The Power of Believing God

Cleaned from the live recording. Lightly edited for reading.

Trying not to sin

We need to understand these principles: you do not become righteous in the sight of God by doing works.

I remember when I got saved, I tried hard not to sin. I tried very hard to live right. And it was a struggle. I know you guys didn't have that issue, but if you had that problem, you can say, "Mm-hm, I know what you're talking about, pastor."

I remember the seasons where I counted the days. "Oh, I made three days without sinning. Wow, that was an achievement." I'd pass one day without sinning and then I'm wondering in my mind. I knew there was a besetting sin, a big one that really challenged me. Will I be able to go a week or two weeks without stumbling? And when you pass two weeks, you celebrate inside. "Wow, I'm getting somewhere." And then the next day, you start crying. You stumble.

And then the enemy comes and says to you, "You see? I told you you weren't saved. If you were saved, you would not have done that. Your salvation is not complete." And then we cry and say, "Lord, I won't do it again. I promise You, I promise You, never, ever, ever." Then three days after, you do something worse than that, and you even start to doubt yourself. "Am I saved? This Christian thing is not working."

From doing to being

But then I discovered something. One of the big besetting sins, something that troubled me for years before I got saved, suddenly it was gone. I asked myself, when did that happen? I don't know when that thing was removed, but I'm free.

And then I started to think to myself, if something difficult like this, God can just remove from my life without me knowing, well, then He can deal with some other stuff. When this particular thing was removed, there was nothing I did to stop it. I didn't even know I was delivered until a month or two months after, when I said to myself, "You know, something is different about me. I have deliverance in this area of my life."

I wasn't doing. I was being. I wasn't trying not to sin. I discovered something changed inside of me. And once you receive Jesus Christ, something changes inside of you. God wants to move us from trying not to, to being.

God is never satisfied or pleased when our righteousness is rooted in our works. Pay very keen attention to what I'm saying. I'm just laying a foundation for the others who will do teaching during the week and during the month.

I'm not saying you should not do good things. I'm saying if you think it's the good things that make God happy with you, you're wrong. So don't go and say I'm saying go and do bad things. God is displeased with that too. But the foundation of what you do must not be in self. You're pleased because you did not sin. You're pleased because you did something right. Those are good. But the foundation of it must be that your nature has been changed. It's not coming from actions only. It's coming from a renewed mind (Romans 12:2), and from a regenerated, new life.

All sinned in Adam

When Adam sinned, what did the Lord say? The soul that sins shall surely die (Ezekiel 18:4). The Bible says all sinned in Adam (Romans 5:12). Isn't that so? Were you there? Yes.

Now that sounds confusing. But you were in him. Some of you are still thinking. You weren't here physically walking the way you're walking, but you were in him. You were in your grandfather. Your great-grandfather. And there are things about them that are in you. That's why you can go and do a DNA test and they can tell you where you came from, your ancestors.

When Adam sinned, the Bible says all sinned. His nature was corrupted, and all human beings became corrupted by sin. From that basis, anything you do that is acceptable before God is based upon His mercies, not your righteousness. It's based upon His goodness, not your goodness. Because when He looks at man, He sees a corrupted nature.

That's why He was able to say to the Jews, when they said, "We are children of Abraham," "No, you're children of the devil" (John 8:39-44). Because He could feel the DNA, the trace of the enemy in them.

I don't want to go there, but you've heard me say this over and over. The entire story in the Old Testament, when God asked the Israelites to wipe out nations, you'll always see it trace back to a giant, or one of the giants in the land. And you'll always see God saying to the Israelites, "Wipe out everyone from that city." It was a bloodline issue. It wasn't every nation or community He asked the Israelites to do that to. But when you read your Bible, you'll see in those nations the giants, the bloodline of the giants, the Anakim (Numbers 13:33; Deuteronomy 2:10-11), the fallen angels running through those nations, and they were utterly destroyed.

Likewise, concerning all of us, the soul that sins must what? Die. Tell your neighbour: die. This is not "alive." This is no life. Dead.

Justified: no docket

Romans chapter 4 verse 5: "But to him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness" (Romans 4:5).

