RSS

Tag Archives: temptation

Sermon 132 – The Love of Position

15 Sep

Good correction is an instruction that advises you that you’re doing something wrong. It’s an instruction designed to get you back on the right track when you’ve inadvertently stepped in the wrong direction with wrong analysis.

Pride, however, perceives and thus receives correction as a suggestion that “I’m bad”. Our pride turns correction into a ‘good and bad’ scenario, when it should be a ‘right and wrong’ issue.

Why does it do this?

Because pride is only interested in position, position, position. That’s all it ultimately cares about. You can camouflage your pride with as much exterior niceness as you like but underneath it all is the love of position, and this is the thing that Jesus came to save you from … the love of position. All pride is concerned about is … “I want to be above you”. Pride pretends to love its neighbour but in the depths of its heart it hates it when one’s neighbour gets an advantage over it.

Pride hates exposure, so it does anything it can to hide itself. The consequence of this hidden evil in us, is the solidifying of this evil by lying to ourselves that we are good, and thus the Evil One traps us in his web and manipulates us to unwittingly serve his will against God. Then, instead of breaking free from our sin at the point of correction, we reinforce the lie that we are good.

Lie to escape exposure

If correction is bad, why do we routinely lie to escape exposure of our wrong, and why do we routinely fear the embarrassment of the exposure? Obviously, because we’re too proud and selfish to let others think we are wrong. We don’t want to look bad, so we work our butt-off to show we are good, but our real objective is to avoid exposure of any bad, at all costs. We argue within ourselves that the more good we are the more the correction must be wrong. The ‘good-er’ we are the further from salvation we unknowingly wander, believing our own lie that our goodness is evidence of God in us. But, it’s all our own deception fuelled by our own evil pride.

Don’t tell me what to do

When you argue ‘good vs bad’ it’s simply an indicator of your pride. This means that the real underlying issue is the selfish belief … “I’m good, so don’t tell me I’m bad”. But, what this really means is … “you won’t tell me what’s right or wrong, I’ll decide, and you won’t tell me what to do; I’ll fix the issue myself, my way. Mind your own business”. It’s only at the point of correction that this spirit is exposed, and it’s at that point that one’s pride can be loosed from the demonic. Sadly, few surrender; most defend their pride. They still serve and worship God their way, but they’re not saved.

Pride doesn’t think it’s proud

Because pride can’t see its pride, it needs correction to expose it. The problem is, it’s so focussed on looking good, it sees any correction as rejection and a put-down, thus it constantly misses the door of salvation that God places before it.

Fake Goodness is Satanism

Pride won’t be told it’s wrong. In fact, pride won’t be told. Thus, pride is the practice of disrespect of authority, and the practice of incorrigibility. Thus, your pride protects you from being correctible, and thus pride is the root cause of fakeness and de-salvation.

Pride is always trying to show and re-affirm its goodness. Pride thinks it’s good, so it can’t handle any suggestion that it’s done anything wrong, because it hates feeling bad and looking bad. What pride doesn’t realise is that the more good you think you are, or the more you act that you are good, the more demonic influence Satan has over you. It’s really the spirit of Satan operating through you. The practice of pride is really the practice of Satanism. That’s why God hates it. That’s why it’s so hard to eliminate it from your spirit. This lying deception was inherited from Satan via Eve’s and Adam’s sin and refusal to repent. Pride is a direct inheritance from Satan. Retain your pride and serve God as much as you like. It will all be a waste of time and effort, just like Judas.

Fake Goodness (F.G.) retaliates

Fake goodness retaliates with blame for not letting them explain why they did what they did. F.G. shifts the responsibility so its own bad is not exposed. F.G. is focussed on what you think of me and can’t handle being thought less of. F.G. is just camouflaged pride. As I’ve already said, the more good you think you are, the more proud you are, and the more fake you are.

Only God is good, Luke 18:19

The rich young ruler indirectly asked Jesus to confirm to him that he was good. Doing good was his recipe for looking good in the eyes of his peers. Jesus made it clear; the answer is give up your position. Like most people it was too much to ask. So, if you think you are good then the truth is you’re just full of yourself, not God, and that’s what pride is. Consequently, pride judges others’ badness in the light of one’s own assumed goodness. This judgment actually verifies that you are not good (James 4:11), but pride can’t see it, so it bacterially flourishes and continues to be practiced indiscriminately.

Like the rich young ruler, once you find something that gives you value and supports your position in the eyes of others, it’s even more difficult to let your pride go and find God. The support becomes too valuable to you.

Feelings

Pride makes its judgments on its feelings. Pride believes if you make me feel bad, then you’re the baddie. Pride is always trying to show its goodness. Position by any means is all it cares about.

Do

The real reason we do things is to prove our self-worth in the eyes of others, and that’s why we can’t give up what’s of value to us, because these skills, or money, or successes, or popularity are the proof of our value. Instead of sacrificing them, we compromise to keep them and unwittingly instead, sacrifice the precious gift of salvation.

It’s not DO. It’s not FIX. Rather, it’s DIE to your pride. That means, openly expose you’re wrong and face the fear and the temptation to lie and blame. That’s the only way to free yourself from Satan’s evil spirits.

Good doesn’t cut it

The woman caught in adultery wasn’t good. Rahab wasn’t good. Samson wasn’t good. The thief on the cross wasn’t good. David wasn’t good; he murdered. Prostitutes are not good. The five foolish virgins were good. Good is not the requirement; exposing your pride is the requirement.

Jesus didn’t write-off the thief on the cross for being bad; He invited him into His kingdom at the point of his confession of wrong to a loving Saviour. He knew he was bad. He couldn’t fix the bad or the wrong, but he could face his embarrassment and give up his charade of toughness and lower his resistant position.

