Scripture reference: Luke 4:17-22; 28-38; 41-44 (NKJV); Luke 5:1-3 (NKJV); Luke 5:5-11 (NKJV)
Glory to God. Thank you, beautiful new songs. Hallelujah. Thank you, guys. What a wonderful time we had this morning. Praise the Lord. Praise Jesus. It’s always good to be in church. It’s always good to be with the saints of the Most High God, family of God, blessed ones. Are you blessed this morning? Hallelujah. Even if you don’t feel like it, you are. Even if it doesn’t look like it, you still are. Even though other people may say you’re not, you still are. Even though the world might say it’s not happening yet doesn’t matter, you still are. Is it in your hands yet? Maybe not but you still are. If it hasn’t happened yet, wait it’s still coming because you still are. Nothing can change the fact that you still are. You are the blessed ones. You are the favoured ones. You are the covenant ones. You are the birthright ones. You are the blessed ones. You can say, “I rejoice in the Lord always, always always.” Hallelujah. If you keep your mouth straight, then everything will become straight. Hallelujah. Don’t let our mouth become skewed. You know how your mouth becomes skew? You say the wrong words and then it gets turned down on the side here. That’s why you need your mouth straight; talk straight and smile straight. And if you feel like you can’t smile, smile anyway. Because if it hasn’t happened, it’s still coming. That’s the only thing that’s still coming. Hallelujah. Maybe just around the corner, but it’s still coming. Whatever it is, it’s coming. It’s on its way. It’s on its way. It’s on its way. It’s on its way. It’s on its way. It’s on its way and the blessing that God has for your life is on its way. Hallelujah. It’s on its way. It’s on its way. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Praise You, Jesus. Praise You, Jesus. Hallelujah.
Well, it’s good that you’re a loud bunch this morning. Glory to God. That’s how you get your stuff; is when you become loud. You know, firstly, if you’re not comfortable being loud in the congregation, be loud at home. You know, be loud at home. You only have yourself to listen to. Some of you may be challenged by that, but if you’re at least loud by yourself at home, then no one else has to hear that you are like all weird when you’re loud. You might feel weird to yourself but you can get over yourself when you’re alone, you know. If you can do that you’ve got a better chance of doing that in public, you know. Hallelujah. So don’t be all stuffy when you get home. Get unglued and unstuck. Hallelujah. Keep your mouth straight because it’s all coming. It’s all coming. It’s all coming. It’s all coming. Hallelujah. Praise Jesus. Praise Jesus. Hallelujah. Glory to God. Glory to God. Glory. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Praise You, Jesus. Praise You, Jesus. Praise You, Jesus. Praise You, Jesus. Praise You, Jesus. Praise You, Jesus. Glory to God. Well, I guess if you can, you might as well be seated. Praise the Lord.
We certainly are living in interesting times, to say the least, interesting times. I reflect and it’s part of what I’m doing in this process. I’m reflecting on church history. I’m reflecting on times that have gone by and I seek to get some answers from the Lord on things that are in my heart. But we certainly live in interesting times. The amount of information that we have available to us, the amount of knowledge, the amount of the speed at which everything is happening on the earth right now is quite remarkable. It’s quite remarkable. The Bible is quite clear that wherever sin is going to increase in its availability, in its impact, in its proximity to you, God’s grace is going to abound more. Which means that the advent of sin is not going to overwhelm us if we stay close to the grace that’s within us. And that’s our joy, that’s our hope and that’s why we got to stay strong. Amen.
Last week I started part seven of Journey to New Discoveries: Constellation, Confrontation and Cooperation. Today I’m going to speak to you more about the cooperation. Last week was a serious message. I listened to my own message a couple of times and it was serious about the confrontation and the constellation, for sure. I wanted to just bring this book to your visibility. This book was written – I just want you to see the date that was written in here – because this book has been written a long time ago. The first version of this book, 2009, 2009, the first version of this book was written. So that’s 12, 13 years ago. The title of this book is Called to Battle, Destined to Win.
At the time, you know, obviously, Brother Jerry has this prophetic insight into things. And so if he writes a book, Called to Battle, Destined to Win, he’s not just talking about a moment, although it might come out as a prophetic word in a moment or a set of prophetic messages. He’s certainly tapping into the overall flow, the overall focus, the overall direction of the Body of Christ. It’s certainly been something that Pastor Sharon and I have long understood in real close combat, that actually, if you become a human being, you are called to battle. People who are not Christians think that they’re not called to battle because they don’t battle spiritual things. But they’re called to battle because in their humanity, they are forced to choose who they will worship or what they will worship. So, the confrontation eternally is who do you choose to worship and how do you choose to worship? Most people choose to worship with their money. Some people choose to worship with their time. Others choose to worship with their bodies. Others choose to worship with their words. There are many ways that you can worship and there are many outlets of how you do that.
There is a battle on whether you’re a Christian or not because the battle is, who you’re going to worship, what are you going to choose? The good news about Christians is that if you choose Jesus, you’re now called to a different level of battle. The battle that you choose or you’re invited to or you make when you choose Jesus, is that you are now battling the fight of faith. We fight the good fight of faith but faith overcomes the world. We are called to battle and destined to win because there is nothing that you can’t beat. The only thing that can beat you is how the enemy lies to you and I about the battle. He can make the battle so fierce, he can make the battle so hot, he can make the battle so long drawn out that it might seem like you can’t win because you don’t feel like you are winning. But the reality of it is that you will win, if you stay the course. You will win. You will win if you stay the course.
