The High cost of Deliverance: How far will you go to pay the price?

 A little later Jesus found him in the Temple and said, “You look wonderful! You’re well! Don’t return to a sinning life or something worse might happen.” John 5:14. MSG.

Monday Motivation: Greetings, My dear friends! I trust you are perfect on this last day of the month. I know there are two groups of people during this time; those looking forward to a time of rest during the festive season, and unfortunately, another group that will have to catch up with some work left undone during the lockdown period. However, in all circumstances, we give glory and honor to God Most High. All praise and adoration are due to our King and Savior Jesus.

Today I want to talk about the high cost of maintaining your deliverance, whether God healed you in your body, and perhaps restored broken marriages, maybe you just had a financial breakthrough, or any form of victory you recently encountered.

Did you know that for every victory or breakthrough God gives you, there is a part that you need to play to keep the healing, restoration, or any success! I have witnessed different individuals experiencing victory in the past, and in a short time, they were back where they started, and their situation was worse than the initial predicaments.

The Lord Jesus took the time to teach us about the importance of maintaining deliverance. We learn about this in John chapter 5, verse 14. The Lord Jesus found this man by the Bethesda pool; he was disabled and could not walk and could not help himself while others could get inside the water for healing. Out of the abundance of His mercy, Christ healed this man. And later on, when this man was looking good and ready to start his life again, we learn that the Lord Jesus made a follow up on this man and gave him another critical piece of advice.

The Lord told him that he was to maintain the healing by not living a sinful lifestyle again. There was a cost of deliverance this man needed to pay for him to remain free from the previous predicaments that caused him to be disabled. This truth is the same for all of us. When God sets us free from any form of trouble, we need to understand that things will never be the same. We need to adjust to remain victorious; there is a shift that needs to occur, so we continue to go up higher and over and never go backward and downward.

 “When a defiling evil spirit is expelled from someone, it drifts along through the desert looking for an oasis, some unsuspecting soul it can bedevil. When it doesn’t find anyone, it says, ‘I’ll go back to my old haunt.’ On return it finds the person spotlessly clean, but vacant. It then runs out and rounds up seven other spirits more evil than itself and they all move in, whooping it up. That person ends up far worse off than if he’d never gotten cleaned up in the first place.

“That’s what this generation is like: You may think you have cleaned out the junk from your lives and gotten ready for God, but you weren’t hospitable to my kingdom message, and now all the devils are moving back in.”

We also learn from the scripture mentioned above; the Lord Jesus tells a story of a man who was set free from one demonic spirit. That wicked spirit left him, wandered in dry places, could not find any rest, and decided to try its luck and go back from where they cast out. It found the man clean, empty, with no protection, guarding the gate of his spirit, mind, soul, and body when it came back. He was not full of the word of God, and most probably, he was living the sinful lifestyle that quickly attracted that wicked spirit back to his life.
As we continue to read this chapter, we learn that in the end, the condition of that man was worse than before because he was now possessed by spirits that were more wicked than the first single demonic spirit that was afflicting his life.

Then the person’s condition becomes much worse than it was in the beginning. This describes what will also happen to the people of this evil generation.” Matthew 12:45.

As we read from the scripture mentioned above, the Lord Jesus likens our generation to this man because we are not willing to pay the cost of following Him wholeheartedly. We are not willing to pay the price of studying and meditating on the word. We are not ready to go through the process of renewing our minds; by refraining from imitating the ideals and opinions of the culture around us.

We hinder the process from being inwardly transformed by the Holy Spirit through a total reformation of how we think, so we are empowered to discern God’s will as we live a beautiful life, satisfying and perfect in His eyes. We are not willing to pay the price of sitting at Christ’s feet to learn from Him and live like Him. Hence we continue to experience temporary breakthroughs instead of long-lasting breakthroughs.

My question for you this day is, what will it take for you to pay the price. Christ has paid the price for the redemption of our souls once and for all. But there is a price of obedience, commitment, and steadfast love you need to pay to enjoy what Christ has done for you.

May I encourage you to continue to seek the kingdom of God first and put the kingdom of God first even after God has given you a breakthrough! May your healing, deliverance, restoration be a motivation for you to continue to live for Christ. May you be determined this day to feed on the word and guard the blessings Christ has given you and protect yourself from experiencing predicaments that are far worse than those you have seen.

May you pass every test place in your path, may you remain committed to God, so He can fight the battles are His in your life.

I hope you found encouragement in this post. Thank you for stopping by; I genuinely appreciate you. God loves you; He is with you and for you. Many blessings to you.