Pharisee and Tax Collector

In Luke 18:9, Jesus shares a parable about those who trust in their own goodness, yet at the same time, hate. The Pharisee spoke to his own mind about how good he was, whereas, the publican simply exposed his wrong and was saved. The Pharisee proved his goodness was a lie by passing judgment on the publican, in the light of his own goodness, and immediately confirmed his arrogant pride.

Good is always in your own mind

Good is never in the mind of a Christian. Like Christ, a Christian’s focus is serving the will of his Master, not in justifying why the Master should love him or do his bidding.  The Holy Spirit doesn’t pride Himself in His own goodness; He serves the will of the Father. The goodness that flows from a Christian should be Christ, not one’s own self-manufactured ability and fake purity. Fake purity is just piety, not love.

Pride vs. Humility

In simplicity, pride is calling someone a fool; whereas, humility comes via repentance, and repentance is seeing that you’re the fool. If you’ve never really seen your own folly, then your salvation is in vain. “Sorry” is an arrangement of convenient escape, but “repentance” is when you see your own folly, and without that revelation your pride is not broken. All that’s happened is, like Eve, you’ve talked yourself into believing in your own wisdom being right. But, clearly Eve’s wisdom wasn’t right, or she would’ve seen she was wrong.

Why does God advise against pride?

Pride is the fruit of the tree in the middle of the Garden. Pride tastes good, and pride looks good. It never looks bad. That’s so Satan can use it to manipulate you into thinking that you’re right (Genesis 3:5,6). But, the reason God advises against it is because pride will always end up hurting you. That’s why Satan sells it to you; to hurt you.

Everyone is either a Pharisee or a Publican or a Publican Pharisee

This parable is not just a story; it’s an evaluation of the human spirit. You can have different levels of Pharisee or Publican, but everyone exists in these two categories at some level. Everyone is born arrogant. Everyone is born fearful. Everyone is born a liar. You can either protect these qualities and reinforce you link your Satan, or you can expose them. What you choose to do at the point of correction will either lead you to salvation or to hell.

Salvation is simple

All you have to do is expose yourself. All you have to do is own up that you were wrong. All you have to do is face the fear of looking bad in the eyes of others. God does the rest. The problem is, almost everyone resists their conscience by explaining away their sin by blaming the other person, or justifying why they really didn’t do anything that bad, and so the opportunity for salvation is lost and sacrificed to protect one’s pride. You have to sacrifice your pride to be saved. You have to sacrifice your pride to be freed from Satan.

Conclusion

Ultimately, it’s not an issue of right or wrong, or good or bad. It’s an issue of … will you stop your pride and take the correction and admit you were wrong, no blame and no excuses.

No exposure, no salvation

Behold I stand at the door and knock (Rev.3:20). When Jesus is knocking on your door, Satan is also standing there whispering fears and lies into your mind. If you truly want to be saved you will always have to face the fear of embarrassment or the fear of persecution, and the temptation to lie, and the temptation to blame to protect yourself. It’s actually the temptation from Satan to fear and lie, that confirms that Christ is the one addressing your conscience. The fear is the sign of Christ’s presence, not from Him, but from the enemy trying to manipulate you away from Him. In fact, if you don’t face fear at a point of salvation, then it’s not Jesus that’s knocking. Yes, like Samuel, you can be saved as a child, and like Peter, you can walk with Christ and think you’re saved, but, somewhere along the walk you will have to face the fear of your convictions in order to seal your salvation (Luke 22:32). All you have to do is open the door and let your sin be exposed and you’ll realize that the fear was a Satanic inhibitor to block you from being free.

 

Pastor Rick McCauley

 

Advertisement
 
Leave a comment

Posted by on September 15, 2018 in Pride

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Sermon 128 – Comply or Die

04 Jun

When I was a young boy on a family camping trip, my brother stole my best friend to be his friend. I heard the voice … he’s mine not yours. It’s not fair. You already have friends. I don’t. I decided to pay him back by sticking chewing gum in his sleeping bag. Be sure your sin will find you out. My parents made me spend 2 hours cleaning the bag. I learnt a very important lesson … vengeance doesn’t pay.

You like him more than me

Everyone on the planet has heard the voice … you like him more than me. Obviously, this voice is not from the Holy Spirit, so it must be from Satan. It’s the voice of position and not humility. It’s the voice of envy (James 4:5). It therefore is the voice of Satan. Underneath every demonic voice you hear, lies the satanic voice … you like him more than me. Some people even speak it out. If you’ve spoken it out it should tell you what camp you’re snared in. If you’re snared in the camp of Satan then you’ll be plotting the demise of others so you can take their position. Hatred is the automatic side-effect of envy.

Why does everyone hear this voice?

Obviously, because there’s something outside our visual realm that can interact with us. Secondly, it’s interesting to note that it’s easier to hear evil than good, and it’s easier to act evil than good. You have to work at good; evil comes natural. That’s because Satan has our ear, and it takes a decision of death to hear the Lord’s voice above the din of evil. Thirdly, and most importantly, Satan hates Jesus because He’s more liked by the Father. So, when you choose to listen to the voice of … you like him more than me, you’ve linked yourself directly to the spirit of Satan, and speaking his words.

We’re better tuned to the voice of Satan than the voice of God. Voices are evidence of an unseen spirit world interacting with our spirits. No one’s seen Satan but everyone’s heard his voice. Similarly, you can’t see Jesus Christ but you can hear His voice if you want to.

Temptation is a voice

A genuine Christian is responsible to diagnose what voice is speaking and choose death to that temptation. It’s not God’s responsibility to keep you safe from temptation, it’s your responsibility to die so God can raise you up. If you haven’t trained yourself to stop and check whether the voice is God’s or Satan’s, you’ll automatically comply with the voice of evil. It won’t sound evil; it’ll sound fair and just and nice to your emotions, but it’s a lie in sheep’s clothing. It’s a trap to snare you against Christ. It’s a trap to trick you into plotting the demise of others. To God’s eyes, plotting is hatred, & hatred is murder (1 John 3:15), and that’s what Satan wants; to see you out of alignment with God.

