We give God the praise for bringing us to the end of this series, and by the grace of God, we shall be looking into the topic called “NEW MANDATES.”

What are mandates? This is an official order or commission to do something, an authority to carry out a course of action as given by the superior or higher authority. And when a mandate is a superior mandate, in other words, coming from God, it is unstoppable. The heaven and the earth must consent to that mandate so that the name of the Lord will be glorified.

Our God is an awesome God and there is none like Him. The way He handpicks anyone irrespective of who they are or what their status is is incomprehensible, and that is why nobody should see himself or herself as less or short to be assigned new mandates.

Sometimes we may be the least in the family like David or Gideon. Sometimes, we may have no status, or sometimes, we may even have status that is outside the ordinary, but when God qualifies someone for new mandates, no one and nothing should stop such a person from fulfilling their purpose.

This morning, we are looking into Cyrus as a case study, a gentile king of Persia who was handpicked by God to allow the Israelites to return to Jerusalem in 538 BC as seen in the book of Ezra 1:1-4.

Cyrus was anointed to an office, usually as king but much more as a deliverer and a restorer to the household of Israel. And the bestowal of this unique and exalted title on the Persian king, after it had been used in Israel of such notables as the patriarch David and the coming Messiah Jesus, must have shocked the audience that Isaiah was prophesying to.

I mean the question would be, why would the Lord appoint a foreign pagan to carry out His mandate? Why wouldn’t God raise someone from the land of Israel just like the way He did Gideon, Samson, and the like?

And it is because our God has sovereignty over all that He created, and no one could be too far away from Him that He cannot select to fulfill His purpose, because everyone in this world exists for a purpose. Hence the reason you must know that your existence in this world is because there is a mandate that is yet to be fulfilled.

But the concern here is that not everybody knows why they are here. Not everybody has the understanding of what a mandate is, let alone carrying out a mandate. Some who know what a mandate is do not know what kind of mandates should be carried out, and they carry out the wrong mandates.

But for us who have given our lives to Christ must know that the reason we are handpicked for salvation was because we have been qualified by God for such a time as this, and if God can use someone who has not given his life to Him to fulfill His purpose for the deliverance and the restoration of His people, how much more you and I who have been called by His name.

Esther did not by mistake get to be the queen of the land, but it was because of the mandate she needed to fulfill. For there would be a time that someone would need to confront the king for the salvation of the Jews in the land.

And that is why you must know that the office you found yourself in is not by your might or power. God opened up that position to you. He gave you those opportunities so that you may fulfill His mandate in that office.

The Lord did not give you those children ordinarily, but He did so as to fulfill His mandates on them.

There is a new mandate in your life that will bring deliverance and restoration to those whose souls were lost to lust, lost to addiction, to drugs, to alcoholism, to prostitution, to debauchery… you name it.

You must identify and understand that your existence in Christendom is to build a kingdom for Yahweh, is to find those who are in captivity and bring them back home, and you must not write yourself off because if God could handpick Cyrus who was not qualified AND qualify him.

You also can be qualified for new mandates, and God has what it takes to endow you so that when you embark on the journey to fulfillment of these new mandates without resources for the journey, everything that you need shall be released and given to you so that you will not be short of resources in carrying out God’s mandates.

If you would not take my word for it, let us look into the Bible again. The Bible says Cyrus was anointed, his right hand was held (the resource God gave to him was power to subdue by the upholding of his right hand) that he may subdue the nations before him, to loose the armor of kings, to open before him the double doors so that the gates would not be shut – and he carried out the mandates as authorized by God.

One thing that many people do not pay attention to is that when God releases His mandates for us to catch, there are rewards waiting for us both here on earth and in heaven.

First of all, the One who authorized you will not leave you alone but rather go before you to make crooked places straight, and He will break in pieces the gates of bronze and cut the bars of iron, and the treasures of darkness and hidden riches of secret places shall be given to you.

So there is a mandate upon your life irrespective of who you are, even though you may not know God as you should, even though you are Cyrus. All you need to do is to submit yourself to His authority and let Him glorify Himself through you.

We must stop the habit of striving with our Maker.

Prayer Points:
Lord I receive the grace to carry out your mandates as it pleases You. Amen!