HCSKL 2011 Day 1 - Dan Mohler

[Music] You're sitting on questions, and I want you to give me the grace to make the decision. And don't take it personal. Well, you won't be able to after the first two weeks of school. You'll be done taking things personal. You'll either be converted or drop out. You won't take nothing personal after that. So the first two weeks will redeem your life, and you'll be just like, "Oh, it's so cool," instead of, "Well, I'm feel a little offended." You know, because that's not normal. You're not created to be all that yucky stuff, offended, all that stuff.

But what I'm saying is, give me the liberty to decide and discern if I'm even going to take the question. Okay? Because sometimes people have a question, or they raise their hand, and there's something that, that's, that's, and your question is important, but just understand, understand that there's something that's being sealed, happening, and I don't want to stop, but I might come back to you. And people that were in the class last year realized how that worked, 'cause three, four minutes later, I'd say, "Hey, you had your hand up, didn't you?" And they'd be like, "Yeah." And then there was a time to, to break in and do that. So just make sure you get your hand up, and we'll do what we can. There were questions that I opted not to answer at the time because I felt like they were more personally oriented, that the, it was rather than a corporate question that would have helped. It was more personal, so I just waited, and we did, did it later. But most the questions, I just answered when they came. So I want to give you that freedom, 'cause the thing is, I don't want to just be teaching and have you sitting on a question, not able to hear anymore, because you got this question.

