Thursday 23 October 2008

The Struggle for the Authentic - Part 2

This sermon was preached by Rob Rufus at City Church International in Hong Kong on 14th September 2008. This - I believe - will really go down in time as another Rob "classic". I was gripped as I typed. Literally - I couldn't stop until half past two in the morning typing with all my might. This is a prophetic scream that must be heard across the nations.

"The prophetic word to us today that we are going to be hearing a bit later is that we are living in times of the greatest opportunity for destiny and yet we are living in times of great distraction from that destiny. The power of distraction is to visit limitation on your life - to deprive you, to distract you, to decoy you of your highway of destiny.

To live a life that is not fulfilling destiny is to live a life of boredom, frustration, vulnerability to sin at high levels.

But when we come into a revelation of God's love for us, God's grace for us, that God is for us, that God has already achieved the victory for us at the Cross - all He says is; "By faith step in and believe that on that Cross Jesus triumphed for you". He didn't do it for Himself - He hadn't lost anything - He did it for you. He was yours and my Conqueror, He is our champion from heaven that won on our behalf. We inherit all of His inheritance as joint equal heirs with Christ and heirs of God and we are called to be ambassadors of the government of heaven here on earth.

This is a high calling and these are the days when billions are going to be saved, where whole nations are going to turn to the Lord - whole nations.

So we are living in the best of times and in the worst of times. It depends on what you focus on. Because what you focus on - you become. If you focus on the good that God is doing and take your eyes off the evil and the terrible disappointments in the earth and fix your eyes on the good - but most of all don't look at your problems! Look at the size of your God! The devil is determined to get you distracted by your circumstances and by what challenges you and the problems and then consume all your energy in human effort and in human limited wisdom trying to solve your problems.

Distraction brings limitation from destiny that brings the higher power of God on your life to reign in victory.

We hold hands to agree today that we are not going to be distracted off our destiny and we will agree that our God is an awesome God! Have you seen my problems? Who cares! Have you seen my God?! And everything meant for evil that comes against me, He turns around for my good for those who love Him and are called according to His purpose!

We are dealing with a series called; "The Struggle for Authenticity" - everyone is born and designed as original but most people die a cheap copy because they live a life that is a counterfeit life for someone else's dream. Someone else's idea of what they are meant to do instead of hearing God's dream. God's dream is your destiny and God co-ordinated your personality, your gift mixtures, your talents and your background and the preparation and where you were born was co-ordinated. He co-ordinated this to fit into your destiny.

Now there are two things you have to know to live authentically. 1. What you are. 2. What your destiny is.

If you don't know who you are and are trying to live a false life - to live upto someone else's expectation then you will not co-ordinate or connect with your eternal destiny that has begun and was planned for you before time began. In the right time God connects you with all your uniqueness into your destiny and when that happens it's called "fulfillment" and everything else is called "frustration". Everything else is called eating food, passing it through your body, taking up space, surviving it and then dying. That's what it is. That's miserable when you think that God who created the heavens and the earth designed us for destiny and for a purpose.

Last week I spoke about celebrating your authentic uniqueness and how to do that. I said that the religious spirit and the political spirit which are both evil spirits are seeking to connive and contrive to manipulate you and me into allegiance towards them by masquerading and hiding their real evil agendas which is really to control you and counterfeit you and make you a cheap copy rather than giving you opportunity to praise God and celebrate and enjoy your authentic uniqueness. I want to talk about why you can't live in that little hole of limitation and distraction- which you cannot and will not fit in there because God has called you to greatness.

The purpose of distraction is to destroy your dream and your dream is your destiny. The purpose of distraction is to kill your dream.

I want to tell you what some of these distractions are in the life of some brothers and sisters that lived in Bible times.

The purpose of your destiny is not just for your personal breakthrough and fulfillment. Any breakthrough you get in your destiny will bring blessing and relief and liberation for multitudes of other people.

You may say; "Well I want to have a little survival, mediocre life". That's fine if it was just about you. But God called you to get personal breakthrough in destiny because it will bring liberation and blessing to homes, families, education systems, politics, regions and into nations. You have to have a desire to live a long time if you want to fulfill destiny. You have to survive much opposition to see your destiny. Abraham faced 25 years of opposition to his destiny but finally his destiny was fulfilled and the nations of the earth are blessed through Abraham fighting through to win his destiny. Joseph was given a dream to rule and to reign and he faced opposition, he faced distraction from jealous brothers. All 11 brothers hated him and tried to kill him and finally put him in a well.

Lying Potiphar's wife tried to seduce him into adultery and he resisted that and she lied and falsely accused him. Then he was abandoned in prison by the people that he had interpreted the dreams of. Joseph came out of prison and became the Prime Minister of Egypt and his destiny was fulfilled and he had affected blessing on all of Egypt and all of Israel. He forgave his 11 brothers and he brought them into personal blessing of breakthough. Think of David - Saul tried to kill David every single day and that is a distraction. Then in the middle of that David commits adultery and then murder and yet besides all of those distraction David comes through and fulfills God's purpose in his generation and multitudes are blessed to this very day because of David fulfilling destiny.

You have the disciples who were walking with Jesus for 3 years and they were His inner circle. He would bring them into the New Covenant and they would change the world and they were full of hope and then one day Jesus was arrested and falsely trialled and put to death and their dreams faced distraction and opposition but Jesus rose from the dead and they became mighty apostles that we are benefiting from to this day.

There are multitudes and nations who's destiny relies on your personal breakthrough into victory and into your destiny. We are not called to live small lives - we are called to live lives because there is a bigger thing at stake.

Gideon was facing the worst kind of opposition to his destiny - distraction and Gideon came out of that confinement and limitation and lived such a great life that he with an army of 300 people overcome 100's of thousands of his enemies and liberated Israel. Gideon has been on my heart for 3 months now. There is a big difference between a one-off winner and a champion. A one-off winner gets a lucky break, gets an individual prize for something and then never does another thing with their life. But a champion is for their entire life, living on purpose to win and succeed to see the glory of God manifest in the earth.

A champion will face difficulties, set-backs, failures, disappointments, betrayals and yet year after year, decade after decade, keep going forward - because there is something I want to talk about.

The difference between someone that fulfills their calling in life and someone who doesn't is simply this word; "called". When you know the call of God and who you are, you are going to fulfill your destiny.

It is the word "called". It's in the New Testament - the New Testament was written in Greek and that word "called" is the word "Καλούμενος" - "to call" - we will talk about that in a little while. Every human being is called on this planet. Everyone is born into a calling. Jesus said; "Many are called but few are chosen". The reason that is few choose to respond to the battle for uniqueness, to celebrate who they are and few respond to the call of God to destiny because they allow distractions to bring limitations on their lives and they live a dwarfed diminished life instead of a life that has destiny and a call to greatness.

We love to celebrate champions and heroes out there and I like that - that's good. But I don't do that so much anymore because I want to forge my own life as a champion. I want others to talk about me fulfilling destiny rather than me talking about great people and you should stop looking at others who are great. Learn from them but determine who you are going to be - great because you are called to be great!

You were never called to mediocrity. (Judges 6:1) - Israel was being dominated by the Mideanites - they had come in on their land with an army that the Israelities could not number. It was so vast. Every time the Israelites sowed their crops, the Mideanites came and stole all their wheat and all their survival hope. The Mideanites came and destroyed all of their livelihood. It says in (v6) that Israel was greatly impoverished, it had no wealthy left or victorious people - it was under oppression and darkness and destruction. They came into a survival mentality and Gideon was like any other person. He is hiding in a winepress because he is terrified of the Mideanites.

He is surrounded by distracting circumstances so he has withdrawn into a little dark hole of limitation and his whole life is focused on protecting a little bit of a wheat from them stealing it so he can have a little bit to eat for himself. Into that situation God speaks. How many of you know that even the angel of the Lord goes to the Oprah Winfrey show!? Let's read Judges 6:11+. Gideon's whole purpose was to thresh wheat and hide it from the Mideanites so he can have some bread.

What was very confusing to Gideon was that in his distracting circumstances God refused to talk to him ABOUT his circumstances. What was troubling Gideon the most was the thing was the thing God refused to address or talk about. God does not want to talk to us about our distracting circumstances - he wants to talk to us about our destiny and our call to greatness. God is not talking to you about where you are now - God is talking to you about where He's going to take you into greatness.

Because if he talked to you about where you are now and fixed up your little problem then you would stay in the wine-vat satisfied with your personal needs being met. But if you get frustrated enough in your distracting circumstances and frustrated that God won't talk to you about your circumstances then the day will come when He will start talking to you about your destiny and the greatness that He is calling you to.

He's not talking about where you are now - He will talk to you about the greatness He wants to take you towards.

The Bible says that without vision the people throw off restraint. Without a vision people perish. Without a vision people do not position themselves for success - without a vision people position themselves for failure and for survival. But the power of a vision is that it has the power to pull you into the future with the purpose of victory on your mind. It can pull you through distraction - it can pull you through disappointment - it can pull you through opposition because it has the power of greatness in the words.

When God said to Gideon; "Go in your might" - it wasn't Gideon's might. It was the might Gideon now had because God is speaking to Gideon and had put the supernatural power of God into Gideon so he left the winepress in a different way to the way he crawled into it. Most Christian's prayers are not about destiny - they are about survival. Most Christian's prayers (and I have been guilty of this) is about the now - my circumstances now - my problems now. "Lord fix this - change this - stop that - change that person - do this in the now".

Destiny does not originate in the now. Destiny does not originate in your prayers to fix things now. Destiny originates in the speaking, living words of a living God. In the creation of the universe it did not begin with prayers, it began with the speaking words of God.

