Scripture reference: 1 John 4:14-19 TPT
Sjoe, I like it. Don’t you like it? I don’t know how you cannot want to dance, like at least go [Pastor John dances] just a little bit when the music is like that. Don’t you just a little bit? At least tap your foot or something, right? I mean come on. If you can’t get going with that, I mean, you know. I’m going to lay hands on you because you’re half-way to the grave or something [congregation laughs]. You know what I mean?
Hey, the joy of the Lord is a good thing to have. The Bible is true, you know. No joy, no strength. Lots of joy, lots of strength. So, if you don’t live in joy, then you know your strength is a little less. If you’ve got joy, then you know your strength is high. Hallelujah. Thank You, Lord, that the joy of the Lord, continues to strengthen me. Every day I strengthen myself by just being joyful. What happens when you don’t feel like it? Then do it on purpose. Tell your lip to come off the ground, put it back onto your mouth, and then tell it to go sideways.
[Pastor John demonstrates a big smile on his face] “I’m joyful. I’m joyful.” “What are you doing?” “I’m pushing weights. I’m getting strong.” Hallelujah, and you can do it well behind masks in COVID you know? “What’s happening to you?” “I’m just joyful.” Hallelujah. May our hearts be ready to hear and to receive. May our ears hear, may our minds be quiet so that the Word of God can come to us today in strength and in fullness in Jesus’ name. So, that we can change, and we can receive what God has for us. Amen. You may be seated.
Praise the Lord. There’s a lot of noise happening out there in the world at the moment and one of the reasons I had it in my heart to have Pastor Sharon talk about tithes and offering. Well, due to circumstances we had decided that we would both be here today; this day. During the week as I was praying, the Lord just began to speak to me and He said, “There’s a lot of noise out there. There’s a lot of voices speaking and there’s a lot of words being spoken about deflation and destruction and devastation and poverty, and there’s a lot of things that are occupying the minds of the world.”
In fact, if you turn to most news channels in any given time, they’ve got the number of Covid cases, Covid deaths, Covid-whatever. Then they’ll have a whole parade of people talking about economics and then they’ll talk about the politics behind the economics behind the Covid and everything is just, you know, yuk. So, the Lord said to me, “John, your faith in Me for finances is very strong,” and the Lord has blessed our ministry and so we haven’t spoken about money for months. Because it’s been important for me and led by the Holy Spirit to keep encouraging you in your faith; keep building you and bringing hope and strength and giving you a clearer exhortation of Psalm 91.
Pastor Sharon’s been doing Psalm 91 in the mornings, but we started off with Psalm 91 and made sure we’re protected and that we are safe. Because there were a lot of unknowns about this time that we find ourselves in. The Lord said to me this week that you must speak words that are God’s words into the economic atmosphere, so that the people can hear what needs to be done. Because if you respond to the negativity, then what happens is; you fill your mind and you fill your life with those words, and then your trust in God get’s undermined, and then you begin to process the reality of what might happen if.
So, when you start to process what might happen if, then you start to think about what you must do, to protect yourself. Now you’re no longer trusting in God, you’re trusting in yourself and that puts you in a most dangerous place. Because when you then need God because you no longer have yourself to trust, then you have forgotten how to trust Him. Then you become desperate, and desperation is not faith. Many people will often think that desperate declarations are very faith filled declarations.
They are not. They are just highly emotionally charged desperation declarations, but faith filled words continue regardless of the circumstances, because faith filled words, create. God is a God that wants to build up, He wants to create, He wants to do good things for you. He wants to have abundance. He wants to do good things. God creates; the devil deflates. God creates; the devil deflates.
I want to read you this scripture from The Passion Translation and it says, 14Moreover, we have seen with our own eyes and can testify to the truth that Father God has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. (1 John 4:14 TPT). You see, Jesus, the Father understood, and it was interesting, because I didn’t know what Pastor Sharon was going to say. She talked about; giving the least and the little bits of what I’ve got left over to give to God. God gave His best, because He had you in mind. He knew that anything, but His best, could not actually bring salvation. Only the best could bring salvation, and Jesus was His best.
He gave His best for salvation and we happen to think that actually the best is not good enough for us, to save us from our stuff; we’ve got to go and fix our stuff. That’s the biggest lie of the devil, that when reality comes to your life, that you got to fix it because you made the mess, so you got to fix it. You see, that’s a performance mentality and it’s a punishment mentality that’s in society. “You made that your mess, you fix your mess.”
