 Epic, epic. Hey, good morning, everybody. Everybody doing good? You guys doing good this morning? Fantastic, hey, how many of you have been a part of one of our seat gatherings so far in 2018? Man, they have been incredible. Banning, if you don't know, Banning Leapshire from Jesus Culture was with us Wednesday and I had just gotten home from Omaha, Nebraska. I spoke three nights in Omaha and then flew in for Wednesday and I was really tired but man, that was just one of the most powerful services I've ever been in and it was amazing. This Wednesday night, our guest is gonna be Bob Sorgi and Sarah said that Bob can't speak. He actually can speak. He just had a vocal cord injury so he can speak about an hour a day and just an incredible testimony. He travels all over the world actually preaching though which is amazing because when he had a voice he was a worship leader and thought his ministry was over but God has given him a new voice, a more powerful voice and he wrote a book that we have in our resource center called Reset, 20 Ways to a Consistent Prayer Life and it's a real easy read. It's very practical. If you've ever struggled with trying to just get a consistent prayer life this book will help you very much. I have three copies. How many of you would like a consistent prayer life? All right, this young man right down here in the blue. I got a scan over there. Yep, you're right there. Young lady in the cream colored sweater. I think it's you. You, you gotta come. And all the way in the back, you gotta come. So let's give these guys hands for coming on up. There you go. I'll toss it at you. There you go. Good catch. And then this gentleman is coming for it and he's here. All right. So the rest of you they are available in the bookstore and Bob will be here Wednesday night at 6.30 and we really hope that you can join us. It's gonna be a powerful night. Everybody else, if you have your Bibles take them out and open them with me to Ephesians chapter four. Ephesians chapter four. This is part three of our series entitled Saints and Sinners. And at the very beginning of this year I think I told you that I believe it's on God's heart to really speak to us and to teach us to help us grow in our understanding of the issue of identity, of identity. I think identity is not only on the heart of God I think it's important because it's something that is globally something that people are really hungering for that are looking for a sense of belonging and an understanding of where they come from. You know, for you to really know who you are where you come from has a big part to play in that. It's not just your family, but it's your family background. I have a friend who adopted some children and now that they're getting older they're asking questions about where they came from and it's not that they don't love their family it's not that they don't love their adoptive mom and dad and brothers and sisters it's just that there's a question inside of all of us really naturally about who we are and where we came from and so he's dealing with that. You know, maybe 25, 30 years ago I remember someone in my family, my grandmother's sister began to kind of put together a family tree catalog. It was, I remember it kind of had a spiral ring to it. She spent about 20 years putting together this family lineage thing for all of us and I still have a copy of it. It has a lot of photocopy pictures and birth certificates and names and a drawing of a family tree that connects us back about 300 years and it just took an exhaustive amount of time and travel and going to the library but now how many know that you can actually go online and probably do a lot of that in about 30 minutes that would have taken you 30 years because of technology. It happens to be one of the fastest growing what they call vanity industries. They call it vanity because it's just something that you do because you want to where people are going on sites like ancestry.com to figure out their family tree. How many of you have done something like ancestry.com or an online family tree? Okay, several of us. I did it about a year and a half ago, maybe two years ago, ancestry.com was kind of new and it gave me a 30 day free trial and because I'm cheap, I'm like 30 days free anything. It's probably, I'm gonna do it. So except for 30 days free at the gym. So I had this ancestry.com so I went online and punched in all my information as much as I could remember on my dad's side, I was really curious for two reasons. Number one, on my dad's side, I've always heard that we're Irish and every time I've kind of looked up Cummings, the surname Cummings comes up English and so I'm like, where's the Irish part in there? And the second part of it that I was really curious about was on my mom's side, there was rumor that we had Native American in it. So I jumped on the ancestry.com, filled in all the information that was there and sure enough Cummings goes all the way back there but here's what was interesting, I found out. When I go back four generations, what I found out was that my great-grandmother who I knew, her