Fola Komolafe

14 And Jesus answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever. And his disciples heard it. Mark 11:14 (KJV)

Have you noticed how often toddlers say, “No!” I mean at that stage of their life it is their favourite word sometimes to the frustration of their parents. I have often wondered why they learn to say No before they learn to say Yes. I am yet to see a toddler who just says Yes all the time. One parent I read about said her daughter would say, “No” 328 times a day and each time she would have to remind herself that her child is going to grow up to be a strong adult. A medical article said, ‘if your toddler’s favourite word is “No!” and his or her default position is defiance, Relax! New research suggests that this behaviour in very young children is both normal and a sign of a healthy parent-child relationship”

However, as we all grow up and start to learn right from wrong especially what is right by God, we seem to stop saying, “No” and just accept things of life as they come. Jesus said we have the right or the authority to decide what we allow in our life and what we disallow. In Matthew 18:18, He said, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you forbid and declare to be improper and unlawful on earth must be what is already forbidden in heaven, and whatever you permit and declare proper and lawful on earth must be what is already permitted in heaven.’

You are the one to do the forbidding (and the permitting) here on earth. You forbid by saying, “No” to the things that want to come into your life that does not represent God’s good will, God’s word and God’s promise to you. In all situations you need to know where you stand, God needs to know where you stand and guess what, even the devil needs to know where you stand! Are you saying, “No” or are you saying, “it is okay” by not saying, “No”? Silence in all cases is compliance! You need to say, “No” and of course you need to say, “Yes” to everything that represents God’s will and good purpose for your life even when you can’t see it.

In Mark 11:14, Jesus had casually been going about His Father’s business. He gets hungry and goes to this fig tree to see if it would give Him food to eat but there were no figs on it. I believe Jesus did this to show the disciples how faith in God works as He must have known that the season of figs had not come. I also think that the fig tree was defiantly speaking to Jesus testing His authority or right to demand for food out of its season. Jesus answered, ‘NO…’ and the bible says in verse 20 that by the next day the fig tree had dried up completely from the roots. I want you to visualise this and I want you to get this in your heart that,“if by faith you can boldly and emphatically say NO (like a toddler) to everything that is wrong in your life, to everything that is inconsistent with God’s word in your life, to everything that is not good in your life, to everything that does not represent the kingdom of God and to everything you do not want in your life because they are contrary to God’s promise to you, then they all have no choice but to wither from the root in the mighty name of Jesus. Declare your stand today!

I believe that we need to remember our toddler days and say, “NO” more often, only this time we are saying, “NO” in defiance to things that do not represent God and who we are in Christ Jesus.

You have a God given right to say NO!