In this podcast episode, the speaker discusses the fall of the first health ministers and the importance of health ministry in developing local churches. They emphasize the need for pastors to support and train their team members. The speaker also reflects on the deception of Eve by the serpent in the Garden of Eden and highlights the danger of listening to voices that contradict God's word. They urge listeners to rely on God's instructions and not be swayed by worldly events. The speaker encourages sharing the podcast to bless others and build the kingdom of God.
Once again, you are welcome to Thrive with Health Ministries podcast, and we are having our Todd podcast today. One more time, I want to appreciate God for giving us another opportunity to learn at His feet. What a great opportunity. Thank you to our listeners across the globe, our listeners in Germany, our listeners in the United States of America, and of course, in Nigeria. I want to bless God for your lives, and I believe that the lessons learned so far have been put into good use to the glory of God in our different local churches, and then in our personal lives.
What a great opportunity to be here today one more time, and we are going to be looking at something that is very important, something fresh, a fresh revelation from the throne of grace. What are we looking at today? We are going to be looking at, very briefly, the fall of the first health ministers, and then we will be able to establish the fact that health ministry actually has its beginning from the book of Genesis, and then we try to go a bit further in our second podcast.
We will be able to establish that health ministry has a big role to play in developing our local churches, and then we have a very important and straight talk with pastors. I remember sharing with pastors that they need to carry along the people that are working with them, and they don't need to subject them to the kind of training or experiences that they had when they are starting out in ministry. That is looking at the example of how God formed Eve from the wreath of Adam.
Eve did not have to go through everything that Adam went through. God brought Eve out of the experiences and the formation of Adam in order to fulfill God's destiny and God's purpose for his life. So, today we want to look at the fall of the first health ministers, and I believe that as we continue, the Spirit of God will help us to go in depth, and then we will be able to draw many insights, and we are going to have more revelations as we continue.
In the name of Jesus, I want to encourage you to listen to this podcast and share it with as many people as possible because it is going to be a blessing to your lives. It is also a blessing to me because I must confess that some of these revelations that I have shared with people are actually fresh from the kingdom of God. They are freshly received from God, and as I receive from God, I give it out like that.
So, I expect people to share the podcast and then ensure that people whom they share it with listen to it as well so that we can grow together, we can learn together, and then we can build the kingdom of God as we approach the second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. So, let's quickly have a word of prayer as we continue. Eternal Contagious, it's been you all the way, and I want to thank you for bringing us this far.
We thank you for the lessons we have learned in our first and second podcast. We worship you because you are the greatest teacher of all. Thank you for the insight. Thank you for the revelations. Thank you for every word that you have been saying in our way. We say, be exalted in the name of Jesus. Lord, it's another time in your presence, we pray that you open up our minds, open up our hearts to learn things in the name of Jesus.
That as we continue to learn all those things, you will give us the grace to put them into work in the name of Jesus. And as we go back to our different local churches, we will be able to empathize, we will be able to help a lot of people with what we have learned so far in the name of Jesus. Thank you, Heavenly Father. In Jesus' most gracious name, we will pray. So, today I'm going to be speaking from the book of Genesis chapter 3.
So, I'm going to start reading from verse 1 so that we can lay a very good foundation. Then we'll take it up from there. Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, Did God actually say, You shall not eat of any tree in the garden? And the woman said to the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the tree in the garden, but God said, You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.
There was a direct instruction from God on what to eat, on what to touch, on what not to eat, and on what not to touch. A direct instruction from God. But the serpent said to the woman, You will not surely die, for God knows that when you eat of it, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil. Now listen to this in verse 6. And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was the light to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took up the fruit and ate, and also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.
God gave a clear instruction on what to eat and on what not to eat, and then the serpent came and told them otherwise. What baffles me here is the fact that they actually believed the serpent over God, most especially he. He trusted the serpent over God. God said, You shall not. The serpent said, You shall. God said, You will die. The serpent said, You shall not die. In other words, the serpent was trying to paint the picture that God was actually manipulating the woman and the man from eating from the fruit of knowledge.
It baffles me because the serpent successfully deceived Eve, who eventually convinced her husband to eat from the same fruit. You know, it baffles me. I can't sort of get my head around it. If God says, Do not do this, and eventually said, You're going to die the day you do it. Did she, or Adam, or did they bother to even ask God what kind of death is he talking about? Did they bother to ask him what kind of death was he talking about? No.
So, it baffles me how a mere animal, because it has the potential to talk, would deceive a set of people that are made in the image and in the likeness of God. First question I'd like us to ponder upon. How? How is it possible? Does it make any sense that God would say something and then would allow events that are happening around us to tell us otherwise? And you know, interestingly, it's still happening today. In our contemporary world, it is still happening today.
