“To this John replied, ‘A man can receive only what is given him from
heaven'” (John 3:27).
“God never gave you that property,” said my friend who had entered my
life at a time of great turmoil. These were hard words at the time. I
was separated in my marriage, and my financial resources were drying
up on all fronts. It was like rowing a boat with five big holes in it,
not knowing which one to try to plug. My business, my personal
finances, my marriage — all were seemingly drying up at the same
time. My friend had made an observation about some land we had
purchased years before. His point was that I had acquired something
that God never gave me. In other words, it was not a spirit-directed
purchase that was blessed by God. It was not a by-product of God’s
blessing, it was a source of “sweat and toil” born out of the wrong
motives of the heart.
When John’s disciples came to him and asked if he was the Messiah, he
responded that he was not and that one could only be what God had
given him to be. He was a forerunner to the Messiah, and he was
fulfilling a call God had given him. We cannot acquire and become
anything that God has not given us. God gave him that anointing. We
must ask the question of whether we are trying to be or trying to
acquire anything God has not given us. When we seek to acquire
anything that God has not given us, we can expect God to respond to us
like any father would to a child. He will remove that which the child
is not supposed to have.
David understood this principle. When he was preparing to furnish the
temple he told God in his prayer, “Everything comes from you, and we
have given you only what comes from your hand”(1Chronicles 29:14).