In the 6 days of creation, the Word of God says 9 times in the Hebrew language; "And the Lord said ...". And every time He said something creation power was imparted into the nothing-ness and God created out of His glory using words He created the destiny and DNA of planets and galaxies. In the parallel world of salvation, it begins also with the speaking words of God. "In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God".

Everything in creation and everything in salvation originates with the speaking words of God. So your destiny must originate with speaking words of God into your spirit whether they be audible words that you hear (and many times it will be) or whether it be an overwhelming awareness of an irresistable call and a compulsion and a desire to do something in life - it ALL begins with words.

All things that have value must originate in the previousness of God's Word. God's Word must be prior to. Anterior to. "Anterior" is the opposite to "posterior". Posterior means "it comes at the end". God's Word must be anterior to all that is happening in our life. If what is happening in your life and my life is not founded upon and released and created by the speaking words of God that brought creation and salvation into manifestation then the lives we are living are not on course with destiny and will not have the power to fulfill our destiny.

God's speaking words - and I am not just talking about the Bible - this is the final word and this will never contradict what God says to you - but too many Christians just read the Word and don't know the speaking words of God. God is speaking to us and talking to us and He will not listen while we moan about our circumstances, while we moan about our circumstances heaven is silent - as soon as you say "what's my destiny" - then suddenly speaking words will come!

The breakthough will not just be for your needs being met but on behalf of many others. The Word of God is prior to, it's previous to everything. God's speaking words is previous to all human ideas, all human insights - God's Word is prior to and anterior to and previous to. Everything in creation and salvation must be subject to this massive overwhelming previous-ness of God.

Yet the majority of Christians do not value the speaking words of God - they value their own words as more important than the creative, empowering speaking words of God. Their prayer life is reduced to complaining about their circumstances rather than waiting for the speaking words of God to create in them destiny.

When the living God comes to a human being in a wine vat - limitations and distracting circumstances and the speaking previous word of God comes to a human being and the depths of God reach into the depths of a human soul and ALL that God has for you reaches into the depths of all you were created for then there is a combination of God's creative power and His salvation power finding mature expression through you. Then your prayers are like the roaring of a mighty waterfall of faith. "Be it unto me oh Lord according to Your word". When your prayer changes from complaining about distraction and complaining about circumstances and your prayer turns to destiny and prayers of destiny then your enemy the devil gets terrified and frightened and frustrated that he cannot distract you anymore with limitations and pettiness and silly things.

Nehemiah was called by God in the most extra-ordinary context and God called this ordinary man - Nehemiah - to go back to Israel and re-build the fallen walls of Jerusalem. It involved the restoration of the temple in Jerusalem and the restoration of the worship of the one true living God. Every demonic distraction came to Nehemiah. You will see all the tactics and strategies - I've studied it many times. It's helped me push through - I wouldn't be in the ministry today if I hadn't. I would be just a bitter, cynical man and just a surfing alcoholic by now if I hadn't discovered the tactics of my enemy. There were so many;

1. The enemy started with flattery and seduction. How many Christians are flattered and seduced by false words that the person is trying to manipulate you into and draw you under their control rather than liberate you to be who you are.

When flattery won't work - and I hate flattery that goes on in the world-wide church - I see vulnerable Christians that live with a rejection complex that they can't even discern that someone is flattering me to get my allegiance to them.

2. When flattery doesn't work - these 2 men Sanballat and Tobiah - demonically motivated to distract Nehemiah from his destiny. When their flattery didn't work they turned then to intimidation, threats and then mockery. "This stupid little thing that you are doing - you look like a bunch of foxes on the wall - you will never get this job done".

3. Then they turned to false negotiation. They came one day and said to him; "Nehemiah come down and speak ot us about what you are doing". Nehemiah says; "Why should the work stop and I come down to you seeing that I am involved in a great work?". Do not come down from your destiny for silly, childish, distracting trivia of people that are caught up in little-ness and want to talk to you endlessly, sucking your energy and time dry with distraction - but you have got to get gripped by destiny and say; "No, I'm not coming down to these demonic distractions - this person being jealous of me, this person saying this about me, I'm not going to defend myself or correct myself or write articles or defend it - I'm involved in a great work and I am not coming down!

The day is coming when Rob Rufus will leave this planet and stand before an awesome God and give account for the life I live in this body and everyone is moving towards that day rapidly! Gideon and his winepress - all he was focused on was trying to save some bread from the Mideanite. Suddenly the spreading word of God - the previous to all things - the prior to - the anterior word - the word came to Gideon and like many of us including me - Gideon's first reaction was confusion! Because God didn't make one mention in His word about the wine-press, about the lack of bread, about the politics or any of those distracting things.

Gideon was horrified because God did not talk to him about his circumstances but about his destiny.

Every time Gideon heard God speak about his destiny - Gideon thought it was important that he inform this omniscient God about some facts that God obviously wasn't aware of! Gideon began to try and talk about his circumstances and all the impossibilities and all the limitations. "How can you not care about me Lord? Where's a little sympathy?". This isn't politically correct! Don't you care? But God comes and He says to Gideon; "You mighty warrior - you mighty man of faith! You mighty, victorious man of bravery!".

Now if that was obvious to Gideon, I promise you that God would not have told it to Gideon. You don't need me to tell you that you are called. My words have no power. But you need the living God to tell you - when you hear God speak to you, He will never speak to you about your circumstances primarily. When He speaks to you about your destiny (I promise this to you) His words will contradict the circumstances that are surrounding you.

You will be tempted to be confused and to argue with God about why and how He has got the wrong person. But God will not talk to you - He will not even waste time coming down to the level of talking about your circumstances. The difference between people that finish the race successfully and those that fall as casualties along the way-side. "The Lord is with you mighty man of valour".

I mean this prophetically and I have felt this for 4 and a half years that much of the church world - and I am so glad that 1000's of these messages go out every month around the world - I am so glad about that - I am so glad that I can preach to Christians around the world but it is however a far greater privilidge and a pleasure to preach to you here in Hong Kong because we are building something that is becoming a model of liberation for multitudes! Oh people of destiny!

I believe a multitude of believers around the world who live within the confines of circumstances, consumed with the distraction of their circumstances and not their destiny. If they were consumed with their destiny they would put their distractions into the right perspective and put their right energy into what will position me to be more effective in what God designed me as an authentic human being to fulfill in this life.

They would do the right study, position themselves in the right church, they would find no problem in re-locating from one nation to another to get to the place that would help fashion and shape their destiny. They would take a salary reduction to get to the right place or they would turn certain study down and would say that's a distraction - I have got to focus on this.

They would shape everything they are doing by asking this question; "Does it distract me from my destiny or help me fulfill my destiny"?

But multitudes of believers are consumed with distracting circumstances.

The major explanation is because of the legalistic preaching of a false or inadequate gospel that mixes law and grace together. It has crippled believers in condemnation! It has put them under such a lying deception that they have felt that the God who loves them and is calling them to greatness is the One criticising and accusing them! When actually He is the One forgiving them and giving His righteousness to them and empowering them for greatness.

They have been told for centuries and centuries even since Martin Luther's reformation 500 years ago and even further 100o years ago in darkness and legalism and demonic oppression in the church - demonic, satanic power crippling God's people and disfunctioning them in their psychology and they are now confused because the preachers preach some grace and some of the Cross so the people think this is so wonderful but then they preach law! "You have to do more - be holy enough - be better - do more!". And it just nullifies the power of grace.

Bill Johnson has been saying recently - and I am so glad that someone has been shouting it from the rooftops - that something is wrong in the church! Don't blame all this stuff that's going wrong. Blame the religious system of belief that is over the church! Bill Johnson said if you preach undiluted pure grace then anything that is in our hearts will come out - good or bad! That's not bad - that's good!

Because if you preach law then everything bad will stay in there! And pervert you from the inside! Some sweet little church secretary, some sweet little pastor or Christian who is externally so holy and is grinding out the mechanics of religious life which is death! Turning up to church and doing it all right and looking so holy on the outside but fear and punishment has gripped him to be a robot of the system.

But inside nothing has been changed by the power of God! No true holy desires or motives or performing on the inside of him! What's happening is that it's going deeper and deeper and deeper and the hypocrisy of being false and artificial on the outside is making him lose the battle for authenticity and masquerading a false holiness but inside streaming with all kinds of perverted desires!

Suddenly that secretary or pastor or church member rushes off and you cannot BELIEVE the sin that they go and do! I know why those things are happening in the world!

Multitudes are in their wine vats around the world and we have people in this church still caught up in their circumstances and have chosen not to believe but to listen to those who are anti-grace and say; "We've had enough grace - let's move on!". We will never ever move on from the major vision of grace in this church! NEVER!

I believe that the Spirit of God has spoken in my heart - I really believe this - and to other prophetic ministries around the world that right now after we have pushed through for 3 and a half years in this message, suffering all kinds of lies and pressure and other stuff - we are rejoicing! Right NOW as a result of our stand and many others standing I believe the Spirit of the Lord Himself is turning up to multitudes of believers in their winepresses and He is saying to them;

"You are the one that I love! Before time began I purposed you for greatness! You are a mighty warrior lady or man! I have given you all My righteousness! You are clean past - present and future! I am for you - I am not against you - I don't care how many mistakes you make or things you have done wrong! I am for you and I don't talk to you where you are at - I am talking about where I am taking you - I have a destiny for you and I have a unique destiny for you! Even if you make mistakes after the call I am an awesome God and I can turn around for good and I can get you back on line!".

Just like Gideon went from the limits of his distracting circumstances to becoming the leader of a whole nation - a process that lifted him not out of his own terrible circumstances but until the breakthough lifted a whole nation into military victory, into freedom and economic empowerment! So in the same way God is lifting you and me from limiting distracting circumstances and He is addressing our destiny on behalf of many churches out there because our personal breakthough will bring breakthrough for multitudes of people out there!

