The Pious Life, Bible Study 01/04/12

Posted on January 7, 2012 by growintheword

The Pious life

Synopsis of Bible Study 01/04/12

Delivered by Bishop Walker III

 

Study Text

1 Peter 1:10-16: 10Of which salvation the prophets have enquired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you: 11Searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow. 12Unto whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister the things, which are now reported unto you by them that have preached the gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven; which things the angels desire to look into. 13Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ; 14As obedient children, not fashioning yourselves according to the former lusts in your ignorance: 15But as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation; 16Because it is written, Be ye holy; for I am holy.

 

In this text, we believe that Peter wants us to understand the concept of discipline. There are things God has purposed for our lives to accomplish. What is important for us to understand is that it will require discipline to accomplish this purpose. Discipline is ignited by character. Gifts and talents will get you there, but character keeps you there.

 

If you work out often, it is easy to keep working out, but you if lay off it for a while, it is hard to get back into it. If you pray often, it is easy to remember to pray, but if you stop it is hard to get back into the habit.  Discipline must require discipline. We must maintain character to walk it out. It takes character to maintain discipline, so then the enemy’s job is to distract us from this discipline.

 

This message is simply ground work for this series. We must examine then what Peter was trying to tell us. Peter was trying to tell us:

 

  1. I.                    Don’t give up on what the prophets before you were looking for
    1. Isaiah 2:1-4 says 1The word that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. 2And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the LORD’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. 3And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. 4And he shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. – Here Isaiah was talking about how we would not study war no more.
    2. Deliverance – Micah 2:12-13 says 12I will surely assemble, O Jacob, all of thee; I will surely gather the remnant of Israel; I will put them together as the sheep of Bozrah, as the flock in the midst of their fold: they shall make great noise by reason of the multitude of men. 13The breaker is come up before them: they have broken up, and have passed through the gate, and are gone out by it: and their king shall pass before them, and the LORD on the head of them. – Prophesied that deliverance would come to God’s people.
    3. Strong indestructible kingdom – Daniel 2:44 says 44And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever. –. Jesus came prophesying the kingdom of God.
    4. The prophets and the angels didn’t have what we have the benefit of having now, yet they were disciplined and held on. They endured afflication and hung in there based on prophesies they heard. Surely if they did this, we should be able to hold on after seeing how many prophesies have manifested throughout the bible.
    5. Prophesies that we find in the bible, reveal things to us and give us revelation. God reveals things to us though revelations.
  1. Prophets before (found in the Old Testament) prophesied during what we call their dispensation. What we mean is these prophets looked into the future during their dispensation to speak on what God would do in the future. Now (in today’s times) we know that the prophesies that they prophesied about, came to past. Knowing all of this, how could we not believe what the word says.
  2. Prophesy

 

