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The Rock Family Worship Center
Taking The Church Outside The Walls
The Rock Family Worship Center
Introducing You To Yourself
Jesus came to the cross for more than just the forgiveness of sins; He came to reintroduce us to our true selves, to who we really are in Christ. Many Christians walk around with an identity crisis because they don't know who they really are, often stemming from a distorted image of the Father.
• Our perception of God determines how we view ourselves
• The Bible declares "you died" (Colossians 3:3)—your old identity is gone
• Your identity is not rooted in your past experiences or personality
• The gospel isn't about behavior modification but identity exchange
• When Christ went to the cross, He took your old identity with Him
• You are already righteous, accepted, complete, fully loved in Christ
• Living from your true identity stops comparison and performance
• Your life is "hidden with Christ in God"—concealed for safekeeping
• You are not who your trauma tries to define or who religion told you to become
• Awakening to your true identity creates a natural shift in thinking and behavior
It's time to stop living from who you hope to become and start living from who you already are in Christ. Choose to live from heaven now, rather than just waiting for heaven later.
But I made a comment last week when I was preaching, and I don't know if you remember, but as soon as I said it I said, man, that would be a good sermon, because I was talking about what the purpose of Jesus to come to the cross for was more than just the forgiveness of sins. We've said that so often and last week I'd mentioned it and I said you've got to see it as more than just forgiveness of sin. He come to reintroduce us to ourselves, to our true self, to who we really are in Christ. So I took that and I just began to look at it and study on some different things on it. And that's really what this is going to be about today. And you see the title up here, introducing you to Yourself.
Speaker 1:You would be surprised at how many people are walking around and when I'm saying people, I mean Christians, people who are in church this morning. But they're walking around and they're having an identity crisis. They know where they belong, they know they belong to a specific denomination, they know they're a member of a place. They know where they're going when they leave this earth, but they're a member of a place. They know where they're going when they leave this earth, but they're walking around with an identity crisis simply because they don't know who they really are. And it's easy to identify that sometimes you can listen to them. But also you can listen to how they understand and describe the Father, because to understand myself and to truly know who I am in Christ, I've got to take a deep look at my perception of the Father. How do I look at Him? How do I view Him? Because that's going to determine how I begin to view myself and a lot of people, because of the teaching that we've given so much in church of an angry father, of a father who's just out to get us. Unless we do this or do that, we've developed the wrong mindset. And if we have a wrong mindset of the father, then we're going to have a wrong mindset of ourselves. So this morning we're going to talk about introducing you to yourself.
Speaker 1:Today I want to start out with one very familiar verse, but it's going to kind of jump start us this morning Colossians 3 and 3. We went over this verse many times. Some of these verses, you might say, hey, there's more Bible than this. But these verses are very specific to what we're teaching and what we're trying to get people to see. In Colossians 3.3 it says For you died I could stop right there and we could just preach on that a few minutes For you died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
Speaker 1:When we start looking at this verse, it's hard to understand this from a literal standpoint. And when I say that you really can't understand it from a literal standpoint because what you are not literally dead. Your heart's still pumping blood, your lungs are still working, you are still here. So when we try to talk about a verse like this, it's hard for some people to grasp what we're saying, because their first thought is well, I'm not dead. Okay, we're talking about spiritual here and we've got to understand that. So when he says for you died and your life is now hidden with Christ in God, we've got to truly understand what that's talking about.
Speaker 1:So the question I always try to start out with a question just to get you thinking about it. So the question this morning is who are you really? Who are you? Who are you based on what the Bible says, what God says, what the Father says about you? See, most people, I believe, don't know who they truly are. They don't have an understanding of their true identity in Christ. They live out versions of themselves.
Speaker 1:Now think about this, because we've all been there and we may be there right now. This is not a bad thing. This is just the truth. We may live out a version of ourselves that's shaped by our experiences that we've been through. It's shaped by our performance. It is shaped by public perception. How does this person see you? What do they think about you when they see you? And if I walked up to somebody and I said, hey, do you know Cynthia Butler? How are they going to describe her? If I ask them, if they know you, how are they going to describe you? That's being known by the public perception. There's a lot of people you know. Somebody may ask and they say oh yeah, brian, that's that guy that works at the school. I'm known for working at the school, so we're all known by different things from a public perception. Okay, but here's something to think about.