The anointing only kicks in when you respond to a calling way beyond yourself.

It is when you press to a higher mark - when the call comes. You can stay in the boat, you can stay in your wine-press and hear the voice of destiny but unless you respond and press to a higher mark then you will stay in limitations. It's when you press out of discouragement and press out of disappointment and press out of smallness - that the anointing kicks in. God will challenge you and me to press into things that we cannot do! He will say "Get out the boat and walk on water!". Sorry Lord - I can't do it. Yere but you couldn't do it before My word but My previous word carries the power of creation and salvation - now come! God allows you to go into times of frustration in the wine-press. People say; "It's not good for a Christian to be frustrated!".

I would rather have a 100 frustrated Christians who want greatness in their life than a whole bunch of passive, loose-wrist people that are happy with the unacceptable all around them who live their whole lives in smallness.

Frustration is a sign that you have got passion! You can't change anything unless you have got passion! Passion - if it is not fulfilled - results in frustration!

The gap between expectation and reality is the determining factor in the measure of frustration! Frustration is good for a while! Because frustration is often the measure of the degree of which God is going to use you!

If I meet a person that has never been frustrated then I know that is someone I don't want on my leadership team because they are passive. Frustration is an indicator - it is a measure of where God has called your destiny.

If you are called as an inventor to create new technology and you see inferior technology being sold and sold then you will be getting frustrated in your heart. You will be going in your heart; "Something better can be created here!". Frustration can give you courage to drive you out of your wine-press and step out and do something so that frustration has been a good thing! If your gifting is to administrate and to organise and position schools and companies and churches to organise effectively and you walk into meetings and just lazy stuff is going on in there and it is just things aren't switched on at the right timeand people wandering around until 11am. People who aren't administrational in their ability are happy with instruments going wrong - but those called is their destiny - will be fuming with frustration at the ineffectiveness and the lost opportunities for miracles and the waste of opportunities for God.

If your calling is as a preacher, to announce the prophetic voice to thunder into rebel planet earth - it is time to adjust your agenda to the Creator of heavens and earth. If you go into a service and some mealy-mouth preacher is speaking truth in a dull, boring way and there is no passion, or preparation and they clearly haven't spent time in the Presence of God for hours and hours to bring the living Word of God - they are just bringing religious vomit - if you are a preacher then you will sit there fuming with frustration.

You cannot move people full of distractions all day of their lives to destiny unless you have the power of God. Preachers - you should be frustrated with the 20 minute syrupy sermonette to satisfy those who have no knowledge of God, they don't know God and just come to church for a little warm up. We are dealing with eternal things here in our destiny. There is many other things. I just want to say;

Whereever you are frustrated - that will often be a sign of the call and destiny.

Now frustration if you allow it will get you bitter and cynical - then you have been perverted by the devil. Frustration can be an indication of the call fo God -the area where He has called you. But if you get into the wrong camp and you become one of the losers who have rejected the call and sit in the wine-press and want the wine-press all their lives and want the hand outs and don't want personal breakthrough for multitudes all around the world and are not frustrated but are happy for the winepress - if you listen to the voice of the losers or the Sanballats and Tobiah's who are flattering you or distracting you or intimidating you - if you listen to their voices then you will sit there and think; "What is the point of my frustration? Why don't I be like these losers? They live on hand-outs and have broken relationship after broken relationship after broken relationship and go from one church to the next church and have diminished and dwarfed their life to a wine-press.

And they have allowed their frustration to develop not into power - but to develop and turn into criticising every politician, mechanic, preacher, everyone that is out there doing it with brilliance and success.

Don't listen to those who are happy to live in a wine-press. Let your frustration turn you into a person of courage and determine never to go into the wine-press of religion and condemnation and legalism and law and the political spirit. The political spirit just wants to get popular and just wants to get the vote so it will find out what everyone wants and tell them what they want! To get the vote!

The religious spirit will judge people's sin in a harsh way not because they are really passionate for righteousness but they want to pretend that they are passionate for righteousness because they are living in the same sin as the person they are judging because they want to appear like they are righteous but actually they are angry that person fell into sin because it is embarrassing that they fell into sin and it's getting too close to home.

The political spirit will want to make you fit into what everyone wants. I will NEVER fit in with the political spirit - NEVER in the whole world, NEVER in any church, NEVER will I come under that power, EVER again - I have lived too long, for too many decades under that power. I came out 4 years ago when I came to Hong Kong and I stood out and I got out my winepress and I am not going back in that place again! I don't care who leaves this church because I don't fit into what they want - I don't care! But we are called to destiny!

I care about every single individual - you know that and I don't need to qualify anymore because 4 years have proved that. Gideon was a very frustrated man. For many decades I was a frustrated man. I did live with peace and I loved people and I built some good and large churches that are thriving to this day and will be preaching in one of them in a few weeks time for a week of preaching in Adelaide. Those churches have planted dozens of churches around the world. So in all of those decades I was productive and I was fruitful and effective but not as effective as I could have been.

God took me through that process (not wasting my time) to learn some good lessons and I learnt from some great people that I honour to this day - like Dudley Daniel and many others.

But to tell you the truth I always felt there was a degree to which I was fitting in under a political spirit and to some degree a religious spirit to fit in. But in Adelaide just over 4 years ago, the living voice of God came to me in a place and God spoke to me on that Australian coast the words I am speaking to you today. When those words came into my spirit something changed on the inside of me. Gideon was frustrated. Look at it - it's in the text! He said; "IF You are God - then WHERE are all the miracles?". Now he didn't say it like that because religious people act like God doesn't see what's in their heart.

"Oh Lord, if You be with us - where are the miracles?!". In his heart - it was different. "Where are the miracles that Rob talks about? Where are the miracles that our Fathers talked about? If You are with me WHY are we under oppression, WHY is our people disempowered into poverty? WHY?!". God is saying; "You are frustrated Gideon?". "YES!". "GOOD!".

Frustration = good! "Now go in your might that your frustration may turn to power. Do not sit with the critics but someone who will change the issue that you are frustrated with". You have got My power from My speaking word to you now. You are going in My anointing and you are going to go and deal with the father's idols. He had to break from old patterns and bondage of the imposition of ancestoral limitations. He went to his father's idols and smashed them and incurred the anger of his own family. But he rose up and with 300 men overcame the Mideanites!

Now go to Romans chapter 8 quickly and I want to close with this incredible theology here of the predestination of God on your call. And it will be worth the extra little while. Let's read and I want you to look for the word; "Called". Romans 8:28;

"And we know that in all things, all things work together for good to those who love God - to those who are called according to His purpose".

Now - it is not called according to your purpose but His purpose.

He has a unique purpose that fits into your unique personality and gifting.

(v29); "For whom He forknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son that He (that's Jesus) might be the first born among many brethren". (v30); "Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called". I want to read that to you again because it's that line I want to close this message on by unpacking the revelation in that one line. (v30); "Moreever whom He presdestined, these He also called".

Everyone is predestined by the way. I've studied Calvinism and Arminianism for decades - those He predestined He also called. Let's read on; "Whom He called - these He also justified". God called you and when He called you before you were born, He already justified you and declared that you were righteous - no more sin in His eyes. He doesn't see your sin! He just sees you as righteous. That's pretty powerful! "Those He called, He also justified and those He justified He also glorified". This is all past tense now. "What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us - who can be against us?". Now that Greek word "Called" - those He predestined, He also called. The called according to His purpose.

The New Testament was originally written in Ancient Greek - not the modern Greek. The Greek word is; "kaleo". The word actually means that God "screamed". He screamed in time; "You can do it! You can do it! You may have felt overwhelmed but you can do it! You may have been overlooked but you can do it! You may have been misunderstood and failed many times but you can do it!".

The "kaleo" is the scream of God.

It also means this - the predestination of those that are called means that He fixed the end before you began! God didn't wait to see how it would turn out for you. God went into your future and fixed it for you to win then He came back in time and screamed His call to come this way - that He has prefixed for you to win!

Come this way! Don't go that distraction! See that distraction? There is a demonic idea that has some inkling as to what I have called you to be - don't go that way. I scream at you; "Come this way!". My previous speaking words say; "Come this way - I have prefixed it for you to win!". We would have settled for silly sin and distraction but He kept calling us out. We tried to make excuses - but He just kept calling us out. Fifteen years ago I deliberately tried to backslide - I said "I just want to go and look for sin - I'm sick and tired of all of this cynicism and unbelief and legalism and Christians moaning". So many backslide! Let me backslide God! I want to go and surf and become a champion marathon runner! I meant it! I wanted to smoke everything I could and drink everything I could and a whole lot more!

That's what frustration will do. I tell you the truth before God - I have never committed adultery and neither has my wife. There has been no emotional affair - we have never backslidden and never walked away from God or gone off course. I tell you why; the scream of God is in my belly. He has called me and is calling me! I can't even backslide anymore! Woe is me! Some years ago there was the controversy of match-fixing in the cricket world and were fixing the matches before they were played so that the people who gamble could get more money. It was called cheating. Some of my country-men were part of that scandal as well as some Aussies. Some Indians. It's cheating! But this is not cheating!

God has set it up! This is a pre-fixed fight! You are prefixed to win! You may face challenges but He has prefixed you to win. You say; "Rob why do some Christians end their lives as counterfeits or copies? Not finishing their destiny?". Because they refuse to respond to the "kaleo" - the call. They said "I know better - my words are more important - I am going to do what I want". Those who respond to the "kaleo" - the scream - the call of God. They are being pulled towards a prefixed end that is set up for your victory.

Many many years ago I was praying in Jo'burg and said; "God I don't want to mess up - I don't want to fail". He said; "Son - I know your WHOLE life - you will finish the race breaking the tape just before you die and you see in your past no scandals, no immorality, no broken marriages - you are going to fulfill your destiny - I am telling you know because you are drawing close to me on a regular basis to get My call clearer and clearer in your heart".