Okay, one more quick thought on questions, and bear with me on this. This is important. The way you ask a question is really, really huge in how you're going to hear. So make sure you always ask a question in humility, not in contention, not because you already feel like you have an answer. You can already have an answer in your heart, but, but what I'm saying is, just ask the question in humility. I've had, you, I think you guys can relate to what I'm saying. Had a lot of people, we get on some real stuff in this school. We got a lot of time. We're going to get personal. We're going to touch real stuff, and, and everyday analogies, and how the gospel looks in that everyday analogy, and how do I live Jesus in this situation? We're going to just really cover a lot of stuff, and it's going to be a, a grace to establish truth in our heart. But there might be some times where you get challenged in your heart. There might be times where it feels like I'm talking right to you, and you'll be like, "Well, then how come you see what I mean?" You have to be careful with that kind of, because it determines how you're going to hear, because you've already heard for yourselves, and you're not really asking a question, you're actually making a comment or proving a point. So be careful with that. Okay. God gives grace to humility, and, uh, honestly, personally, I care about you. But how you ask the question doesn't matter to me at all. I'm saying that for your sake. It determines how you're going to hear in life. Okay? 'Cause you're not going to throw me with the way I talk about anything and everything. I just do because I love people, and we ought to talk about everything and anything, right? We got to get some real help and real answers through the gospel, because life is real. Jesus is Lord. Amen. So we're going to have fun. So ask your questions. We do have a mic, and because they're doing, and by the way, welcome all the internet folks, and forgive me, I am, I am so caveman when it comes to internet and tech. I'm just caveman. She's talking blogs and all that stuff, and I'm like, it's other tongues to me. I don't, I just, I am not internet. And, but, but hi, bless you, and we're just glad you're all here. So yeah, people are important. Uh, anything else? Okay, that's just, get, just roll with it. You got to. Everybody have a communion thing. Okay, now this is, uh, we had fun with this last year. They, they finally taught me that that was some kind of little rice wafer or something in there, 'cause I was like, "We're eating cardboard." Every Monday, it's like, it was like, I didn't know what it was. I thought, "Well, I'm going to remember Jesus. I'm remembering Jesus." They said, "It's like a rice wafer or something." We just had fun with it. The whole school. Here's why we're doing this today. We're not just remembering his death. There's some ways, there's some, there's some real, uh, significance to communion. Okay? Jesus, who knows Jesus, said, "Follow me." To me, is the most, one of the most incredible things he said. I mean, that might seem strange to folks, that that's one of the most incredible things. But when he said, "Follow me," that means I'm in. That means his grace is sufficient for me. That means what I see in his life, I can go after and become. Come on. Jesus is, he's the living epistle of love, but he's, he modeled a life that we're created for, without exception, guys. So when Jesus says, "Follow me," that's huge. 'Cause if I couldn't, he wouldn't say to. Okay. Jesus gave his life. Okay. Go to, see, I love, Holy Spirit is so like with me on this stuff. He's like, "Just go to Philippians 2." It's right. I'm like, "Yay, let's just do it." Philippians 2. Forgive me if I seem a little flaky. I just like when I get help. We got 120 hours. It'd be good if he [Laughter] helps. I really wouldn't want you to sit there 120 hours for me to come up with something to say. Doing good back, everybody? Good to see you. Love your heart, man. Look at your face, and can see your heart. It's amazing. Yeah, I love you. Wow. Philippians chapter, chapter 2. This is going to lead us into communion. This is amazing, 'cause there was a, heing when Sue said, "I don't know if we'll do communion today, but we can do it on Monday." Son, I said, "No, let's do it now." 'Cause something rose up in me. And here's where we're going with this, and, and then we'll confirm it. One of the, one of the best definitions of covenant. Covenant. Who knows we're in covenant with God through Jesus Christ? Do you understand that? Now, we know that we hear the word covenant, but here's a good definition you can wrap your mind even around. All that is mine is yours, and all that is yours is mine. Covenant. All that is yours, 'cause we sure want all that is his, don't we? We're like, "Give me all that is yours, God." But the greatest reciprocation of covenant is when that all that is yours is his. Now, that's deep. That's all inclusive. All that is yours is his. So that means you're not reserving rights. You're not reserving rights for the flesh. Yeah, but, well, yeah, all that stuff. Those days end. We, and we're going to teach this whole school, and, and some of it'll, at, it'll seem at a risk of seeming redundant, but we'll be on, like, just become in love. We might be on that, that one topic for a whole straight week or Mon. And, and it, it's not going to be redundant once we're there, because it'll be very challenging, very provoking, very life-changing. But it'll seem like, like we're talking about the same thing for a long time. It's 'cause we are going to, 'cause you don't need the topic and the amen to the topic. We want to become the revelation of love. We want to become freedom. We want to become right. Isn't that true? That's why we're doing this school. Not to pump your head up with a bunch of Christian knowledge. Not that I'm not putting down any other schools, I'm just saying that's not our goal. Our goal is that we become the reality of the finished work of Christ and receive every bit of grace available to do that. Okay? So all that is mine is yours, all that is yours is mine, is is the idea here when we do this communion this morning. Because one of the greatest ways I can receive communion is when I understand that he gave his life. He, he suffered in his flesh. He was put on a cross. He died because he chose to, because he saw value in me. So the sacrifice on his end was worth it, 'cause he saw the value on my end. And the redemption, that's intimate. That's personal. So when I'm receiving communion, there's times when I'll receive communion where I'm receiving all that he is, and in that process, I'm giving myself back to him in prayer, in communion. Not just, "Wow, you died for my healing. Praise God." You see what I mean? Or, "Wow, you died for the remission of my sins, or the forgiveness of my sins." Well, no, you died to get me back in, to bring me home, to fill me with your spirit, to give me your kingdom, and all your covenant and promises, and all your faithfulness, and all your redemption. You died to obtain me and consume me and make me like you created me to be. There's, there's a bigger picture than forgiveness of sins. It's making me like him. Get it? Come on. It's a way bigger picture than just what I can get because he died and rose again. It's what I can become because he died and rose again. You follow me? Communion brings that out and gives you the opportunity in your fellowship and relationship with God to commune back with him, not just to receive, but to give back yourself in a place of prayer. Okay, I catch this. I'm teaching more than I thought. I thought we were just going to, I want you to see this. One of the greatest ways your life changes. Let me just, God, who knows, God can breathe on you in an order, and it can affect your life and influence you and impact you for the rest of your life. Who knows that you can get those touches, right? But true everyday, 24/7 impact, I personally, I'm going to qualify this and say, I personally believe this, it comes from your intimacy, your communion in your exchange with the Lord. It's, it doesn't fall on your lap. It's not like one day the lights just come on because it's your time. If you're waiting on that, probably a lot of time's going by. You have the right to pursue him, to seek him, to draw near to him. And this thing about identity is going to get so nailed. We're going to hit identity this whole school, so, so much, so that you understand you have every right to approach him. He is waiting for you. He wants you to come to him. He wants you to, to look up and smile, literally unveiled face, "Here I am. Come on." While you were yet a sinner, he died for you. Why? 'Cause he looks way past what you had become through the fall, and he knows who he made you to be. Your potential, your destiny. He knows who you are filled with his spirit. He knows your worth, and your worth, his blood. Come on. That's so intimate. He knows that. So with unveiled face, Christ removes that veil. There's no consciousness of sin through the born-again experience. None. None. Come on. Come on. You got me teaching this school. People watch. That's what's wrong with me. There's no consciousness of sin. Do you understand? That's why I'm okay. See, there's nothing holding me back now. I'm not struggling anymore. I'm not dragging a load. He took that. He cut that cord. You get it? Until I really receive that and accept that, this grace that I so need to touch me and get on the inside doesn't seem to come and click, because there's no faith going this way. Wow, I am lovable. There is great value to my life. Instead of, "Oh, I sure hope I'm valuable." Are you kidding? I am, or he would have died. Faith. The just live by. Don't ever get mad at faith. Don't get frustrated with faith. Faith is so awesome because it teaches you to not live sensual and by your feelings, 'cause that's what's robbed us our whole lives. No, I don't feel it. It doesn't seem well, right? Come on. Faith separates you from sensual living. Did you get that? I love that. I live by faith because it's teaching me to never live by how it seems or how I feel. We, we minister to each other based on feelings all the time, and we, we really need to stop it and get a grip on faith. What do you mean you don't feel loved? And then we think, "Well, let me here, let me take your hand. God, would you come and let your love just..." And that's how we feel like we need to minister. And there's times it seems like people, but see, if they don't get established in the truth of God's love for them through the cross, they're going to need you to hold their hands sometime again and keep affirming and keep fueling. It's just like, it's just like insulin for something that's not right. You don't ever have to take my hand. Okay, okay. There's a place to grow to where it's all through intimacy and communion, and we're going to hit this real hard. 'Cause here's what happens. You're saved by grace through faith. Don't ever forget that. It's not just ministrations, manifestations, utter calls, laying hands, and woo. I'm cool with what Holy Spirit does. I'm not offensive to God when I'm talking like this. I could be offensive to some people that here, because we're really into the whole ministration and the ministry thing, because some of us find our identity through all that, and that's what makes us feel fuzzy. I want to feel fuzzy when everybody leaves the church and I'm in my truck and I'm alone, and if people get real, they don't feel real good at that time, 'cause it's over, or they need another shot, or whatever. No, I want to be driving in my truck, not just 'cause Destiny's there. She could tell that was real in me. See, you could tell that was real in me, and I was calming down because I wanted to get real excited. But I don't get as excited when I'm with you as I do when I'm alone. Now picture that, 'cause I'm not here to impress you. I'm impressed. I have relationship with God. He has transformed my life forever. So when I got talking about not being afraid, that became so real to me and so alive in me, because when I wasn't with Destiny, I was entering into that truth when it was just me and God. Are you catching this? So the greatest, the greatest privilege of your life is being with him. You follow me? Not just thinking, not just talking with friends about him. Your greatest blessing, your greatest privilege in life is, is that you might know him, that you might be with him. I'm talking driving in your car, "God, it's so good to be alive. You made me alive 'cause you love me." I've learned that the average Christian mindset has no capacity to even think that way. When they're driving, they're just hoping it's true, and they never enter into that place of faith where grace can come and go and make it their reality. Because let me explain what happens. You're saved by faith through grace. So grace is God's ability, God's supernatural power. It's God's spirit, God's movement. God's, how do you explain it? It's God's supernatural power on your behalf. It's he does stuff. He makes things real. You can start believing God loves you through the cross, and all of a sudden, God loves you, and you're like, "Yeah." And in the midst of the greatest trial, God loves you, and, and it's settled forever. God loves me. I have no problem with that. Do you see? But you have to grow into that. You're not just going to read your Bible and the light one day. That's how we teach it sometimes. It's just ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. No, it's through faith. It's the just living by faith. So watch this. So just because you don't feel lovable, that's not a problem. It's when you allow how you feel or don't feel to rise above what the gospel says that becomes a problem. Because then you're reduced to live for the moment, for sensuality, or for the fuzzy feeling of love. It's way different. Like, like the fuzzy feeling of love is so fuzzy and fun. Let me qualify that. It is. It really is. But there's something way more powerful knowing that you love. Knowing like where the question is settled, and you look in the mirror and actually realize you have great value. The person you see is loved by God. Now, I promise you, you want that way before the fuzzy feeling. In fact, I would be real strong to say that only then is the fuzzy feeling in the long run healthy, or you'll go chase the fuzzy feeling to try to make sure you're still loved. There's people that need ministry all the time to affirm they're in and not out. "Oh God touched me. I'm still, you must still love me." And they run to the altar all the time to get touched. "At least it touched me." You don't want to be in that position. That's actually a position of weakness. It's enabling you to continue that way. And when will that change? There's a place where faith has to look at the finished work of Christ and say, "My life has to be reflecting, no matter what I feel, what it seems to suggest around me, how it feels like I've even failed in some things I pursued. There is something so valuable about my life that you would put your son on the cross. You, you want me as yours. And Lord, I receive right now that value, and I say thank you for teaching me, showing me, but I accept this. You love me, and my life is worth living, and I thank you for making that alive to me." You start living that way, you won't have to read your Bible because it's the Christian thing to do. You know, a lot of people struggle reading their Bible 'cause it's works. "Well, I probably should read my Bible. I'm a Christian. I know I should. I know, I know I should read my Bible." It has nothing to do with that. It's knowing him. It's finding him. It's like a treasure hunt. You find him here, you find you here. You can't find him without finding you, 'cause you're one. It's like, "Oh, the clearer I see him, the clearer I see me." But communion and union, we're going to talk about it a whole lot. So let's kick this thing off and look at Philippians. Watch this. Well, let me back up. I, I don't, I don't ever read it there for you guys know that. I don't ever jump into it therefore, 'cause we'll miss what it's there for. Serious. You'll do injustice. You'll misinterpret the word if you just jump in it. Therefore, if he's saying therefore, he's saying in light of what I've just said. So let's just back up to like verse 27. "Only let your conduct be worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that whether I come and see you or in absence, I may hear of your affairs, that you stand fast in one spirit, one mind, striving together for the faith of the gospel." Let me just interject something there. Don't be in a hurry when you read your Bible. Don't just read it to quote it or to know what it says, but to become it. Look at this. The conduct be worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that whether I come and see you, or I'm absent, I hear of your affairs, that you should stand fast in one spirit, one mind, striving together for the faith of, uh, God. What are we to strive for? The faith of the gospel. Some people think that we fight the good fight of faith, that that means busting the devil in the mouth or something. Every place in the Bible you find the faith, contending for the faith, to walk in faith, uh, uh, holding up the faith, striving together for the faith, it's in the connotation of securing the identity you've received. Now that Christ has come, it's the finished work of Christ revealed in your heart. It's who you are because him. The faith has nothing to do with fighting the devil. When you put on the whole armor of God, that has nothing to do with punching the devil in the mouth. He loves when we teach that way, 'cause he loves when we pay him attention, because he's a cut-off, withering branch coming to nothing. And when you pay him attention, he just gets awful, and he'll just poke you all the more. So you go, "Whatever you do." And he just says, and he just gets a rise out of you. He loves that stuff, 'cause he's a cut-off, withering branch. He's out. He's not in. You're in, not out. He's out, not in. So the, the weapon of your warfare is mighty in the breaking down of strongholds. Has nothing to do with binding and rebuking the devil like people do. It has to do with replacing every lie with truth. You'll find, if you don't know it now, and you really stay awake, and I don't put you to sleep, in the next few weeks, you'll find that truth's your best friend. You'll find that truth is the word of God, and the word of God will never fade away. And everything around you, and all these false emotions, and all these things we became through all that stuff's fading away. Everything, the earth and everything is passing away, but my word. We're going to learn to honor his word, not in some militant, robotic faith way, but where I find myself in him, where I see myself in him. The word of God brings life. Amen. So I'm going to contend for that, and contend for the faith. What's that mean? To maintain my identity and hold fast to who I am in the midst of chaos, other circumstances, other suggestions. I'm going to stay in one mind. Now, how can Anthony and I, what's he mean by in one mind and striving together for the faith, when he might have a different aspect or facet of calling in his life and ministry than I do? He might have an area in ministry, or a people category, or a nation, or an age group burning in his heart, burning by the spirit of God, burning in his heart. Who knows what I mean? Who knows that some people just have children burning in their heart? Who knows some people have the elderly burning in their heart? Who knows people, some people have widows or third world nations burning in their heart, missions? Do you see what I'm saying? Wonder if he has that burning, and I don't necessarily have that burning, but I'm in agreement, and I can minister to those people, and I see their value, but he, he has that calling, right? Yet the Bible says that we strive together in one mind, and we're standing fast in one spirit, one mind. See, his calling and my calling doesn't make us separate. It doesn't divide us. It's not divisive. In fact, in the, in the, in the diversity that's in this room right now, there you find tremendous unity through the diversity, because it's that aspect of humility, and we're all on this planet for the same reason: to become like him and to manifest him. And then in that place, fulfill our respective callings. So here's how Anthony and I have one mind and one spirit. We both wake up for the same reason: to look like Jesus, to respond like Jesus, to think like Jesus, to love like Jesus. That's what drives us. That's why we're on the planet: to follow him. And in doing that, he fulfills his calling, or his calling becomes his identity, his calling becomes his satisfaction, his calling becomes his fulfillment. And if his calling isn't rolling real well, he's not rolling real well. You follow me? How many people are letting what they do in ministry determine who they are and how they are? That is so backwards, guys. And it is detrimental to your life. It's, don't make that trap. There's people pushing to get in what we call full-time ministry, feeling like if they get in there, they've arrived. No, you arrive, and then if God sees fit, you get in there. Does that make sense? Come on. Don't let anything identify you but the finished work of Jesus, and it's left for you. And we're going to teach and talk about how we do that. That's where we're going to take a lot of time. Uh, so I'm throwing some thoughts out, and we're going to wrap all this up through the course of time. And I, I know last year the school was fun because I felt like I had to get, it was the first day, and I couldn't quit. I'm trying to, and I'm thinking, "I'm not getting this done." And I'm thinking, "Wait, we got 13 weeks." And then the more we laughed about it, it felt like, "Wait, we don't have that much time left," because there's a lot of stuff we can cover. But we're going to get intimate and personal with it, and how to walk this thing out, like we're going to teach you how to actually commune with God and keep your heart in this place of one mind and one spirit. We're going to talk about it and give you example after example. So Anthony and I can have one spirit and one mind, even if his heart's burning in a different area in ministry than mine, and we can strive together for the faith of the gospel. That means to continue to be encouraged in who we've become now that Christ has died and raised again. What's that lead to? Of course, not in any way, then terrified by your enemy. Do you see how cool the word is? So if I'm standing steadfast in the faith, and faith works through love, and I understand God loves me, and I'm in and not out, and this thing is sealed, and I'm leaving a legacy, no matter what it seems to be costing me, I'm going to manifest his nature, period. Then I'm in no way terrified by what adversity, enemies, trouble. It's not even trouble. It's like, Don, Pastor Don preached yesterday, "I'll be with you in time of trouble." He didn't say, "I'll keep you from time of trouble." "I'll be with you." "Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers them out of them all." We've teached a self-serving gospel that makes us think that the gospel is a free ride from adversity. Are you kidding me? There's all your brothers all over the world are going through the same things you are. Don't think it's strange. Peter wrote, "See if you're thinking it's strange." And you're getting discouraged and despairing, then you have to take a real look at why you're in this thing called Christianity. And, and, and you have to actually, oh God, here we go. You, you have to actually face and realize you're in it for your sake and your well-being, instead of manifesting Jesus. God. Okay, I just said it. First day of school. Serious. If you're discouraged, if you're weary-hearted, if you're despairing, here's what we do. We accommodate that stuff. We say, "Oh, honey, I know how you must feel." Okay, that's what we do, and we call that love. No, we can be sensitive and compassionate, but we, we, we share at the same time, and we've done this together. We share at the same time the strength of truth that pulls you out of a mindset that's producing nothing. You don't, you don't need me to feel sorry for you. And sometimes we want people to feel sorry for us. It justifies weakness. The flesh justifies certain emotional patterns that are all detrimental to your productivity and your freedom. So we want, we just want somebody to understand. But what you want them to understand isn't even the truth that'll make you free. So why do they need to understand? Are you all following me? Come on. We're going to be real careful. These are snares and traps. And honestly, I see a lot of young folks, and God bless you all for being here, and some of us aren't as young as them, but watch this. We've all been for all the years we've been on the earth, we've been taught to live this counterproductive way that I'm talking about. We've been taught that it's normal. And in the church, we, we just accept it as just the way it is, 'cause it's the way it's always been. But everything changes now that Christ comes. Old things pass away. Behold, how many things? All things. The way I see, perceive, the platform I come from, as far as motivation, everything gets new. I, I don't live new from all the old places. That's what changes the foundation of from where I live. The eye that I look through, all that, that changes. And, and, and probably all week long, we're going to talk about communion and fellowship with God, because that's where these things will change. See, because in, in his light, we see light. And the more I get alone with him, and I yield to him, and I get in agreement with him, and have a want to in my heart, forget who I, who I was talking to yesterday, and they wept and said some things, and I said, "That, that desire, that want to in your life, and tears I see in your eyes, that want to, that's already enough." See, that's already enough. That's, that's all God needs. He just needs you to want to. Sincerely want to. Like, if you sincerely want transformation in your life, who knows? That's, that's the greatest place you can be, because now God has something to work with. It's called you. You know, it's one thing to just say, "Oh boy, I wish my life would change." It's another thing to be sincere about transformation and sit on your bed when ain't nobody around, "Father, there's so much more to my life and so much more value to my life." And then you start talking to the Lord about your life. "Father, I thank you for giving me wisdom, changing this eye. I want to see. I don't want the way the world taught me. I don't, I don't want what I grew up learning and, and, and what I was brought up on. I want your way. I'm going to pick up that word in a minute. I'm going to begin to reading. I thank you for illuminating me and transforming me from the inside out. I, I, I don't believe I should be hurt, frustrated, discouraged, and despairing, and I'm tending to feel that way a lot. I believe there's so much more in you than that, and I believe that you love me." You just start at a simple place like that, it'll begin to change your life. But you have to get out of agreement with the things we've called normal. You follow me? Some of this stuff needs so challenged. Now, I, I, I don't think in names because I don't lock faces and names to where I, you know, project it on a ministry when I preach this kind of stuff. But I know I've heard it preached many times from the pulpit over the years by just remember hearing phrases like, "Well, you know how it is, brother." "Well, we all go through that." "Well, we're all this." And it puts us all in the same basket, as if we can't really be free and change. Or you'll hear a pastor say something like, "Well, now, who hasn't this week?" "Well, if you don't raise your hand, you just need prayer. You're in denial or you're lying." Or, and we actually force ourselves into the flesh where people can't even admit to be free. Because if somebody's always doing good, you need to pull them aside and get quiet and say, "Okay, now sister, how are you really doing?" We're taught that nobody can really be okay. And yet we're preaching a gospel that says, "Set you free." Who's ever heard that? You can't really be okay. And you can pull somebody aside when nobody's around. They're not in prayer. Look them in the eyes, say, "Now, how are you really doing, brother?" You've ever heard that? I've heard people preach that and talk that a lot. "Well, if you have one of these guys in your church, and they're just always okay, somebody needs to be bold enough and get them alone and pin him down." "Well, let's take a walk." That's [Laughter] go. I can look you in the eyes, tell you I'm okay. It's true. Through natural knowledge, human wisdom, we're getting sucked into sell them the grace of God that's available. Sure. Through natural reasoning, we're all wanting to be spiritual. But that's true spiritual thinking, to believe that those limits can be broken. True spirituality isn't just woohoo. True spirituality is knowing your life can change, and you can look through different eyes, and your experience from yesterday in the flesh does not have to be who you are today. That there is change for me on the inside, that I really can be okay. You follow me? Come on. That's true spirit of thinking. To live by the spirit is to be in agreement with truth. It's not a mystical, "Turn left. Oh, left." You see? It's not. Now, who knows your life? God can do stuff like that. I'm not putting that down. The Lord knows what I'm, don't you get offended with me. The Lord knows what I'm saying. Let, when you hear "led by the spirit," it means living by truth. Because if you live by the flesh, it's what? Death. If you live by the spirit, life and peace. That's a drastic difference, isn't it? This thing's worth pursuing. I'm glad we're all here. This thing is worth it. Death, life, and peace. You know, oh, it doesn't matter. Just give me one. No, there's a big difference. How do I get the life and peace? Living by truth. How do I live by truth? Sometimes by just raw faith. Faith. And you'll find that as you live by faith and say, "Wait a minute." And when nobody's looking, you're not just putting on a religious show, you know? "Well, I believe God." And da da da. And you're quoting all the right stuff. And in your heart, not even believing it. When you get to your car, crying. But you just declared, and you call that your declaration of faith. No, I'm talking about faith. I'm talking about the realization, the, the substance, the realization, the tangibility of your hope. That's the Bible definition. Bible letter, right? The substance of things. That word substance means realization. It's like tangibility. The real. How can you realize your hope? 'Cause hope that is seen is in hope. But yet you realize your hope 'cause you know the nature of God, and the promise of God, and the love of God, and the finished work of Christ. So by faith, by faith, you live your life. It's deeper. Your hope takes you there. You get what I'm saying? But you see the possibility through the blood, through the message God sent by sending his son. Man, if he didn't love me, why would he put his son on the cross? See, why don't we ask that question? Here's what we do. "Well, if God loved me, why'd he let me get in that accident?" We challenge God's unfailing love based on a natural, physical circumstance that pertains to us and our well-being. And then we question God's love when he put his son on the cross. "If God didn't love me, why'd he put his son on the cross?" That's the only question I would ask. If God didn't love me, why would he die for me? So obviously, he didn't just administrate a car wreck today and go, "What do we think?" It's just natural thinking. It gets us in a jam. It muddies up our spiritual growth. It just does. I hear God accused of all kinds of stuff because we don't understand. See, if you can get right thinking, it'll take. This isn't going to be deep. Trust me. If you, if you can get right thinking, it takes away all wrong thinking. One strong told you it wasn't going to be deep. Watch. One strong foundation of truth can wipe away a whole mess of wrong thinking. Just one. He loves me. Period. Not subject to change. Not for sale. He loves me. Through one truth, bam. Then it just puts everything else in alignment. Then all of a sudden, you can't accuse, subpoena, take personal anything else in question. This one truth that's settled. And I had the great privilege for a lot of years of travel, meet lots of people, talk to lots of people. People seem to call my house for help and counsel and questions. And I hear a common thing across the country in the church. We don't understand these things, and we get tossed to and fro. We get double-minded. We maybe does, maybe he doesn't. Yeah, he does. He does. Maybe he doesn't. We look this way, question. Look this way, hope. Look this way, question. Look this way, hope. And when are you ever going to commune with the God that you're, that you're keeping open-ended like that? Whenever just going to approach him and be sure that he's your father? That he loves you? Do you get what I'm saying here? Come on. I, I, a lot of the passion you see in me is, is, is I do care about how people are doing. And I hear the same mindsets. It's like they're widespread. You can go to the east, the west, the Midwest. There's some universal mindsets in the body of Christ that are detrimental to a solid foundation. Detrimental. Like we're giving God credit for things he's never should get credit for. Stuff like that. All he should get credit for is sending his son while you were yet a sinner. He must love me. Jessel, in your life, has so much value. It's ridiculous. It's worth the blood of Jesus. You get it? She's got to start thinking that way. You got to start thinking that way. I say, I've been saying, "Lady, you're not a yard sale item on a back bench with a quarter tag hanging on you. You're not a throwaway. You're not somebody's junk. You're not what somebody doesn't has use for." So, "Hey, maybe God can use you somewhere." He created you to be a son, a daughter. He loves you, and he paid the highest price of the blood of his son to obtain you. You're that precious. Dechurch, you have to start there. And if you say, "Well, I don't feel that precious." What's that have to do with anything? That's just you speaking out a life that's been. If you're just waiting for the ding, ding, ding, ding, okay, yay, he loves me. I'm ready now. No, you live by faith. And at some point, you got to choke the life, so to speak, out of those detrimental thoughts and feelings and know they're not true. And in the face of those things, stand up and be loved. Stand up and be forgiven. Stand up and be redeemed. When nobody's looking, guys. When it ain't a church service, and the music's right, and the pastor wooing you to the front, 'cause it's easy then to just come to the front. And I'm not saying things don't happen then. Don't hear that wrong. We've just relied on that so much. We've relied on the moment so much that we failed to live in the moment. So don't hear, I'm not against all that stuff that we did. Well, some things I am, because it's successive. It's 'cause we're groping. So I'm, yeah, I'm just addressing it 'cause I just realize I'm not being straight up when I, there's a sincere move of God, and then there's a place where it can get unhealthy. And you'll notice, if I ever minister at the altar, I don't do the same thing with everybody. And some people I'll stop and talk and teach. Some people I'll counsel. And some people I'll just say, "Holy Spirit, come." It's discernment. You know what I'm saying? But some people don't need another touch at the altar in the sense of to try to find God. They're more aware when they leave sometimes. If you get honest with people and you look, they're at that, they're at that that same kind of article all the time because they're, they're certain. And their, their greatest benefit is if they go home and get alone and open their heart. "If you seek him, you will find him." Period. Wow, that would get in your face, wouldn't it? 'Cause then if somebody says they can't find him, "Are you really seeking him?" "Yeah." "Are you going to a lot of services and conferences and altars?" "Are you seeking him?" You have to know you have the right to approach him, guys. And if there's something keeping you from looking up and approaching him, it's all deception. I'm just talking real plain right now. It's all lies, guilt, condemnation, shame, lies, trash. It has nothing to do with truth. The blood of Jesus is speaking on your behalf better things than the blood of Abel. You are not marked guilty, condemned, and ashamed. Christ died and rose from the dead. It's not based on what you did. It's based on what he did. You could have lived like a heathen this morning, only because you failed to see who you are and your value, not 'cause you're a wretched evil person. And then because you lived like a heathen, you think, "See, I am a wretched evil person." And now all the more you can't approach him. The only reason you're doing what you do is because you failed to see who you are. When you see who you are, you lose the capacity to do the things that you did that you thought you were only worth. Are you guys getting this? Or come on. Identity is huge. So I'm worth the blood. So that, that, that's fun. Now, I'm not trying not to sin. I'm not this wretched bag of flesh that is just so ready to miss it. And if it wasn't for God's blood crying out in mercy, oh, you know, we understand everything we are is because of mercy. But don't you think that you're some evil, wretched mess just only walking this way because God made it possible because Jesus died and rose again? That's to keep you producing the same things, thinking the same things, and being the same the rest of your Christian life. When the Bible says there's newness of life, there's resurrection life, there's a brand new identity and a brand new fruit. You know them by their. So things change, don't they? You know what we get trapped doing? Trying to bear good fruit. Who would be humble and agree that there's a connotation out there we're trying to bear good fruit? Who, who has felt like they are under the definition that I need to bear good fruit because you know me by my fruit? So I need to bear good fruit. Be honest with me. Raise your hands real high. I want to see how many of you. Okay, now watch. That comes out in our teaching a lot 'cause we'll quote scripture and we think, "Oh, you'll know them by the fruit, buddy." We're like, "Oh my God." But guess what? If your fruit's not in alignment with truth, guess what it means? You don't know what kind of tree you are. You just don't know the, the tree you are. See, it's not about the fruit. It's about the tree. Because if you make a tree good, these are the words of Jesus in the Gospels. If you make a tree good, what's that mean? Well, if you study that out through the cross, it means if you make a tree righteous, if you tell a tree, "You're righteous. You're amazing. You're the will of God. You were planted by God. You were destined to live and destined to reign and destined to bear fruit. My life's on purpose. My life's calculated by God. I'm the will of God." All of a sudden, this tree is made good. It's a tree of righteousness. It's the planting of the Lord that he might be glorified. We're not trying to go out and bear good fruit. We're becoming good trees, and good trees bear good fruit. Come on. This thing is so simple. This isn't rocket science. We are so heavy sometimes, it's become a downfall. Why? See, I'm not a deep guy. You're going to learn that over this school, okay? I'm probably more borderline flaky than deep. I, I'm just the flighty, whatever. Watch this. Does an apple tree bear apples to say, "See, I'm an apple tree"? But does an apple tree bear apples 'cause it's already an apple tree? We try to bear righteous fruit to say, "See, I really am righteous," because we don't believe we are. So we're striving to do good things 'cause we're not affirmed that we've been made right, and we're not affirmed that there is something good inside of us called a changed heart. Because the fact that you care means you've changed. The fact that you even want to bear good fruit means that that's a good day for your heart, 'cause you could be a whatever person, right? Whatever. Hey, whatever, man. Hey, God knows. Look, God knows my heart. Just whatever. You get up.