Speaker 1:The world tells us all the time that we need to find ourselves. I think I've taught a message on that one time. It said find yourself. So I'm not knocking this, but I just want you to think about this a minute. The world will tell us that we need to find ourselves, but have you ever noticed that Jesus says the exact opposite? He don't say find yourself. He says lose yourself and then you'll find the real you in him. So it's not that we're searching, trying to figure out my identity, and that's the problem. That's what we do. We search around to see what the world has put on me and I grab onto an identity that the world has put on me and then, all of a sudden, I can't find myself in Christ. Why? Because I'm now being guided and being viewed from this perception that the world has put on me, rather than losing myself in Christ and seeing the true reflection of my identity through Him. So here's some things that I believe we need to recognize and we need to grab on to.
Speaker 1:No matter what you've been through, your identity is not rooted in your past experience, I don't care how bad it was. That's why I often say this, and some people don't like it, but that's okay, I don't care what you've been through, it don't make a difference. Now, again, if you want to tell your story, if you feel the need, if you get born again and you feel the need to get all that out, hey, we'll sit down and have a counseling session. But I don't have to know your story from the past to know your story for the future. I don't have to know every detail of what you've been through and what you've experienced to know who you are right now.
Speaker 1:And we feel like sometimes we've got to do that. We're going to tell somebody why I know who Christ is. I've asked the Lord to come into my life, but we feel like we have to preface that sometimes by telling you first what hell I've come through to get there. Great testimony, nothing wrong with that. But it's not necessary to always have to go backwards to take a couple of steps forward. We don't have to do that, but we have taught people that because we put so much on focusing on the perception of what the world has made me into, that's where I mean, think about it, that's where our testimonies come from. So I'm not knocking.
Speaker 1:You know, listen, your past shapes who you are. Ain't no doubt about that. Your past will cause you to think certain ways and act certain ways, so we can't forget that. But we also have to know that our true identity does not flow from that. And also, you're not defined by your personality. And this is kind of what I'm getting into right there, talking about the way you think and the way you feel and the way you react, your personality, if you really say, okay, what does that mean?
Speaker 1:A personality it's our tendencies, our temperament, our preferences. That's part of who you are. You can't deny that we all have a personality and we all have different personalities. Can't deny that we all have a personality and we all have different personalities. Can't deny that it's part of who you are. But it's not the foundation of your identity. It don't shape your identity. Because why? Because personalities unlike some people.
Speaker 1:Some people would argue this and I'm saying in the science world would argue, but I say that a personality can shift. I believe a person's personality, their preferences think about what we said. It was your preferences, your tendencies, your temperament. That stuff can shift based on what Life experiences Trauma, healing, spiritual growth. I don't think when my life begins to change and I've had this spiritual encounter and I've had this intimate encounter with the true living God there's some things changed. So my preferences are not the same, the tendencies I have are not the same. So therefore, I have made a personality shift.
Speaker 1:So personalities will change and you can be introverted, bold, analytical, sensitive. This may describe how you function on a day-to-day basis, believe it or not. Until I stand behind a pulpit, I'm very introverted. I'm not one of these people who just jump out there and it is in the front and try to stand out in the crowd. I'll seat back to the back. That's just my human nature, my fleshly nature of who I am. That's part of my personality. Until I'm in a pulpit, on a ball field or in a competitive something like that, then it's like the real me comes out and I'm not shying away in the back, I'm going to jump to the forefront. But my true nature is as an introvert. Okay, so those things shift, but it does not define my worth. It does not define my calling or what I'm capable of.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of shy people put a microphone in their hand and you'll say, man, I didn't even know they could speak, I didn't know they could even do this. But, man, there's just something that comes out. Although you've never heard them speak before, you're going to see that one day, when I call Renee up here to speak, she's quiet, she sits back, she listens. And one day you're going to look and say, wow, I didn't know that was in her. Because that's what happens. When that thing shifts and all of a sudden we're getting a true concept of who we are, we begin speaking differently, walking differently, acting differently. Our perception of ourselves and the people and world around us is totally different Because we're viewing it from a different perspective. So let's be honest, there's some people in this room who's been through some stuff. You don't have to sit here and start going over it in your mind and all that kind of stuff, but you know there's some folks who've been through some stuff in here.
