The Audacity of God's Grace: 10 Strategies To Living Your Best Life Now (20 page)

God can still perform and facilitate that miracle you are about to give up on. He specializes in miracles and in stepping in when we think that all hope is gone. In verse 10 of John chapter 5 where the story of the unnamed man in docility is accounted for, we are told that because this miracle happened on the Sabbath day—a day that God set aside for man’s restoration, for renewal, relaxation and rest, for prayer, for meditation, and a day of joy that God personally pronounced holy and added special supernatural blessings of peace, and of healing and refreshment in the presence of the Holy Ghost according to (Genesis 2:1-3), the Pharisees misunderstood the concept of the Sabbath. You can recall that, in the Christian Scriptures according to the Gospel of Luke chapter 6, the Jews and the Pharisees who exalted the Sabbath day itself over the originator and creator of the Sabbath with their legalistic attitudes of work and burden instead of upholding the owner and the giver of the day of divine rest, renewal and restoration questioned why Jesus and his disciples had to walk through some grain fields and ate the grain on the Sabbath day.

Get a Rest in Jesus, You Need One

Luke 6:5 [NIV] noted Jesus rebuttals to the Pharisees: Then Jesus said to them, “The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.” In essence, Jesus was saying that the Sabbath he has instituted should be about joy not for sorrow, a time of healing, a day of miracle to lift people up and not to destroy or condemn them; and a time of retirement before the Holy Ghost and for mind-liberation and physical rejuvenation and restoration. Jesus healing and restoration of the unnamed man in docility for 38 years demonstrated his concept of what the Sabbath is about— a 24-hour period well spent with God and not all about religion and tradition, but about releasing the blessings benefited from this association with God to those who needs our love and help around us, about worshipping God in the spirit and in truth (John 4:21-23), forging a deeper friendship with Jesus, experiencing his divine healing that cures our hurts, praise and adoration of the one true God who created all things in six days and rested on the seventh day after the creation week according to Genesis chapter 2:1-3 etc.

By performing the miracle on the Sabbath day, Jesus was rebuking the pharisaic emptiness and religious system of tradition, understanding, and hypocrisy of mere religious observance and correctness where the Lord of the Sabbath and the day itself has been reduced to nothing more than “going to church and doing religion.” Because majority of these Pharisees were born into the religiosity of the Sabbath and the observance therein or have inherited from their parents a culture of attending church services on the seventh day of the week—the Sabbath, instead of doing greater good to humanity and restoring men and women created in the image of God to reach their fullest abilities and dedicating the Sabbath as a great day for real time spiritual renewal and revival; a time to wait on the Lord by having our strengths renewed as well as our inner abilities and those who are disenfranchised among us, Jesus did the unthinkable—the unconventional that defies everything these Pharisees have taught and documented in the Mishnah about Sabbath observance and their burdensome expectations that does not uplift Jesus, the Lord, owner, and creator of the Sabbath.

People Need Restoration

In my non-denominational ministry, JohnJane GraceWorld International Ministries whose church ministry—the GraceWorld Christian Fellowship (GCF) conducts fellowships, community outreaches, nurture and deliverances and worship services on Wednesdays with particular attention paid to the weekly Sabbath—Saturdays, we strongly believe in people’s restoration. I have ensured that our ministry follows this example and the pedagogy set forth by Jesus by encouraging our members to never undermine using the Sabbath for the purposes of healing wounded hearts, helping the less privilege and those who wants to do better than they have done in their past life by doing what we can as a community of faith in the God of many possibilities to see that the least of these people in our communities—those who are docile and/or are struggling through life are helped to move forward. My ministries has continued for some years now to use every Saturday of the week in uplifting people and communities, feeding the poor, helping widows, doing other community services, and becoming all things to all people for the sake of Jesus Christ.