Brother Jerry has on page 25 here, he just has a subheading. Chapter two is called Called to Battle and he has a subheading, No exceptions, God wants you in His army. No exceptions. God wants you in His army. There are three areas that every Christian must choose to live in. You choose to live as a farmer, you choose to live as an athlete, and you choose to live in the army of God. Those are three areas that the Apostle Paul talks about, where he says if you’re a farmer, this is what you do. If you’re an athlete, this is how you behave and if you’re in the army of God, this is how you behave. It’s not the main focus of my message today. I’m just going right along. But he says here; no exception, God wants you in His army. It’s no coincidence that a lot of what the Apostle Paul writes in all of his epistles is military-style, Christian living. Part of that is, the reason for that is that Apostle Paul was called to the body, for the body, to develop the body of Christ. He was all about the body of Christ. He was less focused – I don’t want to say less focused – he saw the value in self-development but it was all about the body’s total engagement in eternal matters. One of the things that we have to be very mindful of in the current age that we’re living in, is that so much of what’s happening in the body of Christ today is; encourage me, develop me, bless me, let me feel good. As long as I’m good, then everything about the world is good. But that’s not how the army treats you. I don’t care which military force you go into, they call you to do certain things and one of those things is that they will get you fighting fit. That means physically you will get fit, mentally you will get fit and with your weapons training you will get fit and then they will begin to teach you tactics and strategies and different things about how you can take the fight to the enemy. And no exceptions, God wants you in His army. Amen.
He makes a comment about himself here and I just want to say this because there will be times in the future God willing that I will talk more about this but he says; I was living the American dream, so why was I so miserable? Because I had received the call from God, I had purposely ignored. Now he was living – according to him – he was living the American dream.
What was that dream? He was living out his passion. He was working on cars. He had his own business working on cars that his father had taught him. And he was married. And, you know, he lived in his own home. He lived in the town where he grew up and he had friends and family around him. According to him, he was living the American dream. Again, this is at a time in American history anyway. And if you listen to brother Jerry’s materials and you read his book, In the Footsteps of a Prophet, and various other things, you know, when he went to go and visit his grandpa, they literally didn’t have a bathroom in the house, they still had to go to the outhouse. They didn’t have air conditioning in every home, they didn’t have TV’s in every home when he was growing up as a kid.
So, when he talks about, “I was living the American dream,” and he had his own business, he was doing paint and bodywork as his passion. And he was married and living in his own home. Those are things that, it by today’s standards, you could say that he was living with a very successful business, with lots of cars. He had a lot of debt. And if you extrapolate the debt of that age to the debt of now, it was a lot of money that he had debt. But he would say, “I was living the American dream.” So why was he so unhappy? Well, the reason he was so unhappy was because there was a call of God on his life. And you can’t escape what God’s called you to, you have to pursue what God’s called you to. Amen.
And that is where the assembly of splendours and excellences come in. This is where destiny comes in. This is what the arrangements of parts and elements in your life all come together. The outcome depends on the configuration of the influences of the time. It also means the gathering of very important people. And so, that’s what happens when you follow the plan of God for your life. He brings important people that are necessary to make your dream come true. The dream that God puts into your life for you to serve Him. And we will talk about that in different ways.
And so, our part. Last week I read out of Psalm 139. And I read about how God, before we were even substance in the womb, in the mother’s womb, God knew us. And I spoke about whom He foreknew, He also ordained to become sons of God. And we had an example of that last week. Before we were even a glint in our parents’ eyes or in biological bodies of the people that brought you into the earth. Before you were even there, God knew you. Glory to God. This makes all the difference to how you actually react in your soul to everything else in life. If you know that God has something special, and something that is destiny-making, and something powerful, that He’s created you to be, it makes all the difference. Hallelujah, makes all the difference.
I’m going to go through the cooperation side of things. I’m going to talk to you about it today. And if you go with me to Luke chapter four, verse 17. And the Bible says, We know these verses well, but I’m going to just keep reading and ministering out of the passages of Scripture here in the book of Luke this morning. 17 And He was handed the book of the prophet Isaiah. And when He had opened the book, He found the place where it was written: 18 “the spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He has anointed me. I can tell you with absolute surety that the Spirit of the Lord is upon you. He knew you before you were even born. He never left you. People who don’t serve God have got to make a choice to leave Him. He never leaves you. He birthed you. So when people grow up, they have to make a choice to leave Him. 18 He has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed; to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.” (Luke 4:17-19 NKJV)
Well, right here, Jesus is speaking. And He’s declaring the intent of the Father’s heart for everybody everywhere. That He wants them free, and He wants them delivered. He wants them free from the burden of sin. All of these categories are the burden of sin that brings on to men. If you have a broken heart; if you are captive and need liberty; if you need sight because you are blind; if you need liberty because you are oppressed – all of these things are because of sin that has come into the earth. So Jesus closes the book, 20 and He gave it back to the attendant and He sat down. And all the eyes of the people in the synagogue were fixed on Him. 21 And He began to say to them, as He was now seated and they’re all watching Him. 21 And He began to say to them, “Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” 22 So all bore witness to Him, and marveled at the gracious words which proceeded out of His mouth. And they said, “Is this not Joseph’s son?” (Luke 4:20-22 NKJV)
Now, it’s evident and obvious that as He was speaking, the anointing of God was upon Him. And the words that He spoke had such anointing and such authority and power, that even though they were Scripture that anybody could have got and got up and read. When He read this passage of Scripture, the anointing was so strong, that they couldn’t help but recognise that these are gracious words. These are words that have grace in them and they have power to deliver. And so, then they looked at the message and they looked at the messenger and they said, “How is it possible that this is Joseph’s son, and such a powerful message can come from Joseph’s son?” Right? Because He’s one of those, He’s one of us.
