Living a life of purpose, Bible Study 01/08/13

Posted on January 11, 2014 by growintheword

Living a life of purpose

Synopsis of Bible Study 01/08/13

Delivered by Bishop Walker

Anchor Text: Ephesians 2:10 (NKJV)10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.

This is season where everyone wants to know what their purpose is (the new year).

2 keys to purpose

  1. Know that your purpose existed before you got here
  2. Know that your purpose is in the mind of the creator

When God made the world he stepped out onto nothing and made something. The point is God had already purposed the nothing before he stepped out into the nothing and He made it something. We were then created for a purpose.

I . Created for purpose

We have a spiritual birthmark- Genesis 1:26-28 (NKJV) 26 Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all[a] the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” 27 So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. 28 Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” – We are made in the image of God. God’s personality and DNA has then been placed our lives. This means, people should be able to look at you and know that you belong to  God, just like they are able to look at you and see that you belong to your parents.

You must also take your dominion in the earth. You can’t fulfill purpose without dominion and authority. No matter what happened in your life before you got here, know that you are not an accident. You had nothing to do with how you got here. You were made by God. We are fearfully and wonderfully made. God made sure he prepared us for purpose before he delivered us onto the showroom floor. Ex- Like a Saturn or Nissan car, the parts and components are put together and planned for a specific purpose in mind, before being delivered to the showroom floor. These cars were designed for the purpose of driving. You wouldn’t buy a car without tires or windows on it, would you? Like this, God has madue us for a specific purpose to fulfill and our makeup is designed with purpose in mind. This means we don’t have to add anything to ourselves. We are perfect he way we are. God didn’t put you out and say, “batteries not included!” You are perfect for you purpose.

Jeremiah 1:5 (NKJV) says 5 “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you;
Before you were born I sanctified you; I ordained you a prophet to the nations.”- God says, you existed before you got here. This doesn’t mean you had a former life. It simply means that you were in the mind of the maker. In other words, you existed. Your existence was on God’s mind. God knew you, because he had you on his mind.

 

If I existed, then I had a choice to exist on the earth or live in the earth. If you just exist on the earth, you are just moving from place to place with no purpose and no kind of life. When you on the other hand live, you do what you were intended to do and live like you are supposed to live. Life (living) is all about purpose. You have to know that when you are in purpose, you will never work another day in your life.

Isaiah 44:22 (NKJV) says 22 I have blotted out, like a thick cloud, your transgressions,
And like a cloud, your sins. Return to Me, for I have redeemed you.” – God was incubating you in eternity. Your 9 months inside your mother really wasn’t your incubation period. God did this before he put you into your mother’s womb. God was orchestrating things before you even got here!

II. Purpose is found in God

Colossians 1:16 (NKJV) 16 For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All  things were created through Him and for Him. – Everything that God created has its purposes in God. Everything God creates, it has a purpose. If we were to ask you “What is the purpose of water?” you could give 50 reasons for this. If we were to ask you “what is the purpose of grass?”, several theories would come up about this too,  but when it comes to knowing our purpose, we can’t name it. Isn’t that interesting?

When you understand purpose, then you know that God aims you towards something. In otherwords, there is that amazing thing God wants you to do. It is out there! The question is then raised, “How do we know it is out there?”

We know it is out there, because:

a. It is not free from persecution – Persecution is the devils attempt not to let what God has in you, come to fruition. You got to then not whine over your persecution. You got to know that if you are going through persecution, then the devil must be nervous about what God has for your life! What is it, that is inside of you, that makes the devil so nervous?

When you walk in purpose, you can’t be nervous. You got to just walk in it.

2 Corinthians 4:8-9 (NKJV) 8 We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; 9 persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed— – Persecutions come to children of God, but we don’t respond to it. We don’t allow ourselves to be broken. We know that what’s in us us is greater than what is after us and what is happening to us. We have to the a blessed assurance.