The serious lesson from Christ

In Luke 4 we read Satan’s temptation to Jesus. Satan was trying to get Jesus to change his position from standing with the Father to get Him to stand with him instead. He effectively was bribing him to comply with his wishes by using food, position power, and the pride of proving your power. Jesus wouldn’t comply. Satan then simply changed into his true character and threatened Jesus with … comply or I’ll kill you. Jesus chose the path to die rather than the comply.

Fear of dying

Why is everyone afraid of dying? Aren’t we going to be with the Father in heaven? So, why the fear? Simply, because Satan doesn’t want us to die he wants us to comply, so he threatens death to put you in fear so you’ll comply. He intimidates you with a spirit of fear.

Jesus, Himself had to face this fear and then He had to choose the way of the cross and trust the outcome to His Father. Daniel had to face this fear and then choose the way of death instead of complying with the voices of temptation followed by the voices of threatening for not complying. No one said anything to Daniel. He knew what Satan was saying, and enticing to go the easy way, and then threatening if he didn’t bend to his comply. Satan was tempting Daniel to comply in the exact same way he was tempting Jesus. Through facing death, God raised him up above his enemies.

David was threatened by his father-in-law to comply or be killed. David fought the tempting voices of the easy way out and chose the path of die rather than comply. He chose to face death and in so doing God raised him up above his enemies.

Victory is only through death

Jesus didn’t die on the cross just to save us from our sins. His death was the example to His followers of how we must pass through death to earn eternal life with Christ, and also how to be lifted up above our spiritual enemies. You don’t buy your way to heaven but you have to pay the price of death to earn salvation (Luke 9:23,24) and position. He complied with His Father’s wishes and chose death to Satan’s temptations to comply. The consequence was life and position above His enemies (Philippians 2).

There’s no other pathway to victory, than through death. Any other pathway is a satanic deception to eternal death. Position should only be attained through death instead of complying with the satanic temptations or the threats to comply; any other pathway is a temptation to satanic life which ends in death.

Satan comes with sweetness and enticements and if you won’t take the bait and comply, he then threatens death. Joseph was enticed with the sweetness of adultery and when he wouldn’t comply he was threatened with the death of imprisonment. He chose to silently cop the evil and in due course, God raised him up above his enemies.

The irony

If you comply you’ll seem to save your life but you’ll die; whereas, if you choose death, you’ll live above the voices. In fact, the only way you can live above temptations is through death. You can’t beat temptation by complying and then making a decision to address your feelings and decide not to sin; that won’t work. Rather, you have to die first. Just like a seed has to die before it germinates, so our spirit has to die to the temptation to comply, before you can have real life. In fact, if you won’t die, you won’t fly.

Repentance

Repentance is complying and then realising you’ve sinned and then reversing your decision to not comply but rather die, by admitting that you complied and then giving up your position and having no position except trusting the Lord’s position. In the case of my brother, I had to die to my wants by giving up my friend and trusting God. Interestingly, my friend fell out with my brother and came back to me. However, I soon lost my friend because he chose to comply whereas, I chose to die, so we went our separate ways.

The lesson of death

Later in life, I learnt this important lesson in a deeper way. A member of my wife’s family hated me for no reason except the spirit in them conflicted with the Spirit in me. I initially tried to defend my position, but over the years learnt you couldn’t win. I turned to the Lord and chose to lose. Instead of living in fear of their insults, I chose to die and cop it. Before long, I found myself no longer entrapped by their fear and living above their satanic attacks. They had the money and they had the power, but I chose to die instead of comply with keeping them happy so I wouldn’t get emotionally injured. I chose to withdraw in love, like David, in order to survive. They hated me more, but God freed me even more, through death.

Every Christian who truly wants to walk with Christ, somewhere in their life has to choose the path of death or else submit to the threats and fears of losing if you don’t comply. You can’t be a disciple unless you forsake everything, take up your cross daily and follow Him. If you choose the wrong path, like Peter, there’s only one way back, and that’s die to your pride and repent. But, if you choose the easy evil path, like Judas, you’ll actually be a traitor against Christ and die anyway.

 

May God encourage His remnant to live above the temptation to have position, and live above the fear of death, so we learn not to comply and can trust Him with death.

 

Pastor Craig Kristianson

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on June 4, 2018 in Death, Voices

 

Tags: , , , ,

Sermon 105 – Demons love a Sugar Fix

02 Sep

Humans love sugar … chocolate, ice cream, coca cola, cakes, biscuits etc.

Sugar makes you feel good.

The problem is that when you eat too much sugar, the sugar is converted by your liver into fats. It’s the sugar that causing the western world’s obesity epidemic.

Demons love sugar too. They crave it. They manoeuvre wherever they can to get it. They fight over each other for it.

I’m not talking about the natural carbohydrate; I’m talking about “pride”. Pride is the sugar fix that demons get off on. Without pride, demons are lost. They might kill you like they did Jesus, but they can’t win. They can only have power over you through the door of your pride. This is the very reason why Jesus said in Luke 14 that a true disciple must die to themselves. Spiritual death really means that you have surrendered everything to the will of the Father, like Christ, and thus when you’re tempted to think you are special, or capable, or intelligent, or better or envious of your fellow-man, the Holy Spirit gives you the power to resist the selfish temptation to fall to your pride so that demons don’t have the upper hand in the battle against the kingdom of God.

Satanic currency

Satan hated the fact that Jesus was more favoured by the Father; thus he instigated the currency of pride. He sold this currency to humankind when he tempted Eve to reach for pride. She took it and it tasted like sugar, but it actually turned to fat. Once man fell to pride he inherently practiced fear, lying, blame and murder. Adam and Eve attacked each other with their words and Cain killed Abel. We’re all born under this satanic infection of sin and it’s a fight for our salvation to escape this disease of pride.

