Articles and Sermons :: The Message Without Darkness! by Bro. Gbile Akanni

Size: px

Start display at page:

Download "Articles and Sermons :: The Message Without Darkness! by Bro. Gbile Akanni"

Opal Bryant
5 years ago
Views:

1 The Message Without Darkness! by Bro. Gbile Akanni - posted by sermonindex (), on: 2011/12/9 9:47 Prayer: Father we honour You once more for this privilege of looking into the Living oracles to set the path of our feet on the right course, the path that our Elders have trod. Lord I pray this hour that the Spirit of Truth might come down to speak with us. As many as are listening to your Word today, Lord, raise a standard in our midst and cause men to hear you again and afresh. Lord we are praying that no man who partakes of this sharing today would regret at the end-time. Thats our prayer. Thank you Father for hearing us for we have prayed in Jesus Name. Amen. We praise the Lord for the privilege He has given us to come your way once more. And I thank God that He has made it possible for us to continue this series of teachings on Living Seed. You will remember that last week we began to speak about Guideposts for the End-time Believer and we decided to study, as the Lord led us, the First Epistle of John from chapter 1. We only did some general introduction to this theme in the course of the last edition of Living Seed. Today we are going to continue a little further on our current theme of Guideposts for the End-time Believer. Can you turn your Bibles with me as we now look at 1st John chapter 1. For continuity I would like to read from verse 1 again but this time I would read quickly to verse 10. 1Jn 1:1 That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life; 1Jn 1:2 (For the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us;) 1Jn 1:3 That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ. 1Jn 1:4 And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full. 1Jn 1:5 This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is Light, and in him is no darkness at all. 1Jn 1:6 If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth: 1Jn 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. 1Jn 1:8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 1Jn 1:9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 1Jn 1:10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. May God bless His Word as we read and as we study together in the Name of Jesus Christ. Amen. I would like you to come with me as we now begin to examine what are the Guideposts that helped and held the Patriarchs, the Elders, the men that have embraced this same faith that you and I are embracing today. What are the Guideposts that kept them? What are the issues they obeyed? What are the words that God taught them that kept their lives the way it was kept. And what gave them the victory that they had over the devil, over sin, over the flesh and over the world system? These are the issues that we are trusting God to reveal to us as we study together in the course of this broadcast today again. Having said to you in the course of our last broadcast, we said that this whole Epistle was written and in it all these Principles are being declared unto us - that you also may have fellowship with us and truly our fellowship is with the Page 1/6

2 Father and with His Son Jesus Christ. I would like to pick our discussion from that verse 3 today as the Lord moves us on. Now when you look at that verse 3 from the New International Version of the Bible, it says 1Jn 1:3 We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. 1Jn 1:4 We write this to make our joy complete. Last week I said that God has not just called you unto something local, if God had just called us unto something local then a local standard, a convenient local arrangement would have been alright. It would not have mattered much if you say - Well, in our own village or in my own town or in my own group or in my own denomination, this is what we chose to believe. There would not have been a need for this study! But you see God is calling you into a fellowship and these Guideposts, these instructions that the Lord passed on to our Elders, that the Lord passed on to men of the earlier generation of believers and that God has continued to pass on to anybody that would hereafter believe, they are the issues that would make you to also have fellowship...when they say with us, that us includes all the Apostles, all the Patriarchs, all the Elders, all the martyrs of the faith. It includes all those that have served God in one capacity or the other and who have gone to heaven to rest waiting for the rest of us to join them. Now one of the reasons that we need to pay attention to these Guideposts is because the fellowship unto which God is calling us - and truly that fellowship is with the Father and with the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, that fellowship is with all the believers all over the ages, all over the world; regardless of their tongue, regardless of their culture, regardless of their upbringing and regardless of their civilisation. This means that the truth that God has presented to us is timeless truth, its truth that cannot be localised: it is not affected by our culture or by our upbringing. The issue now is are you laboring, are you walking in order to be in that fellowship? While we now study, we need to begin to find out what was the instruction and what was the Word of God that they believed? What was the message that God spoke to them so that we also as end-time believers, as men that the end of the age has come unto might set our lives aright and that we might set our faces like flint, not to be deviated, not to be diverted, not to be polluted, not to be adulterated from the same path that is leading to that common fellowship of all the believers. Follow me as we now look at chapter 1 of the Epistle of John starting from verse 5. It says 1Jn 1:5 This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. 1Jn 1:6 If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth: I want you to wait there meanwhile before I continue. It says - This then is the message which we have heard of Him. Now, this issue weighs heavily on my heart and I would like to pick that for you to see the kind of instructions that is coming to my heart even as we look at that Scripture from other versions of the Bible 1Jn 1:5 This is the message we have heard from Him and announce to you, that God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. New American Standard Bible. When you look at that Scripture from the Amplified Bible it says 1Jn 1:5 And this is the message which we have heard from Him and now are reporting to you: God is Light, and there is no darkness in Him at all. Page 2/6