Verse 28, 28 So all those in the synagogue, when they heard these things, were filled with wrath. They were filled with anger, they were filled with rage. They were filled with an emotion because such gracious words, such power anointed words came from someone like Joseph’s son, who they saw Him as Joseph’s son. They did not see Him as the Christ. They saw Him as Joseph’s son. 29 And they rose up and thrust Him out of the city. In other words, this was not just a few guys that grabbed Him by the arms; the whole synagogue were stirred up with anger and wrath, and they went in and as a mob, they mobbed Him and pushed Him and thrust Him out of the city. 29 And they led Him to the brow of the hill on which their city was built, that they might throw Him down over the cliff. 30 Then passing through the midst of them, He went His way. (Luke 4:28-30 NKJV)
How did Jesus manage that? Well, the same anointing that was on Him to preach the gospel, was the same anointing that was on Him to be delivered from a very, very dangerous situation. If He reverted to His natural strength in that moment, there would be no way that He could physically make His way back through the crowd. Would you not agree? Because if He could have done that before, why didn’t He do it when they came out of the synagogue? Why didn’t He do it at any other time? Their intent was to kill the messenger. Because they didn’t like the message. Amen. And so sometimes, when you are engaged in the battle of life, the enemy of God will cause circumstances to come against you that are just wrath. They are circumstances that are filled with wind that will blow up storms. They are filled, those circumstances will fill people’s hearts and minds with rage and with envy and with anger. And they won’t even know why they’re doing that. They just want to accuse the anointing that’s on you.
Because they wouldn’t throw Joseph’s son off the cliff, would they? No, if He was just talking as Joseph’s son, they wouldn’t throw Him off the cliff because He’s one of them. So, they wouldn’t throw Joseph’s son off the cliff. So why do they want to throw Jesus off the cliff? Because Joseph’s son cannot speak with such anointing. Joseph’s son cannot represent what He’s saying. So, they treated Him as something completely different. It should not surprise you at any given time, if you are misunderstood. Because people cannot understand the anointing that rests upon you. They can’t understand the things that you can accomplish with the Word of God in your mouth, and a time of prayer in your life, and things that happen in you and around you. They can’t understand how this could happen. And when God gets it done, you don’t understand how it gets done. But it does get done. It just happens.
And you find yourself ten years down the line and you say, “Look where I am ten years now, and where I was ten years ago.” And you see how much God has accomplished. I’m busy going through that at the moment. I’m just going through the strikes that God had me do. And I was marvelling at the fact that God gave a release of joy in my spirit in July 19th of 2017. And I was going through all of the strikes that I’d been striking for victories in my life and in our ministry at this point in time. And 2017 I was striking the ground for things that would happen in our media ministry. Look what we have as a media ministry now. I was striking the ground in 2017 for things to develop and to grow and we’re not done yet by a long way. But look what God’s doing.
Certainly, from a transportation and aviation component in our lives, many things has changed in the lives of Pastor Sharon and I personally and even in our ministry. Amen. There are many things that I have been out there, that has the confessions of my mouth and the declarations – things have come into my hands in ways that I could not, I could not uh, have ever thought this is the way that God would bring something into my hands. And sometimes it would happen over a very short period of time. Amen. But there is a lot of stuff that’s still got to come. We haven’t got done yet, not by a long way. Amen. And that is part of what the Lord wants me to make sure I stay consistent in and stay stronger in it. But all of this I am saying to you is, it is that you shouldn’t wonder why people would have anger and wrath towards you. Hallelujah. But God will always provide a way for you to walk away from dangerous circumstances. He will open a path for you and He will allow you to walk through it and just like the young men that were thrown into the fiery furnace, you will come out of it without smoke, even smelling like smoke. But certainly, all of the things that would bind you will be burnt off you. Amen.
Chapter 4 verse 31, 31 Then He went down to Capernaum, a city of Galilee and was teaching them on the Sabbaths. 32 And they were astonished at His teaching, for His word was with authority. (Luke 4:31, 32 NJKV) You always need to speak and be very careful what words you are speaking, because if you are in agreement with the word of God you will always have authority on your side and people get enraged with words of authority. Amen. If you have to listen to a Christian scientist or a Scientologist, the Scientology movement is about what? Predominantly, the movement of Scientology is about positivity. It’s about speaking positive words and having control over your circumstances with words and never, never giving up control. That is the basis of Scientology or Christian science or however you want to call it. You never yield, you never give ground and you always say what you want as an outcome, not what the circumstances say.
That is the reason why people like John Travolta and Tom Cruise and other people have embraced it as a form of religion in their lives is because it is very close to what the Bible teaches. The difference is that they don’t carry the authority of God with their words. They only have the authority of their soul. So, a person who operates in Scientology that has a function of understanding these things might have very good outcomes in their lives, but they just tapped into a principle, but eventually, it will undermine them because they’re self-believing. They’re not God-believing. And that’s the case with everything that imitates God. Glory to Jesus.