God said, “You made your mess, I came to fix it,” and it didn’t cost you anything. All you have to do is believe me and then keep believing me and I’ll keep fixing your mess. Come on, this is the greatest story of salvation. That’s what tithing is all about. Tithing is not about “God needs your money.” For goodness sake, He made the world with His words; He created all the gold and silver that is in the world. He created everything that ever lived and ever will live, has come by the Word of His power.
What do you think He needs your money for? Huh? He needs you to give money to earthly messengers, so that He can bless you from Heaven. Why must you give money to earthly messengers, being the church? Because it’s through the earthly messengers that He’s going to bring words to you. Not only will He also speak to you personally, but for the directions that you need in your life; He’s going to use earthly messengers. That’s what He says in His word. To bring truth to you.
15Those who give thanks that Jesus is the son of God live in God and God lives in them. 16We have come into an intimate experience with God’s love and we trust in the love He has for us. This is time for us to trust in the love that God has for us. I’m going to speak about words and the trust of God’s love in a minute. God is love and those who are living in love are living in God and God lives through them. 17By living in God, love has been brought to its full expression in us, so if you are not experiencing the full expression of God’s love, He’s going to give you the answer. What happens next? …so that you may fearlessly face the day of judgement…
Let me tell you; if you are found in the love of God and you can face the day of judgement, then you can face every other day. You can face every day of accusation and judgement against your mess. Do you get what I’m saying? There will be a day when every man will be held to account for all of his stuff that he didn’t do in believing God. What He did with Jesus or what he did not with Jesus, there will be a judgement day. This Bible says that if we are found in the love of God, living in the love of God then we can approach that judgement day fearlessly. Right? Am I reading the truth? So that means; if I can face that day fearlessly, I can certainly face today fearlessly. That means that there’s nothing that’s in this day that can hold me down. …because all that Jesus now is, so are we in this world.
When we walk in the love of God, then as Jesus was, and Jesus is now, so are we. 18Love never brings fear for fear is always related to punishment but loves perfection drives the fear of punishment far from our hearts. 19Whoever walks constantly afraid of punishment has not reached loves perfection. Our love for others for others is our grateful response to love God first demonstrated to us. (1 John 4:15-19 TPT).
So, if we have any fear about anything, then it just means that God’s love has not been perfected in us. If God hasn’t perfected His love in us, that means that we are constantly listening to other voices that are telling us something different and we respond to those voices that’s telling us something different, and so then God’s love is not perfected in us. This world that we live in, is full of voices and the world that we’re living in is a very performance measured world. The performance measurement is always about what you can produce, it’s about your behaviour, it’s about many things and so you get judged on what you do and say and so then you’re either rewarded or punished, depending on which line you fit.
Well, Jesus never actually took that, and the Father never took that stance with us. He said, “Actually there is nothing you can do, ever that’s good enough. So just understand the best performance you could ever perform in My eyes, it’s like dirty rags. You got nothing that’s good enough for Me, nothing. You got nothing that’s good enough for Me. So, what I’m going to do is bring my best”, Jesus, “I’m going to let Him represent you and I’m going to let Him die for you, and then when I raise Him from the dead, now nothing about what you do ever matters again, other than you just believe that He paid the price for you.”
When you believe Jesus paid the price for you, you have now the same relationship with God the Father that Jesus has. Same relationship. It’s not about performance, it’s not about how well you do things or don’t do things. Jesus died because you could never do it right enough. So, you’re still not doing it right enough. I’ll tell you what; the devil will make sure that as he deflates you and he divides you and he distracts you and he deceives you, that you will always not be good enough. and he will always bring it to your thought and bring it to your life; you’re not good enough. That’s why you have to constantly stand behind the Blood of Jesus and say, “Don’t talk to me, talk to the Hand.” It’s the Hand that’s got a nail-pierced hand in it. “Talk to the blood of Jesus, He makes me perfect and in that my love can now be perfect.”