Justified means to be declared right. From a legal point of view, the Greek conveys this kind of understanding. You go to court. They try to bring up a case against you. There was a case, but when they start to look for the docket, there is nothing there. It's not that you won a court case. It's that there was no legal basis to take you to court in the first place.

So when the Bible speaks about being justified, it's saying that when you stand before God, there is nothing anyone can bring up against you. No accusation. Nothing can be found. We need to understand these things if we're going to understand righteousness.

What the blood of Jesus Christ did is not go into a record book and draw a line through your sin. When they check the record books, there is no record of that wrong. So the enemy can't bring an accusation against you, because there's nothing he can find. Even the Father, our heavenly Father, can find nothing against you, because the Bible says He casts our sins into the depths of the sea (Micah 7:19).

And if you sin, you have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous (1 John 2:1). It's not Jesus the lawyer standing in court saying, "Look, he didn't really mean this. Heavenly Father, it's just a mistake. This was not his intention." No. He stands in the courts of heaven and says, when the enemy brings that accusation, "Show me, based upon the records of heaven. There is no sin here. Nothing written against . Nothing written against ."

So when you're standing on the earth and every day you're saying, "Lord, forgive me, forgive me, forgive me," if you're born again and you have repented of your sins, there is nothing tomorrow on that matter to forgive. You're bringing up an issue in the courts of heaven that no longer exists. And this is not based upon how good you are. It's based upon your confidence and your faith in the One who declares you innocent, who declares you guilt-free, who declares you justified.

I am not a sinner

As I said the other evening, I don't ever want to hear from Christians, especially believers here, "I am a sinner saved by grace." I am not a sinner. If you make that statement, you don't understand what Jesus did for you on the cross. If you say, "I was a sinner," I can understand. But I'm not a sinner.

When we believe Him who justified us, as Abraham did, his faith was counted as righteousness. I have a lot of scriptures here. Romans 4:20: "He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith" (Romans 4:20). If you notice, if we're going to talk about righteousness, we have to talk about faith.

If you are a child of God, you are righteous. There's been a change of nature, and we all need to decide whether we're going to live according to the new nature, or go back to the old.

My father at the party

I remember my father telling me a story. He loved to party when he was young, dance competitions and those kinds of things. But then he went into Region One, Matthews Ridge, and lived there for a number of years, and subsequently came back to Georgetown. He heard there was a party somewhere in West Ruimveldt. So he dressed and went out to party. But when he saw the type of party that was happening, it was different from twenty years ago when he used to go to the disco, and he found himself out of place. The young people were doing their own thing.

Many times as Christians, when you go back to the life of sin, you know something changed inside of you, because you start to feel out of place. That's the new nature. It makes you feel out of place. You can't have certain conversations. It feels strange. Things you were accustomed to watching suddenly feel filthy. That's not you trying not to sin. That's the nature of Christ in you being expressed. You're living it. You're being.

I started this way, dealing with it from the foundation, because many of us are asking the question this morning, "Am I truly saved?"

Imputed: downloaded

Romans 4:20-21: "He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully persuaded that what He had promised, He was able also to perform" (Romans 4:20-21). Listen to me. What God promised, He is able to perform. What God says in His word, He is able to do. And if He says I'm righteous... If He says you're righteous, do you believe it?

Verse 22: "And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness" (Romans 4:22). That word "imputed" means to give, but not just to give in the sense of you receiving. I love this word: downloaded to you. He just took His righteousness and inserted it in you.

This is not you working and striving, "Lord, make me righteous." He made you righteous. It's part of your nature. From the time you're born again, He places it inside of you. You're righteous. This is not a licence to sin. We're going to get there just now.

Job 29:14 says, "I put on righteousness, and it clothed me. My judgment was as a robe and a diadem" (Job 29:14). In Matthew 22:11-14, the king in the parable Jesus told asks, "How did this person get into this wedding feast without the proper clothing?" (Matthew 22:11-14). He clothes us in righteousness.

