The Oscar Ajoku Blog: Daily Vitamin Devotional

DAILY VITAMIN - The Faith That Wins "...Anyone who wants to come to God must believe that there is a God and that he rewards those who sincerely look for him" (Heb 11:6 TLB)     We have come to the end of the year, but as we also know the end of a thing is always the beginning of something new. To some, it will be so great; to others, it might be not so good. But the concern here is how can we make it great for ourselves and those around us. The Bible says that by faith, Sarah who was hopeless as it regarded childbirth gave birth to a new nation for Abraham (Heb 11:11-12).      In the same way, it may not look like anything good can come out of your situation; however God is saying that if you will trust Him and believe Him, something great will happen. Remember what Jesus said to the sick boy's father, "If you will believe, all things become possible for you" (Mark 9:23).     Now is the time to risk it all in faith. Don't be conservative in trust

DAILY VITAMIN -  At His Command "Now get up and go into the city and await my further instructions." (Acts 9:6 TLB)      Every believer is at the command of the Lord; designed to satisfy His every need (2 Tim 2:4-5). Recall that as He has said to one, He says to all (Mark 13:37). Those words in our theme verse is God's word to all of His children. In fact, in that same chapter we see multiple examples.      First of all, we see Ananias who was commanded of God to go and minister unto Paul - a man whom He had won unto Himself (v.10-17). Can you see yourself in the face of Ananias right now? You should. You see, a lot of us have been commissioned by God to nurture His people. It might be in your street, your class, your workplace or even in church. It is possible that God has called and empowered you to encourage, exhort, teach and correct the people of His flock and those outside the flock; and I can only hope you're doing so.      This is important because yo

DAILY VITAMIN - Choose Commitment To God Always "The shepherds of my people have lost their senses; they no longer follow God nor ask his will. Therefore they perish and their flocks are scattered." (Jeremiah 10:21 TLB)      No man can leave the path of goodliness and expect to find any form of good. That is, you can't take a train to Mexico and expect to end up in Holland. It's not just possible. In the same way, you can't cease walking with God and expect to end up with Him.      God is the source of all life, and so it would be foolishness to abandon the ways of God and expect to find the fullness of life He's reserved for you in whatever you do. In the scripture above, we see that there was a reason for the downward progression; and He says you can't engage in such and end up differently (1 Sam 2:30).      Non-commitment to God does no good to the believer, because it is likened to denying himself of the right to live the life that is his in f

DAILY VITAMIN - What's Christmas To You? "But the angel said to them, Do not be afraid; for behold, I bring you good news of a great joy which will come to all the people. For to you is born this day in the town of David a Savior, Who is Christ (the Messiah) the Lord!" (Luke 2:9-10 AMP) What is Christmas to you? Is it just a holiday where red seems to be the colour in vogue? Or one whereby Santa Claus always seem to gain some level of viable existence in your mind? Is it just the day of carols? Or one in which the chicken tends to become popular? Your perception of things becomes your conception of the same, and later on your reality of it. So if truly we claim to mark the memorial of Christ's birth on this day, then Christmas should be a day of revealing Christ to the world; a day of expressing Him to all. As the angel said "a day of great joy which will come to all the people [who receive Him]. In other words, since Jesus' ministry on earth was to

DAILY VITAMIN - It Pays To Be Good "The man who tries to be good, loving and kind finds life, righteousness and honor." (Proverbs 21:21 TLB)     It is said that every good deed deserves another. Well, it is very true. The entire Bible proves its validity. And there is nothing more profitable than being good regardless of consequences.     Let's consider two examples here. First, we have David. In 1 Samuel 30, after his entire household and possessions had been looted by enemy soldiers, David found a servant of the enemy who had been abandoned by his master. But instead of returning evil for evil, David fed him till he was revived. This act of goodness led this man to go against his natural fears just to help David recover all he had lost. It's like what Paul said, when you do good to the enemy, you make void all his attempts to ruin you; for only good can truly overcome all evils (Romans 12:19-21).      Second, we have Saul. At a time when the people of Jabe

