When you are preparing for an encounter, depending on what the encounter is, and the expectations you have from that encounter, you prepare.
If you are going for a job interview, you prepare, you don’t dress anyhow. You don’t eat beans yesterday and then you don’t wash your mouth today. And then to go and talk to the person who will employ you. When you just say “bonjour”, the job interview is over, because, the perfume, that you are carrying, your boss will imagine how it is going to fill his office every day. So you are liberated. We were preaching in a town in Nigeria called Abeokuta. We went somewhere and were preaching to one man, and the man was dead drunk and really drunk. The brother who was with me ask me, “How can you be preaching to a drunk?” I told him, “He will believe.” We led the man to the Lord in his drunken state; whether he remembers what he has told the Lord oh; then we carried him, we went and baptized him when he was drunk. We came back for the baptism into the Holy Spirit. We pleaded with God, that the Lord will baptize him; he was drunk. So the brother with me was asking, “How can the Holy Ghost come upon a drunkard‘, he is drunk, actively drunk, not that he drinks? I told the brother, “Is it not such helpless captives that need the power of the Holy-Spirit?”
I said let us pray, and there were about eighteen brethren that we had led to the Lord. And when we asked the Holy Spirit to come down, the first person to be filled with the Holy Spirit was the drunkard. Then he jumped up, and asked me, “Where am I? Where am I?” We said, “You are in church.” And then he asked me: “What has happened to me?” I said, “The Holy-Spirit has come upon you.” Then he told us, “It is the first time in about twenty-four years, that his senses have come back to him.” He told us: “It is the first time in twenty-four years,” and he told us, “You, people must give me a new name because I cannot go back to carrying the name I used to have.” We asked him, “What do you want us to call you?” He told us, “Call me Abeshuleru, that is demon overcomer; because this demon has been overcome.” So we call him Abeshuleru.
Hallelujah! And we blessed him, and he has abided. He was the one who told me, He said, “I am a London-trained stenographer, but drinking, has ruined me. When I present my credentials, every company wants to employ me. He said but when I enter, the interview finishes before they have asked me the first question“. He said, “pastor, do you understand what I am talking? He asked me, you don’t understand the misery! My daughter was getting married; she was in church, waiting for me to come and give her hand in marriage to her husband; I woke up from my drunken sleep at five o’clock in the evening; I promised her I will be there in church“. He said, “Tell me, pastor, alcohol has useless my life.” No, no, no, Abeshuleru was the name of one of our missionaries who was always immoral then when the Lord delivered him from immorality, he said no, we should call him Abeshuleru, that from now on he would punish all demons. But this man, he said his name was Aborieshu, that’s the one who overcomes, the one who has triumphed over Satan—Aborieshu. So that was his name; Abeshileru was one of our missionaries. … My co-evangelist did not believe that a drunk, not mildly drunk, thoroughly perfumed by alcohol; when you sit with him, you receive impartation; because it is not hidden. He went back to the Baptist church, but he has been faithful; so we called him Aborieshu, the one who has overcome Satan. But I’ve not forgotten his interview; he says when he just enters the office, haa the interview is finished.
When you are going for an interview— for an encounter in view for a job, you prepare—you study, you dress well, you put deodorant so that the person interviewing you is not distracted by, your powerful aroma, and all of that; you prepare!
There are other kinds of encounters. When you are going for a romantic encounter, you also prepare; true or false? The boys, they buy a new purse, so that when they remove their crocodile skin, even without saying anything, there is an impact. Say Amen! You prepare, and you make sure, that even if you go and borrow the money, that the purse is thoroughly loaded; so that you look like a man of substance.
One of my disciples said, that he wanted to go and ask a girl who was hired than him socially to marry him; so he went and begged one of his friends for his Mercedes car so that when he appears, the girl will know that a guy has come. When he got there, the girl looked at him and laughed; she said: “Look at you; you are so thin, you don’t have money to feed yourself, then you want to come and add me on top of your budget? Weeh, bros, go home, eat well and be fat, and come back. And next time when you are coming, don’t borrow a car, when you will be coming don’t borrow a car. She said you think I don’t know this is your cousin’s car? ”
When you are going for an encounter—a romantic encounter, you polish your manners, you put out your best foot, you show the best that there is in you because you want to leave an impression because you have expectations. You can also have an encounter; if they call you to the court, that you should come and answer, I tell you, all the fear in your heart will go through your heart, you’ll wonder (all) how you’ll answer, your head will work, you’ll prepare. Who has understood my point? For every encounter, people prepare if there is an expectation. If there is an expectation in an encounter, people prepare. If you are going for a job, you prepare; when you are going for a romantic encounter, you prepare; when you are going for a trial, you prepare; if you are going back to the village, and you are afraid of the witches and wizards, you prepare. When somebody comes to meet you and doesn’t border to prepare, he has no expectations; and you shouldn’t bother to take the person seriously. If somebody doesn’t even bother to prepare—in his looks, in his attitude, he doesn’t prepare, he expects nothing, and he despises you. You ought not to worry about giving him anything.
When people come to see me, I know whether this one is expecting something or not; because once I just see them, I know that they are expecting nothing; if God blesses me with some money, I give them a gift quickly so that they can get away, they are wasting my time. Where people have expectations, they prepare. In all encounters, where there are expectations, people prepare. When people want to go and meet God when you want an encounter with God, and there is a hunger to meet God, and you truly want to meet God, you prepare; you prepare. You prepare your heart, you even prepare your environment. In Israel, it was forbidden to defecate carelessly, because the Bible says: “God is in your midst, he walks amongst you; let Him not see anything that will be offensive to Him.” Don’t offend Him with dirt. When you enter a house, you know which house the people are ready to meet God; because there is basic hygiene. When I go to a house and I don’t go often now to many people’s houses; but when I used to go, I would invent that I want to ease myself; even when I don’t want to ease myself, I go to the toilet, and when I enter there and come back, I know that this couple is hiding sin. If you can keep dirt, outside, is it moral dirt that you will not keep?
We all have the same heart! If you can tolerate dirt, disorder, your inside is not different.
If you don’t judge dirt, who will like you? Who would be attracted to you? If a man likes cleanliness, moral purity, he would not surround himself with environmental disorder and dirt; because it’s the same person; he must be consistent with himself. There cannot be a dichotomy; you don’t have two hearts; the heart that can live with the dirty toilet, and the heart that will live with the clean heart. It’s not possible!
Where there are expectations, people prepare. In many marriages, the expectations died long ago; the wife expects nothing from the husband, the husband expects nothing from his wife, everybody is old soup, sour soup. You have become sour soup to your husband, he expects nothing; your husband has become sour soup for you, you expect nothing; and then jealousy starts, because another sister still see something in your husband; and when she is excited about what she sees, then you’ll become awaken to say: “Ah, so there is still something wonderful here; this is my territory! don’t come near.” When that sister goes away, for one month, you still see something, and after one month, you come back again, and you tell your husband: “Many women marry men; I married apology. Other people have husbands, I have regret your true Christian name is Regret, your Christian name is Regret. I cannot say that I have a husband! Are you a husband? You last bought me shoes when?” No expectations! And then another brother sees your wife as a wonderful woman and befriends her and then you start becoming jealous. Ah brother, what are you looking for? What are you looking for? We should be careful hein! There are many mammy waters that have come into the church. If you valued what you had if there was still an expectation in your heart if there was still something that your husband can bring into your life, would you treat him like that? Will he be available for other sisters to come and cling to?
To be continued …