III. We have blessed assurance

John 16:33 (NKJV) 33 These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will[a] have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”- You don’t have to worry about whats coming, because Jesus has already over come it. The devil is already defeated. Look at the things you have already over come. Jesus died at Calvary and over come it, so you have to know that since there is nothing greater than Calvary, you can overcome it! Ex- When a boxer knocks out another boxer, the crowd doesn’t ask you to go and knock them out again. Why is this? It is because the opponent has already been defeated! Just like this, years ago, Jesus already overcome the devil. Why then would he do it again? The devil is already been defeated!

IV. There is power in purpose

The people you hang around can speak a lot about your purpose. Everything God created, besides us, has an 8th sense about boundaries that could potentially kill them. Ex-A gazelle never goes up to lions, because the gazelle knows it could be lunch. The rodent doesn’t goes up to the rattlesnake, because he knows he would be lunch. The antelope doesn’t go up to the crocodile, because he knows it could be lunch. Everything God creates respects boundaries between life and death, except us. God’s greatest creation (us) will come close to stuff that could potentially kill us, because we are so intrigued. We are like a deer running up to a lion with onlookers trying to warn us by yelling, noooo!

Isn’t it amazing the curiosity we have! The more dangerous it is, the more intrigued we become!

Your purpose will be truncated with repeating this flirt with danger.

Psalm 1:1-3 (NKJV) says

1 Blessed is the man
Who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly,
Nor stands in the path of sinners,
Nor sits in the seat of the scornful;
2 But his delight is in the law of the Lord,
And in His law he meditates day and night.
3 He shall be like a tree
Planted by the rivers of water,
That brings forth its fruit in its season,
Whose leaf also shall not wither;
And whatever he does shall prosper. – Planted by anointing that is flowing, it will be growing. – In this season, God don’t want you with stuff that will make you wither away. You ought 2014 to be the year that you prosper.

V. Fulfilling purpose, pleases God

Matthew 3:17 (NKJV) – 17 And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”- You have to be in the right place at the right time. Lots of times we miss a blessing, because we are not in the right place. Ex – The palm tree is a beautiful thing, but who plants a palm tree in Connecticut? This would be a good thing in a bad place. If you are not positioned where God wants you to be, you will not grow.

Timing is is everything concerning your purpose. Ecclesiastes 3:1 (NKJV) says 3 To everything there is a season, A time for every purpose under heaven: John 2:4 (NKJV)  says 4 Jesus said to her, “Woman, what does your concern have to do with Me? My hour has not yet come.”- Jesus knew when it was his time to walk in purpose. Galatians 3:4 (NKJV) 4 Have you suffered so many things in vain—if indeed it was in vain?- Jesus knew which season he needed to come. Everything that happens in purpose has to happen in a specific time. We can’t be premature or too late! When you are premature, people can not receive your purpose or your vision, and as a result, you disengage, but this is not God’s fault! Others don’t move when God says to move and as a they miss it their blessing. Ex- Bishop explains that he went to his publisher and told them that he needed his book to come out at a certain time. The publishers explained that this would be impossble to do, because it atleast takes 12 months to write a book. The publishers explained that in order for this to happen, he would have to write the book in 6 mths. Bishop buckled down and wrote the book in 6mths, because he knew the importance of timing. This book had to come out at the time that God had designed it to come out.

There was a specific timing in the way God created things. God didn’t create the cow before the grass for instance. When God moves on your behalf, it has to be the right time. Get ahead of God if you want and see what happens. Wait for your time. It is all about timing. God is rearranging and setting the stage for you, so don’t get there before he’s ready for you. God is fighting battles for you before you get there.

Our purpose then manifests in certain time. Ex – Old HB and Antioch location (of Mt Zion) both were built in God’s timing.  Its growth and success is the result of this.

