How many of you here love sleeping? Sleeping is good and does us well! Doctors say that we need around 8 hours of sleep per night to function at our best.
Sleep is good for our body but the bible warns us about a dangerous kind of sleep. That is the spiritual sleep.
Whenever we start to get sleepy for the things of God our life is in great danger!
God has a word of warning to all of us :
Today’s message : The danger of Spiritual Sleep
A few weeks ago Paulo preached a great message about not letting the fire of God go out of your heart. Are you awake or sleeping for the things of God ?
“Consider and hear me, O LORD my God; Give Light to my eyes (revive) Lest I sleep the sleep of death;”. Psalms 13:3
David said : revive me, set fire to my heart or I will sleep the sleep of death !
If you’re not awake you are going to be deceived and your spiritual life is at risk.
“The Spirit clearly says that in later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons.” 1 Timothy 4:1
The Bible says that some people who are in church today would abandon the true faith. Many will stop listening to the teachings of the Word of God and will start following these “deceiving spirits” , they are Christians but they are going to be deceived.
This warning has to be taken seriously, because Paul the Apostle, through the Holy Spirit, said that this would happen in the end of times. I personally, have been seeing this happening in many places, I have been seeing people abandoning their faith, people that used to be so close to God, but today have been deceived and lead only religious lives.
“But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ.” 2 Corinthians 11:3
Why was Eve deceived and why did she fall?Because she did not pay attention to the “word of God” !
Whenever we ignore principles from the word of God and we say : “well, this doesn’t really matter” , “Maybe I can just try this fruit” , “I have the right to be happy” , “God understands my weakness” , “I don’t need go to church so frequently”, “I can’t be too extreme”, then we are being deceived by the Devil !
Unfortunately, there are some Christians that are spiritually sleeping. This is not a natural sleep, but they fall asleep for the things of God!
This is very dangerous!
11 “I say this because you know that we live in an important time. Yes, it is now time for you to wake up from your sleep. Our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. 12 The night is almost finished. The day is almost here. So we should stop doing whatever belongs to darkness. 13 We should prepare ourselves to fight evil with the weapons that belong to the light. We should live in a right way, like people who belong to the day. We should not have wild parties or be drunk. We should not be involved in sexual sin or any kind of immoral behaviour. We should not cause arguments and trouble or be jealous. 14 But be like the Lord Jesus Christ, so that when people see what you do, they will see Christ. Don’t think about how to satisfy the desires of your sinful self.”Romans 13:11-14
You that understand the present time! You that is part of the church (Shalom) and knows the word of God. The hour has already come for you to wake up from your sleep! Because our salvation is near!
So let us put aside the deeds of darkness – The prophetic word for today is: wake up, It’s now time for you to wake up from your sleep!
How do we know if we are asleep? Whenever we start to slowly get further away from God’s presence, and little by little we stop praying and having our quiet time with God, we start leaving aside the word, we stop coming to the meetings and services that have the power to strengthen us.
“not abandoning our own meetings, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging each other, and even more so because you see the day drawing near.” Hebrews 10:25
Whenever we abandon our Services , our prayer meetings, our Cell meetings, the reading of the word, we start practicing the deeds of darkness again: Addiction, dissension, jealousy, flirting with sin, lies, breaking the principles of the word, not giving value to our Church , marriage, family and partner !!!!
6 “So we should not be like other people. We should not be sleeping. We should be awake and have self-control. 7 People who sleep, sleep at night. People who drink too much, drink at night. 8 But we belong to the day, so we should control ourselves. We should wear faith and love to protect us. And the hope of salvation should be our helmet. 9 God did not choose us to suffer his anger. God chose us to have salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.” 1 Thessalonians 5:6-9
To be awake – is to serve God faithfully and diligently. It is obedience to the teachings of the word of God. We should keep watch, as in a vigil, in standby mode, and this talks about not being asleep. We should be fully awake to the things of God.
“Yes, everything is made clear by the light. This is why we say, “Wake up, you who are sleeping! Rise from death, and Christ will shine on you.” So be very careful how you live. Live wisely, not like fools.” Ephesians 5:14-15
The bible talks a lot about this state of spiritual sleeping and brings us a warning as Christians: Wake up sleeper, rise from the dead!
The bible makes it very clear that we all those spiritual sleepers are actually dead and they need to rise from the dead!