You know, we put the Word of God aside and we begin to listen to the voice of events and happenings around us, telling us that what God is saying is a lie. If God says, You are blessed, then you tend to listen to the voice of events around, the voice of the bad economy, the voice of bad leadership, bad governance, and then you believe that over what God said. You know, it continues to happen. And I believe it is because of the human nature that we have.
The serpent successfully deceived the woman into doing what God said they shouldn't do. The woman did it, but here is the thing. It was only a suggestion to the woman. It was only a suggestion to the woman. And the Bible says that the woman looked at the tree, looked at the fruit, and she discovered that it is desirable. It is desirable. That means the fruit and the tree were so attractive to the woman. So when the woman, in verse 6, so when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was the light to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise.
Who told her that she was foolish? Who told her that she was not wise? Who told her that? So what voices are you listening to, my brother, my sister, in your local church? What voices are controlling your decisions? Now what voices are telling you that you are bigger than that ministry, and as a result of that you just thought about it in your head, I am bigger than this ministry, I need to bounce. I need to get out of this ministry because I believe I have what it takes to start my own ministry.
Contrary to what God has been telling you. So what we are looking at here, we are talking about the roles each and every one of them played in this fall that we are looking at. Adam fell. Eve fell. And as a matter of fact, what happens to the serpents too if you read further? He suffered in their consequence for doing what he did. For being smarter than an animal is meant to be. He is an animal.
An animal who God has given you authority to tread on. God has given you the authority to control, to dominate, and even hit where necessary. He is not telling you otherwise. An animal that should see you and tremble in your presence because God has put your fear in the animal. It is the same animal telling you stuff that you should know about God. God will help us in Jesus name. So we are looking at the fall of the first ministers.
Now, we have been able to establish that Adam was playing a help to God in the garden. Now, let me reiterate again, God made the garden. And as a matter of fact, for man, he planted the garden for man. The Bible says he planted the garden and he put man there. So the garden was made for man. So since the garden was made for man, God needs man to look after the garden. God wouldn't have used an angel to look after the garden, but God used a man to look after the garden.
Man being a help in that regards to God. And we looked at how God was able to bring Eve into the picture. In Genesis chapter 2, the Bible says, I will make a man a helpmate for him. So Eve was meant to be a help to the man. Which, of course, that was the intent of God. But let's look at the role Eve played here. Number one, the serpent came and, you know, they got talking. Nobody could have been able to understand the kind of relationship the animals and humans had at that particular time in history.
But for the serpent to be talking to Eve, there must have been a cordial relationship between the animals and humans. The serpent came and the Bible says he was the most crafty of all beasts that God had made. And I expect that Hadam and Eve could have known that, especially Eve could have known that, that this animal that she was talking to was very, very crafty. Now, it baffles me. Here was a woman that was meant to be a help to the man whom God has committed a great assignment.
And the same woman brings about a very, very serious problem for the man. We are going to be looking at the role of each of them. Praise the Lord. And the first thing I want us to look at here is the fall itself. What was responsible for the fall? It was not the serpent that was responsible for the fall. The serpent only played a role that maybe it shouldn't have played in the first place. But was it actually responsible for the fall? No.
It suggested. It was a suggestion. There was no time in the scripture in Genesis 3 where we read that the serpent took the woman to the tree, plucked the fruit and gave it to the woman. No. He only suggested that he came from this will open your eyes to see so many things and you will be like God. Now, who told her that she was not like God? When God said, come let us make man in our own image after our likeness, she was already like God.
Adam was already like God. So, I don't know where that deception was coming from. I don't know where that mentality was coming from. She was made in God's image and in God's likeness and the crafty beast was telling you that once we hit this, you are going to be like God. You are already like God. You are already like God. You were made in his image. You were made in his likeness. So, it was not the serpent that was responsible for the fall.
It was the man and the woman that were responsible for the fall. So, let's look at it. The woman received a suggestion from the serpent. The serpent said, you hit this and this is the result. Suggestion. The woman accepted the suggestion. She did not process it very well but she processed it but negatively. The Bible says, she saw that the tree was new and to be desired to make one wise. So, she really wants to be like God.
She has been like God but she wants to be like God. The fruit has to be desired to make one wise. The one lesson we learned there is pride. Pride. I'm going to read it again so that you can understand. Then she hit the fruit. Pride. Another lesson there is con-ver-tious-ness. Don't forget. Pride. Con-ver-tious-ness. Is good for food. That is greed or have viraciousness. Greed. As if she has not been eaten before. But the moment that particular tree was suggested to her, she said, wow, this is good food.
