How You See Yourself Will Make You Live Either Like a King or a Slave
By Abraham Israel
Many of us have a slave mentality after we have lived in the condemnation of the devil for a long time. We have been beaten, bruised, condemned and were made to believe the lie of the devil that we can never be what God has said to be in the Word of God.
You might ask, why should God allow me to live like this when He promises a great abundant life in the word of His promise (John 10:10).
My friends, the problem is not with God, but with us humans who are fighting the fight of faith to become perfected in our soul life, so that our life may bring GLORY TO GOD! (1 Peter 1:4-9). God does not keep us away from the problems, but he is faithful to keep His promise of empowering us to become overcomers over all problems we face, as we continue to believe His Word to work on behalf of us (1 Cor 10:13).
The enemy of our soul will try his best to make us live in unbelief so that we may destroy our soul and not experience the abundant life that Jesus promised (1 Peter 2:11; Rom 14:23; John 10:10). We can experience abundant life of God only as much as we believe and not by how much we behave in a perfect way before God and men. So don't be too concerened about your behaviour now, it will fall inline with your belief as you start to rest in the promises of God.
This is the reason God has put a new way of belief system in the New Covenant to be victorious over all types of earthly circumstances we face.
The New Testament system says, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ." (Eph 1:3). In other words, all the spiritual blessings of God that we need as long as we live on this planet earth in order to be sucessful, prosperous, victorious, joyful, peaceful... has already been given to us through Jesus Christ.
Then the question arises, how can I see these spiritual blessings tangibly in the physical dimension of my every day life?
Apostle John gives the answer to this question saying, "11-12 He who has Jesus Christ the Son of God has the eternal heavenly life of God living vibrantly within him to be successful and happy in this earthly life, and this life of God is in His Son who is experiencing it every second in heaven and giving it to people who are living as one in Him on earth. If someone does not have the Son of God Jesus Christ as His Lord and Saviour, He cannot experience this life of God on earth or in the eternal time to come 13 I have written these things to you that you may know by experience this life of God on earth through believing in the name of Jesus Christ, that you may believe Him continually to experience this heavenly blissful life on earth as it is in heaven." (1 John 5:11-12, 13, Abi's Paraphrased Version).
Once we have received Jesus Christ as our Lord and Saviour, we have got positioned to experiecne this awesome life of God on earth. God's life is His fullness. Exactly as Jesus was filled with the fullness of the life of God bodily and has been seated at the right hand of God, we are progressively filled with the same fullness of God to be seated with him in the heavenlies, as we have already been made completely worthy to receive His fullness in our body by His awesome Grace (Eph 1:18-23; 3:16-21; Col 2:9-10). In other words, we cannot be made anymore worthy to God that what we are already in Christ Jesus. God sees us through our Lord Jesus.
When He sees us, He sees Jesus who is dwelling in us spiritually. When our Father in heaven sees our righteousness, he see the perfect righteousness of Jesus in us and not the behavioural rightousness of us which is always like a rag that reveal a person's spiritual nakeness (2 Cor 5:21; Isa 64:6).
We cannot be any more further accepted by our Heavenly Father than what we are already in Christ Jesus (Eph 1:6).
We cannot be any more further blessed than what we are already in Christ Jesus (Eph 1:3).
We cannot please God anymore further than how we have already pleased Him by our faith in Christ Jesus (Heb 11:6; 2 Thess 1:10-11; Gal 3:26).
We cannot be any more sanctified than how much we are already sanctified in Christ Jesus (Heb 10:10, 15).
We are completed product of God in our spirit-man (Eph 4:24), but a progressive recipient of the finished spiritual transaction in the physical realm. This is the reason we should not see ourself as we think how we feel in our soul, but we should see as God sees us as we really are in Christ Jesus. Who we are in Christ is who we really are.
We are a product of our faith and not our behaviour. Behaviour will fall inline with out belief as we pursue the will of God with a passionate heart.
When God sees you as a righteous lion, don't see youself as a helpless puny little cat (Prov 28:1). A Indian Tamil Proverb beautifully says, "You may never know, even a cat might become a tiger". Why not with God's people as we are already of the line of the lion of the tribe of Judah (Rev 5:5)? Though it may look like a spiritual thing to see our self as a tiny little worthless rats, it is this deceiving religious spirit influence that God hates. And this poisonous self-pity also makes us as dry as a bone without the blessing of God inside us. The Israelite's did the same mistake of seeing themselves as grasshoppers, when God who had chosen them saw them as lion (Num 13:33; 24:9). Until we begin to see ourselves as God sees us from heaven, we cannot be able to experience the life of God in its fullness on earth.
The biggest lie of the enemy is to make you believe as you think you are in your soul. The greatest truth of God is to help you believe as you are in your redeemed and reborn spirit inside you.