JohnJane GraceWorld international Ministries and the GraceWorld Christian fellowship has powerfully been using the weekly Sabbath—every Saturday of every calendar year to heal lives and hearts, reconcile families and broken friendships and relationships, enjoy community outreach and enriching Bible studies and set free, those under the clutches of the enemy by delivering people who the enemy has held in the captivity of docility.

Other great institutions that have continued for so many years to do excellent ministry of healing and restoration on the Sabbath and have followed the example of Jesus in helping folks subjected to biddability in one way or the other by helping such folks and communities to live well are Loma Linda University Medical Centre in California and Babcock University Teaching Hospital in Nigeria among a number of other health institutions that are using the Sabbath to make men and women whole.

Over the years, I have learnt to not make my Sabbath a day of doing “religion,” but as a day to empower people’s lives, count my cost and reflect over my own personal life journey and look inwardly into my spiritual life, and how I lived during the other days of the whole week. I examine myself from everything and anything that will not help to keep me walking with Jesus. Apart from reaching out to the community, I use my Sabbaths—Every Weekday Saturday as I saw Jesus do throughout the scriptures to thank and worship my God, and to retire before the Holy Ghost where I recharge my inner spiritual batteries after working hard through the week.

This has significantly helped to keep my mind focused and significantly boosted my health. I use the Sabbaths to heal lives, at our nondenominational and multicultural/multiracial church—The GraceWorld Christian Fellowship (GCF) which my wife and I founded and are the General Senior Pastors. Increasingly in the United States and around the world, a number of other Christian churches, ministries, and many nondenominational Christian organizations are beginning to tap into this revealed treasure and lifestyle exemplified by Jesus Christ and his disciples throughout the Christian scriptures—to use the Sabbath to free people from the burdens of docility; stress of life, and observe and use the Sabbath of the Lord to do greater exploit, just like Jesus did.

Apart from following Jesus’ example, I discovered in the history of Christianity that even after Jesus returned to heaven, his followers—the early Christians continued to use the Sabbath of the Lord as a day to bless people, touch lives, worship God, and heal broken relationships until the time of Constantine in the fourth century. Emperor Constantine in A.D. 321 and the Roman Catholic Church, following the Edict of Constantine in the Catholic Church Council of Laodicea (circa 364 AD) effected the legislations that changed the noble scriptural practice of using the Sabbath to free the body from stress, worship God, heal hearts and save lives that begun in Genesis 2:2-3.

Constantine was emperor of Rome from A.D. 306 to 337. He was a sun worshiper during the first years of his reign. Later, he professed conversion to Christianity, but at heart remained a devotee of the sun worship. The idea and origin of using the Sabbath—the Seventh-day of the week to bless humanity, and as a time for the restoration and refreshment before the Holy Ghost that begun within the first 24 hours after the creation of man during the creation week as documented in Genesis 2:2-3 even before Jesus came for redemption and continued the same practice alongside his disciples in the new testament was overturned by religious rulers—not Jesus, nor his twelve apostles and the early Christians.

“The Sabbath should be used to heal the physically handicap and those whose minds are sick just like Jesus did.”

It should be used to pause and rest, to share love in freedom and life in the community. When this is properly done, folks in the community and others who have disproportionately experienced life challenges and difficulties are empowered to move out of poverty, pain and sorrow, and to move out of the docile neighborhoods of life. I wonder how you use your Sabbaths and what significance it makes to you and those around you.

On What Religious Environment Do You Reside?

Another perspective to look at what Jesus did in John chapter 5 or other lessons to learn from the story of the unnamed man that was docile for 38 years that Jesus healed and restored on the Sabbath is this: You must be careful with people or any religious environment that questions the audacity of God’s grace in facilitating the restoration of your stolen potentials from the treasury of your life by the enemy on a Sabbath day because such religious environments will fail to help you reach your fullest God-given potentials. There will always be people who are happy celebrating your downfall. They are happier when you are at your lowest; when you are unsuccessful and are not able to win big in life, when life is beating you and you are not prospering and being the person that God has created you to be. Majority of such groups of people or friends who are happy when your potentials are undermined are possessed by the spirit of poverty. Avoid these groups of people at all cost. They will never help you get to the beautiful destinations of life where you will be capable to live your best life now.

