The Franchise

Psa.8:³ “When I look at the night sky and see the work of your fingers—the moon and the stars you set in place—⁴ what are mere mortals that you should think about them, human beings that you should care for them? ⁵ Yet you made them only a little lower than God…”

Does God speak? Absolutely! God speaks and clearly too. But we must be humble about it. Most of the time; and it is deliberate when what I say is, “I feel this is what God is saying” or “I believe this is what God is saying”.

However, there have been times when the Holy Spirit would say to me, “Do not say I feel or I believe, tell them the Holy Spirit said…” and I did exactly what He said. The reason He would give me that instruction is because He knows I would say, “I feel this is what God is saying.” Why do I say that when it is obviously God speaking? It is because we must hallow His Name. “Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy Name!” We must honour God’s Name. It is very offensive to God, when His Name is used as an exclamation. It is very offensive to God when His Name is distorted, commonized or used hypocritically or presumptuously.

Most people are familiar with the franchise business model, right? So, I will use the franchise business model to explain this point further. Operating a franchise fast food business for example, means you have to use their colours, have the same ambiance, serve the same recipe – everything. So, when people enter a KFC in Lagos, hopefully, it is the same as the one in New York. That is how the idea works. Imagine someone running a KFC franchise in Lagos decides to add Nigerian local dishes to the menu – he or she cannot do that. The moment that happens, the person would have to drop the name because you simply cannot do that under the KFC franchise.

If you cannot do that with a franchise business, then why do you think you can do that with the Almighty God? It is not going to work. If you are going to carry His Name then you have to serve His menu. The misuse of God’s Name is not a sure verdict for hell like people think. But unless you make the right use of God’s Name, you will not make heaven and we need to get that.

Prayer: Lord Jesus, I thank You for choosing me and for putting Your Name on me. May I always hallow the Name of the Lord and never misuse it, in Jesus Name. Amen