It’s Time to Experience God in the miraculous
By the mouth of Elijah, God declared a draught in Israel, yet Elijah was not to be excluded from experiencing the effect of the draught; nevertheless, there was provision for him to see with his eyes the dryness and experience God as Jehovah Jireh.
The first miracle – God tells him to go to the brook, a raven will feed you with bread, flesh and water. An outside person may say he is eating little but considering the situation, he had enough to meet his need.
Sometimes when things are tough all we have is just enough to meet our need. The fact that we have just enough to meet our need does not mean we are not living in the miraculous.
Sometimes we need to step back again and look at our situation from another perspective in order to see His hand. Many times our eyes are too clouded with the problems so much that we fail to see God in our situations.
Let’s take another look at Elijah’s experience, when it was a time for a new experience the brook dried up and God told him to go to a widow, another unlikely source of provision. There he knew abundance much more than he did earlier. God even created an avenue to prove Himself as the almighty.
Sometimes when things get tough, God is setting you up for the miraculous. Imagine you got pregnant the first night or first few months of your marriage, your experience could never be called miraculous. Now think about Hannah! Can you see the difference? Or imagine you never had any financial constraints and your family is growing material wise in leaps and bounds; now imagine you moved into an empty house after marriage and the next day or months that follows, the house is filled to overflowing. Can you imagine what Job and his wife went through when they lost all in one day?
And then God turned around all their losses for good, can you imagine the joy that followed?
Malachi 3:3 says: “He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver.” Like the silver smith God is holding you in the fire, not taking His eyes off you for one minute, waiting until He can see his image in your life and relationship.
Whatever they’re going through, they’ll be a better person in the end.
Hold on, surely morning will come after the Night.
– omolola ezeifeoma
Sometimes in marriage things get so bad that it seems you have lost control of your life. Things are just happening around you and you have lost track of time. Two weeks back you were planning for Christmas and all of a sudden some events take place and the last thing on your mind now is Christmas.
Let’s meet Ken. Ken got married to the love of his life after so many objections from both his parents and her parent. Neither set of parents thought the other was good enough for their child. Things take a new turn in his life after his wife got pregnant and lost about three pregnancies in quick successions. And soon after he had a minor problem with his fertility. The doctor convinced them it would only take a few months to rectify things if medications are adhered to. Months rolled by yet the story remained the same.
Mary his wife was under pressure from family and friends, every time she fell sick they began to ask questions. The pressure from her mother in-law kept building up by the day. She was confused, she could not tell anyone what the real problem was. Whenever she wanted to, she remembered she had to cover her husband.
As time passed by, the situation began to take its toll on both husband and wife, the once sweet relationship started going sour. The pressure kept building from both families. The pressure on Mary was getting unbearable for her; she now nags and gets touchy easily. She vents her frustrations at work, at home and the once sweet babe is turning into an unbearable babe. Even the charming smile Ken used to have is fast disappearing! The situation is getting out of control …
Sometimes things get really tough in a marriage! You wonder how things got so bad. You go through your wedding pictures again and again, you tell yourself it was not meant to be like this. This is never like I envisaged it would be.
I have learnt that the issues in marriage never come in expected shades. When these things happen, the last thing we need to do is panic and get soaked up in worries. The last time we said it was time to learn, today we say it is time to pray also!
In my entire walk in the Christian race nothing ever made me realize that prayer is the Master Key, like marriage. After I got married I learnt to pray more and talk less. Often times there’s nothing much we can do than to pray especially speaking from the female perspective. Prayers said in faith can change any situation no matter how difficult. God is a Faithful God who will always honour His Word.
He said ‘If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray, and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways; then I will hear from heaven, and will give their sin, and will heal their land’
The restoration of Ken’s fertility is something out of control of both husband and wife, but there was something they could both have done. They could have prayed in faith to get out of the situation.
Praying might not instantly restore his fertility but it would:
- keep hope alive and hope will help them keep their joy
- heal their broken hearts
- help in building their faith together in Christ
- keep them from giving in to distractions
- Provide an avenue for them to share their burdens with one another
- Help them to discover God in a new Light together and stabilise them in their Christian Race
We need to always pray and not faint like the scripture says. As we remain in constant communication with heaven, we will receive instructions as to what steps to take. Keep in touch with heaven concerning your situation. He will come and save you in His time when all things will be Beautiful. As you continually pray, search the scripture for His promises concerning you and hang on to them.
Love
omolola ezeifeoma
A Time to learn
Lara after her service year to her nation got a job with a high profile organization like she always dreamed. She met Tom a banker during her service year. Both of them were, Christians who loved the Lord. After going steady for some years, they got married, and a few months after marriage Lara became pregnant.
Upon discovery of the pregnancy, Lara was happy and sad; happy that she was going to have a baby and sad that she would be relieved of her job because of her company’s policy. She really needed the job; things were not going too well in Tom’s bank in recent times. This was just the beginning. Things really got worse overtime. Just as Lara expected, she was relieved of her job. And things continued to get worse at Tom’s bank. The psychological and physical changes taking place in Lara did not help matters. Neither did the financial needs because of the baby on the way and increasing hospital bills due to the rough pregnancy Lara was having.
Lara and Tom started growing apart; they were both under so much pressure. All Lara’s dreams about how her first pregnancy will go were trillions of miles away. Tom wasn’t the caring and loving guy anymore. He was under pressure himself, the salary was not regular anymore, and he did not like the fact that he couldn’t meet Lara’s needs. His spiritual life was not in good shape too. The burden was heavy on him. And all this was just the beginning of their troubles…
Sometimes in marriage things get really tough, tougher than you ever dreamed even if you expected things to get tough sometimes. Even when you are expecting the storms, they don’t come in the way you expect. What do you do when these times come? How do you escape the noise and scare of the storm to remain focused? How do you manage the building challenges when the Honeymoon seems over?
How do you keep your dream of a model marriage alive? How do you stand by your spouse when you seem not to have any strength of your own?
When times like this come, its time to take your notes out and take down some lessons! Someone reading this will be wondering what I’m talking about.
Well I am still here, and did not forget what the story is about. This is a hard truth I had to come to terms with myself. I’ve come to learn that the Word of God remains true no matter how we feel. God’s word is constant regardless of the situation we might face. David the Psalmist saw this and said, Forever Oh Lord your WORD is SETTLED!
The Bible tells us that Our Light affliction is but for a moment working in us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory (2Cor 4:17).
First thing is never to exaggerate our troubles, rather see them as little issues that will pass. Most times we do not knowingly magnify our problems. When we meditate on our problem without a mind of seeking solution, things get worse. Remember we have a foe that must never be undermined, he lurks around the corner waiting for times like these to display the weakness of our spouses and remind us of the several options we had before marriage.
When things get tough, there’s only one place we need to remain, at the master’s feet and around the children of God to tap strength from others.
God wants to do some great things in our marriages this year but he needs to toughen us.
So get ready get your notes out. You might be going through hard times now, crying, too weak to pray and saying when will these end. It sure will end sometime soon but you need to hang in there first.
It’s a great year ahead, get ready!
Love,
omolola ezeifeoma