VI. Fulfilling purpose is for the glory for God

Isaiah 43:6 says  (NKJV) – 6 I will say to the north, ‘Give them up!’ And to the south, ‘Do not keep them back!’
Bring My sons from afar, And My daughters from the ends of the earth— – Everything thing you do is for the glory of God!

a. Our life has to be devoted to God – Everything I do is fruitful. Proverbs 11:28 (NKJV) 28 He who trusts in his riches will fall, But the righteous will flourish like foliage.- I want to flourish in everything that I do!

Our life purpose involves growing in character- Gal 5 talks about the fruits of the spirit. You can be a gifted person in purpose, but it will not manifest if you don’t have the character to sustain it! The problem for some people is you are too mean. Ex – You can be the best Barber, Baker, or Store Owner there is , but if you got a nasty attitude, it will kill your purpose. Ex- People often asks how Mt Zion has grown so much and though Bishop has given many different reasons for our success, at the end of the day, Bishop feels it is because he is a down to earth Pastor. If you just ask God to help you with your social skills, it will often make the difference in all that you do.

Remember no matter how gifted you are, if you don’t have the “fruits of the spirit”, you will not prosper!

VII.Purpose draw us close to God

It ain’t just about stuff, it is more important than that. You think your purpose is about chasing the dollar bill, but you got to know that you never depend on money for purpose.

Philippians 3:7-10 (NKJV) 7 But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. 8 Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; 10 that I may know – Paul says if I loss all this stuff, it doesn’t compare to my knowledge and relationship with Jesus Christ. This keeps you from loosing your mind. Paul says simply, “I don’t need stuff” to make me happy!

7 things to remember about purpose

  1. There is a problem – When God engages us in purpose, there is problem that has to be solved. For example, there is a problem called cancer and somebody in jail has the cure for it. That problem therefore still exists, because that somebody missed their purpose. Somebody will eventually come into the earth just to solve this problem. Polio is an example of a problem that people thought couldn’t be solved, but eventually, God sent somebody that solved that problem.
  2. God works by his providence – God brought your mother and father together. He needed your father and mothers genes to come together to make you and so you could solve a problem. Ex- Bishop explains that his Dad is 84 yrs old. Not only does he not look it,  he in addition has an abundance of energy. He is always doing something. God gave Bishop Walker his Dad’s energy and his Moms kind, nurturing, and caring spirit. Both of his parents were needed to make a Bishop Walker who would solve a problem. As an answer to a problem, God sent Bishop to Pastor Mt Zion.
  3. Predestined – You are predestined. When you were conceived, you were predestined towards a thing. In the spirit realm, the devil even knew why you were born. In the spirit realm, your conception was made aware even to the angels. How is this proven? Elizabeth looked at Mary and said to her, “you’re pregnant. What you going to name the baby?” and Mary said, Jesus. When she said this, John, Elizabeth’s unborn leaped in the womb. You were born, grew up, and it turned into passion. This is an example of being predestined.
  4. Passion -Passion drives you for purpose.
  5. Preparation – This makes you the best in your purpose.
  6. Persecution – During preparation, this is when you will experience your greatest persecution. Satan wants to make you drop out during your prepartion period so your purpose will never come to pass.
  7. Produce– When you endure the persecution, your will reproduce. That thing God placed in you, he will complete. There is some big stuff that is about to jump of in your life!

 

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Jehovah-Rohi, Sermon notes 12/29/13

Posted on January 6, 2014 by growintheword

 

 

Jehovah-Rohi

Sermon Notes 12/29/13

Delivered by Bishop Walker

This psalm was written when David thought he had been forsaken by God. Many Theologians think this is David’s maturity psalms. It was in that field with sheep (as a sheep herder) that David discovered God was Jehovah-Rohi (The Lord my Shepard) to him.

 

Here in this scripture we see that the people mentioned in this scripture are sheep and we see that the Lord is our Shepherd. This means Lord will feed his sheep like a shepherd does for his sheep.- Psalm 100:3 NKJV The Lord declares that we are his sheep.1 Peter 2:25 NKJV For you were like sheep going astray, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.