Speaker 1:Okay, but if you think about the worst moment that you've ever encountered, it may be tough. It may have been tough when you was going through it, it may have almost seemed impossible and you even said that I'll never get through this. I just don't know how I'm ever going to get over this. But that hardest, most difficult moment in your life does not define you. It does not define who you are. You are who God has always known you to be and Jesus came, as I said last week, to reintroduce you to that person. Why? Because we've been lost in our own perception of who I am. So he came to reintroduce us.
Speaker 1:What if I told you that the gospel isn't about improving yourself? Most people would not agree with me on that, but I want you to hear that the gospel, the good news, is not about improving yourself. It's not about that. It's really about trading your old self for a new one. Making a trade. This is who I was. It's dead. I already read that to you out of Colossians. It's dead. If it's dead, it has to be resurrected. But I'm not resurrecting the old, I'm resurrecting a new creation. So I died. I rose againing a new creation. So I died, I rose again as a new creation. So you've got to see this exchange right here. That happened.
Speaker 1:Let's look at Galatians 2 and 20. This is a great example right here. One of the verses that you can use when you're talking about Jesus didn't just die on the cross to forgive us of our sins so that we can get into heaven. That is part of it, but there's so much more, so much deeper than just that. Verse 20 says I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me. Man, we could preach on this right here. We could stay on this. I have been crucified.
Speaker 1:I started out with the first verse out of Colossians 3 and 3. It says you died Okay. Well, that's a little bit hard to grab onto because I'm with. The first verse out of Colossians 3 and 3 says you died Okay. Well, that's a little bit hard to grab onto because I'm still living and I just can't wrap my mind around that. You have been crucified with Christ. Okay, that's dead. Okay, it's the same thing. Colossians just said Okay.
Speaker 1:So we're following a pattern right here. We're showing you that it's not just an opinion of a pastor, it's not just something I believe, it's just not my theology. This is what the Word of God says, and it don't just say it one time. All through the Bible it says this, but we just don't have an understanding of what it really means. I have been crucified with Christ. I died with Him. We've got to see that. Can you imagine what it would be like if we stopped seeing the gospel as behavior modification, if we stopped looking at the Word of God as something that's just there to try to get us to change our behavior and started seeing it as an identity exchange. Think about that Identity exchange. What does that really mean?
Speaker 1:When Christ went to the cross, he didn't just take your bad behavior. It wasn't just for that. He took your old identity, the identity that was made up of shame, guilt, striving and all this stuff failure. He took that to the cross with Him. It all died in Him and you died with Him and everything that you were guilt, shame, every situation you could think of, every bad thing that is there. It died with Him, according to this verse right here Okay, and then he rose again.
Speaker 1:He didn't just give you a clean slate. Remember, we always say this you died with Him, you were crucified, you was co-crucified and you co-rose with Him. Okay, so you was made alive in Him. You rose with Him. But he didn't do that just to give you a clean slate. He didn't just dust everything off and say keep going. Okay, he gave you a new nature. You are a new creation with a new nature. You are a new creation with a new nature, which means I'm no longer bound and tied to the old nature. I don't think the same way that I used to think. I'm not drawn by the same things I used to be drawn by. I have a new nature. I see things differently now than I ever have before because of the new nature.
Speaker 1:Maybe the best way, but let's go to this verse here first. 2 Corinthians 5 and 17. I want you to see something right here. I've got a way. I want to show you this, but we need to see this verse. 2 Corinthians 5 and 17 sums this up pretty well. Therefore, we're going to talk about that word right there in just a minute. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ I just said this, but I want you to see it he is a new creation. Old things, all the junk, all the stuff that beat you down, all the stuff that made you feel like you wasn't good enough, all the stuff that condemned you Old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new.