Jesus only

There’s only one escape from this disease and it’s only through the door of the blood of Jesus Christ. Jesus said … I am the Way, the Truth and the Life, no one comes to the Father but by Me (John 14:6); not Mary, not Mohammed, not Allah, only Jesus Christ. And that door can only be opened when you fully surrender to the will of the Father, not by words but by actions.

Jezebel

In 1 Kings 21 we read the story of King Ahab envying the vineyard of Naboth. Instead of being grateful for the garden he had, he wanted better. He inherited this disease from Eve who obviously did the same thing. He then went and had a big mood which was designed to manipulate others to feel sorry for him and to give him what he wanted. Sound familiar?

Jezebel, his wife, came to the rescue, and plotted a plan of perjury that resulted in Naboth being unjustly stoned. Ahab got what he wanted. But it backfired. Eventually God raised up Jehu who killed the sons of the king and finally Jezebel despite her attempts to woo him with her cosmetic face paint. Then Jehu also lost his way because he let his pride fill him with his own importance. Behind all this, demons were actively destroying God’s special human creation by simply activating their pride.

Satan hates God’s authority

Like Eve in the Garden and Jezebel in Jezreel, once a woman chooses pride she will be used by Satan to envy other women and destroy males. Generally, they’re not doing this deliberately or knowingly, they unwittingly become instruments of Satan even though they’re outwardly covered in goodness. Satan hates authority, so deep in the inherent spirit of a woman is the hatred of man’s position over them. The only way this hatred is retained in its proper box is if the man stands for righteousness on the principles of God’s commandments. If he falters to his pride he will also falter to the woman’s wishes instead of God’s will, and the woman will take the man to hell, just like Adam who was separated from God and the Garden.

It was the spirit behind Jezebel that stirred up Ahab (1Kings 21:25). Consequently, because Ahab chose pride he was subject to Jezebelic demons even though from his perspective nothing could touch him because he was the king. But that’s what pride does; it tricks you into your own deception of being your own king.

You only have to look at society, tattoos, nose rings and earrings, sex change operations, lesbianism, and sport to see that men are becoming woman and woman are becoming men. The Word of God declares that if men compromise the principles of the Word, then woman and children will rule over them (Isaiah 3:4,12). All Satan’s interested in is opposing God’s creative plan, reversing it and ultimately destroying it. Satan is winning, and he’s winning because the church is sick.

Faith levels

Obviously, God grants us different levels of faith, so some of us are able to address our pride better than others, but from my years of observation of people, most don’t even try; they don’t even know that they’re vulnerable to demons; they’re too busy coping with trying to look good in the eyes of others. Like Saul, they worship the true God but their real heart’s interest is in their own well-being and their position on the totem pole of the society they move amongst.

When you devalue the Ten Commandments you prosper pride and the demonic

You can’t stop the progression of pride without God’s Ten Commandments retaining the top shelf of respect. Respect for the Ten Commandments is the first bulwark against the enemy’s manoeuvring. Sadly, the modern church has fallen for the lie that the God of the Old Testament was hard and cruel, but the God of the New Testament is meek and gentle. Consequently, modern Christians have been duped into believing the grace lie that they can interpret God’s commandments according to how they feel at the time because the Commandments are implanted in their hearts when you become a Christian. The Word of God states that God is the same yesterday, today and forever; He never changes (Hebrews 12:8). So this teaching is just a lie designed to make the church look more acceptable to the world, and if you believe this lie then you are not a Christian; you’re a tare.

When it comes to the crunch, by far the majority of Christians practice family first at the cost of compromising the principles of God. If you say you love God, then obviously His principles over-rule all else, but the modern church displays its hypocrisy by being openly submitted to divorce and re-marriage, openly retailing with the world and sporting like the world on God’s holy day, openly endorsing women in the pulpit, not separating from wilful Christian sinners but rather falsely loving them in their sin (1 Corinthians 5:11-13), and turning a blind eye to the sin of homosexuality (Romans 1). The church is sick and dying.

Once you mix your Christian principles with the world

People have been so duped by their self-evaluated goodness they don’t even know what pride is. To most it’s a feeling of superiority which they believe they don’t experience. The truth is, pride is believing I’m special; pride is being jealous of what your neighbour has; pride is believing it’s not fair when you hurt my feelings; pride is taking on someone when they’ve said or done something unfairly offensive; pride is wanting a better deal and failing to see the garden God’s placed you in. It’s pride because it’s all about me and my feelings. It’s not faith in God’s will and plan. Pride is simply turning to myself instead of stopping the mood reaction and instead turning to the Father for His will in the matter.

Never take on a demon in your own strength

If you take on someone for hurting your feelings, or if you envy someone for having a better deal, you’ll unwittingly take on demons and you’ll end up with the same consequences of decay as that person (Matthew 7:1,2). We’re not fighting flesh and blood but principalities and powers, and the rulers of darkness and spiritual wickedness in high places (Ephesians 6:12). We’re up against gorilla warfare demons, not people. The demons use people to trick you into their snare. It’s pride to take on a demon in your own strength especially by using the Name of Jesus with your own self-elevated self-worthiness. Like Christ, who let Satan kill Him, demons are only submissive to the will of the Father. You’re wiser to wait on God and leave the outcome to God.

 

May God grant the strength of character for some men and women to stand against the swell.

 

Dr. Samuel Gourdone

 

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on September 2, 2016 in Pride

 

Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Sermon 104 – The Rain Falls on the Just and the Unjust

15 Aug

ABC news radio recently announced the past discovery in the National Gallery of Australia of a stolen statue known as the dancing Shiva idol belonging to the Sripuranthan tribe in southern India.  Two years ago the Australian government had returned the idol to the Indian authorities but it was being held in police custody as evidence of the crime. The tribes people were now expressing their frustrations to the authorities. They wanted the idol returned to their temple because they believed that the idol brought them good luck. To their thinking, when the idol was with them the rains came and their crops prospered and life was happy.

