Transcription
You have been told your entire Christian life that the cross saved you. And that is true. But it is not the whole truth.
And the part that has been left out, the part that most pulpits have never preached, the part that most believers have never heard, the part that the enemy has worked relentlessly to keep buried under 2,000 years of religious tradition is the part that changes everything. Not just where you go when you die. Not just your eternal destination, but who you are right now. What you carry right now, what authority you walk in right now, what position you occupy in the spiritual realm right now.
The cross did not only save you. The cross seated you. And there is a difference between a saved believer and a seated believer that is so vast, so profound, so utterly transformative that once you see it, once this revelation lands in your spirit and not just your mind, you will never again approach your life, your prayer, your authority, or your identity the same way. Most believers know the cross. Very few know the throne. Most believers live in the consciousness of what Christ did for them at Calvary. Very few live in the consciousness of where Christ took them after Calvary. And this gap, this distance between the cross and the throne in the believer's understanding, is the single greatest reason the church walks in so little of the authority it was given. Not because God withheld it, not because the provision is incomplete, because the believer never took their seat. They received salvation but never occupied the position that salvation purchased. They were born again but never sat down in the place where the born-again believer was legally placed. Far above principalities far above powers. Far above every name that is named. Seated with Christ in heavenly places. Not someday. Not in eternity. Right now in this body, in this life, in this present moment. Ephesians 2:6. God hath raised us up together and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Three words carry everything. Raised, made, sit, not will raise, not plans to raise, hath raised, past tense already accomplished. Not will make you sit, made you sit, past tense already done. In the mind of the father, in the legal record of heaven, in the spiritual reality that governs the physical realm, you are already seated right now at this moment in the position of Christ above everything that was ever placed under his feet.
Everything we cover in this teaching is drawn directly from E.W. Kenyon's "What Happened from the Cross to the Throne." His most complete unpacking of what Christ accomplished after Calvary and what that means for the position of the believer today. And by the time this teaching is finished, you will understand not only what the cross accomplished, but where it took you. Because the cross did not stop at forgiveness. It did not stop at salvation. It did not stop at the empty tomb or the 40 days before the ascension. It continued all the way to the throne, all the way to the seated position, all the way to a moment that most believers have read past for their entire Christian lives. The moment Christ sat down and took you with him.
Now, before we go into what that seating means and how to walk in it, I want to sit with the contrast Kenyon drew between two kinds of believers. The first kind knows they are saved. They know their sins are forgiven. They know they are going to heaven. They are grateful for what the cross did for them. And they spend their Christian life approaching every spiritual battle from below. Praying defensively, living cautiously, hoping God will intervene, wondering why they keep losing ground to an enemy that the Bible says was already defeated.
The second kind knows they are seated. They know the cross not only dealt with their past, it established their present. They know salvation did not just remove them from darkness. It placed them in a specific position in the spirit realm. A position above the darkness. A position of authority. A position that the enemy has no legal answer for. And the difference between these two believers is not the amount of prayer. It is not the depth of theological knowledge. It is not the length of their Christian walk. It is revelation. One of them has seen Ephesians 2:6. Really seen it, not just read it, not just agreed with it mentally, seen it in the spirit until it became the lens through which they interpret every circumstance, every attack, every situation they face. The other one is still standing at the cross, not knowing the story continued. Today we follow the story all the way to the throne.
You cannot understand the seated position without understanding what it cost to get there. Most people have no knowledge of what took place between the cross and the resurrection. The disciples who stood at the cross and watched Christ die did not know what was happening. They saw a man dying. They did not see God dealing with the sin, the sickness, and the spiritual death of the entire human race in the spirit of his son. They did not see the three days and three nights in which Christ bore the full penalty of humanity's transgression in Hades, suffering as the substitute for every person who would ever live. They did not see the moment when justice was fully satisfied and God justified his son in spirit. The first person who was ever born again. They did not see the moment when Christ, justified and made alive in spirit, threw off the principalities and powers that had been pressing upon him, stripped Satan of his authority, paralyzed his death-dealing power, and arose from the dead as the absolute master of sin, death, and hell. Colossians 2:15, "having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a show of them, openly triumphing over them." Spoiled, the word means to strip, to despoil, to take by force the weapons and authority of a conquered enemy. Satan was not merely defeated. He was stripped. His authority was not merely diminished. It was taken. His dominion over man was not merely weakened. It was broken. Eternally, completely, irrevocably broken.