So, let’s continue with this. Now in the synagogue there was a man who had a spirit of an unclean demon. And he cried out with a loud voice, saying “let us alone what have we to do with you, Jesus of Nazareth? Did You come to destroy us? I know who You are – the Holy One of God!” (Luke 4:34 NKJV) This is a demon speaking to Joseph’s son – Joseph’s son who is also Jesus. I am using those words on purpose. Because, the crowd saw Him as Joseph’s son, but He is Jesus and the demons bypass all of the what everybody else saw Him as Joseph’s son, they bypass that and say, we know who You are. We really know who you are. You are the holy One of God. So how does Jesus treat them – these demons that are speaking through human bodies? 35 But Jesus rebuked him, saying, Be quiet, and come out of him! And when the demon had thrown him in their midst, it came out of him and did not hurt him. 36 Then they were all amazed and spoke among themselves saying, “what a word this is! For with authority and power He commands the unclean spirits, and they come out.” 37 And the report about Him went out into every place in the surrounding region. Luke 4:35-37 NKJV)
Well, it’s time for the church of the Lord Jesus Christ to be that powerful that when you come into any given situation you have a recognition of what is working in front of you, what is happening around you, and you speak with words of authority that God puts in your mouth so that you either silence the demon spirits that are coming against you, or you silence the people or you walk through their midst. Either way, when you called to battle, you’re called to win. God will always create a way out for you – always. He’s not called anyone of us to lose. We are not called to lose. We are called to overcome. It is our faith that overcomes the world and all that is in it. We are called to that. Praise Jesus.
But don’t, don’t misunderstand the fact that people will start talking about you. People will start talking about you. We have a situation developing here in our, our local authority here whereas a combination of Rich Communications and Slip Stream we are having a very big impact with our local government. And so, next weekend actually, you all want to come, you are welcome to come. We are doing – we were invited or asked by the local municipality to manage a morning walk/run in the trails of the resort and the roads of the resort here, and there is an entrance fee here that the municipality is charging for the access to the morning, it’s R30 a person. They’re wanting to raise visibility and they’re wanting to raise funds and they asked Slip Stream to be the managing partners with it. So, we’ve had a conflict of interest – or we had a conflict because as a member of Athletics South Africa, we have to get their approval to stage an event. Most of those approvals start a year ago at least, and then there is a lot of things that they have to agree to and the reason there is all these approval timetables is because you have to have an umpire or a referee, you have to have inspectors, you’ve got to have people come to do whatever ASA and so you’ve got to have a whole lot of infrastructure in place for it to be a formally approved race.
They let us know weeks ago that they want us to be the managing club for this event. So, tell me why they approached Slipstream? Well, they approached Slipstream because we have a relationship with them. We manage access to the Nature Reserve and to the dam for clubs. Anybody from any club who wants access to that, we administrate that on behalf of the local council. So, they didn’t go to any other club, they came to us. So, now we’ve got a conflict. So, how do we resolve this conflict?
Well, it is a backwards and forwards between – you can’t just nominate this as a 10-kilometre run, because there are things that come around. No, no, the mayor says it has to be 10 kilometres. No, no, you can’t have it if the mayor says it’s going to be 10 kilometres. You don’t understand, the mayor says it’s going to be 10 kilometres. Ok. ASA, we have no approval for this event. So, we go to ASA and we say, what is happening? To cut a long story short, this is what ASA says – Athletics South Africa. We are aware of the good work you are doing in working with the municipality to advance athletics and sport in the community of Witbank. And so, we are going to support you, in the sense that we are not going to call this an illegal event which we would normally do and that would then sanction you in your club either with a fine or certainly if you now apply to do an event yourself further down the line, they will say no, or put more stringent rules on you, because you have now broken their rules. Right? So, we are talking to ASA, so, they say we are aware of the good work that you’re doing, so we’re not going to sanction this event, what can we do to help you? So, we said, well, give us – tell us what we must do and said, go like this, do like this. They wrote us a letter – so they’re just saying do what you have to do, we are not going to stand in your way. He literally changed rules, regulations and normal regulations for us. Hallelujah.
You won’t imagine suddenly how many people don’t Slipstream to succeed in Witbank. I promise you. People that have been in Witbank in the running community for a long, long, long time – they consider themselves the rainmakers of the running community. King rainmaker – you know what that term means? Not the actual rain makers, (Pastor John indicates rain from the sky). Those guys – we’ll be involved as long as it is not Slipstream. What have you got against us? You’re an exclusive club. Say what? You don’t know how many people are doing our programme – as we go into it, we find out that some of the leaders of the other clubs are actually doing our programmes every month. They’re not the ones coming against us, it’s some of the ‘guys’. So, then they want to say, no, we don’t want any club to be involved because it becomes political when clubs become involved. No, where’s the politics? We’re just serving here. It became political when you came into the equation. Come on, you understand – a simple thing like an athletics club that you are running for the good of the community that has now reached a level of profile in this community and amongst Athletics ASA South Africa, it has reached a profile where people are talking about us. What was it started for? So, we can be the light. We could be the light.
What are we doing with the Light? We’re doing it on our terms. Well you say, well isn’t what the mayor is doing on her terms? Yeah, but she feels confident, she can call an event and then call on Slipstream to do it for her because we are that well organized. Praise the Lord. I mean, you know, we’ve had the same thing with our thrust into the education sector and so, we are approaching education at a school level and pre-school level in a certain way and as we’ve just been obeying God and we’ve been praying and doing many things, God has given us a voice in Parliament – literally, Lebo went and sat in Parliament and was heard in Parliament about our view of education, two weeks ago, to the point that one of the opposition parties changed their entire, their entire memorandum of philosophy, if you like. I don’t know what they call it – constitution or whatever they have as a party or opposition party, they changed it to embrace our way of doing education, directly because we influenced them to do it. Now we just got to deal with the governing party and that’s coming our way too because we are a praying people that gets things done in prayer.