Speaker 1:So maybe the best way to truly understand what the Gospel is really saying is to first look at what it's not saying, because we mess it up sometimes, and I used to love when Apostle Townsend used to say that He'd say something. He'd say now don't hear what I'm not saying, and at first I thought it was crazy, but then I began to understand what he was saying and then I started saying that don't hear what I'm not saying, understand what I'm trying to give you. So I believe sometimes we have to just not look at what it is saying, but let's first start with what it's not, what the gospel is not what it's not saying Try harder to be good. It ain't saying that Work on yourself and God will meet you halfway. It ain't saying that Do better, be better, and then maybe you'll be accepted. It ain't saying that Listen, I've heard all those things and they sound really good and they are really good, but they ain't really biblical. They're not verses out of the Bible. Something could be good and not be biblical.
Speaker 1:Okay, the good news is this your old self has died. You've been raised with Christ and now you live from who you already are in him, as a new creation. That's about as simple as you can put that message. You died, you were raised and now you live as something new in Him. Now you can expound on that, obviously, but if you want to narrow it down and put it in a nutshell, that's it. You died, you were raised, but you were raised as something new. Why? Because the past is gone. You died to it. It's gone, it no longer exists, and you was created with a new identity, with a new nature.
Speaker 1:This is not a spiritual makeover. Okay, and that's what sometimes church tries to give us. You come in here and you're going to get a makeover. We're going to clean you up, we're going to put some nice clothes on you, we're going to fix your hair just right, we're going to get some of that dirt off of you. We're going to change the way people look at you and then you'll be one of us. But this is not a makeover here. This is a divine exchange and you've got to see a lot of that Divine exchange.
Speaker 1:He didn't make this exchange with just a few people. He didn't walk and say, well, here's a group of people here that I love and I'm going to give this to them. He didn't walk and say, well, here's a group of people here that I love and I'm going to give this to them. He made this exchange for all. All died. I know we don't want to accept that. Sometimes it's hard for us to recognize that, because all don't include just Christians, all don't include just the ones being born again. He died for all. All were crucified, all were raised.
Speaker 1:Some people say you know, you tiptoed on the line of heresy and they'll start trying to just tear you apart for that. This is Bible. This is understanding what the Bible says, and not just reading it because it sounds really good and because I don't know what it says. I just read it and say go home and study that. No, let's break it down, let's look at it, let's get the true intent. Know what it says? I just read it and say go home and study that. No, let's break it down, let's look at it, let's get the true intent of what it's saying.
Speaker 1:One more verse I want you to see here 1 Corinthians, 15 and 22. Another really good one that goes right along with what I'm saying right here. I'm just giving you a few verses that can follow each other. For, as in Adam, who died all. As in Adam, all die. Even so, in Christ, all shall be made alive. We don't have no problem believing. All died in Adam. Every Christian I know will say that that Adam was a representation of all humanity. And when Adam died, when Adam committed the sin, he did it on behalf of all of humanity, even the ones who wasn't born yet, which included all of us. Okay, you wasn't around then, so he did it for all. We have no problem grabbing on to that. But then we stop. We stop with the verse. We don't read the rest of it after the comma. Even so, in Christ all shall be made alive. People believe this, but you know what this verse means to them I shall be made alive when I go to heaven.
Speaker 1:Don't say that we're misunderstanding. We're misinterpreting what this verse says. So I'm not saying, when I say this all the time, I'm not sitting there saying so and so's theology is wrong and so-and-so's theology is wrong. I think it's incomplete. There's some people that I listen to and I start saying my theology is incomplete Because we're always hopefully, learning more and more. Okay, but this is not talking about that. You'll be alive when you get to heaven. So we've got to understand that. We've got to see it.
Speaker 1:Think about what was exchanged your sin, why? Because Adam done this and you were included with it. Because he was the worldwide representative. He represented all of humanity. He sinned. So therefore you sin right and we understand that sin. We're talking about your distorted image of yourself. I don't know why that is so hard to understand for some folks, and I guess it's because it's been drilled in there behavior, behavior, behavior.
