TESTIMONY: RULES OF ENGAGEMENT – PART 1

Everything in the universe is ordered by laws and bounds beyond which they must not passed. Just as time of harvest is ordered by the law of sowing and reaping, so is time of testimony. Where there is no sowing, there cannot be harvest. It is a universal law. Sowing time is hard times but when harvest comes, the sower will come with his sheaves rejoicing. Between sowing and reaping, a lot do happen. Testimonies will not come without those difficult hours, days or years. Where there has been no noise of battle, there can be no songs of victory. Christians want to have testimonies, God wants to get honour in us by giving us testimonies but neither will happened unless we pass through the sowing time.

The way and manner God will package individual sowing time and the duration it will last vary from one person to the other, so also is the way He will package our victories when the time of harvest comes knocking. That is why He is God. Even as parents we don’t train or deal with each of our children same way on every issues. As it is in heaven, so it is on earth. There are rules of engagement that must tailored the path of sowing (when the testimony is in the making) to the time of harvest (when the victory is won and testimony is ready to be shared).

What are this rules of engagement? I will share three most important with you, using the familiar story of David and Goliath where all three were fully represented. There may be more, but these three hovers over them all.

1. WATCH OUT FOR NEGATIVE TESTIMONIES

The people you listen to when things are down matters a lot. In your hour of trial and temptations, which is your season of sowing toward the manifestations of that testimony, you must carefully chose your advisers and counsellors. What you read, the posts on social media that comes your way during that period are all tailored to either help you or corrupt your seeds, but most often, they are sent to weaken the last standing fabric of faith you have left. But as careful as you may be, there is always one or two loopholes you can’t altogether block. These are routes that are unavoidable and totally necessary. They are words and testimonies of people that have a say in your life, people you have enormous respect for. Their inputs in your sowing season (time of difficulty) can either mar or make your harvest depending on your response on each occasions.

To be a spineless believer is to open to advise that can have potential damaging effect on your sowing time, it can delay or even deny the testimony that God have in store for you. Who are this very respectable persons you must be on your guard while listening to their advise in your difficult moments? Top on the list is your Pastor, prophet, your spiritual counselors, your parents, that highly revered christian couple you regularly visit when things are hard, your trusted friends, your financial advisers, your lawyer, your doctor, your spouse etc. In this list is one or more people you can’t possibly run away from, especially in your hours of need. For example, your pastor and spiritual counsellor are people you can’t possibly hide anything from, except you have chosen to run your life without spiritual advise.

That was the dilemma David found himself in the very important meeting with Saul, who doubled as the king and his commander-in-chief, prelude to the ultimate battle with Goliath that lunched him to limelight. Please don’t forget that Saul, aside being the king was also the Lord’s anointed and in ancient Israel, the anointed of God carries unctions that ordinary Israelites do not carry. He is closer to God, at least, he is supposed to, and he is often privy to revelational information others in the camp don’t have access to, and expectedly, his words are supposed to be closely akin to the mind of God for the people per time. When he speak, others will listen. Just as pastors today, their words are suppose to be akin to God’s mind per time, and per season. Is it always like that? The answer is No. Why? Because they are humans, they too have high and low times.

They sometimes fly very high on the mountain and at another time, they walk through the valleys and like any other humans, in hours like that, they can only hope in God’s help. This tell us something, pastors are human, subject to domestic stress and other human challenges, but by experience and the unction they carry, God often help them walk through the wood into safety with zero damage to the flock, for those who are sincere with God but for those who are willful and disobedient like Saul, they pose great dangers to the sheep. This is why to be spiritually clueless as a believer is bad, a wise king said for “the soul to be without knowledge, it is not good” (Prov. 19:2). No matter the confusion, please don’t run your life without basis understanding of what God wants for you. It will greatly help you, when you stand before a respectable counsellor, pastor, doctor etc who is walking the valley himself or a guide who is equally blind to spiritual things like most physicians, lawyers, financial advisers, imposing fake prophets etc that line the streets.

When David met Saul as occasion demands, for advise, approval and blessing of a father and anointed of God before facing Goliath in battle that looked more of certain death than life for an untrained shepherd boy, on that very occasions, king Saul the anointed was at his lowest, he was not the same strong man prophet Samuel anointed king over God’s people, he was down the valley in fear and confusion, something was tragically wrong with Saul hidden from public view and the events after the death of Goliath proved this to be the truth. But David, unlike many of us, saw through the towering figure that stood before him and declare the mind of God for the season. Never be so revered a man that his word means heaven and earth to you, even when his view is contrary to God’s mind for you.