And the keys of death and of Hades were placed in the hands of the risen Christ, who then ascended, carried his own blood into the heavenly holy of holies as the high priest of the new covenant, had that blood accepted by the Supreme Court of the universe as the seal of man's eternal redemption, and then sat down. Sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high.
Now, here is where Hebrews 1:3 becomes one of the most significant statements in all of scripture: "when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the majesty on high." Sat down. Kenyon pressed this point with everything he had. A priest under the old covenant never sat down in the holy of holies. There were no chairs in the tabernacle. There were no seats in the temple's inner court because the work was never finished. There was always another sacrifice, always another year, always another atonement day. The priest stood because he could never rest because the blood of bulls and goats could never finally, permanently, completely deal with the sin problem. But Jesus sat down. The work was finished. The redemption was eternal. The sacrifice was once for all. And the sitting down was the declaration of heaven that nothing more needed to be done. That every claim against the human race had been answered. That every demand of justice had been satisfied. And because he sat down, you can stand up in authority, in boldness, in the unshakable confidence of a believer who knows that what Christ accomplished is fully sufficient, fully complete, and fully available for every situation you will ever face.
Now let us go to Ephesians 1:20-22: "which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in that which is to come: and hath put all things under his feet." All things, not some things, not most things, all things under his feet. And then verse 22: "And gave him to be the head over all things to the church, which is his body." The body of Christ shares the position of the head of Christ. The feet of Christ are part of the body of Christ. Which means all things are not only under his feet, all things are under your feet. Because you are his body, you are his feet on the earth. And what is under his feet is under yours. This is the seated position. This is what the cross accomplished beyond Calvary. This is where the story went after the tomb was empty. And this is the position that every born-again believer occupies right now, whether they know it or not. The difference is not in the position. The difference is in the knowing.
Now, here is the question that determines everything. If the seated position is already yours, if Ephesians 2:6 is past tense, already accomplished, legally established, why are most believers still living from below? Why are they still praying as though God has not yet acted? Still approaching the throne as though they might be turned away, still accepting the authority of sickness, lack, fear, and the enemy over areas of their lives that their seated position places beneath their feet. The answer is not a lack of salvation. It is not a lack of sincerity. It is not a lack of prayer. It is a lack of revelation. The seating is real. But if it has never become real to you, if it has never moved from doctrinal position in the mind to lived reality in the spirit, then you will continue to live as though you are under your circumstances when your circumstances are supposed to be under you.
Kenyon said this verse, Ephesians 2:6, was almost entirely unknown to the average believer, and it remains largely unknown today because the church stopped at Calvary. It got the forgiveness. It got the salvation. It got the empty tomb. But it never followed Christ all the way to the throne. And the practical consequence of that is a church full of forgiven people who live in defeat. A church that knows it is going to heaven but does not know how to live on earth. A church that has been given all authority and exercises almost none of it.
So what does it mean practically to know you are seated? It means the way you approach God changes completely. Most believers approach the throne room as though they might be turned away, as though their access depends on how well they have performed this week, as though God is grading their prayer life and deciding whether their faith is strong enough to merit a hearing. But a seated believer does not approach the throne as an outsider hoping to be admitted. They come as a son, as a daughter, as someone who is already in the position of Christ before the Father because they are in Christ and Christ is at the right hand of the Father. Hebrews 4:16. "Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need." Boldly, that word in the Greek means with freedom of speech, with confidence, with the assurance of someone who knows they belong there. And you belong there, not because of your performance, but because of your position, because of where the cross took you, because of the seat that was prepared for you before the foundation of the world and occupied on your behalf the moment Christ sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high.
It also means the way you face the enemy changes completely. Most believers approach spiritual conflict as though the outcome is uncertain. As though they are fighting for a victory that has not yet been decided. As though the enemy is an equal opponent who might win if they do not pray hard enough, fast enough, believe enough. But that is not the picture Ephesians paints. Ephesians 6:1. "Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil." Stand. Not fight for ground you have not yet taken. Not struggle toward a victory that has not yet been won. Stand on ground that is already yours against an enemy who is already beneath your feet. The armor is not for conquering new territory. It is for maintaining the position you already occupy. And you maintain it not by striving, but by standing. By refusing to be moved from the consciousness of where you are seated, by knowing, settled in your spirit, immovable in your conviction that far above all principality and power is not just a description of where Christ is. It is a description of where you are in Christ. And once that becomes the lens through which you interpret every attack, every circumstance, every report the enemy brings against you, nothing looks the same because you are no longer looking up at your problems. You are looking down at them from the position of one who is seated with Christ far above all.