Speaker 1:But even if you go all the way back to Adam, what he done in the sin that was committed, he knew who he was. He was walking with God every day, in the cool of the day. They were intimate, they were spending time together and then all of a sudden God come back and Adam was hid somewhere and God said Adam, where are you? And he said I hid. I hid. I walked with you every day. I've talked to you, I've been in conversation with you, I've been out here with you, but for some reason I felt like I had to hide because I just got a realization that I'm naked. You've been naked the whole time, adam. Really, he didn't lose his clothes when he ate the apple. He'd been naked the whole time, but he never realized it until his eyes were opened.
Speaker 1:So his nature, his image, his image of himself shifted that it was a distorted image of who he was. That was the sin. Eating the apple wasn't a sin. Eating the apple opened the door to the sin. There's another message. It was not the apple opened the door to the sin. There's another message. It was not the apple or whatever fruit it was. We just always say apple, but it was not the fruit, it might have been a plum. The distorted image is what shifted. So the distorted image is what shifted. So the distorted image is what he's bringing back. If he sinned because he ate an apple, I would think Jesus would come back and kill off all apple trees. If that was the sin, why still have it? We've got to see. I'm telling you, this stuff makes so much more sense when we take the little things and begin to understand them and we look at it in the right way. Distorted image. I'm no longer seeing myself the way that God sees me. That's what happened with Adam and because of that, jesus come back to bring restoration to what was wrong. Now A distorted image, not to behavior.
Speaker 1:Think about it like this you got your phone. What if I took Cynthia's phone and I said I just want to bless you, I'm going to go and I'm going to get you an updated phone? And I take this phone and I'm gone for a little while and I bring it back to her and I go and I get a new screen protector on it and I get a new shiny case with a more colorful butterfly and all this kind of. And I just really just do this thing up and I bring it back to her and say here's your updated phone. And then she's going to cut it on and see that her operating system is still the same. Nothing on the inside shifted. It was only trying to beautify the outside. Come on now, that's what church teaches us. Sometimes let's get trying to beautify the outside. Come on now, that's what church teaches us. Sometimes let's get everything fixed up on the outside, but we never really want to focus from the inside out.
Speaker 1:I didn't get her an updated phone. I got her a cleaned up phone, put a new protector on it, put a new case on it, cleaned it up, shined it up and gave it back. Not updated, because it's the same operating system. The phone is still the same, in Christ. Your old system is gone, a new, you runs the show. You don't have the same internal parts that you had before.
Speaker 1:The thinking is not the same. That's why it says be transformed by renewing of the mind. That's why it says repent, change the way you think. It's not about doing, it's about. It says repent, change the way you think. It's not about doing, it's about changing my thinking. And when I change the inside, the outside automatically begins to shift, and sometimes it's not even that it shifts, it's just that I have a different perception of it. You know, let me do a reverse thing on this. I could go and get her a brand new. You know, let me do a reverse thing on this. I could go and get her a brand new, one of the most updated, best number one phone out there as far as the operating system, and I could put a horrible looking case on it Crack Screen, but that phone is still the best phone as far as operating system. Simple things like that, I think, help people see what we're talking about here.
Speaker 1:Jesus didn't upgrade your path. He died to awaken us to our new identity in Christ. It wasn't just the refurbished. While I'm cleaning up the old, he said I'm going to kill the old. I don't want it to exist anymore, so I'm going to kill it off and you're going to be born again, not in an order, but in me.
Speaker 1:Altar experience is just something we've created because we want accountability of what's happened. The Bible never says anything about coming to an altar repeating a prayer. Nothing wrong with it. But I'm just saying, when we understand what we're talking about, being born again into an altar repeating a prayer, nothing wrong with it. But I'm just saying when we understand what we're talking about being born again, I think we've got to understand where it originates from. I can only be born again after I've died. I can only be resurrected after death. How can I say I'm a resurrected person in Christ but then say no, I've never died, but you can't be resurrected until you die?
Speaker 1:2 Corinthians 5 and 19 says this is another good verse. God was in Christ reconciling, making right, bringing back, reconciling the world. I love that, the world. We'd have a problem if this said he was reconciling the believers to himself, christians to himself. He was reconciling the whole world to himself, not imputing their Uh-oh this would be hard to preach Not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation. So it translates as the ministry the only ministry you've ever been given, according to the word of God, is the ministry of reconciliation. That's it. I mean we talk about a lot of different ministries, but the only one that was actually given to us in the Bible was the ministry of reconciliation, only one. We make other things into ministries, there's nothing wrong with that. But if you really want to go back and say, what ministry did Jesus give to me? Ministry of reconciliation.
