BEING HATED?

MEMORY VERSE: and when they saw him afar off, even before he came near unto them, they conspired against him to slay him. Genesis 37:18

BIBLE IN ONE YEAR: Hosea 1-3

A wise man once said, ‘if you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.’ Do you know that, nine out of ten times, opportunities do not appear as opportunities at first glance? This is why many of us miss it. Who would have thought, the agenda to wipe out tiny Judah in Chronicles 20, was a divine opportunity to enrich them? Opportunities can also come disguised as persecution or hatred for no good reason. A typical example of this can be found in Genesis 37. The brothers of Joseph hated him for no good reason. Genesis 37:8 says and when they saw him afar off, even before he came near unto them, they conspired against him to slay him. What a world! Thank God, Reuben rescued him from their hands; otherwise, they would have beaten him to death. At the end, they sold him to slavery. The brothers thought, they had succeeded in putting an end to his dream. Unknown to them, they were fulfilling God’s plan. In Egypt, Joseph became a prime minister and a father to Pharaoh. Had it been, they left him alone, he would have remained at home and end up as a nobody. That persecution in your place of work could be an opportunity for you to start your own business.

Recently, an ex- NASA scientist (now a pastor), shared with us an incident that changed his life forever. Whilst in secondary school, back in Africa, his mathematics teacher gave the class an exercise from the mathematics workbook. On completing the exercise, he took the workbook to his maths teacher. After marking his work, the teacher asked why he did not complete the Part B of the question. ‘Oh sir, you only asked us to do Part A,’ he responded. The man, huge peace corps from USA, stood up and gave him a dirty slap. He went back to his seat wondering, what he did wrong. Whilst everyone made fun of him because of the dirty slap, he sat quietly and wondered what he did to deserve the dirty smack in the face. Suddenly, it dawned on him; the teacher expected more from him because he was the best. The next day, at class again, the man gave another exercise from the same workbook. This time around, he completed all the exercise in the workbook. Whilst in form 4, the man told him to get the mathematics workbook for form 5 and complete all the exercise. That was it! He graduated from secondary school with distinctions. He graduated from university with a first class; NASA heard about him and employed him. All of these, came at the cost of a dirty slap whilst in secondary school. That thing you are facing could be what God wants to use to prepare you for your glorious future. That persecution in ministry is your desert experience, it is your opportunity to learn to depend on God for virtually everything.

PRAYER POINT: Father, please open my eyes so that I will not miss any opportunities again in life

Bro Samuel | Reaching the world for Jesus.