Pastor Ken…
Good morning, everyone. Hello on this Tuesday morning sub-zero day in Minnesota. Hopefully, it’s warmer where you’re at, but it’s a sub-zero morning here in Minnesota, on this last day of January.
God’s got some good things in store for us. And in the next month, I believe. We’re going to take some time and enter into worship this morning. I invite you to open your heart to Him, open your soul to Him this morning. Invite him to come in.
He wired us up to need Him…
We desperately need Jesus. There’s never a day that you or I don’t desperately need Him. In fact, He wired us up to need Him, to be dependent on Him… not on a substance or another person or a job or money or any other thing. But He has wired us up and made us uniquely and wonderfully and amazingly to need Him, to be dependent on Him.
Jesus said, “Apart from Him, I can do nothing…”
Jesus Himself recognized that as the one who came, the darling of heaven, who came, He laid down His godhead in His place at the right hand of the throne of God. And the Bible says He took on the form of a human being. He became our forerunner, the one who demonstrated the way forward and how we could live and move and have our being on planet earth during the short time that we appear in this realm anyway, before we go on to the next. And He had this observation at one point. He described it this way. He said, “Apart from Him, my heavenly Father, I can do nothing.”
When I am weak, it’s an opportunity for Him to step in…
In other words, if Jesus could say and recognize that, how much more should we identify with that: apart from Him, we can do nothing. And I don’t know about you, but I’m getting to the place in my spiritual journey where I’m starting to rejoice and celebrate in the fact that apart from Him, I can do nothing. I celebrate it. I’ve learned the secret of weakness, that when I am weak, it’s opportunity for Him to step in and come through and be strong in me. When I don’t see a way forward, I begin to rejoice because I know God has already made the way forward. He is my game changer, my way maker.
God has made a way forward for you…
That is true for us this morning. For your soul this morning. Although it may be malfunctioning or short circuiting with crazy emotions and feelings and maybe you’ve been disconnected with your courage this morning, God has a way forward for you. He’s made a way. He is the darling of heaven who came to change the game concerning your finances, and your family, and your ministry, and your business, and whatever it is that you’ve been assigned to do and to follow in, He has made a way. He is the way maker. And He wants to work in us His good pleasure and delight. He wants to work and weave in you and me this morning a fresh supply of His spirit and grace. He wants to weave into you and into the fibers of your being new strength and refreshing. His intent is that in this hour we would be revived. That glory would shower down on this generation and that we would experience, once again, the supernaturalness of heaven. Experience, once again, the strength of His might.
In a childlike fashion, acknowledge Him…
Once again, the writer of Ephesians, that being Paul, said that there is power assigned to you and me, that there’s great power that is to and toward us who believe. That’s all that’s needed this morning, is to believe. In a childlike fashion, acknowledge Him and look up and say, “What’s up, Papa?” As Jerry Savelle once said. “What’s up, Abba? What’s up, Heavenly Father? You’re my source. You are my supply. You are all that I need this morning. I’m hungry for you.” That’s what we can do with our will. You may not be able to do a lot of things or even know the way forward in your natural intellect, but one thing we can do is we can choose God each and every day and say, “Lord, I’m hungry for you. I need you. I want you. I want to know you more profoundly, more accurately, more intimately.”
Because His intent is that the download that He wants to bring in and through our lives, that it would animate our actions, that it would infuse us with divine, heaven-sent assistance, that it would bring expression through us, through His Spirit, by His Spirit.
I have given you all authority…
Maybe we’ll just read something before we worship. There’s a devotional I want to read; in it is a point of reflection that perhaps goes along with what I’m saying. But in Luke 10:19, it says, “Behold, I have given you authority to tread on serpents and scorpions and over all the power of the enemy and nothing…” One translation says, “By any means will hurt or harm you.” In the NASB it says, “and nothing will injure you.” Glory to God. I just sense more and more that the Spirit of God is inviting and calling the church to rise and thrive… to rise, to mobilize, and thrive.
The Big Mo…
I was just reading a chapter out of one of John Maxwell’s book on leadership last night. He was reminding us in the chapter about the “big mo.” Momentum he was speaking about. And there is such a thing as spiritual momentum that God is granting you this morning. I’m speaking to each of you online and this chapel this morning. God is granting momentum to rise, mobilize, and truly thrive in this moment in history, in this season of your life in particular calling and what God has assigned you to. He’s granting momentum. Momentum is a beautiful thing. When you have it in business, when you have it in a sport… It really is nice to have. When you don’t, not enjoyable. But there’s a momentum God is granting to us spiritually right now, that He wants us to take hold of and enter into a momentum that is designed to carry us, to take us from where we are, to where He is calling us to be, individually and as a collective. That being the collective of the body of Christ. Momentum that is supernatural in nature… momentum that is all encompassing in its application and deployment in our lives. In other words, it will apply to your finances equally as it’ll apply to your prayer life, your relational life, your particular ministry, and what God has assigned you to do. There’s a momentum now.
Will you receive that momentum?
