have introduced to them, now covenant them in the Name of the Son of Man. (Selah).
71. My choice of a Pastor for this Church without looking at anybody’s face but trusting in God who sent Me here, if they agree that they must serve this God, ordain by revelation one that is already revealed who has been working with Me even when he never knew Me and it is no other person but Brother Promise.
72. This man doesn’t know where he is standing. This is euphoria. He didn’t know what happened. Leave him alone. He won’t die. He wasn’t the one that pulled himself on the ground. After all he knows more than that, being a pastor for many years. I believe something pulled him. I believe it is revelation. That is witness.
73. You know a man can be working with God and yet he won’t know that he is working with God. St. Paul was working with God in blindness. When St. Paul was persecuting Christians, he never knew he was called from his mother’s womb. Amen.