It reminds me of the Jews burning incense to the queen of heaven, Jeremiah 44:16-19. They worshipped the Lord God and at the same time made cakes to the queen of heaven. They adopted whatever technique gave them the most apparent prosperity. Life was based on getting the best deal; it wasn’t based on trusting God. Consequently, their thinking was the fruit of their contaminated spirits and their behaviour was irrational, but not to them.

What’s idol worship?

Obviously, bowing to a statue is clearly idol worship, but does western society practice idol worship without recognising their contradictory behaviour?  ISIS thinks so.

There’s a difference between thinking that you’re good because things are going good and being thankful when things are going well. One is the love of self and the other is the love of God. If you say you’re a Christian, then one is using God as your idol for your own well-being and the other is serving God whatever the circumstances. They’re miles apart. Sadly, most Christians have been indoctrinated by our humanistic society to believe that they are worshiping God when in fact they’re just using Him for their own self-value.

David was thankful for things working out well, but if you read the Psalms & the Book of Samuel you’ll quickly recognise that most of his life was surviving the satanic hassles fired against him. Think about Saul’s hatred, Absalom’s rebellion, and the loss of Ziglag. Despite the conflicts, he retained a God confidence attitude, and fought his own selfishness. Everything was based on trusting God’s plan, not chasing the best for himself.

If you give self an inch, it will take a mile

The current motto supporting homosexuality is … Love is Love.

In other words, their argument is that any type of good feelings is love. As if sin is going to feel bad! Everyone knows that sin is not love, whether it feels good or not. Once you give sin licence, of course it won’t be able to stop itself, so evil just calls the sin ‘love’ so it can justify it. What rubbish! Humanism can talk itself into anything, because self is its idol. Homosexuality is just an excuse for more self-idol worship and anti-christ resistance to the will of God.

Christians are losing the war

Everyone is born under satanic influence with the desire to worship themselves.  It’s the pride of thinking that we are of importance. It’s heavily promoted by our humanistic society. In fact, in modern society no one’s allowed to fail; no one’s allowed to feel bad. But the truth is, our children are being manipulated into thinking of themselves first; to protect their rights; to love themselves first before their neighbour. The whole process of modern society is to devalue Christianity and negate God and His rules from inhibiting our selfish passions.

We’re all subjected to the temptation of thinking we’re pretty good when something goes our way, but it’s temptation, and if you’re saved you have to wake up to the trick and resist Satan, not by telling Satan to rack-off, but rather by not giving ground to your pride.

Whatever is not of faith, is sin, Romans 14:23

It’s this inherent satanic inspired self-love that has to die daily, by surrendering in faith to the will of God. You can camouflage this pride with good works or happy attitudes, but if it’s not of faith then the good works are just a smoke screen to get into the good books of others, to protect your self-value to be liked and not dis-liked.

Why does the rain fall on the just and the unjust? Matthew 5:45

So why does the rain fall on the unjust too? Because, if it just fell on the just, everyone would swap sides so they could get the deal, so how would you know who was fair-dinkum? Plus, the just would be full of their own importance over the unjust, and thus get lost in their selfishness.

The rain falls on the just and the unjust. So, if you think you’re just because it rains on your life, how does that prove that you are just? Thinking that you’re just actually suggests that you are full of your own importance, like the Pharisee vs the Publican in Luke 18:10, and therefore you’ve either fallen into the pit of self-elevation, or you are actually one of the unjust.

The just walk by faith, Galatians 3:11

The unjust think they deserve God’s goodness on them, but the just don’t think they deserve anything, they’re just grateful when it rains on them; they don’t bemoan when it rains on the unjust more; and they trust God when it doesn’t rain on them. Any other pattern in your behaviour and attitude is contrary to faith, and therefore is evidence of using God for your idol worship. We all face the temptation to have a mood when it doesn’t work to our advantage, but that’s the tempter’s strategy to trick us into our pride. Love doesn’t fall to pride, and if it does it repents.

Think of it this way … the unjust have 70 or so years; the just have eternity. There’s no need for envy.

Why resist the temptation to think we’re something?

That’s simple … we’re all born in sin and therefore fully susceptible to demonic influence. Our pride opens the door to these familiar spirits (Isaiah 8:19) that will work against you and against the will of God.

I’ve lost count of the character changes I’ve observed when people open their heart to their pride. Recently, I was counselling a Christian man who felt the pride of his daughter’s achievements. I could sense there was pride in his picture because the outward manner of his children, including the daughter, began to show signs of superior self-value and say and do things that were out of character. I drew his attention to the fact that his children were showing the same unhealthy characteristics of their self-centered grandfather.  I pointed out to this man that his pride had opened the door to the spirits operating behind his family chain. When he looked he thankfully could see what I was pointing out to him. He recognised his healthy joy had turned to unhealthy pride. Instead of being thankful for the Lord’s rain, he had succumbed to the pride that he was the one who had done it for his daughter. He repented and his children’s attitude reverted back to normal behaviour.

We’re not fighting flesh and blood but principalities and powers, Ephesians 6

Demons attack and tempt in order to activate your pride. Don’t worry about the demons, rather, keep a check on your pride. It’s the thing that will kill you.

God doesn’t stop your pride; you’re responsible to do it.

 

Pastor Greg Saunders

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on August 15, 2016 in Pride, Thankfulness

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

Sermon 97 – I don’t want to be a NOBODY

28 Mar

I was talking with a young Christian man about his feelings when all of a sudden he spurted out of his mouth … “I’m sick of being treated like a 3 year old; I want to be a somebody”. These words or similar words are being touted more and more regularly. The humanistic teaching to the younger generation is twisting the minds of the youth to believe they are someone special and thus can achieve anything they set their mind to. Sounds ok, but it’s a satanic trap.

