The preacher came to call the other day.
He said at my age I should be thinking of the hereafter.
I told him, "Oh I do it all the time. No matter where I am - - in the kitchen, upstairs, in the living room, or in the garage, I ask myself, "Now, what am I here after?"
Will you bow with me for a Word of Prayer?
You know, last week we came together and declared some things in the name of the Lord – I want us to stand together this morning and remind ourselves of just WHO we are in Jesus Christ:
I am the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ.
I am who God says I am.
I can do what God says I can do.
God wants to prosper us not to harm us!
He has a plan for us! He says that we are the head and not the tail!
We are blessed in the city and blessed in the country!
We are blessed going in and blessed going out!
He wants to bless our storehouse and everything we set our hand to!
He says He will defeat our enemies!
Amen!
You know, my Mama used to tell me, “Tex, if you don’t have anything nice to say – then don’t say anything at all!”
Have any of you ever heard that?
I like the way that sounds – we ought to listen to our Mama’s! Don’t you think?
We ought to listen to the Word of God too! We don’t pay enough attention to the words we speak over our lives and the lives of others – we ought to guard our acid tongue a little better! For some reason – we have no problem coming in here singing praises to God on Sunday and letting the same tongue that praises God spit out words that only Satan would be proud of on Monday through Saturday!
Proverbs 18:20 tells us that “A man’s belly shall be satisfied with the fruit of his mouth; and with the increase of his lips he shall be filled. Death and life are in the power of the tongue: and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof.”
You are going to eat the fruit of your tongue! You want a helping of LIFE? Or a helping of DEATH?
If you don’t have anything nice to say – don’t say anything at all!
As we come into this place where we begin to open our eyes to the Blessings of God through Jesus Christ – as we proclaimed this morning – we are the righteousness of Christ Jesus Who lives in us! As we come into this time of awareness of who we are in
Jesus, we need to remind ourselves of who we AREN’T!
And as we come into this awareness we need to begin to walk and talk – with the love of Christ dwelling in us.
Turn with me this morning to Colossians Chapter 3
Romans 6:16 says “Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to who ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?”
Every day we have a choice – WHO am I going to serve today? Shall I serve Jesus with my word and actions? Or shall I let Satan rule over me? Every word and every action you take throughout your day should be processed with this thought – with this Scripture in mind.
Colossians 3:1 says, “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth.”
Church, if we are going to become the lighthouse for Knox City, Texas – we are going to have to get these things into our hearts! We are going to have to quit talking about it and start doing it! We ARE risen with Christ as believers in Him – so we need to start letting others SEE Him in us! There is no excuse for being under the influence of Satan!
There is no excuse for using the words that Satan puts in your head to use! I’m not just talking about vulgar language – but of words that are used to tear down instead of build up! If you can’t say something nice, then don’t say anything at all!
Verse 8 tells us: “But now ye also put off all these; anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication out of your mouth. Lie not to one another, seeing ye have put off the old man with his deeds; and have put on the NEW man…”
Psalm 141:3 says – “Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth; keep the door of my lips.”
Colossians 2:10 says “And ye are complete in Him, which is the head of all principality and power”
That means that “The Devil Made Me Do It” don’t cut the mustard anymore! Jesus Christ lives in you and He is above ALL principalities and powers of this world! You have Jesus Christ living in you and you need to let Him set a watch over your mouth and let HIM be the door of your lips! If JESUS wouldn’t say it – then SHUT YOUR MOUTH!
Some of you may be tempted to say, “Well, that old Preacher wants me to quit cussing!”
Well, yeah, but that is not the whole story here. I am talking about life and death. Your words have the power of life and death in your life and you need to start paying attention to them! You need to become more aware of what you are speaking over your life and over the lives of others!
We’re going to have to quit getting angry at one another! If you don’t have something nice to say – don’t say it! Hold your mouth! Bite your tongue! “For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God”
James 1:20 tells us that anger – angry outbursts – taking offense at someone – when you let anger come into your heart you are under the control of Satan and you are NOT walking and being led in the Spirit! Wrath does NOT work the things of God!
