Attitudes that Attract the Empowering Grace of God - Part 1

This sermon was preached by Rob Rufus on Sunday 20th July 2008 at City Church International in Hong Kong. I am so grateful to a new friend from Australia - Meredith - who has kindly transcribed the whole of Rob's "Attitudes that Attract the Empowering Grace of God" series! I am thrilled to be able to use this monumental series to kick-start the transcribing on this blog again. Enjoy!

"I have a sheer joy of being together with you today in Your Presence, God – in Your Covenant Keeping faithfulness. If You are with us – who can be against us! Nothing can separate us from Your Love! Through us gathered here – Your AMEN is spoken for ALL Your Yeses are Yes and Amen – O God!"

Recap of Word and Spirit Conference (WSC) in South Africa: testimony re Johnny praying a blessing in Cantonese

Something was birthed in South Africa with leaders from different denominations coming together as one.

The teaching of Michael Eaton has moved us into something new. Word and Spirit Conference was a time of breaking through legalistic churches. It is not the revolutionary’s fault but the leaders of 30 years ago who had the political power to change the church but chose not to use it according to God’s leading. They held onto political and leadership positions and oppressed the people of God.

When Jesus came there had been 300-400 years of religious oppression – there was no other option but for Him to be a Revolutionary and break people out of bondages and religious oppression.

Now there is a Grace Revolution taking place on the earth and you can’t make it a sweet tame little renewal. This one is wild, passionate and not for the faint-hearted. It is not for the insecure – it is for those who love Jesus with all their hearts; who love the lost and who love the church and who want to see a new generation come through in a revival culture.

Introduction to the Series - Attitudes that Attract the Empowering Grace of God.

If you have the empowering grace of God operating in your life – you’ve got IT happening for you! God is urging us to not just settle for something that’s god – He wants us to go for the BEST because the good can become the enemy of the best! God’s got far more for the church.

When you are regularly raising the dead and seeing blind eyes open - when this is happening and the whole of Hong Kong is aware that City Church International is a Book of Acts church then HK will see that traditional denominational churches have not been making people aware of the authority and authenticity of the Kingdom of God.

But when a Book of Acts church appears – CCI hopes to be amongst the many because we love God’s church. The Book of Acts church is one where people are healed because our very shadows are healing people and then all 7 million people in HK will know that there is a Kingdom of Heaven that is not an optional extra – it is the ONLY Government of God’s Peace and the Kingdom of God through the Gospel of Jesus Christ – Amen!

So we must not settle for the good when we know there is MORE. When we have all the empowering grace operating in our lives – those things will begin to take place. Right now we have empowering grace and we’re grateful – we’re excited about the healings we’ve witnessed however, we believe there is more – much, much more! Our desire is not for less to be healed but for MORE ... We want to see each member of this church seeing people set free and saved.

We look at that awesome church in Acts 5 – but the key we have to see is in Acts 4:33 With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. Rob Rufus does not know of one church in the world where each single person in the congregation is carrying GREAT GRACE on them! May the blessing of GREAT GRACE be upon you ALL in CCI! (Some of you would be even louder than me and more assertive than I am!!) GREAT GRACE to preach the gospel with liberty and joy!

Exploring the attitudes that attract empowering grace does not mean working or earning or deserving GREAT GRACE! That would be a contradiction in terms – you can never earn or deserve of work for the empowering grace of God!

These attitudes are not something you work on – they are fruit OR the result of you gaining revelation of you gaining acceptance grace. The more you understand you are accepted IN the Beloved: IN Christ Jesus – the more you understand you are made perfect forever ...
Heb 10: 14 For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are sanctified.
Eph 1:6 to the praise of his glorious grace that he freely bestowed on us accepted us in the Beloved.

God accepts us in the same love, honour and respect as He does Jesus – for we are co-heirs with Christ and an heir of God ... that’s acceptance grace! We are not co-equal with Jesus but we have a co-equal righteousness with Him which makes us a co-heir with Christ Jesus and an heir of God!

When you have more understanding of acceptance grace – that there is NO disapproval from the Father: no possibility of rejection from Father: that the foundation of your acceptance is NOT your fluctuating performance or obedience – bit it is ALWAYS the perfect obedience of Jesus on my behalf: that is where I stand in the Father’s Eyes.

When that acceptance grace builds into your inner life a strong healthy sense of security and an inner sense of safety is it from that place of humility and safety – you can build attitudes that attract the empowering grace: for you to have more victory over circumstances, life’s attacks and difficulties and to operate as a partner with God—doing the works that Jesus did and greater miracles even!

Comment on the South African experience:
In all the meetings with leaders this was the most commonly asked question ...
Q: Rob - tell us how your prayer-life works!

People want to know that what you produce in the public has something to do with your private life. Artificial religion is form a people who are so embarrassed in public ministry because they know they have NO substance in their private prayer life and interaction with God. Such leaders are caught out as fraudulent when they are asked to pray or do something ... listeners can hear that there is no connection between them and God.

A: The Holy Spirit and I have a very simple and uncomplicated relationship: this is how it goes ... He really likes me!


He really, really loves being with me (and me with Him!) – therefore, all I have to do is get up in the morning and invite Holy Spirit to Come! And there is an immediate manifestation of His Presence – therefore I don’t pray to get the Presence – I pray IN the Presence.

Folks! It is very hard talking to Someone Who is not Present! They don’t have to answer you back because they are not present! You can’t hear God unless He comes in manifested Presence! As soon as Holy Spirit manifests His Presence – you have access to the Father in a tangible way – and now you are talking with the Trinity – as a Reality! This is Authentic! You may then move on to do other things in your day – and all day there is an awareness that He really likes me and really wants to be with me!

Q: Do you know why this works?
A: The Holy Spirit knows that I know, that I know the Holy Spirit know that I know, that He know that I know that the Father accepts me the way He accepts Jesus – because He’s placed me INTO Jesus: that’s why Holy Spirit like me and He loves being with me!

When you believe that acceptance grace, that’s when empowering grace comes upon you!

I am concerned about the emphasis in churches on empowering grace to the exclusion of acceptance grace. If you don’t build empowering grace on the foundation of acceptance grace: when you over-emphasise empowering grace to do mighty things and to overcome sin all the time – that emphasis allows the devil to bring the law up and disguise the bondage of the law in the appearance of grace that takes them into self-righteousness and makes them very insecure on the inside.

When they don’t feel safe on the inside they then begin to live in jealous insecurity comparing themselves with others and feeling inferior – rather than knowing God’s acceptance grace. When you believe the gospel of grace – the first thing you understand and should understand and should be made clear to you – is not the empowerment—it should be the acceptance!

When you believe the gospel of grace – that faith in the gospel of grace will produce 3 spontaneous fruit that will come out of your life: when you truly, truly believe – the gospel of grace is acceptance on your life – these 3 fruit immediately and spontaneously grow and develop:

(i) boldness;

(ii) obedience;

(iii) humility.

Re obedience: obedience of faith – Holy Spirit tells you to do something – you do it! Either you do it because it is a good thing to do OR you stop doing something that is not a good thing to do. When you have obedience you have grace ... Please note: no-one is obeying perfectly yet! But the fruit is there ...

Q: What is humility?

A: It is not gained through apology and self-deprecation. Humility is the revelation of grace that fills your inner life with security: with such a sense of significance: validated by God’s Love for me ... therefore I am significant, secure and valuable—I don’t have to prove anything! I don’t have to boast or compete with people or be jealous because I feel so significant and safe and secure because I am accepted in the Beloved.

The 3 fruit (i) boldness; (ii) obedience; (iii) humility simply flow out of simply believing the message of grace.

Now for those Christians who are in unbelief (and there are many unbelieving Christians!) The majority of Christians in the church-world today are unbelieving believers. They do not walk around with boldness, obedience and/or humility ... and with empowering grace on them. They walk around with condemnation, insecurities, jealousies, fear and they can’t worship God extravagantly.

The fruit of unbelief is fear, rebellion and pride. When you don’t believe you are accepted in the Beloved – you fear rejection from God and man and so you will try to do everything to get people to like you – even if it includes NOT obeying God!

Thus you will go the way of secular religious humanism; you’ll do what man wants because you are so insecure; you don’t believe the gospel ... you want man to love you so you become a man-pleaser and you are easily manipulated off your destiny!

Jesus did only what He saw His Father do – because He knew His Father loved Him and He was secure in His Father’s Love.

The fruit of not believing the acceptance grace gospel is fear, rebellion and pride.

1 Peter 5:5b-7 ... all of you must clothe yourselves with humility in your dealings with one another, for “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”6 Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, so that he may exalt you in due time. 7 Cast all your anxiety on him, because he cares for you.

Here we have a God with a Mighty Hand: when you humble yourself under that Mighty Hand – He lifts you up ... now when a Mighty Hand lifts you up you will have influence over nations – your home – your marriage ... ! Children will come into order and security – you will have freedom and influence in your jurisdiction ... When God lifts you up – that’s empowering grace!

But when God resists/opposes you – it doesn’t matter if you have an army backing you or you have the wealthiest people on your side – if God is opposing you ... you are in trouble!

But if God is lifting you up by His Mighty Hand – it doesn’t matter how many human beings are against you – you are going to succeed in your destiny. You are going to leave footprints in the sand of human history. You are going to change nations – you will have an effect on the way history is going to unfold. You will be the ambassadors of God: ambassadors of the highest Government in the universe—authorised to activate the Power of the Kingdom in the earth and have influence.

But we need to remember that we don’t have the luxury of letting our grumpy moods go where they want to! We don’t have the luxury of having a little tantrum now and then ... instead of ‘deserving a depression’ ‘deserve yourself’ the blessing of grace to refresh you! When you go down the depression track for a few days it takes a whole lot longer to get out!

I know there are some Christians who are so into this warfare stuff! ... Somewhere in all their activities of fighting devils they have lost the Gospel – they’ve lost the gospel of grace; they’ve lost sight of the fact that God is ruling the earth with a Sovereign Authority! They’ve focused on devils etc and yet it was at the Cross that they were disarmed! Jesus disarmed all powers and authorities!

The Christians who worldwide live under this thing of focus on spiritual warfare rather than focus on the completed works of the Cross are those who (i) do not believe the acceptance gospel of Grace; (ii) who do not find their inner security and safety and confidence that produces the three fruit from believing acceptance grace; (iii) who do not find it from acceptance grace but what they will find is fear of rejection; performance pressure to look like you are obedient and holy; rebellion against the Truth of the Word of God and there will come pride in trying to perform and then God resists and opposes you!

When such people feel a spiritual force opposing them and resisting them they think it is the devil! Then they fast and prayer and end up with more pride, self-effort and self-righteousness. AND the devil says This is fantastic! They think I’m resisting them but actually God is resisting them because they’ve not believed in the Gospel of acceptance grace! Now they’ve gone into pride ... and I don’t have to do anything! But I will do what I can to make things worse for them!

I have watched people get into this spiritual warfare stuff and eventually they just look like they’ve been pulled backwards through the exhaust pipe of a car. They are not happy people because they are focusing on the defeated foe.

When you spend hours praying with God you should come out ecstatic with joy because your focus has not been on demons and devils – but on Jesus; the gospel; Holy Spirit; the Beloved.

I used to do that stuff in Adelaide – then he heard God say ‘Son – if you’ll just believe how much I love you; how much you are accepted in My Kindness in Christ Jesus; and just find release to humble yourself before Me – you’ll see empowering grace come on you!

Rob: Father – have I been wrong?
God: Son – I have to oppose the proud: for what you are doing is contrary to My Nature ... I have to oppose self-righteousness.

Rob: Father – do you mean I have proud, arrogant and self-righteousness?
God: Son – I tell you with redemptive kindness – YES!

Rob: God You are so good to me ... I repent of my pride; performance pressure and self-righteousness – I repent!

AT this point these demons seem to go out of existence ... and empowering grace comes upon me and I just walk in the Peace of God – casting ALL my care on Him because He care for me!

The devil wants to lure you into fights everyday – don’t get into them!

Humility is the greatest weapon against demonic oppression: humility = keep reminding yourself of acceptance grace!

The church has truly robbed Christians around the world of dignity through religious systems and we have degraded them by judging them on their performance rather than helping them to understand who they are in Christ and that they are accepted in the Beloved. When they develop that inner security and inner sense of safety that the Mighty Hand of God will lift them up and God will give them the stewardship of empowering grace to do mighty signs, wonders and miracles – then they won’t fall into the trap of pride!

There are many Christians who try to find a formula to ‘get into the Power’: without relationship with God we cannot ‘get into the Power’. When we use formulae to get into the Power we will find we can do a few miracles but then it is over – you can’t sustain it because pride comes in. Because you didn’t access the supernatural empowerment through humility but you accessed it through formulae – you only get temporary anointing for temporary release – but you can’t sustain it.

What I am talking about will bring such inner-security into the People of God SO THAT you can steward mighty empowering grace year after year – decade after decade and not be worn out; not mess up marriages; stay normal and not go weird!

One of the most attractive features of the Bethel Church in Redding is that all the leaders RR has met are normal – they still love hunting and fishing and hiking! They are normal people who don’t get all religious and weird!

I wants to see generations birthed who can sustain high level of supernatural power without becoming weird!

If you live under the performance pressure of the law you have to do religious things to maintain your performance power. This environment produces an artificial life wherein people burn out. Under the empowering grace of God you wake up in the morning; invite Holy Spirit to Come! and the power to do miracles is there through grace! Holy Spirit likes being with you! He wants to be with you! You are able to go to work every day, raise children and walk in the empowering grace for signs, wonders and miracles.

We do not have to feel God before we DO anything! You do not need to feel God before you do anything! You start in faith – you step out and Power comes!

In South Africa when I started praying for 2000 people – there was very little corporate anointing in that room. There was no Glory Presence – however, I started praying and eventually I was walking down the aisles and 10m in front of him people were falling under the Power of Holy Spirit ... You start out in faith and God just comes!