The syndrome of superiority vs. inferiority

Why does everyone want to be a somebody? Why can’t people be happy with their lot in life? Why is everyone comparing themselves to their neighbour as to whether they’re above them or below them? Most people might not bring it to their conscious mind, but just below the surface everyone knows within their circle of friends and family, who’s more superior and more liked and more happy, and who’s inferior.

Once Eve disobeyed God and fell to the temptation of being a somebody, every human being thereafter has inherited the same desire in their DNA. Wanting to be a somebody is a temptation that if you fall for, it will put you under the power and control of Satan. It’s a trap designed to ultimately separate you from creator God.

You can’t find God by being a somebody; you have to become a nobody

Philippians 2:7 states that Jesus made Himself of no reputation and took on Himself the form of a servant. To prove this, He was born in a stable and He died a cruel death. The Pentecostal church teaches that because He suffered you don’t have to; He did it all for you. But is that the truth? No it’s not, because v5 states let this mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus; which means, we are to have the same fixed mind of servanthood as Christ did. He didn’t do it so we wouldn’t have to; He did it to show us how to.

The real reason

The real reason why everyone is competing against each other to be a somebody is because we’re selfish; we want to look good in the eyes of others, we want to be better than the other person, we want to be happy, we want no hassles. This secret attitude just confirms what God already knows, and if we will look, confirms that we haven’t found God at all; we’ve just tacked Him onto our selfishness.

The church says it follows the law of God, but it’s lying. When you want to be a somebody, you’ll keep the laws of God up to a point, but when it comes to the crunch you’ll come up with your own laws and run by them.

If you judge people for not doing it the way you would have, you operate under your own law that says …” if you don’t do it my way, you’re an idiot”.

If, like the man I was counselling, you have a mood because someone bosses you and you don’t like it, you operate under your own law that states … “if you’re not nice to me, then I don’t have to be nice to you”, or “if you hurt my feelings them I have the right to have a mood”, or “if you tell me what to do you make me feel stupid.”

Everyone has hundreds of secret laws which are considered acceptable because everyone has them and they’re regarded as the norm, but the truth is, our personal self-protective laws come from the heart of Satan.

The reason we keep our own secret laws is because we don’t want to be put-down, we don’t want to be told what to do … we want to be our own boss. In other words, without us even waking up to the fact, we are actually the god of our own kingdom and if we run by our own laws we are always right and can’t be wrong and we can blame everyone else for our pain and hurt feelings.

Some of us express this blame as “you don’t understand” (which just simply means if you won’t agree with my opinion, you’re ignorant), or “I will be nice to you so you can’t tell me I’m bad”. They’re simply just techniques we’ve learnt that help us not feel inferior because we don’t want to be told we’re wrong. They have nothing to do with God; it’s just plain selfishness.

The King Saul phenomenon

We analyse and then justify why the person that’s hurt us is wrong, then explain away why they are wrong, then resist being told that we may be the one that’s wrong, and then refuse to see it. The consequence of this selective selfish blindness is demonic possession and ultimately, hell, and all the time we’re the ones who think we’re badly done by.

I felt the temptation but I dealt with it

Most Christians I come across argue that when they were tempted to blame or feel hurt that they dealt with the temptation, but they fail to see that their mood reaction confirms they’re lying to themselves. Why do we have to believe that we’ve dealt with it? Because we’re selfish and we don’t want to feel a failure, nor look bad to others, nor be counselled that we haven’t; we don’t want to be told we’re selfish. We’d rather argue that we have dealt with the temptation. Generally, the real truth is that we live under the fear of being corrected or rejected, which is just the fruit of our selfishness, and we hide behind our self-righteous laws and shift the blame to the other party so we don’t get hurt. Selfishness always surrounds itself with fear and blame so it can’t be told it’s wrong.

God’s counsel = repent first, forgive second

Instead of supporting the man’s feelings by pointing out the wrong of the person who had offended him, I said to this Christian man … did you do anything wrong? Once he admitted that his mood was just a selfish reaction, I told him that God’s law says “repent”. Once he repented, he was able to forgive.

People believe that freedom = no one telling me what to do. But that’s just the deception of my own fake selfish laws. Freedom is obeying God’s laws, because that’s the only way to disconnect yourself from Satan’s power.

If you want to be free you have to look at yourself in the light of God’s laws, not your own selfish laws. Your own laws will always support your case; God’s laws will expose your selfishness.

The grace lie

The reason the modern church says we’re under grace and people who respect God’s laws are legalistic is really so we can be free to operate under our own legal system and thus retain one’s selfishness. Why do I know this? Because His grace in only given to the humble; He resists the proud, and you’re definitely not humble if you think you’re a somebody. The evidence that we’re outside His grace is the decay of the land and the decay of the morals of society. The church is meant to be the salt but it’s lost its saltiness.

God’s grace is not there so you can be safe from the consequences of your sin; it’s in place to delay addressing your sin whilst He waits to see if you will own your sin and repent. If you fail to see your selfishness and repent, eventually He will punish your selfishness.

You have to be bitten to learn not to bite

If you want to face your selfishness, you can’t face it by everything working out to your own satisfaction. Things have to go wrong to expose your moodiness. If you open your eyes to your moodiness you will see your selfishness and if you repent you will be saved for heaven. Therefore, it’s God’s grace that you be bitten.

Motivation

If your motivation is for God, living under God’s laws is simple. If your motivation is for yourself, it’s impossible.

Pastor Jim Desmond

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on March 28, 2016 in Elevation, Pride

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

Sermon 87 – Occupied by a Demon

30 Jun

Q. What’s a demon?

Nobody likes thinking about demons and nobody likes talking about demons, but the fact remains that if there is a Holy Spirit then there are unholy spirits, and if there are angels then there are demons. God calls them unclean spirits (Revelation 16:13). Nobody understands how the Holy Spirit can indwell the body of a Christian, but if that’s possible then it’s also possible for an evil spirit to do the same.

