April 14th, 2024.
Topic: EVERY MEMBER, A BIBLE STUDENT (1)
Text: Psalms 138:2, 119:12, Joshua 1:8, Hebrews 4:12
Minister: Dr. Daniel Olukoya (G.O. MFM Worldwide)
Pay very close attention to this series we are starting because of the importance of the matter. To start with, it is a huge tragedy if you come to church without a Bible. It is inappropriate to come to church with just the New Testament Bible in your hand; that is not the whole Bible.
I agree that there is a Bible on your phone, but you must come to church with the hard copy. Your phone should not replace your physical Bible.
Psalms 138:2 (KJV) says: “I will worship toward thy holy temple, and praise thy name for thy lovingkindness and for thy truth: for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name.”
This tells you the importance and power of the Word of God.
Psalms 119:18 (KJV) says: “Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law.”
This shows the centrality, power, and importance of the word of God.
It is not enough to just pray. You must know your Bible, you must be a Bible reader. You must meditate, memorise, chew, and eat the Word of God. It must be like honey in your mouth. You must be a student of the word of God.
The Bible says:
Joshua 1:8 (KJV): “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success.”
Hebrews 4:12 (KJV) says: “For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”
So, beloveth, the fact is this, and I want you to know and understand this very well: Satan flees when he hears “it is written.” But if you do not know what is written, you become prey to the enemy.
The fact is this, the Word of God:
- is the solution to every problem.
- will show you the direction to follow at every junction of confusion.
- will make you wiser than your enemies.
- is a hammer that breaks rocks to pieces; it breaks any rock the enemy is putting before you.
- will make you love the unlovable.
- will move you and make you go deeper and deeper in the Lord. Do not make the mistake of getting outside of your house without reading the Word of God.
- will bring revival into your spiritual life.
- teaches men and women good morals.
- has the capacity to heal spiritual wounds.
- has the capacity to restore lost joys.
- will give you grace to make heaven at last.
- the Bible tells us that the Word of God brings light: ‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by Him….That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.
The Word of God:
- brings illumination, revelation, and light.
- is still the cure for the darkness of man.
- has the capacity to make you arise and shine. It says that if you meditate on it day and night, you do not let it depart from you, will make your way prosperous, and you will have good success.
It comes to mind today—the song we were taught in our Sunday school when we were young. It looks simple, but it is very deep.
Read your Bible, pray every day,
Pray every day, pray every day,
Read your Bible, pray every day,
You will grow, grow, grow.
You will grow, grow, grow,
You will grow, grow, grow,
Read your Bible, pray every day,
You will grow, grow, grow.
They also taught the opposite:
Don’t read your Bible, forget to pray,
You will shrink, shrink, shrink.
And that is the truth. A believer who does not read the Bible or pray is an accident waiting to happen. When you are too lazy to pray, read the Word of God, and meditate on it, you are a very serious tragedy waiting to happen.
The Word of God:
- has the capacity to kill any depression.
- injects motivation into people’s lives.
- brings hope and gives faith.
- is a builder of faith because you need that Word to build your faith and kill fear.
- is a channel of power. The Bible says, “Where the Word of a king is, there is power”.
- brings wisdom.
- is a mentality sharpener.
- makes you wiser than your age.
- makes you spirit-filled. I am just trying to explain to you why every member must be a Bible student. I am also explaining the centrality, power, and importance of the Word of God.
- brings purpose to life.
- causes spiritual growth, like we sang earlier.
- brings maturity.
- makes us to overcome satanic temptation. When the temptation came to Jesus, His answer was, “it is written”.
Listen, it is a good thing you know about prayer. But the Word of God:
- makes you powerful and formidable in spiritual warfare.
- is the instruction manual for marriage.
- will explain to you the origin of creation, the sun, moon, stars, and planets.
- will tell the truth about the future, heaven, hell, and eternity.
