Now, let’s take our minds back to the hospital. Let’s imagine somebody on a four-wheel bed, placed on a drip and the only thing he can do is cry “Help! Help!! Help”!!! They brought him breakfast and he cannot eat. Lunch also, he cannot eat it; likewise dinner. I can imagine a doctor or nurse coming and carrying out cross examination on the patient, even if they know the patient is going to die (as it is in their professional ethics), they will say to the family, “No problem, he will be fine. Just be prayerful.” Now imagine that the doctor has gone, the nurses have also gone and now is the time for such a person to go to his eternal home. It is good to always think about. Please do not be angry with me, because death is inevitable. This is one topic we don’t think about every day.
When it is time for him to go (and usually this is what happens), he will continue breathing high, and at that moment the family will be disturbed and will run around, calling on the doctor, the nurses and on anybody available to revive him. And from breathing high, he takes his last breath and that is all. At that moment, he will give up the ghost.
The real self will come out of the physical body naked, and we shall return in nakedness. That day, he shall leave this dust called in nakedness, he will want to touch the doctor, but the doctor cannot feel him any longer. He will be asking himself, “What is wrong with me?” After sometime, in realization, he will ask himself, “Am I dead?”
He will lift himself up and down, and later throw himself through the wall. You see, it is only your body that cannot penetrate a wall, but your real self will diffuse through the wall at a very high speed, an uncontrollable speed! And suddenly he will see himself on white sand with small granite stones. People of God, this place I am talking about, there is no hill nor mountain, no water nor tree – it is just an empty flat land.
And the spirit will be wondering and asking himself, “Where am I? What am I doing here?” Some people will be coming from far and they will be approaching gradually; and his heart will be troubled. After sometime, somebody will touch him at the back and he will ask the person, “Please where am I?” The Angel will tell him, “Son of man, you are dead; you have left your body behind. Now look this way.” When you look at the other way, it is also without end. You look at your back, the field has no end.
The Bible says that the Lord is your shadow at your right hand. Listen to me, in this world, your shadow never means anything to you; or have you ever thought about your shadow? Shadow means nothing to you. That is why at the last day you too will mean nothing to your shadow. And when you look at your shadow and ask, “Please, who are you?”
The answer will be, “Yes I am your shadow and I have been with you all your life.” If you happen to be a backslider or a sinner who has never repented before, the shadow will twist the hand back and puncture the thumbs, then insert a padlock and lock both of your hands with the padlock. Having handcuffed him, the shadow will now grab him and say, “The journey has started.” The two of you will lift (rise) up and begin to run on a very top speed.
BACKSLIDING
As a Christian, I backslid five times: I backslid twice when I was
working in the office and thrice as a Pastor. It is possible also that
you may have backslided before. A Pastor that’s beating his wife, has he
not backslided? He that embezzles Church or public money, has he not
backslided? If you have backslide in any way, the Lord is calling you
back to return home. He told the children of Israel to return to Him:
“Return, you backsliding children and I will heal your backsliding …”(Jeremiah 3:22)
“Why then is this people of Jerusalem slid back by a perpetual backsliding? They hold fast deceit, they refuse to return (Jeremiah 8:5)
THREE (3) TYPES OF BACKSLIDING
- The first type of backsliding is when such an individual has backslidden in the heart and yet nobody knows it. You may have backslidden in the heart and still preaching and conducting evangelisms. “They made (Him) the keeper of the vineyards; but (His) own vineyard have (He) not kept.” (Songs of Solomon 1:6b; Proverbs 14:14).
- The second type of backsliding is when there are noticeable physical evidences. It is the situation when you used to be a prayer warrior and a very strong man of God, such that when you go on your knees to pray, you can pray from morning till evening before standing up. But now, the only time you pray is when you are in the Church and leading prayer session, or the prayer session being lead by someone else. If you find yourself in that position, you have already backslidden. A Christian or a man of God, who enters a car and can no longer preach the gospel; a Christian or a man of God who can no longer do personal evangelism, has he not backslidden? “Once I was in a vehicle going to Lokoja, I was not preaching but listening to a message. Then I heard, “Abraham, you are now a big man for you can no longer stand to preach.” Immediately, I took to my feet and started preaching, not knowing that there was a man in that vehicle who was going to commit suicide because of what he was going through in life. If a Christian or a minister of God has become so big that he can no longer do personal evangelism again, that person is already a backslider. When such individual has been reading the Bible very well before, but now he no longer has the urge to read the Bible anymore. Anytime he makes an attempt to read, he will just sleep off; that is a sign of backsliding. That person may be behaving anyhow in the Church and will not even take any correction. He or She will be living an untruthful and or immoral life.
- The third type of backslider is that, that person has out rightly and stubbornly stopped coming to Church and is deliberately “forsaking the assembly of ourselves together.” (Hebrew 10:25)
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