I received an Email today from a well known
minister in America which was an Easter greeting inviting the readers to click
on the button to receive their breakthrough which included going to another
level. If you clicked on it, you would
be directed to a secure portal to give your miracle seed offering by Visa,
Mastercard or Paypal. The big hint he
was giving is that if you give to his ministry, he will included you in his
prayers (I doubt personally since there will be thousands who click) and you
will receive your miracle and hit your next level since you had the faith to
sow into his ministry.
What came to my mind is that after Jesus’
first miracle of turning water into wine, the next thing He did was go and
cleanse the temple in Jerusalem of people who were making God’s house into a
marketplace.
You obviously have deduced by now that I
probably don’t believe that giving of your finances will necessarily take you
to the next level. Well, it’s not that
simple. If God tells you by His Holy
Spirit to give, then I do believe that you should and that there will be great
benefit based on your obedience. But you
need to beware of manipulation.
So, how do you get to the next level?
Matthew 23:23-24 (MSG)
23-24 “You’re hopeless, you religion
scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You keep meticulous account books, tithing on
every nickel and dime you get, but on the meat of God’s Law, things like
fairness and compassion and commitment—the absolute basics!—you
carelessly take it or leave it. Careful bookkeeping is commendable, but the
basics are required. Do you have any idea how silly you look, writing a life story that’s
wrong from start to finish, nitpicking over commas and semicolons?
What is normally thought is that you have to make a change
in order to make it further in this Christian life, in blessing, in anointing,
in calling and more... And when using
human intellect, this would make sense.
Common sense. After all, we know
according to a famous quote by Albert Einstein that "The definition of
insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different
results." In other words, if you
keep doing the same thing and expect different results, you will continue to
fail. In many ways I agree, but not in
achieving a higher level the Kingdom which requires the use of UnCommon Sense!
In God’s Kingdom, we must not be like the Pharisees and try
to get fancy, trying to figure out some new thing or focusing on some minor
thing. (the minor thing Jesus accused
them of making too big of a deal about in the above scripture was in being
legalistic about tithing, but it’s just one example) Instead, we must always be diligent to get
back to the basics of what God’s Word requires of us. If you did the basics to get to where you are
now, don’t get off track, instead, get back on the track... the very same track
that got you this far and go around again!
It’s like a lap race. The more
laps that you complete on the same track, the more levels you will achieve in
your relationship with Christ!
What are the basics?
Jesus did not go into great detail in this scripture. He mentioned as example, fairness, compassion
and commitment. But there are many more
basics. I will not complete the list but
will add prayer life, worship, study of the Word, having accountability
relationships and more. The big word
that I believe describes the basics in our Christian walk is
“consistency.” The key to achieving
another level is being consistent in the basics over long periods of time.
It is consistency in the basics that promotes you!
The more worn your trail of the basics in your relationship
with God gets, the more familiar you are in the basic disciplines of your
faith, the deeper your relationship will be to Jesus who is the source of all
power, all wisdom, all anointing and every good thing you could possibly
desire. My advice to you? Find out what the basics of God’s Word are
and make your goal to put them into practice every day and in every way that
you can. Before you know it, you will
have completed another lap in this race called life, another level in your
relationship with God!