Who may dwell in Your holy hill

I'm going quickly. Psalm 15 verse 1: "Lord, who shall abide in Thy tabernacle? Who shall dwell in Thy holy hill?" Verse 2: "He that walketh uprightly, and worketh righteousness" (Psalm 15:1-2).

This working of righteousness is not you trying to just do right things. Go home and read Romans chapters 6, 7 and 8, and you'll see the apostle Paul talking about how whoever you yield yourself to is your master (Romans 6:16). You now have the nature of Christ within you. You decide whether you're going to yield to that nature or yield yourself to sin. He says whichever one you yield yourself to, you are its slave. When you look at the language of those verses, it talks about you submitting to one or the other. It's not whether you have the ability inside you to live one way or another. It's whether you deliberately submit.

Truth in the heart

"And speaketh the truth in his heart" (Psalm 15:2). Have you ever spoken with your mouth, but you're lying? "You look so lovely." But inside, "I hate how you dress. You dress better than me." There's one thing coming out of your mouth, but your heart is saying something else. So the Bible is saying, don't just speak truth with your mouth.

My small son always makes me smile. If you confront him about something he did wrong, he admits and doesn't admit at the same time. He doesn't deny it, but he doesn't admit it. He does it in such a way you can't say he's lying, but you have to listen very carefully. He's telling you he did it without telling you he did it. And I always smile, because he causes me to remember myself. You don't want to lie, but you don't want to find yourself in trouble. So you want the sweet of both worlds.

We need to speak truth. There must be a heart and mouth correlation. And that's why it's very dangerous when we question demons for truth. Demons give you facts. The word of the Lord gives you truth.

Speak to yourself. Speak the truth in your heart. Jesus said they worship Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me (Matthew 15:8).

Some of us will get a shock when there's a level of the prophetic in this church. I hope we don't reach an Ananias and Sapphira, where you speak with your mouth and the apostle says, "You did not lie to me. You lied to the Holy Ghost" (Acts 5:3-4). Many times we're talking to people, but we forget God looks at our heart. We say nice things with the mouth but have bad intentions in the heart. And God doesn't judge you only on what you said with your mouth, but also on your thoughts, what you conceive in your heart.

That's why righteousness cannot be an act. It has to be our nature, who we are, our core being. Because if that transformation was not made by God, you're going to have an external view of things and an internal hatred. Some people can do it nice. They smile at you, and from the time your back is turned, the heart expresses itself. There's no correlation between face and heart. Beautiful on the outside. They make you feel so happy, but when you hear the words, it cuts you to the core.

Backbiting and the share button

Psalm 15:3: "He that backbiteth not with his tongue, nor doeth evil to his neighbour, nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbour" (Psalm 15:3). Just look at your neighbour. Don't say anything.

You get people who hate you and don't even know you. They hold venom against you and don't even know you. Somebody just told them something. We need to check ourselves and see if there's anything like that within us. We hate people and we don't even know them, because somebody said something. People hate T.D. Jakes. They weren't there. They hate some preacher because of something.

And then when people do the same thing to you, you get angry and start crying up before God, calling down fire and brimstone, asking God to judge them. And then you sit in front of the television or YouTube and go through every scandal, every pastor, every sister, every brother, and you're sharing. And from the time somebody goes on social media, sees something about you they don't like and shares it, it's a problem. Be very careful.

You don't want to be like the story I told you from when I started working. A woman was watching television. She saw someone's house burned down and the woman was crying, and she said, "I wonder how that feels." Three days after, her house burned down.

Be careful what comes out of your mouth. Be careful before you click share. Be careful before you record. Some of us do it this way. We know you have a problem with a person, so we call you and ask you a question, and then we start to record. You think we love you and believe what you're saying, and you lead on and lead on, and then we forward the conversation to the person you were discussing. Then you're the instigator.

When righteousness offends you

Verse 4: "In whose eyes a vile person is contemned; but he honoureth them that fear the Lord" (Psalm 15:4).

Sometimes even in church we side with the people who are like us. The righteous stumble several times and fall several times but get up (Proverbs 24:16). But you've been stumbling your whole lifetime and you want company. So from the time somebody rebukes that person, you take offence. "The Bible says we must not judge." And you're asked to show the scripture and you can't find it, because you're living a certain lifestyle, and once this person is confronted, you're certain you'll be confronted too. So you side with those who are living like you.

