WORD OF THE DAY - ADVERSITY AND DISCOURAGEMENT/ PROBLEMS AND DISCOURAGEMENT

𝐌𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐓𝐀𝐈𝐍 𝐎𝐅 𝐅𝐈𝐑𝐄 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐌𝐈𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐋𝐄𝐒 𝐌𝐈𝐍𝐈𝐒𝐓𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐒

International Headquarters, Lagos, Nigeria.

Sunday Worship Service

June 5th, 2022

Minister: Dr. DANIEL OLUKOYA (G.O MFM Worldwide)

Topic: ADVERSITY AND DISCOURAGEMENT/ PROBLEMS AND DISCOURAGEMENT


Text: Proverbs 24:10; Romans 8:28; Acts 20: 23-24

If it is in the day of adversity that the fainting power comes upon you, and you give up, you stop what you are doing because of the trouble, it means your strength is small. So what our text is trying to tell us is that definitely a day of adversity will come upon us all. But the decision to faint or not to faint is yours. If you are not used to listening to sermons, listen to this very well. Memorise and read Romans 8:28 to yourself everyday. All things work together for good, whether positive, negative or neutral to them that love God.

Joseph faced his brethren and said "you thought it for evil, but the Lord has turned it for good". If they never threw him into that pit, the Ishmaelites would not have found him, and sold him to Egypt; and he would not have become the prime minister. They thought it for evil for him but there was a conversion. I am praying a prayer for someone whose amen can be loud that:

>>> May the Lord convert your problems to advancement! May the Lord convert your adversity to your advantage! May the Lord convert your insult to result, in the name of Jesus!

"And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose". Whether we like it or not, hard times are a part of human life. You have a problem shows that we are still carrying the passport of the human race. The Bible says in the book of Job 14:1 that: "Man that is born of a woman is of few days, and full of trouble". Adversity entered into the world through Adam and is the lot of man.

Adversity beloveth, is Satan's tool of discouragement and defeat. At the same time, that adversity is God's method of making warriors and champions. When Goliath appeared at that battle front, he did not know that he was coming to promote David. He came to fight Israel but eventually his problem became a promotion for David.

>>> Your problem shall become your promotion in the name of Jesus.

Check your Bible beloveth. Adversity always precedes victory. Adversity can come in different forms, wearing different uniforms; sometimes even pretending to be friends. But it is that adversity that sometimes pushes men beyond their limits. It is that adversity that makes us to recognise our total dependence on God. The wilderness is still the road to Canaan, whether we like it or not and we still need to pass through that road. The Gethsemane experience is still the one that precedes glory. This is a true situation.

Every work of God is opposed. Check through all the prophets of the Bible and the men of God in scriptures. They were opposed. All Satan's territory that we invade is bitterly contested. They are not happy that you are getting through. I want to pray one prayer again that I have been praying for members for months and let your sevenfold amen be the loudest here:

>>> Every power that is saying "let us kill him/her and see what becomes of his/her story, his dreams, his visions", I command the power to die in the name of Jesus.

But God in His mercy will not allow more tempting and testing than you can handle. So, you have the capacity to disallow adversities from shaking you and from turning your life upside down. You can decide to turn your troubles into joy.

>>> I am praying for somebody here today: every problem that will push you into the camp of the enemy must backfire, in the name of Jesus.

So you can allow the adversity to make you better or bitter. Some are so bitter with life. Joseph should have been so bitter but he understood that they were stepping stones to where God was taking him to. God looked at Joseph and said "they have spoilt this boy. His father is always sewing special dresses for him. The father loves him too much and is favouring him above the rest". God looked and said "if I leave this boy with this man who is spoiling him, he will not grow. Let us rough him up a bit so that he can develop muscles to stand and fight". This is a very very serious matter.