God prefixed your end for victory and He did that in eternity - in time He called you out with vigorous sounds. He is calling you Christian - wherever you are in the world - He is calling you into destiny. Don't get distracted by stupid trivia and child-likeness and small thinking people calling you out. God fixes the end before the beginning and then He goes back to the beginning and He calls you to the end. He has already prefixed to you and He says to you -

"When you get over all your crying, all your confusion, all your self-pity, all your sulking and listen to My scream - My kaleo - you will realise that My call is evidence of divine permission to do something you thought you couldn't do".

Just over 4 years ago when God called me to leave Australia and come to Hong Kong and plant a church here with almost nothing here. When I heard that I know exactly where I was - I know the road I was driving - I know exactly where I was when the call came; "Go to Hong Kong!". If you have a destiny that God calls you to in the call He keeps taking you to higher levels in that destiny. I know exactly where I was and I knew that hardly anyone knew me in this city, I can't speak the language, I won't have much support. And I thought for 3 months I woke up every morning at 3am literally shivering with fear and trembling with terror because I am going on 50 and this is insane career suicide. I am comfortable in Australia with a great house right on the beach and I am supported by a huge church that loves me and fly me around the world and pay all my expenses and I have made it. I don't know anyone here, I don't know their culture, I have seen churches die in Hong Kong - ex-pat leaders come here and die of cancer. I have watched people I know come here and their marriages fall apart and the children go into drugs. I thought; "God I am afraid of failing!".

For 3 months the screams of God got louder and louder and louder and louder until it dawned on me that God has prefixed the end! Now He is saying "Come to Hong Kong because I have prefixed great victory for you!". After 4 years I am staggered at the blessing and success and fruitfulness and influence of this church.

This is but a small part of what God showed me in those 3 months of what He had prefixed for us and the people He said He would call around us and I am seeing those people in this meeting right now and thousands who are not here yet and I am seeing impact into the politics and media of Hong Kong and I am seeing a base of thousands of people and I am seeing a move of the Spirit in Hong Kong that will touch the entire world - I am seeing multitudes come to Hong Kong to see what's happening in City Church International - I am seeing impact on Beijing and China and pulled into my future by a vision - a kaleo - a scream - a call that has been prefixed!

Now I have free will - I can do what many other Christians do and pack up and move back to Adelaide and you know what that will make me do? Make me comfortable and happy in the flesh and surf regularly and live a life where they all speak English and go to shopping malls and see English speaking people all around me. I can be loved by that church there. But you know what that will do? Bring tragedy and frustration and will wreck that church there and will wreck everyone around me because when you are out of place in your destiny you are displacing everyone around you with your anger and your frustration.

You can hear this isn't just a pastor's message today. He has prefixed it so you can do it. If He has called you into some area then you can lead it, buy it, pray for it because of the previousness of His word - because of the prior prefixing power of His word because before you were born He spoke about you. Before you were born there was divine speech made about you. Special selective kind words were made about you. Before time began and before creation began - God was speaking selective, kind words about you and was talking to angels and was saying; "Have you seen My son - have you seen My daughter? They are going to be born in that date and that future and I am prefixing greatness for them. They are like Gideons - I am going to pull them out of wine-presses and give them destiny and I am making announcements of glory and greatness over them!". The angels will get all excited so that when we were born - angels trumpeted in the heavens and said; "Yes!".

Then the religious world got a hold of you in cynicism and pulled you and pulled you and oppressed you until those great dreams left those angels perplexed and puzzled - why this misery? Why this smallness? Why this pathetic-ness? What's happened to all those words that you said God? God said; "Just wait - I am choosing the right time when I am going to speak to them. I am going to call them out of their wine press and I am not going to talk about their circumstances - I am going to talk about the greatness that I have called them to be".

Predestination to be prefixed! Kaleo also means He invites you and includes you and calls you to a predetermined end - something He has prepared for you. The call is an invitation to do what you couldn't do before. He called you - listen to this. Before Jesus stood on the water and looked at Peter and said; "Come" - Peter could never have walked on the water. Because he had not yet been included in the call or in the miracle. The moment the previousness - the Word of God came - "Come!" - when Jesus kaleod him, he walked on the water. God doesn't ask your bank balance, your education or a committee if He can call you. He calls you. And if He calls you - you can do it.

Some people say; "Well Rob I'm too far gone - I've got so many things happening in my life - so many mistakes - so much dysfunction - so much failure - I'm too far gone even for the call of Almighty God!". Lazarus was so far gone that he was stinking! He was rotten to the core! He was dead! But when Jesus gave the kaleo - "Lazarus - come forth!". He had no option. Jesus does not have any resurrection power - He IS the Resurrection! When Resurrection Himself says; "Lazarus - come forth!" - He had to specify only Lazarus. Because if He hadn't specified and Resurrection said; "Come forth!" - then every grave would have opened in that area and the dead would have been raised. I am telling you the truth!

It will become a scream louder and louder until it blocks out all other sounds. Some still resist it - incredible because of the voice of the Sanballats and the Tobiahs that distact them because of pressure on marriage, children, domestic issues that we make much higher priorities than the call. You can fix every area of your marriage, your children and can get all of that sorted out and go back into your wine-press and stay there. But if you heed the call of God to purpose and destiny then God will lift you to a level of power for your marriage and your children and all the issues. But your personal breakthrough will be the breakthrough of multitudes as well. Most Christians are consumed or confined with their cirumstances and not their destiny and that's why they stay in their wine-presses all their life.

The scream of God does not refer to the sound of a frustrated parent screaming at you. It is not the sound of harsh, hysterical panic. God never panics - He is at peace. The scream of God refers to the intensity of God's love and passion and desire for you - and it is an intensity of that love to pierce through the darkness and the fear that tried to clothe you. It's an intensity of the scream that wants to pierce through the numbness and despair that clothes people - it's an intensity of His love that wants to pierce through the distracting voices so that your life is not wasted. You were called to destiny and royalty - to have the fire of God on your life and to see nations impacted and influence made in all regions that God has destined you to have.

Then He justifies you - if God went to that commitment to prefix your victory then He has also gone to the same degree of commitment to protect your process.

To shield you with His favour! Nothing can kill me before my time! Nothing can take me out before my time! There is a shield of favour when you say "Yes!" to God's scream He sets up angels to protect the process. Every false prophet that has prophesied and criticised me - God has brought wisdom and friends to help me stand and He will protect my process until that day comes and I split that tape and arrive in heaven and God says; "Rob - well done! Good and faithful servant!". I am living for that one second to hear that - I don't care if I don't get it from while I am on earth. I don't care if man pats me on the back or appreciate or respect what I'm living for.

What I am living for is the one acclamation - "Well done!". That's worth all the words that man can give you - all the comfort, niceness, sympathy. If you face and fulfill your destiny then you must walk through months, sometimes even longer of being misunderstood, not acknowledged and you are not looking for the praise of men - you are not looking for men to understand you! I did not respond to the scream of God for people to like me and agree with me. I responded because I understood that He had prefixed my end and was uniquely made in authentic-ness have a destiny that no man can know or understand. No man knows it except God and what He has called you to be. Until we say; "God I don't want to be a distraction and I don't want to be distracted!". When you allow distraction on your life you become a distraction for others. But when you focus on your destiny then you break others through into greater levels of faith and boldness to follow God.

Although you make be like David and face days when all your enemies mount up against you and there is no hope, God still comes and breaks David through so that David can come to the end of his life and God can say; "This is a man after My own heart who served My purpose in My generation". I would rather hear those words just once than a thousand Olympic gold medals and a wreath that will fade away. We have a destiny that will never fade away in eternity and your response to the scream of God will bring accolades in heaven - all of them will be worth it on that day that is hastening towards us and God is coming! We are called to be history makers!

I am not just called to lead a church - I am called to empower people to change the politics of nations, to change the education system and get wrong teaching out of the education systems. I am called to affect orphans and those who are hungry and not clothed and the broken and the disenfranchised. We are called to bring the misery that is on earth out of the way and the Kingdom of God in. We are called to relieve epidemic poverty, we are called to cure people from AIDS, we are called to bring justice to nations and are called to trumpet that and sound that! Though I may not do many of those things personally - I am called to sound a prophetic trumpet that awakens the scream of God in people's tummies so they will get rid of the silly trivia and the silly things that distract us.

A bit of sickness is not enough to distract a person from coming to church - people prove that today! Eternal hell waits the majority on this planet while silly little messages are there to comfort them. No - we must press eternity into the hearts of men and women! We must press eternity while we can into the hearts of men and women! We need thousands in Hong Kong to rally to the trumpet call of God. We need people to bring their tithes and offerings not under law but under grace - to invest into that which can empower us financially to buy buildings, to care for orphans, to care for the broken. We need a people who are world-changers and history-makers! That's what we are called to be! Anything else is a dishonour to Jesus! We are called to be invaders of the kingdom.

Rise up against every voice that talks rubbish to you - stay faithful to the Word of God and your brothers and sisters and leaders. Stop murmering. We want to cut down the angles of distraction and break the spirit of witchcraft that tries to pulverise my wife and I every day! If we all act with majority and talk to one another and see a believer missing services - get on the phone! Keep doing it! Who wants to be a history maker? I have a degree in history. But that is nothing compared to making history rather reading about it. I enjoy history - but I want to be a history maker so that future generations will read about you and me. Great politicians, preachers, parents, inventors, children. We affected change in our time because we came out of the wine-presses and came into the scream of God - the kaleo of God! Can you sense the heart of God - the urgency in our hour? We are living in the best and worst of times!

I am speaking for nations! I am releasing this into the spiritual atmosphere! A spiritual sound is coming; "Wake up church!". Its about breakthrough on behalf of yourselves and multitudes.