James 3:16 says “For where envying and strife is, there is confusion and every evil work.”
You are NOT going to find the Holy Spirit in the middle of one of your temper tantrums! So many of us are asking God for peace in our lives – we come to Church on Sunday getting filled up with God’s Good Word and the love of Christ – and we hit the bricks after Church is over and we just vomit out the vilest things to those around us and the ones we love – we speak negative things into their lives – we complain about them – we speak angry words over them – we talk about how old so and so could do this or that better – or they made me mad – or we talk about how they hurt our feelings –
And then we expect God to restore these relationships??? No wonder Satan is having such a wonderful time amongst the body of Christ! He just latches on to the things we say about one another and has himself a halleluiah hootenanny in the pits of hell!
He loves every word of anger – every word of strife and envy – every negative foul sounding word that comes out of you lips – you better wake up to the fact that Satan is saying, “Yippee!! I got him now!!! I got him under my control! That boy is WHIPPED!”
How do you like being whipped?? Satan has you right where he wants you and you better believe that he is going to steal your love, he’s gonna steal your joy - your peace – he is going to take from you the slightest bit of patience you might have with someone – he is going to steal and rob and destroy your gentleness – stomp on your goodness and then he is going to hold up the highest trophy of all and parade around with your faith!
“If we live in the Spirit, let us also WALK IN THE SPIRIT. Let us not be desirous of vain glory, provoking one another, envying one another.”
Ephesians 4:27 – “Neither let us give place to the devil.”
Do you understand that when you do these things – you have to GIVE your authority to Satan?? You have to SUBMIT to him?
You walk around proud of the fact that you are a “Born again, bought by the blood, ‘I got a mansion in Heaven’” believer – yet you SUBMIT yourself to Satan! How does this line up???? How do we walk this way??
And yet we do. We walk – we talk – we act like agents of Satan – all the while proclaiming to the world – “You need to get Jesus! JESUS will make you whole! Brother, let me tell you what’s wrong with you – you son of a so and so…. You just need Jesus in your life!”
We need to let the Word of God dwell within our hearts and remember that James 4”7 says: “Submit yourselves, therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.”
Get behind me Satan! I am NOT going to submit to you! You HAVE NO authority in my life! I will submit myself to the LORD and you WILL flee from me!
“Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, BUT THAT WHICH IS GOOD to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers.”
If you can’t say something that will edify – then keep your mouth SHUT!
Colossians 3:5 goes into our actions. “Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry…”
Some of these are big words for a country preacher. Starting with mortify. When I think of mortify – I think of horror. Horror therefore your members….that doesn’t work too good for me - - - mortify by dictionary terms means to practice self- denial of one’s body and appetites. Hold within limits and CONTROL – subdue one’s appetites – mortify the flesh.
You need to remember, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. I am the head and not the tail. I am complete in HIM – Him who is the head of all principality and power. I am the righteousness of Christ! I will resist the devil and he will flee from me!”
You have the power of the living God within you – you CAN stand up and get rid of these things! You can resist the devil! You CAN put on the NEW MAN and throw off the old – you CAN renew you mind! You CAN begin to walk and talk and think like Jesus Christ and throw Satan right out the door!!
It’s time for us to quit being such beat down sissies and getting whooped time after time by believing the LIES that Satan tells us – he is STEALING from us and we are practically handing our lives over to him without even putting up a fight – and WE HAVE JESUS CHRIST LIVING IN US – THE NAME ABOVE ALL NAMES – ABOVE ALL POWERS AND PRINCIPALITIES!!
I’m telling you we are VICTORIOUS IN JESUS CHRIST!!! It is time to get your head up and tell that wicked bunch of putrid puss to get behind you! Put him under your feet and submit yourselves to God!!
