That I may Know HIM - A Devotional

Day 35: THE ONUS OF THE WATCHMAN

 In the present conflicts over the soul of Nigeria, it is too early in the day to begin to celebrate, but at least we can say that God has begun to fill out mouths with laughter and our tongues with singing, and we can testify to His mercies (Psalm 126:2).  Writing “The Next Agenda” on Saturday, January 14, I remarked, “the cloud [is] not as threatening and as heavy as it has been hanging since last year.”  My head told me, “Hey, be careful.  How could you suggest that the battle is over?  The nation-wide fuel subsidy strike is still raging, and could get worse from Monday.  You also might be stopping people from further prayers.  Things could get worse.”  I thought to myself, “There was no apparent danger when the clouds began to weigh down on me, compelling days of prayers and fasting since last year.  Does it now have to depend on the news outside?” Even though in this case it was not an audible voice that I had heard, I knew deep down in me, by the assurance of the Spirit, that as at that moment, a major shift in the battle had occurred, although I could not naturally see how.  Watchmen do not always have to “cry” (Isaiah 21:6-8); the time comes when they also “shall lift up the voice… together [to] …sing” because the Lord has revisited Zion (Isaiah 52:8).

 One day later, on Sunday 15th, I began to see why.  That night, I got information from the Federal capital city of Abuja, that a man had been arrested in Kaduna in north central Nigeria with a large cache of arms, including a rocket launcher, some surface-to-air launcher.  Those weapons were probably part of the Jihad arsenal intended for the onslaught against which the alerted Church had raised prayers from midnight of the significant date of January 12th, as carried in the last post in this series on the spirit of Sudan. 

 Another partner in the ministry reported a similar arrest in another northern state.  Then I got a mail, with a follow up call of confirmation from elsewhere, that the suspect behind the Christmas day bombing of St. Theresa’s Catholic Church at Madalla on the outskirts of Abuja had been arrested, with a military aid, from an Abuja guest house belonging to one of the northern state governments.  That was on the eve before he was scheduled to have flown out of the country to England.  The same caller stated that with the new resolve of the Government, following a Security Council meeting, security was already on the trail of a few notables; and some others, especially their mercenaries, have begun to flee the country through the Chad and Cameroon borders. I could not have felt more relieved, although I see some of them merely sheathing the sword for the moment, like the Tempter who, after failing three consecutive times to ensnare Jesus in the wilderness, “departed from him [but only] for a season” (Luke 4:13).  In about two Christmas seasons from now, we may have to face this battle once more (1 Kings 20:22). Their last attempt at cutting up the nation was about two Christmas seasons ago in 2009.  It was not on the pages of the newspaper. Those who were close enough read the moves; prophets caught it in the spirit. 

 Irrespective of whoever’s a sentiment, common sense tells me that if God should so insist that we pray against the division of the country, then it is not His will that it should happen. For Him to have revealed through so many vessels that a demon spirit is behind the agenda; for secular news to have also indicated so clearly that an anti-Christ religion is pursuing that agenda for its own selfish purpose, then we need not an angel to tell us any more clearly that even the economic, religious and ideological reasons anyone might advance in favour of a split are remotely demonic, no matter the status of those who advance it.  After all, even Peter once got infiltrated and became Satan’s mouthpiece.  If the nation breaks, God will still use the parts, as He did the divided kingdom of Israel, but Satan would have scored an eternal point, and destiny would have been missed.  God has forbidden it.

 By today, Monday 16th, my head has been able to catch up with my spirit following the President’s early morning nationwide broadcast and its diffusing of the tensions arising from the Labour protests.  The official pump price of petrol has been reduced by a third, and the strike is, to all intent, over, in spite of the Labour leader’s sit-at-home order.  As if that had not been enough, news reports also suggested a division in the ranks of the present Labour protests and the denial by the Labour leader, Malam (?) Abdulwahed Omar, that he was being used by certain anti-government forces.  Not only did God thus give the gift of ‘divers tongues’ to the builders of this Babel tower, some of our own, having believed the prophetic cautions from these pages and the confirmations thereof by their own spiritual leaders, have had to quickly reassess their position in the present standoff.  We salute such prophetic Christian courage.  Alas, how many perish when there is no vision! (Proverbs 29:18).