B, whatever. Come on. A lot of people in the church that way. That's that's God's crying out. That's way more than that. If you, if you come up under a, a teaching that, that's just the best that you can be because you're a wretched piece of flesh, that is not the spirit of God. It's not the spirit of God. It'll become deception and excuse for the flesh, justification for sin, and it'll trap you from even being able to hear the clear gospel because you'll get into defense of your own life. After a while, I found that people that were raised believing a certain thing, it makes it hard to hear the clear gospel now because they're trained to defend what they were brought up in. So when the gospel does come, they can't even receive it because all they yell, "Buts and what ifs."

What happened to Jesus when he came on the earth and started speaking? They could hear the authority in what he was saying, but they couldn't receive him, hear him, believe him, and they finally crucified him as a heretic and a blasphemer, and he was the Word made flesh. Their minds were so contrary to truth that when truth spoke, they couldn't even. "Dude, you're amazing, but you're weird." Killing, isn't that pretty much what happened? You see why we need renewed in the spirit of our mind, man? Don't take this lightly what I'm saying this morning. This is you. Proverbs says, "In all your understanding, or in all you're getting, get understanding." It says, "Get wisdom, get understanding." It says, "Treat her like a precious silver jewel." Proverbs 4, it says, "In all you're getting, get understand." Understand doesn't say get blessing. I'm cool with blessing, but some of us are blessing crazy, man. We think if God blesses us, it means he's found favor, and we found favor, and that he loves us. And come on, put his son on the cross. That's what means he loves us. So when all you're getting, get understanding, right?

I don't know if you read Proverbs much. Proverbs are awesome. Talks about, I'd rather have nothing sitting on the table and some peace around the table, than a whole bunch on the table and strife. See, we call the whole bunch on the table the blessing of the Lord and forget the strife, and figure that's just everyday normal family occurrence. But thank God we're provided for, brother. Man, look at that campus. [Laughter] Fat. Proverbs says, "I'd rather have like hardly nothing on that table and some feast right there." Think about it, okay? I see we don't get far with scriptures and stuff. I, I don't. I don't. This Philippians 2, the Lord had me read for 13 weeks about 15 years ago. He said, "I want you to read this." I started to read it one morning. He said, "Dan, I want you to stay in this chapter until I tell you to read somewhere else. I don't want you to read anywhere else." And I was like, "Okay." And I inquired. I said, "What, what, what, what do you want?" He said, "Dan, I want you to read this and become this. It's foundational for your life. And I want you to read it not to know it and what it says, but to become it. He said, "Until you could come it, I don't want you to read it anywhere else." And I was like, think about that. I was a neat encounter with the Lord 15 years ago. I'm in my bedroom. He froze me on Philippians 2 and told me not to read anywhere else till I became Philippians 2. So he wasn't in a hurry. He was like, "Read your Bible, boy. Didn't you ever check out Ephesians? It's awesome." You know, Ephesians is awesome. But you know what he wanted? He wanted me to become Philippians 2. That was what he spoke to my life. And you'll see why.

Well, see, here we're at verse 28 in Philippians 1. Not terrified by our enemy. That's amazing. Why? Because we're standing together in one faith, in the spirit, striving together in faith of the gospel. I mean, in the spirit. And we understand who we are. So why are we afraid of the devil? It's not even about well-being. It's not even about me dying. It's not even about what the devil's doing. It's about who I've become through Christ. And I'm sealed for eternity. And in every bit of pressure, I can manifest Christ. What's the big deal? Come on. We've preached a self-serving gospel. We've preached a gospel that just takes care of us and blesses us instead of changes us. Because if it changes you, the devil has lost his power. When you see through a clean eye, clear eye, he's lost his power. When, when you realize that it's not about you, it's not about death, it's not about adversity, it's about Jesus. And you really realize that, and that's not just a Christian cliche. Amen, brother. Cliche. He's lost his power. Yeah.

So how could he take your joy? On, if Jesus didn't understand this and model this, Jesus wouldn't have had any joy in his heart to do what he did. Peter thought, "We're a bunch of losers. Why am I bothering? If they don't get it by now, they ain't never going to get it." How can I know that this mentality won't go from generation to generation? And here I am, dying for nothing. These same people I healed and did all this good in their cities and call the devil and crucifying me. I mean, outwardly, it looked like a pretty bad plan, didn't it? Didn't look like things were going in a good direction. But yet, he said, "If I be lifted up, I'll draw all men to me." He knew that the spirit of God would be poured out, that the veil would be toward top to bott. He saw all that by faith. He literally came and lived on the earth and died by faith. And you can prove that because Jesus was told by the Father, "This is my son, in whom I well pleased." And it's impossible to please God without faith. I trust my spirit to. He's ready to face death. The offering Giver of Life is ready to go into the realm of the, of death and die once for all and face death and give himself over to death. He's, he's eternal. He's life. He made himself of no reputation. Now he's going, going in to face death so none of us ever die. And he does it by faith. I'm trusted my spirit to you. I'm believing it's just the way it's written. On the third day, I'm going to rise. I give myself to you. And he dies by faith, believing God the Father's going to raise him up. Come on. You think that way and understand that Jesus had to model faith and live faith on the earth as a man in the flesh, didn't he? His every step was faith. Because when he looked around him, things weren't going so well. I mean, everything he did was manifesting blind eyes, lame. We think, "Woohoo, we're all seeking all that." But the people weren't all, "Woohoo." And if they were in a moment, they were all changed. And it looked like it was working. And then it looked like it wasn't. And, and but you don't see God and Jesus and the elders grabbing new plans and having rush board meetings and trying, "Hey, this thing, we got to steer this, this way." Just living by faith. Love sincere, pure, staying steadfast. What you see is what you get. Jesus, right? Oh, I so honor that and just honor Jesus. He is so much more to me. And like the lamb thing, this said he's such a hero. You understand what he did? He modeled integrity. He modeled love. He modeled true honor, commitment. He modeled what we're all designed for. He came and said, "This is who you're created to be. Now that you see, follow me." And we're still believing we can, we can, we can be sincere. We can be honorable. We can walk in true forgiveness. We can walk and not be jealous ever. We can walk and not compare ourselves and be envious and full of pride. We can walk in really love and care about people even more than ourselves. We can. He said, "So you show me a time he ever lied to us." He didn't. There's people out there trying to hold him to face value, his word, methodology, praying a certain outward prayer and say, "See, God's word."

I met a pastor. He's so hard and and harsh and hurt. And oh, it was so fun. We're driving in a car, and he's just telling me all the reasons for being broken and hurt. He had no idea. He didn't really know me. He had no idea. He had no idea what he was getting. He was so set up. It was, it was so funny because he's just justifying his pain and justifying and how he took God at his word and how God didn't honor his word. And how I went out to pray for the sick. And he said, "And God left me looking like a fool." "I ain't praying for the sick." And he, "I took him at his word." And he said, "If I touch the sick, they'll recover." So I said, "Okay, God, I'm going to do my part. You better do yours." I went out and I touched a sick person, and he didn't get healed. And then I touched another, and he didn't get healed. So I said, "Well, this is ridiculous. You just set me up to look like a fool. If you're not going to back up your part, why should I lay my hands on anybody?" And he's just hard, hurt, and angry. Made rational sense to him. He says, "See, it's not a relationship." Okay, face value, legalistic. Okay, you said you'll do this if I do this. Okay, I'm going to do it. Where are you, God? So you're constantly testing, challenging, judging, and setting up God to fail. It means you don't even know him. You don't even have a clue.