  1. II.                  Gird up the loins of your minds
    1. Gird up-ANAZONNUMI- This means to gird up or to gather the loose ends or to pull yourself together.
    2. The mind – DIANOAIAS – This is the understanding – In other words, do we really understand what God is trying to show us. To gird up our minds means to be sober.
    3. Be sober- NEPHO- Signifies to be free from the influence of intoxicants- Like intoxicants, there will be people that want to polute your thinking process. They come into your life and plant seeds. Think about the time you wasted thinking about stuff that polluted your mind. Ex-Just imagine you have this big project that you are supposed to be doing. All of a sudden you receive this text message. You see it knowing you shouldn’t answer it, but you do anyhow. Now that you have answered it, you don’t have time to complete that project that you should have finished. Answering the text message caused you not to be productive. This is the season where you have to declare you won’t let negative people cloud your mind.
    4. 1 Thessalonians 5:6 says 6Therefore let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober. – In other words, pay attention to the things that happen around you.
    5. 1 Thessalonians 5:7 says 7For they that sleep sleep in the night; and they that be drunken are drunken in the night. – Those that sleep do it at night.
    6. 1 Thessalonians 5:8 says 8But let us, who are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love; and for an helmet, the hope of salvation. – Let us put on salvation.
    7. You got to learn how to keep your head. Confession is a mater of the heart. Romans 10:9-10 says 9That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. 10For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. – How can we have so many people that say they love the Lord with their heart, yet their minds are so messed up? Their minds are so messed up; you don’t want to hear anything come from their mouths. Remember, we have said it before. There is a thin line between from Schizophrenia and hearing God.
    8. The bible says put on helmet of salvation. This is mentioned one other place in the bible. This is however very important. In other words, God can have your heart, but Leroy can have your head. If Leroy has got your head, he will eventually make your leave God. We have to really process this.
  1. Peter understood that the attack would first come to our mind. If you think about it, most of your problems start in your mind 1 Peter 1:13 says 13Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ;
  2. This scripture teaches:
  1. Prevention of negative people clouding your mind
  1. 2 Timothy 4:5 says 5But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry. – Timothy’s assignment was for him to be an evangelist and fulfill his minstry. Affliction was going to come, but he had to keep watching. Paul told him to focus on his head so he could fulfil his assignement.
  2. Set your hope fully on grace-1 Peter 1:13 says 13Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ; – God gives you and I the grace to live out our asignement. Every assignment we have, God gives us the grace to walk it out. This is why you can’t walk out anyone else’s assignemnt. God didnt give you the grace to do their assignment.
  3. What we got do in this grace is trust God more than we trust ourselves. We can’t trust ourselves, because we are a mess. We have to trust God to walk this thing out. We walk this thing out in hope.
  4. Hope – is desire with expectation. Expectation creates desire, making us focused and disciplined towards this thing. The first attack the devil will bring then is to plant people who will plant negative thoughts. Today my mind will be sober.
  5. If Satan can’t get you through there, he will plant affliction. Now we know we got revelation, because we know we dont have to deal with it. Our assignment was to focus on the goal. Folk are working it out.

 