Speaker 1:And this reconciliation is not a waiting game. The exchange has already been made. I'm not waiting one day for this to happen. You don't earn it by what you do. You don't qualify for it because you meet some type of criteria. You simply awaken to it, wake up. All that's left is to see it, to believe it and to walk in. I can't walk in something I don't understand, and I won't understand something I don't see.
Speaker 1:But what's our job? To introduce people that don't hear, that are still seeing some things in a different way, to just introduce them to it. I can't make them believe it. I can't make them believe that my way is better or my way is right. I'm not trying to do that. I'm just going to introduce you to another way of seeing this and let you decide, let you study this thing out and see what really makes a difference.
Speaker 1:So here's the question what did Jesus actually finish? We've talked about this so many times, but every time I look at it it's like something else is coming. He showed a different way what was finished on the cross when he said it is finished. This is important because it was so much more than simply forgiveness of sin the old you dead, the guilt removed, the separation gone, the performance not necessary. So the old you, the guilt, the separation, the performance mode, performance mentality, all of that is finished. We no longer have to be held accountable to those things.
Speaker 1:And I want to go back to where I started at. I started in Colossians 3. So I want to go back to Colossians 3 and 3 and I'm going to end in the same spot that I started, but we're going to show you this verse from a little bit different perspective of how it makes sense right here, for you died and your life is hidden. We really, just well ago, we zoned in on one part you died. We're trying to get you to see that you died, died, died. He was trying to get you to see that you died, died, died. Now we're going to go to the next part, after the comment and your life is hidden with Christ. This verse has always messed with me, because when I first started learning this and first seeing this, I was like, okay, if I'm dead, I don't have a life. And then it hit me, in fact I died to old self. But it says my life. I still have a life, but it's hidden with Christ.
Speaker 1:The Greek word if you look up the word hidden, the Greek word is group talk and it means it means concealed for safekeeping. Think about it Concealed for safekeeping. This is not about hiding in fear. It's about being tucked away in Christ to do what? To be protected from distortion, so that you know who you really are. You're hid away, you're concealed. It's like treasuring a vault. If you've got gold, you don't just leave it laying around on the dresser, you put it up. So it's like treasuring a vault. Or it's like a seed being put in the dirt. That seed is concealed away under the dirt until life comes.
Speaker 1:Matthew 13,. The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field. Proverbs 25,. It is the glory of God to conceal a matter. To what Hide a matter? Why? Because everybody is not ready for it. So sometimes God will conceal a matter and then we go after it, we search it out and it is revealed to us. The more we understand Him, the more we understand the Word. Some things are just revealed to us as revelation when something is hidden. It's hidden. It's safe and it's secure. Get the question Safe and secure. And what is hidden is not found by working and striving. It's found by revelation. It's revealed. So it's hid away for a purpose.
Speaker 1:You don't discover yourself by looking in a mirror. Think about that If you was to pull a mirror out and look in it. You don't discover yourself by looking in the mirror. The mirror shows you who you appear to be and it'll show everything. It'll show what you like, it'll show what you don't like. All that stuff will start coming to your mind when you look in that mirror, but it shows who you appear to be. The cross shows who you were meant to be. It changes. So who is the real you? Let's meet the version of you. I'm getting ready to end right here, but let's meet the version of you that's already alive in Christ. This is a version that we're not trying to strive for, we're not hoping to get one day. This is the version of you right now that, whether you see it or not, whether you've awakened to it or not, is already alive in Christ. You are righteous according to the Word of God.
Speaker 1:2 Corinthians, 5 and 21. You are accepted. Ephesians 1 and 6. You are the hard one now Complete. Colossians 2 and 10. You are seated with Christ Ephesians 2 and 10. You are seated with Christ Ephesians 2 and 6. I'm saying these verses so if you don't get them now, you can go back online and they'll be there. You are fully loved, not partially Fully loved Romans 8, 38 and 39. You are God's masterpiece Ephesians 2 and 10. You're righteous, you're accepted, you're complete, you're seated with Christ, you're fully loved and you are God's masterpiece. That's things. That is already complete because of what happened on the cross. There's nothing you can do to work for it, to earn it or to qualify for it. You're already qualified because he qualified you. So you're not meeting today a better version of yourself. You're meeting the only version that God ever had in mind for you.