You can read from Genesis to Revelation in days or weeks. You can split the Bible into 15 chapters a day, and in 90 days, you will have read through them. If you read 20 chapters a day, you will read the Bible in 60 days. If you read 4 chapters a day, you can read the entire Bible in 11 months. If you read between 3 and 4 chapters a day, you can read the Bible in a whole year. If you can manage and read 7 to 8 chapters a day, you will read through them in 5 months. If you read 10 chapters a day, you will read through them in 119 days.
But if you take the lazy approach and read a chapter a day, it will take you 3 years, 3 months, and 4 days to finish reading the Bible. Reading 2 chapters a day, you read through them in 2 years. If you read 35 chapters a day, you can complete reading the Bible in 40 days. The longest book in the Bible, which is the book of Psalms, will take you 4 hours and 28 minutes to read through. And you can read the Bible through in a year by reading it for less than 12 minutes a day. Do one reading each day, Monday through Friday; 2 readings per day, Saturday and Sunday; and you will get through the Bible in 140 days.
If you spend 15 minutes a day on the Bible, you can actually finish the whole Bible in 21 days. In 45 days, you can read the whole Gospels. So there are plans to read the Bible through. It takes 65–75 hours to read through the whole Bible. These are plans for those who want to make themselves Bible students.
If you want to become a good student of the Bible and want it to be inside of you, then one good practice that you must imbibe is reading the Bible aloud. “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth……” It did not say “out of your mind,” but “out of your mouth.”.
People in centuries that have gone by, particularly in those times that Christ lived, spoke the word aloud. They read it aloud. That was what the Ethiopian eunuch was doing in his chariot. This was the part he was reading: “He was led as a sheep to the slaughter; and like a lamb dumb before his shearer, so opened he not his mouth: In his humiliation his judgement was taken away”. He was reading it out loud. It was when Phillip heard that, he asked, “Do you understand what you are reading?” He said, “How can I, except for someone to explain?” Then Philip began to explain.
Reading the word of God aloud is powerful. If you gather a large crowd like this and say, Open your Bible to Psalm 1 and read loud and clear, the kind of miracles that will take place will surprise you. When you read out, it slows you down to about 125–140 words per minute. That is half the speed of reading silently. When you read silently, it’s okay, but when you read out loud, it has a greater impact on your life. This is a powerful way you must learn to read your Bible. Why?
It helps take the scripture through the gates of eyes and ears and is far more engaging than silent reading. Another problem with silent reading is that your mind can be wandering, so you won’t be able to mediate. But somebody is saying it. Just like praying and saying it out loud, it engages you more. Many people’s hearts are like a big market place, with all kinds of things going on there. If what I’m saying is a new idea to you, when you start, you may find it awkward at first.
If it is something you don’t have the privacy to do, find a quiet place where you can talk. I encourage you to try it. That’s why you see when those Jews read the law, you find them reading aloud. When you read aloud, it sinks deep into you. Your eyes, mouth, and ears are all engaged. So you focus more. This is where we are going to stop. We continue next week.
PRAYER POINTS.
[Before Message]
- Every door opened to spiritual robbers in my life, I shut you down, in the name of Jesus.
- Powers assigned to strike me from behind, your time is up: die, in the name of Jesus.
- Strange dreams, assigned to naked me, scatter in the name of Jesus.
- Powers assigned to kill me from my sleep; you are liars; die in the name of Jesus.
- Powers sitting in dark places in my place of origin/village/town to attack me, scatter, in the name of Jesus.
- Any rope tying my glory to the grave, catch fire, in the name of Jesus.
- Grace of God, swallow my disgrace, in the name of Jesus.
- (Shout your name; hear the Word of the Lord: arise and shine, in the name of Jesus).
[After Message]
(Lay your hand on your head.)
- Powers that do not want me to raise my head, you are liars; die in the name of Jesus.
- Arrows fired against my brain, backfire, in the name of Jesus.
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