  1. III.                Don’t be distracted
  2. IV.                We need God to consecrate us.
    1. Sanctify- When we got saved, right at that moment, God took away all the things of my past and made us clean instantly. Nobody tells us about sanctification. It won’t work by itself, because we are flesh. We have to engage other flesh all the time. In fact, we are released in a world exposed to what people say and do. It is inevitable that we will bump up against some things (or encounter our lust issue) with our saved self. Now if you bump into someone or have a mere encounter with your lust issue, that is one thing, but it entirely another when you lay down with it. You had to make a conscious decision to do that. This is saved folk doing this not people of the world. We have to realize that nothing in our flesh is good.
    2. Every man in this place is bumping in stuff if he was to be totally honest about it. Don’t ask to have your issue of the flesh taken away, because what are you going to do when you get married? Are you going to ask for it to be put back?
    3. Sanctify- means we are cleansed. Sanftification is the porecess of setting thing in order.
    4. Holiness -is sanctification laws. God doesn’t’ deal with rubbish.
  1. 1 Peter 1:14 says 14As obedient children, not fashioning yourselves according to the former lusts in your ignorance: – We are walking this thing out, but we have to understand how to live in obedience-Obedience-HUPAKOUO-This means to listen or attend, to submit, or to obey. – Two key words here is to listen and submit. Ex- When a parent tells a child to do something and the child doesn’t do it, the first response is to say, “Didn’t you hear what I said?” You think in your mind, “Clearly you must not have heard me, because you respect my authority and my ability to take stuff from you, so clearly you must not have heard me.” In like manner, God says, “Clearly you didn’t’ hear me. You know I could just take back the breath I gave you or the job I gave you that you didn’t deserve” We have got a lot of folk in church, but like this example, not everyone who goes to church is listening. We got a lot of folk who go to church who is not listening.
  2. Only when Christ comes in will you know the difference. – The devils destaction is to cause you not to listen, so you will not obey. If you dont submit, you will conform to this world rather than being transformed by the renewing of your mind. The devil says, “I got you now”, because if you are not obedient, you conform and you go back to the former lust of your ignorance. There were things you done in your former life, because you were ignorant. Now the devil is trying to pull you back to it.
  3. Examine this and see if any of this gets into your Kool-Aid. God you gave me stuff to do and now I have decided to do it. I have made up my mind not to let people mess with my mind. When my mind is sober and I have sobriety. Now I know how to handle affliction. We are not worried, because we are turning it all over to him. We find out while we trying to figure it out, he has already worked it out. Now as soon as I get out of church, trying to do right, the devil asks if I thought he was done on me. As I begin to answer, he says “Look behind you.” There is some stuff our flesh likes and Satan says if he can get us to like that, he can get us to turn. There is a part of us that is like Paul that says when he would do good, trouble is always around. You realize you have a flesh issue. Satan uses this and waves it in front of us like a banana. We try to be holy, but why don’t somedy tell us how to handle being holy when our flesh is horny. How do we handle this? Deep people might be saying they can’t believe we are saying this in a church like setting.
  4. We must realize that it is holiness that we are after. That is why we got saved. We turned from our waves and got saved.
  5. God’s desire is for us to be holy- HAGIOS- Means to be separated. – We got separated somehow from God. We are trying to help you so you don’t join church 10 times this year. True deliverance is not running from our flesh issue. Instead it is the ability to to walk by it and not have a problem with it. Running from it is called relocating.
  6. Relocating is not the answer, because guess who is going to be in your new location? You will!
  1. 1 Peter 1:15 says 15But as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation; -Holiness is God’s work. Sin has the power to blind your mind, compromise your integrity, break down you morality, and pervert your view of God
  2. Rationalism – This made Cain murder Abel, because their inequity had reached its fullness.
  3. The wrath of God is being revealed – Romans 6:11 says 11Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. -Sin makes us miss the mark. We were dead to sin and Paul asks in the scripture, what died in you? In other words, what is the authenticity of your salvation?
  4. We have people vacillating between two different things. There is no difference between their post and pre-saved state. In their present state, they drank all the time and after being saved they still drink. You slept around before and after. What died then? What died in you? Here is the problem. In order to reach that goal God has set for you, you have to understand the process of sanictification.
  5. Sanctification-It is not a denomination. After all, we hope all churches are sanctified.
  6. Sanctify, sanctification, holiness

 

Every day, we wake up with something but we turn it over to Jesus.

How do you deal with that stuff in your flesh? Sin is to miss the mark. Holiness is a life style. Can we truly be holy? God is purely holy, because he is God. We can pursue and come close to holiness, but can we really be purely holy in this flesh? Every day we wake up, we had to die of something. Paul says he had to die daily, so surely we would. Every day, we say Lord consecrate me. We might pause and look, but we got to go towards our goal. We know this is trick, but we know what we have to do. When we get right there, the Devil tries one more time and put in front of you what you really like. How do you make it? You make it by looking back from where you were delivered and examine how far God has brought you and you ask if your really want to go all the way back there as to moving on to the short distance you have left before reaching your purpose. We have to remember that every man became a man when he got sick and tired. Every woman became a lady when she got tired. Every believer becomes more like Christ when they get tired. Are you tired?

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Identity Crisis Part II, Bible Study 12/07/11

Posted on December 22, 2011 by growintheword

Identity Crisis Part II

Synopsis of Bible Study 12/07/11

Delivered by Bishop Walker III

God says he has to check your ID to make sure you look like what his word says. We have to understand the power of loving God. When we love God, we live it out. In response, he reminds us how he sees us. When you believe in his power, you can believe in his love, and he will…

 

  1. I.                   You got to know that God thinks about you a lot

 