3 I want you to note that! THIS is the message that we have heard from Him. Now that is the first issue I want you to note: these men that have believed, these elders that have jeopardised their lives on the field of the Gospel, they heard a message that changed their lives. They held a message that turned their situatio n around. They held a message that propelled them forward. What was the message that they heard from the mouth of Jesus? What was the message that was preached unto the early believers? What was the message that parcelled and p ackaged their lives for heaven and for the glory of God? Now if you also are going to share from the fellowship into which they have entered, then you need to also hear this mes sage and understand it and critically examine what kind of message are you hearing nowadays. What kind of message a re you focusing your mind on nowadays? What kind of message are you placing your life on? On what message is your conviction built upon? I need to put this to you my dear brother, my dear sister! If not that we have a common fellowship unto which God is calling you...that fellowship is higher than your local fellowship, that fellowship is higher, more superio r than the one you are going through in your local church, I dont care who your Pastor is, I dont care who your Evangelis t is, I do not care who your Prophet is and who your Prophetess is. If that man or that woman is not sharing this same 'M essage' that prepared our elders for the glory of God, if he is not sharing that with you, I want you to know that that man i s NOT preparing you for that important fellowship. Maybe he is preparing you for another fellowship somewhere on the o ther side in hell! Now that God is giving you an opportunity, you must critically hear what was the message that they (the elders) listened to! Lets take that message together as the Lord now helps us. Lets look further at how some translations put this matter. Le ts check the Williams Translation of the Bible. 1Jn 1:5 And this is the message that we have heard from Him and now announce to you: God is Light, and there is no d arkness at all in Him. Now lets go over that: the message that they had from the Lord Jesus Christ from the beginning says GOD IS LIGHT! T hat is very interesting - that God is Light and in Him there is no darkness at all. That God, unto Whom we have come to walk with, unto Whom we have come to share fellowship with, is Light. That is to say that in God there is no darkness at all! Please note the words in that Scripture as it is coming. That God is Light: THIS is the message that we heard Jesus pre ach, this is what we heard Jesus present! And this is what the Apostles of old heard from Him and they announced right from the day of Pentecost until each one of them was hanged or crucified or roasted alive! THIS was the message that t hey passed on unto every other person that believed! You remember what Paul was telling Timothy and he said - the thi ngs that you have heard of me among many witnesses, commit the same to faithful witnesses who will be able to teach others also. Now, this was the message that they heard from the beginning - GOD IS LIGHT. Now what does that mean? What does THAT mean? One thing you know about light is that light is transparent. Light is what reveals. Light does not conceal, it does not hide anything. If you look at Ephesians chapter 5, lets quickly check Ep hesians 5 and see what God calls light and darkness there. If you will read from verse 8 of that Scripture it says, Eph 5:8 For ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord: walk as children of light: Eph 5:9 (For the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth;) Eph 5:10 Proving what is acceptable unto the Lord. Eph 5:11 And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. Eph 5:12 For it is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in secret. Eph 5:13 But all things that are reproved are made manifest by the light: for whatsoever doth make manifest is light. Page 3/6

