09/05/2017
THEME: BREAKING FINANCIAL YOKE
PREACHER: APOSTLE DAVID MENSAH
The Financial Yoke
What is your yoke? Is it a financial one? That yoke can be broken. God gave a financial plan over seven hundred years before the Law and it has never been changed. Abraham at that time paid tithes. Five hundred years before the Law, Jacob was a tither; God prospered both of them. Give, and it shall be given unto you, the Lord said (Luke 6:38). Faith for the finances must be used the same way you use faith for salvation, healing or the baptism of the Spirit. Don’t wait until God first gives to you; He said to give and it would be given in return. When you have taken God as your partner, obeyed Him, then you can let Him know you are expecting a good return, expecting your needs to be supplied. The Bible tells of how Elijah was fed by the birds during a famine. Anyone with that kind of faith could have stayed where he was for the duration of the famine, but God moved on him to leave for a purpose. The brook dried up and, one morning, the birds failed to come. Then the Lord told Elijah, Arise, get thee to Zarephath…I have commanded a widow woman there to sustain thee (I Kings 17:9). God was providing that widow a chance to give to Him that He might give to her. He would ask her to give all and if she did, great blessings were to follow. Elijah said to her, Bring me, I pray thee, a morsel of bread in thine hand (verse 11).
And she said, As the Lord thy God liveth, I have not a cake, but an handful of meal in a barrel, and a little oil in a cruse: and, behold, I am gathering two sticks, that I may go in and dress it for me and my son, that we may eat it, and die (verse 12). What a bleak outlook! When you’re down that low, you may just as well give your last morsel to God because you’ll soon meet Him. Would you have baked that cake for Elijah; would you have given God a chance? God doesn’t want you to wait until you are out of debt before you pay your tithes and love offerings. God said if you fail in your tithes and offerings that you have robbed Him. Bring ye all the tithes…prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it (Malachi 3:10). The widow woman believed Elijah when he told her what thus saith the Lord God of Israel: The barrel of meal shall not waste, neither shall the cruse of oil fail, until the day that the Lord sendeth rain upon the earth (verse 14). That woman made a cake for Elijah first. It took great faith, for not only her life, but also the life of her son was at stake. To think that she would give that last handful of meal to the man of God rather than her own son is hard for many to imagine. When she went back to that meal barrel, it was filled and running over, the cruse of oil full, too. And the barrel of meal wasted not, neither did the cruse of oil fail, according to the word of the Lord, which he spake by Elijah (verse 16). It wasn’t magic or luck; it came about through faith in God. The widow’s yoke had been broken through faith in the anointing of God. She gave her last to God and found that she could never out-give God. The anointing in Elijah’s life helped bring about deliverance for that woman. Miracle power worked in Elijah’s life; miracle power broke the bo***ge. God can work a miracle for your needs whatever they are: physical, mental, spiritual or financial. Perhaps your need is more money: God may move you about, send you job hunting. If God directs you to peddle papers on the corner, He will prosper you; wherever He sends you, you will prosper. Your will must always come second to His. Desire what He wants for you. When people come to me who need jobs, I tell them to put in their application at five or six places they would like to work, and we’ll pray. It works! Don’t sit around waiting for a job to fall into your lap; do something about it.
The city of Samaria was under siege. People were starving; some had been driven to the point of eating their own children. Four l***rs outside the gates of Samaria were starving too, but they said, “Why sit we here until we die?” and started down the road for a miracle. God was going to use them. Although they had become accustomed to sitting by the gate, they had to break out of that rut before God could move for them. Maybe you’ve been in one place so long that it’s worn into a pit you cannot see over; you’re afraid to make a move. Someone once said that a turtle never gets anywhere unless he sticks his neck out—I’ve been sticking mine out ever since. You can draw up in your little shell crying, “Lord, send a miracle; Lord, send a miracle!” or you can stick your neck out and start after one. You don’t feel like it? Have you ever seen the condition a l***r gets in? I have, and I know those four leprous men didn’t feel like walking down the road, but they did anyway. As they came, the Lord put great terror in the hearts of the Syrians.
