ICHABOD(Obtaining Grace to Last)

Clock Wed 04, 2025 12

1st Samuel 4:1-22 – The Israelites were defeated when they fought against the Philistines. Eli’s sons died and the Ark of the covenant was taken. This news caused the death of Eli and his daughter in law went to labour bringing forth a son whom she named ICHABOD which meant that the glory of God had departed.

ICHABOD is a Hebrew word which means the glory has departed or without glory or where is the glory. It was customary in those days that people would name children after experiences they have gone through.

Every believer in Christ has the destiny of ever increasing glory. More and More is the destiny of every believer in Christ Proverbs 4:18. God is committed to ensuring that our experiences are better at the latter part of our lives than at the beginning Ezekiel 36:11. The end of something is more important than the beginning. Better is the end of something than the beginning Ecclesiastes 7:8. Many people are always excited when they begin something in life and it can be characterized with joy, pain, overconfidence or ignorance. It is in God’s mind than no matter how an individual begins, the end should be characterized with success, increase and glory Job 8:7.

The reality of increase is met with conditions that should be kept. There are people who started with excellence but ended up to fail in life for example Gehazi. He started by serving a prophet of God with a potential to be the next prophet but ended up with leprosy. On the other hand, there are people who started with nothing but ended up in great places becoming references across the nations. There are people who start a race with a mindset of failing whereas others start with an unbending focus to win. Your stamina is measured with your ability to last/remain.

Keys that hinders longitivity of impact

  1. Pride – Before a fall and destruction is pride. Behind everything that was once glorious and is no longer glorious is pride Proverbs 16:18, 18:12, 29:23. Pride is the refusal to acknowledge God as the reason and basis of the result you have. You want to step in front of God and refusing to accept God as the principal factor for your success. There is nobody who cannot go down. Before a man falls, he always looks as if he is very stable.

    4:6 – The anointing of God was meant to fight everything that is against the will of God. If God is the One fighting you, there is no power or grace than can immune you from God’s wrath. The bible gives a condition where God can fight you, the man that is proud for God resists the proud. In the presence of greatness, it is hard to hide pride and this is what happened to king Nebuchadnezzar. The pride of life comes when you have results that are so loud and justified. Success is loud, visible and clear, thus the desire to show. In the phase of greatness, pride will always tempt you. Something happens to men when they become great. If the devil tries to tempt you and you resist him, he will wait for you in the corridors of greatness.

    The moment you start to feel that everything fails without you, you are in trouble. You know that you have pride the moment you have no value/regard for people. You believe that people have to bow to you and acknowledge you for what you are doing. That people are less important to you except you are the principal factor for the success. Sometimes it can come as a sincere acknowledgement of celebrating your value. Some people have systems that do pride for them. You have real victory when you conquer the pride of life.

    Humility is discernible, feelable and when you stand before a humble you will know. You know you are walking in humility when the desire to glorify self is not in you. Combine humility with your results. Your passion to remain must exceed by far your passion to be known. A man can be known and yet not last but it is difficult to remain and not be known. When you go down people don’t remember your exploits. You will be used by many as an example for failing like Samson. His end mistakes overwrote everything good he had done before.

    To conquer pride;

    • You must acknowledge God in all your ways Proverbs 3:6

  2. An arrival mentality – Inability to continue learning and improving 1st Corinthians 8:2 - You will always know of a real champion because of their openness to learn. To know the people who will be great and last is their ability to learn; they are always students for life. The school of wisdom is where you never graduate, you are only admitted and when you graduate, you are only graduating to failure. There only few people who have accessed the level of light needed for them to excel in life and destiny.

    Yesterday’s excellence will always be tomorrow’s mediocrity. Nobody claps for you twice for doing the same thing. If you don’t grow, you will not receive any applauds again. If you are still celebrating the results of yesterday, there is a problem. Why not talk about what is happening today? What happened today? Champions never arrive, they are aware that there is always more. You see and know the character of a champion by their passion to know more. Champions learn with their hearts open. When you find what you don’t know, humble yourself and learn. Always have a heart of a learner. Jesus being God, the Word incarnate, humbled Himself and went to the temple at age 12 to learn. He sat down like a man to learn Luke 2:46. You know that a man will last in life and destiny because of their passion to learn.

    When you find what you don’t know, humble yourself and learn. Reject an arrival mentality 1st Timothy 4:15-16. Learn from everyone, whether older or younger than you. Learn continuously without stopping so that you are not called Ichabod. When you see greatness, honour it.

  3. Destructions and compromises – That you can start well but something can happen to you and influence your life negatively. There are somethings that the devil can introduce in your life that can take you from the original course, causing you not to last Galatians 5:7-9. You must have a mentality that you must press, no destructions Philippians 3:13.

