Romans 8:14 14 For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. The leading of the Holy Spirit is critical in our walk with God. On the 16th of May, 2021, my senior Pastor announced that God says I should begin my church services on a land the church had procured at Oyarifa. A few days earlier I had a dream that a man of God appeared to me and said I should start a branch of His church in Oyarifa. I woke up amazed by the dream but I kept quiet about it only for about 72 hours later my senior Pastor confirmed this dream by His prophetic word and direction that God says I should start a branch of the church in Oyarifa. The leading of God is very critical and I realized that you need it even the most when you become a Pastor. Jesus Christ is the head of the church and you must desire His leading in order to steer the affairs of the church.
Men who fulfilled and women who fulfilled their ministries in the Bible like David, Joshua, Deborah, Prophet Samuel and many more were men who were led by the spirit of the Lord. You can follow or be led by someone you can hear and see. The leading of the Lord is possible if you can hear the voice of the Lord. Once I stepped on the grounds to begin church on June 6th, 2021, I had to be very sensitive in hearing the voice of the Lord in which direction the church should go, what we should be mainly focused on and what sermon to preach, who should be an elder and which areas to evangelize in even within the territory. A church is a spiritual building and not a physical one only, so you need to hear from the Lord of the church on what you need in building it. Hearing the voice of the Lord for me was in three folds: number one, reading the word of the Lord. The book of Acts lays the foundation for the New Testament church and the Gospels give us in-depth insight into how Jesus fulfilled His ministry. Secondly, hearing the voice of the Lord through my senior Pastor or the man who commissioned me by speaking to him about ministry and providing reports about the ministry, and thirdly the voice of the Lord through the audible voice of the Lord, prophetic encounters and dreams from the Lord. Without spiritual vision a great assignment like this can be truncated as the Holy Book says in Proverbs 29:18a KJV: “Where there is no vision, the people perish.” You must pray to hear the voice of the Lord. Prayer is one medium that opens up the heavens for the voice of the Lord to come down. Prayers bring the presence of God around you and by it God begins to show you how He wants things done. Jeremiah 33:3 says that “‘Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.'” In calling on God through prayer, portals of dreams and visions are opened unto you. The Bible in Acts 10 talks about how Cornelius saw a vision evidently when he was in prayer.
Once I began to rely heavily on hearing the voice of the Lord through His word and through revelations, I easily applied it to my business. I began to rely heavily on the voice or the leading of the Holy Spirit in business. I have written a few articles about it here but I began to be more sensitive to the direction God wants my business to go. Ministry is just like entrepreneurship. In entrepreneurship you require a land, idea, labor or men to make money or impact. In ministry too you need a God-given mandate (idea), you need labor or men (church workers or eldership) to win more souls and impact people positively to change their ways in order to make heaven profitable by making sure many souls make it to heaven. Working with men is not a very easy task. In business you look for skill, academics and all the physical qualities of men to do an assignment with, but in the ministry you look for who God has appointed, trained and prepared to the work of ministry. Over time when you begin to manage both you realize more that even in business you need people who God has appointed for your business assignment.
The leading of the Holy Spirit is also preservative in the field. By God’s grace and His mercy I operate a prophetic and deliverance anointing. I have written about it briefly here. The Holy Spirit will guide you on who to draw closer and who not to draw closer, who to lay hands on and who not to lay hands on; the Bible gives us a command not to lay hands suddenly on people. There are people who came to church that the Holy Spirit by divine revelation showed me they came with ulterior motives. After such revelation, I prayed more and for some divine reason they left and never returned. Do not forget we wrestle not against flesh and blood and you do not need to fight or chase people out but God will orchestrate it. There are monies people blessed me with that God told me neither to take nor use. I believe I have escaped many traps of the enemy because of the leading of the spirit. Similarly in business too, by the leading of the spirit I avoided hiring some people because God told me they were going to bring me trouble.
There are many lessons learned but the last one I will add is that God will use your unique gifting to grow the church, so grow and build your unique gifting. Every minister has a unique gifting that God will use to grow the church. You might be a good teacher, a good minstrel as a pastor, a prophetic person or even an intense prayer warrior as a pastor. God will use that unique gift to grow the church. God will call a man with a particular gift for a particular geographic location for a particular divine reason. God called Samuel as a prophet because at that time they lacked the voice of the Lord as said in 1 Samuel 3:1: “Now the boy Samuel ministered to the Lord before Eli. And the word of the Lord was rare in those days; there was no widespread revelation.” The Israelites needed someone to tell them what God was saying and to provide the nation direction. So the prophetic ministry was needed in those days. David was anointed King because the King of Israel at the time, Saul, had become very disobedient to the Lord and turned against the Lord, so Israel needed a King to direct them in their going in and out. The people of Israel needed a shepherd so God sent David to shepherd the nation. In the New Testament Jesus came to save God’s children from their sins and He was endowed with the giftings of both a (rabbi) teacher and prophet to expound the scriptures more accurately and to prove to them the fulfillment of it with its accompanying signs and wonders to back what He was teaching them about. 1 Timothy 4:14a says “Do not neglect the gift that is in you” but instead grow the gift and God will grow the assignment using that gift as a vehicle. The gift is given to benefit the people God has sent you to as the Bible says in 1 Corinthians 12:7: “But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all.” By the supernatural giftings God gave to Moses He was able to deliver the Israelites from Egypt and even in the wilderness He was able to provide water and food through the giftings to save the people from drought and famine. Daniel’s gift of dream interpretation was able to save all the wise men in Daniel Chapter 2 and David’s gift was used to drive out demons from King Saul. Thanks to Elisha’s giftings many people were saved from captivity, a woman without a child got a miracle child, dead waters came to life and even dead people came alive and many more. You should note that God did not give you the gift for yourself only but for the people to be blessed by it. Grow the gift and sharpen it by constant use, prayer and supplication. Many people joined my church by a unique prophetic word they received or by a prophetic encounter than any other means. The gift is given for the fulfillment of the assignment.
I hope these 4 lessons have been helpful. There are many other lessons I can share with you like: be very intentional about the things of God, always come against spiritual attacks, do not wait to be in the right mood to do things for God and finally prayer, fasting and the word of God must be your constant food. Do not be in competition with anyone, do not seek applause and always let God take the glory when there is a good work or miracle. Lead men to Jesus and do not be the Holy Spirit to men.
Finally be focused on the assignment. The enemy wants to distract you with petty quarrels, misunderstandings and accusations. Always be focused on the God who called you. Drop a comment with your experience as well.