And then you look at Sister Tracy and say she's some goody two-shoes. "She always thinks she's righteous. She always thinks she's better than the others." Not because she's doing anything wrong, but her righteousness offends you.

I don't know about you, but I've had those experiences of my own, when people's righteousness offended me. There was nothing wrong with them. It's that every time I looked at them, I was convicted of my sin, convicted of my wrongdoing. Some of you don't want to talk now, right?

Keep your word when it hurts

"He that sweareth to his own hurt, and changeth not" (Psalm 15:4). You know how this happens? Let me talk to the fashion people. You go to buy shoes, and you call your friend, and she likes them, and you say, "I'll buy them for you." There's only one pair. Then you come back home and your mind says, "Put your foot in the shoes. Let's see how it will look." And when you put on the shoes, or the dress, my God, you look fine. Proper. But you already promised your friend. Today you're in the mirror with so much regret, but you call them and you give it to them, even though you look so fine in it. Don't look at me like you don't know what I'm talking about. Time will come.

I'm just trying to put it in a practical way. You promised somebody some money, but the money you were waiting on did not come through. But you already promised them. You go through with your word. That's what the Bible says. Let your yes be yes and your no be no (Matthew 5:37). Don't swear swiftly, or take a pledge on behalf of someone.

Up in the US, we were talking to a particular sister, and she started to talk about somebody owing somebody money and dodging them. We always had that issue at GTT with the credit union. People look at you and smile, you know them, and they come and say, "Sign as guarantor for me." Then you go to work the following week and they say this person is on vacation. Three weeks, four weeks, the person took all their leave. Six weeks, two months, and you say this can't be vacation any more. So you go and ask, and they've migrated. They borrowed money from the credit union, you signed, and they jumped on a plane. And then you receive a letter stating that you owe money you did not borrow.

Fine print and the innocent

Verse 5: "He that putteth not out his money to usury, nor taketh reward against the innocent" (Psalm 15:5). That part there: taketh reward against the innocent.

You see all those companies that put things in fine print. There will be a reckoning. If you put something in fine print that a normal person cannot read, in a fine part of a fifteen-page document, what are you trying to do? I know some of you work with companies like that right now. You've gone very quiet. Let me stop there, because we'll have to be doing a lot of praying for some people today.

Sometimes I used to be smart. Sometimes you just pass your hand or your finger and say, "Please read here before you sign." You don't have to tell them anything, but at least give them an opportunity to read the company's fine print before they sign.

I don't want to say too much here on social media, but let me say this. Before I left, I was working in a department that interfaced with the public, collections and debt recovery. Many times you're in rooms where you have to give your say on certain policy decisions. I don't want to say what went on in that room. But a VP said to me, "I don't know how you can do this work and be a pastor." Because a decision was about to be made that was wrong, to put that on the customers. I was overruled.

And I lived to see, a year or so after, one of the very people who was pushing for it calling me to undo the same thing, because he was out of the company now. He was now a customer. We were all in that room, and I was the one saying no, that is unethical.

So I'm saying to you: taketh reward against the innocent. I'm showing you from a corporate level how some of these things happen. Then these policies are passed down to the front line people, supervisors and the normal staff, and you make sure people don't read the fine print, because if they ask you questions, you don't know how to answer.

Many times when we read the scriptures, we apply them to church and how we talk to our neighbours, but we don't apply them to the workplace. That was just one example. I can't state certain things. When I was leaving the company, the first question the VP asked me was whether I was going to work for a competitor, because when you're privy to certain things, you've got to make sure you don't share that information. That's why I'm saying it this way. Sometimes the job requires you to go to court and stand before a magistrate and answer questions on behalf of your company. Some of us don't have jobs like that. Some of us do. And some of us take rewards from the innocent for a big commission at the end of the year.

Or you're a salesperson for some company and you're selling things that don't work. Don't get vexed with me. Tell them, "I won't sell this." Sometimes you have to be bold like a lion (Proverbs 28:1).

