meaningless promises

I will be kind, more patient, pray more, and fast more…  These are some of the many promises we give God.  Some will promise God the unthinkable just to get healing or some other sort of desperately needed miracle.   Why is it then if we are willing to sacrifice so much for something that we desperately desire why doesn’t God fulfill our desires?  The answer is because He knows we can’t handle our end of the bargain.  He knows that we will never fulfill our promises and like many other promises before they become empty meaningless words.

We don’t realize the power that our words contain.  If we did we would see beyond what our physical eyes can see and would live a life of faith that doesn’t recognize any opposition that could become a barrier to the blessings that we are certain to receive.  We try to negotiate with God, like there is any negotiating, promising a certain amount of something if He would just give us that one thing we desire. 

Words are meaningless to most people.  Most people will promise before God to honor, obey and respect in a wedding ceremony but when things get difficult all those promises get thrown up in the air like vain words ( but this in itself is another topic which one day I will probably write about).

To understand the weight that our word carries I want to share a story about a man named Jephtah, who was an illegitimate son of a prostitute.  This should explain enough!  He wasn’t accepted by father’s sons because of his origin.  Not only wasn’t he accepted by his brothers he wasn’t even recognized by his own father and would not be allowed to partake with his father’s tribe.  The amazing thing about people that are often looked down on they can possess the most amazing gifts and Jephtah’s gift was that he was a mighty warrior so when things got bad for the Israelites he was the first person they came looking for.  He would fight on their behalf if only they would recognize him as a legitimate son and make him a leader.  To Jephtah this seemed like a no brainer.  He would finally have the respect he so much desired.  The Bible speaks (Judges11) that God’s spirit came upon him to empower him to face the enemy, then Jephtah made a foolish vow, he asked if God would grant him victory he would sacrifice the first thing that would come to greet him out of his house when he returns home.  God gave him victory not because of his vow but because that was what God was going to do either way, if He wasn’t going to give him victory than God wouldn’t of empowered him with His Spirit. 

The first that Jephtah saw when he returned home was his daughter.  He knew he had to keep his promise to God so he sacrificed his daughter.  This was the result of his foolish vow.  He knew he couldn’t take his word back and had to fulfill what he promised God or perhaps God needed something like this to happen not to allow his heart to swell up with pride.  Sometimes have you wondered that God might give you blessings just because of His mercy and Grace?  God isn’t looking for compensation for His blessings; those blessings are free to all who place their trust and hope in Him.  The problem is sometimes we don’t want to wait for God to give us the blessings and we make foolish promises without measuring the consequences they come with.  We really need to start taking our words more seriously with the understanding that our words carry consequences not only in this world but especially in the sprit realm.  Understand this and use words of faith to carry you through the impossible.  Understand this and stop saying foolish things to those you love.  Start using words of encouragement instead of using words of condemnation.  I’m not saying tell people nice things that they want to hear, absolutely not, we need to be the light in the middle of darkness and when someone is telling you something negative we need to have the bluntness to set them straight.  Not because we want to offend someone’s feelings even thou they might not like what you are saying but to make them have godly reasoning to keep them from making a foolish mistake.  Make God inspire you to reach great blessings by prophesying with your words what you know God will accomplish.