Now let us bring the seated position into the three areas where most believers experience the greatest defeat: the body, the mind, and spiritual conflict. Starting with the body, the seated position means that sickness does not have authority over you. Not because you are strong enough to resist it, not because of the intensity of your faith on any given day, but because your position in Christ places you above its jurisdiction. Acts 10:38 establishes what sickness actually is. "God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power: who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil." Oppressed of the devil. That is what sickness is. Not a gift from God to teach you patience. Not a divine appointment designed to build character. Oppression, a work of darkness, an assignment of the enemy against the physical body of a believer. And darkness has been placed beneath the feet of Christ and beneath the feet of his body. Which means when sickness presents itself to the seated believer, it is not presenting itself to someone over whom it has authority. It is presenting itself to someone over whom it was already defeated. The seated believer's response is not fear and petition. It is declaration and enforcement. "By his stripes I am healed." The finished work purchased my healing. I take my position above this sickness and I declare it has no legal ground to operate in the temple of the Holy Spirit. First Peter 2:24. "By whose stripes ye were healed" - past tense, already accomplished, already purchased, already legally yours in the seated position.
Now the mind. The seated position means that fear, confusion, condemnation, and anxiety do not have authority over your thought life. Second Corinthians 10:4 and 5. "For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds; casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ." Pulling down, casting down, bringing into captivity. These are not the actions of someone who is helplessly subject to their thought life. These are the actions of someone operating from a position of authority over it. From the seated position, every thought that exalts itself above the knowledge of what God has said is pulled down, not endured, not managed, not prayed about in desperation, pulled down from above, from the position of one who is seated far above every principality and power, including the principalities and powers that operate through the mind. Isaiah 26:3, "Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on thee." Perfect peace, not fragile peace that collapses under pressure, not conditional peace that depends on circumstances being favorable. Perfect peace available to the believer whose mind is stayed on the word, stayed on the position, stayed on the reality of what the cross accomplished and where it placed them. That is the seated mind, not governed by what is happening around it, governed by what is declared above it.
And now spiritual conflict. This is where the seated position produces the most dramatic shift because most believers enter spiritual battles as though they are underdogs, as though the enemy might win, as though the outcome is still uncertain. And the only thing standing between victory and defeat is the intensity of their prayer. But listen to how Kenyon described the believer's combat. He said, "Our combat has been fought and won. There is no battle for you to fight except the battle of faith." And the battle of faith is not fought with desperation. It is fought with declaration, with the word of God spoken from the consciousness of a seated believer who knows that the enemy is beneath their feet. You are not fighting toward victory. You are enforcing a victory that is already settled. The difference is everything. A believer who is fighting toward victory is uncertain of the outcome. They pray harder when things get worse. They fast longer when the enemy presses harder. They feel defeated when the battle is intense because they are not sure the victory will come. But a believer who is enforcing an existing victory does not operate from uncertainty. They operate from the settled confidence of someone who knows the case has already been decided. Who knows the verdict has already been rendered. Who knows the enemy is operating in territory he was already evicted from, and whose only power is the believer's ignorance of the eviction notice. The moment you know you are seated, the moment the eviction notice becomes real to your spirit, the way you engage in every spiritual battle changes from the inside out.
So what does living from the seated position look like on a practical daily basis? Because this is where most teachings on authority leave the believer with a powerful revelation and no practical picture of what it means to actually walk in it, and I do not want to leave you there. The first practical shift is how you pray. A seated believer does not pray from below looking up. They pray from above looking down, not in arrogance, not in self-sufficiency, in the authority of the position Christ purchased for them. They do not beg God to defeat the enemy. They enforce the defeat that Christ already accomplished. They do not ask God to heal them. They declare that healing is the legal inheritance of their seated position and they take it. They do not plead for provision. They speak from the consciousness that all things are already theirs in Christ. Kenyon said the difference between a believer who knows their seated position and one who does not is the difference between a king on a throne and a beggar at the gate. Both may be in the same building, but only one knows who they are.
The second practical shift is how you speak about your situation. A seated believer does not describe their circumstances from below. They declare over their circumstances from above. When sickness presents itself, they do not rehearse the symptoms to everyone who will listen. They declare the healing that the seated position provides. "By his stripes, I am healed. I am above this. This is beneath my feet." When lack presents itself, they do not rehearse the numbers that contradict the promise. They declare the provision that the covenant guarantees. "My God supplies all my need according to his riches in glory." Not according to what the bank account shows, according to his riches in glory. When fear presents itself, they do not give it a platform. They pull it down from the seated position. "Greater is he that is in me than he that is in the world." Fear has no authority over a mind that is stayed on the one who is seated far above all.