“It will be good for those servants whose master finds them watching when he comes. Truly I tell you, he will dress himself to serve, will have them recline at the table and will come and wait on them.” Luke 12:37
Jesus talks about keeping watch and not falling asleep. We need to Wake up!
“Don’t let him find you sleeping when he arrives without warning. I say to you what I say to everyone: Watch for him!” Mark 13:36-37
Watch! Many are falling asleep and will be caught by surprise!
Many say: “I know what sin is, I’m not wrong” but they don’t wake up from their sleep!
Falling asleep is not quitting church! You can be in church and you can just as well be spiritually sleeping.
11“Later the others virgins also came. ‘Lord, Lord,’ they said, ‘open the door for us!’ 12 “But He replied, ‘Truly I tell you, I don’t know you.’ 13 ““So you, must keep watch! For you do not know the day or hour of my return.” Matthew 25:11-13
The parable of the 10 virgins talks about the church – when the groom arrived, half of them had no oil in their lamps. How is your lamp? When we are sleeping, our lamps can easily go out.
Being with your lamp full talks about being full of the Holy Spirit! It talks about having a life full of the presence of God! Talks about a life in relationship with Jesus and also with the Church that is the Body of Christ.
‘Lord, Lord,’ they said, ‘open the door for us!’ – But he replied, ‘ I don’t know you.’
Verse 13— So you must keep Watch and be awake!
Watch because you don’t know the day the lord is coming BACK nor the time you are going to DIE
Keep watch so that he does not find you asleep.
The problem is that many don’t persevere… Many start off well, they start by loving God, coming to Church every service , taking part in Prayer meetings, serving his kingdom, walking in holiness, caring for their family, praying, growing in God, but then they start getting sleepy and give in to sin!
Lack of watch makes us start flirting with sin! When we don’t keep watch, we start sinning, we keep on living with this mistake and we say to ourselves:
I’m in church, God is with me, I’ve sinned and God has not killed me!
He’s even blessing me!
However, the Bible says: Wake up, sleeper!
Let’s read now about the life of a man who played with sin and did not keep watch and fell asleep
19 “Delilah saw that Samson had told her his secret. She sent a message to the rulers of the Philistines. She said, “Come back again. Samson has told me everything.” So the rulers of the Philistines came back and brought the money that they had promised to give her. Delilah got Samson to go to sleep with his head lying in her lap. Then she called in a man to shave off the seven braids of Samson’s hair. In this way she made Samson weak, and his strength left him. 20 Then Delilah called out to him, “Samson, the Philistine men are going to capture you!” He woke up and thought, “I will escape as I did before and free myself.” But Samson did not know that the Lord had left him. 21 The Philistine men captured Samson. They tore out his eyes and took him down to the city of Gaza. Then they put chains on him to keep him from running away. They put him in prison and made him work grinding grain.” Judges 16:18-21
Samson was anointed and he had been consecrated by birth – he had a calling, God had a purpose for his life, but he managed to lose all of it! He was supposed to live differently, to eat differently, to marry within his own people but he got sidetracked.
Just like Samson fell asleep many are playing with sin and could lose everything at the end of their lives.
He awoke from his sleep and thought, “I’ll go out as before and free myself .”
But he did not know that the Lord had left him! Judges 16:20
The Holy Spirit was no longer with him! Be careful if you are asleep! It is time to wake up, it is time to get out of our spiritual sleep . We need to wake up, we need to fill up our lamps with oil!
Let’s stand up and read our last verse
4“Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love.
5 Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the first works, or else I will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place—unless you repent.”
Revelation 2:4-5
They were in church, however many of them did not love the Lord as they did before…
many had forsaken their first love! They did not love Jesus as before
We need to go back to our first love, we need to go back to loving Jesus’ presence
God says to you : I love you but you have forsaken the love you had at first.
- Consider how far you have fallen! – start praying now and consider how far you have fallen, when did you start falling
- Repent – you need to cry and to humble yourself!
- do the things you did at first. There’s no point in just praying. We need to go back to where we were
- If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand. We always have to face consequences!
God wants repentance! Repentance is a change of lifestyle and attitude!
If you truly repent, you go back to where you fell, and you fix things up with God and with other people! Some are sleeping for the Work of God, for their calling! Repent and return!
Others want just to be sitting in church and are sleeping for the purpose God has for their life!
May your life be full of the Holy Spirit! May you lamp be burning alight when Jesus returns or when you leave this earth