So we went into a Subway to get a sandwich. And, uh, we're standing in line. Lady's making my sandwich. And I was a little distracted by Subway. It's good. I stopped there all the time. But I started getting this. I was getting pulled out of the lunch and be all that. And I was like, I said, "Hey, you. I said, what's going on in your neck down into your, down into this area of your body? You were in an [Laughter] accident." She's looking, "Two years before she was in a car wreck. That area has never been right." She said, "That is so freaky. How'd you know that? You're freaking me out." I said, "Not, not trying to freak you out, honey. This pastor's standing right here." So fun. It was fun. I said, "Honey, I said, not trying to freak you out. I said, you're going to love this. Give me your hand, sweetie." "Why?" "What?" "It's okay. Give me your hand." Reaches her hand up. "Father, I just thank you." What she said, "Oh my God, it's so hot in there." "Why is it so hot in there?" He said, "It's okay. It's okay." Prayed, right? Check it out. She's just like, "Oh my God." So the pastor's standing. I never looked at him. I wasn't doing this for him. I wasn't performing for him. I was getting a sandwich. And I got a little impression. Now watch this. Other little girl, Spanish girl's there. She's got, she's got tattoos on her that meant things. It, it, you know, sometimes they make statements and you could tell hurts and life and just hard. And, and she had her whole neck, her whole neck. And that's, I guess for her life. Now, her whole neck's a spider. Well, and she go, "Spider?" Got words. This girl's so touched. And I said, "Honey, Jesus, Jesus loves you. That's how I knew about your neck. And that's how I knew about the car wreck, 'cause Jesus knows you. I'm not even from around here. I'm from out of town, sweetheart. But Jesus knows you and loves you to the tomb that he would hang on the cross and die because one day you'd be alive on the earth and then through him, you could find out who you really are and see your purpose and your value rather than just search and experiment and misidentify life." And I went on and talked in a way that apparently she needed to hear because I don't have a script. And while she's listening, it's making so much sense. And she's like, "Oh my God, oh my God." I said, "Yeah, what about your neck?" She says, "Oh my God." She's just, 'cause it's all there. It's well. She's so set up. So guess what she does? Immediately, she calls out her friend. Her friend. She says, "You got to do this for her. You got to do this for her." She's just telling me, she's so young. She's way under the me. She's just telling me she has so much pain. She doesn't know what she's going to do. She doesn't know what's wrong. She's scared. She's just telling me this morning. Now she's dishing her. She's just exposing. And she's going, and she said, "You got to do this for her." That's what she kept saying. I looked over the counter. I said, "Honey, is these things true?" She said, "Yeah." I said, "You hear how got to do this for you? Everything he did for her, he did for you. Jesus is amazing. He loves you, sweetheart. Don't be afraid. Come here. You got pain in?" "Yeah." "Give me your hand, honey." Start to pray. "Oh my God." I don't know what God does. He just does stuff. And every, she knew she was changed. It was so fun.

So there's this tall black gentleman at the cash register. And we got our sandwiches. And they're all wrecked up. And we got to him. And I said, "How you?" He said, "I'm fine, buddy. I'm just fine. Totally fine." That's what he said. He said, "I'm fine. I'm fine." He took a step back. "I'm cool. I'm good." I said, "Well, if you weren't, would you tell me?" I said, "Because this is a good experience. Nothing to be afraid of." He said, "No, no. Really. I'm cool. I'm good." I said, "Okay." We paid, sat down. Sat down. I started opening up my little sandwich. I looked up and the pastor's, "Oh," said, "I went out there without the most important thing of all. I didn't go because of love. I didn't go because of love." He's just balling. I said, "Oh God." And we had a great time. Soon as there was nobody coming in to get sandwiches made, guess where the girls came? Flew right to the table and jumped right in. Is that fun or what? Come on. And here's this guy hurting hard because of natural reasoning, very not being rude, very limited mindset, very shallow. Called the fall of Man. When you think in a manner that creates offense, disappointment, discouragement, it is always a lie. It is always a trap. Because you're thinking for yourself. Did you get that? That's a strong statement. You need to hear that and be humble with it. If your mindset is producing those things, it's the fall of Man to the tune where we reserve the right to do it towards God and actually find fault and charge him. The clay, the clay, I mean, the mind we do have is from him. And all of a sudden, it's ringing above him. Come on. That right there should be of great concern. That's the fall at its finest. It's called the pride of man. Please don't do that ever. I don't care how rational it seems. That's what should scare you away. Yeah, but you don't understand. But God, and why didn't he? And how come? If that's your language, I'm telling you, back up. Take a breath. Just calm down because it's taking you nowhere. He is nothing but good. He sent his son to get us back. You follow me? We still need to take communion. It's all right. We're going to get there. We just need to be ready. We want to do things with purpose. I'm a purpose guy. I really am. I, I, I, I'm a strong purpose guy. Not in any way terrified to them. It's a proof of their destruction. Every time you walk free from fear, that devil that's trying to provoke you to fear, it's just a proof that we're creating God's image and we're Christlike, that we're eternal, and that he's being judged. It's just amazing. So it's not you reminding him of his future. I hear that all the time. When the devil reminds you of your past, you just remind him of his future. Are you kidding? Don't even talk to him or give him the time of day. Totally. He's a cut-off, withering branch coming to nothing. Why even look at him? Why do you have to stand there and spout off and remind him of his future? That just means he's getting to you. He's not even worth that. He's not even worth you thinking you're telling him off. But you're just going to be in a lake of fire for the rest of. And you're just going to this and that and and that and and and and and see, the best he can do is agitate you now. Because he already knows that's true. So he's thinking, "Well, at least I can just take something away from them since I've lost everything." And he'll just agitate. And he'll get you all day. Just yelling at him all day. And, and it'll be like when we come home from work and then, "How was your day, honey?" "Well, my boss such." "I gave him a piece of my mind." Isn't that how we talk and think? "Well, boss, did your boss? How'd he act today?" "Oh, he's a jerk, just like always." "But I gave him a piece of my mind." And then we feel like somebody was that. That's making yourself higher than people. Self-righteous. It's, it's sin. It's, it's the fall of Man. Every mountain's low, every valley's up. And gave him a piece of my mind. You're devaluing him and elevating you. It's a trap. You see, you don't even have to do that to the devil. It's a trap. Not in any way terrified. That means it's as if he's not doing anything. He's taken his best shot. And you're living as if he's done nothing. And you're just in love with Jesus and in love with people. And you're okay. And he just took his best shot. And you're really free. Come on. That's where we're heading. Not, "Well, devil, you're a jerk." And I don't care how much he tried to touch me. You're the one that's cursed and going to the fire. And I'm going to be eternal life. And, and, yeah. And I'm going to take a good shot at you while you're here. Is what he's saying to you. It's evidence of your salvation when you're not terrified. Watch that. Wow. It's proof of his destruction. But to you, it's proof of your salvation. That means it's proof that you have a good grip on your salvation when you're not moved by the devil. Ain't that true? Is that in your Bible? Yeah. For to you, it's been granted. Look at this. It's granted. It sounds like a gift. For to you, it's been granted not only to believe, but to suffer for his sake. That means in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, who being destroyed for the sake of lust, self-centered desire, you've been separated through the divine nature of God. And you walk in love. In the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, you shine as a light. So it's not just granted that you could believe this, but you can manifest this. And in the midst, seemingly suffer, but it's not suffering. It's not suffering having the same conflict which you saw in me and now here is in me. Do you see that in verse 29? It's been granted to believe and to what? Suffer for his sake. All that means is to walk through the, the controversy, adversity, whatever word you want to use, of being in, being walking in a mindset of heaven while you're on the earth. Walking in a mindset of mercy and forgiveness and peacemaking when you're in the midst of unforgiveness, jealousy, pride, and hostility. There's a suffering in that. Jesus suffered by the things which he was tempted. The fact that he had to come as a man and just be tempted as a man at every point. There was a suffering in that. The suffering of just resisting. Of just even the, just the, the whole thought and temptation. He's coming from the heavenly realm. He's coming making himself of no reputation, putting on flesh. God who can't be tempted now comes as a man and is tempted at every point. And he has to endure that and go through the yuck of just the temptations of sin. And he suffered by the things which he was tempted, just through the mere sake that he just resisted it, that he had to even be around it and be in the flesh was a sacrifice. Think with me. But he did that so we could live in the spirit. So it must be pretty important to God that you live in the spirit. That he came and did all that to, to, to make this possible. Do you see our connection? Our place? Do you see how intimate this is? Do you see how you're created to be his? Come on. What else would compel him to come and do this? We didn't sign a petition. We weren't like, "Come on, we're dying and suffering down here. We really need help. And if you really love us, we're ready to live for you now and we'll serve you." And we're just ready, God, would you please send us help? Did you sign that petition? We didn't do that. He already came while we were yet sinners because he knew who we were in the first place. Come on. We've been challenged just to go out of our way for each other in life. We think it's a big deal if we just go a little out of our way. And the person that you go out of your way, "I can't believe you did that for me. Oh my God, that is so amazing. You must really love me." Oh, well. Think of the gospel. Or we say, "Oh, you shouldn't have." "Oh, you shouldn't have." And we're like in this desperate place to receive. We need to receive. And then when, when we, when somebody does something that's, "No, you shouldn't have." Are you kidding me? Why do we even do that? Somebody goes out of their way and buys you the nicest gift. And you, in a false humility thing, "Oh, you shouldn't have." And you can't wait to open that thing. Be real with me. It's some false humility. You, you can't wait to open that thing. With the gospel, so many times I see people say, "Oh, you shouldn't have." And they don't open the thing. But how many times does that happen with us? We, "Oh, you shouldn't have." It's no, you were like, "Oh my God, I want what that." Especially when you're young, growing up, and you have certain relatives and stuff. They hand you the envelope. And you know there's always like $50 in there. And now the economy. And you're thinking, "Man, inflation, maybe there's $100." I'm 15 now. And I'm not 10. And maybe I graduated to a $100 or something. That little thought crossed your mind. Who did that? Growing up, you're thinking, "Man, Grandma always gives me that Christmas card. There's always $50 in there." Yes, she had me my little. "Oh, Grandma, well, thanks. Thanks." Why don't we do that with the gospel? Why don't we look in the mirror and look at the person you see and say, "Jesus, you should have died for them because you created them in your image. And what they were living before you came was nothing like your image. Man, thanks for seeing the value of their life." You know, Christians don't do that. We sing songs about how strange and weird it is that you would pay this kind of price for me. There's songs, a lot of songs out there that talk about, "Why would you die for me?" Well, it's simple. Because we're lost sons and daughters created for God's image and glory and destiny. So he didn't sell us short or sell us cheap. He bought us out and paid the highest price to obtain us. Because we're precious pearls and jewels. He found a treasure in a field and bought the whole field so he could obtain the treasure. And that's us. So it's not a mystery anymore. We're created to be his. Period. Man, let's just get on with that and stop letting anything else define your life. We'll get on a lot of that in the. It will probably take about a week on that one because we let a lot of other stuff tell us who we are, don't we? What Aunt so-and-so said when I was seven and I never forgot it. And what, and now we need somebody to pray for us because Aunt so-and-so said that when we were seven. Well, Aunt so-and-so didn't know your value. Understand your life through the gospel. You don't need nobody to pray for you. Just get over what she said and understand that Jesus is the truth about your life. Well, poor Aunt so-and-so didn't realize the, the beauty of my life. Bless her heart. I hope she didn't say too much stuff to other people. God, if she spoke stuff like that and it hurt other people, please set them free. But thanks for coming and showing me the truth that what you did is so much greater than when Aunt Millie failed to see. Why are we 33 and still remembering what Aunt Millie said when I was seven? Why do we make that matter so much? Because we still live in logical, rational, human wisdom thinking and give it permission every day in our lives. But wonder if you get in a mindset that doesn't even understand that way of thinking. It's like weird to even think that way. That you don't even relate to that kind of thinking. Oh, that would be freedom, wouldn't it? Yeah. See, I don't even want to understand why that should matter. That don't even. Christ has come. Hello. I'm not seven. And Aunt Millie wasn't Jesus. He was whatever she was, right? Come on. And we think the more personal the relationship, and the more intimate the relationship, the more detrimental that if it was a parent or a daddy. We believe that in the church. We honestly believe. Probably a week. Oh God, I'm going to cry. Probably a week. Doesn't go by in my life that I don't hear somebody say, "Well, I understand what you're preaching. It's just hard for me because I've never had a dad that loved me." Not a, hardly a week goes by that I don't hear that. That is so profuse in the body of Christ. That one thought right there. Well, you'd be amazed how many people didn't have a daddy to love. And I always say, "What does that have anything to do with now? Christ has come. You, you have a Father that loves you. You don't have to relate through a natural dad. You accept it by faith because he came. You call no man on earth your father. You have one Father. He's in heaven." Fathered means come forth from your life. Came forth from Father. So why that you had a dad that didn't love you? Why does that? Why do you compare God to your natural experience with your dad when God gave his son and has a whole different than your dad? Why do we compare the two and try to get to God through the natural of life? See, I don't even want a grid for that. I don't even want to understand that. I don't even want that to make sense. Because here's what it'll do. It'll give permission for logic and the flesh to continue to run your life. Unless all your ducks are in a row, you're not okay. Well, whose ducks are in a row? See the paradox. Who has the perfect scenario? Back and unless God touches me at the altar and delivers me. That's what you set yourself up for. And Colossians says, "You are delivered from the power of darkness and translated into the kingdom of the son of his love." You are already delivered. Because we think this way, it's why I hear these terms constantly. "Waiting for my breakthrough." "I'm in my midnight hour, brother." "I'm just waiting for God to deliver." I hear those phrases constantly. We're flesh-ruled, central-ruled, and human wisdom-ruled. And we find very little faith in our hearts at those times. You don't have as much trouble as you think. You really don't. You have a gospel that's enough. We're going to take a little break. We're going to hit Philippians 2, and then we're going to close this out with some communion. We are. We're going to, we're going to, we're going to take this with impact. Go, go take a break. Meet somebody on your way. Do you need to? Yeah, I got a really quick announcement. Okay, just to everyone didn't get to the table. Um, we, I just rushed you in here. I need you to, if you didn't get your name badges, it's very important. That's how we're counting attendance today. Um, since we have so many from now on, I'm going to have a signup sheet when you come in that you just sign in. Because if you're here 80% of the time, you get a certificate. If it's less than that, I'm sorry, but you don't get a certificate. Um, so there's some liability forms out there for medical information. Some of you just got like one for your family or whatever. Please pick up an individual one of those. So at break time, please do that for me, okay? Great. Thanks. Yeah. To today, I'm just, I, I, I could hear in my heart what I was doing. I'm kind of opening a bunch of doors to some topics that will probably really, uh, I was talking to ladies, opening the door to a lot of topics we're going to nail down through the school. So don't, you know, we're going to give a lot of explanation and teach and establish these things. So kind of just having fun preaching out, kind of a big picture this morning. It seems I didn't have a certain plan. It's just what's happening. So remember, it's a 13-week school. So don't get ahead of yourself and say, "But how this, where that?" And if you do have questions, nobody raised their hand yet. So, you know, you can be free to raise your hand. And don't think you know because I said in the beginning a couple things about that. Don't be intimidated or threatened to raise your hand. If you have a valid question and it, it's important to you, man, raise your hand. Okay? And it doesn't matter if I'm in the middle of preaching. Just raise your hand. It'll work. It's good. We did a whole, who was here? We did the whole class like that the last time. I'm looking for, oh, Becky. She was here. We did the whole class with questions last time, didn't we? And people raised their hands and it, and it just flowed and it went real well. And we found that a lot of the questions that people ask were in other people. You see what I mean? Because it just, who knows that sometimes almost universally, if you'll catch that word right in the right context, text across the board, we've assumed certain beliefs and thought patterns in our Christian lives, even no matter where we went to church. There's some common beliefs that arose in our lives. So when you're teaching a certain way, it can raise the same question in 20 people in a room of 60. You know what I'm saying? So don't be hesitant to, to do that. We finally made it. We finally made it to Philippians 2 here. See the word. So good. We just backed up to 27. And it's like, ah, you know, 27, 28, and 29, a Philippians 1. We read that. So we're letting their conduct be worthy of the gospel. We're standing fast in one spirit and one mind, contending for the faith together of the gospel. We're not in any way terrified by the enemy. It's proof of his destruction, our salvation. And we've been granted the privilege to believe and not only believe, but to suffer for his sake. And we are all going through the same stuff. You catch it? Therefore, because of this, if there's any consolation, that means encouragement, any encouragement or edification in Christ, if there's any, of course, there is, right? So it's kind of a rhetor. He's kind of like, "Look, so if there's any reason to be encouraged, which there is, right?" He said, "So if there's any encouragement in Christ, any comfort of love, if there's any fellowship, man, that's communion of the spirit, okay? That's like, if there's any relationship, co-ona, communion, interaction, interface with the Holy Spirit, okay? He's because he's Holy Spirit is like the real deal of your intimacy with God. And, and we're going to really cover all this. It's the, I can't just, I want to cover everything on the first day. So you guys got to be patient and bear with me on this thing because I'm scratching stuff and I like, and, uh, but I'm just throwing out some stuff here. We'll get some little teasers out there and then we'll just, I told the girls, it feels like we're opening a whole bunch of doors and we'll just close them as the days go by. We just will. So if there's any consolation, encouragement, any comfort of love, any fellowship of the spirit, any affection and mercy. Now watch this. Fulfill my joy. This is Paul talking like a father. He's caring for these people. He's, he's overseeing them. He prays for them continually. Fulfill my joy. Now look what's fulfilling his joy. Not that there's great attendance. Not that things seem to be going great in ministry. What's fulfilling his joy is that they become like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord and one mind. That's a big deal, okay? Let nothing, let what nothing, you know, you hear the joke in the Greek, nothing actually means nothing. It's a relief because you look up words and they don't mean what they seem like they mean. So you really have to check someone. How you doing, buddy? It's good to see you. So nothing means nothing. Let what nothing be done. Look at this. Through selfish ambition. Why? Because in Christ, we all denied ourselves so we could pick up our cross and follow Jesus. You got that right? See, some of us thought we came into the kingdom so we could go to heaven and get blessed by God. We didn't come to the kingdom for that. We came to the kingdom to put off our old nature and take on a new. We came to Jesus not to go to heaven and not for blessings. We came to Jesus 'cause we're living for ourselves. God's unto ourselves. And we took on the nature of the fall. And we're now denying ourselves. Uh oh. Holy Ghost got me. Randy, I started to walk forward. Sorry, internet folks. We love you. He told me when I go there, I get in the dark. And I said, "Are you kidding? Light's greater than dark." I said, "On that rerun, you're going to see a light in my face." I'm messing with him. So that's why they moved your tables up, if you didn't notice. And I'm not supposed to go past. I have a, a barrier. I stepped in it. And it was like, serious. It was like, "He loves you so much, Randy. Come on, dude." He's like, "No, Randy." It's amazing. That had to be the spirit of God for me to remember that. Because he said, "Look, don't come past." And he put, I thought he was drawing lines this way. I like this way. I thought we're really in trouble. I thought he was going to tell me to stand right here. So a lot of us came into the kingdom. And you guys that heard any CDs, this is one of the major messages I cry out everywhere I travel. We did not pray a prayer to go to heaven. I mean, that's literally what we proclaim in this country. And we sell the gospel so short. And we sell each other so short. We're just trying to get everybody to verbalize a prayer to get her name in a book. Same frustration, same disappointment, same despair, same motivation, same mentality, same foundation of thinking. How self-serving is that? I'm just praying a prayer to go to heaven. And now it's like hell on the earth. And let's hold on tight because one day he's coming. We want to make sure we're ready. And all what's all that mean? No, we're not praying a prayer to go to heaven. We're denying ourselves, picking up our cross, and following Jesus. Heaven's coming back inside of us. We're back in union with God again. The spirit of God's in us. We have fellowship with Holy Spirit. The old man's dead. The new man's alive. There's a new man, new woman alive. That's supposed to become a reality. And we grow up into that in the faith. Amen. But we're not going to if we're not taught that. We're destroyed for the lack of knowledge. If we're just waiting to go to heaven, we're just going to try to stay faithful to a local congregation, serve within that ministry, and call that our Christian function. And try to be kind of nice on the earth. Isn't that what we're reduced to? To then come on. What else is there to the Christian life? No wonder people are bored and messing around and backsliding. They don't, because we don't understand the beauty of our salvation. Man, this is a glorious thing. I'm not trying to just kind of walk a straight line now 'cause I'm confessed as a Christian and trying to do better things than people that don't go to church and say they're Christians. And I'm not going to let my identity surround the fact that I usher in a church. Thank God for you ushers and thank God for helping servant. That's just service within the body. That has nothing to do with your calling in Christ and the manifestation of his kingdom. And we've allowed the service within the church to facilitate and take the place of our Christian function. And that's what becomes our ministry where we serve within the church. No, your ministry is flowing in the love of God. Your ministry is being like Jesus. Isn't it? Here come one. There's encouragement. There's comfort. And there's fellowship. So his joy is complete when we're like-minded, having the same love, and one accord, one mind. I said it earlier, in all our great diversity in this room, I'm telling you, if I'd go around the room, there's different heartbeats and flavors and, and, and things in you that God himself has put in your lives. There's things that make you tick more than others tick in that area. It's because it's in you. There's a grace on it. It's just things that, it's some of it's just preference and desire. It's all good. Good though. It's all. But there's diversity in that, right? But yet, we're called to be like-minded, of one, one, one, one mind, one accord. How's that possible in the midst of all that different flavor and diversity? Because we all wake up for the same reason. We all understand why we're Christians. We all know why he died and rose again. We're supposed to all understand why we're in this thing. It's to manifest the nature of God, to be restored back to the image of God, to be sons and daughters. And to be known on the earth by the earth because of our love. To walk in the light, to be innocent and harmless and blameless in their sight, holding forth the word of light, life, shining as light. It's right in this chapter. That's our place. That's so the world might know him because they've met you. They get a glimpse of your Father through your life. Now, if you're hurt, disappointed, and only living life as it comes, how are we ever going to manifest that truth? We have to get a better, a bigger and better view of why we're saved. I'm saved to take on his nature, His Image, to be transformed from the inside out, to clean the inside of the cup so the outside is clean. It's what we were talking about. The tree becoming a good tree so I can finally bear good fruit. Why do I do the works of righteousness? Well, 'cause you're supposed to, brother. No, I do the works of righteousness 'cause I'm a righteous tree. I, I've been made righteous. You get it? Let me explain this so you don't, because this is a school. Forgive me. Forgive me. It is a school, though. Watch righteousness. In, in most senses of the word used, means to be made right with God. No sense of guilt, condemnation, shame. To stand right before God. You can't possibly do that on your own. It is the blood of Jesus that makes that possible. It's the finished work of the cross. It's not what you've done. It's what he has done that gives you the ability to be righteous. Righteous righteousness means to be right with God. But the works of righteousness, or living in righteousness, is the expression of the nature and character of God. It's any manifestation of the character, nature, and attributes of God. You follow it? What I'm saying? So if, what's your name, honey? Katherine. So if Katherine is righteous through the blood and made right with God, and understands in her relationship with God, "You love me. You've made me right. I stand before you. I am spotless, pure, clean, and beautiful in your sight." Oh, you love me and desire me. It's good day, right? She's doing that, right? All of a sudden, she's honoring him by receiving him. And all of a sudden, she's going to start becoming like him. Because the things she honors and respects, like his mercy, his love, his forgiveness, his nature, his, his just, his tender loving kindness. All of a sudden, she's receiving that, right? Now watch. All of a sudden, she's treated in life certain ways. And she starts seeing through that 'cause she's accepting and believing that. So she's not legalistically, "Well, I need to forgive them so that I stay forgiven." That's what we're taught. No, you forgive because you're forgiven. So the reason Catherine's forgiven is because she's forgiven. She's forgiving because she's forgiven. She's receiving forgiveness and gets what it births in her, the ability to forgive, the nature of God. So she is made righteous before God through the cross. And now she's empowered to live that righteousness this way. And now she can show mercy where she had no capacity for mercy at that level before. Because her whole mind's changed. Her whole eye, the way God sees her life. And what, what vindicated her and justified her and made her clean. All of a sudden, she sees with a bigger view this way. And all of a sudden, what's become her reality becomes her reality. Does this make sense? It's the whole purpose of the cross. The whole purpose of the cross isn't just that you're forgiven, but you become living, walking, breathing forgiveness. The whole purpose of the cross is Christ reproducing himself after his own kind. A one seed dying, falling to the ground, springing up much fruit after its own kind. Christians, little Christlike ones, the body of. Come on. This is so clear. They're all his terms. This is what he sees. Guys like you are. Watch this. This is not weird. You are so worth the blood of Jesus to him. Or he wouldn't have came. He thinks so. He thinks, "Look, would you buy an article of clothing for $50 if you didn't think it was worth $50?" I mean, you might really want it bad enough and say, "Well, I don't think it's worth $50, but I want it." So you pay. So autom, what you're saying is your desire to have that values at what you paid up for it. So look what he paid for you. You're worth the blood of Jesus to God the Father. Not like, close to worth it. You're totally worth it 'cause he paid that. So you value at that. True. And you receiving that and accepting that and saying, "Whoa." Is a real big deal. Randy and I were laughing about 'cause I always say, "Hey, man of God." And this and that. And there's a lot of people when you say, "Hey, man of God," you know, you talk, you know, in a way that the gospel implies to him. A lot of times people feel like, "Who, me? Were you talking to me?" Or you had to be seeing somebody. You look at that. Look over their shoulder. You must have met them. That's what we do. You know why? Because we've defined our life through life. And the value of our life through life. And you will be deceived and sold short every time. You cannot find the true value of life through life. You can't find it through your family lineage, through your memories of childhood. You will not find the true value of your life except through the finished work of Christ. Jesus Christ crucified is the truth about you. Watch. Period. And if somebody in your life's not saying the same thing the cross is, it's because they're not seeing the same thing. Somebody's just treating you a little wrong or mishandling it. It's why, why would you let that be the end of the world for you and identify yourself through that stuff? You have to see.