The third practical shift is how you see yourself. This is the root of everything because the way you see yourself determines the way you pray, the way you speak, the way you approach the enemy, the way you respond to every circumstance that comes against you. A seated believer does not see themselves as a sinner saved by grace who is barely hanging on until heaven. They see themselves as a son, a daughter, a joint heir with Jesus Christ, a new creation seated in heavenly places, a partaker of the divine nature, a temple of the living God, carrying inside their recreated spirit, the same power that raised Jesus from the dead. Romans 8:11. "But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you." The same Spirit, the same power, the same life that raised a dead body out of a sealed tomb dwells in you right now in this body, in this life at this moment. And you are seated above everything that Spirit conquered, above everything that resurrection defeated, above every name that is named in this age or in the age to come. That is not something you are working toward. That is not a reward waiting at the end of your Christian walk. That is who you are right now. And the moment that becomes the settled conviction of your spirit, the moment it stops being doctrine you agree with and starts being reality you live from, you will discover something that changes everything. You will discover that you have never been as powerless as the enemy told you. Never as unworthy as your conscience accused. Never as defeated as your circumstances suggested. Because you have been seated the entire time. You just did not know it. And now you do.
Now the question is not whether the position is real. It is whether you will live from it. Whether you will let this revelation move from the page into your spirit, and from your spirit into your daily walk. What changes things is when you open your mouth and speak from your position. When you approach the throne with the boldness of someone who knows they belong there. When you face the enemy with the confidence of someone who knows the verdict has already been rendered from the seated position. From the place where all things are beneath your feet. Not just to forgiveness. Not just to salvation. Not just to the empty tomb, all the way to the throne, all the way to the place where Christ is and where you are in him.
So, let me leave you with this. The cross saved you. But it did not stop there. It continued through the three days in Hades where Christ bore the full weight of humanity's transgression, through the stripping of Satan and the paralyzing of his death-dealing power, through the resurrection as the absolute master of sin, death, and hell, through the ascension and the carrying of the blood into the heavenly holy of holies, through the acceptance of that blood by the Supreme Court of the universe, and then the seated position. The moment Christ sat down, everything changed for you. Not someday, not in eternity. In that moment, because he did not sit down alone. He sat down as your representative and in sitting down took you with him. Far above all principality, far above all power, far above all might and dominion and every name that is named, not only in this age, but in that which is to come. That is where you are right now in this body, in this life, at this present moment. And the life available to the believer who knows this, truly knows it in their spirit, is not the life most of the church is living. It is not the defensive, uncertain, hoping for the best life of a believer who knows they are saved but does not know they are seated. It is the life of a son, a daughter, a joint heir, a new creation who approaches every situation, every sickness, every lack, every attack of the enemy, every mountain that stands in the way, not from below, but from above, not begging, enforcing, not hoping, declaring, not fighting for victory, standing in it. Ephesians 3:20. "Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us." According to the power that worketh in us, not according to the power dispatched from heaven. According to the power already working in the seated believer, the power of the one who conquered death. The power of the one who stripped Satan. The power of the one who sat down and took you with him. That power is not in reserve. It is not waiting for a special occasion. It is working right now in you, through you, available to every situation you will ever face. And it is accessed not through more striving, not through more begging, not through more desperate petition to a God who has already done everything. It is accessed through the revelation of the seated position, through the consciousness of who you are in Christ, through the daily, deliberate, consistent choice to live from above rather than from below. The cross saved you. It seated you. And it is time, starting today, starting right now, to take your seat, to pray from it, to speak from it, to face every enemy from it, to live every day from it.
Type "I am seated with Christ in heavenly places" in the comments right now. Not as theology you mentally agree with, as the declaration of a believer who has seen where the cross took them and has chosen to live from that position from this day forward. The seat is yours. It has always been yours. Now sit down.
And here is what I want you to carry into this week. Not a theological position to defend, not a doctrine to explain to others. A living reality to operate from. Every morning this week, before the world speaks, before the circumstances report, before the enemy gets the first word, you remind your spirit of where you are seated. You say it out loud: "I am seated with Christ in heavenly places far above all principality and power. All things are beneath my feet. I enforce the victory that Christ already won. I pray from above. I speak from above. I live from above." And then you live the day from that consciousness. Not from fear, not from lack, not from the defensive posture of someone who is not sure if God will come through. From the seated position. The cross saved you. It seated you. And the world is waiting to see a believer who knows it.