More Room, More Fruitfulness

TRINITY HOUSEHOLD OF FAITH

 

SUNDAY SERMON

19th February, 2022

Topic:                         More Room, More Fruitfulness

Preacher:                   Pastor Sam

Text:                           Genesis 26:22

 

MESSAGE

We are familiar with the story in our text and we’ve read it over and over – Isaac dug the well but they keep filling it. The Philistines kept filling the well that he dug but God made room for him and at a point, they had no choice than to accept him the way he was. They couldn’t stop what God was doing in his life; like Daddy said, they probably got fed up or had a major problem that they had to go and face again because when God wants to give you peace, even your enemies will be at peace with you. Praise the Lord!

Fruitfulness is linked to the room that you have. For greater fruitfulness, you need more room. If the place you are staying is too small for you, there is a desire in every man to want a lager territory, to move higher and want more space. Rehoboth can also mean spaciousness. So, God gives His people space. It is in every man: you want to express yourself and your God-given talent, you want to spread your wings like the eagles and fly – that’s a desire that God has put in you. You want to accomplish everything that God has put in you, that’s a good desire that God even wants the fulfillment. You see our young people now, they want to break every boundary and try to do things that no one has ever done, trying to break barriers and limitations, it is that innate desire that God has created in them for space and more room so that their talents can find expression. You see a lot of people want to move away from where their talents are being gagged to where there is more room. We know the call of Abraham whom God called from his family. God called him in Genesis 12:1 – 3, He said, “Go out, get out of your country, family and from your father’s house to a land that I will show you.” The space in his family did not allow him to express his God-given talents, he had to move; God had to move him away. God had to move him out of his comfort zone. Hallelujah! For the blessings of God to come upon him, there had to be a movement, he had to move. And for as many that are here who are trusting God for one particular blessing and God needs to move you, the Lord will move you to that greater level in the name of Jesus. The movement of Abraham even brought about blessings upon Lot. Because of his move, God blessed Lot. At times, until we move, we can’t be a blessing to people connected to us. The space that is not sufficient for us may not bless others until God moves us to a greater place, that’s why the topic of this sermon is “More Room, More Fruitfulness.”

You can see the story of Abraham and Lot, it got to a point where the Bible said the land cannot support them because they had a lot of herds of cattle and they were so blessed. Same thing with Laban and Jacob, the land could not support them, so there was need for a separation. Some people, God will be calling you to a greater level so that you can be a blessing to others in the name of Jesus. We must understand that the promise of more room and more fruitfulness can only be fulfilled in the lives of the children of God. In Genesis 21, Sarah said, “For the son of the bondwoman will not share in this inheritance with the son of promise.” If you want more space from God, there is need for you to surrender to Jesus. There is need for you to be born again. There is need for you to walk in His will. It is only those who walk in the will of the Lord that God will make room for. If you walk in God’s will, it is His great desire to make room for you. The children of God alone will enter into this realm of more room and more fruitfulness because it is He that gives increase. It is not by your planting nor by your watering, it is God that gives increase. There is room for more in God. God is inexhaustible. No matter what level you have attained, God is telling you that there can be more. Even if you are blessed, that blessing still needs to flow in your generation, there can be more! The blessings for your generation can even surpass your own. There is room for more in God, so don’t limit God to what you feel is enough. Our God is the God that is more than enough.

Proverbs 4:18 says, “The path of the just is as a shining light that shines ever brighter”. So, no one has seen the best of you, the best is definitely ahead. God is able to make all grace to abound towards you. “That you, having all sufficiency may abound in every good works,” so, there is need for more, there can be more abounding blessings upon your life. He is able to do more, exceedingly, abundantly above all that we can ask or imagine because His power is in us. His power is at work in us. His grace is at work in us and it is His grace that will take us to our next level. So, for every child of God, there is no stopping you but there is always forward movement for you. For a child of God, there is that next level that you can move to. In your love for God, next level. In your walk with God, next level. In your service to God, next level. In your giving, next level. In blessing lives, next level. This is God’s desire for us. Remember the word for the year, Ezekiel 7:3 – 5, there is the ankle level, the knee level, the overflowing level. There is more for you in God.