When I find myself in a situation, as I did many years ago, I didn’t have food in my cupboard, I couldn’t pay the rent, I didn’t have a car. We were really in very desperate financial circumstances. I did what Jesus did. Pastor Sharon and I did what Jesus did. When Jesus didn’t have money, He told Peter to go catch a fish, cut the fish open, take the coin and go pay taxes. You understand, he arrived at a place where there is a requirement for money, He didn’t have money. He didn’t go and borrow from aunty, uncle, sister, cousin who lives around the corner, in the town that He was visiting. And then, “I’ll just get the money back to them and pay them when I got money, because Judas, who is the treasurer, is not with Me, he is on the other side of the lake, but I will send someone to pay the money back.” He didn’t do that. He said, “I’m going to do what my Father would do, and I’m going to meet the need through my Father.” He says, “Peter, go catch a fish, and when you catch that fish, cut the belly open and you will find a coin in the belly, and you can go pay the taxes.”
One fish, whole lake, thousands, millions maybe fishes, one fish? Have you lost it Jesus? No, when I speak the words that the Father tells me to speak, to go fishing in a time of tax collection, then I go fishing. Because when I’m fishing, God brings money to me. It doesn’t matter, I could have decided to go and work my network, but my answer was in my fishing. Jesus takes the money, He pays the taxes, and moves on, because the answer is in obeying Jesus.
That’s what I did. I went with my wife, and I would go and stand with those open cupboards that were bare, they were empty, the open fridge, that was empty. We had nothing. We didn’t have money, we didn’t have anything, and we began to speak to them and we’d say, “If Jesus could do it, so can we” and we speak to these cupboards and we command them to be full with groceries. Then people provided groceries for us, and they began to get filled with groceries. Then we started to take half of our groceries and sow it to people that were in the same situation as we were. A miracle happened. As we gave half of the groceries, more groceries kept appearing and kept appearing.
When I needed petrol, people used to come and literally put money in my car, that I didn’t even know about, and I would go and look in my cubby hole, and I would find money in my cubby hole. I thought, if I didn’t get to work today with enough petrol in this car. I don’t know how I’m going to get home, but maybe during work, I’ll earn something or something will happen and then I’d open the cubby hole and there was money to get petrol to work and back. Then God made something happen at work and would earn money. I spoke money, I speak words. Life and death are in the power of words. I spoke the words that God wanted me to speak into my environment.
Here is what happens; when you come into an auditorium like this and you come to church, and you come to hear what’s going on. You are getting motivated, the Word of God speaks to you, and you get inspired and you feel the love of God and you want to praise the love of God. Then you go out, and in a couple of hours or a couple of days you got to go to Checkers or Pick n Pay or whatever it is, and you got to go stand in line and buy food, and you don’t have the right amount of money for the amount of food that you need to live. Now you’re saying that, “Sunday, God was a real God and I know He is a real God, but the real God that I need now, is I need God to show up and pay money for me.”
The reality of this problem becomes bigger than the God that’s in your heart. Then you look to solve the problem for yourself because the God that’s in your heart is too small. It is not that He is too small, He’s too small in your heart, but as you live in Him and in the Love of God, and as you begin to give yourself over to God, and He begins to say, that those who live in love are living in God and God lives through them. You begin to find that the God that lives through you begins to create for you. He begins to create answers where there are only problems. He begins to create solutions when no one else can provide anything for you, He begins to give you creative ideas that solve problems that create solutions, and then people will pay for that. But this is not a get-rich-quick-scheme, and this is not a fix-your-problem-overnight problem.
What happens is that people don’t speak the Word of God, and they just give God space for whenever they feel they want to give God space. Then when their circumstances get desperate, they pray very intense and very desperate prayers. They think they’re in faith because of the intensity of their prayers, and the desperation of their prayers, and the desperation of their need and they say, “Surely God must answer my need because of the desperation that I’m in.” God never responds to need, God responds to faith.
That’s why, in the language of the world, we have to speak the language of faith and not listen to what the world is saying. We got to speak the language of love, and not speak what the world is speaking. Amen.
I need my son’s up here. If you want to go sit at the back and take your time when you know I’m going to call you… Come stand here, please boy. [Brynn comes to the front] I mean, this is my son, and I love him, because we have a good relationship, we know each other. I can hug him [Pastor John hugs Brynn], and I can be close to him, and there’s no skaam here. He is a big boy. He is much bigger than me, but that doesn’t mean I can’t love him, and I love him a lot, I just want to hang around him.