 

This Psalm also introduces God as our Shepherd. Like a shepherd for sheep, we wouldn’t be here today if it wasn’t for our Shepherd.

 

4 things about God that will bring you through that which will change your prospective.

 

I. A The Lord is my Shepherd

 

  1. This is place of position. When you recognize the Lord as your Shepherd, you see him as Lord-over.
  2. There is nothing a child can go through that God is not over. What is over your head is under His feet.
  3. If God is over it, then this means He is omnipotent. God sees things we need before we even ask. Before you were born God knew what you needed.
  4. He has the power to make things go away. He has the power to block all things.

 

II. The Lord is

 

  1. “Is” implies a constant of being. God “is” and not “was”. “Was” suggests that God has shown up, but left the building. “Is” means that God is always in the state of being present.
  2. Because of God’s “is-ness“,  He can’t be pushed to a state of “was-ness“, because he won’t end.
  3. God has everything under observation. God never lets us get caught up in something he doesn’t have power to get us out of.
  4. He is omnipresence. Where I am, God is there. Psalms 149:7-9 NKJV says To execute vengeance on the nations, And punishments on the peoples; To bind their kings with chains, And their nobles with fetters of iron; To execute on them the written judgment—This honor have all His saint.Praise the Lord!- God is everywhere at same time. God is!
  5. The enemy will try to make you doubt that God is there. Ex- There was a story of the woman who’s son was shot and killed. The Mother kept saying, “God where were you when my son was killed?” Soon there came a voice from heaven that said, ” I was in the place I was when my son was killed.” The lesson here is, no matter how bad things may seem, God is always there. God is in that bad situation just like he was at Calvary.

 

III. It’s Personal

 

  1. He is my Shepherd. God is an original and can’t be copied. God in class by himself. God can correct me when I go astray.  There is nobody greater than Him! He can’t be compared!
  2. A shepherd makes sheep understand the power of being obedient. You can’t claim to have relationship with the Shepherd when you don’t want to do what the Shepherd wants you to do. You got to submit to the Shepherd.
  3. God not only leads us, he shepherds us. When we act up, He will take his staff and pull us back into line. If that don’t work, like a shepherd, he might whip you with the other end of the staff. You ought to be glad that God thought enough of you to whip you!

 

IV He is my protector

 

  1. God is always working on your behalf. He protects you. We must understand we don’t belong to ourselves. The Shepherd has complete control. You don’t look like what you been through, because He takes care of his own.
  2. God obligates himself. He obligates himself to take care of you. When you understand who your Shepherd is, you will not put others in his place. John 10:11NKJV says “ I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep.- We are obligated to set at the table
  3. The Shepherd never wastes oil.  God anoints you for a reason. The big things that you go through, is because your assignment is going to be big. If you don’t get what you need in the valley, then you won’t have the strength you need to get through the things on the mountain!

 

God is our Jehovah-Rohi!

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Love , Bible Study 12/18/13

Posted on December 27, 2013 by growintheword

Faith, Hope, and love Part 3

“Love”

Synopsis of Bible Study 12/18/13

Delivered by Bishop Walker III

 

Earlier in this series, we talked about faith and why faith is important to tap into the things God has for our lives. We also talked about hope and how the enemy’s desire is to attack the word in us, so that our faith may be diminished and so our hope would be lost. Tonight we talk about love.

The bible says that these three remain, faith, hope, and love. God says the greatest of these is love. When we think about love, many of us are disillusioned by this idea called love. If we were to ask many of you to tell about your love experiences, some of you would have some real horror stories to tell. On the other hand, some of you would in fact have some interesting stories, because we all have a different idea about what love is and what we have experienced as a result of love. Love is complicated.