Speaker 1:And there's people walking around today who does not see themselves as righteous. They feel like their bad behavior disqualifies them. They don't see themselves as accepted because they haven't knelt down out of an altar anywhere and said the Lord's Prayer. They don't see themselves as complete because they've got too much junk, too much stuff still there. They don't see themselves as fully loved because a lot of people don't even know what love is and we're talking about this love of the Father. I just had a counseling session the other day and I had the exact question I asked the person. I said can you tell me what love is? And they couldn't. And I started explaining the difference between what we're talking about.
Speaker 1:Love as we see it a lot of times as a feeling I love you, I feel something towards you. Love's not a feeling. Love's a choice. Love is the unconditional love of the Father. Means I'm going to love you in spite of. I'm going to love you even with those flaws. Unconditioned means I'm going to love you without condition. See, the love that the Father gives is not that. If love, I'll love you. If you say this prayer, I'll love you. If you stop doing that, I'll love you. If you stop doing that, I'll love you. If you stop thinking those thoughts. That's not the Father. It's unconditional, without condition.
Speaker 1:No matter what you went through, no matter what you've done, he loves you fully, completely. So you're not meeting just a better version of yourself. You're meeting the only version that God ever had in mind for you, the one he saw before you ever failed, before you ever messed up, and the one he still sees today, even after all the failure, he still sees that Now this is a hard message to preach and it's a hard message for people to grab onto because we automatically think now we're just telling people they can live how they want because God loves us all anyway. But that is actually the truth. But remember what I said a while ago when you truly understand self, something changes. So some of the things, my nature, begins to shift, my personality traits begin to shift. So those old things, those old thoughts, all that stuff begins to turn. Okay, so there's some things I don't look at the same way as I used to.
Speaker 1:But we're not saying just live how you want, that everybody's going to heaven. I mean, that's not what we're teaching. We're not teaching a universalism. We're not teaching just do whatever you want to do, but we are teaching that the Father loves you Regardless of what's happening. He loves you unconditionally, without condition. You don't have to qualify for His love. You don't have to meet certain His love. You don't have to meet certain criteria for Him to love you. He loved you before you even had the ability to mess it up, before the foundation of the world. He chose you.
Speaker 1:We teach so much about this because it's time to change some things. It's time to live from who you are and not from who you hope to become. We're focusing so much on trying to get to a place and we're hoping that we're just good enough to get there. Y'all have heard the phrase this guy right here is just going to slip into heaven. Barely make it. That's kind of our theology. I hope I just get in there. I don't care if I just slip in and they have to pull me the rest of the way, as long as I get there. That's kind of the mindset that we live with.
Speaker 1:Religion says try harder. You know, grace says it's finished, it's done, it's complete, it's sufficient. So it's time to stop performing for identity and start living from a place of identity. When you know who you are, let me tell you some things that will stop. You stop comparing yourself to others, you stop pretending, you stop performing and you walk differently. You walk with peace, you walk with power, you walk with authority, you speak with authority.
Speaker 1:People ain't always going to like it. People are going to tell you you're wrong. People are going to tell you you're misinterpreting the Bible. People are going to say you don't know who God really is. That's fine, because I'm not doing this for their approval or pat on the back. Things will change when you truly understand your identity in Christ. Your perception of Bible verses will change drastically and people won't agree with you. They will not agree with the way you're interpreting the Scripture, even though you're going back to the traditional way that the Bible was written. And you're going back to the traditional way that the Bible was written and you're looking at it and you're looking at the true understanding of what that word means, and you're looking at it with context, because it don't align with what's always been taught. It creates a little battle there. It should, but it doesn't. So remember what it said in Colossians 3.