DAILY VITAMIN - Tears Won't Do "They wept until they could weep no more" (1 Sam 30:4 TLB)     From our theme verse, we can deduce that these men must have cried for hours until their tears gland ran dry, but as the subsequent verse said it brought nothing but grief and bitterness to them. You see, as much as pain demands to be felt, our submission to it brings no solution. In fact, if crying could solve problems, the whole world would gladly cry a river if it would stop the anarchy in the Middle East and the poverty in the world at large.     In reality, tears don't do much, and David understood this; which is why while others petered out from the path of courage and into grief, he encouraged himself with the belief that he had God on his side to help him. And so he enquired from the LORD what he should do to recover all he'd lost (v. 8). That's the simple secret behind obtaining solutions - conversing with God, not cowering in tears.     A lot of pe

DAILY VITAMIN - See It God's Way "For I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord. They are plans for good and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope." (Jeremiah 29:11 TLB)     Have you ever noticed how at some point in your life when everything seemed to be going AWOL, then all of a sudden something great came out of it all? At least I have seen it happen without number in my life and others'. Well, that's exactly what God does for a living- turning bitter sources into a spring of life.     Just like most of us, one man who had a myriad of experience regarding this has to be David. David once said that he would have fainted if he hadn't believed to see God's goodness in his life. And went ahead in advising us to wait patiently for all God has promised regardless of what we are currently going through (Psalm 27:13-14). And believe me, he knows what he was talking about.     For instance, David had been told he had been chosen by God to

DAILY VITAMIN - Peace With God "Therefore, since we are justified (acquitted, declared righteous, and given a right standing with God) through faith, let us [grasp the fact that we] have [the peace of reconciliation to hold and to [b]enjoy] peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One)." (Romans 5:1 AMP)     By studying the deteriorating story of Saul, you sort of like pity him. Having conversed with Samuel through the medium at Endor, he realized he was to die the next day, but in spite of all the remorse he felt he couldn't make peace with God. He might have thought of it, but he couldn't do it. He couldn't find access to God even though he had a one day headstart. But this is the thing; this inaccessibility to God wasn't all of Saul's doing, it was an Old Testament flaw. Even God said that He blocked the eyes of such men from conceiving the way and their hearts from understanding it lest they should return back to

DAILY VITAMIN - Overcoming The Atheistic Argument "THE [empty-headed] fool has said in his heart, There is no God." (Psalm 53:1 AMP)     David made that statement. It's almost as though he had a lot of sadistic people also trying to preach the "God doesn't exist" sermon to him, as they still try to do today. Well, here's the proper response he had for them. He said "The heavens are telling the glory of God; they are a marvelous display of his craftsmanship. Day and night they keep on telling about God" (Psalm 19:1-2 TLB).     He was simply saying that everything else can be denied, but not God. A man would have to be cynical to look at all of life and never see God in the picture. We might try to blame it on men's curious intellect or on increased knowledge; but we'd only be deceiving ourselves. Life itself tells us that there has to be a God. The perfect episodes culminated in the unique destinies of men is proof enough that t

DAILY VITAMIN - The Holy Spirit And Your Potential "Now to Him Who, by (in consequence of) the [action of His] power that is at work within us, is able to [carry out His purpose and] do superabundantly, far over and above all that we [dare] ask or think [infinitely beyond our highest prayers, desires, thoughts, hopes, or dreams]".              (Eph 3:20 AMP)      A mass of gold excavated from the earth has no visible value until it is refined. As long as its ores and impurities remain, its true potential in the market remains unrevealed. This is exactly how we are without the fullness of the Spirit upon us. Our potentials stay hidden and limited, because only the anointing of the Spirit can magnify it to visible value.    Acts 4:13 says that when the Sanhedrin found out that Peter and John were suppose to be timid uneducated men, but on seeing the boldness, poise and dexterity of their words, they realized that they must have a part of Christ in them. And so we see P

DAILY VITAMIN - Your Miracle Is Coming "[When] a certain man crippled from his birth was being carried along, who was laid each day at that gate of the temple [which is] called Beautiful, so that he might beg for charitable gifts from those who entered the temple....But Peter said, Silver and gold (money) I do not have; but what I do have, that I give to you: in [the use of] the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk! Then he took hold of the man's right hand with a firm grip and raised him up. And at once his feet and ankle bones became strong and steady, And leaping forth he stood and began to walk, and he went into the temple with them, walking and leaping and praising God." (Acts 3:2-6 AMP)     In our theme scripture, we see a lame beggar whose routine was to wake up, crawl his way to the Tempe gate, and there beg for alms all through the day, every day. It was how he had lived all of his adolescent/adult life. But on a certain day, as he went out as usual to co