Friday 10 October 2008

The Blood - Substance or Shadow?

This sermon was preached by Rob Rufus on 1st June 2008;

"Total triumph and total victory is our total inheritance in Christ Jesus! It is an utter delusion and utter deception to ever begin to come to a place where you accomodate and begin to just manage pain and administrate pain and defeat and discouragement. It is your absolute legal right in Christ to live with joy, with peace in the power of the Holy Spirit every day of your life because of the government of His peace. So in whatever area the the enemy is trying to make you feel helpless - and I hadn't realise that there was an area I did feel helpless in and was getting passive in that area - I thought I was passionate in every area of my life and the Lord began to show me this one area - accepting the unacceptable. Once He puts His light on it - you realise you have given way in that area and just accept feelings of powerlessness, helplessness but every fibre in our being is meant to pulsate with passion of a God of victory and triumph and I trample my enemies underfoot and we live in victory!

The other thing is that the devil lies to us - he is the accuser of the brethren and he wants to insinuate lies in our minds about one another or other people. In other words he will say; "This person is thinking that about you" or feeling that about you and it is not true about you! It is a total lie. He is trying to deceive you to have a wrong perspective of someone else so your attitude changes to that person and you expect them to be unkind to you and then you look for evidence and your imagination finds it. Only the Holy Spirit can give you a word of knowledge that can identify or warn you about someone else's strategy and plans against you that are not good. When the Holy Spirit gives you that, He gives you faith and gives you grace and peace and a sense of a powerful way out to a solution. But when the enemy is accusing you and lying about other people, it's a feeling of oppression, insecurity and a total lie and the Lord wants to break that off everyone of us in this place before we go any further.

Song;

"Looking at Your face, knowing You see mine.
Magnificent in grace, Jesus, You're so kind,

You are the wondrous One I love - so strong.
You are the wondrous One I love - so strong.

You lift me with Your voice - Your glory is my choice,
You could have judged but instead You lift My head,

You are the wondrous One I love - so strong,
You are the wondrous One I love - so strong".

Open your Bibles to Hebrews chapter 9. Two opening comments I want to say here. I believe God wants everyone to know that everyone in this church needs to be celebrated and not just tolerated. I mean that about these accusations that the enemy brings brother against brother and sister against sister. That we can sometimes tolerate people instead of celebrating them. We can all see it - you don't need to be a prophet or spiritually discerning to see the ideosynchrasies, the flaws, the failures in all other people. There's nothing holy and noble about that. The devil is very good at that. So I hope you are not good at it because then you are in parnership with someone who is the accuser of the brethren and he scrutinises believers for their faults. The devil is a prosecutor so he will not see anything good about you because he has to prosecute your case, accuse you and judge you and condemn you.

Our Father declares that His Son is our great High Priest and our heavenly advocate. He is our lawyer and our justifier.

When you look at people through the eyes of Jesus then you stop tolerating them and start celebrating them.

It is worth the full package of their failures and flaws and idiosynchrisies - if you can do that to yourself then you can do that to anyone. So I believe we need to celebrate one another. Secondly I believe God is positioning every member in City Church International to move into a much higher level of signs, wonders, healings and miracles. I do not believe miracles follow a gift - they do not follow a gift. Jesus Christ had no miracles for 30 years because He couldn't do anything unless His Father did it through them.

So miracles, signs and wonders do not follow a gift - they follow a message. The unfading glory of the New Covenant. The anointing comes on people who understand what I am going to talk about today.

How many of you know that Jesus was not anointing for 30 years? There is no evidence in the Bible that when Jesus was playing outside as a little boy Mary and Joseph came to the door and said; "Jesus come inside now and do Your homework - You can't walk on the water all afternoon! Jesus stop turning all the water into wine! We just want a little water to drink! Don't raise the dog from the dead for the fourth time - this is an old and bad dog now and it stinks! Let it die next time!". He never did any miracles! That's what it said in Luke 3 and Matthew 3 that He never moved in signs and wonders. He was a carpenter with all of His divinity totally restrained within His humanity and He was just like you and me having to trust the Holy Spirit.

So He got anointed by the Holy Spirit and began to preach a message of the kingdom and then signs and wonders began to follow Him.

I told you last week - not to boast but to make you hungry that Glenda and I saw dozens and dozens of notable miracles that God did through Glenda and my hands and what we spoke in different parts of Europe and in the UK. So when someone comes to me and says; "One day we are going to start doing healing" - we started seeing miracles in 1981 and we saw blind eyes open - so it is not new to see deaf ears open for us. But we are now in a new climate! We saw much more healings than what I talked about but there were dozens and dozens of notable miracles with the lady coming out of her wheelchair that was incurable.

Everyone had seen her running and walking in the conference - a miracle! Many other crippling diseases we saw melt off people's bodies.

We saw demons coming out of people's bodies as we spoke the word of command. In that moment there was an authority on us that was by the anointing and I knew I wasn't operating in my gifting - I was operating under a mantle that was confirming the message of the New Covenant. You can get under stronger and stronger mantles that can enable you to go way beyond your gifting. I have a preaching gift but you see that is not enough to raise the dead and open the eyes of the blind. I have an equipping gift to equip you - because the truth is I would rather see miracles happening through your hands than through my hands.

I mean that with integrity. In many ways that's what happened a lot in the UK because I got others to pray for other people. I believe there is a stronger mantle and a stronger anointing that is coming on us today and on people.

Everyone of us in this room hungers not only for God but we hunger for His world. We hunger for His world to break into this world. Every time a miracle takes place it is because God's world has broken into the darkness of this world and the superiority of His world and His light has done something wonderful!

The kingdom of God is the "King's dominion". So when the king's dominion comes into a room or into a street in Hong Kong or into a toilet or into a train - that is the dominion of the king just comes in and shows the superiority of His world over this world. God wants our faith to be anchored in a superior world - not in this world.

Anytime you get depressed or discouraged or feel hopeless or helpless and powerless - it is because my faith is not anchored in His world but in the world of the earth realm.

Jesus preached the gospel of the kingdom everywhere He went. He said this and the disciples preached the good news of the kingdom. Matthew 10:7; "The Kingdom of heaven is near". He then said once you have told them the good news of the kingdom - tell them to think differently (to repent) and know that the kingdom is touchable, is tangible and is near. Then He said heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers and cast out devils.

Yet sadly and tragically for the last 100's of years much of the church has not been preaching the gospel of the Kingdom. It has been preaching the gospel of salvation. There is a big difference. The gospel of the Kingdom includes the gospel of salvation but it is much more. The gospel of salvation is primarily focused on going to heaven. The gospel of the Kingdom is primarily focused on bringing heaven into the earth realm.

So we must not confuse our assignment with our destiny. Our destiny is to go to heaven. Our assignment is to bring heaven to earth.

What does that look like? Every time Jesus healed the sick, opened a blind eye, every time He cast demonic spirits off people who were tormenting them, keeping them awake and night - suicide spirits and deaf and dumb spirits - every time He did things like that, He said the kingdom of God has come among you. Then He said everyone - I want you to do the works I am doing and even greater works.

I told you about the last lady I prayed for in the UK - I told you about my failure where she had been crippled for 38 years and hadn't walked for 38 years. She hadn't been able to stand up or have movement in her legs - I prayed for her for about 20 minutes and after 20 minutes she was laughing and crying and giggling because she was starting to move her legs and move them forward. I didn't like leaving her in that state because she still couldn't stand or walk. So I left her there knowing that if Jesus had prayed for her, she would have got out of that wheelchair that day and walked around and ran. But she just got me and didn't get Jesus!

Now that is a problem isn't it - they get us!

That's why God is saying that the more you yield to Me, the more hungry you are for Me, the more you come into partnership with Me, they will get more and more of Me when they come to you.

So Thursday night Millie told me and had stayed on in the the UK - that lady has begun to stand. She hasn't been able to do that for 38 years. Now she can stand and the next step - she's walking. Jesus would have got her standing on the first night and you know what's going to happen as this greater mantle comes on us - WE are going to get them healed on the first night. We are coming into is the same level as the works Jesus did. In the future - they will be even greater works because He has gone to the Father. This is not rooted in illusions of grandeur - this is rooted in the Word of God.

So we need to hunger for a world that is superior to this world. Heaven is the pattern - heaven is the model and heaven is the substance! And when heaven comes crashing into this world then the darkness of this world collapses. And by darkness I mean poverty, sickness, disease, condemnation, oppression, guilt, inferiority complexes, political oppression - all those things. Lostness is not being born again. The kingdom of heaven is breaking through more and more and more!

So we need to stay fresh in the supernatural because if I can stay fresh in the supernatural then I can stay happy! When I am not fresh in the supernatural - I can (now and again) get grumpy! I know it's hard to believe - but it's not often! If I get stale in the supernatural I get grumpy. What I have found is that the more fresh I stay in the supernatural - the more joyful and happy you are and the more miracles happen through you. I have never been blessed by an unhappy person. I have never had an unhappy grumpy person pray for me! I have never met an unhappy, stingy person that brings people out of wheelchairs. We have seen lots of people over the last 30 years come out of wheelchairs and I tell you what - if it happens to you once, you are ruined for the rest of your life.

They can offer you millions of dollars for position and fame - you are ruined. You will pursue this one thing - to see broken human beings blessed. Orphans fed. People with HIV/AIDS healed. You the instrument in partnership with God! You! Being used of God for these things! So stay fresh in the supernatural - you will stay very happy and joyful! We got back from the UK and were so tired from jetlag and were so tired but realised that the first thing I had to prioritise is - "Oh God I must get fresh again - otherwise I am in trouble!".

How many of you know that the devil seems to speak with an amplifier when you are tired! When you are fresh in the anointing - hey!

