Yesterday I had a wonderful time in the presence of God. I came for prayer with a purpose of being close to God. I praised him and prayed and had a supernatural encounter towards the end of my prayer time.

Today Christians are facing immense pressure to abandon God. News and social media is full of articles that would shake many believers if they do not have a firm foundation. The pressure experienced by Christians to conform to the standards of this world is so great today that many have to choose either to stand by the word of God or become social outcasts. The world wants to you to change the truth as told by the Bible, in effect to have you changed. But they don’t want you to use the Bible to impact and change the world. The truth is that many believers give into compromise, distorting the word to suit their given situations, yet we know that the word of God is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. Every day believers are exposed to information that directly or indirectly aims to make them doubt what they believed in the first place. Many believers abandon the message of truth as written in God`s word, the Bible. As the direct pressure from the world mounts, the self imposed pressure by many Christians also increases. They start to wonder if what they believed in is true in the first place. The world wants Christians not only to abandon the word, but also to be apologetic for following what is written in it. And this is what the devil wants. I encourage you friends to stand firm. You can do both: love every one, but also stand firm with the word.

Mathew 24 vs 9 says “…you will be hated by all nations because of me.” Vs 10 says “…many will turn away from the faith and betray and hate each other,”, vs 12 talks about the increase of wickedness and the love of most growing cold. Am sure you have seen many of these things happening. And vs 13 adds on that “… but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved. ” Vs 14 talks about the end coming after the gospel being preached in the whole world.

The Lord you believed in initially when you got saved is alive forever more. Do not give up. Some of you are starting to doubt creation. With the enormity of the galaxy and the intelligence God gave man, do you really believe that man has the ability to do all the intelligent things he can do , but no other being in the universe can? The advent of artificial intelligence, self driving cars, state of the art medical interventions to treat complex medical conditions etc., make you wonder and believe that man is very intelligent. But are you narrowing your mind so much and believe that all this can only be accomplished by man and no one else? And is there a possibility that what we think to be great civilization is actually far backward than stone age in the eyes of a greater being. Or are you so parochial in your thoughts that you have resigned into thinking that the current state of world civilization makes man a super being and no one is greater than him . You are wrong. If you believe that man can perform a heart transplant, why don’t you believe that a mighty being , with infinite knowledge is able to create life? The person am talking about is our creator, the one no man can ever match. Its being shallow and narrow minded to think that life could not have been created by someone with infinite knowledge and capabilities we cant fathom. Only God we believe in can and created life. Your lack of imagination of how He did so is no reason not to believe. You have never tried to imagine how man makes aero planes and how they fly, or how a heart is transplanted. Despite you not imagining these , you still believe that they are indeed true. Why then do you want to stretch your imagination into realms that are way beyond your comprehension. If you believe that man can do transplants then nothing stops you from believing that our almighty and supernatural God created the world and creates life, something only Him can do. Isaiah 40: 28 tells us that God`s understanding no one can fathom.

Towards the end of my prayer time an audible voice called my name ” Ivan “. The Lord says in His word that ” You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart ” ( Jeremiah 29:13, NIV )