  1. Everywhere you go, God has you on his mind. Psalm 139:13-14: 3For thou hast possessed my reins: thou hast covered me in my mother’s womb. 14I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well. – We are fearfully and wonderfully made. God made sure there would not be another person on the planet like you. God put everything in us that we needed to succeed.
  2. Paul tells Timothy to stir up the gift inside. When you stir up the gift that God placed inside of you, then you will see how much greatness there is inside of you. God put in your capacity things that hadn’t even come to mind yet. You will not get it into your mind until you reach the proper season, because we couldn’t handle any time before this.
  3. The world can’t handle but one of you. Psalm 139:15-18: 15My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. 16Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them. 17How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them! 18If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand: when I awake, I am still with thee. – Before we existed, before our ancestry tree evolved, before being formed in our Mother’s belly, God knew us. God absolutely had us on his mind.
  4. Jeremiah 29:11: 11For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end. -God says I know what i think about you. His thoughts are always of peace and not evil. Evil comes from the devil and not God. God always thinks of the end result. Ex- Before the beginning began, God was, and God began the beginning with you in mind. Just imagine, before the beginning began, God thought he needed to begin the beginning with us. He spent days creating with us in mind. God had a plan for our whole lives. God still does this. He has plans for our arrivals. Ex-You wanted to know why God hasn’t delivered what you were asking for yet. Just know that God planned our revival. God has planned our arrival. That door that will be opened hasn’t opened just yet. God is still planning what is on the other side of the door.
  5. Before your Mom and Dad listened to that first Al green track, he was thinking about us. God spent the first days putting things in order (creating), so on the sixth day when he made us, he was able to drop us into a place that had everything in it that we needed to survive. God didnt begin with the beginning, he began with the beginning.
  6. Remember Lucifer who was over music and worship, didn’t like God getting all the glory and praise and he got a third of the angels to stand with him to rebel against God. As a result he was cast onto the earth which was at the time filled with darkness and chaos. This was before the begining began.
  7. Since Lucifer was an angel, he knows the plans that God has for us. He is a easedropper. This is why you have to pray in the Holy Ghost.
  8. When God began us, he set us on a course for destiny. Satan couldn’t take away from you what God had planned for you, so he offered you a piece (much like the piece of fruit offered in the garden) and you took it and forfieted your promise. Ex- What piece have you taken that caused you to forfeit your destiny.
  1. Satan said give it to me. When God made us, he told us we were made in his image, but when the devil took from us what God gave us, we forgot who we were. Instead of peacful thoughts, we had thoughts of evil. Like Adam and Eve, we were standing before the devil naked. We were ashamed and now, because of sin, we spend our days covering up. Note: Naked mentioned in the scripture means transparent.
  2. God says he wasn’t going to let us stay in this situation forever. Romans 5:8: 8But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.- We lost our identity when we took the piece. God sent one prophet after the next and we were not listening, so God sent his son to be crucified and shed his blood, so we can gain our identity back. What Adam lost on one tree, Christ restored on another tree.
  3. The Holy Ghost was placed in us now to help us walk this thing out. We are Christians, but this is what was amazing. If we were to ask who among us Christians are, every one of us would raise our hands. On the other hand, if we were to get some undercover people to follow us for week, all their reports would say different. We wouldn’t even be able to come up with 10 things that we could list about us that would demonstrate the characteristics of a Chiristian, because we have gotten so jacked up.
  4. God loves us so much, he is not going to give up on us. We thank God that he doesnt give up on us.

 

II. God wants to give you good things

 