You know what they do for sheep in Israel to stop flies? Flies are a huge problem in Israel - they anoint the sheep's head with oil so that the flies can't bite them. David says He anoints my head with oil. When the anointing gets stale the flies can get to you. But the more you walk in freshness of life. God is the glory and He is the lifter of our heads and He is our ever-present help in our time of need! David said though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil because His rod and His staff they comfort me and He anoints my head with oil and my cup overflows. The secret of life is having an overflow in your life! Not living in "just enough" but in "overflow of the life of God coming out of your life!".

Living in overflow! With the business, we live in Hong Kong we don't have time for hours a day in prayer. That's a fact! God understands that. So there has to be a way to live in a busy city and stay fresh in the supernatural. I do believe you need times to get away to solitary places where there is little noise and you get alone with God but you can't do that every day. I want to talk about staying fresh in the supernatural and could give you many practical things today like recreation, give yourselves a reward every day - how to take holidays, how to rest, the secrets of learning because Hong Kong people have to be specifically trained in how to take a holiday. You can spot the Hong Kong tourist anywhere in the world. They are the one's scheduling in tours, putting on alarm clocks in the resort to get up at 5am to go on a bus all over the place and they need practical stuff on how to get still and learn out to re-create.

Nature has rhythms, nature goes dormant and has hybernation in it, fields lying fallow so you can become more productive. There is a a Sabbath rest in Christ Jesus. But city dwellers do not know the rhythms of nature and are driven by technology and don't know these things.

I don't want to talk about those practical problems today because I believe most of our problems stem from spiritual dryness and when we're not living in the freshness of God then we can run into all kinds of problems.

I want to talk quickly about the substance of the blood.

I believe that by understanding by revelation the significance of the blood of Jesus is instant access into the freshness of God's Presence.

It has been a life-source to me - understanding the blood. The Bible says in Leviticus that the life of the flesh is in the blood. I do not want you to think of the blood and the blood covenant of God as something primitive and brutal. The ancient Aztecs had a lot of blood in their religion because they worshipped demons. Those demons demanded the sacrifice of human beings. Their own children at times - thousands of people were sacrificed because demon gods demanded human blood. People compare that to Christianity. It is utterly opposite to Christianity - our loving God did not demand we spill our blood or the blood of our children or anyone.

Our God came and made Himself man and shed His divine blood on behalf. The life of the flesh is in the blood. When you go for a blood transfusion it is not seen as primative and brutal but rather kind and gracious and life-saving. What we are talking about is the greatest blood transfusion in all of the universe. The blood transfusion of the Lord Jesus Christ.

The value of the blood corresponds to the value of the life that is in it.

The blood that makes an atonement for the soul. Andrew Murray said this; "The power of the blood of Jesus is nothing less than the eternal power of God Himself. To talk about the blood is to talk about the eternal power of God Himself". So while I talk about this blood right now, I want you to open yourself out to get ready to see the power of God come fresh.

The anointing will come and "mantle" you with freshness.

This is a subject the devil hates more than any other subject - the blood of Jesus. It is so seldom preached in churches. You will almost never hear any messages on the blood anymore. Yet it is the scarlet thread that runs right through the book of God and without revelation of the blood you have no revelation of Jesus, kingdom, the power of God and the realm of the glory.

The Bible speaks about shadow and substance.

God went to great lengths under the Old Covenant to show us the shadow and prepare generations over 2000 years for the arrival of the substance. So when you see a shadow of an areoplane on the ground, you don't point to that shadow and say "There's an areoplane". But you see a shadow and that points to the fact that the reality of the substance exists. So you look up and see the substance and the substance is INFINATELY superior to the shadow. Now I want to quickly show you on a quick tour (no time to look up the Scriptures - I will quote them and you can look them up). Test the Bible yourself. Don't just accept it because I say so.

God went to almost mind-boggling extremes to show us the shadow blood of bulls and goats almost in a display of extravagance that makes my cynical mind go; "God that's a bit of overkill you know?!". That is pretty extreme God!

Yet it is the reason it is because He wanted to get the attention of a New Covenant generation of the centrality of the blood and power, Presence and glory anointing and intimacy with Almighty God.

So let's look at it - we know that Adam and Eve walked with God in the glory - they had the Presence of God on them every day - they heard God's audible voice and didn't have a Bible They had God and they talked to God face to face, eyeball to eyeball, conversations with God.

So when man fell he was really falling from the Presence of God. He sinned and lost the Presence of God. So restoration - salvation is really about a restoration to face to face intimacy with the Presence of God on your life every day!

It's one thing to come into a meeting where people have fasted through the week and had got before God and interceded and got down the glory and wiped themselves out in the background - yet you come into a meeting having not met with God all through the week and you come in and can experience temporarily an anointing and enjoy it for a while and then go out and spend another week and then go out and spend another week without God's Presence - which is your inheritance!

It's one thing to enjoy a glorious Sunday meeting and get anointed and another thing to know how to walk in the Presence of God on Monday through Friday and wake up in the morning in the Presence. Life in the anointing is different to life outside of the anointing!

What is religion? The absence of power and Presence = religion.

I don't care if there are 10, 000 people on a Sunday morning - with incredible programmes and incredible music and incredible speaking and preaching with great eloquence and persuasive words - if there is no demonstration of power, if there is no cripples walking and blind eyes opening or deaf ears opening or people being set free from demons then you have just seen a very impressive modernist demonstration of religion. You can have an encounter with expert musicians but not an encounter with God. Music is not there to entertain us or impress us - music is merely a servant to facilitate the manifestation of the glory of God.

I have walked out of services weeping and saying; "Jesus You are not there". But there were 1000s people there and everything was expert with smoke machines and presentation and lights and everything was so good - everything is hyped up in the soul realm. I walk out weeping and broken - I can't explain how horrified I am!

It is such a massive deception taking place because principles and cognitive cerebral ideas have replaced the Presence of Almighty God.

In the book of Acts there were glory and signs and wonders and miracles there. There is nothing judgemental about what I've just said about programmes! In my heart I MUST see His Presence! I want His Presence! When Adam and Eve fell, they fell from the Presence and glory of God! They didn't fall from the evangelical gospel; "Repent and live without the glory for the rest of your life". Sickness and disease is from the Lord - hallelujah. It's not from the Lord - its from the devil! "One day you will go to heaven and it will all be worth it" - that is the gospel of salvation - it's not the gospel of kingdom. I know one day I'm going die. I am not in total kingdom now.

The kingdom has come, it's coming and one day it will fully come at the return of Jesus!

(I just thought I would put that in for the heresy hunters and Pharisees and Sadducees, Couldn't-sees and Wouldn't-sees!). Adam and Eve covered themselves with fig leaves and it was the wrong cover and the cover must be blood. God was basically saying any other cover but the blood will leave you feeling guilty and will leave you feeling shamed so He slaughtered animals and put bloodied animal skins in order for them to find the peace of God.

Their son Abel understood the blood and Hebrews 11:4 says that by faith Abel offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain through which he obtained witness that he was righteous. God testifying to His gifts and through it "He being dead speaks today". That's an amazing Scripture! That through blood Abel FELT righteous but Cain brought just fruit from the land and God was not pleased with his sacrifice so at the beginning of humanity, we see that Abel though he is dead, still speaks today. That without blood there can be no approach to God, no favour of God, you cannot know God experientially, you cannot walk with God - there is no grace, no blessing, no power in your life without the blood - the manifest Presence of God is absent.

Except that if you go to church and God turns up and the faith of some of the other people draws Him. That for me is not good enough - I want to carry His Presence every day. I know I wouldn't be alive today if it wasn't for carrying His Presence.

I have carried His manifest tangible Presence every day for 30 years. There has not been one single day where I haven't felt the Presence of God. I am so concerned when some people are impressed by that. I am SO worried about that! Because it is a normal Book of Acts inheritance - to walk in His Presence!

I don't walk in His Presence every day, all day, all the time. I like to watch movies and read a book. But I am saying that I MUST feel His Presence every day and so must you! Noah (Genesis 7:2). How many of you know that God told him to bring the animals into the ark two by two? God said actually to bring the unclean animals in 2 by 2 - but to bring the clean animals in pairs of 7. Most don't know that. God puts nothing in His Bible for nothing and He's got shadows in there to help us look and see what the substance is. The unclean animals could not be sacrificed in a blood covenant but the clean animals - the superior number in pairs of seven - they were brought in so that after the flood (Genesis 8:20) after the judgement was over - Noah got off the ark and sacrificed the animals on Mount Ararat.

One from each. That's a lot of animals (v21). It says God smelled a "soothing aroma" and God took an oath not to destroy the earth again or curse the ground again. Why? Because of the blood. Then you get Abraham in Genesis 12:7. God shows him the future Promised Land of the people of Israel. God showed him the Promised Land and says; "I will give this to your descendants" and Abraham built an altar and makes a blood sacrifice in response to the promise of receving the Promised Land. Genesis 26:24-25 - Isaac.

I was preparing this yesterday and felt God say; "Preach on the blood". As I was putting these thoughts together and preparing this, I felt the Presence of God come on me as I was preparing and I must say as I am speaking now I feel like I am wrapped in this beautiful atmosphere of God and His Presence. We talk on the blood and it is a soothing aroma because of our faith in the blood - it is a soothing aroma to heaven and it brings such a Presence of rest and peace. Can you feel that? It's so wonderful.

Isaac - he also sacrificed blood in (v24-25) of Genesis 26.

So notice Adam and Eve - not without blood. Abel -not without blood. Abraham - not without blood. Isaac - not without blood. Notice who is without blood. Ishmael and Cain and what happened to those 2? Cut off. Those with blood - prosperity and peace and friends with God and His glory-Presence. Those without blood - cut off.