I know some women who would not be here and praying and getting breakthroughs if they married good husbands. Maybe when they got married, the man was beating them and they started seeking help and then ran for prayers. What the husband was doing pushed them to their breakthroughs. So you can disallow the adversity from making you bitter and turn your sorrow to joy. Beloveth, there is no education like adversity. God's best soldiers are trained in the school of adversity. You learn more from adversity than from your teachers and books because that adversity has no respect for your brainpower or connections.

But you must understand that the principle of God is straightforward: God will deliver you from troubles if you cry unto Him, but He will let you get into the trouble first. This is a very serious trouble you must know. The Bible says "when thou passest..." and not "if thou passest...". God will always dig the well of joy with the spade of adversity. If adversity is facing you, and you have some problems facing you, it is a signal that your life is a threat to some powers. If you are useless and you are not threatening anybody, they will leave you alone.

It is adversity that sometimes brings out people's talents which in prosperity may never have come out. That is why in the Bible, every righteous man faces the plot of the wicked. It is when you surmount that adversity that you become a champion and a hero. Assistance, facilities do not make men, only adversity does. So when you watch a person in the days of adversity, you will discover what kind of person he is.

The adversity will not discriminate, will not show mercy, has no respect, will come invited or uninvited, does not issue prior warnings, could afflict a person from the cradle to the grave; and no matter how fast you can run, you cannot run from adversity. There is no place you can run to, that the adversity will not reach you. If you have an issue in one place and you run to another place, the place you are running to is most times an amplifier and you will not know what has gone wrong.

There is no trouble free life beloveth. Anyone who wants to live a trouble free life is having a fraudulent dream. Trouble free life only exists in the cemetery. And even in that cemetery, you are only at peace if you are with God. So the day of trouble comes upon every man. This is a serious matter. You cannot buy your way off adversity or trouble, but then; adversity becomes hard when a strong man is attached to it, to keep it on. So, sometimes when you see MFM praying against strong man, that is why. When a strong man is attached to a problem, then it becomes a serious battle.

This is why I am going to pray this giant prayer now:

>>> I decree that every strong man assigned to any problem in your life, I command them to die, in the name of Jesus! (A sevenfold Amen).

Adversity becomes a master dribbler when it is foundational. The only language adversity understands is violence. The enemy does not grant freedom; it must be demanded. There is no point crying day and night that life is unfair. From which book did you read it that life will be fair? Life is not fair. This is why you must demand that what belongs to you must come to you. One man's food is another man's poison. One man's prayer is another man's food. If you are praying everyday not to die but live to declare the works of Christ, what is the prayer point of the man who is selling coffins?

His prayer will be for more people to die so that he can sell more. Or you are praying "by His stripes, I am healed", what is the prayer point of the man who has built a big hospital? He is praying for patients. So this is life. Life is mostly unfair. You see someone who married a virgin and yet having difficulty in child bearing and then find somebody who has aborted 18 times and is having triplets. There is no book that says life will be fair. So the purpose of aggressive prayer is to demand that what must be, must be. You look at what is happening and know that what is happening is not what should be happening, so you need warfare.

>>> I am praying for somebody here: any good thing that the enemy has stolen from you in the womb, repossess your possession in the name of Jesus.

This is why you must understand that we can fight battles at different levels. We do not choose our battles, our enemies, our struggles but we can choose our weapon of retaliation. We are about to start praying now but however, the worst thing that can happen to you when you are in the midst of trouble or adversity is discouragement. The Bible says David was greatly distressed in 1 Samuel 30 when he found out that they had captured his wife and children and that of his men.

The people were unhappy with him and were thinking of stoning him. Then the Bible says "and David encouraged himself in the Lord". It was after he asked the Lord "Lord shall I pursue them, overtake and recover all?" That God said "since your crying has not brought any result, now that you have stopped crying, pursue them", and he recovered everything.

>>> I see someone here this morning: you shall pursue your enemies, you shall overtake them, and without fail, overtake everything they have stolen, in the name of Jesus. (A sevenfold Amen).