Speaker 1:Your life is hidden with Christ, in God. You're not who your trauma tries to define. You're not who religion told you to become. You are who Christ reveals you to be, and that person is righteous, whole, loved, redeemed, forgiven, complete. But the question is can you see it? And if you can't, it still don't change it. It still don't change it. It's just you're not awakened to it yet. When you awake to it, what are we doing? We're trying to wake people up to the truth of their identity. When you awaken to it. There's a shift that's going to happen and I hope people in here awaken to it. That's why I said I'm not preaching to you necessarily, but giving you stuff that you can go out and have conversations with other people and you can talk to other people, you can share things with them. You are who Christ reveals you to be. So welcome to the you that's no longer searching, striving, working, surviving, putting that mask on and just surviving every day Until God takes you home.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of people that's just waiting. I'm just getting by. And a lot of people that's just waiting. I'm just getting by. And a lot of times their prayer is Lord, I'm ready, take me home. You will never hear me pray that I don't want to go See some people. Some people are anxious to meet God because they don't know Him. I know Him, I spend time with Him. So why am I so in such a hurry to get somewhere to be with Him, when I'm with Him every day anyway? Why I saw you in such a hurry to get somewhere to be with Him, when I'm with Him every day anyway?
Speaker 1:I didn't say they wasn't born again as we define it. You can be born again. You can say your prayer and still not truly understand who the Father is, and therefore there's a lack of understanding of who I am. We have an opportunity now just to rest in the truth of who we were created to be, what Christ has already done, what's complete, finished. Or we can live a life looking to the sky and waiting. It's kind of crazy because the Bible tells you you're not going to know anyway. I mean, it don't make a lot of sense. So it really comes down to us.
Speaker 1:What do we choose? You could choose to live life now. You could choose to have heaven now. You could choose to live life now. You could choose to have heaven now. You could choose to walk with Him now. You could choose to be intimate with the Father now. You could choose to know who he is. So, therefore, I know who I am. You could choose that now. Or you could say one day and keep struggling now One day and keep going through hell now One day. Why not today? Why not today? Why not let today be a reintroduction of yourself to what, to the real you, no longer living with a false identity, no longer living with an identity crisis, no longer being molded and shaped into what everybody else is, because when I don't know who I am, I'll act like somebody else. So no longer do I have to pretend to be what I'm not, no longer do I have to pretend to be what I'm not, no longer do I have to fake it until I make it. I can just rest. I can rest in the understanding of who I am in Christ.
Speaker 1:I had somebody talk to me the other day and they told me that they were this message, the message, and I say message. We preach a lot of messages, but the theme of what we're talking about was really hard for them to grab onto. I know that I do. It took me a long time to awaken to it. I can go back and I can tell you some of these messages I'm preaching. They were messages I preached back in 2007, 2008,. Because I date my messages.
Speaker 1:I was preaching it then, but I wasn't awakened to it. I might have one eye open, but now I'm awake to it and I see it. I'm not there yet. I learn something every day. I'll go and listen to Tommy or listen to somebody and I'll say, wow, I've never seen that before and I'll learn something new about it. But I mean, I'm a lot more awake than what I was in 2007 and 8.
Speaker 1:But yet I was preaching it.
Speaker 1:But you know what it was? I was hearing, I was getting revelation on it. I was hearing some folks preach it and I was getting revelation on it and it resonated with me, but I just didn't quite understand it yet. But it's taken years for it to really just sit in there and kind of marinate and marinate and all of a sudden, wow, this is boom, the light comes on. So I can imagine what it's like for somebody who's brought up in a totally different denomination with a totally different teaching.
Speaker 1:That's sometimes very contradictory to what I'm teaching. I can understand how difficult that is. So again, you'll never hear me say well, I'm right and brother so-and-so at the Baptist church is wrong. I'm not saying that Because I can come back and look at my own message and say, dude, you were wrong. But we're not using right and wrong. We're just saying where do you want to be? What level do you at? What place do you want to stop your learning? You can stop today or you can keep going and you can keep learning more. You can keep getting more revelation, more understanding, and the more you get, the more it's scary sometimes Because you start realizing things that you've believed for so long is just not accurate. It's not true, it don't really line up with what the Word is, what the Word really says, but we've always believed it.