Anthony Wade Ministries

Most of us have purchased products that are perishable. On many of these items there is an expiration date. Usually the containers of these items have a statement stamped on it, best consumed by a certain date.

Well, I said all of that to bring to light the fact that all of us have faced trying times. Temptations test and trials have come to us all. The thing that we must take into account is that those temptations, tests, or trials, won’t last forever – they have an expiration date. (1 Peter 1:6 * 2 Peter 2:9).

Brothers and sisters, be very happy when you are tested in different ways. You know that such testing of your faith produces endurance. Endure until your testing is over. Then you will be mature and complete, and you won’t need anything (God’s Word Translation James 1:2-4).

When looking at the previous passage I have two phrases that I want to bring your attention to. First of all, you must realize the trials that we face from time to time are not the trying or testing of us personally. What is on trial you ask? It is our faith that is on trial. We must be mindful of the fact that there is something that was delivered to us via the new birth (Heb.11:1-6 * Romans 12:2-4).

The enemy of our soul wants to extract our faith from us by causeing adverse situations that are diversions, keeping us from taking the benefits of our inheritance (Psalm 103:1-6). If we could only see into the real of the Spirit we would realize there are more with us than with the enemy (2 Kings 6). One brother said if we knew what was on the other side of the mountain we would speak to it. (Mark 11:23-24,) We would speak the desired results.

Once we have come through the temptation, test, or trial, maintained our endurance, defeated the enemy; we will come to the conclusion that everything we need is in hanging on to our faith. How do we maintain our faith? By making sure we don’t play into satan’s hands by saying the wrong things. Part of extracting your faith from you is causing problems with the intent of getting you to say the wrong things, something not in line with the Word of God.

Yes, my brother and sister,trials have an expiration date — they will terminate. -Peace

Ephesians 6:16 (KJV)
{16} Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked.

There are times when we will encounter personalities that are negative. You know the kind of people that are against you – that don’t want you to succeed. They always find a way to tell you how they would do it, and it is for the most part why you shouldn’t do it the way you are going to do it.

They are full of unbelief. They may say things like “Who do you think you are – do you think you are better than us?”

Many times when you hear that they are trying to make themselves feel good about their failure. Those people have a “crab mentality.” It has been said that you can put a bunch of crabs in a bucket, and if one tries to get out another one will try to pull them down. There are people that are so full of competitive jealousy, that they can’t help themselves.

That is where the shield of faith comes into play for you and me. The shield of faith is given to us to deflect, better yet, quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. You have in your arsenal all you need to quench all the negative junk hurled your way. Instead of talk to the hand, we should say “Talk to the shield.” — Peace

Ephesians 3:16 (KJV)

{16} That He would grant you, according to the riches of His Glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man;

You and I have been given a Heavenly Grant. It is from His riches in Glory, filled with His Might, in His Spirit delivered to our inner man – our spirit. Your spirit is where The Holy Spirit abides and resides. That’s right, when you gave your life to our Lord and Savior, The Lord Jesus Christ you were granted all the might that you need to overcome every obstacle that would try to take advantage of you.

This is a part of our inheritance. You must realize that when Jesus went to the Cross, was buried, and rose from dead, we were given this grant. The death, burial and resurrection sealed it all for us. This is part of the benefit package that was bought and paid for us (Psalm 103). When I worked a secular job I was given a contract booklet. In that booklet was listed the wages and all of the benefits I would receive. Well, the Bible is our contract book – our Covenant.

It is our responsibility to get acquainted with our Covenant. Why? Because it is a Covenant that was ratified by His Blood – This Blood’s for you (Hebrews 8). Another thought comes to mind when I was working a secular job. A difficulty had come to surface on the job that I was working. Someone tried to take advantage of us and it was necessary for us to look at our contract book to see how it was worded – how it read. As we perused through our contract book, we found that it ruled in our favor.

Again, we have a Covenant, a Contract that was ratified by the Blood of Jesus. That New Covenant reads in our favor. Now, the Bible speaks copious times about favor, I will list a few. Psalm 102:13-14 * Psalm 35:27 * Proverbs 3:4, 12:2. We have The Spirit of Might resident in our spirits. It is up to us to look at “The Book” to find out the favor we have.

You will find along with favor, prosperity, freedom from fear and a number of benefits that have you in mind. Don’t depend on your feelings to let you know what you have. Why? Because feelings are fickle, fleeting, unreliable. We must bring our feelings in line with our Covenant. We can’t afford to be body ruled. Let’s be ruled by our spirits. — Peace

Psalm 84:11 (KJV)
11 For the LORD God is a sun and shield: the LORD will give grace and glory: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly. I was awakened early this morning. Immediately my mind went to our text.

As I pondered upon it I decided to look it up and gaze my eyes upon it. The phrase that got my attention was the later part of this verse. I italicized that it to bring attention to it. There is a lot to be said about that portion of this verse let alone the first part of this scripture.

My question to you is what are you contenting for, or believing God for, for Him to do on behalf of you? He said that He would hold no good thing from us, if we are walking uprightly. There is a condition with this verse. I can’t help but think of another scripture that is found in John 15:7 which plainly says if you abide in Me and My Word abides in you, ask what you will, it shall be done unto you. Wow, I believe I will say that again, WOW!
If we know we are meeting, or have met the conditions, we can rest assure our petitions will be met (Psalm 20:5 * 1 John 15:5). There are many scriptures that aid us in meeting the conditions that we can’t miss the chance of having our request answered, if we are walking uprightly.