4 When we talk about God being light, we are saying that in Him there is no darkness at all. There is nothing that can be hi dden; there is nothing that you would be ashamed of. If you just say - let me look into Gods life, you cannot see somethi ng that God would want to be hiding!! One property of light is that light is not ashamed of its work; light has nothing to hide! Actually light does not hide anythin g neither does it hide anyone; rather light actually reveals. If you put on light, light will point out everything, every contour, every mark, every scratch on the surface. When light is so strong there is no shadow at all. The Bible says the message we heard from Jesus was that God is Light and that in Him there is no darkness at all - ther e is no here and there with God, there is no shadow of turning - there is no hide and seek with God. I dont know if you have come along with me to that point. God is Light! When you come to God, He doesnt say Yes and No at the same time. His Yes is always Yes and His No is always No! You cannot meet God with double tongue. Whatever God said 2,000 years ago, He is still saying it today! He stands by His conviction, He doesnt swallow His words. God is Light AND in Him there is no darkness at all! Not even o ne. Lets see how the Amplified Bible puts it. It says 1Jn 1:5 And this is the message which we have heard from Him and now are reporting to you: God is Light, and there is no darkness in Him at all. Now, how does that apply to our own faith? Verse 6 now says 1Jn 1:6 If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth: So if we say we are partakers together and we enjoy fellowship with Him and we move and we live and walk about in da rkness, we are speaking falsely and do not live and practise the truth of the gospel. Friend, lets begin from that point. Th e message that we heard from Him from the beginning is that God is Light. That if anybody wants to relate with God in fe llowship if anybody says - Look I belong to Jesus, I belong to God, I have been saved, I have been born again - one of t he first things to notice about that man is that he himself has to become light! There will be no darkness about him, there will be nothing he is hiding. There will be nothing you will discover about him and he will be ashamed about! The believers of those old times are transparent. They are transparent because they knew that God is Light and in Him t here is no darkness at all! Now I want to ask you - Did you say you were in fellowship with God the Father and the Son? Did you say that you were preparing for that eternal fellowship in the heavenlies? Can we check your life now? What kind of gospel did you believe that your life is still full of darkness up till this time that I am discussing with you? There are several of you listening to me that say you are baptised, you say you speak in an unknown tongue, you say yo u are performing miracles.. YET your life is not transparent! Some of you listening to me now are on the pulpit, there are some dark corners in your life, there are areas of your life that even your wife knows nothing about! I wonder what kind o f gospel you heard, I wonder what kind of God you have encountered - the God that Jesus began to speak about in the beginning is Light, AND in Him there is no darkness at all! With God there is nothing to hide, with God there is nothing th at He is ashamed for you to discover! There are some of you who have impregnated somebody somewhere for the past 5 years. That child is growing! And yo u moved from that place, you went into another town a-n-d you have started up your church now! You are preaching. Yo u are a big Preacher now!! And you are making big noise everywhere!!! I wonder what message did you hear from the b eginning! What message did you hear? What kind of God did you meet? What kind of Jesus Christ did you encounter in your life that there is still a bundle of darkness in your life? Several of you listening to me today are very good church members but the Pastor does not know everything about your life! There is darkness about you! There is darkness about your character! There is darkness about your life! There is da rkness about your life! In the office where you are working, you are not straight forward - your life cannot be predicted! T here are so many things that are confusing about you. Page 4/6