We are great ones for putting performance pressure on ourselves and others and even giving a star-rating for our performances! All based on pride! >>> pushing people to make things happen instead of making them secure in Christ and allowing 5 star things to happen through Holy Spirit! When this latter happens we’re at the stage of not being aware we’re doing it – we’re not boasting in it—we JDI! (Just did it.) We boast in our weakness and boast in the goodness of God and we move in signs, wonders and miracles.

A 5 star Christian leaps tall buildings with a single jump
is faster than a speeding bullet
is stronger than a locomotive
walks on water
talks with kings.

A 4 star Christian leaps tall building with a running start
is as fast as a speeding bullet
is as strong as a bull elephant
keeps his head above water under stress
talks with governors.

A 3 star Christian can leap short buildings if prodded
can keep up with a slow bullet
is almost as strong as a bull
washes with water
talks with himself.

A 2 star Christian bumps into buildings
misfires frequently
shoots the bull
drinks water
argues with himself.
A 1 star Christian cannot recognise a building
wounds himself when handling a gun
smells like a bull (!!)
passes water in an emergency (!!)
loses arguments with himself.

The 5 star performance-Christian is like a shooting star – coming down tragically ... OR they can learn the attitudes of humility and when God lifts them up they will forget about acceptance grace and go back into the cycle of performance more ... the devil loves to say do more! Do more! Do more!

We are here to stay! Emphasising acceptance grace so that as God raises us up to 5 star Christianity we are not even aware we are doing these things- as we are just so in love with Him.

Apostle Paul had such a revelation of acceptance grace like no other apostle did. On the basis of that foundation of acceptance grace God poured empowering grace out upon him (See p5 session 2).

Not once did Jesus call his Disciples brothers: He called them foolish and ye of little faith ... servants and friends by not brothers until ... after the Cross! Before the Cross they did not have righteousness in Christ Jesus: after the Cross they now share a common righteousness – WITH THE SON OF God! That is profound! The King of Heaven is my Brother; the King of Heaven is your Brother ...

Rom 8:29 For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn within a large family/many brothers.
Heb 2:11 For the one who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one Father. For this reason Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters.

Q: Why is he not ashamed to call us brothers?
A: Because we are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus! He ACCEPTS us as brothers!

Apostle Paul does not put the title APOSTLE before his name: people do not call him Ps Paul: He says: By the grace of God I am Paul called to be an Apostle – Apostle is my function NOT my title ... The legalistic church has become too enamoured with titles in front of minister’s names.

When Jesus calls us brothers ... and Paul addressed fellow-believers as brothers – we do not need titles! Some Bible Colleges even train ministers to keep their distance between themselves and the people: that’s not brothers! (Ladies you can be brothers because we men have to be the Bride of Christ!)

We are bonded together firstly as brothers and with brothers we relax: in a healthy home brothers don’t have titles – they can joke and reals and have fun and friendship and be transparent. Everyone of you who are born again are brothers and you are brother to the King of Heaven! Jesus is NOT ashamed to call you brothers!

Heb 2:11 For the one who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one Father. For this reason Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters.

In the 30 years of my ministry – whenever we come to the time to appoint deacons and elders – there is always tragedy that takes place: that is why I have not yet made such appointments in CCI. I have been waiting to kill this demonic hierarchical mentality that is in the church-world. It is rampant across the globe. As soon as people are designated leader there are two extremes that happen in the church ...

(i) people look at them and say now they are superior to me! Now I have to keep my distance ...

(ii) people are disdainful and say who do they think they are? I’m more spiritual than them! I’m not going to listen to them!

There is a rebellious, jealous lack of acceptance grace.

There are people operating as elders in CCI already and they’re not seen as superior to anyone else – because we’re brothers! Because I stand up here and speak – it is not because I am superior: it’s just what God has called RR to do. God hasn’t called all of us to be a mouth (thank God!): He’s called us to do all different things.

An aside on leadership ...

Q: What’s my ministry = the WRONG question!

Q: Where should I serve? That’s what ministry is ... serving. It does not take long to see who has a servant attitude!

All roles in the church are that of servant – i.e. to love the flock and to make sure everyone is growing in freedom in Christ. A shepherd is not someone who is a boss. Initiative has been crushed by hierarchical regimentation in church and culture: it has produced a bureaucracy and high level control-management that has dwarfed, diminished and robbed the people of God of initiative, creativity and of growing and developing in the ministry.

I will always encourage you to pray and seek Holy Spirit’s guidance: He will talk and counsel you – but he will not say Yes do that or NO don’t do that – he wants you to learn how to walk with God: he wants you to be liberated to walk with God.

That’s what liberators are: liberating leaders who liberate the people of God – they don’t manage the people of God. One day at CCI we will appoint leaders and he hopes no one will be shocked! All I am looking for is people who regularly turn up on time and who are a basic good example – people who give you a model of life to follow. I need people whom U know where they are at ... not people who engage in highs and lows – because such people can’t lead. I need consistency of behaviour.

When you have the idea of brothers and inner-security and safety – there can be no jealousy, no comparison ... whether you are appointed or not appointed – Father loves you fully! I want to build CCI into and lead CCI as a church like I have never led before. In every other church I done my best to break the hierarchy and insecurity and jealousy ... AND WE DID NOT SUCCEED. I pray we will succeed this time!

Some Christians, when they are not appointed cry out Why not me? And they leave the church AND that proves why they shouldn’t have been a leader! Leaders have to take enormous abuse and rejection and they can’t react back like some people do – they must stay stale, loving, gracious and consistent ... year after year after year ... Leaders must always be part of the answer: never part of the problem.

I want to get onto the attitudes ... you whom I love ... the kinds of attitudes that come out of acceptance grace that will produce in us humility, boldness and an obedience to God that will attract the empowering grace of God.

Prayer ...
I want to lift my heart to You and I want never to drift from acceptance grace; I don’t look for empowering grace – I believe if I live in the revelation of acceptance grace – God’s empowering grace will come looking for you! If you live with the attitude Paul had toward his fellow believers and it doesn’t matter how much empowering grace he is walking in as an Apostle – Paul sees his fellow believers as brothers ... beloved ... I long for you ... (This is the strongest Gk word to express human emotion ...)

I long for you – with all the affections of Christ – my joy; my crown ... when that atmosphere begins to permeate the church world – we will see such empowering grace.

We want to live as 5 star Christians: we want to demonstrate the Power of our Lord Jesus Christ in signs, wonders and miracles but that’s not what we want to focus on ...we don’t want it as a badge of merit that grades our spirituality: we don’t want to fall into that deception ... Our hearts want to grow in revelation, understanding and richness of the gospel of grace – of acceptance, of true humility, true inner security – having nothing to prove; not comparing ourselves with others; no jealousy, no gossiping, no devouring one another ... We want to be those kinds of people who walk in a humility that attracts Your Mighty Hand, O God! To lift us up – in due time that we may see Your Manifest Power – as 5 star Christians.

Release any attitude of negativity towards any Christian in the world – wherever, whoever ... we repent and seek a pure heart: we want to love everyone (when you love everyone that doesn’t mean you have to trust everyone – particularly if you have been betrayed ... you don’t have to trust them until they have earned your trust!) ... but you can love them – because you are already loved perfectly by our Father; you can forgive them – because you are already forgiven perfectly by our Father; you can accept them – because you are already accepted perfectly in Christ by our Father.

Father – we’ll make every effort to keep the bonds of peace: we preach a strong gospel message here and we thank you for every brother and sister IN Christ in this city and the world ... we want it be a blessing as far as we can go with your people around the world. We want no attitudes of arrogance or pride or superiority or self-righteousness. We choose to be humble ourselves – we’d rather humble ourselves than be humiliated. O Father! I’ve been humiliated and I know that humbling oneself is a lot better! We choose to humble ourselves because of Your Grace ... in Jesus’ Name.

"Increasing Glory" Conference - South Africa - MP3s!!

Here's another chance to hear Rob and Glenda Rufus and Fini and Isi de Gersigny that I was planning to grab but missed thanks to swine flu! Fortunately I knew a few people who were at the conference so I was enjoying text updates throughout! I'm thrilled to also discover a blog covering the event by one of the pastors - a guy called James here. The hosts have very kindly made the MP3's available for wider listening around the world - so here they are;

Session 1 - Morning
Rob Rufus
Wednesday 8 July
Download Session

Session 2 - Afternoon
Rob Rufus
Wednesday 8 July
Download Session

Session 3 - Evening
Rob Rufus
Wednesday 8 July
Download Session

Session 4 - Morning
Fini & Isi de Gersigny
Thursday 9 July
Download Session

Session 5 - Evening
Rob Rufus
Thursday 9 July
Download Session

Session 6 - Morning
Rob Rufus
Friday 10 July
Download Session

Session 7 - Afternoon
Rob Rufus
Friday 10 July
Download Session

Session 8 - Evening
Fini & Isi de Gersigny
Friday 10 July
Download Session

Testimonies - Morning
Various
Saturday 11 July
Download Session


Session 9 - Morning
Rob Rufus
Saturday 11 July
Download Session

Session 10 - Evening (Celebration Service)
Rob Rufus
Sunday 12 July
Download Session

Interview with Fini & Isi
Leadership Podcast
Friday 10 July
Download Podcast

New Nature Publications on You-Tube!!

Just got back from an awesome weekend away in Brighton - to find this:



Awesome!! Get over to the website and get browsing - this is only going to grow!!

New Nature Publications!!

I am so tremendously excited to report that Ryan Rufus's new publishing company - "New Nature Publications" - has just gone live on the internet offering an awesome vision along with products and resources from City Church International and others to "rain grace upon the nations"!

Ryan's two incredible books; "Sanctification by Grace" (that I've just finished reading for the tenth time!) and "Do Christians Still Have a Sinful Nature?" are available there along with ...

A new book by Rob Rufus called "Invading the Impossible!"

The vision is this;

"The vision of New Nature Publications is to provide an ever increasing amount of grace resources to churches and people across the planet and to see those churches and people come into the fullness of His glorious grace. Our desire is that the lost will find these resources irresistible as well, as they encounter gracious grace filled people who are getting these resources out!"

I do urge you all to go have a browse! This is an awesome answer to prayer for all those who hunger and long for a people of reality and grace to arise in the earth and start showing the lost that not all religion is hypocrisy and legalism!

Why Angels Visited Our Service

I mentioned in the last post that I am using a few spare days to catch up with some archived sermons and the month of June 2007 was particularly significant for City Church International. In this sermon Rob explains exactly WHAT happened on the 10th June 2007 and the significance it carries.

This was preached on Sunday 17th June 2007;

"Please open your Bibles to Genesis 28. I have what I think is going to be a short message. I want to talk about something that happened here last Sunday and bring some interpretation to it. I really think it is for today and we would lose something of it next week. So I want to talk about the "Downloads of God's Glory". God is downloading glory into our church. Dion and the rainbow - you look in the Book of Revelation and chapter 4 and John was caught up into the heavens and he described the throne room of God and the first thing he said was; "I saw a rainbow encircling the throne". As Dion prophesied, a rainbow means that judgement is over! That is a sign of the covenant at the end of the flood when God judged the world - the rainbow said that judgement is over. There is no judgement but a throne of grace with a rainbow over it where our God sits and rules the universe and we sing praises to our reconciling God who is redeeming the earth and the planet.

Let's have a look at what the house of God is. What is it? It is the church! It is great to be in church where everyone is alive! We are living stones the Bible says. People think that the church is a cathedral in the corner with a few old grannies going to it!

But the church is the most relevant thing on the planet! It is the gateway to heaven! It is where the glory of God finds a portal to manifest into the earth!

Genesis 28:10;

"And Jacob went out from Beersheba, and went toward Haran. And he lighted upon a certain place, and tarried there all night, because the sun was set; and he took of the stones of that place, and put them for his pillows, and lay down in that place to sleep. And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven: and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it. And, behold, the LORD stood above it, and said, I am the LORD God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac: the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed; And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south: and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed.

And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of. And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said, Surely the LORD is in this place; and I knew it not. And he was afraid, and said, How dreadful is this place! this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven".

(John 1:47) Jesus said the same thing to Nathaniel. That the house of God is the gate of heaven where angels ascend and descend.

Last Sunday morning while I was talking I was aware that there was like a static electricity in the air. Something rather unusual but nothing overwhelming - just an awareness of the Presence of God. When I came to the end of the speaking and I invited people forward and we came and knelt down in the tenderness of God's Presence and let God align us and adjust our allegiances so that we were in proper alignment for the anointing to flow in unhindered power through our lives, I thought we do that for a few minutes and then we would close the service. But as those who were here remember the glory of God came into this place. When we were in the military we were trained what to do if we were in the bush and if we walked into an ambush, we were trained how to get down to the ground as quickly as possible. I said to Dion that I have never seen people fall so fast. I knew something was happening as people began to weep and others began to explode with joy.n

Afterwards I was talking to Marina. She is a very intelligent lady! She thinks - she is not weird. We were talking about the glory of God and every time I said the word "glory" I felt like I was being stung but in a nice way with a thousand beautiful stings. I was shivering and my hair was standing up every time I said the word "glory". So I said; "Marina everytime I say the word "glory" I feel voltage going through me". And very matter of factly she said; "Oh when you got up to speak, 5 minutes after you started speaking 2 very large angels assembled themselves one in one corner and one in the other".

Now this is where some people take a departure from the meeting and say; "Okay! Angels!? These are weird people! They believe in angels?!". No we don't believe in angels! We believe in the Bible and the BIBLE believes in angels! Angels were a common occurance! I want to get out of churches where angels never turn up because if angels never turn up then it is a sign that God has left the place! The House of God is a stairway where angels ascend and descend!

1. She said that they were LARGE angels.

Immediately I knew because I have studied the angelic Scriptures in the Old and New Testament and the Bible is full of the activity of angels - they come on assignment from the heavenly realm through the church and into the nations doing the will of God! They never preach the Gospel - they are not assigned to preach the Gospel. They are assigned to help human beings preach the Gospel! You won't find one angel preaching the Gospel in the Old or New Testament - they help human beings. After Jesus went through His wilderness temptation in Matthew 4 it says that He was exhausted and angels came and refreshed Him. If He needed angels when He was limited to His human body then you and I need angels! Hebrews 1:14 says angels are ministering spirits of fire sent forth to minister to the heirs of salvation! We need them! We don't worship angels and will never worship angels. We worship Jesus Christ!

