COVENANT

PASTOR ADEBO TOMOMEWO

Psalm 35:27 says, “Let them shout for joy and be glad, who favour my righteous cause; and let them say continually, ‘Let the Lord be magnified, who has the pleasure in the prosperity of his servant.’”

The word ‘prosperity’ in Hebrew means shalom. Shalom means peace. Peace means wholeness so the Lord has pleasure in the wholeness of his people. Wholeness means nothing broken and nothing missing so the Lord has pleasure in nothing broken and nothing missing in his servants. Wholeness is more than financial prosperity. When you have a picture of prosperity, you should have a picture of wholeness. You can have a lot of money but lack good health. This concerns God because you have financial prosperity but you lack prosperity of the body – this is not wholeness. You can have money, but have bad relationships. This is not prosperity. Prosperity is like a pie chart. Prosperity is the whole pie chart. Financial prosperity is just a segment of the pie. Peace in your home is another segment of the pie as well as good health.

Many people want to practice principles of a foundation they don’t have. If you walk with God well, your unborn children will take the wealth over from you. Gods will transfer this covenant to your seed for instance when Abraham died, God continued the wealth with Isaac.

There are five foundations of prosperity:

1. Covenant

You must understand covenant. Prosperity does not respond to fasting and prayer, it responds to the understanding and practice of covenant details. You will never meet a wealthy, ignorant man. You cannot have success in this kingdom without knowing your covenant right. You have to understand that being wealthy is your heritage.

2. The place of purity – consecration, righteousness

2^nd Timothy 2:19 – “ Nevertheless the solid foundation of God stands, having his seal; ‘The Lord knows those who are His’ and ‘Let everyone who names the name of Christ depart from iniquity.’” When God placed Adam in the garden, he had abundance. He only lacked a woman and he did not even see it. It was God who saw it. Adam never knew lack until he sinned. It was sin that the devil used to drive Adam out of the garden. When Adam sinned, the first manifestation was nakedness, shame and poverty. Sin is the mother of poverty. You have to pass the purity test to qualify for God’s kind of prosperity.

Job 22:23-25 says “If you return to the almighty, you will be built up; you will remove iniquity far from your tents. Then you will lay your gold in the dust and the gold of Ophir among the stones of the brooks. Yes the almighty will be your gold and your precious silver. If God is your lifter, he becomes your defender. Until sin goes, plenty is not in view. To enjoy plenty in this kingdom, you must have passed the test of purity. The oil for enthronement requires that you hate iniquity.     

3. Dedication

How dedicated are you to God. Do you just want to use God to get what you are looking for? Are you looking for things or are you looking for God? This is why sometimes God does not immediately give people what they want He checks your heart first. Only God can see you true heart.

4. Love for God

Do you love God? This is the foundation, which Abraham had in his relationship with God. Genesis 22:1 “Now it came to pass after these things, that God tested Abraham…” was a test of love. Only men with deep affection for God will end up with affluence.

1 Chronicles 29:3 “Moreover, because I have set my affection on the house of my God, I have given to the house of my God, over and above al that I have prepared for the holy house my own special treasure of gold and silver: three thousand talents of gold of the gold of Ophir……” King David is still recognised in Israel today because of his affection for God.

King Solomon never asked God for money. He loved God into it, so

 love opens the treasure house for you.

1^st Corinthians 13:3, “And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but I have not love, it profits me nothing. These are foundations that cannot be broken. It is a waste to skip the foundations and go straight to giving.

5. Addiction

Even though Solomon loved God, he got to a point where his wife dragged him away from God. 1^st Kings 11:1-4“But King Solomon loved many foreign women, as well as the daughter of Pharoah: women of the Moabites. Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians and Hittites – from whom the Lord had said to the children of Israel, ‘You shall not intermarry with them, nor they with you. Surely they will turn your hearts after their gods.’ Solomon clung to these in love. And he had seven hundred wives, princesses and three hundred concubines; and his wives turned away his heart. For it was so, when Solomon was old, that his wives turned his heart after other gods; and his heart was not loyal to the Lord his God as was the heart of his father David.” Solomon loved God but he lacked addiction to God. Verse 9 says “So the Lord became angry with Solomon, because his heart had turned from the Lord God of Israel who had appeared to him twice..” Solomon violated the law of prosperity and in verse 14 it says, “Now the Lord raised up an adversary against Solomon….”