Like I said, many times when people come here on a Tuesday night, they think when we pray for our government and we pray for things and when you pray at home and you’re online, then you know, what are we accomplishing? Here it is now. All of those days of praying. Here it is now. This is what’s happening now. It doesn’t take a big church that’s got a big voice, that’s got lots of money, that wants to challenge the president and take him to the High Court and do anything to get things done. We just take our place in prayer in the Spirit, we take our authority, we declare things, we process things we say things and the next minute the right person in the right time, here we are. And we don’t have to make a big noise about who we are and what we’re doing and make ourselves to be grander than everybody so, “Look how great we are.” No no. God wants to just use us so use us, Lord, however You want to use us, okay we there. And so, then when the people turn against you, isn’t it a surprise? Shouldn’t be because they’ll, they want to throw you off a cliff. You got to stay strong hey, you got to stay strong, all the time.
38 So, the report went out about him and now verse, chapter four, verse 38, now he arose from the synagogue and entered Simon’s house, Simon. Everybody, please say this with me, “Simon”. This is not Roos – this is Simon. But he was mentioned in the Bible a long time ago, Simon, but Simon’s wife, not Tarryn. But Simon’s wife’s mother was sick with a high fever and they made request of him concerning her. 39 So He stood over her and rebuked the fever and it left her and immediately she arose and served them (Luke 4:38 NKJV).
I just want to show you something that I want you to see what is happening here, this is not my main point today. But I want you to see something that, that Simon Peter is about to have a confrontation with God that is going to meet, this is a constellation of things that are happening. He is in the synagogue, he says, “I’m anointed,” he goes and he delivers the demon-possessed people, they call him out as the Holy One of God. He’s operating in his gifting – Jesus – in His calling and so Simon, says, “My wife’s mother is sick,” he goes into the house to go and heal her. Can you see the constellation, the assemblage of important things and people coming together in this moment? And so in this moment, Jesus prays for his mother and the mother gets up and she immediately does what she’s called to do – serve. She immediately gets up and get straight back into her calling.
See when you bring authority and when you bring your calling, it releases other people to come into their calling. When you do that, you live life in such a manner that you are not being dictated to by the world system. But you tell the world system the rules that you want to live by. Is the Church there yet? No. Are there some Christians there yet? Yes – some of the time. Are some of those Christians there all of the time? I doubt it. I doubt that there is any Christian living like Jesus lived all of the time, in all of their callings, all of their authority, all of their power, all of the time. Do you understand what I’m saying? That doesn’t mean to say we mustn’t preach that it is available to us. Certainly, it’s available to us as all of the body. But it takes us to be operating that way, some of the time, so that we can release some of the gifts so that we can be more functional as a Body more of the time. Because the more we do it, the more we’ll function in it.
I’m going to give you one example, just one example and this is something I’ve been asking the Lord about it. I said, “Lord, you know Luke,” and I’m using this book of Luke as on purpose because this same story is also in Matthew and in Mark, although they’re different in the way that they’re written. But Luke was a physician. He was a medical doctor. Right? So I suppose Jesus needed to have Luke with His disciples because they needed His medical practice with them. They needed a doctor to kind of put ointment on bee stings. Jesus needed a medical doctor? He never needed a medical doctor. Do you think Jesus needed a tax collector? That’s why He went to, after Matthew saying, “Listen, I need a, I need a guy that can help me with the taxes. I need a chartered accountant that’s tax qualified. So I need, you know, a tax advisor. You think He went after Matthew because he needed a tax advisor?”
Oh no what, you know, “Uuh, I need somebody to run my import and export goods, so that we could eat, you know, guys that will do shopping and groceries and organic foodstuffs for us.” “So Peter, Peter, and James and John, you the guys that know how to fish and to do, you know, the whole food, organic, real food stuff. So I can’t eat junk. Let me get the highest level of you know, fishermen and organic food guards in my team,” because I suppose He needed all these kinds of, that’s why they were there right? No He went after them because of what they were called to, not because of what they were trained to. Your calling and your training can be two different things. Training can be an impact of things that happened in your past, calling can be something that you are supposed to yet walk into. Hallelujah.
And so Jesus, it all happens in the constellation and there is a cooperation. Can you see there is a co-operation happening here? Already, Jesus is cooperating with the Father, He’s speaking messages that change everything. He’s casting out demons, telling them to be quiet so other people don’t hear what the spirit world already knows that humans don’t. The spirit world already knows what’s going on when the constellation is happening. The humans are too slow to see it but the spirit will seize it before it happens.
And so Jesus tells them to keep quiet, the next minute, He’s going after Simon Peter’s mother, or his wife’s mother and so she gets healed. She goes about doing what needs to get done and feeds them. Verse 40, 40 When the sun was setting, all those who had any that were sick with various diseases brought them to Him; and He laid His hands on every one of them and healed them. Where was He? He was outside Simon Peter’s house. Simon’s house, right? He was out, that’s where He was. That’s where He ate, that’s where He was. That’s where He was healing people, in the streets there. 41 And demons also came out of many, crying out and saying, “You are the Christ, the Son of God!” And He, rebuking them, did not allow them to speak, for they knew that He was the Christ.