It is important for us understand that God gives us a blueprint for love. Vertical relationships are significant, because this is the relationship made up of us to God. Horizontal relationships involve man to man. The problem is our vertical relationships have not been strengthened. As a result , we try to draw strength from our horizontal relationships without examining the model in which God uses to demonstrate how we should be loved. This is why in the past, the horizontal relationships never stood!  So tonight we will find out what love really is.

Now let’s understand how we define it (love).

When you think about it, the New Testament was a Greek document. The Greek has 4 words for love.

4 Greek words for love

  1. The first is Eros – This is carnal, sexual love, properly reserved for marriage.  Hebrews 13: (NKJV) 4 Marriage is honorable among all, and the bed undefiled; but fornicators and adulterers God will judge. – Whenever one enters a covenant of marriage, you can eros (love) as you want and how you want as long as both of partners consent and as long as it is inside the confines of marriage. (We know this might be uncomfortable discussing, because church folk usually don’t like about sex in the church). When you get married, you can do what you want concerning this love/sex as long as both partners agree. Actually this kind of love is a carnal expression.
  2. The second Greek word for love is Philia – This is love of a close friendship, such as brotherly love. This is drawn from the root word Philadelphia. We find this example particularly in John 11:3 (NKJV) 3 Therefore the sisters sent to Him, saying, “Lord, behold, he whom You love is sick.”- Remember when Lazarus was sick?
  3. Then there is storge which deals with family love – This kind of love goes with the phrase we use that says “blood is thicker than water” meaning despite our incredible dysfunction, we still love each other, because we are family. Unfortunately, you can’t pick your family, so you have to love them anyhow.
  4. Lastly, there is Agape – Agape is the highest form of love. This is the love which seeks the highest good of others. The is an unconditional love.

As we recap, we learned that there are four terms for love. They are eros, philia, storage, and then agape. Agape again is unconditional love.  A good Tweet- able for you is this; You will never be faithful to that in which you do not love. What you love you will be faithful too.

Love then is demanded

When you look at the love of God, you begin to realize that God gives us this command to love. Mark 12:30 (NKJV) says 30 And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.’[a] This is the first commandment.[b]  –  Here is a 4 part directive about how to love God, with your heart, soul, mind, and strength.

4 parts to loving God

  1. With your Heart– This is putting it into a human relationship.  God says, “I need you to love me like your heart is here, because I can tell when you disengage. I can sense when something isn’t right. I feel like you’re here, but your heart is disengaged. I need to feel like we are going in the same direction. We are trying to end up in the same place, destiny”
  2. Love him with your mind – In other words, God occupies mental space. You are really thinking about him and He is not an afterthought.
  3. Love him with your Strength– God needs to feel like no matter what has happened in your life, or how tired you are, no matter what you have experienced, one call from Him, and you will gather the strength to come and see about Him. Nothing will keep you from him, no matter how fatigued you are. You love Him so much that when God’s name is mentioned, you get strength you would never have had otherwise.

 

God says, do you love me like that (keeping these for directives in mind)? God says do you love me with your heart, because I can see you lifting up your hands and opening your mouth, but remember what Jesus said to the Pharisees. Jesus said, “You honor me with your lips, but your heart is far from me.” Jesus can sense when we are just going through the motion, but have disengaged from the heart. We know how to put on form and fashion, throw together theological phrases, and look sanctimonious. We also know how to play church, but if our heart isn’t there, God can sense it!

  1. God says to us, are we really trying with our soul to love him? Because that which we make every day is an indicator that we are really trying to make sure our soul ends up where He is. If you really love God, then you are thinking about your soul. You are loving with our soul. Your soul is so valuable, you will say to yourself, what does it profit a man to gain the whole world but lose your soul.
  2. God is also saying, do you really love Him with your mind. When temptations and trials come, are these things blotted out because there is no space for them, because all day long we are thinking about him. All day long you have him in your mind and people can tell just by looking at you that you have God on your mind all day long and all night long. God wants to know, do you love him like this, that even in your strength, when you’ve been out all night long, you have the strength to get up on Sunday morning and say “as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord”. You have the kind of strength that you don’t lay up and make excuses as to why you can’t do what God has called you to do. God needs to know that you love him completely. This is commanded of God!