5 Now we see a lot of people today, this end time Christians - and they are A LOT - you cant take them by their word! If th ey enter into an agreement with you, you just know that you have entered into trouble because they are not going to hon our their word! They have a different and a hidden agenda in their heart. Now! The question I want to put to you is that - IF you are preparing to join that general fellowship that is above, what m essage did you hear and darkness has not disappeared in your life? Several of you are telling lies and you call it diplomacy! Several of you stand up and even on the pulpit you exaggerate a nd you collect money from peoples pockets and you never declare everything! I wonder what kind of message you hear d from the beginning. Friend! What kind of message did you believe that DID NOT remove darkness from your life? There are very many area s of darkness - dark corners - in your life! There are many things that are unknown about you. Oh it is so painful today th at several brothers, several Christians, several Prophets, several Prophetesses, several Evangelists - that it is only whe n they die that we begin to discover terrible things that they have covered. Now that Scripture says - THIS then is the message that we heard from Him and we declare unto you that God is Light AND in Him is no darkness at all! Are you a Bible-School student? See the kind of exaggeration, see the kind of fictitious claim you are sending back to your own church! And I want to ask you - Have you really encountered God who is light in Whom there is no darkness at all? Can you say you are walking in fellowship with Him and your life is not straightforwar d? You are a liar! You husband listening to me - Does your wife know everything about you? Does your wife know what is in your bank ac count? Does she know all the money that comes in? Sometimes you say you are going to Lagos and then you face Ilorin. Sometimes you say you are delayed in the office YET your delay in getting home is because you went out with one girl. I want to ask you - Is your life in fellowship with the Lord Jesus Christ? Are you really living in consonance with the Word of God? So if you say we are joint partakers and in fellowship with Him a-n-d we live and move and are walking about in darkness, we are both speaking falsely and do not live and practise the truth of the Gospel! That is the word of God. I hear you say - O Brother, why are you doing this to me? I am NOT the one doing it to you. The message that we have heard from the beginning says - GOD IS LIGHT! I cannot reconcile the kind of Christian life you are living now, this your l ife that has a lot of cloud and a lot of confusion, and a lot of crookedness and unstraightforwardness is not lining-up with a life that has had contact with God Who is light and in Whom there is no darkness at all. Dear Preacher, there is darkness about you if there are issues you have been hiding - Nobody knew that you are still co mmitting sin secretly, you cover everything up: THAT is darkness! You are in darkness dear Brother. You are in darknes s dear Preacher - you NEED to repent today IF you are planning to be part of that fellowship at the end of the age.. And I dont know how many years you have left, I dont know how many more years before the Lord comes to take His own pe ople! I ask you - Are you in the light? GOD IS LIGHT AND IN HIM IS NO DARKNESS AT ALL...none at all. No! N-o-t in one case!! Now verse 7 says 1Jn 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Chris t his Son cleanseth us from all sin. Can I ask you dear Friend - Are you walking in the light? Are you walking in the light of the Word of God? Is your life co mpletely exposed? Is your life completely revealed, completely manifested under the light of the Word of God? Or are yo u still walking in darkness? Are you still moving in an environment that conceals your true nature? Are you an hypocrite? The Bible says if we walk in the light as He is in the light then we have fellowship one with another. As long as you are a liar you have no fellowship with our Father in heaven, you have no fellowship with the Lord Jesus Christ and I dont supp ose you have a fellowship with the saints who have gone on high. You may be having fellowship with other crooked men Page 5/6

6 . Some of you say - Yes, our fellowship is so big our fellowship is so great? Can I ask you - Is there no darkness about h ow you are gathering the people? Is there no darkness - some cloudy thing, some shady thing - some shadow about ho w you have been doing the work? Is there no darkness about the way you say you have been praying and people are fal ling down? Are you not pushing them down, are you not using some means that are NOT from the Holy Spirit? Is there n o darkness about your life? Is there no darkness about your activity? Is there no darkness about where you are going? If you say you are in the light and you walk in the light then we have fellowship with the Father? Are you truly in fellowshi p with Him? When you come under the light of His Word, His blood cleanses us from all sin, His blood makes us right wit h Him. I am asking you - Are you in the light or are you walking in darkness? This is the message that we heard from Him from the beginning. And so the next Guidepost we are dealing with is the M essage that does not allow darkness, that does not allow any shadow, that does not allow any cover-up! This is the Mes sage that will take you to heaven. If as we are listening to the Word of God here today you discover that your life is not straightforward, the contract you ar e doing is not straightforward, your relationship with your wife is not correct, why dont you bow down and repent right no w? I dont want you to go about with the false hope that you are in fellowship: You are NOT in fellowship with our Father! In this regard, I do not know who your father is. Bow your head right now and say - Jesus, dont let me run in vain, dont let me deceive men, dont let men deceive me! Br ing me into light, bring my life into light, bring my activity into light, no more will I walk in darkness. Bow your head. Surrender every darkness, bring it to the limelight of the Word of God and God will use the blood of Jes us to cleanse you from every sin. Re: The Message Without Darkness! by Bro. Gbile Akanni - posted by Jedibelove (), on: 2011/12/9 12:34 Another timely one from Bro Gbile. I can't forget a life transforming experience I had with Bro Gbile as a college student i n one of the Students' conference some few years back. He is one man that God is really using to revive the church esp ecially here in Nigeria Re: The Message Without Darkness! by Bro. Gbile Akanni - posted by Elibeth, on: 2011/12/10 8:28 Bro. Greg, Thank you for putting this on! Ido not have much time to write at this point. Good Truth! Blessings, Elizabeth Page 6/6

December 2013 USPS Volume 52 Number 12. In This Issue: THE THREE STAGES OF SALVATION

December 2013 USPS Volume 52 Number 12. In This Issue: THE THREE STAGES OF SALVATION December 2013 USPS 184720 Volume 52 Number 12 In This Issue: THE THREE STAGES OF SALVATION In general Bible terms, salvation means forgiveness of sins and deliverance from the power of Satan. This deliverance