Psalm 15:2 (KJV)

2 He that walketh uprightly, and worketh righteousness, and speaketh the truth in his heart.

Along with looking up our text, I stumbled across Psalm 15:2. Again, I am going to dissect this verse, in my endeavor to bring to light the different aspects of this verse.

WALKING UPRIGHTLY
Need I reveal more? This phrase is self explanatory. To be honest with you in basic terms it means to be your best at doing the Word on any subject. I am not talking about a lackadaisical walk or being slipshod in your presentation of the Word. In short be doers of the Word. (James 1:22).

WORKING RIGHTEOUSNESS
When we were born again we were declared righteous. Now that we have this affirmation it is our responsibility to work in conjunction with all that Jesus went to the Cross for. Stop and think about it, because of the sacrifice of one man – The Lord Jesus Christ, many have been set free, delivered from darkness. It is our duty to live everything that our Lord and Savior intended for us to live.

SPEAKING TRUTH IN YOUR HEART
Jesus said in John 17:17 that God’s Word was Truth. It is important that we speak His Word to ourselves on a frequent basis. Speaking Truth in your heart in my humble opinion is meditation. No, I am not talking about sitting in one spot in deep contemplation. That is part of it, but the exercise is not inclusive without saying His Word, to you. I am talking about saying The Word of God to yourself, as a habitual underpinning. It’s an inside job. AWM

In Luke 8:11 Jesus makes a very profound statement that will be the foundation of this message

He said that… “The Seed Is The Word.” He then went on to discuss how the Word works in the heart of every believer. The heart of the believer is the soil that the seed of the Word goes into. The soil of your heart will determine the type of harvest you will have; depending on the condition of your heart. Your heart will ascertain the yield that you will receive from any particular seed. The seed of the Word must be planted in the believers heart — soul and spirit. That seed then germinates deep within the believers heart — his or her spirit. Then that seed has the ability to produce, first the blade, then the ear, then the full corn in the ear (Mark 4:28). When the harvest comes then we have the ability to enjoy the fruit of our labor. The fruit of our labor is in direct proportion to the type of soil our heart is, or has become. We decide the type of heart (soil) we have by what we do (Luke 8:18, Mark 4:24-25).

PLANT THE SEED:
Much like a farmer the believer decides what type of crop he or she will have. The farmer goes to the granary to receive the seed he needs for his crop. If he desires a corn crop he must plant seed corn. If he is wants a cotton crop he must plant cotton seed. If he wants soybeans, he must plant soybeans. I have never heard of a farmer that wanted corn, but planted watermelon seeds. No, If he wanted watermelons, he would of necessity plant watermelon seeds. It is impossible to get corn from soybeans and visa versa. It is the believer’s responsibility to plant the seeds of the type of crop that they want. You and I are responsible for the type of crop we have buy the seeds we have sown. The farmer cannot blame anyone but himself if he has not produced the type of crop that he desired. If he did blame someone else, the most logical question would be what kind of seed did you sow? If he told you that he planted soybeans, but was looking for corn, you would immediately tell him that it was his fault for planting the wrong seeds.

The same is with you and me. What are we looking for that is supported by the Seed of the Word? If we are looking for Salvation, we must plant the seeds of salvation. If we are looking healing, we must plant the seeds that would produce healing. If we want prosperity we must plant the seeds of prosperity. Incidentally prosperity is more than money; it encompasses more than finances. Finances are only one-third of true biblical prosperity. If we want marital harm- ony we must plant the seeds that will bring forth a blissful marriage. One of the things that has been very important to me personally is the peace of God manifested in my life. There is a passage of scripture in the book of James that I have endeavored to sow not only in my life, but also in the life of others. It speaks volumes to me particularly when I see this seed produced in the life of others. I do everything I can to plant this seed. Why? Because the seeds you sow is what you will grow.

James 3:16-18 NKJV

{16} For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there.

{17} But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy. {18} Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.

INCORRUPTIBLE SEED:
1 Peter 1:23-24 NKJV

{23} having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the Word of God which lives and abides forever.

INCORRUPTIBLE HEART:
When we think of something that is incorruptible, it means that nothing can destroy it or deny its existence — taint, or cause it to be other than it was created to be. Did you know that that is what God thinks of the real you. The real you is your spirit. The Bible supports that we are a tri-part being — spirit, soul, and body (1 Thessalonians 5:23 * John 4:24 * Hebrews 4:12 * Romans 8:16-17). Your spirit is the real you. Your spirit — the real you — has the life and the nature of God in it (2Peter1:4). If you have accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior your nature has changed by virtue of the fact that your spirit has changed. The part of you that has changed is incorruptible. (the real you.)

WATER THAT SEED:
In his book Christ the Healer, the late F.F. Bosworth said that the seed is not planted until it is known, received, and trusted. Mr.Bosworth also said that “the seed must remain planted and kept watered before it can produce it’s harvest.” We water the seed of the Word, by speaking the Word over the seed. That’s called watering the seed. -AWM