To Whom Belongest Thou? - 1

Anchor Scriptures: 1 Samuel 30:13-22, Matthew 7:21-27.

Introduction
In the time past, in most African communities, tribal marks are used to identify individuals descents. Some other places on the planet use characteristics as distinct as pronunciation of certain sounds to know where somebody came from.

In those days, even powerful men within communities have their personalized "trade" marks with which they could easily identify their slaves or servants. And when there is rivalry, these marks are what the rivals used to know whether the straying individual is on their side or not.

Painfully, this means of simple identification has disappeared with civilization and technology.

Message
I pose the question to you again, my fellow Christian man/woman: "to whom belongest  thou?"  The first time this question would be posed in the Bible (1 Samuel 30:13), it was during a battle of supremacy between David and his men on one hand, and the Amalekites who raided certain cities in Israel on the other (1 Samuel 30: 1-22)

Brethren, we need not fall asleep as Christians. Either we know it or not, we are in a battlefield, called the earth. The battle of supremacy goes on between God and Satan. Each of the two masters have thus enlisted men into their body of soldiers.

Last week, God required to know how clear our sounds are. That was because he knows that many of us aren't blowing our sounds clear enough, such that people hearing our sounds are not so sure whether we are blowing for Armageddon or for some piece of worldly music.

Jesus Christ mentioned during His earthly ministry that trees and their fruits are inseparable (Mat. 7:16, 20). As individual Christians, we are trees and we bear fruits which manifest in our ways of lives such as our conversation, mode of dressing, companies we keep, places we go, etc. The question is when people see you outside your church, are you easily identified as a soldier of Christ. Are your fruits and sounds so clear that people will know that you belong to the Master?

Today, there are many Christian chameleons. Their case reminds  me of the joke of a man of God, Rev. Kunle Salami, founder of Chapel of His Glory, Ado Ekiti, Nigeria, when I was young university undergraduate. Every Sunday when he made altar calls, he would say "I know some of you give your lives every Sunday. But by Monday evening, you'll tell Jesus, 'please, borrow me my life, I need it again.' You collect it, use it your own way and come back next Sunday to give it." Some Christians today are like that, but in a different mode. What they do is to maintain double lives: Christians while in the church, unbelievers outside the church. Let me ask you once again: "To whom belongest  thou?"

Let me warn that there are many false teachers in the world today, just as predicted by the Master Himself. Just about 10 hours before this message, I heard that a preacher taught that the works of the flesh are not sins, but works of the flesh, and that Jesus Christ died for the works of flesh, not sin, so that the works of flesh may not to count against us any longer." That is what Jesus Christ was saying. Can you compare that preaching to the Word of God in Romans 3:23-26?

The Bible is agog with different principles on how we should leave our lives as true children of God. Painfully still, many of us still don't understand what the Scripture says in Romans 6:19 that "Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?" We need not be oblivious if the fact that "a servant can not serve two masters" as rightly  posited by the Master Himself.

Brethren, there is no way we would continue living "double lives" and say we belong to God or His Christ. We need to "choose this day whom we will serve." I pray that the grace of God to live for Him, God will release it upon us today in Jesus Christ Name. Amen.

Conclusion
Acts 4:13 says "Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men, they marvelled; and they took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus." This means that the people saw Christ in both Peter and John and identified them with Christ. Are you that easily identifiable? May God help us, all. Amen.

Till we meet again, keep keeping on in Him!