INTRO: For 38 years this man is stuck in a disappointment
Paralyzed in a situation
38 years...no progress...no victory...everyday the same!
It seemed as though he would forever be the victim...stuck in a rut
„« 38=== 3 Resurrection
„« 8 New Beginning
* The question is one that's a bit unsettling
* Do you want to get better?
* Yet his answer is what bothers me most...
* If this was the church...
...The water got stirred
...We sit paralyzed because of damaged emotions
...And our answer shows we are a victim
* I am concerned with those who become addicted to being a victim:
...addicted to a crisis
...addicted to a problem
...addicted to people feeling sorry for you
...addicted to people's reaction to your problem
...Addicted to feeling sorry for yourself
* Like the drug addict...
...his body doesn't want it
...his soul hungers for it
...love/hate relationship
...and you don't know how to function without it
* Victim addiction...
Victim = One who is harmed by or made to suffer from an act
Habit = A reoccurring, unconscious pattern of behavior acquired through petition.
Habit = Develops lifestyle
Lifestyle = Develops strongholds
> > > >If you always do what you've always done
> > > >You will always be what you've always been
* Many times we become a victim as a child
* The Devil is always trying to harm you when you're a kid...
- Message: "The King and the Kid"
* This leaves us with childlike emotions in grown up bodies
- Throwing temper tantrums
- Pouting / crying / screaming
* Paul told us to grow up
* Yet growing up is a process
* Habits and 'victim mindsets' don't come because someone laid hands on you
* Growing up is a process
* You don't get character in a prayer line.
1 Corinthians 13:11
"When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me."
LIVING WITH HOLES -- 3 REASONS WHY
1. I SPOKE AS A CHILD
* Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks
* I am not talking about what the mouth says on Sunday
* But what it says when you're down
* Stop talking like a victim
* You tell the world you're a victim...
...take advantage of me
* Continuing to repeat what someone has previously said!
...I am too ugly
...I will never get ahead
...I don't trust men
...I don't like women
...I want to love you, but I don't know how
* The enemy is using your mouth to curse you
* Every time you say it
* You reinforce it
* Now everyone in the family is fighting to be the victim
* You are cursing yourself
* Dead words
* Destructive words
2. I THOUGHT LIKE A CHILD
* How you view yourself
* Low self-esteem...
...strongholds / Stinking Thinking
EXAMPLE: The little girl who got molested...
...hates men
...hates authority
Or
...grows up thinking that sex is all she is good for!
* The word thought actually has meaning in the financial world:
Thought = To call into account
It's an accounting word
* Wrong thinking then gives us a word picture
* That we put things in the wrong account
* Remember in school when they taught us to add
* We had to line things up in the right column
* When different events come up in my life
* I think immaturely and put them into the wrong column
* So, I never get the right answer
EXAMPLE: He came home late...
...your column, he's cheating
He didn't listen to me...
...he don't care
...he hates me
Wrong column
She is friendly to you...
...your thoughts turn sexual
Wrong column
„« Always put new relationships
„« Into old relationship columns
„« Now second husband is paying the price for first
„« And wife is paying price for abusive mother
„« When you add it all up, you can't get the right total
>>>You need to change your stinking thinking!
Ephesians 4:23
"...to be made new in the attitude of your minds..."
- Make your thinking new
- You will not be made new in one prayer line
Study prayer line
Meditate prayer line
Read prayer line
- You get prayed for, but you need to...
...breaks habits
...stinking thinking
...strongholds
>>>> through the Power of His Word
- God won't pour new wine into OLD wine skin with Holes
- Thinking like a victim...
...victim = feels less than / weaker than / powerless
- Anger / Rage / Bitterness / Depression
...all stem from feeling powerless
...backed into a corner
...they explode / defense / to feeling powerless
- That's why you need the Word of God
- The Word of God is empowering
- It gives you power
- It renews your mind
- It tears down strongholds
ľ In Bible times...
...People feared when preachers came to town
...Because the Word empowers people
...It sets captives free
...Mindsets / strongholds
ľ This is why the enemy today has tempted so many Preachers
ľ To give quick little milky messages
ľ It's the Word of God that...
...breaks habits and strongholds
ľ Paul said the foolishness of preaching
Saves / sets free
Not with the words of human wisdom
Lest the cross be emptied of its Power
1 Corinthians 1
„Ï The Roman officials...
> would arrest the disciples for preaching
Because it is the Power of God unto salvation
EXAMPLE: My break lines
„Ï The Disciples went into one village...preached...and a woman was delivered from a Spirit of Divination
„Ï The people who owned her were furious
Because they were making money off her weakness
People will profit off your victim addition
Someone is living off your low self esteem...
...your body
...your finances
...your time
They don't want you to be delivered
Preaching will empower people...
...that habits / people / strongholds...
...are controlling
...to be set free
„Ï That's why:
1. Preaching is hard work
2. Devil will make every excuse for you not to be in church.
3. I REASONED LIKE A CHILD
* Speaks of motive
* You won't drink, but you hang with those that do
* I put around me other people
* Who reinforce the same negativity
* You don't practice the sin
* But you hang with the people who do
* See if you got around the people who were delivered
* They would convict you
* You hang with them because there are familiar spirits
* You need to get around people
* That won't let you be a victim
EXAMPLE: Money
Marriage
Self Esteem
* If you're going up...get around people who are going up
* If you want to know who you are...look at who you socialize with!
„« The reason...
...why do we do what we do...motive
...we have too many childlike motives in the church
EXAMPLE: Casting out spirits
„« Christians are prone to label too many things as an 'evil spirit'
...controlling spirits
...Jezebel spirits
...unteachable spirits
„« Most of which...I don't believe exist
„« Hold on, let me explain:
„« A controlling spirit...
...is a frightened
...angry
...hurting soul
„« Who is trying to control situations
„« So he don't get hurt again
„« An un-teachable spirit
...is often someone who has been abused by authority...or hurt
...by counsel been tricked
-by some smooth talker
-and is now terrified to take anyone's advice
„« These are not Devil spirits...
„« More than they are wrong behaviors driven by powerful, unmet needs deep within a soul full of holes!
„« The danger in blaming everything on a spirit is that it removes
„« Personal responsibility...
...so, we come to church
...anoint with oil
...shout
...cast out
...leave and never take responsibility
>>>>> "The Devil Made Me Do It"
„« We wrongly think that it's not our fault
„« And if someone with the right anointing will pray for me, I will be delivered
„« The problem is you can't be delivered from yourself
„« We hear way more about casting out demons...
„« Than we do about healing damaged emotions
„« Because we've been told we have power over the enemy
„« So it appears logical to fight devils
„« But you can yell at devils until you're blue
„« You need to yell at yourself!
EXAMPLE:
- Person looking for a lost wallet under a street light
- lost it in a dark parking lot
- but it's too dark to look over there
- I can see fine here
„« So the church has lost ground because our services are always about repairing
„« And seldom about reloading
Victim addiction refuses to let go of that thing that is dead
Who you used to be...is dead
When you were baptized it symbolized this
Yet you still do what you don't want to do
Romans 7:21 & 24
"So I find this law at work: when I want to do good, evil is right there with me.
What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?"
In Roman days whenever they wanted to punish someone, they would make them walk around with a dead body tied to them.
The decay and death on the dead man got on the living man
It's time to...