But I knew they were high-ranking angels - she said "large" angels. And she said they had trumpets in their mouthes. And I want to give interpretation on that. I want to say this - when angels descend they come on assignment in answer to the churches prayers. When angels ascend it means that their assignment is over and they go back for R and R in heaven. They will stay there until the church prays again and asks the Father to help us break into Hong Kong, break into China, to get marriages right, finances right, health right. And you get prosperity angels, warring angels, communication angels, guardianship angels - every human being whether they are saved or not are assigned a guardian angel. That's why the angels in heaven rejoice when someone gets saved becase they know at least if he dies he will go to heaven!

Every human being has an angel - from the time you are born to the time you die, you have an angel assigned to you! As the church prays - we do not command angels around - we pray to the Father and He commands the angels to do the command of His Word. He assigns angels! But many angels are so bored in heaven - they are tired of their harps! They have played their harps this way and that way! They want a church that will get out the boat and walk on the water and take some risks and stop being so religiously conservative and playing it safe and don't want to make a fool of themselves! They want a church that steps out in the authority of God and gets out the boat and says we want to see miracles happen, we are tired of normal Christianity, we want to see signs and wonders!

And God says "Wow - look at them they are praying! Angels go and help them before they make fools of themselves!". Go! And God is starting to dispatch angels that have been on assignment to other groups and other peoples and they are not using them so God will use them on assignment for people who want to change the world around them!

I would not have been in the earth today if it were not for angels. I would have been dead some time ago! I would have been killed in my bedroom in Hong Kong! Demon powers would come into my room from the time I got to Hong Kong and try and push me into my bed and paralyse me and throttle me in my bed and one night Geoff came and layed hands on me and said; "From this night God says that His angels will come around and guard you and stand around you". Angels came on assignment from heaven and guard me when I go to sleep now! Isn't that wonderful?! I am a university graduate and some say I am intellectual! I as a so-called intellectual believe that God has angels in the earth and I believe those angels will activate and move out when God's people believe in the supernatural and believe in the invisible world and stand up and say "God come and help us - come and support us!".

2. Why would they have trumpets in their mouths?

If you look in the book of Exodus, Israel when they were going to their freedom, when they were going to inherit the promises of God in the Promised Land and were going to inherit vineyards, houses, prosperity, land, estate, fruitfulness - God said "I give you the power to get wealth" (Deuteronomy 8:18). And they were on their way following a cloud of glory that they could see with their eyes! During the day a cloud of glory was moving across the desert and they would follow it. At night it would become a pillar of fire. Every now and then the cloud of glory would stop and wait in a place for days sometimes even weeks. When the cloud of glory stopped then 3 million Israelites stopped and waited there until the cloud moved again.

A great lesson for us to know - God is on the move! Move when He moves but stop when He stops! Some Christians don't even know that God is moving! Some people make things happen! Some people watch things happen! And some people don't know what happened! The church is full of people that don't know what God is doing! Get on assignment with God! Get purpose and vision and destiny to change nations and you will be the happiest person on the earth while you walk through hell! But if you want to sit on your blessed assurance for the rest of your life and get happy then you will be the most miserable person on the planet! But when you get on assignment for God and angels come to help you and God gets behind you and financial miracles take place!

They waited under the cloud of glory and that cloud of glory was like a shelter from the desert heat during the day! It gets very hot in the wilderness and it is boiling hot - the light is so glaring. There is no moisture in the air! So they would have air conditioning under the cloud of glory during the day and then during the night it would turn to a pillar of fire. How many of you know that in a desert the nights become freezing cold and drop down to freezing? So the pillar of fire kept them warm at night and they were following that. When it stopped they stopped. They knew that they could not go anywhere without the Presence of God. Some Christians do not know where the Presence of God is going and don't know when to stop or when to go! So they go out in the wilderness and say "Where's God?" and they wonder why it is so hot in the day and so cold at night spiritually speaking! The Bible says as soon as the cloud of glory began to move then God spoke to Moses and He said "As soon as the cloud begins to move - I want trumpets to sound. Awaken and get Israel aware!". The prophetic! Get Israel aware that the cloud is now moving! Get up and break camp! Get going!

Some of the Jews said; "No business is good here - we are not moving!". We are staying here! So the cloud went and everyone went off and they stayed but within days there was hot sun and freezing desert and drying up! You have got to keep moving with the glory of God! You can't get offended and get hurt and say "No I am just going to stay here and camp here and I am tired of following the cloud and I will do what I want with my family, my marriage!". Fine - but when that cloud moves and if you don't move with it then you are in serious trouble! I have not moved sometimes when the cloud moved - I got too comfortable. Business was good in Adelaide or in Durban! It takes a few days without the Presence of God and you start running back; "Wait for me - I am coming!". In 1st Corinthians 14 Paul says that the prophetic must make a clear trumpet sound in order for people to assemble. What he is saying is that the assembly is something wonderful - the cloud is about to move! You are going to go into greater dimensions of My Presence!

It is not just about us moving geographically. I personally don't think I will move from Hong Kong for many years. It is about moving on with God into new dimensions and new encounters and realities of the supernatural.

Bethel - the house of God - the gateway of heaven! Gates are access points and when you go through a gate you go from one dimension into another dimension. The Church is a gateway into realms of the glory! It is a gateway into the realms of what is happening in heaven!

And God says "I am beginning to move again in CCI - you have come through months and months of testing and trials and people analysing and questioning". But the cloud is beginning to move! The trumpets are sounding! It is time to move! The house of God!

John 14 - Jesus says in my Fathers house there are many mansions ... so that where I am, there you may be also. We have always said; "Well that just means going to heaven one day". I don't believe that at all! I believe we will die one day and go to heaven and that will be great. But I am in no rush to get there. Home is heaven! But we must read Scripture in context! Jesus was not talking to the disciples about going to heaven - the whole context was that Jesus was going to heaven but the Holy Spirit is coming to replace Him in the earth and the miracles that I have been doing then you will do also and greater works. Anyone believes in Me - I am going to the Father and He will send the Holy Spirit to you!

Then He goes on throughout the whole chapter talking the church moving in the power of the Holy Spirit. So that "where He is - you may be also".

So last Tuesday when I was praying for the service, I said "Holy Spirit You are an eternal being and You are not locked into time! You are the Alpha and the Omega. You see the beginning and the end simultaneously. You live outside of time! You created time! So Holy Spirit please go ahead to Sunday and be there already and be there for five days perfuming this place and preparing a place for us so that where You are we may be also! Then won't You break back into Tuesday and start working on the hearts of everyone in this church and supernaturally align us to be positioned properly to receive what You have been preparing for us on Sunday". That's why I believe being at church is so vitally important for divine encounters in what God is doing.

3. Now the question I have to ask is why were there TWO angels?

Why couldn't there have been one angel? Why two? One angel could have sounded their trumpet! So this week I began to pray and ask why two? Your head only can catch up with spiritual reality later! Education means you can study for hours and after much study and effort you learn something. But with spirit revelation you can have divine information into your spirit that you just KNOW something that is quite large information but you got it in a split second. So divine information from heaven can come instantly and suddenly you know it!

So I heard God say something very obvious to me. "While you were speaking on covenant - one angel represented the Old Covenant and one angel represented the New Covenant. And this church knows with our heads and some degree with our hearts that we are not under the Old Covenant at all! We are not under law at all - we are totally under grace and under the New Covenant. I am announcing in the spirit realm that there is a moving of the people of God out of long held conditioned positions of Old Covenant thinking and mentality of condemnation and insecurity and guilt and I am releasing this church in the spirit realm to step out from Old Covenant thinking. We know we are not under the Old Covenant but Old Covenant thinking still remains like shadows in our minds. And the New Covenant trumpet is sounding - step into the glory of New Covenant thinking!".

2 Corinthians chapter 3 speaks of two glories! We often say we are being changed from one degree of glory to the next. We try to say by that the New Covenant is going up with ever-increasing glory. That is not good interpretation of that chapter because that chapter in it's context only speaks of two glories! It talks about the glory of the Old Covenant which was a fading glory and no glory at all compared to the glory of the New Covenant! The glory of the Old Covenant was a ministry of death and condemnation written on tablets of stone but the glory of the New is that we get a free gift of righteousness, we get boldness, we lose all condemnation and it is a glory that brings a spirit of life and energy into our lives! The glory is God's view and position of you! The Old Covenant glory is how God sees you through the law. So all He sees is the perfect standards of the law and His righteous holiness must judge you and me because the law demands a perfect righteousness of us all the time. The moment you are below the standards of the law then the wrath of God must come and judge.

In New Covenant God provides His righteousness for us permamently for 24 hours every single day we are seen by God as perfectly righteous in Christ Jesus! The New Testament glory is God's opinion and view of you through only grace. God never looks at you through the law. He never shifts His position of you from the Old back to the New. God is in a perfect position looking at you only through grace and only through the New Covenant glory all the time every second - even when you fail and SIN! Even though we don't want to sin and we hate sin. God doesn't put you back under law when you sin! What would be the point? No God said that the law would crush us and condemn us and judge us! So the New Covenant even when we sin and mess up God can relate to us with authenticity because His wrath was already poured out on Jesus Christ in your place forever and ever - it's not even an issue anymore under the Old Covenant!

This is the point I want to make - if you find your confidence before God is based on your performance and based on how well you are doing then you have put yourself in an incredible place of pressure. Because only when you are doing perfectly well will you feel that the Father loves you and accepts you and approves of you. The moment you start doing bad you will feel you have divine disapproval over your life. How do you know when you are doing good enough to have the Father happy with you? How do you know when you have done enough to keep the Father happy? There is always a pressure to do more!

I want to go more and love Him more! I want to! But if I live in confidence based on me fulfilling all my want-tos then when I don't fulfill all my want-tos then I will feel insecure before the Father. It is not about you and me having to do more! Jesus did it ALL! He was enough! In Him you are accepted! In Jesus it is finished! All the things I do are never to get His approval - I have already got it in Jesus Christ under the New Covenant and that liberates me to have the right motive in what I do for Him! Every week Glenda and I get letters like this from our website and most of them we have never met. Most of them are saying "The grace message has set us free". I don't know this couple - they are from the UK and from Watford.

"Dear Rob and Glenda,

We just have been so passionately stirred - the last two weeks to write this email and tell you what the grace of God has done for us. There are no words to describe what is happening to us. It is a freedom and liberty that has lifted us off our feet with joy. We are truly FREE!!!!!! It has been the most amazing thing to truly understand God as Father and His sweet Presence. I had this revelation a month ago and I had a life-changing experience with the Holy Spirit in my quiet time where it was so tangible it was upon me. The room was so bright that I was afraid to open my eyes. Trembling, laughing and weeping at the same time I don't know what is happening to me - all I know is that I just want to know Him more and more and fall deeper in love with Him. For Rory it is freedom to rise up and boldly speak the gospel to his collegues at work. His journey is at least an hour there and an hour back on the M25 (the biggest parking lot in the world because no cars move there) and the teachings from your website refresh him every day and he says that it feels like he has been born again again! It has helped us understand the Scriptures in such a profound way that you just want to read and read and read!".

It is amazing that people keep asking me if I am under grace then I won't read the Bible, pray or nothing! No! No! No! When the grace of God truly sinks in and you hear that trumpet sound to get out of an Old Covenant mentality and come here - you cannot learn grace with your head, you must learn it with your spirit and when it hits your spirit then you will know! Let me encourage if it hasn't hit your spirit yet then it is going to sooner or later! When it does you will know! You will be changed! You will have confidence before God!

"Our friends have noticed the change in us! Some have said we are drunk??? So as a result our CD writer has been working overtime as we continue to pass the message onto others. We just want to encourage you and thank you as you continue to teach the message of God's grace. Please let us know when you plan to have a conference in Hong Kong! We would love to come! Love in Christ, Rory and Cindy".

Lets read 1st Corinthians. You will never move from that Old Covenant mentality into the freedom of the New Covenant mentality by trying to analyse it with human wisdom. It is too big. You and I have been indoctrinated since we were children that nothing is for free and you have got to earn everything! If you are thirty or forty years of age then you have had thirty or forty years of brainwashing and indoctrination. Nothing is for free! In this world's system that is absolutely the truth! Nothing is for free! You work for it by the sweat of your brow and that is the judgement that came on Adam and Eve. Before the Fall they could think where they wanted to be and be there - from one geographical location to another. They named the animals and had governing power over the earth. They thought let's have prosperity and prosperity came. They thought let the fruits come and fruit came. After the judgement God said that by the sweat of your brow will you work. In the New Covenant sure we have to work in the world's system but in the Kingdom miracles come FREELY!

Not how much you prayed or how holy you are or how good you are or how nice you are. You could have just messed up and a download of glory comes. A promotion at work, a healing in your body, a miracle in your marriage. You say "I didn't deserve this!" - yep! Never ask God for what you deserve! If you do then warn me so I can get out of Hong Kong! The New Covenant is all about receiving the generosity of a Father freely! Worldly wisdom will never let you move from Old Covenant thinking. You will stay in bondage. The trumpet has sounded! If you just say "God I repent of worldly wisdom and worldly ways of thinking and I just come into the foolishness of the Cross and at the Cross it is enough!". He did it! It is finished! Worldly wisdom says the Cross wasn't enough! Religious systems say that you can't have free things from God! The wisdom of God is the Cross! Worldly wisdom is working by the sweat of your brow to earn it!

Chinese communities have been brainwashed to earn it! A worldly wisdom has to be broken! Let's read 1st Corinthians chapter 1:17;

"For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect. For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent?".

The Bible is going to speak in a minute about the spirit of this world. We will see that the Holy Spirit can show your spirit what God has given FREELY to you without you earning or deserving it.