Constellation of things happening. Hey, let’s not be so afraid of things that happen in the spirit realm. Even if they come to undermine you, to discredit you, to attack you and events happen outside of your control that seek to bring you down because you don’t create events, to bring yourself down, not normally. Normally, you are careful in creating events that are good for you. Come on. Nobody’s on purpose saying, “I think I’ll create an event that’s going to make me or my life worse.” You’re always looking for a better outcome, aren’t you?
So then, verse 42. 42 Now when it was day, He departed and went into a deserted place. And the crowd sought Him and came to Him, and tried to keep Him from leaving them; 43 but He said to them, “I must preach the kingdom of God to the other cities also, because for this purpose I have been sent.” 44 And He was preaching in the synagogues of Galilee (Luke 4:41-44 NKJV). I’m going to read right along, next chapter, because if you read this without chapters, it would read like this. 1 So it was, as the multitude pressed about Him to hear the word of God, that He stood by the Lake of Gennesaret, 2 and saw two boats standing by the lake; but the fishermen had gone from them and were washing their nets. 3 Then He got into one of the boats, which was Simon’s.
Can you see the constellation? Can you see the assemblage of persons and events and things coming together to create something? Which was Simon’s and asked him to put out a little from the land. And He sat down and taught the multitudes from the boat (Luke 5:1-3 NKJV). There are things that are happening here that God is bringing an order. He is bringing a constellation of important events, important people, for who? For the person who is prepared to operate under the Father’s complete control, rather than by the agenda of everyone else’s control.
Part of the reason I started reading you this whole passage of scripture, is that everybody started out talking about Jesus as Joseph’s son, “How can Joseph’s son speak words like this?” How can Joseph’s son be doing things like this?” And it was Joseph’s son that they tried to push off of the cliff. We have to transition from having the community tell us who we are, into walking into what God wants us to be. If we live in the scope of what we keep listening to what the community and social order, and the social structure tells us we must be, then we can’t go into the things that God wants for us and has called us and birthed us to be. So how long will you be called salesman? How long will you be called mother? Wife? Father? Brother? Well, you might say, “But I’m all those things.” Yes, you are. But you’re not just all those things. You are also called Son of God. And for you, woman that means you too. You are called purpose-built children of the Most High God, that you might be doing one thing but your call to a much greater thing.
As a church, we have to understand that we are blessed. And the blessings of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob the blessings of Jesus. The blessings of all of the patriarchs of faith are ours to enjoy right now. They are ours to enjoy, but you must also be someone that lives in the blessing on purpose. You got to live in the blessing on assignment. You got to live in the blessing with the reason that God’s reason wants you to have. Hallelujah. And we are supposed to be having joy right along with it. And celebrating each other’s victories and celebrating each other’s many good things.
Well, how do you celebrate it? We give God glory, we give Him praise, we give Him honour. And we speak of the good things that are happening in people’s lives. We share in their testimony, and we share in the power of the blood that has given them overcoming faith and victory overcoming power, overcoming strength, overcoming authority of your words. We share in the awesomeness of where you see someone walking in their testimony, wow. Glory to God.
So, 3 He sat down on the boat and taught the multitudes from the boat. 4 When He had stopped speaking, He said to Simon, “Launch out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.” 5 But Simon answered and said to Him, “Master, we have toiled all night and caught nothing; nevertheless at Your word I will let down the net.”
So, I wanted to read this context to you because why would Jesus… why would Simon call Him Master? Well, the first thing is, is that he recognized that he was hearing words of authority and power. He also recognized that there was a lot of people that were following him. And they wouldn’t want to hear what he had to say unless he had something to say. He had also seen his mom get healed. And now Jesus was speaking to him and saying, go for a catch. And so he says, “At your words, I’ll go for a catch, not because of the knowledge that I have about the system”. Because if he just operated in the system, this is not the time of day to go fishing. This is the time when the fisherman mend their nets. This is the time of day when you when you do this and that and the next thing, but… Okay, if You tell me that this is the time of day, I must go fishing, I’m going to go do that. So, but Simon answered. And then He said, 4 “Launch out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.”
So if he’s going to go into the deep it means he’s got to, he’s got to make some commitment here. Commitment to what? Commitment to what the Lord said. Otherwise, he could have just gone off a little way away and said, “Look what I’ve done here.” But Jesus gave him specific instructions, launch out into the deep.
5 But Simon answered to Him, from his natural mindset. “Master, we have toiled all night and caught nothing; In other words, “Hey, I’ve worked every plan. I know everything about the system. I know everything about everything. I know what’s going on. This doesn’t work in the way that You saying it works. Jesus saying, effectively, this is what Jesus was saying, I designed the whole system. If I give you an instruction it’s designed to break you free from the system. I’m not giving you an instruction, so that you can go back into the system. I’m giving you an instruction to break you free from the system that’s trying to control your future. Because I’ve got a plan for your future. But first, you must obey Me here. Because Simon doesn’t know what’s coming yet. He’s going to go fishing. Jesus is talking to him about fishing. Call it about running his business if you like. 6 And when they had done this, they caught a great number of fish, and their net was breaking. 7 So they signaled their business partners with more boats and more nets and the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both the boats, so that they began to sink.
I beg your pardon. You’ve been fishing how long? At the best time? With the best knowledge? And the best everything that you know how for generations and transfer of knowledge. And you got what? And we went in the wrong day, at the wrong time of the day, in the moment when you were doing maintenance not prepared for the whole blessing factor. When you thought it was all wrong, this was My time for it to all be right. Hallelujah.