The enemy knows that the redeemed soul will only be fully made free from sin at the time of rapture of saints (1 Thess 4:14-18). It is desperately evil and irrepairable completely until the appointed time of God in which we will all receive a glorious sin-free, Spirit-led and heaven residing body suit during the rapture of all saints (Jer 17:9; 13:10; 2 Cor 5:2; 1 Cor 15:49, 40, 43-44). Satan usually influences us in our soul easily and therefore will deceive us completely when we are off guard soul walkers and not spirit walkers (Jer 10:21; 11:8; Gal 5:16). The spiritual antidote for soul walking Christians to become spirit walkers is not behavioural change, but a change in one's belief. As also Martin Luther the great reformer says, "Faith is a living, daring confidence in God's grace, so sure and certain that a man could stake his life on it a thousand times."
Therefore keep believing the promises of God even though you may not be able to feel the power of it in your body immediately. All the promises of God are yes in Christ Jesus, ready to be fulfilled for the glory of God to all those who believe it and seek for its fulfillment diligently by continual faith (2 Cor 1:20; Heb 11:6; Jer 1:12).
I hope you will understand this powerful truth through this following story clearly.
A wealthy man had a only son who was born very late in his life after much faith and prayer, and he loved him very much. The family always lived in great peace.
They had a beautiful big farm in which a big lake was there and a lot of trees surrounded it. The father of the house always had a liking towards animals, birds and fishes as he was a naturalist.
As the house of this wealthy man was built on a hillock, it was always a panoramic view of great serenity to see the the lake from the house. But a servant who took care of the house was a very wordly wise guy who was always looking for oppurtunity to promote his own benefit.
The wealthy father instructed the servant to take care of his little boy in such a way that it should not make him think that some one is following him whenever he is in outdoors. So one fine morning on a weekend the boy excitedly ran with all his strength to spend his time on the outdoors near that beautiful lake.
As he saw that big lake shining in the morning sun, he got very much tempted to thow stones and create ripple effect in it. So he collected stones and started to throw stones as far as he could in to the lake and was enjoying himself. Suddenly a misdirected stone went to the other side of the lake and hit a beautiful imported goose that his father recently bought. The stone hit the head of the goose and it fell down immediately before his eyes and it died. The boy cried and ran towards it to see whether it is possible to give first aid to it. But sadly he found it dead. Soon fear took control of him as he was thinking of how he could tell his father about this accident and tragedy. Then he tried to bury the goose immediately before anyone could know it.
Just at that moment when he was burying it, the servant appeared and told the boy, "I know what you did and how you killed the goose, but if you do all the work I tell you, I will not tell this to your father."
So the boy from that day began to work for the servant and the servant enjoyed his time greatly in the ourdoors. But soon the little boy got tired of the laborious work that the servant told him to do day after day and finally decided to tell his father the truth privately.
When he confessed it to his father, he told that he already knew what had happened and he patted the boy on his back for his honesty. Then the father said to the little boy, 'You are my son, so I love you for who you are to me. Then he embraced and kissed him.' The boy could never forget after that what his father said, and from that day he began to look to his father as a friend he could trust in hard times.
The next time the boy went out to play near the lake side, the servant was sitting lethargically expecting the boy to come and do his work. But to the surprise of the servant the boy joyfully played without even noticing the servant who was lying down and enjoying himself near the lake.
The servant angrily asked the little boy why he did not do the work that he was supposed to do as usual. The little boy stupefied and stunned the servant saying, "I love my father and my father loves me because I am his son." The servant on that day ran away as usual to do his daily work or lose his job before the end of the day.
What can we learn from this, we need to confess our wrong doings to our Heavenly Father as soon as possible and then keep believing that because we are his sons and daughters, our Heavenly Father God loves us and we love Him back because of it (1 John 1:9; 4:19). Then when the enemy comes to discourage us and harass us to do his evil bidding through our body, then we must remind him that we are His sons and that God loves us unconditionally at all times because we are his sons and daughters through faith in Christ Jesus (Gal 3:25-26; Jer 31:3). God has become our friend now through Jesus Christ (Prov 17:17; John 15:15; James 2:23) and we ought to see this truth in our day to day life and apply it to transform the way we see ourself differently forever. This will make the enemy to flee away from us (James 4:7-8). Our confession of our sins to God is our submission to him, and that very act becomes a drawing near to him in fellowship. Confession restores the fellowship and restores our sonship identity. It also keeps our faith intact in the promises of God and makes our mind to consider God as a friend whom we can trust with our weakness, sins and inadequancy.
Jesus promised all the sons of God that sin cannot alter the sonship by saying, " 34 ...“Most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin. 35 And a slave does not abide in the house forever, but a son abides forever. 36 Therefore if the Son [has made you free from sin through the Cross, you are free (1 Cor 15:17)]...indeed." (John 8:34-36). We who are adopted in to the house of God are his sons forever by faith which is given as a gift of God (Rom 8:15; Eph 2:8). The next time you are tempted to reject the promises of God because of the condemnation of the enemy, simply remind yourself of the fact that you are God's son and that nothing can change that fact, especially sins of the torturous kind. Then with all faith and confidence in the promises of God remind Satan and his cohorts that you are the son of God, he will surely flee from you as soon as possible.
"Be a sinner and sin strongly, but more strongly have faith and rejoice in Christ. Faith must trample under foot all reason, sense, and understanding." - Martin Luther
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