COULD IT BE SAID THAT GOD IS HARSH OR SEVERE? 2

4 Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, TO ALL WHO WERE CARRIED AWAY CAPTIVE, whom I [God] HAVE CAUSED TO BE CARRIED AWAY from JERUSALEM to BABYLON:
5 Build houses and dwell in them; plant gardens and eat their fruit.
6 Take wives and beget sons and daughters; and take wives for your sons and give your daughters to husbands, so that they may bear sons and daughters—that you may be increased there, and not diminished.
7 And seek the peace of the city where I have caused you to be carried away captive, and pray to the Lord for it; for in its peace you will have peace.
8 For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Do not let your prophets and your diviners who are in your midst deceive you, nor listen to your dreams which you cause to be dreamed.
9 For they prophesy falsely to you in My name; I have not sent them, says the Lord.
10 For thus says the Lord: After seventy years are completed at Babylon, I will visit you and perform My good word toward you, and cause you to return to this place.
11 For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.
12 Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you."
Jeremiah 29:4-12 (NKJV)

• Types of captivity.
(i) Financial captivity or financial drought captivity. At such a time, things might be difficult for you. Money to meet your basic needs might not be there or available, in spite of what you do, your labouring and efforts to make money. God might be using the period to communicate or pass a message across to you.
(ii) Growth captivity. This is when you probably lack some qualities that you would need in the assignment God has for you. Thus, He wanted to build such qualities in you.
a. Moses perceived he would be used to liberate his people, the Israelites, and he wanted to do it with his physical strength (Acts 7:22-25).
b. God had to send him to the back side of the desert for forty years. At the end of his wilderness experience or captivity, he had already lost his confidence—ability in the self. He could not trust in his own ability again (Exodus 4:1,10,13).
c. He had gotten to know or understand that If he would be used to liberate his people, it has to be through God's power and help—not by his own physical strength or efforts. In summary, God permitted his captivity or wilderness experience, to prepare him for the assignment ahead and to equip him with the skills needed for the assignment (Acts 7:30-35).
(iii) Fruitfulness captivity. This could be a spiritual fruitfulness or physical fruitfulness. God might withhold your fruitfulness to equip you or mature you for an important agenda, and that for His Kingdom on the earth.
a. You might have been in the Ministry for a number of years but you have nothing to show for it yet.
b. The delays or lack of the desired results in the work could be that God wanted you to gather experience in all you are passing through, that the experience you gathered would be the core of your message—the emphasis of your Ministry.
c. Some have been in the Ministry for a number of years now, most of their contemporaries are big or great, but they are still struggling with a little result. For such a person, God might want the him or her to do a specific task which might not be common or be in agreement with the traditions of the church in general.
SUCH assignment or task might need a special skill and the training for the fulfilment or accomplishment of it.
d. The delay, captivity, or wilderness experience, or God's silence, does not mean the person is forgotten or abandoned by God. No. It is just that the person is being prepared for a greater work or an assignment.
e. Some people's work would rise and come to the limelight under the few years of the commencement of their works, whilst in some, it may be later, after several years of labouring in the work.

• An Example: Some of the Kenneth E. Hagin's colleagues or contemporaries works had gotten to the limelight, several years, ever before people started to know him and his work. The like of Oral Robert's work had been known a number of years before the work of Hagin began to come to the limelight. Kenneth Hagin had no Base for his work or Ministry when the like of Oral Robert had built a university with a Ministry Base. In fact, Kenneth Hagin started his Ministry Base with old T. L Osborne offices in Tulsa. But in the late sixties and the early seventies, the work of Hagin started gaining momentum and recognition. Whereas he had started, being in the Ministry, over thirty or forty years before then.
  f. Likewise in physical fruitfulness, or biological fruitfulness. All the women who had delays in the Bible, such eventually gave birth to glorious children.
  SARAH later had Isaac; Rebecca, Esau and Jacob; Manoah's wife, Samson; Hannah, Samuel the Prophet; Elisabeth, John the Baptist.
  IF you had a delay in child bearing, it probably has a reason, the child which would be given to you would a Glorious One.
  (iv) Health captivity. If you had challenges on your health and you could not get help medically. God might be waiting for you to strike a deal with Him.
  a. A number of those whom God had used in the Healing of others were the people who had challenges with their health.
  b. Some of them were bedfast for a number of years before God raised them and made them an instrument of healing for others.
  Lester Sumral, Kenneth E. Hagin, Benson Idahosa, even Oral Robert, and others, had sickly childhood, before God healed them and used them as Healing Evangelists.
  c. Health captivity or Wilderness, or challenge, could be a way of God telling you that He has the interest of using you to liberate others after you might have gotten your healing—liberation. Thus, consider striking a deal with Him, that If He does heal you, you would make yourself available as an instrument for the healing of others.

• You will not fail in Jesus' name.

• Whatever is contrary to your health is cursed and rebuked and uprooted now in the mighty name of Jesus Christ.
• The works of the devil come to an end in your life in the mighty name of Jesus Christ.
  Peace!
  TO BE CONTINUED

• Take notice of this:
IF you are yet to take the step of salvation, that is, yet to be born-again, do it now, tomorrow might be too late (2 Corinthians 6:1,2; Hebrews 3:7,8,15).
a. Acknowledge that you are a sinner and confess your Sins (1 John 1:9); And ask Jesus Christ to come into your life (Revelation 3:20).
b. Confess that you believe in your heart that Jesus Christ is Lord, and that you confess it with your mouth, Thus, you accept Him As your Lord and Saviour (Romans 10:9,10).
c. Ask that He will write your name in the Book of Life (Philippians 4:3; Revelation 3:8).

• If you took the steps As highlighted above, It means you are saved—born-again. Join a Word based church in your area and town, and be part of whatever they are doing there. Peace!