Now the question is, has she not been eaten before? She has. So, help ministers watch out for these three key things in your ministry. Number one, greed. Number two, con-ver-tious-ness. Number three, pride. These are the things that were responsible for the fall of the first ministers. And of course, maybe I should add this to hit. Your inability to appropriate your identity in God. The woman failed to appropriate her identity in God. She could have shot the animal.
When the animal was suggested, once you hit this, you will be like, oh, sorry, I am already like God. Glory to God. Glory to God. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. I am already like God. I don't need your beast to tell me to hit something to be like God. I am already like God. He made me in His image and after His likeness. For God knows that when you hit all feet, your eyes will be opened and responded by saying, hey, hello.
I am not blind. I can see. At least I can see you talking to me. Glory to God. Glory to God. And you will be like God. Knowing good and evil. Knowing good and evil. So she has ample opportunities, ample time to discourage or cut off that conversation immediately. But of course, she did not because she was unable to appropriate her identity in Christ. And this is going to continue to happen to us if we are unable to appropriate our identity in Christ.
And as a matter of fact, as ministers, you don't need anybody to tell you who you are in Christ. You should know who you are in Christ. You should know who you are in Christ. You should know that which God has called you to do and you face it squarely without having to listen to somebody tell you what God has not really said. And I think this is a great challenge for many health ministers appropriating your identity in Christ.
Appropriating your identity in ministry. Now the fact that you are gifted does not mean you have to start a church or you have to start a particular ministry. Your gift is meant for the profitence of the saints according to the scriptures. But that does not signal the fact that, okay, for instance, you have the gift of dreaming and interpretation of dreams. You can interpret all manner of dreams. Does that make you a prophet? Does that mean you should go and start a dream interpretation ministry? No, it doesn't.
Not at all. Praise the Lord. It doesn't. A lot of health ministers have actually cut off the flow of God from their life and their ministry because they listen to what other people say because they are unable to appropriate their identity in Christ in ministry. You must know your identity in ministry. You don't need anybody to tell you that. No man has the capacity to call another man. The only person that calls man is God. And for you to appropriate your identity in Him and your identity in ministry, you need to go back to Him to tell you what He wants you to do part time.
Not all of us are going to have churches. Not all of us are going to be sitting over mega churches. Some of us are meant to stay in the ministry, have the ministry built. But we see a lot of health ministers, the moment they discover or some people are telling them you have this gift, they tend to leave the church. They tend to just carve out a niche for myself within a church. Now let me tell you this, health ministers, God is not a God of confusion.
You can't tell me you are in a word-based church and you are trying to carve out a prophetic ministry for yourself. You are going to cause confusion. Or you find yourself in a prophetic church and you are carving out a motivational speaking ministry. I'm not talking of the word. Every church has to be word-based. You are in a prophetic church and you are trying to carve out a niche for yourself in the same ministry by listening to suggestions from people who are likened to that serpent in the scriptures.
Block your ears! Appropriate your identity in Christ. Appropriate your identity in ministry. What has God called you to do? You've got to stick to it and do it well. It is not the time to start listening to what Brother Ye is telling you that you preached yesterday and as you were preaching, I was taken to the seventh heaven. That doesn't mean that God has called you into a word ministry. You are not even pulling out sensibly.
You are pulling out with baggage, with bitterness and all that. It's not done. You know, health ministers have made a lot of mistakes today that almost got them shipwrecked because they listened to voices of serpents around them. Who are those serpents around you? Because they are going to cause you to fall. Their holy assignment around you is to cause you to fall. Praise the Lord! The Bible says in verse 7 that the eyes of the poets were opened and they knew that they were naked and they sewed sheets together and made themselves loincloths and they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day.
And the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, Where are you? You see the lesson there? God did not say Adam, Eve. God called the man. So pastor, this is where I need to talk to you. Amen. I need to talk to you here. I need to talk to you here. You are the one with the ministry.
You are the one God has called. So whatever happens in your ministry, God is going to hold you responsible squarely. Then I got thinking that one of the major challenges here is the fact that Adam did not guide Eve very well. He didn't guide Eve very well. He didn't. If he had done his job as the man God has committed this great assignment to, Eve wouldn't have been deceived by the serpent. So Adam failed to guide Eve into the importance of obedience to God.
It was not written in the scripture that Adam even thought of eating that fruit. Eve met him in that garden. The thought did not enter into his head. So Adam failed to guide Eve into the importance of obeying God and obeying God alone. I said in our last podcast that a people or a set of ministers that you have not trained, they cannot stay. So it is your duty as pastors to guide your ministers. You guide them in line with the mandate that God has given you.