(2:1); "And I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God. For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling. And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power: That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.".

Now Paul is about to say that we do have a wisdom in the church! It is God's secret wisdom, a wisdom that planned the Cross before time began!

When Adam rebelled God didn't have a nervous breakdown! Before time began God knew what was coming and He planned the secret wisdom of the Cross destined for our glory! He says that the powers of darkness, the rulers of this world did not know God's secret wisdom and operated in the spirit of this world and had they known the secret wisdom of God they would have NEVER crucified Jesus because if they had found out that at the Cross you and I would be liberated to the New Covenant and into the glory of the New Covenant then they would have let Jesus live to old age! Jesus didn't come to the earth to live forever and ever He came to the earth to die as a perfect virgin born Son of God.

Jesus is unique in the entire earth as the virgin born Son of God and when He died on that Cross He ambushed every demonic power and ruler of darkness, all their clever intellectualism could not see the secret wisdom of God at the Cross! Neither can any human being but for those who believe "It is finished!" and God's glory is for me and I am out of the Old Covenant and not under law but in grace - from that moment on we live in the trumpet sound of the New Covenant!

(v6); "Howbeit we speak wisdom among them that are perfect: yet not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes of this world, that come to nought: But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory".

Your mind can't work this out in natural wisdom. It must be heard inside. Your brain cannot contact an infinite God and your ears can hear beautiful melodies but only your inner being, your spirit can hear the wisdom downloaded directly by the Holy Spirit. We must be so sensitive to the Spirit of God! No one knows the thoughts of Rob Rufus apart from my spirit and you don't know the deep things of God. It is impossible to know the deep things of God by your natural mind but the Spirit of God who is God equal with the Father and Son searches everything even the deep things of God and we have received the Spirit so that we may know the things that God has FREELY (not earning or deserving) given to us!

When that starts to sink in then you have been delivered from the wisdom of this age which is satanic and delivered into the wisdom of the age to come. You are on your way for deliverance from condemnation and you are going to be a wonder-worker, a miracle worker! Lets read (v9);

"But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.

Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man. For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? but we have the mind of Christ".

That is absolutely phenomenal!

Demons are about to break and be cast out who are hating this message. My spirit knows these things. Those little demons know that I know that they know that they are already defeated and our power is of infinite phenomenal strength. I am fed up of demons! They just come out now in the presence of the anointing. Straight out. Stand and lift your hands and welcome the Holy Spirit. None of us are 100% in the New Covenant mentality yet - but we are moving there. We are first fruits of generations that will never be born into Old Covenant law teaching and will be born in grace and will never have to struggle with what most of the church has had to struggle with. The next generation will be liberated congregations! We are walking into the rainbow of God and leaving behind chains and bondage and entering into the trumpet sound of the New Covenant! Is Jesus good enough?! Yes He is so therefore I am the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ!"

Ryan Rufus - Hebrews 6

This sermon was preached by Ryan Rufus at City Church International in Hong Kong on Sunday 8th February 2009. I have decided in light of the exciting prophecies about the year that City Church International is going to have to follow their sermons weekly and transcribe each sermon.

"Can You Lose Your Salvation?"

I've got no time for introductions this morning so we are getting straight into it! Turn in your Bible to Hebrews 6:4 and I am reading from the King James Bible this morning. It is never good to just have one version. Always look at many versions and cross-reference and always look at the Greek. That way you avoid error. Hebrews 6:4;

"For it is impossible for those who have once been enlightened and tasted of the heavenly gift and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost and have tasted the good Word of God and have tasted of the world to come - if they shall fall away, to renew them again seeing as they crucify again to themselves the Son of God afresh and put Him to open shame".

Now - what does it sound like that Scripture is saying? If we read just those Scriptures without the context? That you can lose your salvation! It sounds like if you fall away then you are toast. Many people have preached these Scriptures out of context and have butchered these Scriptures and have butchered the Body of Christ as a result. There is a context here that you have to understand otherwise you are guaranteed to get these verses wrong.

(v4) actually starts with the word "For" - which shows what it is there for. He has just said a whole bunch of things and now says; "For it is impossible". So there is a context that we cannot ignore! I am going to go back where I feel the context begins to start. We are going to go back and build the context right back to these verses and by the time we get there you guys will know what these verses mean in their proper context without me even having to say. You can start in Hebrews chapter 1 but you don't have to go back that far. You can go back to Hebrews 4:14. I am going to read a few verses and then explain them and then move on;

"Seeing then that we have a great High Priest that has passed through the heavens - Jesus the Son of God - let us hold fast our profession".

Chapter 5:1;

"For every high priest taken from among men is ordained of men of things pertaining to God that he may offer gifts and sacrifices to God for sins".

Chapter 5:5;

"So Christ glorified not Himself to be made a high priest but He said unto Him; 'Thou art My Son - today I have begotten Thee' (v6) - 'Thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizadek".

So here we start seeing the context being revealed. The writer of Hebrews introduces Jesus Christ as the superior high priest of a better covenant - a superior mediator of a better covenant and he is contrasting Jesus with the old Levitical priesthood and the old order of sacrifices and inferior priests with the new order of Jesus and the better sacrifices that Jesus offered. So we have to see that! The book of Hebrews does that a lot - it contrasts the inferior with the superior. The Old Testament Levitical priests are inferior - why? Because they offer an inferior sacrifice and they keep dying! Their sacrifice could never remove your sins - it could only temporarily cover them. They kept dying! That means God could never wrap up time and take people to heaven because the sacrifice could never remove their sins and you cannot have sins in heaven. The priest could not go to heaven and keep offering sacrifices because they weren't holy either. So if things continued under that old order of priesthood then no one could go to heaven!

That is why Jesus is superior because He offers a superior sacrifice - His own blood - that by one sacrifice He has dealt with EVERY sin for ALL time.

He is a High Priest and is revealed in the order of Melchizadek. You can read about him in Genesis 14. The big deal about Melchizadek is that he is a high priest forever. The actual big thing about him is that he has an indestructable life. Jesus is a high priest in the order of Melchizadek because He has an indestructable life and that means He will never die again! He offered a better sacrifice and He is an eternal High Priest! That means He mediates for us. 1 John 2 says that if we sin we have One who speaks in our defence - Jesus Christ and Hebrews 13 says that Jesus is the same yesterday, today and forevermore! Often we use that for healing - which we can if we wanted. But He is not going to be healing forevermore in all eternity. There will be no need for healing in eternity. The Book of Hebrews reveals Jesus as the superior mediator for our sins and speaks on our behalf and He is the same yesterday, today and forever!
Yesterday He dealt with our sins in the past. Today He is our mediator and deals with all our present sins and forevermore He is our mediator and deals with all our possible future sins!

So here we see the context starting to evolve. I want to read a few Scriptures. (v8); "Though He was a son yet learnt He obedience by the things which He suffered". What does that sound like!? Because people have also butchered that Scripture! It sounds like Jesus turned obedient through the things that He suffered. Well let me ask you the question - was Jesus ever disobedient? Did Jesus ever need to learn obedience? No! And if you actually study the original Greek it doesn't say that! It actually says that He REMAINED obedient through the sufferings. Why? Because He knew He was a son! He knew who He was in God! So He had great strength to persevere through anything He suffered, any persecution and He remained faithful and obedient to God.

The book of Hebrews is written to a people that are facing persecution. It gives them encouragement and strength in their faith and not to shrink back and throw away their confidence - but when you know you are a son of God and you know your place in the Kingdom in Christ Jesus then you can persevere through anything! (v9);

"And being made perfect, He became the Author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey Him".

Another Scripture that has been messed up by people! See when you have a legalistic mindset you read the Scriptures wrong. But when you have a New Covenant mindset then you will unlock the Scriptures! Let me explain that one. Jesus was made perfect and we are in Him! Therefore we are made perfect! It is not a case of wondering if I am saved. Once we are in Him we receive ETERNAL salvation! "To all them that obey Him". Ah you see you have to obey Him to make sure you receive eternal salvation! It is talking about obedience to the truth. You can obey Moses and be obedient to the law or you can be obedient to Christ and be obedient to faith! Romans 1:5 says it gives an apostolic call to call Gentiles to the "obedience of faith". Faith is obedience! Works is disobedience as is unbelief! He is the Author of Salvation to everyone who has FAITH in Him! And faith only in Jesus. If you are in anyone else then you are imperfect just like they are.

Hebrews 13:20. How many of you thought that Jesus died for our sins and how come He didn't stay dead but was raised back to life? Hebrews 13:20 says He was raised back to life through the blood. Once that blood had been offered it was a perfect and acceptable sacrifice to God and once it had been offered it was a done deal and Jesus could be raised to life. The wrath of God was satisfied and sin had been dealt with once and forevermore! The one sacrifice for all sins for all time had been offered and therefore it was impossible for death to keep it's hold on Him. He was the Resurrection and the life. Once that sacrifice had been offered then resurrection life came forward and He came back to life.

(v10); "Called of God and high priest after the order of Melchizadek". See again he is trying to reveal Melchizadek. Then he stops for a while and explains a few things and then explains the incredible sacrifice and the high priest that is Jesus. The book of Hebrews is a very relevant Scripture for today because it was written to Hebrews - people under the law who were trying to do things to make themselves right with God. It was written to people in grace who had received the gospel and believed and had faith in Jesus. And it was written to Jews who were caught in between and thought they could have both. A mixture of law and grace. So sometimes they would try and offer sacrifices and sometimes they would try and believe in Jesus. That is exactly what is happening in the church today. There are people trying to keep the law and those who are born again and saved by grace and those caught in between and not sure where they are at.

(v11) - this is a key verse which many of us miss - "Of which we have many things to say and be uttered seeing as we are dull of hearing". So here Paul - sorry the writer of Hebrews! - which I believe was Paul. There was no one around at the time that had such a revelation of grace as this book reveals. He was trying to bring this incredible revelation of Melchizadek and of Jesus as a high priest forever and the sacrifice. He said it is hard to explain these things to you because you are dull of hearing! Dull of hearing - what does that mean?

Dull of hearing is a legalistic mindset and it is a law-based mindset! It is that Scripture in 2 Corinthians 3 that when the law of Moses is read, a veil covers their minds so that they cannot grasp the glory of the gospel of Christ. It is a legalistic mindset that makes them think that when they sin they must offer a sacrifice and then to be restored back to righteousness. That is a mind that is dull!

(v12); "The first principles of the oracles of God". The first things you hear when you hear the Gospel about Jesus. He is telling them that they cannot even accept the Gospel properly and think that one week you get saved, and the next week you sin and remember the law and then don't feel saved. So you go to church the next week and respond to an altar call again! It is because they sin and feel guilty and feel they should offer something to get rid of the guilt of that sin. If that was the case and one week you get saved and then sin and then get saved again - if you did need to get saved again then it means that Jesus needed to be crucified again. Because you are trying to offer the sacrifice of Christ again.

So when you have a dull mind or a legalistic mind it is hard to accept the first principles of the Gospel which is turning away from repentance from dead works and putting your faith in Jesus. Turning away from dead works - they are offering sacrifices to make yourself acceptable to God! They are dead works. Why? A once for all sacrifice has already been offered!

Under the Old Covenant you could offer sacrifices for your sin. That was a license to sin! You could go and sin and then go and take a lamb and offer it to the priest and get forgiveness for that sin! But when you come into Christ all that stops because His once for all sacrifice was offered and never ever needs to be re-offered and it cleanses you from sin and it covers every single sin once and forevermore!

So he is trying to tell them that you need to keep away from these dead works! That sacrifice has already been offered and if you continue in those dead works then no sacrifice exists. That is what is what Dad was talking about last week in Hebrews 10. Turn away from dead works and put your faith in Jesus. Only He offered the perfect sacrifice and is the eternal mediator for our sins forever!

(v13); "For everyone that uses milk is unskilled in the teachings of righteousness" (NIV). What is the teaching of righteousness? This is what Dad has been preaching about for the last 5 weeks - being established in the gift of righteousness. But he is saying here that you are struggling with the first principles of the Gospel. How can I go on and explain the incredible revelation of the gift of righteousness when you are not even established in it?

There are only two kinds of righteousness. Your righteousness (which is self-righteousness, legalism and works) and God's righteousness which is perfect righteousness and it is the GIFT of righteousness!

When you are behaving righteously it is not your righteousness - it is the gift of righteousness bearing fruit! Whose righteousness do you want to be in?! He is trying to get them established in the teaching of righteousness so that they will move away from self-rightousness and rest in God's righteousness!

(v14); "Strong meat belongs to those who are of age". What is that all about!? Some people get this Scripture wrong! They say that the more you study righteousness the more you will do more good and less evil. That is not what this Scripture is all about. It is saying that the more you get established in the gift of righteousness the more you will be able to discern between good and evil. Eating the meat of the Word is the teaching of righteousness - it is not eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. He is talking about eating from the tree of life! The more you do that the more you can discern between what is good - God, the gift of righteousness, faith, God speaking to you and telling you you are righteous in Him - and evil which is legalism, the devil speaking lies to you.

Hebrews 6:1; "Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ let us go on to maturity .... doctrines .... ". Those are all the things you hear when you first hear the Gospel. He is saying that you need to move on from them. A lot of people use this Scripture to say "Come on you need to move on from grace. You taught us grace and now you need to tell us what to do! Let's move on to what we need to do!". That is not what the Word of God is saying here. He is speaking to a people that are struggling with the principles of the gospel. They don't even know whether they are saved or not. They are trying to offer Jesus again and again! And he is saying to them that we need to move on and understand that we don't need to offer Jesus again and again and again but ONCE was enough!

"For" (v4) "It is impossible for those who were once enlightened" - those who were born again - "... because you are crucifying the Son of God twice".

This Scripture is not trying to scare us with the possibilty that we can lose our salvation. It is trying to fill us with an absolute assurity that it is completely and utterly impossible to ever lose your salvation!