Examples of Demons

Demons seem to have different primary functions and can be single or multiple e.g. lying spirits (1 Kings 22:23), spirits of fear (2 Timothy 1:7), King Saul, the Gadarene (Mark 5:9), spirit of divination (Acts 16:16), Mary Magdalene, boy thrown into the fire, spirit of infirmity (Luke 13:11)

Church thinking

The church believes that if you are a Christian then you are occupied by the Holy Spirit and you can’t be occupied by a demon, but is that the case? Think about King Saul, Samson, Peter, Korah, and Baalim.

The church believes that if you are a non-Christian then you can’t be occupied by the Holy Spirit, but is that the case? Why should creator God be restricted to our thinking when He owns His creation, both good and bad? Both King Saul and Baalim suggest otherwise, as does Judas, Nebuchadnezzar (Daniel 4:37), and Cyrus (king of the anti-christ kingdom of Persia, 2 Chron.36:22).

Everybody has been indoctrinated to think that we are born good and are inherently good; but the Word of God says the opposite. God flooded the whole earth because His creation had been contaminated from birth by the Evil One, Genesis 8:21. David confirms this in Psalm 51:5. The fact is, we’re all born under the power of the Evil one, and, from birth, God is fighting for you to be freed from Satan’s power over you; that’s why Jesus died. He’s just waiting for you to concede to His will.

Everybody thinks that demons are beings that inhabit people and cause them to rant and rave and froth at the mouth, but is that the case? The fact is that demons lay low until cornered. They don’t want to be cast out of the carrier. They hate exposure, but at the same time, like the spirit of divination in Acts 16, they like to promote their prowess. They come as wolves in sheep’s clothing, and angels of light. However, as society disintegrates into more sin, and the Holy Spirit backs-off His defence, demons will feel safe to come out of hiding and be more confrontational and aggressive because no one is spiritually capable of confronting them.

Characteristics of Satan (John 8:44)

In John 8:44, Jesus described the Pharisees as demons when He said that they were sons of Satan. They weren’t frothing at the mouth; they were practicing the rightness of religion and worshipping the same God as Christ. Yet, Christ could easily discern the façade. Secretively, they displayed the satanic characteristics of (1) Envy (2) Murder (3) Liar. These are the signs of a demon operating either in you or against you. The ultimate liar is someone who smiles to your face whilst plotting to stab a knife in your back.

A demon’s main objective

Demons are servants of Satan with the same characteristics but with different levels of power. The main objective of a demon is to kill you. When King Saul opened his heart to envy against David, his one and only objective in life was to kill David. That was the objective of Joseph’s brothers; that was the objective of Cain; that was the objective of the Pharisees against Christ; and whether you realise it or not, that’s the objective of any person who opens their heart to envy of their neighbour.

How does it work?

From birth, we are all under the influence of the demonic. Demons are able to speak into our minds; this is called temptation. The temptation is always to get us to elevate our position. God calls this ‘pride’, and in 2 Timothy 2:25 KJV, God calls it ‘opposing yourself‘, ie. you become your own worst enemy and thus in your blindness, your own pride starts to destroy you under the occupation of demonic spirits. Once we fall to our pride, demons have right of power over us (2 Timothy 2:26), and only repentance will resolve the problem. The opportunity for repentance will usually occur at a point of correction. If one resists this correction, then demons will take more ground and eventually the person will be possessed. King Saul became possessed because he was too proud to repent even though he said sorry, whereas David repented and was freed from his sin and the demonic influence that stirred him to commit murder and adultery.

The confusion of pride

Most people think pride is walking around with your nose in the air and acting pompous; but it’s much more subtle than that. Pride is exposed when I think I’m special; when I think you’re an idiot; when I think I’m better than you; when I murmur that I haven’t done anything wrong yet you are being mean to me; when I selfishly want something; when I can’t forgive or repent; when I wallow in rejection; when I have a mood because someone else is having a mood; when I have a mood because someone hurt my feelings; when I have a mood because I can’t get what I want; that is, basically whenever I regard myself higher or lower than my neighbour, or submit to my moodiness.

What’s the opposite to pride?

The answer is Faith; that is, trusting God’s outcome, rather than having a mood that it isn’t working out to your expected outcome. It’s this walking by faith that God calls HUMILITY.

James 4:5 “The spirit in us lusts to envy”.

When God talks about lust, He’s talking about envy. Envy then leads to all sorts of immoral behaviour. The Greek word for envy is Phthonos (*5355) = pain felt and malignity conceived at the sight of someone else’s excellence or someone else’s happiness. In other words, to us the English word ‘envy’ just means we are simply jealous. We all think of it as a ‘soft sin’. It doesn’t sound that bad, nor does envy feel bad, but in the Greek it means that I’m so unhappy with you having more happiness than me that I will kill you.

Anyone who practices envy is practicing murder from their heart whether they know it or not. Thus God clearly states in 1 John 3:15 that if you hate your brother you’re a murderer and you will not access heaven; but to even clarify it further, if you envy your brother then you don’t love him, you hate him and wish evil upon him. Thus your true hidden murderous heart is exposed by your relationship to your brother.

People think jealousy is just a normal characteristic of humanity. Everybody does it so it’s ignored as acceptable normal behaviour. What people don’t realise is that when they practice envy against their neighbour they’re actually operating under demonic power and wishing their neighbour dead. Envy is anti-Holy Spirit and the practice of demonism whether you want to know it or not. If envy is routinely practiced in your heart; if you desire the No.1 position, if you believe you are special to God, if you believe you have a special spiritual call, then know you are not saved; that’s the heart of Satan and you are under his demonic power. Like Isaiah, Peter and Moses, anyone called of God knows they’re not special or worthy.

Goodness isn’t the measurement

When you practice envy against your neighbour, you are demonstrating that you are under the influence of Satan and not Holy Spirit. Be as good as you like, e.g. the rich young ruler, it won’t save you. Envy is the sign that you are not under the Holy Spirit because it contradicts the law of ‘loving your neighbour as yourself’.