Discouragement is a terrible spiritual disease. DIS means: lack of. COURAGE means: boldness. Discouraged people do not hear God speak. The devil knows that discouraged people do not hear God properly. He knows that they will always take the wrong decisions, always hear the wrong voices, always do the wrong things and think the wrong things. These days, we hear people say they drink sniper and all sorts of chemicals but it is discouragement that is affecting their souls. Encouragement will keep you on your feet and make you smile in the face of defeat. Discouraged people have a lot to lose.

Discouragement:

- Will snatch

defeat from victory.

- Will make a man to be borrowing problem from the future.

- Will make people drink the well of frustration. The Bible says "thou will keep him in perfect peace".

- Scatters the heart.

- Is a killer.

During discouragement, your mind is full of worry. Negative thoughts will keep coming and as they are taking over your life, it is disconnecting you from God. So, it is something not to allow at all. Discouraged people will be praying the wrong prayers, saying the wrong things, thinking the wrong things. They will do the wrong things because they are discouraged. They will be seeing the wrong things like giants instead of God. They will be seeing difficulties instead of God's power. Discouragement will make people to end in the wrong place, and the person will get into the wrong spirit, seeing the spirits of defeat, murmuring, complaints, difficulties and so on.

This is what discouragement does. Before we pray, many will need to repent and ask the Lord to forgive them. The discouragement you have allowed, may be the reason the problem seems harder; because discouragement:

- Is a sin against God and man.

- Makes life harder.

- Leads to fear and anxiety.

- Can lead to confusion
.
- Leads to unnecessary anger.

- Can make a person selfish.

- Can create doubt and unbelief in a person's life.

- Will hinder you from being successful.

- Will be making you feel bad about yourself.

- Is a clever weapon that is hindering your progress one way or the other.

- Creates unhealthy relationships.

- Leads to carelessness with the tongue.

- Makes people to give up.

- Can cause lack of direction or purpose.

- Sometimes weakens people in the face of temptation.

- Can lead to depression and insanity.

- Can make you say what you should not say and remove your confidence.

- Can make you have self pity.

- Will definitely hinder you from reaching your potentials.

- Can make you a bitter person.

- Is an expert at stealing the joy in your heart.

- Is an expert at making people rejected, having low self esteem.

- Kills our faith.

- Turns us to discouragers ourselves.

WHAT SHOULD YOU DO IN THIS SITUATION

You need to:

1. Surrender your life to Jesus.

2. Key yourself into the power of God which says "with God, all things are possible".

3. Key yourself into the factor that as a child of God, all things work together for good.

4. Carry out a spiritual mapping of your life, family and know where you are coming from. If you do not know where you are coming from, you are like a leaf that does not know what tree it fell from. So understand where you are coming from.

5. Know what you are doing.

6. Prayerfully by war, demand that what ought to be in your life must be. And those are the kind of prayers we are going to pray now. The prayer of "what ought to be, that is not happening now, must be!"

PRAYER POINTS


Bow down your head and ask the Lord to forgive you for allowing worry, anxiety and discouragement to affect your life. Talk to the Lord.

1. Powers assigned to kill me before my glory appears, you are liars, die, in the name of Jesus.

2. Powers saying I will not be better than this, your time is up, die! in in the name of Jesus.

3. Every midnight power, working against my destiny, die in the name of Jesus.

4. Every destiny blocker, you are a liar, die! in the name of Jesus.

5. Powers making my case difficult, your time is up, die in the name of Jesus.

6. Every generational serpent of my father's house, die in the name of Jesus.

7. Every good thing that belongs to me, that the enemy has stolen, angels of fire, recover them now, in the name of Jesus.

8. Satanic conspiracy against my shining, scatter! in the name of Jesus.

9. Where is the Lord God of Elijah? Arise, release your fire on the altar of my enemies, in the name of Jesus.

God bless you all in Jesus name.

©2022 MFM H/Q Sermons Publication