(Genesis 33). Jacob is on his way back to the Promised Land (v18) and built an altar and made a blood sacrifice. Jacob had 12 sons - all of which ended up in Egypt with their wives and children and they stayed for 430 years and became Israel. But they did not know God. In that 430 years they went into darkness and there is no mention of blood for those 430 years. Without the application of blood, they go into slavery and into bondage to the extent that they have no concious knowledge of God at all. So that when God appears to Moses, Moses has no idea who God is (41:11); "Who are You?". It's hard to believe because of how intimate Moses became with God and how close to God he was. But God turned up and Moses did not know God at all. He commands Moses to go and set His people free. But when Moses first went back to the Israelites, they didn't believe He was from God.

When people aren't under blood, they are in darkness and are religious and in slavery and are so discouraged. As Christians we are meant to live so full of hope and so full of confidence and so full of purpose and certainity. You live under Old Covenant thinking and you will not have that unless you come fully over to the New Covenant. They were in darkness for 430 years - and how did they get out of slavery? How did they get out of darkness? They applied the blood of the lamb on the doorposts and to the lintles.

Now God had applied blood to Adam, Abel, Noah, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and now the power of the blood covenant is revealed to Israel and God says; "When I see the blood, I will pass over - I will not bring judgement". He did not say; "When I see your holiness or when I see how well you perform". He said; "When I see the blood ...". There are so many Christians trying to impress God - with how much they are not sinning and "I am not sinning and I am searching my heart to see if there is any sin in me". Don't go down that route to search your heart for any sin! It's depressing to look in there! Look out and up! Look into Jesus - the Author and Perfector of our faith! Don't look in here!

I get very discouraged when people start a meeting by getting us to look in and see how much sin there is in there and repent of everything. 3 hours later you won't be finished! And when you have finished, you are so negative that you won't know how to worship! Thank God that woman didn't know anything about searching her haert - she knew she was a sinner but that wasn't what she was about. She walks in and throws an alabaster jar on Jesus's feet. She just worshipped Him and knew nothing about Hong Kong's religion. "Let's check our hearts before we worship". At the end of that He said; "I forgive you". The religious people say; "Doesn't HE know she's a sinner?". Of course He knew! But the law came through Moses and grace and truth came through Jesus.

"When I see the blood, I will pass over in judgement". Psalm 105 says the people came out laiden with gold and silver. So the blood brought them out of darkness and slavery and into a knowledge and encounter with God and into freedom and prosperity and into assignment on their way to the Promised Land. In Exodus 24:4, 9 - 3 million people were to be sprinkled with blood. We are talking shadow so we can see the importance of substance. We will never slaughter cats and dogs and put blood on you! Shadow. All 3 million were sprinkled with blood - can you imagine the amount of calves that were slaughtered? Now don't get angry with God for that - if you eat red meat! City dwellers should go and see how animals are killed and still enjoy their red meat. The book was to be dripping with blood and all 3 million people had to be dripping with blood. It says in (v10) that they encountered God and met with God through the blood.

(Exodus 25) - God tells Moses to build the Tabernacle which is a mobile Tabernacle as they were travelling the wilderness. It had 4 coverings and around it stood a fence of linen. Blue, purple, scarlet - at the gate. At the gate they came into the Tabernacle - those colours spoke about Jesus very clearly. Don't have time to go into the details there. The priests would come in through the gate - and right before them stood the altar of sacrifice. The first thing you saw was a blood sacrifice altar - all ordained by God. Beyond the altar was a big laver-like cup that priests would wash in - it was full of water and beyond that was the tent divided into two sections. The Holy of Holies and the bigger part - the Holy Place. We think that is Old Testament stuff and we don't need to know about it. It is shadow that God took time to put in through the reality of the substance more alive in our faith for daily living.

We have to understand the Old Covenant so we can leave the shadow and come into substance. The larger section of the tent - the first section as you come in through the door was the Holy Place and you would see on your right the Table of Shewbread. On your left you would see the lampstand - the 7 minora full of oil. Straight ahead you would see the Table of Incense. Beyond the Table of Incense you would see the veil that seperated the Holy Place from the Holy of Holies. In the Holy of Holies there was the Ark of the Covenant that had 2 cherubs with their wings nearly touching and a gold covered mercy seat and under that was the literal law written on tablets of stone with Aaron's rod that had budded.

God said; "I have to put the law under the mercy seat of gold referring to royalty and I have to cover that with blood otherwise I will have to kill all of you". They had to be hidden. Once a year the high priest would go into the Holy of Holies and sprinkle blood seven times on the seat. This is what would happen; here are some shadows that we need to catch and we need to see. Every day the priest would come through the gate, he would face the altar of sacrifice and then blood was offered from morning until night every single day. Blood was offered on the altar and then he would go in beyond the laver and the priests would wash themselves in the laver and then blood was splashed on the Table of Incense, on the veil itself and blood on the mercy seat once a year. Every day in the Holy Place - every day the priests would come into the Holy Place and would put fresh bread on the Table of Shewbread and make sure the wicks of the candles were clean and trimmed and filled with fresh oil and they would put fresh blood on the Table of Incense which refers to worship.

Our worship is unacceptable without blood. How often do people come into praise and worship on Sunday clue-less about the blood of Jesus and just go through the mechanical motions of praise and worship and God is a million miles away from them in their experience because they just cannot worship God without blood?

Daily they would spray the veil with blood - the veil between the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies and then once a year the mercy seat. Now what is God saying in all of this?

The blood is at the centre of His Presence, the blood is at the centre of open fellowship, living contact, communion with God and fellowship with God is only through the blood.

This continued for 1, 500 years. The mobile tent came to an end - the various temples but more than 1, 500 years later at the temple in Jerusalem, blood was still offered every day for 1, 500 years. Think of how many animals had been sacrificed and blood was shed? God was going to extravagant lengths to get a New Testament people to understand grace, to understand Presence and fellowship and how to hear His voice and walk in His glory and how to see signs and wonders and miracles and have an unfading glory - the reason they had to put blood there every day was that the blood of bulls and goats was a fading glory. The glory came and it faded so more blood, came and faded, more blood. That is the Church today!

Revival? Fade. Years and years of dead religion. Then re-discovery of the New Covenant, re-discovery of grace and revival and then back to law, back to Old Covenant thinking - we need another revival!

The church is meant to go from one degree of glory to the next because the devil has deceived the church and confused the majority of the Christian world today. The majority are deceived - mixing Old Covenant and New Covenant together. It is a confusing cocktail that is crippling the church of the supernatural. They believe in the New Covenant - the problem is that they do believe in grace. They believe in enough grace to make them believe they are New Covenant believers - but also believe in enough of pressure to perform to earn, to deserve the blessing by their own actions that they have enough Old Covenant there to nullify and neutralise the power and the authority of the New Covenant.

Let's look at Hebrews 9 - we are there and we can close in a little while. After 1, 500 years of this suddenly a Jewish prophet points to a Man born in Bethlehem and says; "Behold the Lamb of God - the true Passover Lamb - who takes away the sins of the world". Jesus at the Last Supper - the Passover Supper - takes the cup of wine and says; "This is My blood of the New Covenant for the remission of all sins". That's what we are going to see. Hebrews 9 and we will close with this.

We don't want to miss the substance. Despite all of those blood sacrifices no-one ever got free from guilt or condemnation under that blood.

How many of you know Christians today who live when they sin or make mistakes and then live with guilt or condemnation. In other words they are living under an Old Covenant mentality.

I want to show you in the substance that a Christian is never ever meant to live in or feel sin conciousness - never meant to feel guilt-conciousness - never meant to feel condemnation. That doesn't empower us to sin or live rebelliously or disobediently. That empowers us to love God and walk with God. We are not preaching a sinning Christianity - we preach a Gospel that empowers people to be free from the control of sin.

Hebrews 9:9; "Were not able to clear the conscience of the worshipper". That's Old Covenant. Now today some Christians live as though the blood of Jesus was not able to clear their conscience because they think Old Covenant. (v10); "until the time of the new order". You and I live in the New Order called the New Covenant. "When Christ came as the High Priest of the good things that are already here - He went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle". (In other words not Moses, tabernacle or the temple in Jerusalem). "That is not man-made - that is to say not part of this creation. He did not enter with the blood of bulls and goats and calves but He entered the most Holy Place once and for all and by His own blood on the hand - having obtained eternal redemption".

What kind of redemption did Jesus obtain for you? Eternal! So why do people keep asking me if I believe in eternal redemption? Of course I believe in eternal redemption! I don't believe in the blood of bulls and goats! I believe in a salvation/redemption that was purchased and got me eternal redemption. Not redemption on probation or in instalments - do you believe in eternal security? What kind of other security is there? Temporal?

I believe that people say; "Well you can lose their salvation" - absolutely have no idea of how horrific hell is. I have had a revelation of hell and I've studied the Scriptures on hell. If I thought there was some chance of me falling into hell and I was saved now but could one day get lost then I tell you I would have a nervous breakdown and psychiatrists are telling me and many other pastors more and more that the majority of their parents are Christians who live with a fear of losing their own salvation.

He brought us eternal redemption. I want you to look at (v13);

"... the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer sprinkled on those who are sprinkled on those who are ceremonially unclean, sanctify them so they are outwardly clean - how much more then will the blood of Christ who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death so that we may serve the living God?".

How many of you want to serve God, see signs and wonders and miracles and serve the purposes of God with a clear conscience?! Most Christians do not see signs and wonders in service to God because they always do not feel worthy enough. This is the blood of Jesus - not your good works! Not your; "I will never sin again - I promise you I will never sin again!". The clear conscience is based on the fact that the blood of Jesus will and is able. The Greek means; "He will cleanse your conscience from meaningless and useless ceremonies". So the blood of Jesus doesn't just cleanse your conscience from condemnation but from all Old Covenant thinking. All the meaningless ceremonies they did, that they still feel guilty after pouring out, all that blood the worshippers still felt guilty. This blood - the substance blood brings an unfading glory and a permamently second by second, week by week, year by year, decade by decade clear conscience!