DAILY VITAMIN - Breaking Free Of Bitterness "And be ye renewed in the spirit of your mind".    (Ephesians 4:24)    We have a lot of bitter people these days, even in church. But this is the thing about bitterness: it hampers growth, and impedes the expression of the liberty of the saints. Bitterness is a bondage; and every time we indulge it, we somewhat like place a banana peel on our path to make ourselves slip. Paul called it the raw material for backwardness (Hebrews 12:15). And the field where this seed of bitterness relishes the most is the heart of man (see Mark 4:15).    You can't be bitter in your brain. It wouldn't hold for long even if it did; and so the enemy always entrench it in the heart, from which proceeds all the issues- both material and immaterial- of a man's life. Little wonder we are warned to guard it well (Proverbs 4:23). This siege to the spiritual and physical exploits of a man must be dealt with if such a man must experience a ne

DAILY VITAMIN - The Fellowship Of The Spirit "The Spirit of Truth, Whom the world cannot receive (welcome, take to its heart), because it does not see Him or know and recognize Him. But you know and recognize Him, for He lives with you [constantly] and will be in you." (John 14:17 AMP)     In Christianity today, we have a lot of people who still think the Holy Spirit as simply a force or a mere thing. And so they ask questions like "What is the Holy Spirit?" as though He is just some object from God. Recently, a high school senior asked me "What is God?" 'What?' God isn't a thing. We may call Him an entity, but that only means He is wholesomely manifested in Father, Spirit and Son. He is a Person; and so is the Holy Spirit of promise -who is the God IN us.     However, while a lot of well taught believers understand that there is an indwelling presence of the Spirit in us that sealed us on the day of our redemption, identifying us the

DAILY VITAMIN - Why Are You Doing The Lord's Work? "Whatever may be your task, work at it heartily (from the soul), as [something done] for the Lord and not for men, Knowing [with all certainty] that it is from the Lord [and not from men] that you will receive the inheritance which is your [real] reward. [The One Whom] you are actually serving [is] the Lord Christ (the Messiah)." (Colossians 3:23-24 AMP)    A lot of people are quick to judge clergymen these days who seem to be more interested in the material world than they are of the spiritual; and while many of their accusations might have been right, at the end it shouldn't really concern us as much because God Himself will judge such ones as He would also judge us. And so, what should concern you should be your own intentions for serving the Lord. You may not have done in extent what these men may have done, but can you really say that all you do is for the Lord and simply not just for yourself?    Serving

DAILY VITAMIN - Jesus Knows Where The Fish Is "Then He said, 'Throw out your net on the right hand side of the boat, and you'll get plenty of them!' So we did, and couldn't draw in the net because of the weight of the fish, there were so many!" (John 21:6 TLB)     The disciples had struggled for a long time to find a catch as they always did without Jesus, but then they heard a voice from the shore saying "Cast your net there and you will have a great catch!" They did, but it wasn't just some they caught, it was a lot. Immediately this happened, John knew it was the Lord. Remember, He had done the same thing on Peter's boat before they all got acquainted. It was Jesus' signature move- the ability to find a way where there seemed to be no way.     The moral behind this story in scripture is simple. And it is that Jesus knows how to simplify our complexities in all ramifications. When you don't know where to go to find peace and

DAILY VITAMIN - What Are You Believing? "Then I went in too, and saw, and believed [that he had risen]" (John 20:8 TLB)    In this particular scripture, we see that while two people saw the same thing, their perspective, their insight and their belief regarding it differed. Both Mary and John saw an empty tomb, but while Mary believed Jesus had been exhumed by the Jewish antagonists, John believed He had risen. And we see their response to this omen of life immediately. While John and Peter returned home, Mary stayed crying on. However, as soon as her eyes were enlightened and she saw the Lord, she was much more enthused than the other disciples had ever been that they almost even began to doubt what they had once believed.    That's exactly how life is to each and every one of us every day. We all look, but only we can independently decide what we see from the picture we beheld. When life throws tantrums at you, do you see a disappointment, or an appointment for