For the lord had made the host of the Syrians to hear a noise of chariots, and a noise of horses, even the voice of a great host: and they said to one another, Lo, the king of Israel both hired against us the kings of the Hittites, and the kings of the Egyptians, to come upon us. Wherefore they arose and fled in the twilight, and left their tents, and their horses and their asses, even the camp as it was, and fled for their life (II Kings 7:6,7). The starving l***rs entered the camp and had a feast. A miracle was theirs: God had used them; He had broken the yoke. If God can use four l***rs whose flesh is falling from their bodies, why can’t He use you? When in sin, you were a spiritual l***r; but then God cleansed you, made you a new creature in Him as you accepted Jesus into your heart. He cleansed you, and you must know that He will work a miracle for you if that is your need. We live in the day of the miraculous. God will not do the miracle in the way you want it done; He will do it His way. You have the choice of yielding to God’s methods or of taking the bit in your teeth and trying to do EVERYTHING for yourself. Do you want to work where YOU want to work, or do you want to work where GOD wants you to work? Will you let God prosper you, or will you sit in one place wondering why God doesn’t give the miracle? If you’ve prayed and prayed, done absolutely all you know how to do, maybe it’s time to step out into God’s power like the l***rs did. When they started walking, God prepared the way. Walk for your deliverance—why sit there until you die? If you want that yoke broken, it’s time to move, stop drawing up in your shell. “But things are apt to get worse,” you say. Sometimes they have to get worse before they can get better. Learn to humble yourself before the Lord.
The prophet, Elisha, was approached by a woman in deep trouble. Her husband had died; she had no money and her sons were about to be sold into slavery. Elisha asked her what she had to work with. She replied, Thine handmaid hath not any thing in the house, save a pot of oil (II Kings 4:2). Because that’s all she had, she looked everywhere but the right place for a miracle. How like her we are today! If there seems to be a lot to work with, we’ll believe God for a miracle. Our faith sinks, however, when we see nothing. We forget that nothing was what God created the whole universe from. He can perform a miracle for you out of absolutely nothing! All He wants is for you to get ready so He can use you; you are the channel He must work through. Be ready for the faith-God to take you over. “Mold me and make me, Lord,” you ask. But in your heart you really think you already have been molded and made. It seems to be the case that whenever we feel we are molded in just the right way, that the Lord breaks our vessel into a thousand pieces. “But I can’t take any more, Lord!” you cry. The Lord promised that when things become worse than you could bear, He would provide a way of escape. If there is none, then you can bear a little more. “I can take it Lord; I can take it.” He gives you grace and help for your situation.
Elisha didn’t do all the work for the woman who came to him for help; he gave her something to do. She was to borrow from her neighbors as many empty vessels as she could. Would you have done it? Everyone in the community knew the poor state that woman was in; they probably thought she had snapped under the strain when she started collecting pots. Soon her whole house overflowed with empty vessels. The world thought she was a loser, but God looked upon her as a winner. Get ready for the blessings of God, and when they come, recognize them and hold them to your bosom.
After the woman collected all the empty vessels, Elisha told her to go into her house and shut the door. By doing that, she shut out all unbelievers. When God starts moving for you, don’t tell everyone—wait until the miracle is complete before you testify. When the doubters were shut out, the power of God broke that woman’s bo***ge. She started pouring oil into the empty vessels from her one little pot of oil. The oil kept pouring until all the empty vessels were filled. Elisha then said to her, Go, sell the oil, and pay thy debt, and live thou and thy children of the rest (II Kings 4:7).
God will move; He will supply your need if you look to Him and are obedient. Simon needed money to pay taxes, and Jesus told him go down to the sea. Cast an hook, and take up the fish that first cometh up; and when thou hast opened his mouth, thou shalt find a piece of money: that take, and give unto them for me and thee (Matthew 17:27). What fantastic ways the Lord uses to provide for His people! Would you have been obedient had a true man of God told you to get money in that way? Some of you cannot accept the fact that God will move for you because you have not stopped worrying long enough so that faith can take over. So long as you worry, you are not accepting God’s plan for your life. Get ready for God’s miracle. Get ready for God to move for you; prepare for your yoke to be broken, whatever it is!
You say you believe God? You don’t if you’re still walking the floor, if worry keeps you awake at night. Have you ever stayed awake at night and walked the floor because you had a good dose of faith? Too many people say, “Lord, I believe, I believe,” and in the next breath ask, “What am I going to do?” That is NOT faith—faith is full assurance that God will do what He said He would do. Faith takes all the worry out. When faith comes in, fear goes out the window. You don’t have to conquer worry and fear all by yourself. All you need do is open the door and say, “Come in faith, come on in!” When faith possesses your heart and mind, there’s no room for fear.