“Nobody or any single religious denomination or organization has the monopoly of the Lords Sabbath,”

A closer observation of John 5:10 reveals that, after Jesus had restored the man, a group of people (the Pharisees) who knew that the man had been in the docile condition for thirty eight long years questioned the audacity of God’s grace and why the unnamed man was healed on the Sabbath. This is the type of group you must avoid by all means, because “Nobody or any single religious denomination or organization has the monopoly of the Lords Sabbath,” for Jesus is the Lord of the Sabbath (Matthew 12:1-14). First, it was Jesus who conducted the deliverance service by himself, on the Lord’s Day. Does it matter when, where or how the deliverance took place? What mattered that day was that the “Lord of the Sabbath” has liberated a man who has been docile, unstable, and unable to live his best life in the last 38 years! It was also for the sake of this Pharisaic attitude that negates using the Sabbath for the greater good of humanity that made Jesus to remind the Pharisees and the Jewish religious leaders what the concept of the Sabbath was about. The Gospel of Mark 2:23-28 accounts Jesus response: Specifically, in verse 27, Mark records that “Jesus said to them, The Sabbath was created for the sake of man and not man for the sake of the Sabbath.” In another similar case, (although not on a Sabbath day) even the disciples of Jesus were shocked to found Jesus passionately discussing and systematically engaging in a mission to free a Samaritan women who have been subjected to a system of docility by the enemy. John 4:21-23 [NLT] captures Jesus’ interaction with the woman, something which was a taboo to the people and the religious leaders and systems to have persons like Jesus, openly sitting in a public place with a Samaritan lady and having a conversation in public which changed that woman’s life forever: Jesus replied, “Believe me, dear woman, the time is coming when it will no longer matter whether you worship the Father on this mountain or in Jerusalem. You Samaritans know very little about the one you worship, while we Jews know all about him, for salvation comes through the Jews. But the time is coming—indeed it’s here now—when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. The Father is looking for those who will worship him that way.”

Who Are Your Friends?

Any group of friends, religious cycle or family members who will stand in your way to receiving God’s best, by keeping you bound and not able to live your best life now must carefully be ignored. It does not matter what you have done with them in the past. At best, forgive them and keep petitioning God that they turn a new leaf and do well; but you must find ways to go around them and move forward in God’s promise about your life. The human mind can be very hypocritical, wicked, and ungrateful—and people don’t change easily too. Forgive people when they betray you, but move ahead with life. Don’t allow people or life circumstances to keep you in the docile neighborhood where you are unable to perform your earthly duties and every redemptive assignment God has called you for.

Any friend or religious system that rejoices at your misfortune or when you are down and not doing well in life, or question why you have been promoted by Jesus upon your liberation must be cut off from your circle of network and influence. There is a difference between forgiving people and moving on with life. You must not work with everyone. Everybody who is not your friend should not be your enemy and everyone who is not your enemy should not be your friend. The name of a friend, church or religious organization will not save any single individual. The only name that has the capacity to save all of us is JESUS! Acts 4:12 [NLT] records this: There is salvation in no one else! God has given no other name (except the name of Jesus which means savior) under heaven by which we must be saved.”

Watch Your Lifestyle Choices and Behavior

My final observation from John 5:13 is this: Be very careful with your lifestyle choices and behavior if you must be able to enjoy your life and live your best life now. The account noted in John 5:13-14 that: “The man who was healed had no idea who (Jesus was—i.e. the man have never had an encounter with Jesus and possibly lived a life without Jesus’ principles), for Jesus had slipped away into the crowd that was there. Later Jesus found him at the temple and said to him, “See, you are well again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you.” Clearly, from the preceding verses, you can see that the man who was healed had a lifestyle problem that may have caused his paralyses.