When you love God like this, you got to:

  1. Got to love our brethren: This means easily to translate to others. John 13:34-35 (NKJV)  34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. 35 By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” – We must develop the capacity, because we have been the benefactor of the love of God, we must love others as God has loved us. The issue is, we don’t realize how difficult it is to love us. You probably don’t realize that you are a mess. When you think about all of your dysfunctions, all of your issues, all of your hang-ups, all of your failures, and all of your flaws, then you begin to think about yourself and find out that you can’t even stand yourself. God loves you despite all of these imperfections and if God loves you like this, then this is the kind of love that you have been the benefactor of. Therefore, God needs to know that you can have this same kind of love for someone else.

You don’t love people based on their history, you love them based on their destiny. Our problem is, we want to go into people’s history and make a determination of whether they are lovable. The truth of the matter is, God did not decide to love us based on our history, he loved us because of our destiny. He love us because of what was in us. He loves us for where we are going, not where we have been.

We don’t have to know you to love you. We love you simply because you are God’s child. No matter where you are, we realize that we could have been in that same place. Because we know that we could have had this same struggle, we are not here to judge you, we are here to love you no matter what. You are forced because of your relationship with God, to love everybody. We don’t have to agree with you, but we do have to love you!

In Romans 12:10 (NKJV) 10 Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another;  – Be kind or affectionate to one another. Isn’t it interesting how we can be some of the kindest people at church, but some of the meanest people outside of church. It doesn’t hurt to be kind. One act of kindness can go a long way. Ex-Bishop tells of an encounter with a waitress in a Louisiana Cracker Barrel. This waitress was overwhelmed with the workload she had. It was very busy and people were pulling at her from every direction. Bishop and his family had only one hour to eat and she worked hard to try and make this happen, despite how busy it was. When she got time, she brought out the bill. Bishop gave her some money that he had found in his pocket that he had forgotten that he had. You could tell that this really made her day. Later Bishop and his family were on the plane and the airline had upgraded his seat to first class, because he travels by plane so much. The problem was, they did not upgrade Bishop’s family to first class. This meant Bishop would be riding first class while his family was seated in regular seats. Wanting to sit with his family, Bishop went to see if the attendants could get whoever had the seat beside his wife, to trade with him and they could take his First Class seat. Another passenger from first class over heard this and told them that he would give up his first class seat so that Bishops family could come up and join him. The point of this is this, when you are kind to others, kind things come back to you. When you are mean, mean comes back to you.

  1. Got to love our families: You have to be able to love the brethren. We got to love our families. We don’t choose our families. They choose us. We all have those family members that we wish we could give back, but unfortunately we can’t. In fact, we are commanded to love our families. There is a blueprint for this. According to Ephesians 5:25 (NKJV)25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her, – Husbands should love their wives as Christ loved the church. A husband should love his wife so well, she should looks loved. The glory of a man is on the face of his wife. She should looked so loved that when other men approach her, they retreat, because they don’t feel they have a chance.

A wife according Titus 2:4 to should love her husband and love her family .Titus 2:4 (NKJV) 4 that they admonish the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, – We have to love our families because it sets an example and sets an atmosphere. When you don’t do this, what you do is create an atmosphere of anger and hate. Lots of issues we have with violence and anger comes out of the atmosphere of our homes. Your position of anger, unforgiveness, and trust often comes out of what you saw growing up. If you saw love and that was all you were around, then that is all you know. You got to love you neighbors and your enemies.

