Jesus Wants You to Live Your Best Life!
It’s the second month of the year and slowly all the excitement and over-exaggerated hope of the new year is fading away like the last drizzles of the rainy season before harmattan comes. Most people I know are beginning to settle while others are settling back into old ways, old habits, and old routines.
People say very loosely, “Yeah, life is happening to us all’’ but is this really how life should be lived? Is this how God, the Designer and Originator of life planned for it to be? A constant rising and falling, a vicious circle of hope — getting built and destroyed?
When Christ came, He introduced a new way of living, a life free from worry and anxiety, a life unburdened, one that echoed everlasting peace.
From His first miracle at the wedding in Cana to His remarkable net-breaking miracle that led to the appointment of the first disciples:
‘He said to Simon, “Put out into deep water, and let down the nets for a catch.”
Simon answered, “Master, we’ve worked hard all night and haven’t caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets.”’ — Luke 5: 4- 5
Christ demonstrated a new way of living, one that wasn’t hinged on the failure of the past, one that wasn’t recklessly wandering in “luck” but one that was strongly hinged on an unwavering faith in (the assurance of) His words: forget the toils of last night; it’s a new day, show up and “let the nets out for a catch.”
At the very start of the year, Ferdy Adimefe, the Lead Pastor flagged “Abundance” as the word of the year for our community.
At first, I was excited about it. In my mind I pictured full barns, bursting bank vaults, and taking new and extended territories. While these pictures aren’t wrong, they might be limiting, also to the achieve this as I had pictures it, it would require either sitting and wishing into the universe and expecting the goodies to land to fall on my lap or working extra hard and breaking my back and entire body. January came and proved that both scenes had little or nothing to do with the reality of living in abundance.
Understanding the concept of abundance doesn’t mean with excluding yourself from work or working yourself into the ground.
If the last month taught me anything (backed up by series of sermons taught at the Tribe Lagos expounding on God’s concept of abundance), it was that living a life of abundance, one that was fully and divinely supplied for, was the direct opposite of the two scenarios above.
“Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature?
“So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?
“Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.” — Matthew 6:26–32
Securing a life of abundance doesn’t necessarily require your excessive toiling and fussing or waking ridiculously early and sleeping less than 4 hours daily because of your hustle.
Abundance is an assurance in a Person — God, our Father, our Source and ultimate Provider. It’s a lifestyle. This understanding changed everything I ever thought about the word.
God’s supply and his possibilities are limitless, what really is a $100,000,000 to the God and Maker of the entire universe. What is bread, clothes, or whatever I need? How inconsequential and trivial are these things when we compare them to the supplier of all things good and perfect?
I’m sure when Jesus introduced this life in John 10:10, people clapped, some may have even chuckled.
“Yeah, he’s here again with his motivational speeches. Aspire to perspire vibes.”
But Jesus didn’t just say it, He lived in abundance and walked the walk. Never was He in lack!
From drawing money out of the mouth of fish to having access to a donkey when he needed one, to multiplying fish and bread, He had all fronts covered. Never did we see Him worry, fret, or degenerate His faith to running around in the name of hustle.
I have moved my mind and eyes away from the activities of hustle to looking at the source — Christ.
The Lord is my Shepherd, I have no single want — Psalm 23:1
This is the life Jesus modeled for us.
It was evident where He drew His faith from. He spent His life giving thanks to the Father, assured that He would always come through, and this is His will for us.
Pray without ceasing. Give thanks in every circumstance, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. — 1 Thessalonians 5:17–18
Jesus wants you to live your best life here on earth and in the world to come, so why hold back?
Live free and in gratitude knowing that God, your Father, the kindest Daddy any one could have has your back.
Turn your worries to prayers. Hold on to faith and fix your confidence on God, be assured in His abundance and the vastness of his supply.
This is how we will survive 2021 and the life beyond.
Wishing you a great and superabundant year!
Written by Makuochi Okafor, a content writer in Lagos, Nigeria.