7 So they signaled their partners to come and help them. And they came and filled both their boats, so that they began to sink. 8 When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!” He recognized that he didn’t really believe what Jesus did. He just blindly obeyed. But he didn’t have the belief factor. Hey, and yet God, the Father through Jesus was showing His intended purpose for Simon’s life.
And in the moment of the extreme blessing. He comes and he recognizes his own humanity, and how much the system has affected his thinking, and how much the system has controlled his outcomes. And God in one moment delivered him from all of it. It doesn’t take long to get set free. It just takes a God moment. 9 For he and all who were with him were astonished at the catch of fish which they had taken; 10 and so also were James and John, the sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. And Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid. From now on you will catch men.” 11 So when they had brought their boats to land, they forsook all and followed Him. They forsook all and followed Him (Luke 5:5-11 NKJV).
What’s the catalyst? Jesus, in a constellation of assemblage of important things, timings, many things that were to happen. Jesus comes and intervenes in their life and He says, “I’m about to change your mindset. I’m about to show you something that no one else has been able to this time been able to bring such great deliverance.” You have to believe this. And so Peter, Simon when he started doing this, he didn’t actually believe it. But then the belief came with the repentance, which is why I said, you can’t actually move from perception and deception without correction. Because in the moving from perception that brings deception, because what was the deception that Peter was operating in? You can’t catch fish at this time of the day. And everything that I’ve seen in the past, you can’t show me that there’s any proof that it’s going to be different in the future. But one word changed everything.
And so what Jesus did was He came with a correction through an action. He came through a correction, but he came with truth that immediately brought the repentance that correction brings with it. When he brought repentance when repentance came out, then he was able to face his future. From now onwards, you will no longer be fishing for fish, you will be fishing for men.
I can tell you, there have been many, many, many, many people, there have been many pastors that have been operating in the ministry as pastors. This is a statistical fact, in America, about 5000 new pastors go into the church system every year in America. And about 5000 pastors in America leave the church system every year. And, and part of that is because… part of that is because of the pressure, the confrontation that comes with actually walking in assignment. Some of it is because people just see it as a job. But if you see it as an assignment, and you see it as a calling, you will still feel the pressure. But you will have the grace to get through it. There are many, many, many people that have left the call of God on their lives because of money, because of worldly things, stuff.
I mean, you know, Pastor Sharon’s father was an AFM Pastor. And in those years of being an AFM Pastor, you lived at the graces of the people that were in your community, what they could afford, or what they were willing to put in the offering, and what they were willing to tithe and the money that came in there. And then sometimes in that area, there might have been richer churches, and maybe sometimes the corporate in those years, it was much more of a denomination in those years. And so the denomination might give you some kind of help to help you live as a Pastor, depending on the kind of church that you are running, the community, the kind of environment. And so Pastor Sharon’s mom and dad, they lived very poor very, very poor. And, you know, due to the financial pressure, he left the ministry and went and found a job and died at the age of 50. One day before his 50th birthday. He died, went home to be with Jesus. Part of it was because he was so heartbroken that he had to leave the ministry. That he could not fulfill the assignment and the destiny of what God called him to be.
I was blessed enough to meet him and know him for about three months before he died. But he already had a tumor on his brain. And he didn’t recognize me most of the few times that I had with him. But a wonderful man that had a lot to offer the body of Christ, but because of finances, he wasn’t able to fulfill his destiny. So Pastor John, what are you saying with that story? I’m saying if we understand the authority, that war we walk in, then we have Jesus moments where He can have us catch fish to feed us. Because we changed the rules of what God’s assignment is for us. We are not led by the system.
You see he was captured by the system. He didn’t have the revelation knowledge that we have today that great men of faith have brought to us that have been revealed to us that we can dictate our future with our words. We can bring spiritual authority to any environment in any position in any place. Amen. Hallelujah. And so I’m finished with my message for today. I want to say to you that God has got a desire, I want to say He has a need for you to cooperate with Him. Because if you don’t cooperate with Him, He can’t change your mind. Well, what are you saying I’m saying He, first of all, Peter had to use his boat. And then secondly, he had to obey Jesus by doing what Jesus told him to do.
And then when he did it, the blessing was so great that he nearly failed, because they nearly sank, both the boats. So there are things that we have to be ready and prepared for to go with God. Sometimes you got to give Him you got to give Him the use of your stuff, you got to give Him that stuff. And then you gotta be prepared to say, “I’m walking away from it even as I gave it.” I mean, here’s the thing about Peter Simon, he gave his boat to us for a short time. And then it became so meaningless to him that he just left it. You know what the most important thing is to a fisherman is a boat. And then the nets.
How long do you think it took them for them to craft a boat to buy a boat to have a boat, I mean, that will become the difference of people that actually were fishermen or not fishermen, is the boat factor. Right. And so in the end, what happened was the boat, the boat, just became his seed into his future. He didn’t give it to Jesus, he just left it for someone else to use. Why didn’t he need it anymore? Cause he’s all assignment to change. Cooperation, your blessing is in your cooperation, not in your resistance it is in your cooperation. Hallelujah. Praise the Lord.