  1. Got to love you neighbors and enemies: In Mark 12:31 (NKJV) 31 And the second, like it, is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’[a] There is no other commandment greater than these.”- Single people, this says you become the paradigm in which you love others. This means you can’t love someone else at a deficit to yourself. You can’t play yourself and love someone else. Love should not cause you to devalue yourself in order to love someone else. What happens to some of you is you give up your values and dreams, because you love the other. You remove yourself and give your dreams up, but you got to realize that you are the model at which you use to love others. If you want to know how I will love you, then  look at how I love myself. If you don’t even love yourself enough to be home by yourself, then what makes you think that someone else wants to be at home with you ?

Loving your enemies

Matthew 5:44 (NKJV) 44 But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you,[a] – This is hard to do.

Things you must understand about people that hate you.

  1. They don’t know you. – All they know are assumptions about you. Most people that don’t like you, have never met you..
  2. They don’t realize their emotional environment and issues toward you is not going to make their lives any better. You have to learn to say what Jesus said when he said, “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.” You have to in other words learn how to pray for them. You got to learn to do good for them that despitefully use you. Ex- Bishops explains how he loves blessing his haters. He tells of a time that he was in Starbucks and saw someone that he knew really hated him. He waited till this person got ready to checkout and Bishop snuck up and told the cashier to put it on his bill. The lesson here is, a person can only hate less the amount you love them. If you hate like them, you have taken on their venom and thus are becoming just like them. If you love a thing, you got to let your dislikes and hangups go.

1 John 4:9-10 (NKJV) 9 In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. 10 In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. – God loved us first. Love is not measured or determined by the lovee, rather it is determined by the lover. The lovee doesn’t have the capacity to understand the depth of the love of the lover. The lover must love the lovee until the lovee learns how to love them back. God loved me before I learned to love him back. He loved me when I didn’t know how to love. We shout because we know God loved us when we didn’t know how to love him. God protected us when we were out there uncovered and God waited on us to get our lives right. You are here, because God was patient enough to say, “You finally caught up with how much I love you.” While we were yet sinners, Christ died.

When we think of this kind of love, we see God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. He looked at humanity and said here are people I created to worship me. I gave them breathe, gifts , and destiny and they allowed Satan to turn them against me. God says, ” I sent prophet after prophet to call them back to me and they just laughed. They brought my prophets to places of depression”.  Jose kept covering Gomer the prostitute even though she kept going back out into the streets. Just like this love demonstrated, God sent his son, because he knew the only way to save his humanity (creation) was by the shedding of blood. God sent his son to pay this price.

Jesus paid for sins he did not commit. Even after being sent, the same people that cried Hosanna later cried “crucified him!” Though he had the power to come off the cross, Jesus stayed there and died. Jesus loved enough from the cross to still die! When Paul writes in 1 Cor 13:4-8, he says you can have all these gifts, but love suffers long. 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 (NKJV) 4 Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; 5 does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; 6 does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; 7 bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.8 Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away.

  • Love does not tap out.
  • Love is kind. When we love, no matter what it looks like, we are consistent with the person who is kind to you.
  • Under love, we won’t make you responsible for what others did to us. One unkind act can turn people from church.
  • Love is not envy and love celebrates the house the neighbors get and the career jumps off for them. Love does not envy or parade itself.
  • Love doesn’t remind what you did.
  • Love does not behave rudely. Love won’t speak fowl .
  • Love is going to pause and think of the impact of word before it speaks.
  • Love is not unilateral and it isn’t all about one person.
  • Love is not seeking its own, or this is a leach.
  • Love is not, provoked.
  • Love can be on the job and walk it off instead of reacting when someone does something that is off. Love is isn’t easily provoked.
  • Love thinks no evil. It does not wish evil things to happen to you, despite what you did to them, for this would be revenge. Vengeance is mines says the Lord.
  • Love does not rejoice in iniquity.
  • Love will tell you that you are wrong , even if it costs a friendship. Out of love is our responsibility to tell you that this could happen. The wages of sin is death.
  • Love rejoices in truth. it believes all and hangs in there with me.
  • Love never fails.
  • Love will always remain.