yourself through him. That doesn't give you permission to be this. That it puts integrity, it puts discipline, it puts change in your life. It's not an easy out. It's actually the transformation of your life. That's why the biggest challenge. It's not an accident. The biggest challenge of the Christian is accepting this good news. Period. To where it's a big deal and worth the time of their day, and they stay, stay excited about it, where they enter in long enough to where it becomes their joy.

The biggest challenge, because the enemy knows that if the light ever comes on, the room's light, if the light ever comes on, he's so afraid. The enemy is so afraid that the light's going to come on. See, he tries to keep you from pursuing the light, seeking a million reasons why this can't work, or you can't seek God, or you just, all that frustration in the flesh, all that rationale, dime-a-dozen mentality, it's just non-stop with people. Because Satan is so afraid that the light's going to come on. 'Cause if the light comes on, it's over. The room's light. Serious.

So if that's been your resume and your struggle, man, you ought to realize there is a spiritual strategy set against you to keep you from the very thing your heart's crying for, trying to frustrate you, get you to whatever, what you really care about, and keep, keep you from seeking and finding. Do you know what I'm saying? Come on.

If he knew what he was doing, if the authorities of the earth ever knew what they were doing, they would have crucified the Son of God. But they did. So now they're playing the big cover-up. Come on. He is dead and raised to life. So he did what he came to do, and it is all fulfilled and accomplished. In the just live by faith. So Satan's trying to get us to live carnal, natural reality, human wisdom, and trying to cover up. He was played like a pawn by God in God's wisdom. He played the devil like a pawn, right into his hand. He played on his, his instinct of steal, kill, destroy. Steal, kill, destroy. That's why Jesus said in the garden, "Uh, do what you came for. It's the hour of darkness." What is that mean? It means God just drew back and let darkness do what it does, and he let darkness play right into the hand of his wisdom, and it still killed and destroyed. 'Cause to kill is to win. "If I can kill him, I can win." Well, if you kill him, you've just lost really big. Come on.

So all we can do is steal, kill, destroy, steal, kill, destroy, kill, kill, kill, lie. And God just pulls back and lets him, like a fool, just right into his hand, played right into his hand, and killed the Son of God. 'Cause now you just killed an innocent man and shed innocent blood, and now the guilty can go free. Because that blood goes to the mercy seat, and there's mercy on the earth, and man's no longer held accountable for his sin. 'Cause one died, all can live. It's the gospel.

So he just lets him die. Boom. Because that's all he knows to do. Kill him. And he lets him die. Why? Because now he raises him to life. And through his life, raised, we're justified. Romans 4 says. And then he didn't stop there. He took his blood into the throne room of heaven, and applied his blood on the mercy seat, and then sat down on that seat, and forever represents man before God.