Not in line with the mandate of what God gives somebody else. In line with the mandate of what God has given you. That is how you guide them. That is how you teach them what to do. Don't be like Adam who was so busy taking care of other things without building his wife. Build your wife. Build your ministers. Make sure you guide them into the line of truth as regards the mandate. What has God given to you? What is the template of your ministry? So whoever must walk with you as a minister must be guided.
Must be carried along. Must be trained in line with that which God has committed into your hands. Otherwise, somethings within or without your ministers will come around and poison their hearts. And you see them carving out their own niches. Carving out their own ministries under your ministry and as a result of that it gives birth to what? The vision. The vision. Praise the Lord. A wise man said some years ago and I saw some sense in it.
He said when vision becomes true, it becomes thy vision. The reason why that very good brother whom of course you did not train has so much influence on your church members than you yourself is because you refuse to do the right thing at the right time. Praise the Lord. Guide them. Adam failed to guide his helpmates. He failed to guide his helper, his wife. And what happened? Serpent came into the picture and get rid of them from the plan and purpose of God.
Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. So pastors you really need to think about that and make sure whoever is walking with you has quality time with you. You have to guide your people. Create time. Start a discipleship class. That should be the core of your ministry. Start a discipleship class. What has God told you to do? What is God expecting of you? When God called you, He gave you that mission. He gave you that vision.
He gave you that ministry. There is a purpose in the mind of God that you as a pastor should fulfill. So that purpose, the plan of God and the purpose of God for your ministry should guide you into guiding your help ministers into fulfilling God's plan and purpose for your ministry. God is not going to call that brother whom He had not committed the assignment to. God was going to call you. He was going to call you and He is going to call you.
The Bible says He called unto the man, not unto the both of them. God is a God of principle. The man was the one servant with the responsibility of taking care of the garden. He was servant with the responsibility of taking care of the woman, of guiding the woman into her food. So when God came, God said, Adam, where are you? And he said, I heard the sound of you in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself.
Where you see disobedience, you see fear. Now the free relationship, the free fellowship you have with God, you couldn't have it again because the serpent has paused the show. I pray the Lord will help us in the name of Jesus. We are not going to be deceived into disobeying God in the name of Jesus. Now to wrap this whole up, the four of the foster ministers, Eve allowed herself to be deceived by the serpent because of her conviciousness.
In Genesis chapter 3 verse 6, we have studied that place very well. She was convicious. She was an avarice. She was a glutton as if she has not been eaten before. Praise God. Adam failed to guide Eve into the will and the plan of God and of course to solve the consequence. So I've been able to address workers, ministers, and at the same time I've been able to address the pastors. Ministers, be careful. Every gift you display must complement the ministry of your pastor, not make it complex.
If you don't carve out a niche or a ministry for yourself under a ministry, God did not give you that vision. God did not give you that ministry. If you must start your own ministry, get out and make sure it was God telling you to get out. For in getting out, make sure you get out the right way. Do not turn yourself to something else. Do not constitute a nuisance in another man's field, in another man's ministry.
I pray the Lord will help you in the name of Jesus. And pastors as well, train your workers. Start in discipleship class. Let them know this is what God has said we would do. Stick to that. Stick to God's assignment. Do not be so carried away with ministry that you forget your helpers, your ministers, people God expects you to train and grow together. Do not be so carried away doing the work of ministry that you neglect your help ministers.
Because in the long run, they are either going to make your ministry or mar your ministry. So God has committed that assignment into your hand. In fact, they are your first priority. They are your first ministry. I said in the last podcast that I believe that all pastors should build disciples and allow their disciples to go out there and build a church. That is the model of Jesus Christ. Jesus was able to build people and the people he built, talking about the disciples, went out there to give him a church, to build him a church.
And the church has been waxing strong. The Lord will help us in the name of Jesus. So as we wrap up this episode of the podcast, I want to encourage you once again to stay in your lane and the Lord will help you to fulfill your ministry in the name of Jesus. Once again, my name is Adeniyo Olavi and I love you. Keep listening, keep sharing and I see the good Lord taking you to the next level in the name of Jesus.
So until we meet the next time, I am saying keep winning, keep helping. The PD is coming. That PD is coming. The PD is coming and you will not miss your reward in the name of Jesus. Once again, we thank you, Father, for what you have been able to do. We pray that your life comes upon this in the name of Jesus. Thank you, Father, in Jesus' name we pray. So your washout from high above is coming out in a moment from now.
It is titled, Servant Warriors. It is specifically for ministers. Watch out for it and God bless you in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen.