So, you understand that this kind of love comes from proper relationships? This is not fake, there’s lots of things that have been said, and lots of understanding that have happened, there’s real trust, there is a covenant bond here. Right? [Pastor Garth comes to the front] So, I didn’t do this in the first service, but he has a special kind of way that he loves on me. Letting you into a secret here between me and him; secret. You know what you are going to do? So, when we do this, and I hug him like this [Pastor John hugs Pastor Garth] What does he do? You see, he rubs his ear against my ear, every time, a coconut, but there’s love here. There’s a bond here because there is no fakeness here, because I’ve never allowed his mistakes to damage our relationship, or his [Pastor John gestures to Brynn]. My love for them, they’ve always known, has stood as a solid rock, immovable.
There are a lot of things they did that removed themselves from me because of what they did, but that didn’t change my love for them. Look what happens when we come together and we stand together, father and sons, we are a powerful force. When I say, “Come, let’s speak and create what you need in your life.” I’m standing here and I am waiting, and I’m waiting for them to speak. Now if they speak words of blessing and prosperity and they speak words that I would speak. So, they would say, “What does my father want for me?” What do I want for you Brynn?
Brynn:
Supernatural increase, joy overflowing, the love of God in me flowing through me, full demonstration.
Pastor John:
What do I want for you Garth?
Pastor Garth:
Greatness, goodness, abundance, supernatural increase, confidence, great faith.
Pastor John:
Don’t you want lots of cash?
Pastor Garth:
Absolutely!
Pastor John:
You want lots of cash?
Brynn:
Yes, overflowing.
Pastor John:
More than one house, too?
Pastor Garth:
Yes, amen. For a while hey, for the lots of children.
Pastor John:
Troops of children that you are breeding [Congregation laughs].
You see, I can get into agreement with them because that’s what I want for them. As long as they keep speaking it, what they start to do is they start to get to my creativity as God the Father and I start to say; “Angels you hear my boys are speaking, go fix it, go fix it. Go and make those houses happen, go and make those things, go and make those blessings, make that prosperity, make that joy, make that money, oh I see there is a bit of a tangle up there, it is delayed”, now I send the Holy Spirit; Holy Spirit go minister to Garth, tell him not to quit with his words, because there is a delay there, the devil got involved in that, those demonic angels that have tried to stop money through that channel, that person was supposed to give him the money, and he didn’t because he got afraid, he got to channel some money so that it will take a bit more time. Go and encourage him, go and encourage him, go and encourage him. Then, an angel will come and encourage him, or a person will come and encourage him, and he is thinking all the time, “How come this thing is not happening, how come things don’t?”
Hey, just keep speaking creativity, “My power is working, My power is working, My life is working, it’s coming, it’s coming, I don’t care, Covid, no Covid, Father and sons, you create your future. That’s what tithing is about. Your tithing is that you trust God with your future. He doesn’t need your money.
Pastor Garth:
Tithing is doing this.
[Pastor Garth and Brynn hugging Pastor John].
Pastor John:
There you go, that’s what tithing is doing. Good job guys. Praise the Lord.
So when you feel like, “This is real, and I’m tight and things are feeling bad and I’m feeling hopeless”, just remember this analogy; the more you speak the Word, the more God puts His arms around you, and He is creating goodness, opportunities, momentum, good things for you, just keep speaking what He would say about your future. Please stand with me please.
That’s why I say to you every day, it’s an important thing, it’s not just a nice thing, I do it every day. I put my hand on my chest like this, and I wake up in the morning first thing, wake up in the morning and say; I am a son of God, and I thank you, Lord that I am a son of God because today I can stand behind the blood of Jesus and I’ve got a good day waiting for me, regardless of what is out there what I might keep there what I might encounter there, I’m waiting and I’ve got the son of God in my heart. I’m a son of God and the blood of Jesus protects me from all the accusations, all of my weaknesses, all of my fears, all of the things that want to come to me, I am a son of God. Hallelujah.
Won’t you say with me; I am a son of God, I receive the love of God in my heart, I know that He wants to bless me, I know He wants to increase me, and I do not allow any of my weaknesses to stop me from having a close relationship with Him, in Jesus name.
You know, the only thing, in that thing that can happen that is not good for you, is that you decide that God can’t meet your needs, or God hasn’t got what it takes for you, then you walk away. The further you walk away from God, and He wants to speak to you and He is speaking to you all the time, you just get tone deaf, because you can’t hear God’s voice, because so many other voices are speaking to you. Shut them up, get with God, let Him do the creativity, Amen. Thank you for coming to church, God bless you.
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