And I am going to tell you why! It is because when we got saved and came into Christ, we were united with Christ! It is because you and I when we got saved, when we came into Christ - we were united with Christ. This is good news! You are going to be blessed here! It is impossible for you to lose your salvation! We need to be filled with a confidence that it is impossible for us to lose our salvation! Imagine going through life wondering if we are actually saved or not and thinking when we die will we go to heaven? I don't know if I could live with that - the possibility of spending eternity in hell!

God wants us to be filled with a confidence and a boldness so that we can endure any sufferings and any persecutions and be filled with incredible strength and courage.

You were united with Christ and that word is much more powerful than you realise! "United" with Christ - you were united with Christ in His death, burial and resurrection the book of Romans says. Again in Ephesians it says we were united with Him in His ascension and even when He sat down on the throne, we are seated in heavenly places with Him!

In order for you to lose your salvation, God would have to kick you off the throne, He would have to descend you down to earth, He would have to kill you, put you in the grave, put your corpse back on the Cross and resurrect you back to spiritual death! But that's not all. Because you are united with Christ He would have to kick Christ off the throne, descend Christ, kill Christ again, put Him in the grave and then put Him back on the Cross. That will NEVER happen because Jesus has an indestructable life and it is impossible for Him to ever die again!

If Jesus can't die again then you can't die again! If you can't die again then you can never fall away! You can never lose your salvation!

I can keep going on and on saying that!

It is impossible for you to fall away because the life of Jesus won't allow it!

You are united with Him and He has an indestructable life! He is a high priest in the order of Melchizadek! For you to lose your salvation means you would have to die again but you cannot! That means you cannot fall away! If you could fall away to your shame you would be crucifying Jesus again. Do you see what that Scripture is saying?

Let me move on because it keeps getting better and better and better! There are a few verses after that which talk about those which are saved and those that aren't. Those that aren't saved cannot produce any fruit to God - anything they do isn't righteous but those who are saved can produce fruit. Read that along with Romans chapter 7 - they kind of tie in there. Then (v11) - and if you have an NIV then don't read it in the NIV because it gets it wrong. I have actually crossed out a line in my NIV because it interprets concepts and not the literal translation. So they interpret the concept wrong and have created an error in the Word. It is not the NIV that is the infalliable Word, it is the original writings that are - the Greek!

The NIV is good but in some places it gets it wrong because they are interpretations. Anytime you go from Greek to English then things get lost. I am going to read (v11) in the KJV;

"And we desire that everyone of you show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope unto the end".

"The full assurance of hope" is the hope that you and I can never fall away and that we are in Christ, children of God and that God will never reject us or turn us away. We have an incredible hope because we know that we can go through this life knowing that we are going to be with God forever and ever in all eternity and that He will never hold our sins against us. This is an incredible hope that we have.

Some people have interpreted this Scripture to say; "You need to hold onto this hope to make the hope sure and certain". That is absolute RUBBISH - they have missed the point completely! Let me read (v11) - what must we show the same diligence to? To the full assurance of hope unto the end. You have full assurance of hope and you can hold onto it through anything you face because you already have it! Let me prove that by going to (v19); "Which hope we HAVE as an anchor for the soul both sure and steadfast". See we have this hope! It can never move! Even if you don't hold out to the end and for some reason you bail out - God doesn't bail out on you because you have this hope as a guarantee and it has already anchored you.

You are in Christ and that is it! We have this hope as an anchor for our soul and our minds so that when we do face persecution and temptation - we can stand strong because we know God will not kick us out and judge us! God is for us and not sending punishment but He is endorsing us and is for us! How can we have this guarantee? How can we have this hope? What gives us such confidence?

(v17); "the immutability" - that means the unchanging nature - "of His counsel" - that is this hope. "Confirmed it by an oath that by two immutable things in which it is impossible for God to lie - we might have a strong consolation" - that is we might be greatly encouraged - "who have fled for refuge to lay hold on the hope set upon us". We can be greatly encouraged and fully assured in this hope of eternal salvation because of two things God promised us on oath. What are those two things he is talking about? He swore on an oath about these two things and it is impossible to lie! Once He swears an oath it WILL happen!

These two things are the New Covenant code that we need to crack and until we crack it our minds will still be dark. Until we crack this code we still see things through a legalistic mindset. Once you crack that code you will be able to interpret any Scriptures that are difficult and see them through New Covenant lenses.

1. The first one is the once for all sacrifice that completely deals with all of our sins and makes us perfect.

(Hebrews 10:12); "But this Man Jesus after He had offered one sacrifice for sins" - that's for all sins - "forever, sat down at the right hand of God until His enemies be made His footstool". (v14); "For by one offering He had perfected forever them that are sanctified". By one sacrifice He has made us perfect ... for how long? As long as we hold onto the hope? Forever! If God has made you perfect then nothing and noone can make you unperfect! (v15); "wherefore the Holy Ghost is a witness". He is a witness in a court of law! The Holy Spirit is our counsellor and our defence and when the devil comes and accuses us of this sin or that sin then He stands up and says; "Father remember You swore an oath to never, ever relate to them through their sins and their performance but through Christ's performance on their behalf".

2. The second is that Jesus Christ is in the order of Melchizadek.

The book of Hebrews reveals Jesus as the superior Mediator of a better covenant. (Hebrews 7); "God swore an oath that Jesus is a high priest forever under the order of Melchizadek". That means "forever" He has an indestructable life. And He mediates for us EVERY sin! We have an eternal Mediator - one who goes to the Father in our defence! We never even have to fear again! What a hope we have!

God will open your eyes and you will see something and will no longer be fearful about this message. If you tell people that by one sacrifice then God got rid of your sins and there is no more punishment then what's to stop them going out and sinning? That will produce Christians who want to commit crazy sins surely! That's taking restraints off them Ryan! What about the warning Scriptures?!

There is not ONE warning Scripture about losing your salvation to New Covenant believers.

It is rubbish to couple the grace of God with the warning passages!

Why are people so scared of this message of grace? I will tell you why - because they haven't seen their salvation. They haven't seen the supernatural miracle that took place in the Spirit of a person when they got born again. So many Christians still believe that the heart of a Christian is evil beyond cure and quote Jeremiah 17:9. Our hearts were evil beyond cure and God didn't cure it! He replaced it! He removed our hearts of stone and gave us hearts of flesh!

They think that Christians have got this evil in them and a sinful nature and that sinful nature will drive them into sin! Colossians 2:11 says He circumcised us of the sinful nature through Christ - that means He REMOVED it! That means He took it out! It is gone! Circumcision doesn't come back or reattach! It's dead! Romans 6:6; "For we know that our old self was crucified with Christ so that the body of sin might be done away with". I hear people saying; "That's the body that wanted to sin". No it's not! The body of sin is the entity that was living inside of us! Indwelling sin - the personality of sin - the driving force of sin that Adamic nature and the fallen nature produces that wants to sin.

That was an evil nature but then God circumcised us of that nature and cut it out of us! Sin was not the effect. It was the cause. God removed the cause - the sinful nature. Temptation is external and God has regenerated your spirit and made your spirit perfect. 2 Corinthians 5:17; "A New Creation". Our body is still a part of the old creation order that was subject to frustration so it will still decay. Your mind will still be embedded in the corrupt wisdom of this world. But our spirit is a NEW creation! It has been alive with Christ!

It means that our spirit has become a part of the new creation order! That means our spirit is perfect and nothing else needs to happen to our spirit. One day our minds and our bodies will become a part of the new creation order. And will catch up - but nothing will happen in our spirits because we have already received perfection in our spirits and have already received the new creation order in our spirit. Colossians 2:8, 10 - "In Christ all the fullness of the deity dwell ... and you have been given fullness in Christ". Your spirit has come into the new creation order!

Nothing of the old creation order was put back in your spirit! The sinful nature was not put back in your spirit! Evil was not put back in your spirit! You have the fullness of God's love, His faith, His power, His character, His nature. It says in Ephesians 3 that our spirits have His nature in our spirits! Our spirit wants to live absolutely righteous for God. If you could live just by your spirit then you would live absolutely righteous, absolutely obedient and fruitful unto God! It is our body and our mind that get in the way.

Preaching the law takes people out of the spirit and back into the flesh and into their mind. Preaching grace awakens our spirit and causes our spirits to rise up in who we are in Christ and we begin to live by our spirits and the things that are in our spirits! So preach grace and don't preach law!

This year we are going to live more and more from our spirits and all the riches of God and it will just come out.

Terry Virgo says that this year is going to be a tough year for the legalists!

The Struggle For The Authentic Part 3 - "Qualifications For The Blessings - Faith or Works?"

Rob preached this sermon on Sunday 21st September and it can be found here. I must warn you that it is a whopping 1 hour and 45 minutes long! I think it may be one of his longest yet ... but I plead with you - it's worth every minute of it. It truly is an incredible foundational message and must be read again and again!

"A prophetic people are able to see beyond the eternals and see into the heart of the matter - what are the real issues motivating and energising things we are encountering in the natural world? There is a supernatural world that has an effect on the natural word when we are not aware of this and just naturally minded and move only by natural human instincts rather than the power of the Holy Spirit and revelation and divine wisdom then we are often taken captive by the ignorance of what is going on behind the scenes. A prophetic people live aware - not perfectly.

All of us make mistakes, we get it wrong - we interpret inaccurately at times but I do believe over the last two weeks it has been like an oppressive kind of cloud - an oppressive veil that has tried to come over us as a church and tried to crush us and oppress us. The entire agenda of that oppressive force was not only distraction but also to really dilute the message of grace and dilute our faith in that message and begin to wonder what is the value of the message and how does it really help? Does it really change anything? Just complete lies! Some of us behind the scenes have been really praying - God lift it, God break that demonic oppression off, that force of distraction - in prophetic intercession.

Thursday night we did it again and when I woke up this morning I just felt that the air was clear again and the pollution of darkness and oppression had evaporated and lifted off us. I don't want to be weirdly spiritual but the very natural atmosphere has had the pollution blown off it. Then every traffic light driving here was green and God was saying; "It's a green light! It's a go-ahead!". Then I realised that I was wearing a green shirt! Sometimes in God things aren't a coincidence - there's a prophetic significance.

Let's join hands and agree with one another that the heaviness has lifted and agree with one another that a new day of free, lovely, pure, heavenly atmosphere fills our lives again. The joy of knowing the face of the Father and His love for us. God commanded Moses to speak a blessing over the people and one of the the declaration of that blessing is; "May Your countenance shine upon us". The Hebrew word for "countenance" is the word that means "God's face".

In His face is all the fullness of His love and His grace and His goodness. God says; "My hand is not shortened" and in His hand is the power that split the Red Sea and in His hand is mighty power to do awesome miracles. In His face is His favour and His kindness and His peace and His stillness and His assurance and His encouragement.

Faith is a supernatural ability to connect with a living God in confidence. Faith is the substance of your heart of the things that you are hoping for and it is the evidence of what you cannot see. Faith has evidence - faith is not a blind leap into the dark. Faith is a leap into the light based on supernatural substance and evidence inside your spirit given to you by the Spirit of faith - the Holy Spirit. When faith rises up in your spirit, you have the substance to manifest your hope and what you are hoping for starts happening and the goodness of God starts happening around you but you need faith for that.

Today we will pray that the spirit of faith will rise in everyone of our hearts to believe the good news of the message of grace and that what the enemy intended for evil over the last 2 weeks is going to be turned around so powerfully for our good that we will come into a more delighting place of confidence in the grace of God than ever before.

Our focus is not on numbers - our focus is on the Presence of God. You can have lots of people but if you don't have God then it is just going to be a whole lot of very depressed people! We are positioning ourselves for growth - He is giving us growth and it is coming from Him. We are not doing anything extra - we are not trying any harder. It's God so we just want to stand together and function together as a priesthood of believers.

Let me just clarify something about our call for baptism (made earlier). God didn't call for sprinkling on the head - that was something that was started in the Dark Ages hundreds of years after the Church had begun and was really based on superstition. If you have had that done - don't worry about it. I am not criticising it - I am just saying it was cute and I am sure you looked really nice in that fairy dress when they did it to you but the Bible teaches you baptised people that get saved.

Baptism is a supernatural sign to the heavens that you have died to the old life of living for yourself and have been born again and raised up to a new life that is in Christ Jesus.

So you baptise believers. You don't baptise people to kill them - you baptise people that have already died. You don't bury someone to kill them. That's illegal. Hebrews 6 says that the foundation doctrines of Christ is faith, repentance and the laying on of hands and understanding eternal judgement and grace. One of the things in there says "and baptisms". There are 3 baptisms. You are baptised into Christ when you are born again, you are also baptised into the body of Christ which you can see around you - His body on the earth - so you are not a loner independently going to a service on Sunday. To be born again truly is to be born again into Christ - then you are baptised (submerged = baptism) and that means to go under water.

It doesn't mean sprinkling on top of the water - it means under = submerge. You are submerged into Christ, into His body on the earth and you are baptised with water. Hebrews 6 says you can't go onto maturity and God won't give you permission to go onto maturity if you don't have those foundation doctrines of Hebrews 6 firmly established in your life. I know believers that have been born again - in the body but have never been baptised because no one taught them the incredible significance of the power that happens when you go through the waters of baptism. Water baptism does not save you. The Bible makes that clear but Christ saves you and after you are saved - you go get baptised. I know people that have been saved but have never been baptised in baptismal submergance under water and for years are immature and don't go onto maturity and wisdom in Christ because they have not been water baptised.

It is a very significant thing. The Bible compares it to when Israel came out of Egypt - they were under slavery to Pharoh and under oppression and God brought them out of Egypt through the blood of the lamb - that is salvation. He baptised them into the cloud (that's the body) and then He split the Red Sea open and they went through and the Bible calls that in 1 Corinthians 11 - their baptism. As their Egyptian enemies were chasing Israel - when the waters of the Red Sea closed behind Israel, they closed on the Egyptian army and destroyed the army. Something about going through water baptism that closes something from your past. So if you have never been baptised or baptised without any faith - it didn't mean anything to you - you weren't doing it with faith or intelligence - then I encourage you. We will baptise you and it is a great celebration.

