One More MORE...
The Path To All The MOREs We Could Ever Need
Dear #DailyFollower,
Introduction
I trust we’re doing great today and have had a fantastic day or still having a remarkable day (depending on your time zone).
January is already almost gone! Can you believe it! Just 9 days more till the end of the first month in 2025. January 1 seemed like yesterday.
I hope we’ve found ways to make each day this year count, especially count towards following Jesus daily.
If, for some reason, your days have been a blur so far, we still have 343 days to go in the year. That’s close to 94% of the year unspent, so you can still consciously decide to prioritise following Jesus daily and leaning on Him to make each of the 343 days count for good for you.
In my letter yesterday, I shared an ongoing conversation with the Holy Spirit about Christ's message to my generation in “There Is More…“.
If you haven’t read it yet, I recommend you take 5 minutes to read the letter; I share about the unending flow of light, grace and love that we can tap into (light and grace) and give (love) as we have received from the God of love.
I wrote the piece yesterday in obedience to the Holy Spirit’s prompt to share a part of my journey with Him. I wasn’t aware that in my personal devotion today (January 22, 2025), I would read a passage that would form the basis of my letter today.
It could have only been the Holy Spirit orchestrating the piece to provide the foundation for a critical MORE that enables access to the unending flow of all ‘the more’ we have in Christ.
Fellowship with the Holy Spirit is sweet, my dear daily followers! When we learn to follow as He leads, He opens our eyes and minds to the wonderful things abounding in His Light for us.
Access to these things (starting with light, grace, and love) flows freely from His endless supply when we pay attention to receiving this critical MORE and take prompt action every time we receive it.
So, what is this MORE?
The Critical MORE
As I read the story of Samson’s birth in my devotion today, this MORE jumps out at me in the part of the story where Manoah (Samson’s father) missed the visitation and instructions of the angel of the LORD and received word from His wife about her encounter.
Now Manoah said a prayer that we must all say consistently this year to unlock God’s endless streams of more in Christ for us (individually and collectively, as the body of Christ) in Judges 13:8, NLT:
8 Then Manoah prayed to the Lord, saying, “Lord, please let the man of God come back to us again and give us more instructions about this son who is to be born.”
The critical MORE, the one more MORE, is:
INSTRUCTIONS
Like Manoah, we need more instructions about all God has laid in our hearts for this year.
Instructions that enable us to access the degrees of Light will allow us to take guided steps in directed paths this year.
Instructions that empower us with the graces we need to run through troops and scale walls as we match through our directed paths this year.
Instructions that enlighten our hearts and help us to see the areas in our lives where God’s love must shine in and through our lives this year.
We need ‘more’ instructions!
Manoah wasn’t leaving the nurturing of their miracle baby to chance. He needed the same encounter his wife had, but he also wanted more instructions.
God answered his prayers, but the man was out and about again! [Judges 13:9, NLT] Thankfully, this time, he left the distractions, taking him away from the more instructions he sought, and he ran back [Judges 13:11, NLT] to the place of encounter to get what he asked of God.
In the place of their encounter, Manoah asked one more time for more instructions in Judges 13:12, NLT:
12 So Manoah asked him, “When your words come true, what kind of rules should govern the boy’s life and work?”
Once again, this a question we must constantly ask the Holy Spirit this year. We need the Spirit-inspired guidelines that govern our life and work so we don’t just expend energy living unrewarding lives or doing unprofitable work.
Now, the response of the angel of the LORD got to me (I’ll explain why shortly) because he said exactly what He said to Manoah’s wife earlier [Judges 13:4,13-14, NLT].
Meditating on this reading, the Holy Spirit reminds me of Psalm 62:11, NKJV:
11 God has spoken once,
Twice I have heard this:
That power belongs to God.
He tells me, “God never repeats Himself; all the instructions you will need to fulfil your purpose on this side of eternity have already been given. However, you must pay attention to hearing it twice - once in your spirit man for quickening (to get your mind ready to obey) and the second time in your ears for action (to get the body moving in obedience to the instruction).”
In the case of Manoah and his wife, God gave the exact instructions to two people. To us, He’s saying, "Engage me to quicken your spirit and body to obey me this year.”
While God won’t invent new instructions about our lives and work outside the guidelines He already gave us in His Word, He wants to enlighten our hearts so that we see the instructions in His Word in contexts that help us take the right actions this year.
Hearing the instructions, as we know them in the Scriptures, and hearing them in contexts that apply to our daily lives activates the faith we need for action. That was what Paul was saying in Romans 10:17, NKJV, when he said:
17 So then faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God.
The instructions we receive this year won’t be ‘more’ in terms of number or newness; they will be more because they activate faith in our hearts to partner with God and see His Word come alive in our lives.
Conclusion
There is ‘more‘ instruction in Christ for us.
Instructions that open our inner eyes and hearts to the Rhema Word, which provides contextual instructions that enable us to take directed steps on guided paths towards all that God already planned for us for 2025 from the beginning of creation.
Are we willing to pay attention to hearing the same instruction twice?
Much more important, are we willing to obey the instructions we receive?
Our actions regarding the instructions we receive show that we are confident in the One who is giving them.
We don’t have to see the whole picture; the bit we see is always enough to take sufficient action until God unveils the next part of our picture of more in Christ.
This continuous unveiling leads us to consistently seek more instructions as we partner with God in what He’s doing and blessing in our world so we stay on track with Him all through our journeys in life.
I pray that this year, we’ll be like Manoah, seeking God to reveal the ‘hows’ [the second hearing] for every ‘what’ [the first hearing] he has laid in our hearts, in Jesus’ name. Amen!
Yours faithfully,
John, a #DailyFollower.
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