  1. Everything that seems good to you is not good for you.
  2. What God gives us isn’t determined by the recipient; instead it is determined by the giver. We might not want God to give us some things that are good, but we dont know what is good for us (all the time). Ex- We don’t like to eat vegetables for example. We want meat and cake and the sweet tea instead. Again what we want is not what is always good for us. If we ate the vegetables, we wouldn’t have the obesity, the high blood pressure, or the $10,000 dental bill. Just like this, God says he knows some things he takes us through don’t feel good, but if you look back on it, you realize that some of those things were good for you. All things work together for the good them that love the Lord and are called according to his purpose.
  3. Matthew 7:9-11: 9Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? 10Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? 11If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him? , John 16:24: 24Hitherto have ye asked nothing in my name: ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full.-The key word here is asking in his name. Word means that Jesus is the word. In other words, we can’t ask for something that isn’t in his word.
  4. Why do we trip? Luke 12:28-29: 28If then God so clothe the grass, which is to day in the field, and to morrow is cast into the oven; how much more will he clothe you, O ye of little faith? 29And seek not ye what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink, neither be ye of doubtful mind. – Why worry about what you put on. Don’t let your mind play tricks on you.
  5. Nations think – Luke 1:30: 30And the angel said unto her, Fear not, Mary: for thou hast found favour with God. -Your father knows, as you are trying to figure it out on the calculator. He knows about the breakthrough you need. Ex– We got 30days left to pay our bill and we panic as if God doesn’t know. God already knew you were going to need it, before you were even placed in your Mother’s womb. Lean not to your own understanding and in all your ways, acknowledge him.
  6. Luke 12:31: 31But rather seek ye the kingdom of God; and all these things shall be added unto you. -Seek the kingdom of heaven first. The world says we have to do “the hustle thing.” We understand what that means. There are some things God is going to do without you. There are some things we just don’t need to know all the details about. Do you think Joseph knew and understood everything that was going on with Mary (referring to her being pregnant with the baby Jesus)? There are some things that God can do without you. You stay where God wants you to be. Seek the kingdom of heaven first and stop trying to work it out yourself.
  7. III.              God takes pleasure in blessing you

 

  1. Proverbs 8:17-19: 17I love them that love me; and those that seek me early shall find me. 18Riches and honour are with me; yea, durable riches and righteousness. 19My fruit is better than gold, yea, than fine gold; and my revenue than choice silver. -God wants us to see him. Ex- Imagine that there are 2 curtains. Behind curtain 1 is a million dollars. Behind curtain number 2, there is access to Bill Gates homes, access to all of his resources, and you are written into the inheritance. Some of you would take the million dollars and run. After you realize what you got to live on each yr, you find out that you are in trouble. If you choose curtain 2, you realize that you don’t have to pay rent or cook, because you have access to Bill Gate’s stuff. You might not have a have dime in pocket, but as long as you have access, everything will be alright. Just like this, God will fix it where stuff will just bless you in unusual places. You will almost be out of gas and somebody will just come up and bless you with enough to get gas. When you have access, there will be little blessing along the way to your destiny. We are in the God’s house!
  2. Psalm 37:4: 4Delight thyself also in the LORD: and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart. – This is not the desires of a carnal heart. The desires of your heart are things that bless God. You ought to want stuff that edifies God. This truly is what is meant by the desires of the heart. If i can help somebody as I pass along the way, then my living won’t be in vain.
  3. Proverbs 3:9-10: 9Honour the LORD with thy substance, and with the firstfruits of all thine increase: 10So shall thy barns be filled with plenty, and thy presses shall burst out with new wine. -In our identity, every time God blesses us we bless others. You can give a believer a $1 and they will but a dime in church. The world dont think like that. The world gives to its own. The first fruits of the world go to the world. The first fruits of believers go to the kingdom. Ex-Bishop explains how he had a dream or a vision that it was Christmas Sunday 2011 and from the pulpit he asked for the congregation to give an offering and everyone acted like it black Friday at Wal-Mart. The people that act the way they do, giving their money to Wal-Mart on Black Friday, only have the sales to motivate them to do what they do. We as Christians have grace and mercy to motivate us, yet we act stingy. The world doesn’t understand us when we act like we do (giving our first fruits to God). They want your side hustle to assure their survival. As Christians, there is no hustle. We just know that we give and he will give it back to us. We know that God will open up the windows of heaven and pour us out a blessing that we will not have room enough to receive. This is not a hustle! It is living out the word!
  4. God has a desire for us to be blessed. If our identity is anything, we ought to be advertisment for the kingsodom. If anyone ought to be blessed, it ought to be us. Our blessings fund purpose. If God blesses you, he knows you will bless others. This is why he can trust us with it. Know that he is coming.
  5. IV.              Whatever is done to you, God takes it personally

 