This blood doesn't have to be offered ever again - it was offered once! I don't want to have to come every day and pray "Lord clean my conscience with this blood!". No - one application of this blood and your conscience is cleansed for the rest of your life!

Any condemnation, any sense of insecurity or guilt is a sign that you are still living under something of an Old Covenant mentality and I want to nail that in now - prove it and then finish. I want to show you that they were never free from guilt with shadow blood being applied through all of that millenia. (Hebrews 10:1); "The law is only a shadow of the good things that are coming". How many of you want to live in reality? I don't want to live in classroom Christianity. I don't want to be standing here 5 years from now talking about how we are going to move in signs and wonders and Hong Kong has not changed. I am expecting the sick to get healed in the streets - I am expecting people to get saved - I am expecting millions of Chinese people in Hong Kong to come to know Christ! I am expecting that!

Everyone knows when the church came to town 2, 000 years ago! The Church has been in Hong Kong for over 100 years and people ignore it.

Let one book of Acts church appear in true signs, wonders and miracles that don't happen just once every few years but happen every week and every day and not through some super-guru but through the ordinary priesthood of all the believers. ALL believers because we understand the blood. I don't want the shadow! I want the reality - the good thing!

Look at the next phrase. "For this reason ... worshippers would have been cleansed once for all". Why is he saying that? If all those blood sacrifices for 1000 years have cleansed the worshippers - then it is in God's intention and desire to have something that cleanses our consciences from guilt and condemnation not temporarily but once and for all! So God goes to millenia of shadow of the plane - look to the substance, you can get in that plane and fly around the world and do amazing things but with that shadow you can do nothing! So God takes millenia to show the inferior shadow that is not the realities so we can see the substance.

The majority of the Church lives in the shadow! Then it lives in a bit of the sustance, then a bit of the shadow, then the substance! It is spiritual schizophrenia!

Almost every meeting I go to nowadays outside of here, there is always some point in the meeting where we are told to be quiet and check the sin. That is shadow! There's nothing good about checking me - I want to check Jesus!

The shadow says that when the priest came, he didn't check you - he examined your lamb or your sacrifice! That's shadow! The Father isn't checking you out and analysing you - He's analysing the Lamb - Jesus. Perfect. Come on in! Glory Presence is yours! No condemnation!

You are in the New Covenant! Rob that is preaching license to sin - no it's not! The more you come into this glory Presence through a clear conscience the more you want Him, the more you don't want to sin, the more you want His glory Presence! For the worshippers were cleansed once for all - but these sacrifices were an annual reminder of sin. So that Old Covenant shadow was a reminder of sin and is false to the New Covenant people. Those sacrifices were an annual reminder because the blood of bulls and goats could not take away sin. Look down at our famous theme of City Church International in (v11);

"Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties again and again ... which can never take away sins. But when this priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God and since that time He waits for His enemies to be made His footstool by one sacrifice, He has made perfect forever those who are being made holy".

Does the Holy Spirit convict the church of sins? No! Read the next verse; (v15) "by one sacrifice He has made us perfect forever!". That's what the Holy Spirit testifies to. We are perfect forever! Yes but Rob the Holy Spirit convicts us of sin - we've been through that boring stuff. John 16:7-8 says that the Holy Spirit will convict of righteousnss, sin and judgement. Sin because the world doesn't believe on me, righteousness because I go to the Father and judgement because the prince of this world has been judged. If you are a believer He will not convict you because you are a believer. What righteousness will He convict you of? That you are the righteousness of God because Jesus went to the Father and He is the great High Priest mediating for you a better covenant and the Holy Spirit is testifying that you are perfect forever.

What is the judgement about? Judgement because the prince of this world - the devil - (John 14:30) - has been condemned. So condemn the condemmer, accuse the accuser, grab guilt by the throat and float, get out of the religious boat and float and wear your Father's glory coat! The Holy Spirit puts the law in our hearts - not a law that we have to live upto but an empowerment of grace. Then he adds (v17) that their sins and lawless acts I will remember no more. Their sins and lawless acts I will remember no more. The Holy Spirit testifies to that! So when you sin and say; "I must go and confess that" and go and say; "Holy Spirit I want to confess to something". He says; "I don't know what you are talking about - I don't remember anything!". Then (v18); "Where these have been forgiven" ... what has been forgiven? All your sins and lawless acts! "Has been" - past tense. Where these have been forgiven, there is no longer any sacrifice for sin.

(2 Corinthians 5:19); says God is not counting your sins against you. (Colossians 2) says God has forgiven your sins. God says you are perfect forever in the Father's eyes through the blood. So when you go and confess your sin and say; "Father I have just sinned" - it is an Old Covenant mentality and I have shown you the only place that says if you confess your sins He is faithful and just to forgive you and cleanse you from all unrighteousness - the only place is 1st John 1:9 - John is writing to Christians under the teachings of Gnostics and there is a confusion there that sin doesn't exist in the world. Now if sin didn't exist in the world then why did we need blood sacrifice for cleansing? So John is writing and saying; "If you say you have no sin, then the truth is not in you".

He is writing to people to GET saved in that community! And he says if you confess your sins then he is faithful and just to forgive you and cleanse you from ALL unrighteousness. How much? All. That's salvation! ALL - past, present and future!

He is not talking about the Christian that every time you sin; "Oh I've got to confess my sin now". The devil is teaching this doctrine in many churches that if you sin as a Christian and don't get a chance to confess that sin before you die, then you are going to hell. That's insane! The Holy Spirit is testifying to the opposite! That your sins and lawless acts He remembers NO more!

Did you notice that when Jesus finished all this He sat down? Do you know that if you study the tabernacle of Moses you will not see any chairs - you will see lots of tables. But no chairs because those priests never finished their job. They couldn't sit down! This One finished the job! "It is finished!" - He is sitting down and is not sitting in heaven saying; "I hope they make it - I hope they don't sin and lose their salvation!". No He is sitting down with confidence.

So then He says; "I want you to be seated with Me in heavenly places. Right now! Not one day when you die and go to heaven. In Christ we are in Him and seated! So you wake up in the morning and realise you are seated! What about if you do sin? Well look through every epistle that Paul wrote and he never once talked about confessing your sins - never mentioned it. This great apostle who knew the Law so well but also knew the revelation of the New Covenant. Not once did he instruct the believers to confess their sins to God. Confess your sins one to another - yes. But no instruction in the entire New Testament on this big confessing your sins - that is an Old Covenant mentality. You need to do that if you are under shadow blood. You sin - and relationship is broken! You need to get some shadow blood and a temporary relationship is formed. Sin again? More shadow blood!

But this thing of confessing sin every time you sin is just making you more CONCIOUS of sin.

That is the shadow friends! We are in the good things - we are in the realities! We are in the substance! We are in the unfading glory! So what do you do if you sin? You say;

"Father I want to thank You so much that You love me and I thank You that Jesus blood has got me eternal redemption and I thank You Holy Spirit that You testify that I am perfect forever and I thank You Holy Spirit that the Father never remembers my sins and they are not being counted against me because they have been blotted out, past, present and future - and I worship You Lord and I praise You God!".

That's empowering sin? No - it's empowering righteous living! It means we will have 100% believers turn up on Sunday and just come boldly into the Presence of God! I don't care if you messed up five seconds ago. You are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus! Somewhere, some congregation has to fully embrace the fullness of the New Covenant and fully reject and renounce the fully redundant and obsolete Old Covenant that is based on inferiority and shadow. We have got to see what the Old Covenant was for - shadow to point to substance! Get out of the shadows and step into substance!

"Therefore brothers since we have CONFIDENCE to enter the MOST HOLY place". What does confidence look like? Have you seen people that are religious going into a cathedral? Once a year the High Priest used to go into the Holy of Holies and they say they would tie a rope around his ankle in case he died in there and they could pull him out. There was great fear - but our great High Priest has gone through as an anchor of our souls beyond the veil - not of a human tabernacle but of a glory realm so that we can confidently come into the most holy centre of the universe! Even if you have sinned 5 seconds before! It's not about you - but about Jesus and His blood and His worthiness! You have got to live in this every day!

I tell you I'm so happy now. I just feel like it's another day where God's people said; "I believe this!". It's so fantastic! Hope you guys listening on the web are getting excited and we want to bless you guys all around the world! We look like we could go over 300, 000 downloads this month - we heard last night. We preach and affect nations around the world. This message is getting out! (v19-20); "Open for us through the curtain, that is His body ... let us draw near to God" (not an idea about God, a theory about God, an intellectual theology about God but the living God) " ... in full assurance of faith having our hearts sprinkled ... and having our bodies washed with a pure water, let us hold unswervingly ... for He who promised is faithful".

When people get under guilt like these Hebrews are doing, then people stop coming to church because who wants to keep coming to church when you are being discouraged all the time? This was a mixture of born again Hebrews and some who were not saved.

To the unsaved Hebrews he is writing to and the saved, he says if you have heard the knowledge of the truth (but haven't been converted yet) if you keep trampling this blood underfoot and therefore wilfully sinning (and this is in the context of the chapter) and is putting the blood of shadow above the blood of substance! He is saying you are trampling the blood of Jesus underfoot and you are using the blood of shadow and law. All sin is deliberate! Noone sins by mistake! It was deliberate! So you are on your way to hell according to how some intepret that! He is warning against going after shadow. You won't see any blood sacrifice going on in Israel today. Yet the Scriptures teach that there is no forgiveness of sin without the shedding of blood. That's why you can't to heaven through Mohammed or Buddha - because you can't get to heaven with blood.