God has shut the door to your past through that water baptism. There are only two institutions in the New Testament - the breaking of bread and the drinking of wine celebrating and remembering the glory of the New Covenant and water baptism. There are no other rituals in the New Covenant. Both of those are really underestimated and just done religiously without faith and it is meaningless. Do it with faith and it is supernatural and very powerful. Healing comes into your body when you are breaking bread and drinking wine. As a pastor before God it is my urgent responsibility to urge you to obey the waters of baptism.

I felt God call me to preach a very defining word last Sunday and it was the message of your appointment with destiny. It is probably the most powerful message I have ever preached in my entire ministry.

As a result I don't want to assume in your busy schedule that you will have the time to hear the copy. I have an urgency that you must hear it so I have got copies already made for you.

Please open your Bibles to Romans chapter 9. On the next Sunday I am going to talk about how the seeds of God's word works and how it brings transformation in your life that you can't change yourself. Because we are not into behaviour modification principles. You can change yourself on the external and you can force yourself to change by an act of your will but it doesn't change your heart. The New Testament is about changing your heart. We have so focused on where the Bible says in James 1; "Be doers of the Word" and we have so focused on the doing part that we have missed the New Testament heart. We are not "human do-ings" but "human be-ings" and we need to focus on the "be" part. "BE do-ers of the Word" and I will show you next week how the Word of God sows seed and the condition of the soul of your heart will determine what that seed will generate and germinate in your heart.

So I will teach about the power of the Word to germinate victory in your life, success in your life, prosperity in your life, healing in your life, functioning effectively, healing in your marriage, healing - and I want to talk about how the seed has the power to do that. I am going to talk about how the Holy Spirit can prepare the condition of the soul of your heart to give maximum fruitfulness to the seed in your heart. So that's important. Then I am going to talk some time after that on the power of being a son or a daughter of God. People are so nervous and say; "Rob if you preach just grace - grace - grace and take the law off people" (by the way the Bible says the law is taken off New Covenant people and we are dead to the law") - people are afraid! They think if you take the law off people then they will live sinfully and lazy and won't be disciplined and will live irresponsibily.

They say that because they don't understand the New Covenant. The Bible says we are dead to the law that we may belong to another who was raised from the dead because we have a life-giving spirit that we may bear fruit to God. So we didn't just die to the law - we came into Christ, came into the power of the Holy Spirit. You see when people say this message of grace causes people to sin and sin and sin, they don't understand the true message of grace. Let me say this to you - if you think I am saying or hear anyone saying that I say that this message of grace is a license to sin and do whatever you want and get into all kinds of addictions and problems then I want to say this - may the fleas of 10, 000 camels affect your arm pits! Because I am NOT saying that!

This message of grace gives you victory over sin. This message of grace breaks things that control you and addictions - that's what this message of grace does. The message of the law holds you in a prison of fear, condemnation and confusion. You hide your sins inside you and they get deeper and deeper inside and one day they errupt in the most perverted way. People who live under law and religion get into hypocrisy and sin in secret. But they live double lives. We don't preach the law - we preach faith in the grace of God so that opens the door to the prison of the law. People come out to an ever-increasing world of ever-expanding horizons of blessings because they come out not under law that accuses and condemns and commands you change - but they come out under the power of the Holy Spirit.

If people say that this message doesn't empower people to live victoriously then they don't know the Holy Spirit is!

So I want you to help me today to release faith in the atmosphere. To help people around you.

The Bible says in Hebrews 5 that there are people who are dull of hearing and don't have a grid to receive grace because they have just received law and legalism and condemnation and put down and disapproval all their life. So when they hear grace - it sounds too good to be true! That they can be loved and accepted like this by God.

So I want you to work with me in faith all the way through. I want you to be like highly hysterical Pentecostals! Just for today! We are not hysterical Pentecostals but let's for today go over the top! "Preach it Rob! Amen!".

I will show you that "Amen" is not a religious thing to do if you do it with faith because you are agreeing with the promises of God and a promise comes to you under the anointing and you agree with it, then power comes to you to fulfill that promise in your life.

The message is simple today - we are going back to things we've discussed before and we are going to do it quickly and reinforce and go deeper than we have ever done before. I want to make the devil pay for the last 2 weeks. I have felt your pain in my prayer closet and your discouragement and your feeling of oppression and condemnation and what's this grace message all about - not for all of you but some of you! I am going to get sanctified, redemptive revenge on the devil! God-sanctified power to vindicate this message of grace that faith will rise up in your heart! I have got a bag of supernatural divine seed today to scatter in this place and the soil of your heart will either be hard, shallow, stony or rocky. The word will come and you will hold onto it for a while but when persecution comes you may throw the word away.

Not to you anymore! I declare you all have good soil in this place! Good soil! So let's pray together - and let me tell you that you are allowed to be happy while the word is being preached! You are allowed to be very joyful! The noble Bereans received the word with joy - the Bible said! Let's pray;

"Father we ask in Jesus Name for a spirit of wisdom and revelation as we hear truth and revelations that we have heard before - we pray you will take it to a deeper level in our hearts and into a dimension of height, length, breadth - that we will come to know by revelation the very love of Christ and that we would be filled to the full measure of God - that we would be able to do all that we can ask, think or imagine according to the power of the seed that is going to be sown into our hearts today and we declare 30, 60, 100-fold into our lives and we declare faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God and faith in the message of grace will rise up supernaturally and change our lives".

When you see someone who has lived under the grace message after a lifestyle of addiction and control by substances or controlled by desires that are not freedom and joy and holy and pure then you know that you are seeing someone who is either in the process of growing in grace or if they are utterly out of control year after year and there is no change after years of sitting under grace - don't blame the grace message. What is happening is that you have got someone sitting under grace but they are not believing the message of grace. It is not hearing the message of grace - it is believing the message of grace that gives you the victory in life.

Don't judge a Christian that is failing and sinning and falling and say "Look at you - who do you think you are?! You are under the grace message!". Don't judge them! They are struggling to believe! They are struggling to believe the message because they have a grid of parent abuse or a father that molested them or they grew up in a religious church where a man dressed up like a mother and we called him "Father" and he said; "I can play dominoes better than you can!". Then they found out that he was a paedophile and they are so confused now! They just feel like condemnation. So when you share that this is the love of the Father and the message of the good news - they don't have a grid to receive it. This morning there is open heaven! You have a grid to receive it this morning and it will go in and God will change all of our lives!

How many of you want to be blessed by God? How many of you want to be overwhelmingly blessed by God that there is not enough room? I have been cursed and I have been blessed and blessed is better! Blessing is the empowering to succeed in life. Christianity is not just to pray and succeed in life - Christianity is for all of life. For everything you do - to be empowered to succeed. So the question is - what qualifies us for the blessing? Our good works? Our sweat, our morality, our human endaevour, our holiness, our obedience? In the New Covenant - works do not qualify you for the blessing! Simply believing the message of grace is what qualifies you to be declared righteous. Righteousness is right standing before a holy God.

That is what righteousness is - and the righteousness of God is God's self-absorption in the glory and the value of His nature and being. God is not a being who is just silly and insecure - He is self-sufficient, He is self-existant and He is perfection, omniscient, omnipresent, He is before time! He does not live in eternity, eternity lives within Him! He is the Creator of the heavens and the earth. He is an awesome God! He is a God in which there dwells no darkness at all! He is perfect holiness and perfect light and He has pleasure in the glory of His being and He is always honouring the glory of His being - that is the righteousness of God. And that is the standard by which He will judge every human being on the planet on the great day of judgement. And not one will be able to stand and declare themselves righteous. It is not doing a few holy things and being a good boy or girl.

It's about righteousness - God's righteousness is the standard by which He will judge every human being! So unless we get a gift of righteousness that is by grace through faith then we are all lost and on our way to hell.

There is this idea that God is a God of love (and He is love) and the idea is that He will let everyone into heaven. God wants everyone to go to heaven and He wants everyone to be saved! But not only is He a God of love but He is a God of light and He is perfect holiness and a loving Judge of the court system. But if a paedophile or a murderer is destroying society and they come and stand before this loving Judge and they say to this loving Judge; "I know that You are such a loving Person - You are going to let me into freedom and You won't do anything about what I have done or all the crimes I have done because I know You are love and I know that You would never punish anybody!".

That Judge will say to you; "I am a loving Judge and because I am a loving Judge I am going to sentence you to the full justice of the law and penalise you with the full punishment of the law to protect the innocent in this society. For if I were to let the paedophiles and the criminals go free into the streets to rape your daughters and your children and to murder - a loving Judge does not do that. That's not a loving Judge! A loving God will send people to a penitentary of darkness and He will not have a heaven where there are people running around as rebels hating God and doing what they want".

Yet the same God who is so loving and perfect in holiness and justice said; "I am going to provide a way to give righteousness as a gift to all who believe". That's why we preach this message. To preach a message that says you can earn your way into heaven by being moral and good enough is to preach a lie and to banish people to hell. This message is the only message that can justify and save Hong Kong from the judgement that is coming at the end of this age. This is a tragedy - that if a Muslim came to an average church-going believer and said to them; "These are the standards in the Koran that are the requirements for righteous living and for righteousness" - and showed you the Koran and then said; "What are the standards that the Bible requires for righteousness?". The average Christian in the church today would take them to the 10 Commandments.

That is a tragedy because the Bible teaches that the 10 Commandments do not make anyone holy. The 10 Commandments do not make anyone righteous. In fact the 10 Commandments (Romans 5:20) were introduced into the earth to increase sinnning - to increase the transgressions. The 10 Commandments - the law of God - was never introduced into the earth to fix man's behaviour problems. It was never introduced into the earth to make man righteous. The 10 Commandments were introduced by God into the earth to reveal and expose a condition that mankind was in. The condition that every human being was in was the sin of first Adam and they were cut off from God and dead to God and were under first Adam's death. They didn't know it! And thought they were okay with God!

So God said He would introduce the law and when the law comes - it will be a standard that reveals sin and exposes sinfulness and increases the sinning in man so it will lead man to a revelation that they will be never right with God through their own self-righteousness but only through the gift of God's righteousness freely given by grace - if you receive that by faith and it comes into your life then your spirit is born again and you get a new nature.

When you sin or make mistakes in the New Covenant then you are still righteous before the Father - if you sinned 50, 000 times today but you are in Christ then your righteousness was never diminished - you are still absolutely the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus! The truth is that the more you believe this - the less you will sin! And you will not use it to indulge the flesh and do lazy spiritual life.

Let's read here from Romans 9 and let's read from verse 30;

"What then shall we say? That the Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness have obtained it? A righteousness that is by faith but Israel who pursued the law of righteousness did not obtain it. Why not? Because they pursued it not by faith but as if it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone because it is written; "See I lay in Zion, a stone that causes them to stumble and a rock that causes them to fall and the one who trusts in Him will never be put to shame".

Notice that the Bible says that the message of righteousness that is obtained through faith and not the works of the law. That message was a stumbling block to Israel. So though they sought to obtain righteousness through the law - they never obtained it. But us Gentiles - pagans and heathens - the revelation of righteousness as a gift was revealed to us and we believed on it by faith that God has given us righteousness so that we will never be put to shame. Now people in the modern church are still stumbling over the stumbling stone of this message because the grid again is self-righteousness, self-promotion, pulling themselves up by their boot-straps - "I am good enough, I must take charge of my life, I am moral enough, don't you accuse me of being a sinner!".

I am not accusing anyone of being a sinner who is not in Christ! I am just saying here is the standard of God's righteousness - do you live upto that? No you don't. So there is a judgement that will come. So there is a grace that gives you righteousness by believing in this message of grace - you get the declaration of righteousness and you will never be put to shame. I have been praying all week that those of you who have stumbled all your life in the hearing of this message because it just seems so good to be true, will be able to say; "To hell with the devil - and for the heaven of it, I am going to give my mind permission to believe 100% through faith". You hold onto that seed in your heart and it will grow.

When is the best time to attack an acorn? When it's 100 years old? No - you can't get it out of the ground but you get it when it's a seedling sown into the soil. Stay in faith that you are the righteousness of God no matter how many times you fail and this seed will keep growing in your heart and produce conviction of faith that you are the righteousness of God - no condemnation is allowed to come against me! I rebuke it - it's demonic and it never came from the Father! The Father doesn't justify you and condemn you at the same time! He is not schizophrenic! It is the devil who condemns! It is God that justifies and declares you to be righteous!

Look at Romans 10:1-4;

"Brothers, my hearts desire and prayer for the Israelites is that they may be saved".

I believe that every Christian should have a desire for the people of Israel - the native Jews - the people of the Old Covenant lineage that brought the Messiah. The Jewish people - the Messanic race that brought the Messiah into the earth and I believe that we should pray for the peace of Jerusalem and stand in faith for Israel while loving Arabs and hoping and praying for reconciliation. There are many hundreds of thousands of Jewish people coming from the ex-Soviet Union and coming into Israel in these last few years and many of them are coming to Christ - they didn't grow up in the land of Israel - but many of them are coming to Christ and we do believe that the people of Israel - their eyes are going to be opened and they will see their Jewish Messiah Jesus Christ and be born again and gain righteousness by faith and not by works of the law.

"For I can testify about them that they are zealous for God - but their zeal is not based on knowledge since they did not know the righteousness that comes from God and sought to establish their own".

What is that? It is self-righteousness. It is seeking to establish it by the law - it's self-righteous.

"Christ is the end of the law so that there may be righteousness for everyone who believes".

What is the basis for the blessing of God? When I get a Christian come upto me and say; "I need healing - I have served in the church all my life, I've been good, I've done this and that" - I know that person is not going to get healed. Because they are hoping to get healed on the basis of their self-righteousness instead of being healed on the basis of the gift of God's righteousness. They are not submitting to God's righteousness - they are promoting their works of righteousness. Then none of the blessings will come their way and Galatians 3 says the curses come on those who are self-righteous.