  1. If they mess with you, God takes it personally.  Matthew 25:24: 24Then he which had received the one talent came and said, Lord, I knew thee that thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown, and gathering where thou hast not strawed: – Who fed the hungry? This is the answer to the question if we are a democrat or republican. Eveyone was born in greatness, but not in the same context.  Ex– Before the beginning began, God thought about you. God knew what was going to happen. He began the beginning with you in mind and planed your arrival. Adam arrived and God gave him everything and allowed him to rule. He forfeited it, because he liked immediate gratification. We are still like that. He just saw it, and it was over. Faith dont come by seeing, but hearing. God gave his only son to reconcile. If we believe, we have everlasting life which is what he intended for us to have in the beginning. We claim to be saved, but we are not there yet. There is the here down here and the here in heaven. The “there” down here, is the place of promise. It is the thing you were born to do. You have grown and left the beginning. You can see your “there promise.” You are almost there and in between the beginning and the promise, here comes the serpent.
  2. Jesus told Peter that Satan desired to sift him like wheat. Because of this, Jesus says he prayed for him. Just like this, God has us covered. He saw how we lost it the first time, but he is not going to let us loose it again. Our destiny is in front of us and we wonder why it is so hard to get to it? Are we going to get there? Is it really going to happen now?
  3. Psalm 34:7: 7The angel of the LORD encampeth round about them that fear him, and delivereth them. – Everything you get into between here “your there”, God will deliver us from. Aren’t you glad that some things that could have jeopardized your” there” were blocked by angels that God sent. There are angels in the natural and the supernatural. The scripture says many of us have entertained angels unaware. Things should have happened, but thank God it didn’t, because there were some angels.
  4. Thank God our identity is not shaped by people and is instead shaped by God’s word. God has great plans for you. All you got to do is walk it out. The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord. This is why you shouldnt rejoice in those who fall. Next time it could be you that falls. Thank God that he rejoices and wants to restore us. God sees us and right through us. He sees where he is taking us. We have to trust him and believe when we don’t know what he is doing Ex- Bishop remembers that he came to Nashville kicking and screaming, but you can’ get him to leave now, because he is at “his there.” “There” is the most awesome place to be. You know you are where God called you be when you reach your “there.” You don’t worry about others when you get there. Just remember that most of the time, the ones talking about you are the ones who have not reached their “there!”
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Identity Crisis Part I

Posted on December 5, 2011 by growintheword

Identity Crisis Part I
Synopsis of Bible Study 11/30/11
Delivered by Bishop Walker III
We have to be what we are supposed to be in our life, no matter where things may take us. Our identity is not defined by or economic level, our social status, or who we are connected with. It is defined by God who has his hand on our lives.

Who are we in Christ?
What does this look like? We have to remember that sin pushed us from our original God intended image. We call ourselves Christians, because it means Christ like, which means we are supposed to be modeling ourselves after God. When we say we are Christians, we are saying that our identity is like God. In fact, we ought to actually fool the angels when we get to heaven, because we look so much like God.
John 8:3- says the truth shall make us free. We are loved by God, not because of what we have done, but because of who we are. Romans 5:8 reminds us that how we acted within our old actions is now inconsistent with our image today, because now God lives within us. He didn’t cut us off despite what we have done, because he saw what was within us even when we didn’t see it for ourselves.