So it was the hour of darkness. So now, can you imagine when the light comes on in that one Spirit? Holy Spirit. Without, I'm telling you, I tease about it, but it's true. It wasn't a struggle. He didn't have little radios to Michael and Gabriel, "Cover the back corridor. If, look, if a legion of imps come up this hall, you cover my back, I'm gonna go get him out." You know, we watch too many movies sometimes. I think we think like, you know, look, one Spirit, Holy Spirit, walks into the realm of death and just, poof, lights up the place. Light is greater than dark. So where there's light, there's no dark. And He is light, and there's no darkness in Him at all. It's what First John teaches. So He goes into darkness, and darkness is no longer darkness. Poof. And one Spirit, Holy Spirit, raises Christ from the dead, according to the Spirit of Holiness, the Bible says. Because He was innocent, man, innocent blood, and death could not hold Him. So He broke the chains of death and judgment and the law of sin, and now the law of the Spirit of life through Christ makes us free. It's how it works. It's amazing. He raises Him from the dead and trumps death forever.

Now, watch. He did that and went to the extreme of that. The extreme of that being beaten and battered and dying and pierced and hanging there. And the extreme of it. Come on. It's extreme. He went to the extreme of that so He could put His Spirit back inside of us, so we could be what we were originally created to be. We've reduced it to a verbal prayer to get your name in a book. Yeah, shame on us. That's not what the gospel is. The gospel is not getting everybody to pray a prayer on the planet. It's getting our lives transformed so people see Christ in us. So you could be sitting on an airplane, you walk in a subway with a pastor that's misunderstanding and without projecting and trying to show off. Holy Spirit's just loving that girl because He wants to love the world and even heal that man in his deceived heart. It's fun for God.

So don't ever forget this. For God so loved that He gave. Why do we give? Because it's the Christian thing to do. It's because we love. We've become love, and that's what love does. It's more blessed to give than receive. Doesn't mean we can't receive. We're just big-time givers, giving of mercy, forgiveness, another chance. Not, "Well, you really hurt me." "Well, you broke my trust." "Well, I don't know." That's what we do to each other. You can have somebody broken and and and and be so in yourself in their wrong that you miss the cry of their heart and the sorrow of their heart. You're just holding them captive based on their error instead of freeing them to just go bear good fruit. We do it all the time because we're afraid to enable. We're afraid to. It's not your place to draw the line on that one. It's your place to love, show mercy. And even when I do correct, I have to make sure I correct. If, if, if, if Anthony came to me and I felt like I had to talk to him about something, God forbid I talk to him just because I've noticed it that he might be wrong. It's because I see the value of his life, God's calling on his life, and where this could head him, and what he might not see or see. And the only reason I would have a a desire to correct Anthony in my life is because I love him. Because if I correct him just 'cause he's wrong, I ought to keep my mouth shut and find somebody that loves him to talk to him. Because then it's just a right and wrong thing, and there's very little grace on it. It's just people trying to. When you, you, you know, we're afraid to preach the love like it is because we think it empowers and enables people to stay the same. Are you kidding me? It's the answer of our lives changed.

You know, it's even our children. It's not that you don't correct, just and discipline your children, but you always do it through a heart of love for their sake. Because you see a bigger picture than how maybe their repetitive action is tempting to make you feel. "I told you three times now." And you actually teach them a picture of that's how God is. Then, in that sense, that's why we so relate that and we say, "Well, I never had my parents." So they grab that out of that. Well, this is discipline. This is love. And they hear a scripture about God, they can't relate because it's all works and legalism, and if I do good, I'm accepted. And we ingrain that into our children. And some of them are Christian families, and then they're trying to teach mercy, love, and righteousness, and at the same time correcting this way. "I told you three times now." And then bury the discipline, and we drop hammer rather than get them down, get them quiet, maybe even tear fills your eye because you realize they're on a course that you say, "Listen, man, we talk. This is our third, maybe what our fourth conversation. Do you understand?" And all of a sudden, the only reason you're talking is for their sake, not because they're a frustration to you, because they ain't listening, 'cause they embarrassed you in front of somebody. Come on. That is weird and twisted in the way we all became through the fall of man.

You have to discipline people. You have to correct in the church. There's corrections. There's, there's correction for stuff. But where we've gone wrong is we've corrected people 'cause they're wrong, not because they're valuable and worth the blood, and because where their wrong is taking them is detrimental to their productivity and their destiny and their legacy. So we just correct people sometimes 'cause they're a thorn in our flesh or a stumbling block in our home group. And we pull them aside and set them straight. 'Cause if we could set them straight, it will take the pressure off. Do you understand how real I'm being with this? This is what we've done. I'm not saying you did it, but we've done it at large. And we discipline in the church because the Bible and Matthew says, and we make it open show, and we forget compassion and love and the sake of people. Even Paul said, "When a man's disciplined, man, restore such a brother." Soon, don't wait too long, and let him in that situation where he's just aware of wrong and embrace him and love him, receive him. And let's make sure we don't give Satan a foothold in our church. You get it?

Because I teach love and forgiveness all the time, and and sometimes people think that, well, if it's that way, it's just a cushy thing. It's like, "Oh, I just love you, man. It's okay." "Who, what?" "No, I didn't even notice that." "What do you mean you've been sleeping around?" "No, I don't even think that about you, brother." You follow me? That's not love and forgiveness. You have seen how many conversations I've had with this stuff. Grabs me when I try to talk about it, especially young girls. You know, growing and boys and stuff, and they, I would cry is countless over the years. I I can't even keep track of young kids and get alone, and they, and they know what's right, they know. But yet, because they're lacking this relationship where God reality is fueling them, they just know they shouldn't, but they want to. And the desire and the need to outweighs the integrity of knowing it's wrong. See, I don't teach right and wrong. That's what gets people. There's no grace there. So then they cross the line of wrong. Oh my God. And they step into. And then even after the, oh, and there's a side that's bittersweet, like, "Well, was oh, but oh my God, now they're in the dark. They're in secret." I countless, and and I would cry with these kids and say, "Listen, don't you do this. This is what will happen." And and I'd talk out of a lot of other experience. And I remember they sit there and they just, like, encourage them this way. Two months later, come in my office, just balling, and you know exactly what's going on. And then you sit and you cry again. Not what you did. What? Well, you, well, you're in the youth group. How do you? Well, you, you can't. Come on. If you really love God, what? That's like a zero now. It's trying to get people to see their extreme value so they live up to that value and never devalue themselves or their conscience through their actions. Like there's places you can't find me in life 'cause I'm way too valuable to be there. I'm worth way too much. Are you getting this?

Your relationship with the Lord, your God reality, okay? Your God reality, your personal God reality is what will carry you through your life. Not your knowledge of the scriptures, and not your church attendance. The level of God reality that you possess. And we are going to camp there all week, all this week, on growing in God reality to where these things aren't spiritual truths or scriptural truths where you're growing into their your revelation. That when you're all alone and ain't nobody around, you're okay. You understand your worth is life, and your life's worth living. Where you're grown, and that where temptations are coming, and you don't even have a grid for the temptation, they just come because they're common to man, but they just pass by you because there's nothing, there's nothing to even hold to, 'cause God reality in your life has grown you beyond the ability to even struggle there. It's, He's changed, changed you from the inside out. And you're not trying to be a better person. You get it?

Like, I, I try to teach this sometimes. I say to people, "Look, I, God's not a legalist, and He doesn't have a bunch of angels around me in the sense of keeping me straight." There's protection and stuff, and there's angels and stuff in our lives that minister to us, and I understand that. But look, I could leave the class here today, I could go buy a six-pack, stop it, excitement video, and I could hang out in the afternoon all just by myself, and you wouldn't even know it. But then again, I can't. 'Cause that's like, sounds weird to me. I'm 16 years saved, 18 years ago that I would, I would have considered that. It's not a possibility. There's nothing there. Because of what I see, my life has way more value than that. You following? And the level of God reality that I carry is way beyond that. 'Cause He's with me. Like He drives my car. When I worship, He does. He does. He's a good driver. He stays right in the lane. Sometimes I try to hold the wheel and worship. I'm all, He stays in the lane. I don't know how you let go of the wheel and you're in the lane. Like, so let Him drive, right? We're going to worship the whole way home. Or am I going home with you? Or is it taking you home? You going to bail on me and get another ride home? Can somebody take me home? I love you.

So did you have a question? Yeah. Oh, oh, okay. Well, Sue, you make Sue aware. Did you talk to Sue about that? Okay. Talk to her personally, and we'll see what we can. Yeah, 'cause she would be the one to talk to. 'Cause that's the bigger fish pond of the church and the congregation. So thanks for bringing that to our W. Make sure you talk to Sue about that. See what's up and what's available. Okay. Good. Thanks for your heart and care.

Watch this. Let nothing, nothing, what nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit. Honestly, that can be simple where you're not the focus of your day, your life, how things are going for you, how people are thinking about you. You want a good reputation in that sense. You want to have a good name. That's, that's priceless in that sense. You're not living to maul up your name. But what I'm saying is, you're not, okay, here's, here's a good one. In John 2, people started to believe in Jesus, it says, because of the things He was doing. It says that in John 2, it says, "However, He wouldn't commit Himself to them, 'cause He knew all men and needed that no man testify of Him." So it almost sounds like an island unto himself, a little high-minded, like, "Hey, I don't care what you think." That isn't what it means. Because He so committed Himself to us that He gave His life for us. So it sounds like a paradox. That Jesus, they were believing in Him, but He didn't commit Himself to them. When you look up the word here, here's what it means. He didn't allow them to determine His spiritual well-being. He didn't allow them to dictate His identity and determine who He was. And the fact that they were accepting Him and believing wasn't what motivated Him and made Him okay today. It's that He was in the Father, and the Father in Him. Because about the time you entrust yourself to men, men change. Because now they're yelling for Barabbas and putting Him on the cross. And He's allowing His spiritual identity, well-being, to flow through them and come from them. And yet, they tend to be flighty and change. Right? So that's a paradox to me. That scripture.

Five, four, months ago, three months ago, I don't know. Time flies. It, it wasn't that long ago, came through me while I was driving. The Lord just showed that to me. I was driving, and He just showed, "They believe it." I was seeing the scripture in my head 'cause of reading it and just watching the John Gospel of John video. You ever watch that Destiny Gospel of John? They have that on their TV all the time playing. And I go over and laugh. It's so good. Gospel of John. And, but yet, He didn't commit Himself. And I'm like, "What? What? You didn't commit yourself? You gave your life, you submitted to the point of death, you gave yourself to people." That's not what that means. So here, He's giving Himself to a people, but not getting His identity from them. Whoa. You follow me? In selfishness, oh, it's going to be tight. Are you going? Just in selfishness, we give ourselves to people 'cause we're getting our identity from them. So we're willing to give 'cause we're getting. That's why we're so brokenhearted, hurt, and disappointed when it doesn't pan out, 'cause we're trying to find ourselves through one another. Y'all. All right. It's true. It's the way we were taught to live. It's not 'cause you're some evil, wicked person. You were taught the way that seems right to man. You were taught that way from as long back as you can remember. That's the way that's right to man. That's normal. It's not normal. It's twisted. You get it?

So here's Jesus. He wasn't getting His identity from them, but was giving Himself totally to them. Now, how selfless and sweet is that? That's no strings attached, is it? You know how we say, "I love you." "Do you love me?" And we're waiting for the response. All you're saying is, "I love you." For me, it reduces to, "I need you. I'm getting something from you that makes me feel better. So please keep giving it to me." You get it? That is not what Jesus did. Jesus came and said, "I love you." You get it? It's a huge difference than what we were brought up doing. We were brought up, "I need you. I love you for my sake." We have used that word, whoa. Those, "I love you," those three words have been more butchered and used and manipulated in life because people so desperately want to believe they're loved and lovable, that you can, you can live like a wretch and not even mean change and want change and just pull out the card, "I love you," and pass by. 'Cause people are so desperate to believe that you do. "No, really, I love you." "You, no, look, I'm sorry. I, I do. I love." And the very next day, just whatever. And use that card. And I'm telling you, that card flies all the time because people are desperate to feel loved and need loved and need to be loved. And instead of just seeing this one, see, that's the difference between Jesus. He didn't commit Himself, but He gave Himself. I love that about Him. That's a pretty strong position, isn't it? Come on. That other position is vulnerable, right? You're only as good as the faithfulness of men. You're only doing as good as the world's treating you or people are. You ever hear that song, "Nobody can do me like Jesus"? Yeah, it's a good truth there. Nobody's going to do you like Jesus. But nothing. We're getting somewhere here. I think we are.

Through selfish ambition or conceit, but in loneliness of mind, let each esteem others better than who. So you're not ministering to draw attention to yourself. You don't even want God to give you a word to make yourself feel spiritual. Please stop that. God gives you a word because you're already spiritual, 'cause you're in contact with Him and touch with Him and His Spirit lives in you. It's not, "Oh my God, I was used by God." And we draw our identity from that, and we're like, and all that reveals is that you were a mess up until that point and unsure and unstable and undecided. It's, it's, it's fun when God does cool things through you. But if you're letting that determine you're okay, that's deception. Look, I'm a lady. I'm fine. When I leave a subway and those kind of things happen, I'm like, "It's fun to be alive, God. That was just fun." Okay? So don't misunderstand that part. You can enjoy that, but it's not, "Now I'm in touch with the fact that I am a son 'cause God moved through me." No, God moves through you because you are already a son. That's the healthy way. Or you're only going to jump from ministry experience to ministry experience, testimony to testimony. It's just that same thing like coming to the altar. It's the same thing. You'll learn to ride your gift and flow in your gift and get your spiritual identity through your gift instead of your sonship. And ministry will determine who you are instead of His finished work. Come on. It's just a real healthy word. I don't even need to spend a whole lot of time there, but that's true.