We know that momentum includes authority because the Bible’s very adamant and punctuates the fact that all authority in heaven and earth was granted unto Him. And as we read in the final chapter of Matthew, He delegated that authority to His disciples. And by virtue of you being in family, that authority in heaven and earth has been granted to you and to me and the church as a whole family. Authority. Momentum to stride, to not struggle, but to stride. And to develop a cadence in our prayer lives, a cadence that begins to reveal the glory of God. A cadence in our running, in our striving, in our race of faith that begins to emanate God’s glory and produce miracles and cause increase to show up in your bank account and in our churches and in every aspect of our earthly assignments. There’s a momentum He’s granting now. Will you receive it? Will you agree with it? Will you go with it?
Choose Him today…
But it goes back to what I said earlier. You’ve got to leverage and utilize your will. The Bible says… I believe it’s in Isaiah, “Who among you will stir him or herself up to take hold of more of God?” It’s that simple. Leverage your will and choose life today as the Bible says. Choose Him today. Choose to run your race of faith today. Choose to strive with God in prayer today and not struggle. Choose to enter into your future and not be bogged down by the failures and the abandonment and the struggles and the limitations of your past.
The best is yet to come…
Your past does not equal your future. I like to say there’s a reason why auto engineers designed a windshield to be this big piece of glass that you can look out and ahead, but they only gave a tiny little mirror to see what’s behind you. And that’s what God is saying. Our future is bright. The best is yet to come. He’s granting momentum to the church. He’s granting momentum to you and yours today. Choose Him today.
“Well, I did, Ken. I came to an altar many years ago and gave my heart.”
Well, that’s great, but how many of you know that salvation is just the first or the introductory offer when it comes to salvation? It’s just the first step of many through the rest of your life. God always has a level up available for us. He’s always got something next in mind. He’s already prepared a breakthrough, unprecedented favor, increase, promotion, new intentionality that He wants to discharge through you.
It won’t happen if we sit around and pet devils…
Or I always go back to what Jesus said once again. He’s taught us to pray that it would be “on earth as it is in heaven.” Well, that on earth as it happens in heaven through you and through me. As we go with Him. Not as we just try to get by and we just play around with the status quo. Or if I can get a little crass. A friend of mine once said, “Not when we just sit around and pet devils, and pet familiar spirits, and pet old patterns of behavior and thoughts and attitudes.”
We have the authority to kick out demonic spirits…
You have the authority as a believer, as a pray-er to kick those diabolical, deceptive, harassing habits, patterns, demonic spirits. You have the ability to route them out of your life. Remember, Jesus said that the keys of the kingdom were to bind and to loose. That means to refuse or to permit. So you have the ability this morning, not only as we pray about things beyond ourselves that concern the nation and the body of Christ. But first and foremost, pray-ers must acknowledge and understand and become skillful in the use of the prayer of binding. The decree of binding and say, “No devil, you may not have your way in my soul, in my emotions. You may not set up a tent in my home in regard to this particular problem or this issue.” It will not stay. It’s not welcome. Yes, though I walk through the psalmist penned in the scriptures… Yes, though I walk through the valley that has shadows that appear like the defeat or the death of me. In other words, keep going.
He wants to do a great work in you…
We trust and follow Him. His Word and His Spirit comfort us. Empower us. His Word equips us and makes us competent to route the enemy, to bind those evil forces in our lives and in others. So God’s granting momentum. Will you go with Him? I mean, I’m just going to prophesy over you that in the coming months, in the next year, and it could be a much shorter timeline, you will be able to describe yourself if you will take hold of this spirit-granted momentum, you can describe yourself as the most changed person in the world. Not just for little O you to say, “Hey. I’m changed. I’m free.” That’s great. But God’s always out ahead of that and thinking what He wants to do in you, but also what He wants to do through you. Before He can do a great work through you, He wants to do a great work in you.
Refused to be pressed into the mold of this world’s ways…
So the writer of Luke 10:19 says, “Behold, I give you authority.” I give you spiritual momentum, you could say. Authority defined literally from the scriptural standpoint, means the right to rule within a given domain. Your given domain is your life, your household, your business, your ministry, your church, your body, your emotions. Romans tells us in one particular translation, “Don’t be pressed.” In other words, refuse to permit to be pressed into the mold of this world’s ways, thoughts, attitudes, and actions. But instead on a daily ongoing basis, be transformed, be changed from within by the renewal, refreshing, and refilling of your consciousness, refilling of your soul with God’s thoughts, with God’s ways.
They’re out and you’re in…
This is God’s way. His way is authority. His way is to push back darkness, not entertain and welcome and serve hors d’oeuvres to dark entities. Make no mistake about it. As I referenced yesterday, we live in a realm that is thickly populated with demonic entities who don’t like you or the church or Israel for that matter. Because they’re out. They’ve lost their place and there’s no hope or redemption for them. Only certain judgment. They’re out and you’re in. You’re a son or daughter of the most high God… the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. You are crowned with glory. You are robed in the righteousness that is analogous to the righteousness that Jesus Himself bears on and in Him. You are qualified. You’ve been made competent. You are entirely lovely and doted upon by your Heavenly Father. There’s nothing he won’t do for you and for me, for you are entirely lovely to Him. Because you emanate the fragrance of grace and redemption, which Jesus clothed you in.