    There are two dimensions of destruction;

    • Getting into areas beyond the scope of your grace – Some people get away from the mandate they were given to areas where they don’t have grace. Everyone is given grace according to their gifts in Christ Ephesians 4:7. This is what happened to John the Baptist, he went into something that was not within his mandate and caused his death. You have to discern your area of grace and stay there to be able to profit others. When you function within your area of grace, the grace given to you is to insist that you remain accurate within that area.

      Don’t claim over things you don’t have grace to defend. Be comfortable where God has placed you and serve there with excellence. Remain in your kingdom and respect other kingdoms around you. Remain where you have been graces because God does not empower or send men to do everything.

    • Not protecting your focus and pursuit – If you don’t protect your focus, you will find yourself doing many things without making progress. Examine your core area of your call and raise people to function areas that are not around your core assignment so that you are efficient in your call Acts 6:1-4. Moses was about to kill himself with many things, his father in law advised him to appoint people to help him. As a leader if you are not training people to help you, you are destroying your life. You will always need people to help you. Create structures and systems to protect your focus.

      Stop being busy doing many things. There are things that can be destruction if you do them. Become comfortable with greatness and create a system to protect it without feeling bad. So many people have settled with unnecessary things. If you are honesty and kind, you will meet people to help you. Great people last because they unclutter their lives, removing things that are unnecessary and settle with things that are necessary. You can be busy doing few things that are necessary and required.

  4. Violating your winning strategy – The strategy that God gave you or the strategy that was built after many years of discipline, sacrifice and investment. Exploits and victory is always strategy dependent. If you have not kept the strategy behind your success, you are preparing for failure. David needed a strategy to bring Goliath down. Joshua asked for a strategy of bringing the wall of Jericho down. It is always the will of God plus the strategy to bring that will to pass that is equal to victory. When God gives you a mandate, there is a strategy that accompanies it. Beware of people who come into your life with their own strategy, maintain your own given strategy. Your strategy is not for everybody. Teach the people within your custody your winning strategy. When you teach them they will preserve it, when you don’t they will lose it especially when you are not there. The first thing to transfer to your children is your convictions. If people don’t want to learn what makes you win, then they should enjoy your success from afar.

    There is something that God gave you and the moment you lose it; you will become Ichabod. The moment you forget what keeps power to your head, you are in trouble. Understand what keeps and builds the anointing God has given you 2nd Chronicles 15:12-15. Every time you see greatness, someone is doing something somewhere that is not normal. There are things that you should always do and others never do. God honours covenants. When Israelites violated the strategy, it led to the death of Eli’s children and the capture of the Ark of covenants. Every time you see grace turns to shame, know someone has left their winning strategy. Just because God used you yesterday does not mean that He will use you today. People can distract you to leave your strategy. When you see extra-ordinary results, there is a covenant backing it up. Leviticus 9:6 – There are things that you can do for God’s glory to appear.

  5. Undress weaknesses and vulnerabilities – Revivals dies because of the humanity of men (the people who spearhead revivals are humans). Every man born of a woman have weaknesses and vulnerabilities. Any weakness undress will eventual destroy you. Weaknesses and vulnerabilities become threats when they are undressed. Men manipulated by spirits when they find the trigger points to destroy men. Become honest with yourself and deal with your weaknesses and vulnerabilities.

    Vulnerabilities are things that you are easily giving to and can be used to destroy you. Weaknesses and vulnerabilities don’t care who you are and if you become honest with yourself to deal with them, you have found the key to last Hebrew 12:1. Weaknesses and vulnerabilities necessary don’t have to bring profit to your life for you to pursue them. You can just find yourself bound by it. You must find out what can bring you down and cry to God to help you. Every time you feel you are standing by yourself you are already on your way down. The only reason why we are standing is by the mercy of God.

    Offense is one of the weakness that is plaguing many people. It comes with growth and increase, because as you grow, comes the awareness of pain, embarrassment, disappointment, honour and shame Acts 24:16. If you allow the cancer of offense to eat you, you will do things that you could not imagine. Obtain grace to fight your weaknesses and vulnerabilities. If you know God, you will not be affected with offenses. Sometimes offenses come when expectations are not met. Find out what your vulnerabilities are, pray and create systems by grace to protect yourself.

  6. Loss of passion and fire for God – Everything can still be right but the impact is still not the same. The problem can be that the secret place is wrong 2nd Chronicles 26:5. It is not always about what you are saying, is about who you are loving. Sometimes what you’re saying may not change but because there is a disconnect between your love life with Jesus, the impact will not be right Revelation 2:5. Beyond what everything people do, is there genuine love for Jesus. There are things only love can motivate you to do. The proof for your love for Him, is what you can lay down for His sake.

Every great person who desire to last in today’s world must have the following;

Prayer point

  1. Lord, the name Ichabod will never be used on my life.