How can one do that? Watch out for negative testimonies and declare God’s mind for you to override them. Jesus says by their fruits you will know them. A man’s fruit is mostly in his word. What we are inside is what comes out of our mouths. As the heart is, so is a man’s word. Sometimes , its not because the person is evil, but because humans will always be human, susceptible to weakness and to be taken advantage of by devils. Negative testimonies can come from anybody, you must watch out for them, sometimes from the most unlikely persons.

The person sharing that negative testimony is often not the problem, he/she is just a spokesman for the enemy whose job is to frustrate and discourage you but he knew sometimes the best way to do it is to use someone whose words you won’t like to refuse to get at you. They may think they are helping the matter, in ignorance, they may be working for the enemy more than for your good. They are not the enemy, like Peter did to Jesus when he privately rebuked Him, they are just borrowed unwilling tools of the devil. Any of us can fall into that trap against a brother or a sister. Watch your words by watching your thoughts. Look at what Saul said when David met him.
1 Samuel 17:33 And Saul said to David, Thou art not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him: for thou art but a youth, and he a man of war from his youth.

Those words sound like facts than the truth. They were facts in favour of a common enemy, Goliath, than the truth that is God’s mind that David represent. That was the same thing God called evil reports from the spies in the wilderness that earn the entire camp deaths in the desert. Saul was not a realist, he was an anointed spiritual man, who has lost his place in God and his words betrayed his true position. God is not against facts. Fact must not be ignore but when facts runs against God’s promises, we must learn to pitch our tenth with God. Facts that pour cold water on an already troubled soul is evil. Facts that annihilate faith, and cause discouragement for another person is satanic. Fact that sound like negative testimony should be avoided at all cost, less we make ourselves an agent of discouragement against a brother/sister without we even knowing it. Carriers of negative statements risk running into God’s anger.

What are negative testimonies? Negative testimonies are examples that buttress the facts of a matter in manner that causes further distress and discouragement for another person. Take for example, a brother or sister that is overtaken by a sickness, instead of giving him/her words that will encourage the heart toward faith and healing, a privileged “counsellor” chose to real out catalogues of men and women, pastors or church people who have suffered same ailment and died in the process despite their titles and prayers. Now what will a negative testimony like that do in a hearer that is going through the same condition than to kill his/her spirit into faithlessness and fear? That is a negative testimony.

Any testimony that fails to promote faith and hope in God during difficult moment is evil, it is negative and God frown at it. “You cannot go against this Philistine to fight with him and hope to win: you are just a boy and he a man of war from his youth.” What effect will this information have on David and an already perplexed army whose only hope was this shepherd boy who came from no where? These words can only further help to kill their spirit. Please let’s learn to keep our mouth shut if we don’t have words of faith rather than open it wide and gushed out facts that are distressing and add woe to woes for other people. It is better to be quiet than to share negative testimonies.

But David knew God by experience, and with better words he overthrew the words of a backsliding king. Here was his testimony.

1 Samuel 17:37 David said moreover, The LORD that delivered me out of the paw of the lion, and out of the paw of the bear, he will deliver me out of the hand of this Philistine. And Saul said unto David, Go, and the LORD be with thee.

Testimony of God’s goodness and works in one’s life or in the lives of others are the only antidotes against negative testimonies. When someone, no matter how respectable and well placed, shared a distressing testimony on any matter you are involved in, please be bold enough to tell him/her why God can do it based on His past dealings with you or in the lives of others or at least rehearse to yourself as many times as you can testimonies of God goodness to you in the past even if they are in small matters and irrelevant to the issue at hand. That was the secret of David. It wasn’t the stone that killed Goliath, the stone was the final hit that nailed the victory for the people of God. The real battle took place between the words of king Saul and those of David. They overcame the devil by the word of their testimony (Rev. 12:11). Words win spiritual battles.

This is the first pit to watch out for and avoid, the pit of negative testimony.

Watch out for part 2….

Olumofin Kehinde Benjamin, writes for Praying Parents Prayer Group Christian Ministry (3pG)