Why would we tell you that God loves you?
It is because of John 17:23 which says in other words, look at the depth of the love of God between God and me. God loves us like he loves Jesus. After every act we have committed, God still loves us the way he loves Jesus Christ.
John 15:13 tells us that people go through life acting in certain ways, because they don’t feel that people love them. This is a result of their identity being jacked up. Human relationships have failed them so much; their concept of love has become jacked up. As a result, we start looking for love and anyone that has game can love us (or gain our love).
Ephesians 3:17 tells us about how we should be rooted. Rooted and grounded in this scripture means being planted, being stable, or being grounded in the love of God. People that have been rooted are stable. God then becomes the example by which they are to be loved. If we don’t know where we are at or what we have got in God, we are not stable. If we stay still in the love of God, he can show us how we should be loved.
Everything in your flesh hates you being by yourself. God wants us to be alone with him, so that we will know what love really is and have a way to measure real love. If we are not stable, all it takes is somebody to say something nice to us and we will forget what we have. Every day we wake up, God reminds us that we are the head and not the tail and that we are above and not beneath.
If a stable and loved person is approached, game will not work them. This is why Fathers must take their daughters on dates. This will allow them to see an example of how men should treat them. Just like this, the bible says love your wife as Christ loves the church. We must stay grounded, in the love of God, so when it shows up, we know what real love looks like.
Ephesians 3:18-19 reminds us that we are filled with the fullness of God. The love of God fills us and fulfills so we must know that we are complete in God. Ex-There was a Husband who had a meeting one night. On the night of the meeting, his wife has chicken, sweet potatoes, greens, and cornbread prepared for him. Notice that she is taking care of her man. He sits down and eats and when he has finished, she asks if he wants more. The husband tells her no, because he is full. After the meal, he leaves for his meeting. When he passes by Wendy’s or J. Alexander’s, it doesn’t bother him, because he is full. The issue is, when we understand that God fills us in like manner, then we don’t need somebody else to do what he has already done. We are full. We have the fullness of God. God completes us.

You are purchased with a price
1 Cor 6:20 says we were purchased with price. It cost Jesus’ blood to redeem us from the hand of the devourer. God says he couldn’t continue to let us go out like we were doing, he sent his son to pay the debt. It costs something.
Your body and spirit represents your identity. If you glorify God in your spirit and in your body, what comes out of your mouth and how you carry yourself will be of God. We want to always strive to look like God.
We are justified and declared innocent- If you realize that you are justified then you don’t worry about your past. Gal 2:16 talks about being justified. In this scripture, justify means to render innocent. This doesn’t mean you are innocent (referring to our past); it means that we have been made innocent by God justifying us. He makes it just as if we never done it.
Why is justification important? – Satan can terrorize our mind and hold us captive about stuff we have done in our past. All of us have been terrorized by stuff that we did in the past, if we were to be totally honest.
We are entitled to have a clean conscious- Heb 9:14 says that we are urged from all those thoughts and things. Don’t beat yourself up over failures of your past. They have been nailed to the cross. Remember when you tipped out on your spouse? Remember the last time you got drunk and embarrassed yourself? All these things were nailed to the cross. You allowed the opinions of others to bother you. Romans 8:1 reminds us that we can’t live in our past. We won’t be terrorized by our conscious. God has purged the things we’ve done. Ex- When you purge something, it is like a hard reset on your phone. A hard reset means you lose everything. This is what God did. He hard reset our mind. We know we did it, but we know that God has taken it all away.
Your sins are no longer a part of you- Your sins have been removed from your account. John 1:29 says he takes it away. Matt 26:28 says God said he has chosen to forget the failures of our past. Why then haven’t we? Why do we think God is walking around waiting to penalize us of stuff that he has delivered us from. This is like saying that you prayed, God forgave you, then thinking God is about to turn around and get you for what you prayed about. If that was the case, we all would be walking around with leprosy. Heb 10:17 says God forgot about it, so why don’t we.
We have peace with God- When we are in proper relationship with God, we have peace. Rom 5:1 says it doesn’t matter if others have peace about it, as long as we got peace with God. While you are talking about me, I am sleeping at night. We realize that we are not that same person anymore.
We are clothed with the righteousness of Jesus- Rom 3:2 & 25 suggest the idea that we have been made right by God. There is not one cell in your natural flesh that wants to do right. Every day when we wake up, our flesh wants to go left. The only thing that keeps us from going left is our relationship with Jesus and the Holy Ghost within us.
When you are spiritual, you know when you are leaning left. Some of us lean so far left, we end up worshipping and ministering while leaning left. You need to understand that when you are out of alignment, it is hard to go straight. Ex- If everything in your car is in proper alignment, your tires are properly inflated, and your tires have been rotated, then you could take your hand off the steering wheel and the car would still go straight for a while. After hitting a few bumps and pot holes, we will find that our car will pull to the left instead of going straight. What has happened is that the bumps and pot holes have knocked our car out of alignment. It is important to note that you can’t change your alignment while driving. In order to get our car realigned, it has to be jacked up, wheels rotated, and tires inflate to its proper levels. In like manner, we try to work, serve, and minster while we are out of alignment. Sometimes we have to pause, get jacked up, and rotate our spiritual tires in order to keep from going left! In order to be effective, we have to be spiritually in line
Our identity is we know there is no good thing in us. We know that every day, God wakes us up and has to make us righteous. Because of flesh, we are not geared to do everything right.
You are made new in Christ. 1 Cor 5:17- You have been restructured. You can’t tell what has been there before. Ex- As Mt Zion the church, we didn’t remodel our Antioch location, we gutted it. There were mirrors and poles located inside of our now Antioch location which used to be Club. We didn’t want any memory of the old place lingering around, so we restructured it (instead of remodeling it). To look at it now, you have no idea what used to happen there (at the Antioch location) before it was a church. Just like this, you have been recreated and not remodeled. We have been made new. We often get upset when people say we are acting new, but really we ought to be glad, because we ought to act brand. If we have been made brand new, why shouldn’t we act brand new.