Signs of a demon

Genesis 3 spells out the side-effects that Satan has over you when you concede to his temptations, viz. envy, fear, blame, lie, bossing, sickness (in some instances). These were all exposed in Genesis 3 when Satan conned Eve, and Eve changed character as a consequence. The human spirit was made in the likeness of God. Envy was not a characteristic of Adam and Eve until they were tempted into it by Satan. From that point on, man inherited satanic characteristics.

1. Blame is the fruit of defending your envy. Blame is expressed by accusations against your neighbour e.g. if you make me feel bad, then you’re the baddie, you made me do it, it’s your fault I’m in trouble, it’s your fault I’m not getting what I want.

2. Searching for happiness is another fruit of your envy.

‘Demon’ in the Greek = daimon. ‘Happy’ in the Greek =eu-daimon. In other words, the Greeks believed that if you got lucky you were happy because the demon gods looked well on you. Seeking happiness is of the Devil; it’s not of God.                          

3. Bossing and hating to be bossed is another fruit of your envy.Demons love to boss, tell everybody what to do and tell everybody what’s right and wrong. They think they’re special and they don’t like being told what to do; they certainly don’t like being corrected or put in their place.

4. Moodiness because it won’t work out the way I want.

Demons don’t love each other; they can’t, they can only hate. They hate other demons for being higher than them. They only link together for the purpose of hate, and if you open your heart to envy they impart this hate into your heart.

Demons hate your happiness. They want the No.1 position.

Demons are happy when you’re helping them, but they’ll hate you when you’re not or when you’re higher than them. Thus if a sibling hates their brother for being more liked by a parent or friend, that sibling, in every single case, will plot to kill their brother. It may not be with a knife or gun, but it will be in their heart, even to the point of putting cancer on them. They’ll wish evil on their brother; anything that will remove him from the top position so they can replace them. Joseph is not an isolated case; his brothers are an example of the spirit of evil that lurks in the heart of every human being.

Confusion (James 3:16)

Wherever there is bitter envy there is confusion, and demonic, and every evil work.

Most Christians have split personalities. Consistently, one moment they’re really nice to you and the next time you meet them they’re sharp and bitey. This is confusing and thus it’s a sign that something else is going on in them that you can’t see. If you’re confused about someone’s inconsistent behaviour and you’re not sure whether they’ll bite you or be kind and considerate towards you, then know that you’re talking to two different spirit personalities in the one body.

Demons often tell the truth

It’s also confusing because demons often tell the truth, but it’s always selective and designed to manipulate and divert you from your course, or to hide them from exposing their course. Satan told Eve she wouldn’t die and it was the truth; well, almost. The spirit of divination in Acts 16 told the truth about Paul, and demons often worshipped Christ with the truth.

Voices

If you listen with your spirit, you can hear demons talk to you. These are the voices of temptation and they include feelings of guilt, fear, lies, intimidation and presumptions. You can diagnose these voices by comparing them to what the Holy Spirit would say to you.

The rise of demonism

Murder is on the increase; immorality is on the increase; drug abuse is on the increase; homosexuality is on the increase; the disintegration of the family is on the increase; divorce is on the increase. This is all due to the church’s de-valuing of the Ten Commandments which were written as life’s boundaries to inhibit the growth of evil. The church has lost its saltiness; it doesn’t deal with sin by separation, as instructed in 1 Corinthians 5, it accepts sin under the lie of love, and thus evil is propagating like an infection.

Death to self

Self likes the glory; death-to-self gives Him the glory. If you’re the axe and you tell the axeman what to do, know you’re under a demonic power (Isaiah 10:15).

To become a Christian, these satanic characteristics that indwell the heart of man, must be killed. You either die to your demonic character by letting God have His way with you, or you will die eternally. Man can’t do this by his own ability and will-power. Only the Holy Spirit can do it for us, and He does this when you fully surrender to His will = death-to-self. Even before you were born, God’s been fighting to free you from the power of demonic spirits we are all born under. If you could do it yourself, you could save yourself. You can’t; it’s only by His grace (Ephesians 2:8,9).

Pastor Mike Stanford

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on June 30, 2015 in Demons

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

Sermon 49 – Things go BAD because God has a PLAN

30 Mar

In 1 Samuel chapter one and two, we read the story of the birth of Samuel and the conflict of two adversaries. Hannah grieved for a child and Penninah took advantage of it to put her down, all because she felt not as loved.

Q. Why was Hannah barren?
Read the rest of this entry »

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on March 30, 2013 in Elevation, Faith

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Sermon 45 – RETALIATION

19 Jan

Why was Jesus nailed to a cross for doing nothing wrong?

What would you do if you were nailed to a cross for doing nothing wrong?

Being crucified was Jesus’ final temptation. What a temptation to retaliate against His oppressors! What a temptation to prove He was God by coming down off the cross just as His enemies were taunting Him to do!  If Jesus would have retaliated without the Father’s consent, He would have wasted His time being on the cross. He would not have saved us from our sin, for He would have Read the rest of this entry »

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on January 19, 2013 in Retaliation, Temptation

 

Tags: , ,

Sermon 44 – The Nice Christian

12 Jan

When we get hurt by authority, one of two reactions occurs

  1. Rebellion against authority
  2. Cooperation with authority

Niceness is the most common response to hurtful authority. The fear of getting into trouble drives a person to set up a belief that Read the rest of this entry »

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on January 12, 2013 in Fake Christian

 

Tags: , , , ,

Sermon 35 – FAITH 3 – THE CONTRADICTORY TRUTHS OF GOD’S WORD

18 Sep

Faith is relying on God no matter what’s happening around you or to you. You can’t be saved without faith. It’s a gift from God; it can’t be self-manufactured, and it grows by
Read the rest of this entry »

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on September 18, 2012 in Faith, Two Truths

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

← Older posts