This verse describes the desires, longings, lusting for things that are forbidden. Satan tries to lie to us and tell us we can live without these things – that it’s not fair that we have to stay away from them – that life would be better or happier – or more peaceful – JESUS tells us to deny them! JESUS tells us to CONTROL these lusts and JESUS tells us we can control them by resisting the devil – by walking in faith – by unloading our burdens on Him –
You have a choice – who are you going to be a servant to today? This is the day. The choice is yours. Submit yourself to Jesus – the author and the finisher of your faith? Or submit yourself to Satan – the one who comes to steal, kill, and destroy? Do you want for LIFE?? Or for DEATH?
We are told in verse 12 that “as the elect of God, put on bowels of mercy, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering; forbearing one another, if any man have a quarrel against any, even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye.”
I don’t know if you understand what longsuffering means. For most of us that means we give someone a second chance and if they make up for it then fine – if not, then we are done with them.
God understands longsuffering. He has had patience beyond our wildest imagination. He is showing patience for some of us in this room right now. He is talking to you one on one. He is telling you – “Longsuffering? You think YOU understand longsuffering??? You think YOU understand love? Second chances? You think YOU understand someone doing you wrong time after time after time??? How about ME??????? Have you ever walked a day in MY shoes????”
He says in verse 14: “And above all these things put on CHARITY, which is the bond of perfectness.”
Charity is love. God is love. God loved us enough to die for us. This is love, that He should give His life for us. While we were yet SINNERS He died for us.
We have this thing in our human minds – this eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth attitude. We live under a new covenant. A covenant that says we are to PRAY for our enemies. We are to love one another as Christ loved us. Forgive one another.
You can’t show love for someone – you can’t forgive someone by speaking ill towards them. You can’t love them if you aren’t speaking love. You can’t love them if you are talking about them behind your back.
You can’t do anything about what THEY do – but you CAN do something about what YOU do.
If we are going to start taking back all the things that Satan has stolen from us – then we need to start speaking LIFE. We need to start being DOERS of the Word and not just HEARERS of the Word.
I believe that God gave me a gift for speaking. But I can get up here and preach my guts out and it probably won’t make a difference in your life except to get you fired up for 20 minutes of your week. But I’m not preaching to you today. I am speaking the Word of God over you.
I am proclaiming the Good News of Jesus Christ and the hope that we have in Him. I’m not trying to pump you up or motivate you – or fill you full of feel good thoughts and feel good clichés – I am proclaiming the Word of God and for all those who have ears let them hear!
If you want to take back your relationships that you have lost – then you tell Satan to get off your back and you start speaking life into those relationships! Get that anger and bitterness and strife out of YOUR heart to begin with! You get down here and repent before your God – confess your bitterness and anger and resentfulness to Him – pour out your heart to Him and let Him heal YOU first!
Stand on the Blood of JESUS and let the truth set you free!
If you are tired of living under the bondage of debt – tired of fighting Satan over your finances – then come down here and rebuke him off your back! Stand on the promises of God! He has plans to prosper you – not to harm you! You are the head! Not the tail! You are blessed going in and blessed going out!
If you are suffering in sickness and you are tired of being poked at by Satan and his ministers of pain and sickness then you need to come down here and be set free! By His stripes you were healed! Satan is robbing you of that healing! He is lying to you telling you that God doesn’t heal anymore – he is telling you that there is some grand scheme of God’s behind your sickness – that God is “getting back at you for all the bad things you have done” – well it’s time for you to stand up and call a liar a liar! God didn’t put this sickness upon you! Sickness is a curse! Jesus took all curses upon Himself on the Cross! His Name is above all names!
Jesus came that we might have LIFE and might have it abundantly! Your actions determine whether GOD controls you or whether Satan controls you! Who controls you this morning???? Are you going to stay in those pews and let Satan rob you again??
Will you let him lie to you and tell you that you don’t need any of these things? That God wants you sad, mad, and bothered?
Jesus Christ died on the cross for us – He gave His LIFE! The biggest lie Satan ever told is that you don’t need Jesus in your life! If you are here this morning and you have never met Jesus one on one – I encourage you to come down and meet Him. “If you will confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved!”
Jesus is the Name above all names! May all glory and honor and praise abound to Him!
Will you bow with me for a Word of Prayer?