Talk:
Bishop explains that he has been wrestling with something theologically. It has to do with identity and being a new creation. Bishop explains he was in the store in New York and saw this young boy. His Mom was buying him some jeans. To Bishop the pair of Jeans the boy was trying on looked good. The young boy asks for a larger size. Once he got up to a pair that was saggy, he was finally satisfied. Now in assessing this, it was evident what was going on. This is a generation that is attracted to that which does not fit. It is much deeper than jeans itself though. That which fits is considered corny and out of date. This generation does not like structure. This generation wants to be out of the box.
You can’t even discipline this generation. For example, Bishop remembers that when he was young, whether you had to go to the bathroom or not, you had to sit there until the church was over. Just think about the images that are put out now days. As a result, this generation is attracted to things that are out of the norm and that doesn’t fit. Bishop admits that he does the skinny jeans (one of today’s fads), but explains that if you have to point your toes like a ballerina to put them on, then something is wrong. This just doesn’t fit. Another thing is you go to church and gain all this word, yet your show up with somebody on your arm that really doesn’t fit.
Bishop challenges us to think about this: Here is a brother in church with a job and a degree, but in a modern day woman’s eyes, he is corny. They don’t realize that you can possibly mold a corny dude with a job more than you can the unemployed brother with the sag and the swag. The sad thing is, the brother who is trying to live right can’t even get a date. Bishop further explains that he admits to enjoying going back home to his class reunions. He says he was that corny brother, but look at him now. This generation likes stuff that doesn’t fit. This generation possess identities based on images that are put out by the world that are opposite of God and his planned identity for you. We have to realize who we are and how God made us.
We are seated with Christ in a position of authority. Eph 2:6-When Christ got up from the grave, he brought us up too. It doesn’t matter what background you came from, when you got saved, Jesus raised us up with him. You have the opportunity to be who you want to be, because he will take care of you. Every day you wake up, you have the confidence to know who you are. We don’t need anyone’s validation. You just want to hear God say, hello thou good and faithful servant… well done!
When you leave from reading this writing, you are going to hear from some image. For some, you will say you want to be like that person. We impress upon you to let your identify be shaped by “I am that I am.” We will be who we will be. Bishop reminds us that he is Joseph Walker, the son of a glass cleaner and teacher of a Special Ed class. Bishop explains that he didn’t realize that he was brought up poor until he was grown. He explains that he thought everyone grew up like he did.
At one point he realized that his identity had to be shaped by God not what was around him. He explains that he is an engaged person. Whatever God does in your life, God wants to know if he can trust you to be what he called you to be. Even if you walk with kings, don’t let people define you. Bishop says even though he is a Pastor of over 26000 people, he knows where he came from and if it hadn’t been for Gods hand on his life, things would have turned out different. He ends by encouraging us to know that the same God that did it for him can do it for you.

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Posted on November 13, 2011 by growintheword

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