Romans chapter 1 - forgive me I am not preaching my opinion or the Reader's Digest but actually from the New Testament! I think God's opinion is a lot more important than yours or mine. I am interested in God's idea - that's what brought my marriage through in a love affair of romance without any adultery. That's what this message will do - it's powerful! It changes lives! It is wonderful! You save yourselves a lot of pain, suffering and a lot of stupid wrong decisions if you live by faith that I am the righteousness of God as a gift!

Let's look at Romans 1:16.

How can we boast if the foundation of success in our lives is by grace? Through faith! You say; "Well if all we have to do to qualify for the blessing is believe then what else should we do? That sounds too easy!". Well what do you want - me to give you something hard? Just believe for the blessing! What else? Just praise Him! Worship Him! Thank Him! Adore Him! Enjoy Him! Then what you put your hands to is blessed! You get the promotion - you start inventing new technology! You write the book! You solve the problem! You start that company and it works!

Romans 1:16; "I am not ashamed of the gospel for it is the power of God unto salvation of everyone who believes - first for the Jew and then for the Gentile".

Now people have got this wrong - they say that Paul was saying; "I am not ashamed of the gospel" and by that they say that he meant he was willing to go out in the street and tell people about the gospel because he was not ashamed of it. Well that's good to tell people about the gospel in the street - but that's not the context of what Paul was saying. Paul was speaking in the context of a society that was dominated by a Judaic moralism with the very idea of someone claiming to be righteous apart from their behaviour or their morality - it was almost blasphemy and sentenced to death!

Even though you fall and make mistakes yet you still claim you are righteous - despite my shortcomings and my failures and the things I am still struggling with - because Paul had not arrived - he said "I still press on ... not that I have attained yet" - so even this great apostle was not totally holy in all his behaviour and attitudes! He was a work in progress! Before he was saved - he said that under law he was a murderer, a violent man and a blasphemer. That's what the law did to him - it stirred up sin in him. Then he meets Christ on the Damascus Road, delivered, set free and saved and he believes he is righteous by faith and faith alone! Even when he can't see that his behaviour is always righteous, faith is the evidence of things not seen - so in his spirit he is saying; "I know that I am righteous" and in a society dominated by hypocrisy, Pharisees, bigots, moralists - in a society where it's practically blasphemous to claim you are righteous apart from your works and behaviour - he says; "I am not afraid or ashamed" in that society to say; "The gospel is the power of God unto salvation".

That word "salvation" is "soterio" - "sozo" - it means; "Peace, prosperity, protection, preservation". Now he gives us the revelation where the power for this gospel comes from. Where does the power for miracles - the power for life-transformation - the power of "soterio" - he tells us in the next verse. Let's read it: (v17);

"For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed".

I want to say to you again - this is a righteousness from God. FROM God. It is not a righteousness from man or from the law or from your obedience or from your holy morality and good efforts. It is a righteousness from God that is revealed in the gospel! Revealed means that it was previously hidden and then revealed. Revelation is an invitation to a supernatural encounter with God's glory. The Holy Spirit has to come to our hearts and supernaturally bypass the head and to your inner spirit reveal to you that you have in Christ a righteousness not from your holiness, your amount of praying, your fasting, your good things - it is not based on how much you sin or don't sin - it has got NOTHING TO DO WITH YOU! It is a righteousness FROM God and that has to be revealed supernaturally until you believe it. Until it's revealed you don't believe it because the grid of your head won't allow it - most education systems, most parenting, most society bases everything on your life on your performance - on what you have earnt and what you deserve.

So when it comes to this - it has to be revealed to you that God's righteousness is what the power of God for salvation comes to you. The more you believe this that is revealed to you, the more God's power comes on you to live this life.

I find when my faith in this goes down, I start striving harder, I start fretting more - pressure comes on my marriage - every time my faith in this gospel goes down then pressure comes on my marriage and on my relationships and on my finances - everything starts coming under pressure because this gospel I am NOT ashamed of because it IS the power of God unto prosperity, peace, preservation and protection - in this gospel a righteousness from God is revealed that is by faith from first to last!

The Old Covenant - which many Christians are still living under a bit of it and a bit of the New. I call it religious schizophrenia. The Old Covenant under law teaches this - that if you keep all the law 100% of it then you are righteous. The Bible makes it clear that no one kept it 100% except Jesus Christ. He fulfilled the law and the law is fulfilled and you are in the One who fulfilled the law on your behalf and He measured up on your behalf! This Old Covenant teaching that you hear around the world from pulpits - it breaks my heart. You have got to sow more, you must pray more, you must be more holy, you must resist sin more, you must do more and then God will bless you. No! That is the Old Covenant teaching. The New Covenant teaching is that it is not what you have sown, how much sin you have resisted and how obedient and holy you are. It is all based on what Jesus has sown, what the Father has sown in Jesus, Jesus resisting sin, Jesus obeying the Father, Jesus fulfilling the law and Jesus dying and giving you the righteousness from God! That's where the blessing comes!

God will not take people into the manifest glory of the ultimate fulness of signs, wonders and miracles - of the raising of the dead, of the opening of the blind eyes on a regular basis, of mighty signs and wonders - to a people who do not have this clear because we will boast in self-righteousness and say "God is doing these miracles because of my fasting and my praying and my holy life". God will not allow anyone to boast and Paul says "I boast in nothing but my weakness and in the power of God".

But in this message you find your heart becoming more obedient and you want to pray and you want to follow God and do things for God - but it's not to earn or deserve but because of the power of the Gospel and that you love Him and the power in this gospel delivers you more and more from those things. Let's read the rest of this - (v17);

"For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed - a righteousness that is by faith from first to last - just as it is written, the righteous will live by faith".

Now this is where we have a problem.

This righteousness we stand in is by faith from first to last. So everything in between is also by faith. I don't need to learn how to have faith for healing, faith for my marriage, faith for prosperity, for success, for business, for the church. All I need to grow in is faith that I am the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus because that faith in that gift of righteousness pulls the power of "soterio" or salvation into my life!

When I was in Holland a few months ago - in the meetings a lady came out of a wheelchair who was completely crippled without any hope of walking. We saw 50 people healed of incurable diseases. Now just before those meetings I was in the forest waiting on God. I felt so tired and so jet-lagged and I didn't feel very good. I was so glad that I know this message. I hadn't done anything particularly wrong but I know that I had been a bit irritable and sure if someone had saw me then they would have thought I needed to get saved and lead to the Lord. I am in the forest and of course the devil was piling in on me. I am speaking and training 600 European pastors and the Spirit of God rose up within me and said;

"Rob if you will strongly believe that you are the righteousness of God in Christ - I will bring angels to whisper healing words into your ears and you will call out words of healing and you will see signs and wonders in that place".

I said; "Yes Lord!". Ended my prayer - went home - showered, got dressed and went to the meeting and the power of God broke out and I called one person by name and gave the detail of how many lumps.

God will not entrust this power to people who think they have earned it by their zeal. Paul said Israel was zealous - but without knowledge! What's that knowledge? It is revealed knowledge - its not academic, cerebral, Bible information in the head - it is knowledge revealed to your spirit that you are the righteousness of God from faith from first to last.

The trouble is that many theologians are educated beyond their intelligence. This is about faith from first to last. What does Colossians 2:6 says; "Just as you received Christ, so walk in Him". So live in Him (NIV) - walk in Christ. How did you receive Him? By faith through grace! The preacher tells you at conversion that it's all by faith and then you have to start doing things. No - Paul says just as you received Christ, so continue in Him! Walk in Christ! The very next verse says; "Do not be deceived by hollow philosphies and traditions of men that have to do with the corrupt wisdom of this age but that are not in Christ".

This is a righteousness that is by faith from first to last. Go to 1 Corinthians 2.

As a Christian my desire is that nothing controls me. Nothing controls me - I don't want the world to see anything that is controlling my life - I want to live self-controlled by the power of the Holy Spirit.

I want to be part of a church where the issue of whether you smoke or not or whether you have a glass of wine are not even an issue! I am so tired of the hypocrisy! You have to go and get your wine with a balaclava on your head and hope that noone sees you. At the same time I have seen two extremes and I don't want to be part of them again! I have seen churches that have said if you don't smoke and you don't drink then you are so holy! I HATE that! I have met Christians who do smoke and do drink who are wonderful people. And who do drink who are wonderful people. The other extreme that I also hate - I am showing how free I am! No you are showing how addicted and controlled you are by something that is not the Holy Spirit. When this thing gets into the culture of the church then we have serious problems.

The principle of love must govern all. My conscience and my freedoms - and I don't mean freedom to sin - are exercised under a principle of love. If I am in the presence of a Christian that is weak in faith and maybe has been an alcoholic and are struggling with their addiction, then I won't touch a drop of alcohol in front of them. If they are just getting over smoking addiction and have their nicotene patches on - then I won't touch a cigarette! If you get a whole bunch of people who have been under the law for so long and suddenly bring them out - then there is nothing left to restrain them - which is good! I like that! So for a while they go; "Wow - nothing less to restrain me!".

As a pastor I have realised that you have got to let people go through that process because while they are going through that process the devil comes and says; "Slap them with the law to stop that!". No because then it all goes back into law, suppression, hypocrisy and double standards again. Preach the message of grace - you are not under law but you are united with the power of the Holy Spirit to live a life in grace!

One of my greatest preachers - Charles Haddon Spurgeon - the greatest preacher I have known outside of Jesus lived 120 years ago and preached to 5, 000 people before they had microphones. I read his sermons today and the modern world wouldn't understand his words - they are so eloquent and so rich. They understood the richness of the English language and I read his language. Spurgeon loved cigars and he eventually gave up. He was so famous throughout London that the cigar company came to him and said they wanted to put his face on the cigar packages. He was like a celebrity! He wanted to be remembered for the face of Jesus not for cigars and he never smoked a cigar from that day.

Something has to come into our spirits and ask; "Am I addicted to alcohol? Am I addicted to smoking? Am I being over-sensative to people that could be struggling in their faith? Could my smoking in their presence cause them problems? You are not free if you do drink but neither are you free if you don't drink. You can be holy smoking and drinking and you can be unholy and smoking and drinking because your smoking and drinking is a sign of insecurity trying to prove your freedom! Until eventually other insecure, immature people think that this is a culture of freedom! We don't want that in the church! Please hear that Rob did not get up and forbid drinking and smoking!

Go to Romans chapter 3:21; "But now a righteousness from God apart from the law has been made known to which the law and the prophets testify - this righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and are justified freely by grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus".

The principle here is that you can discern a Christian who is living in the wonder of freely by grace. When you understand that you are justified freely by grace and you are declared righteous every second of your life freely by grace - even if you have smoked thousands of cigars that day and drank litres of beer that day - I declare to you by the authority of God's Word that you are justified freely by grace and not because you are trying to keep a law and don't smoke or do smoke. Don't let what I said earlier on dilute the fact that you are righteous ALL the time.

While you are battling with addictions - you are the righteousness of God. If you think that addiction will disqualify you for righteousness then you will never get free from that addiction. The only hope to get free from that addiction is while you are in it - you know 'I am the righteousness of God'! That's the only way you are going to get free!

The only way you are going to get free from a drug addiction or a pornographic addiction is that you are in Christ and are the righteousness of God in Christ! That's why we get emails from people who have been addicted to pornography for years and years and couldn't get free by going to church for years and years. They heard the series on grace off this website of this church and they are free from the addiction to pornography because while they were doing it - they said; "Rob your words kept ringing in my ears by the power of the Spirit that I am righteous and then thought - I am righteous! What do I want to do with this?". Finished! Broke off their lives! It is condemnation that drives people to the dysfunctional patterns over and over again - while they were under condemnation, they go to things that will make them feel good in substance abuse or in sexual abuse.

I believe that every man and woman who is not married - just wait until you are married. That is a covenant! The marriage covenant is so sacred! Sexual intimacy is a glorious gift from God but it is a dangerous thing outside the covenant of marriage. It will break my heart if I ever find out that people are saying in this church (and it has not been said and there's no evidence of that) - "Praise God - we are under grace - let's sleep around outside of marriage". That will be insane. That is just what the legalists are waiting to happen in this church to disregard this message. I know this temptations! I was married at 20 and Glenda was 17 - we weren't saved and Glenda was pregnant when she got married. The first time I had intimacy with a woman so I don't know what it's like with anyone else. But I am telling you right now that those of us in Christ must live in this message.

Having said that - if any person has fallen and they do fall and they do commit sexual immorality and they are in Christ - you are the righteousness of God in Christ while you are doing the act! Because that is the radicalness! "That's too radical Rob!". Have you seen how radical the law is?! It is extreme! If your kids are rebellious then take them outside the camp and stone them. The law says if you look at someone with lust then cut your eye out and throw it away! Hack your hand off! You want to take about radical? Understand the law - its very extreme! And grace is equally extreme! You are righteous all the time if you are in Christ Jesus!

"Freely justified by grace". I can discern someone who is living under this freedom - even if they are struggling with some addiction or some problem but they understand; "Praise God I am righteous! I have received righteousness freely by grace!". When you believe this message - the power of God comes on you freely! When you go to prayer, power comes on you!

I do not have a prayer time when the power of God doesn't come on me because I understand that I am the righteousness of God freely by grace!

Power on me can pass through me freely by grace to others. In Matthew 10 Jesus said; "Freely you have received - freely give". He wasn't making it a command - what He was declaring was the more you understand the free grace flowing into your life, the more it can flow through your life. People say - well I lay hands on people and nothing comes out of my hands. Well understand that you have been justified freely by grace and walk freely by grace - I am the righteousness of God and I have all these problems, dysfunctions and addictions but I am still the righteousness of God!

The more grace comes on your life - the more it can flow out - grace flowing through you to others. Roman 8:31, 32; "how will He not also freely give us all things?". They come freely! Romans 4:1-8 - we are talking about does the grace of God and the works of the law - what you earn or deserve - or believing you are the righteousness of God in Christ. Romans 4:1;

"What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh, has found? For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boastabout, but not before God. For what does the Scripture say? "Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness". Now to the one who works, his wage is not credited as a favour but as what is due. But to the one who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness, just as David also speaks of the blessing on the man to whom God credits righteousness apart from works; "Blessed are those whose lawless deeds have been forgiven, and whose sins have been covered, blessed is the man whose sin the Lord will not take into account".