Some people feel like, "Boy, if I could just get a clear word of knowledge. If I could just get." And you strive for that because there's something. It will affirm that should already be affirmed. It's, it's not whether you prophesy that you're receiving love and forgiveness, that your heart's sincere and pure. And the pure in heart shall see God. You getting that? You know, there's people that have words of knowledge or move in the prophetic that don't have a lot of peace in their heart, that don't sleep well at night, that don't have clear consciences, but they're moving in their gift. Just trust me. I've been around a little bit. I get with folks. I've stayed in a lot of people's homes. People tend to cry and reveal their heart after about two or three days when you're with them, especially if they see Jesus. They feel like they can trust. I've, I've had more experiences than you can comprehend, even in green rooms, some speakers you would know if I'd say their names, watching tears run down their face, confessing to not even have this. But we run to their conference to feed off that gift. And thank God for the gift. It's tough if you have that gift and you're not free. You want to be free first. Go ahead. It's possible because the gifts and callings are without repentance. And you can come in contact and have confidence in the anointing on your life without this way. You can still have conscience violations. You can realize God loves people and still have a low identity in yourself and just feel like, "Well, it's just my calling. It's just my gifting." And you get in touch with your gift instead of the finished work of Christ and your identity through Christ.

God can move through a drunk, drunk, drunk, backsliding Christian to get to somebody He loves. 'Cause the gifts without repentance. I know a man that slipped into drug addiction and ran, and you couldn't, couldn't find him. He avoided Christians. He was condemned to shame, was back into the slop of what God delivered him from. So just imagine the pressure on his soul. He doesn't want to be there. He's in crisis. It's not some willful, arrogant thing. He's deceived. He crossed some lines. Condemnation grabbed him, shame grabbed him, guilt grabbed him. He's a tormented, suffering man. That whole time, it's not just, "Boy, what a man hog back to the, to the." You know, it's not always like that. Sometimes it's just deep deception and despair. And and that person's in more torment than you can imagine. 'Cause every day they're living in that slop, there's, there's a thing grading on them, and conscience violated, and the gifts and callings are all still there, and they feel like they've done injustice. Are there? It's too late now. And they're ashamed, and all that stuff rules their life.

Well, this man was, you couldn't even track him down or nothing. And and and he passed a man and the lady. And the lady had a condition that was putting her into a wheelchair, and he's going to put her into a nursing home. And they got talking, and compassion rose up in him. In the kingdom that's down inside of him, suppressed by the muck and the stuff, rose up out of him, beyond himself. And he said, "Listen, your wife." And he started preaching Jesus. And this came over him, and he grabbed her and started to pray. He hadn't prayed for over a year. Hadn't prayed for over a year. Just had a tormented heart cry for a year, and condemnation for a year, and guilt and shame for a year. But down inside was the truth being suppressed and overlaid with all this junk, and it rose up out through all that mess to get to that lady. And he said, "You be healed. You be restored." And the lady's instantly healed. She stood up. She had no complications or nothing in her body, right on the spot. Here we are trying to do everything right to move in that power. He's doing everything wrong, moved in that power. So on either end, we're probably messing up. It's probably a grace thing through faith in the finished work of Christ. It probably flows through healthy identity, or we tap into gifting and sovereignty. And sometimes God just says, "And just does it," and we're shocked. True. Now, it's happened to me. Whoa. You know what the guy did? Man's crying, she's crying. All of a sudden, what hits him is the state of his life. The reality of the last year. Soul scramble. This is funny. What he did. It's actually funny, but it's not. He got a paper and a pen. He, man, told me that that this guy got weird. He just, something strange happened 'cause he called me. He wrote my name and number, handed it to him, said, "Call this man. He can explain everything that just happened." And he took off. God did a supernatural miracle through him that some of us have never even seen, and we've tried hard. He's lost in the muck of sin. And God goes, and then his head spins, and he takes off running in shame because, "Who am I to? And how could God? And oh my God." And here's a lady healed. Why? Because Jesus is Lord, and it's by grace, and He's the finished work, and it has nothing to do with flesh. Yay.

So I talked to the man, and I said, "Was his name such and such?" And he said, "That was his name." And I pursued him, and I tracked him down, and he came back to church. It was awesome. And I can't tell you, I'm in touch with him today. But for a season, he came back to church, and time and people shift. And I've known so many people of years. This is a long time ago. But I remember tracking him down and bringing him back to that day. What rose up in him and teaching him about that gift and anointing and separating that from all this, and then dealing with all this, and remember him getting clean and coming back to church and facing people again and facing God. It was just a good time. Isn't it amazing how none of that stopped God's power from flowing through him to get to that person? So you have to be very careful you don't just let that be your Christian identity. And, "Hey, God's healing through me. Everything must be cool. God's healing through me." And yet, in your conscience, you're violated, and you know there's issues in your life. Yeah, God will heal through you because He loves people. God healing through you isn't your affirmation of spirituality in every case. It's just the evidence that He loves people. You get it?

Here's what weighs your spirituality. I never, I don't know if I ever said it this way, but this is how I'm seeing it right now, and I know it's true for me. Your ability to close the door behind you, look up and face Him, and know He loves you and feel really good about this doing this, no matter what. That's a good barometer of spirituality. It's just being able to do that. Some of us don't even really have the strong desire to do that 'cause we've been subverted in so many ways of of believing bad things about ourselves. And we don't believe that we can do that. Oh, you can do that. He's waiting now. We'll do it in a prayer group because we gain confidence with one another praying, and we feel fitting in because there's people. And we live this way. But it says, "Don't just pray in groups and street corners. Don't just pray when everybody's praying." He said, "When you pray," Matthew 6, "get alone in the secret." Your Daddy, the Father, who's in secret. Oh, He'll see you there. And He'll just slip up. And then you know what He'll do? He'll reward you in the open. What are you seeking in secret? You're seeking Him there. What's He rewarded with in the open? Him. That's our whole pursuit in life. Is Him. That I might know Him. Here's Apostle Paul, who we honor and respect, crying out, "That I might know Him." Brother, lighten up. I think you do. No, you don't understand. "I might know Him." Passion in his heart. Because there's a time he leaves a man by the road sick. And there's a time he's telling Timothy, "Just take a little wine for your." And yet he's preaching redemption and all this stuff and promises. And yet he's not seen it as his reality in every area of his life. And then he's humbly penning down that, "I might know Him." Think about it. It's a big deal.

See, people, people find a case against the gospel and they say, "Yeah, but Paul, and he had a revelation, and he didn't see the, the brother healed on the way to Malus and, and, etc., etc. So Paul couldn't heal him." And we make Paul our standard instead of Jesus. And we forget that Paul was crying out that he might know Him more. Why would a man that already knew Him as He could be known cry out to know Him more? Because there's some things in his life that he's writing about that he's not even always seeing manifested, but yet he knows it's God. Think of that. Okay, we got to close. We're going to close this day with communion. I thought we were going to start it with communion. Isn't that cool? Isn't it cool that we like have no idea? Like, you guys came to the school where the guy up front has no, no idea what he's doing. Like, zero. Serious. I have none. I'm like, I'm learning as we go. Like, I'm on a journey. Every day I'm on a journey. I'll go to a church and they'll ask me to do four or five services over the weekend, and I don't even think about it. I just go get up there, and it does what it does, and happens what happens, and I'm like, "This is a journey." So that sure beats being nervous, what I'm going to say, how am I going to preach, are they going to like this? That is like ridiculous. I'm just going to go give them Jesus. I can only give you what I got, and it seems to work out good when we go. It really does. You know what we did? The last church I was at last weekend, we had, everybody line up that never saw anybody healed or never prayed for the sick, and had all the sick line up in front of them. You should have saw that. Tears, crying. One lady had to lay in a car and be drove there for hours from Michigan to lower Ohio, middle Ohio. She couldn't even drive. She had to lay in the car. And she stood up in front of this lady had never prayed for the sick or seen anyone healed, and God just healed this lady. She was dancing and crying, and three days later was still testifying and crying. Just fun stuff. There was just so many things. So God was really cheering people on because they're already qualified. Who knows? We're under pressure to produce things and perform. Just be, be a good tree. So we taught that all weekend. And then Saturday night, the Lord had me get those people. It was really fun. So we're not looking to our own interest, but also the interest of who? Others. Okay, here's, here's this is the biggest deal right here. This is what I was trying to get to all morning. We're right on time. This is huge.

Okay, watch what this verse five says. Let, watch this. This is huge. Let this mind, the one He's about to describe, let this mind, the one He's about to describe, be in you, which was also found in Jesus Christ. Christ Jesus. So the mindset that made Jesus tick, that was in Him, that He lived by, is about to be disclosed. Closed. And He's telling us to have that same mindset. Come on. How huge is this? Come on. You get theological, you can quote gospel scripture, take your time, slow down, and hear what the Spirit of the Lord is saying. He's saying, "Hey guys, I'm about to reveal what motivated Jesus and what made Him who He was, the mind He lived from, and I want that to be your mind too." Oh, man. Holy Spirit had me camping in this chapter for 13 weeks. And let me read nothing else in the Bible. After 13 weeks, I went in my bedroom one day and I opened it up. Well, I just woke up, actually. I was in the bed. I woke up and I turned to Philippians 2. And He said, "Hey, Dan, go ahead and read Philippians 3." I was like, "God, so awesome." 'Cause Philippians 2 had become alive in me. So when I read Philippians 3, I actually understood it. I was like, and I wasn't just getting more Bible knowledge. Knowledge can puff you up. It's love that edifies. Knowing Him isn't what transforms. Knowing about Him is not what transforms your life. It's knowing Him. Knowledge can puff you up. Love edifies. You can quote your whole Bible word for word and not know Him. I don't want that. I don't know that. I can still quote Philippians 2. I read it for 13 weeks, and I've probably read it hundreds of times since then, and it's alive every time. Do you see how I can't get very far? Do you know why? 'Cause I spent so much time there in these scriptures. When I read two, three lines, I could talk for 40 minutes and just, and it just keeps getting bigger in my heart. Why? Because it's not just a scripture. It's life. It's truth. It's, whoa. Did you get it?

Oh, so here's the mind that was in Jesus. Who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, or something to be held on to, or to be seen as equal. Even though He was who He was, He didn't, He didn't, He even called Himself the Son of Man constantly. He said, "I didn't come to be served, but that I might serve." He washed the feet of His disciples. He died on the cross. He didn't come and say, "I'm the Lord, Lord God Almighty, and you need to die for me." No, He came and said, "I'm the Son of Man," and He died for us. It's a pretty different mindset. You know, you ever see these, growing up, you know, you watch these cartoons? They always have these sinister guys on these shows and cartoons and movies, and they always want to rule the world, and the power to rule the universe, and right. And it's always that wicked, twisted guy that gets the power. You know, or the magic ring that gives him all the. And it's like, "Yes, now I can rule the world." And that your whole life, that picture is painted that that's what power goes hand in hand with that, like self-rule and rule and somebody and pedestal and I'm in charge. Isn't that the mindset that gets painted all the time? And all of a sudden, the people with the most money or the most nety, then and the most worshiped and all the money and power and power and earth. Your whole life, that that just doses your heart into that's normal.

And here's Jesus. Who, even though He's in the form of God, didn't consider it robbery to be equal with God or something to be held to, but made Himself choice, made Himself of, wasn't trying to gain reputation in the sense of the world's way. He made Himself of no reputation. Come on. He was born in a, in, in swaddling clothes. He wasn't, He was, you know, the manger thing, you understand that, right? Come on. It, he wasn't just. Think if man knew ahead of time and understood that the Son of God was about to be born, how they would have catered to Mary and rolled out the red carpet and where they'd had her stay and the best in the world to tend for her. And isn't that what we do? Isn't that the mindset we have? And Jesus comes. It's almost like, shh. And Holy Spirit visits this little girl named Mary. Shh. He comes and tells Joseph, "Look, it's cool. She wasn't with somebody else. It's me." Come on. That's too cool. It's me. I put the Son of God in there. It was I just put Him in there. Look, I just overshadowed your honey. No man went into her. I just overshadowed her. Put the Son of God in there. She's still a virgin. Is this to like, whoa, so powerful. Shh. Joseph, don't put her away. Whoa. In a dream. Whoa. So now he's, you're there registering, doing the accounting thing, census thing. Now she, he's born. She's born. Born. Think about an angel shows up to some lowly shepherds, just some fellas in the middle of a field that nobody's really thinking about, and announces the birth of Jesus to those few fellas. There was a few wise men searching Him out. Oh, that'll preach. And the rest of the world was in a hotel where there was no room for Him, living it up with the highest conveniences of life. And here's Jesus in swaddling clothes in a manger.