How do we experience more room, more fruitfulness?

1. Have faith in God: Thank God for the song we heard this morning from the choir. Our status is changing, there is no more decline in the name of Jesus, we are moving to our better days in the name of Jesus. The church is a called-out one just like God called out Abraham. God is still calling people out for more. God is still calling you out for more. All you have to do is just trust him and obey. The expression of your faith is the obedience to the word of God. Has God promised and said it? Believe Him and trust Him. Trust God for more; for that which He has promised. Trust Him for that great thing that He has said. God has promised us that He will give us room and more fruitfulness, believe Him, hold on to this Word. If you don’t trust God for more, you won’t move. Abraham trusted God and he moved at the call of God. God told Jacob to go back to the land that He has promised his father and at the Word of God, he set out to move. In the face of famine, God told Isaac to stay in the land and not move and God prospered him. In that same land where there was famine, he stayed and he prospered. When God gives the word and asks you to take an action of faith, He may defy all logic and human reasoning but the result of it is there will be more room and more fruitfulness. So, in this season, we must be opened to change. We must not be satisfied with our status quo where we are. That desire must be burning in us for more and we must give that expression in our lives. So, don’t be satisfied. Hebrews 11: 8 – 10, “By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to the place which he would receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going. By faith he dwelt in the land of promise as in a foreign country, dwelling in tents with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise; for he waited for the city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God.” Because of faith, he waited. So, the instruction of God may be different from one person to another. At a point, God told him to move, he moved. At a point, God told him to wait, he waited. So, we must be clear with the instruction that God is giving us. We must not run with another person’s instruction. At his call to move, we must move and at his call to wait, we must wait. The waiting time for everyone of us may be different but we must patiently wait for him. We must not move when God has not moved and we must not loiter when God is moving. If you don’t trust God for more, you won’t move.
2. We must be led by God: This is related to the first one. We must be led by God. “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.” The leadings of God will always lead us to more room and more fruitfulness. When God leads, it is for more room and more fruitfulness. He knows the end from the beginning. Before we start anything, God knows the end result, so we must be wise to partner with Him that knows the end from the beginning. When we are led by God, that’s when His presence will go with us. When we are led by God, His presence would guarantee more room and more fruitfulness for us. That was why Moses cried out, “Let your presence go with us” and God promised Him, “My presence will go with you and I will give you rest”. We cannot face the challenges of life on our own. We can’t face the adversary with our own strength. The presence of God must go with us. When God leads the children of Israel, even the fear of them would be upon the people. The presence of God will terrorize our enemies; it will traumatize them. When God goes ahead of us, His presence will make room for us. His presence will part the red sea. That sea that makes it seem like there is no room, it is His presence that will part it.
3. Don’t Give Up: In Genesis 26, the thing recurring is that Isaac would dig a well and they would fill it but the Bible says he would dig again. Isaac dug the well again, he dug another well and continued digging until the one he dug there was no more quarrel over it (v. 22). There is that which you would do that God will make it have room for you, that will create that needed room and fruitfulness in your life. So, we must not abandon what God has called us into, we must try again. In verses 18, 21 and 22, he dug again and again. So, we must not give up. Our Father in the Lord talked about this like two anointing services ago, that we must try again and not give up. This is not the time to give up. The times are challenging, there is a lot of discouragement but the children of God are not people that give up. We must not give up easily. We are very close to that which God wants to do in our lives. So, giving up closes the opportunity for more room and more fruitfulness. When we give up, the opportunity for more room and fruitfulness would be closed. The way Isaac did not give up, as children of God, we must not give up. We must not close that door for what God is doing in our lives. Giving up shuts down our creativity. Instead of thinking about the solution, when we give up, we close the door to every creative thinking. Giving up closes the door to every thought of possibility. When we give up, we tie the hands of God to work. The times are hard, yes but as children of God, we must not give up. So, giving up shuts down our creativity and thoughts of possibility.
4. We must serve Him: We must serve Him with our lives. When we serve Him, God promotes us by giving us more room and more fruitfulness. By service, when God entrusts a little to us, He would give us more room to express our creativity. Remember the parable in Luke 19, the one that was given ten talents served faithfully in that little thing and at the end of it all, more was added. If you want more, serve God more. If you want more fruitfulness, serve God more. Malachi 3:10 – 12 says, “…I will open the windows of heaven that there will not be room enough…” So, faithfulness in our tithing, giving to the work of God opens the door to more room and more fruitfulness in our lives. God will make a difference between those who serve Him and those who do not. How will he make that difference? He will open more doors of opportunity to those who serve Him and those who do not serve Him. We can see the life of Joseph; at every point in his life, he was dedicated to service, he was serving his father, he was sold to Egypt, served in Potiphar’s house and that man even confirmed that God has blessed him because of Joseph. He went to the prison, continued serving until he landed in the palace as a result of serving. Many want to land in the palace without serving in that little place. No! There is no sudden rise to the top. God usually promotes His people and takes them through the ranks. So, we must give ourselves to the service of God – in our work with Him and in the little that we have, it must be to serve Him for His purpose. When we serve the Lord and the Kingdom of God is burning in our hearts, there is no way God will not give us more room because He wants more fruitfulness.
5. Understand the Purpose of Opposition: Isaac understood that the quarrel that the people were having with him was to push him to his destiny that was why there was no bitterness or anger in him. He kept doing what God has called him to do. If you want more room and more fruitfulness, there would be opposition, it’s just for us to understand their purpose. It is to push us towards our destiny in God. This was clear in the mind of Joseph without any form of confusion. In Genesis 45:4 – 8, he said, “I am Joseph your brother whom you sold into Egypt. You have done this but God had sent me to preserve His people.” He had a clear understanding that these people were just opposing him but God was doing His work behind the scene. Even those that were opposing him, that guilt was with them, it tormented them and even at the death of their father, they went to him thinking he was free to do whatever he liked but he said, “No, you still don’t get it. Though the devil may have instigated you to do this, you have only pushed me to the fulfillment of my destiny.” At the end, they bowed to him. He was telling them the story of the dream where they bowed to him, they said, “No, we cannot do that,” but if you count the number of times they bowed to him…. Understand the purpose of opposition. In your place of work, in business, understand it. When they do that evil to you, all you have to do is just smile and know that God is working through it all. God can work through the hatred of men to bring you into your next level of fruitfulness and so shall it be in the name of Jesus, Amen. Romans 8:28 says, “We know that all things work together for good…” both the good of men and the evil of men, they work together for good for those who love God and are called according to His purpose. As children of God, you want more room? There must not be any place for bitterness and unforgiveness as all these will hinder us from entering the realm of more room and fruitfulness. We must settle in our mind that it is God that is working through it all. Hallelujah!