"He that doeth these things shall never be moved" (Psalm 15:5).

Are you righteous?

So let me ask you a question. Are you righteous? How do you know that? Are you quiet now? It was downloaded in you. How do you know? Because you accepted Jesus Christ as Lord.

I just want to finish with this, because I have about fifty more scriptures here I can't get to. Romans 3:23: "For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23). We know that.

1 Corinthians 1:30, give me the ESV: "And because of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption" (1 Corinthians 1:30). Redemption and sanctification are all stories you need to know to fully grasp what Christ did. Verse 31: "Therefore, as it is written, let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord" (1 Corinthians 1:31). The scripture also says Christ became sin that we might be the righteousness of God (2 Corinthians 5:21).

Let us stand. Christ became sin that you might become what? Righteous. So turn around and look at a righteous person in this building. Make sure when they're looking at you, they're looking at a righteous person. If you know they're looking at you and not looking at a righteous person, you need to hand over your sin to Christ Jesus and take His righteousness.

Prayer of salvation

How do you do that? Just by saying with your mouth: "Lord, heavenly Father, I believe You sent Your Son Jesus Christ to die for me. Just as You said, the soul that sins shall surely die. And because You love me so much, You sent Your Son to die in my place. I thank You. And I thank You that I'm raised to new life in Him. When He died and was resurrected, I was resurrected with Him." You're going to get those scriptures later. I don't want to prolong the time.

Romans chapter 10, verses 9 and 10. Bring it up; I don't want to misquote it. "That if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation" (Romans 10:9-10). It's as simple as that.

That's why I started this message talking about righteousness and then talking about faith and believing God, because that's where it starts. Not in our works. So we don't boast in how good we are. It's all based upon His goodness. Even when I was a sinner, Christ died for me (Romans 5:8).

Praying with confidence

So when you open your mouth and pray, you can pray with confidence. When you speak to God, you can speak with confidence. That's why the scripture says, let us come boldly before the throne of grace (Hebrews 4:16). You can only come boldly if you're righteous.

If you don't understand this, at no time can you pray with boldness. You'll always pray wondering what you need to repent of. This is how people who don't understand this open their prayer: "Lord, forgive me for every sin of omission and commission, every sin I remember and don't remember." We end up living a sin-conscious life, and that's not praying according to His will. That's a prayer of condemnation. It's the type of prayer the Father looks upon with pity for His children, because you're praying a prayer He many times cannot answer.

If the first time you asked Him to forgive you, He answered and removed it from the record books, and then you come the following day and pray for Him to forgive you for the same thing... If God cast it into the sea of forgetfulness and you're asking God to forgive you of something that cannot be remembered, it's a prayer He cannot answer. Is anything too difficult for God? Anything impossible? That's the one that's impossible.

Just lift your hands. What a beautiful Father we have. What a good Father. What a loving Father, that He wipes our slate clean every time we intentionally turn to Him and ask Him to cleanse us, to forgive us. A Father who looks upon you and loves you with the same love He loved Jesus with. That's what the Bible says. That's what Jesus said: He loves you just as He loves Me (John 17:23). He's not loving you with a lesser love than the love of Christ Jesus. The same love He has for that Son, He has for you.

Just spend a minute or two talking to Him. Thank Him. Be grateful. And if by chance there's something in your life you have not asked Him to take care of, to forgive you, cleanse you and deliver you of, just talk to Him quietly. He wants you to walk with confidence in Him.

Confidence on the day of judgment

1 John 4:17, give me the NLT: "And as we live in God, our love grows more perfect. So we will not be afraid on the day of judgment, but we can face Him with confidence because we live like Jesus here in this world" (1 John 4:17).

This is one of our themes for this month, this month of righteousness. When we finish with you in this series and you open your mouth to pray, you're going to have answers quicker, because you go to the Father not as a beggar but as a son, as a daughter. You ask, and you know you'll receive, because He loves you. And you operate like Jesus on this earth, so that you will not be afraid on the day of judgment but can face Him with confidence, because you live like Him. That's why this topic of righteousness.