Date
of message: 10 February 2004 Issue
126
Subject: Sanctified By The Word Of God And Prayer
Shalom, Boker-tov (good morning),
Thank you for the calls from some of you asking whether I was alright
for the past two weeks. Certainly, by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,
I am greatly blessed and had been busy with a couple of important assignments
and could not raise the time to write and share. And now that those tasks
had been completed and dispensed with, I am now available to share with
you again.
We are really living in interesting and often troubling times. While I
was in Israel enjoying the many exciting places and eating all those Jewish
kosher food, the Lord impressed upon me that I should share with you on
the subject of kosher food and so in early January I embarked on the series
of kosher food and the relevance of the Word of God on our food. I did
not know how many sessions of messages there would be and I had no idea
where we were heading as well. Definitely I had no idea of the magnitude
of the damage the latest round of bird flu in many of the Asian countries
had inflicted.
Terrible that in a short period of six months or so, we had seen or heard
of the swine fever in certain parts of Denmark and the Netherlands, mad
cow disease in USA and Canada, the salmon sickness among reared salmon
as opposed to salmon in the wild and now the bird flu. So many countries
were impacted that it might even reach epidemic levels – started
in Japan, the flu swept through Korea, China, Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia
and even Pakistan. Someone told me that officially more than 23 million
chickens and ducks have been culled as a preventive measure. And over
the weekend, the health authorities discovered that the chickens in Arizona
USA were also not spared the disease and they had to cull over 24,000
birds.
Thank God, the virus only infects birds and possibly those who come into
close contact with poultry and there are no proven cases of the virus
spreading from one human to another. Also, scientists and researchers
have been working round the clock to identify the virus and to find a
cure for this deadly virus.
So, thinking aloud, if we have to stay away from pork (due to swine fever),
beef (due to mad cow disease), and salmon meat and now chicken and possibly
duck, what else is there for us to eat? Vegetables seem to be in high
demand these days and my family was just discussing this question over
lunch on Sunday and my wife suggested that we adopt the ‘Daniel
diet’ and see how the Lord would rejuvenate our body after that.
Certainly that could be one solution. But what about those of us who simply
need to have some meat in our food intake every day? Is it safe to eat
pork, beef, salmon and chicken or duck meat? Certainly in Singapore it
would be very safe to eat these as the government conducts stringent health
screening of all the meat at the abattoir before they are released to
the markets and supermarkets.
Should we not be afraid of contracting the viruses when we eat any infected
meat by accident? I do not know about you but I will certainly not be
afraid for I know that all food would have been sanctified by the Lord
after we had given thanks to Him. The apostle Paul wrote to Timothy to
remind him of the importance of giving thanks to the Lord before he partook
of the food (1Timothy 4: 4-5).
4. For every creature of God is good, and nothing is to be refused if
it is received with thanksgiving;
5. For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.
Certainly some will argue that Paul was referring to non-kosher food like
the creatures that the apostle Peter saw in his vision of the white sheet
descending from heaven and within there were numerous creatures of all
kinds, kosher as well as non-kosher (Acts 10: 9- 16). In the vision, Peter
was commanded to take the animals and eat of them but he, being a devout
Jew with regards to his dietary habits, refused and the Lord had to instruct
him on the significance of the occasion, that all animals were clean and
that he could consume them all without exceptions.
But then you may argue that what the Lord showed to Peter were healthy
and not dead creatures and quite unlike those diseased chickens and cattle
and the like. Yes it is true that there is a distinction to be made. However,
my point is that when we eat food that we did not cook for ourselves but
by chefs either in restaurants or in the food courts, we never find out
whether the meat we ordered were from animals that were healthy or diseased.
We simply eat and hardly even gave the food a second thought.