God wants to know if we love him like we used to. Have we allowed life to separate us from the love of God? We have to be like what is taught in Revelation and get back to our first love. We have to love Him if he never does another thing for us. We are ready to let the Lord know particularly in this season that we love him. We want to ask the Lord to give us the love back . We want that love back  that made Him occupy our mind and that love that made where we could not get enough of Him.

 

 

 

 

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You got to go through it!, Sermon 04/24/13

Posted on April 29, 2013 by growintheword

You got to go through it!

Notes for sermon 4/24/13

Delivered by Bishop Walker

 

Text:  Psalm 42:5 Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted in me? hope thou in God: for I shall yet praise him for the help of his countenance.

We have gotten to a point where we want God to work everything out. We want a life of little trial or pain. We want a minimum amount of kick back, but we must know that there is no way around it. There is some things that you have to go through.

God knows what is necessary to prepare you for what is on the other side. God needs you to press your way through.

I. He gives us challenging circumstances

In the transparent book (Psalms), David says he is  like a deer panting after the water. Some of you are like the deer, you are not leaving until you get what you come for!

What is this about:

  1. You will have to deal with pain – No matter how spiritual you are, there is something that you will go through that will be painful  for you.

Types of pain:

  1. Acute pain – If you were to ask how bad the pain is on a scale of 1-10, you would answer “It’s a 12!”
  2. Associated pain – This is when you realize what caused your pain. You can simply have an encounter with someone and it triggers the old pain to come back.
  3. Ambiguous pain – This means that you can’t put your finger on what caused it or you don’t have  a specific answer  for it. You can’t put your finger on it, but all you know is that you are in pain.

Effects of pain:

  1. It will disorient you – It will cause you not to know which way is up!
  2. It comes to disconnect you- It will disconnect you from your church and your family.
  3. It comes to destroy you- No matter how much you are already hurting, it comes to destroy you.

 

What must we do?

  1. Guard your posture- Be careful not to let the enemy make you look like what you are going through. Pull yourself together and remember that you are a child of God.

i.            Based on how you look, people ask what is wrong with you? This gives you a platform to have a pitty party. Instead we will start asking what is right with you? This will force you to tap into God’s goodness and start to think praise report.

There are people around you and you have no idea what they have been going through.

II. Confidence in the Creator

We have come to a place where we know hope is confident expectation or a firm assurance regarding things that are unclear. Romans 8:24-25 says For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for? But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it.

When God makes promises, they are translated into prophecies. People have a tendency not to keep their promises, making us skeptical of other people’s promises.

Numbers 23:19 God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?

The reason why we haven’t went crazy is because we remember the promises of God. You can do all things through Christ that strengthens you. God will supply all our needs according to his riches and glory. That thing I started in you, I will perform …,  Be not weary of well doing … you shall reap if you faint not.  Weeping may endure for a night, but joy will come in the morning

Gods promises have been proven – In other words, there is nothing we are going through, that we can’t find examples for in the bible, that give us witnesses who can testify how God can handle our situations. Ask Job, who will testify that God will give you double for your trouble. Isaiah would say that they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength. Nehemiah would say that the joy of the Lord is our strength.

III. I choose to celebrate

Anyone can speak well of God when all is going well, but can you speak well of God when things are going south?

You better learn to have:

  1. A protest praise – This means that we protest everything the devil is trying to throw in our life. We got a habit of accepting things as they are. We accept the fact that we are sick, we accept that fact that we are broke, and we just accept everything that life throws at us .
  2. The power of praise – You praise God for what is on the other side. We praise God even though we don’t have the breakthrough yet. Somebody is about to get their breakthrough!

 

Yet means at the same time or nevertheless. We praise God even though we are in it. Yet says if God doesn’t do it, nevertheless meaning we go through praising him, we come out praising him, and if he doesn’t deliver us, we praise him anyhow.

No matter what happens, we praise God, because we know that there is a reason for what we are going through.

 

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