One day walks along the shore. He's 30 years old, guys. 30 years old. And He's walking along the shore to be baptized by John. And nobody has a clue. He's not announced. He ain't showing off. He's not trying to prove Himself. Up till then, He's just with the Father, just growing. It's amazing. I mean, you didn't blow a trumpet even when He did heal a lot of folks because of the towns and the places and the way word was spreading. He didn't want them to make, they pressed Him to make Him natural king. You guys know that, right? Even when He did miracles, a lot of times He'd say, "Shh, don't tell anybody." We're like, "Dude." [Laughter] And I understand, and it's all right. Forgive me. But some of us are, it's like, "God is moving through me. Let me give you a rundown of the last 10 things He just did." And sometimes that can get weird, huh? You don't even see Jesus talking about anything that God did through Him. You just seem continue to manifest God. And I understand the power of the testimony, and I do, and I'm not saying there's anything wrong with it. But there's a place where you look at Jesus, you never see Him by a fireside or chatting on the Mount of Olives, just reminiscing and talking about how God's using Him. He's constantly manifesting that and imparting to them that they can follow. They can follow. They can follow. You can tell in the life of Jesus, He doesn't even want them to do the "whoa" thing. Even though He's the Son of God, He wants them to follow Him. Is that amazing? He's washing Peter's feet. We laugh at Peter, but we'd have been freaked out. I've had a couple people wash my feet over the years. It freaks me out. So if you come to me and tell me God told you to wash feet after the day and say that, no, forget it. Go wash somebody else's feet. Just does it. It freaks me out. This one girl, girls washing our feet, me and a couple. I couldn't even take. I started, I was like, "Stop. This is too crazy. It's too much." It was too powerful. I was like, it was so humbling. That was good. She just, she washing my feet. "You've been a picture of Christ to me. I look at you and I just get a good picture of Christ, and I just serve this revelation." And oh my God, just washing my feet. I'm just telling you. Yeah, the more she did it, the more I saw the power of it and went, "Whoa." But my first reaction was, "Peter, washing my feet." He, washing my feet. It just, I didn't need her to wash my feet. But when I saw her heart, and she, it was so powerful, it was ridiculous. And I cried and cried and cried. And then after she was done, I said, "Don't you ever do anything like that again." But that's how Peter. Can you imagine Jesus getting tow, getting down, and He's washing the disciples' feet? Now he gets to Peter. "Uh, You're the Lord. You're the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God. You're going to wash my feet?" "Not, I don't think so. Not today." It was, it was a humility. It was a struggle. He's the Lord. Jesus wasn't having any issue with it. He said, "Peter, if I don't wash your feet, you have no part in me." 'Cause he loves Jesus, honors Jesus. Well, then look, "Not only my feet, but my head. My head." "Don't just wash me." So he got over it real quick. When he, but then he said, "What I'm doing now, you don't understand." Etc., etc. And then that whole thing unfolded. You know how we can react sometimes. But here's Jesus. My point is, here's Jesus in that position, totally cool and understanding what He's doing right. And He put Himself in that position. Nobody took His life. He, what, gave it. So He made Himself. That means He emptied Himself of His privileges. Okay? Do you ever hear me talk about when you're a Christian, you lay down all your rights? That's what denying yourself means. How do you have rights if you died and denied yourself? Why are you still living by the world's standards? Well, he shouldn't know. Well, I don't know how much am I supposed to, supposed to take? And, and, and all that stuff we say because the way that seems right to a man, seems right.

Watch this. Form of a bondservant, coming in the likeness of men. So a bondservant. He, being found in the appearances of man. What'd He do? Humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of even death on the cross. Now look, therefore, because of this, that's what that means. Because of this heart, this motive. See, you have to die before you can ever even think a living. You have to be humble before you can ever even think grace is going to overtake your life. Grace and humility go hand in hand. Watch. Therefore, because this mind was in Jesus, God has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at His name everybody would bow ahead, heaven, earth, under the earth, every tongue confess He's Lord. Then He goes on and talks to you and me. Therefore, 'cause there's a relationship between Him and us, because this is true with Him, then not only in my presence, much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with a reverence towards God. For it's God who's working in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure. So do all things without complaining or grumbling, that you may become blameless and innocent, harmless children in the sight of God, or in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as a light and hold fast The Word of Life. Do you see the connection in the relationship? So Jesus lived this way. Let this mind be in you. We follow Him. Humble yourself. First Peter 5, under the mighty hand of God, and in due time, He'll lift you up. You're not doing it to be exalted. You're doing it because that's the exalted place. Humility, service, surrender, dying is where life is found. Giving is more blessed than what? Why? Because it gets your.

mind off of you and what you can obtain. Giving is so receiving in the realm of healthy giving. Is the is glorious, right? Just giving to get. There's not, that's how it's taught. It's not giving to get, it's giving to give. Are you all following me?

So now that we're late, I'll get better. I'm sorry if you got to slip off somebody's going to work or something. Just get up. It won't be rude. Take your communion with you and give yourself to him in the car. But I took me a while last year. I think the first two weeks of school, I ended five, ten minutes late, fifteen. And I said, what am I doing? We got to end on time because we're going to be back tomorrow. It's like I'm trying to fit all thirteen weeks in and every day. It's how I'll feel. Every day I'll feel that way. It'll take me two weeks to get figured out that we're here for a while.

Here's what I want to do. I do want you to understand that he gave his body for you and that he died for your healing. And that's all cool. But today, what I saw in my heart is we're going to receive this on our first day of school to just submit and commit ourselves with knowledge, with understanding that God, my life is yours. Teach me whatever you've got me here for. Open my understanding. My life is yours. I'm not holding back. And I don't have. If there is a, if there is a stronghold in my life, if there's an unteachable place in my life, man, just pull it out of me. Remove it. Just cause it to go away because the best I understand my heart is to know you and become everything you've created me to be. That's what we're doing with communion today. And the way that you gave all that is yours to me, teach me what that means on my end to give all that I am back to you for your name's sake. It's the way that I receive communion sometimes personally. It's just an exchange of covenant. All that is. Because this is what it reminds me of when I take this. All that is yours is mine. Come on. You're still serving humanity. He's at the right hand of God, sitting today. Like I went fishing with Dave Newman for a little bit yesterday. He wasn't even fishing yesterday except that he went with me. But he's at the right hand. He's not on the telephone. If you call, he's not the line's not busy. He's still serving humanity. He's at the right hand of God, mediating on your behalf. And he's the Son of God. He could be racing Michael and Gabriel on a chariot and having fun in the universe. And you know how we think pictures. He's the Son of God. He could be like, guess what he's doing? He's sitting at the right hand of God and his blood's on The Mercy Seat and he's mediating on behalf of men right now. He's amazing.

This is a white, a rice thing. It's totally edible. Don't be bothered by it. It stumbled me all last school semester, didn't it, Becky? I was like, took faith. His body, which was broken. And oh, it does break good. It was broken, wasn't it? So what's a little adversity, a trial, a little pressure? So what if somebody real close to you seems to go off the deep end and act out of character? For wow, why doesn't our heart break for them like his body was broken instead of our heart get broken because of them? Why does natural wisdom allow us to live in the flesh rather than his example? Fuel us by the Spirit. Come on. He was broken, guys, because he wanted to be. He wanted to show us truth through giving of his life and all that is his. It's the Father's good pleasure to to give us the kingdom. Fear not, little flock. Don't be afraid. It's the Father's good pleasure to give you all that he is. This is what this means to me when I look at it. What did he hold back? He gave his life. And he said, if any man come after me, he didn't say pray a prayer to get your name in a book. If any man come after me, let him deny himself. Have the same mind that was also in me. Don't be driven by selfish ambition. Why? Because you'll be vulnerable and touchable if you have selfish ambition. The world will stumble you. People will break your heart and let you down. And you'll have wrong motivations for the things that you do. And your motivation won't be love because it'll still be about you.

Today, we're going to, just as a sign of faith, enter into covenant and say, you know what? I believe you're going to teach me love. I believe you're going to make me become love more than I've ever been loved. And I believe you're going to reproduce who you are in me. And you and me are one. And here's the deal. On my end, all that I can say is sincerely, is the best. Understand all that is mine is yours. So I want you to take that right now. Take that bread. And as you take it, you receive his sacrifice. And in your heart, the best you understand, all that is mine is yours. I'm letting go of rights. And if I have anything in me that's a right, you're going to expose it and remove it because you love me. He's not going to throw you down and twist your arm. Let it go. His goodness, his love, his truth is going to take it out of you. Sometimes, guys, there's not even any pain. Sometimes you don't even know it went. It's just truth renews you. Truth makes you free. It makes you free. You don't always have to hurt to be free. Man, there's so many things I got free from and I didn't even know it until I was just walking free. I was just changed because I was with him.

So Lord Jesus, you gave your body. We took your body and remembered you. And we gave ours in return. And if this gospel cost me my flesh, then so be it. Because if it wasn't for you, I'd have no life and I wouldn't be alive. So let me live for the right reasons. Let me live for the reason you created me. Let me come into communion with that truth like never before. Father, we submit ourselves to you. I ask you to bless this class. To cause a spirit of understanding to come upon us, of wisdom to come upon us. That our eyes would be illuminated. Our hearts would just see that God, we would be transformed right before your eyes and before our very own eyes. In revelation upon revelation upon revelation. That it wouldn't be just good teaching or any kind of teaching, but there'd be revelation of lives changed in this room all through these weeks. Lord, we submit ourselves and we trust. Lord, that you're coming to meet us with revelation and understanding. And father, we're willing to pay whatever price, even our flesh.

And as we take this cup, even this blood that represents the blood that ran out of your body and poured forth when men wounded you and struck you and beat you and pierced you, you forgive forgave every act of sin I ever committed through this blood. And you made me clean and pure and holy in your sight. And even if this gospel cost me my blood, I'll hold nothing back. My life is in you. You have shown me the value of my life through the extremeness of the cross. Why would you do such a thing if you didn't love me? And if I had have amazing value and potential, why would you go so far if I was nothing? I put my faith in the blood that was shed for me. That it's enough. That it is finished. And I release my faith that my blood is yours. I am not for sale. I will not sell out cheap. There is no occupancy in me. There are no vacancy signs all over me. I am not for sale. I am not going to sell cheap through unforgiveness, through discouragement, despair. And I believe you're going to teach me how to walk free. Because in my heart today, I so want to walk in what you made me to walk in. That's all you need in your heart today, God. A big want to. When you're ready, you take this blood and you thank him that you're forgiven. And you thank him that you're free. You thank him right now that he loves you unfailingly. That he's not disappointed with you. He doesn't tolerate you. He loves you. Thank him for that right now. Talk to him. Talk to him right now. Father, thank you. Just whisper out to him. You talk in your heart. You can whisper. You can put your hands over your mouth if you want. Please talk to the Lord right now. You gave yourself to me. I'm in the school. I committed these weeks because I want to know you more. I want to see who I really am. I want the finished work of Christ to reign in my heart and my understanding. And I thank you that you're teaching me and fathering me.

And there's, wow, this is a good one. I'm hearing in my heart. You just say this out. And there is nothing wrong with me. I'm not living from the realm of a problem or what seems to be a setback. I am answer driven. I am moving forward and I am looking up. I am not problem conscious. I am promise driven. I am not a person with a bunch of baggage. I'm a person with a hope, a destiny, and a future. And you're taking me there. I'm telling you, God can clip bags. Even if you got loads of stuff hanging on you, God can clip it as you're looking up. Them things are getting clipped. You don't even have to deal with that stuff most of the time. You'd be amazed. We are dealing with bags upon bags upon bags. We are so problem conscious, weighted down conscious. Let's let that mentality go right now. I heard that in my heart. It was the Spirit of God. I know when I hear his voice clear. He said for me to have you pray that I am not a person with a problem. I have a covenant and I have the hope of eternal life. And I have you, Jesus, loving on me. And I receive it right now. I am not problem driven. I am not down trying to get up. You have raised me from the dead. And I honor you and I worship you.

Stand to your feet with me, class. Please lift your hands high to heaven. Let's just honor him and thank him right now. We're just closing. Sorry I'm late. But let's just honor him right now. Lift your hands high to heaven. Begin to honor him. You're my God. I worship you. I receive your love and your forgiveness. I am not condemned. I am not ashamed. I am a child of God. And I am worthy of the blood. And today I'm stepping out in faith. And I will not be denied. Faith will take me to revelation upon revelation. Yeah. I am not a man with a problem. I am not a woman with a problem. I have a hope, a future, a promise, and a God that's faithful. And while I was yet a sinner, you sent the Son. I have way more than hope now. You came and rescued me. Thank you. Teach me, Lord.

Father, with hands raised and everybody standing in honor of you, I bless this class. I bless this whole summer class, God. Every person in this place, every person on the internet. And I just thank you for hunger. I ask you to honor their hunger. I thank you for grace upon grace coming upon us, Lord God, in each one's lives individually, respectively. I ask you to touch them in a monumental way, in a transforming way. Not to boast this school, not to say we need to come here, but because we've come to seek you, to seek identity, to seek revelation. I believe where there's hunger, there's fulfillment. And I thank you that you're coming and touching each and every one of us right where we're at. Some of us, Lord God, I thank you, you'll touch in ways we weren't even asking to be touched. We'll just realize we've been touched. There, there's some things, Lord God, I believe that you're going to heal and seal and reveal all through these weeks. Lord God, whether we realized it or not. I am excited in my heart. And I thank you for the hunger in this room. And I thank you for your good desire to love us, nurture us, and father us. Holy Spirit, I ask you to come in a great way. Begin to stir our hearts in truth when we're not in class, like never before. I'm asking for this grace to mark this class, Lord. I'm asking you to come and stir us and remind us often of these truths. To provoke us into places, Lord God, of just considering you, of seeking you, of desiring you. When nobody's looking, you even come and tap us on the shoulder. You come and nudge us and say, "Hey," and you get our attention. God, I'm asking you to come and stir and instigate relationship and fellowship and communion with you where it's been a challenge, where it's been difficult. I ask your grace to intervene and you to remove every lie off of every soul and cause us to enter into knowing you. Lord, I thank you that you're the one that makes it fun and desirable. And I thank you that everybody's in. Not one person's out. I thank you, Lord God, for that grace. That's something. I, I'm telling you, I'm hearing by the Spirit of God. I'm marking. And I don't qualify that much, but I know that's the Lord. Just, I'm qualifying this, that you guys are going to have those experiences. This class is going to be marked by that manifestation that you're just driving in your car and it used to be a certain way. And all of a sudden, there's an awareness of God. And and and your mind used to be over here or over there or dwelling on this. And all of a sudden, there's just an awareness of God. And he's just going to begin to instrument like that, just communion and fellowship and relationship. Because deep in our hearts, guys, I can hear that that we desire that. We want that. Father, we're here for one reason: to know you. So we thank you for the grace of knowing you. We're not here to learn more about you. We want to know you. So we thank you for your desire to know us and be known. In Jesus name, we bless your name and thank you. And I bless this class. Amen and amen.

Okay, yeah. Praise God. Tomorrow, same place, same time. We're going to break some things down. We'll start getting real personal, real intimate on some stuff. And, uh, establish. Okay, that's what teaching does. It establishes. I honestly believe the highest anointing in my life is to impart the truth of God's word. That's what I've learned over the years. Bless you. Meet somebody. Hug somebody.