What would happen then? Would we catch the disease and become sick? I
don’t know and I cannot give you guarantees that you will not fall
sick. However, I had heard of our own senior pastor, Joseph Prince, of
New Creation Church who bought a plate of nasi lemak (coconut flavored
rice with fish and hot chilli paste) one evening and after giving thanks
to God for the food, tucked into his food.
After a few spoonfuls of the delicious rice, he bit into something hard
and upon close examination, discovered that there was a rusty nail in
his rice and he was not aware of its presence since the nail looked deceivingly
like one of the anchovies that came along with the dish. Of course he
retrieved the nail and placed it on the table. The Lord caused him to
bite the nail and in the process it could be found. The nail could have
been swallowed into the stomach and thereby caused complications. He was
alert and he attributed the experience to his having given thanks to the
Lord for his food and asking Him to sanctify the food.
As Believers in the Lord Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior, the Holy
Spirit can cause all dangers to be exposed for us and thereafter we can
avoid trouble. This privilege is reserved only for those who have put
their faith in Jesus as their Lord. Outside of that relationship, I must
caution that there is no protection at all.
Have you received the Lord Jesus into your life? I encourage you to do
so without further delay - invite Him into your heart and He will immediately
come into your life and make it His throne. It is not a difficult thing
to do; all that is needed is that you believe and receive Him and immediately
you will join the ranks of being children of God the Father. Jesus died
for us so that we can have His eternal life as an exchange. Because He
died and took away our punishment, we need not go through that again;
otherwise that would tantamount to a double jeopardy. Our Father is a
Righteous God and He will honor His Covenant with His Son Jesus Christ
our Lord.
My friends, one day, after all the Christians have been taken home to
be with the Lord, and should you by any chance be reading this article,
be assured that Jesus loves you so much that He already demonstrated His
love for you on the cross. He died that we may have life in abundance.
Pray this simple prayer to invite Jesus into your heart and immediately
you will experience His peace coming your way.
Our Heavenly Father, thank you for Your protection over us in all areas
of our lives. Thank you that You loved us so much that You sent Your only
Beloved Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, two thousand years ago to die for
all our sin and to be raised from the dead so that we can be forgiven
of all our sin and now we are set free.
Lord Jesus, thank you for coming into my heart and for giving me the Holy
Spirit to be my Friend and my Guide. Thank you that the Holy Spirit is
with me constantly reminding me of my very special position as a child
of God the Father. Thank you that as Your child, I can now start enjoying
all Your blessings for my life - Divine Healing, Divine Health and Divine
Life in You. Thank you also for the wonderful gifts that the Holy Spirit
brings along with Him and for imparting those gifts into my life.
Thank you Lord Jesus for what You had accomplished for us on the cross
thus satisfying the judicial righteousness of the Father. Because You
were raised from the dead, I am now eternally forgiven of all my sin,
greatly blessed among all men, a highly favored child of God, deeply loved
by the Father and completely protected in the Lord and in the most precious
name of Jesus Christ, Yeshua Ha’ Mashiah, I pray. Amen.
If you have prayed this prayer for the first time, welcome to the Family
of the Father (and it is a very large universal family). It is important
that you are not alone facing your personal challenges but that you can
obtain good help wherever you are. Why not take the time to find your
own local Christian family (local church) and worship the Father together?
You will be greatly encouraged when you meet together to worship the Father,
for fellowship and for the study of the Word of Christ.
Start receiving the blessings of the Father as you walk with Him in faith.
It is your inheritance in Christ and He wants you to start enjoying these
blessings right now; you do not need to wait until you reach heaven and
there is more from where they come from.
And, my friend, continue to exercise the gift of praying in tongues and
with the usage, more gifts of the Holy Spirit will be imparted to you.
The Lord blesses you and keeps you,
The Lord makes His face shine upon you and be gracious to you and all
your loved ones,
The Lord lifts up His countenance upon you and gives you His shalom peace.
Numbers 6: 24–26
Have a blessed week ahead, Shavrou-tov
Shalom,
Andrew L W Lee
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