Prayer

Appreciate God and give Him thanks this morning. Thank Him, bless His name; His plan for us as individual, a family and a church is to give us more room and more fruitfulness. Thank you, Jesus.

Express your trust in the Lord. “Lord, I trust you because you are giving me more room. I trust you, Oh Lord. I have faith in you, when you say I should move, I will move. When you say I should wait, I will wait. At your word, I will not give up. I refuse to give up, even as I serve you with my substance and my life, there will be more room for me. I know that the evil of men cannot stop me. Nothing can hinder me, glory be to your name, blessed be thy name, O Lord.” In Jesus name we have prayed.

If you are here, you are not a son of promise and you have not surrendered your life to Christ, you cannot enter into the realm of more room and more fruitfulness. If you want to surrender your life to Jesus, put your left hand on your chest pray. Say, “Lord Jesus, I accept you today as my Lord and Saviour, please come and dwell in me. Blot out my transgressions and wash me clean. Thank you for saving me. Amen.”

 

Thank you, Father because you have sent your word to us. We give you praise, O Lord. Thank you because we are entering the realm of more room and more fruitfulness in the name of Jesus. Thank you because we are unstoppable, our status is changing, there is no more decline in our lives in the name of Jesus. Blessed be the name of our Father. In Jesus Mighty name we have prayed. Amen.