Imagine every believer on the planet living with confidence that God is not counting ANY of my sins against me - all He sees is me - the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus!

Notice he says; "The GIFT of righteousness". Freely given by grace! How many of you know that it is not the "loans" of the Spirit but the gifts of the Spirit! When something is freely given, it takes the pressure off you to think you have got to pay something back. I want to say something very important - please hear this.

In the church world, there is what I call a "Debtors Ethic". People say that if Jesus did so much for you - then you owe Him so much. No my friends - that is a total, demonic lie. You do not owe Him a thing! Before you were saved, you owed Him everything. You owed Him on the ledgers of your sin - the wages of your sin - had built up a huge debt before God. At the Cross Christ wiped that side of the ledger totally clean of all your debts and obligations, and sin and judgement was wiped clean! On the other side of the ledger, He wrote; "The righteousness of God in Christ Jesus freely given by grace!". It takes the obligation and the pressure off you to say I have got to do things for God - I owe, I owe, I owe, it's off to work I go! No! The "Debtor's Ethic" will suck you back into dead works that are not in faith!

There are missionaries in all kinds of parts of the world because of guilt because they are trying to pay Jesus back. They are not there with faith and they are dying and no-one is getting saved. Because they are just there - zealous without revelation knowledge. It won't get any blessing in heaven because my friends when you know it is freely given that I am the righteousness of God in Christ and I am not paying Him back. I am living by the Spirit and lead by the Spirit and He will never lead me into sinful things. He is leading me into predestined things co-ordinated before the beginning of time - I am being led by the Spirit as a son or daughter of God. The Spirit is leading me to come to church, He leads me to read the Bible, He leads me to pray, to love God, to forgive your enemies, to live in joy, to prosperity, to success - as you walk by faith that I am the righteousness of God!

People say "I am free and led by the Spirit" but never read the Bible, never pray, never come to church, never give tithes or offerings. Folks, that's not being led by the Spirit - that's being led by the flesh! The Holy Spirit leads you to live a life of victory! Go to two more Scriptures and then we close. Galatians 3. I want to read you a direct question that Paul says.

Galatians 3:5; "Does God give you His Spirit and work miracles among you because you do the works of the law or because you believe what you heard?". Paul asks a very direct question there. What qualifies you for a life of the supernatural of the Spirit and for the working of miracles? The Greek language there is the present, continuous tense - the on-going giving of His Spirit and the on-going working of miracles. He says is it by the observing and doing of the law - your performance, your holiness, what you have earned or deserved or because you have simply believed the message? The message he has preached is that you are righteous in Christ apart from the law. He said is the Spirit of God moving among you because you believed the message or because you are doing the works of the law?

He is writing to a church that once had great miracles but now the miracles had dried up and the supernatural diminished radically. And now they had fallen into all kinds of terrible works of the flesh and all kinds of sin because they had gone back into the law and the law was bringing destruction on them. He is saying that you once had joy, you once had the moving of the Spirit, does God do these miracles because of your works of the law and your performance or because you believed the message of grace? That is a very direct question and deserves a very direct answer! Paul gives such a direct answer that it should shut the mouthes of the Pharisees and the critics of this grace message once and for all eternity through all the earth!

This direct question deserves direct answers. Paul gives it very direct. The very next verse in (v6);

"Consider Abraham. He believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. Understand then that those who believe are children of Abraham. The Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith and announce the gospel in advance to Abraham. All nations will be blessed through you so those who have faith are blessed".

Those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham - the man of faith! (v10); "All who rely on observing the law are cursed - for it is written; 'Cursed is everyone who does not do everything that is written in the book of the law". If you want to be under the Law - you must keep it perfectly - every second - or you will come under a curse. Now he tells you why - (v12); "The law is not based on faith - on the contrary the man who does these things will live by them. Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us - for it is written; 'Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree'. He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles who come to Christ Jesus so that by faith we may receive the promise of the Spirit".

The relying on the law will bring a curse because the works of the law are not of faith - but those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham the man of faith. Why is faith so important? Because faith connects you with the blessing. Faith gives you confidence that you are the righteousness of God. Faith - when you stand to pray and this gets into your spirit and into your heart and the seed gets in there and you lift your hands to pray and say; "Father, I thank you that I am a man or woman of faith and I am the righteousness of God and I praise you - yes I did some mistakes yesterday but I praise you that I am the righteousness of God". Immediately the grace and the power will come upon you.

His Presence will always come because I know that I am the righteousness of God!

One last Scripture - and we can't leave it out. 2 Corinthians 5:16, 19, 21. (v16) is the most profound insight on this subject. "So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view though we once regarded Christ in this way - we do so no longer". Paul is saying something so profound and I am asking You Holy Spirit to help get this out. He is saying from now on we regard no one - and he is talking about brothers and sisters in Christ (that is the context). The no one doesn't include everyone in the world. It includes brothers and sisters in Christ and he is saying; "From now one we regard no one from a worldly point of view". He said we at one point used to regard even Christ from a worldly point of view. But no longer do that.

The King James says; "We don't regard anyone after the flesh for we even once regarded Christ after the flesh". He says we now don't regard any Christian from a worldly point of view. What is he saying? What is he saying? I don't regard Glenda after a worldly point of view. I don't regard her after the flesh. The way you regard yourself is the way you can regard fellow Christians. You and me from now on should never regard yourself as after the flesh and from worldly points of view. But should regard yourself in the Spirit from a heavenly point of view that you are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus!

This is regarding yourself in a worldly point of view or after the flesh - you wake up in the mornign and think; "Oh I messed up yesterday - oh I failed - oh I sinned - there's no hope for me in God - I'm a mess - I am a failure going no where - I feel so condemned". That is regarding yourself after a worldly point of view. From a flesh point of view - not a heavenly point of view. This is regarding yourself from a heavenly point of view - waking up in the morning and thinking; "I am not happy with what I did yesterday morning but Father thank You so much that I am the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus!". You don't regard yourself according to the worldly point of view or the law or religious standards or according to your performance - you don't regard yourself by religion or by your history of failure in the path or by someone elses performance.

You regard yourself in the light that you are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus!

When Gideon was threshing wheat in a wine vat because he was terrified and was a coward because he was frightened of the Mideanites because his whole being was scared. He was living with a survival, small mentality. The angel of God came to Gideon and spoke to Gideon in his worldly point of view and said to him; "Gideon - you mighty man of valour! You man of courage!". Gideon was completely confused because he was indoctrinated and conditioned by religion to regard himself from a worldly point of view. So he could not respond to this awesome call of God. But slowly as he began to believe what God was saying - he began to regard himself after a heavenly point of view and when faith rose in his heart; "I am a mighty man of God! I am a mighty warrior - I am a mighty conqueror appointed with destiny to lead Israel out of oppression and into prophetic power and economic victory" - when he believed what God said about him, the power came on him and he did a mighty work because he got delivered from regarding himself after a worldly point of view.

Isn't that awesome? 1st John 4:17 says this; "We can have boldness on the Day of Judgement because as He is so are we in this earth". What is Jesus in heaven? Glorified, exalted to the highest place, seated at the right hand of the Father in glory. Ephesians 2 says that we have been raised up together in Christ and seated in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus - do not regard yourself or your brothers and sisters after worldly points of view but after the Spirit, what is revealed in the gospel that you are the righteousness of God and you are standing in Christ Jesus and seated with Him in the heavenly places and that fixed, permament position never changes though your marriage may fall and struggles may come - that is always fixed!

If you regard yourself after a worldly view like most Christians do and have been lied to by the devil with all their circumstances pressing on them with disappointments and frustrations, they limit their beings to a worldly point of view that I am the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. Like Gideon when you believe you are the righteousness of God and have destiny and am empowered and God believes in you that you are righteous, you rise up out of your wine vat and see the power of God come on you and God begins to break through.

When you see your brother or sister messing up and going into sin, you don't regard them after a worldly point of view and come and lecture them in arrogance. You see them in a heavenly point of view and say; "Don't you know that you are light? Don't you know that as He is - so you are?". You don't regard them after the flesh! Announce to them who they are in Christ Jesus. "Therefore if anyone is in Christ". These glorious things are only for those who are in Christ - not for just anyone out there in the streets who are not saved. They are under God's righteous judgement but all they have to hear is the message and believe and then they step into this. "The old has gone - the new has come".

(v19); "Not counting men's sins against them". Those people who go out and say; "God is counting your sins against you!". No! God has already redeemed the whole world at the Cross! The one thing - the one sin that Jesus could not die for is unbelief in Him. Unbelief and neglect and no faith in Jesus - that is what keeps people outside of this covenant of grace.

Our message to the cities - God is not judging you! God is not holding your sins against you! He is not bringing these economic collapse and the credit crunch to judge you and be mean to the earth! These are decisions that human beings are making as based on greed. These are financial institutions breaking down. God is not killing you and doing these things. There is a God who loves you - believe on the Lord Jesus and you will come into the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus! I get so tired of hearing people saying that Los Angeles will fall into the sea to show the wrath of God! The wages of sin is death! Not a building falling down or your car breaking down! If God were to give us the wages we deserved then we would all be dead!

He is for Hong Kong and wants to see everyone in Hong Kong saved. (v21). It's amazing for me that people can go and watch TV for hours and watch trivia but the Word of God that will bring you into a place of joy and victory and abundance - they just want a 20 minute sermonette. We are world-changers! We are history-makers and we are being equipped at the end of the age and this is our time to shine with the Gospel! If this doesn't change then you will see more people jumping out of buildings in Hong Kong. We are not praying for Hong Kong to collapse economically - we are praying for the prosperity of our city. Every Christian - we don't live by the economy of this world but the economy of the Kingdom.

When people are being laid off work in your job - you should be getting a financial fat salary increase because you are the righteousness of God! And I can show you how the righteous are blessed and prosper by God. We are not living by world economics but by kingdom economics. When that tsunami hit in 2004 - a pastor was on the shores of India, the Holy Spirit came on him and said you must pray and plead the blood over your town and your village. He did so - as a man who is righteous in Christ. His whole village wasn't touched at all - the tsunami went right around them. There is a shelter from economic pressures!

(5:21); "God made Him who had no sin - to be sin for us so that we might be made the righteousness of God". My spirit feels someone is a bit angry so let's read it again! "God made Him who had no sin - to be sin for us so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God". The question I have asked is how was Jesus made sin? By sinning? He was given a free gift! Our sin was freely given to Jesus Christ! What a blessing we are? We didn't do it - the heavenly Father made Him sin for us. God gave Jesus the free gift of righteousness and imputed it to Christ on our behalf so that we can be counted the righteousness of God in Him. By sinning? No - by a free gift. How are you made righteous - by acts? No - by a free gift.

God judged your sin and punished your sin. If God were to punish your past and future sin then God would be guilty of a crime of the law of double jepordy. You cannot punish the same crime twice! The integrity of the justice of the high court of heaven has been infinately satisfied by divine holy justice when your sins were given as a free gift to Jesus and He was punished in your place - so that you and I by pure administration can be declared the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. Jesus had faith that once He was declared our sin, He would be judged and the wrath of God would come on Him. He had faith for that. That's why in the garden of Gethsemane - He said; "Father if it be possible - let this cup pass from Me". He had faith that the moment He became our sin, wrath would fall on Him. But forever finished!

One thing Jesus did not have to do on that Cross when He was made our sin - and His blood had dripped out of His body - He never had to say; "Pour out wrath on Me". It came the moment He was made our sin. Now Church if you could regard yourself no longer from a worldly point of view and faith could rise up that you are truly in the gospel in Christ - the righteousness of God in Christ. If your faith would rise up in authentic reality, then you would not need to ask the Father to bless you. He didn't ask for the wrath. Just so we don't need to ask for the blessing! The manifest power of the gospel will come on a daily basis!

My prayers are not asking God for power or to ask God to bless me. My prayers are asking God to open the eyes of your understanding by the spirit of wisdom and revelation so you would know the hope of your calling and you would know God better and experience God and live in the reality of God. The blessing will come automatically and overtake you when you believe you are the righteousness of God!

Almost all of Paul's prayers are for believers to see the gospel - because once they see it the blessing comes automatically and don't even need to be asked for! They will come and dump on you and God will back up a big tow-truck and dump blessing on you! The blessings of God!

Now when you can get a church established in the grace message and not seeing each other or Jesus after worldly points of view - but Christ on that Cross conquering principalities and cancelling the law and believe the message of the gospel and believe that as He is - so are you - then the next minute we are in a building that costs millions! We are opening hospices to care for the dying and seeing them healed before they die! We are opening orphanages to care for the lost, hurting and the broken! We are opening up schools of the prophetic and supernatural! We are taking on pastors to release Glenda and I - because money is powerful! And the blessing of heaven makes rich and adds no sorrow!

God is not going to entrust wealth into the hands of self-righteous people who will say; "I did this - and I didn't do this and was holy enough". No you are wealthy by the sweat of your brow and it will bring sorrow in your life. But the wealth and blessing of Abraham will come on those who believe they are the righteousness of God. And money says to buildings - I can buy you! Money says to missionaries - I can pay for you! Money says to the naked - I can clothe you! Money says to the hungry - I can feed you! Money says to pastors - I can keep you so you don't have to go into other business. Jesus spoke a lot about giving and releasing the blessing of God so the storehouse of God is overflowing! We tithe like Abraham did in Genesis 15 - not Malachi 3!

Abraham was blessed before he tithed! We are the people of generosity! We are the people of destiny - changing nations! There are 600, 000 people below the bread-line. This is the time when God shows that those who have lived by hard work alone - by greed after the god called money - God wants to make a wealth transfer into the hands of the just and who will administrate to bring in the justice of God. We must break the spirit of distraction and seek first His kingdom and serve the purposes of God and not get caught up in silliness or distraction! I want to see the kingdom of heaven break in and religion break down! I want to see the shroud of oppression that came over us for 2 weeks ripped off the church and God's people liberated from their wine press.