That’s why I know I could bring this kind of message to you today because you are a cooperating people. And so you remember last week, I said, right at the end I had a prophetic word, and the word that came out of my spirit was I said, and I’m just taking two points out of it. “He’s creating the environment for you to step up, step up and step into. He’s creating the environment.” This is what I said last week. It came out of my spirit. This is the other thing that I said, I said, “He will talk to you, if you will go and press into Him. And He will talk to you. He will.” Hallelujah. I also said, “God wants you to stop treading water. And He wants you to zoom across to the other side.” And I mean, a part of that was that some of you got to bring money. Some of you got to bring gifts and callings. Some of you got to do various things. I urge you to go and read it. Because Brother Jerry brought a message, I would actually say an inspired teaching this year, it’s been a little different. But it’s an inspired teaching as opposed to necessarily the way that he would normally phrase it as a prophetic insight. But it’s an inspired teaching. You could call it prophetic teaching. And basically what he has said is that this year 2023 will be a year of maximum impact. Maximum impact.
And so I didn’t know that that was the word that he was going to bring out. But the Holy Spirit in me, released it to us. Step up, step up, step into, He wants you to zoom across and go to the other side. If you will give Him your gifts, your callings, and all of the stuff that you need to its maximum impact time. Its maximum impact time. Hallelujah, Glory to God. And so let’s not, let’s not be afraid of the battle. Let’s go for the complete win.
Come on, let’s go for the complete win. Let’s go for the whole bang, shoot. Let’s go for the whole thing. Let’s get free of this world system and it’s control over us once and for all. Let’s do it for our children. Let’s do it for our marriages. Let’s do it for business where we can do business the way God wants us to do business. And we can bring in a moment, we can bring in capture. And we can capture harvests that God has got out there that are beyond our wildest imagination that you can think. Where you think, wait, I’ll prepare for this amount of harvest, because who gets this amount of harvest at this time of the year in this time of space and in this environment?
And you say, “It doesn’t happen according to my natural instinct, to my knowledge, it doesn’t happen.” But if God says, then you obey, and you will get maximum impact, step up, step up and step into, and before you know a dual zoom out of your natural circumstances. You will go across to a place where you haven’t been before, and it can happen just like that. Hallelujah. Hallelujah, He requires cooperation. He says, “Come on, come on, you got something to obey Me with. You got something to obey Me with.” That’s what the essence of the word was last week. Obey Him with something, give Him something. Some of you just hear me out there for a minute. There are some of you that, you know, if you give R50 to God, it’s a lot of money. But that might be your crossing point.
There are some of you that said, “I’ve been in church for many, many years. And I have given abroad my gifts. I’ve done the ushering thing. I’ve done this thing I’ve done that thing. What more can I do?” And so you kind of just sort of hovering around in church, sort of not really doing what you can do or want to do. This could be your crossing point. It started off with Him first preaching from His boat. Very little, very little effort is required here. Come on. But it ended up being something so significant. It’s step up time, it’s step up time. Let’s step into a time. It’s the zoom time. It’s the moment of zoom.
It’s the moment of all of those years that you have gone nowhere treading water. As I said, according to the Holy Spirit, treading water, you’re not going to tread water anymore. You’re going to rise above it and you’re going to zoom. You’re going to go from treading water to doing Superman across the water. Leaving awake. And some people say, “That’s a serious wakeboarder. Say what you want. I’m Superman on this war time, zooming. Hallelujah. Praise Jesus. Praise Jesus. Praise Jesus. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Hallelujah. Come on, stand with me everybody. Don’t see this December as an ordinary December. You know, I mean, you got an opportunity this December to kind of get with God a little bit and find out what He wants. Yes, by all means, go for your run, go for your cycle, go for your game of golf. You know, go run with the dogs and the cats. I guess cats don’t run too much, you know, but, you know, play with your canary. You know? Whatever it is you do I know you’re gonna eat for sure. You know, and all of that stuff, but, also make time for God. Step up, step up. Step in. Hallelujah. Listen to what He’s got to say. Praise Jesus. Praise the Lord. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Glory to God. Glory to God.
Put your hand on your heart, please. Hallelujah. Say, “Jesus, You are my Lord. You are my Saviour. I thank You that today, You live in my heart. I am a child of God. And I live today as a son of God. I live in my full inheritance. I received it now. In Jesus’ name. I walk in boldness. I walk with courage. I walk with strength. I step up, I step up and I step in, in Jesus’ name. Hallelujah. I’m going to the other side.” Praise Jesus. Praise Jesus. Glory to God.
If there’s someone in this service today that needs some kind of counsel, some kind of advice, some kind of praying for please come to the front. And we willingly and we’ll help you and pray for you and just see that you are taken care of, and you’re okay. For the rest of you. And you also, I say, “May your day be filled with joy. May your life be filled with peace. May the goodness of God demonstrate Himself to you. May He become more real to you then the circumstances. And may you have Simon, Peter moments where you transition from what’s natural into what’s eternal. That you transition from natural to supernatural, and that you see everything in your life as the supernatural, not just the natural.”
I pray that for you that you will see that you will receive that you will have it as a revelation of knowledge in your life. And it will change the way that you walk in the future. Do you receive this today in Jesus’ name? I call you blessed going out and bless coming in. I speak the protection of God over you that as you go on, leave some of you going early coming back early. I pray that you are blessed and you are protected. No weapon formed against you will prosper and you will be blessed going out and blessed coming in and everything that’s at home will be blessed and protected and will be in order when you get back in Jesus’ name. I pray that your productivity in prayer spills over to the natural that even while you’re resting God’s creating. While you’re resting God’s bringing while you’re resting your obedience is going to create harvest for you. Hallelujah. Praise Jesus. Everybody said, ‘Amen.’ Thank you for coming to church. God bless y’all.
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TOUCH | TEACH | TRAIN | TRANSFER
