Fired by the Future – Part 1 – Malaysia’s Christian News Website

1 June 2014 by Donna Uning CM –

Right after his trip to Miri, Rev Gbenga Kotila, Senior Pastor for Centre for Reality, Ibadan, Nigeria, headed off to Kuching Park Hotel, Kuching for his next message. Over 100 members from various churches here in Kuching came to listen to his teaching and receive healing despite the heavy rain that evening.

Judges 6: 11 – 17,

“ The angel of the Lord came and sat down under the oak in Ophrah that belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, where his son Gideon was threshing wheat in a winepress to keep it from the Midianites. When the angel of the Lord appeared to Gideon, he said, “The Lord is with you, mighty warrior. Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but if the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all his wonders that our ancestors told us about when they said, ‘Did not the Lord bring us up out of Egypt?’ But now the Lord has abandoned us and given us into the hand of Midian.”

The Lord turned to him and said, “Go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian’s hand. Am I not sending you? Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but how can I save Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my family. The Lord answered, “I will be with you, and you will strike down all the Midianites, leaving none alive.” Gideon replied, “If now I have found favor in your eyes, give me a sign that it is really you talking to me.

Philippians 3:7-12,

“But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith. I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead.

Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.”

“The future you see is the future you possess,” said Rev Gbenga telling, “The future you cannot see, it’s impossible to possess it.” The future you see is also the future you enter into. Whenever God calls a man, the first thing He does is give visions for what He’s supposed to do. What you can’t see, you can’t access, you can’t step into or walk into. When you look at Jesus in John chapter 3:

John 3:1,

“Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.”

“The first thing God does is to make you see. Even in creation, the first thing God created in Genesis chapter 1 is light because it gives the access to see,” he said. When God called Abraham out in Genesis chapter 12, He said get out of your father’s house to a land I will show you.

“The first thing God starts away is to show us; because if you can’t see the future you can never give hope to anything that has to do with your future. You can never predicate anything that has no hope in the future. You may have hope in the past; you may have hope in the present due to the future. Once you look at your past, you are doomed. Once you live by your past you are tied down. Once you live by your past, you are caged. Once you live by your past, access to tomorrow becomes difficult; you are stagnant.

“You need to see what God sees for you to move,” he voiced out. “If you know what tomorrow has for you, you move. You don’t get stuck, you don’t get held back or delayed; you move!”

Jesus said in John chapter 4, ‘do not say there are four months to the harvest but to lift up your eyes and see.’ If you speak the way everyone is speaking, that’s the way you will speak. If you see differently, you will speak differently. But if you see onto God, what you did not see earlier, you will see.

The event of the past always blocks the access of the future. What they have experienced held them down; prevented them from receiving their miracle, he told. At the Lake of Gennesaret, the fishermen were fishing in that water for twelve hours and they caught nothing. They were washing their nets getting ready to move home. While they were doing that, Jesus stepped in.

“I don’t know what your story looks like but there is someone who can change your story!” he called, “I don’t know what’s in your past, but the God I know will change your story. What you don’t know, He will reveal it to you. He will not only show your future but He will impact your future!”

“The reason why you have not access it yet is because you are not caught in God. The moment you get it, you get there!” he explained. They were fishing for hours and caught nothing and Jesus said ‘don’t pack up yet!’ Sometimes we give up, washing our nets because we see no glimpse of tomorrow. “But suddenly, the master of time, the master of season, the master of the seconds, shows up and says, ‘stop there and rise up! I bring Good News!’ He doesn’t just bring good news, He is Good News!

“Whenever Jesus shows up in your life, good news! Whenever Jesus shows up in your life, testimonies will follow. Whenever Jesus shows up in your life, there’s joy! His appearance changes the story,” he said. “No matter your story, there’s a change here. Don’t be discouraged, for God is on the way!”

Jesus asked if they have caught anything and they said no. Peter said ‘Master, we have been fishing all night long and the best time to fish is in the night.’ Jesus made the fish, if he made no fish, they could not eat. It’s because He made the fish they become fishermen. He can call the fish that they have been looking for twelve hours. Peter looked at Jesus and said, ‘At Thy Word.’

“The future becomes real once you hold onto God’s Word,” he said. Jesus said, let down you nets, it was not net. Because of his experienced all night long, Peter let down a net. Actually, God would have filled up the two nets, not one; but he did not believe. In seconds, the fishes were inside.

“The future you are looking for is in the hand of God,” he said telling, if you get God, you get it. If you lose God, you lose it. Jesus said, what shall profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his life. Paul said, ‘that I may gain Christ.’

All the while when they threw the net, whenever Jesus spoke, Jesus pulled them. “He’s got the world in His hands; and He sees everything!” he said. “If you believe Him, He will make it happen for you!”

“Listen, you can’t get your future established if you live by culture. You get your future established when you live by Scriptures,” he said, adding, “Scriptures is superior to culture.” What God wants to create for us is another culture from His Word. The world said, seeing is believing; God says, believing is seeing.

Jesus said if you believe you will see the glory of God. Thomas said if he sees His hand he’d believe. We have not seen the glory of God because we have not believed. “I believe in the future I do not see because His Word said it will be glorious,” he said. “You believe your future will be glorious because God says so! Hallelujah!”

“God does not speak the present, God does not speak the future, God speaks His Words now!” Rev Gbenga called. Hebrews 11 said faith is now!