name was Wilma Norton, her maiden name was Bird and I didn't know anything beyond that but it punched in all the names, birth certificates and all kinds of stuff and what it popped up was that my great-great-grandmother, my grandmother's mother, her name was Lillian Kilborn Bird and I knew that to be true because I asked my grandmother. So Lillian Kilborn Bird but what I didn't know is that she lived and died in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Now we had absolutely no connection to Kalamazoo because I was born in Pontiac, Detroit area, raised most of my life in Grand Rapids and for me growing up in Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo was a direction on 131. It's like, if you wanna go north, you go towards Big Rapids, you wanna go south, it's Kalamazoo. The only time I ever came to Kalamazoo was I came to Wing Stadium to see an Imperials concert. Come on, come on all you 80s, CCM Imperials, this year's model and so that was it, Kalamazoo. So when God called Jane and I down here in 1996, I had no idea that I had family here. My great-grandmother lived and died in Kalamazoo. She died on my birthday in 1922 and is buried in the cemetery on Riverview which I pass every single day. I had absolutely no way of knowing that but it was fascinating. So now every time I drive by the cemetery, I realize I have heritage in this city. Who knows, my grandmother who I know is a Christian probably was praying for the city of Kalamazoo and two generations later, God raised up her grandson and moved him to Kalamazoo to start a church. God just does stuff like that. Then, then I got this notification for something called 23 and Me DNA testing. Has anybody ever done that before? So I'm like, all right, now I'm really gonna figure out if we're Irish or what or Native American. So I did the DNA testing, you do the swab, you send it in, they do a whole scientific thing and the results came back and here's what came back for me. This is last year. I'm 96.5% English-Irish which they're all one and the same really so it still doesn't help me. But then I found out I was 3% Jewish. I was like, the tribe. I mean, I'm in there. I'm in there, shalom. The whole dealio. And you know what else I found out? There's absolutely no Native American. My family on top of being Irish and Jewish is a bunch of liars. There's rumors and lies. Like, there's no Native American in us anywhere. So the reason why those things are interesting and the reason why millions and millions of people are doing it is because they wanna answer the question of who am I? They wanna know who they are. In order for you to know who you are, it's more than just what you wear, what you drive, where you work, who you know. It's more than your present. Who you are has factors that go all the way back even further than you know. And I wanna tell you today that in Christ, your identity, your new identity goes way, way back. Who you were before you found Christ and who you were in Christ and who you are now in Christ goes way back. And it's important for you to know who you are. And it's important for you to be able to answer this question. Who do you say that you are? Who do you say that you are? Because if I ask you that question, who do you say you are? How you answer that question is so pivotal, it's so important. Now, this is what Paul in Ephesians chapter four is answering. He's talking to, remember in Ephesians, he's talking to people that did not grow up in church. He's talking to people that grew up in a culture much like the world that we live in that is un-Christian. They were pagans, which means they worshiped idols. They had a whole different worldview, a whole different perspective about who they were, about what was right, about what was wrong, what was moral, who God was, how you interrelate with other people, how you relate to the rest of the world. And Paul now is writing to them because now on the other side of finding Jesus, on the other side of coming into Christ, he's trying to get them to understand that everything has changed. Everything has been altered. Whether you know it or not, it's been altered. And you need to know because what you know can then empower you to live it. So look with me here at Ephesians 4 verse 17. This is what he writes. He says, this I say therefore and testify in the Lord that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles. For those of you reading the Bible and you don't know what a Gentile is, a Gentile is anyone who's not a Christian. It's just somebody living in the world far away from God. It says so don't walk, don't live your life like Gentiles in, and here's how he describes it. In the futility of their mind, having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart who being past feeling have given themselves over to lewdness to work all kinds of uncleanness with greediness. You'll notice that the two issues that Paul primarily deals with when it talks about people in the world or many of us before we came into Christ. The way of the world, the way that it operates is because we're spiritually blinded and we're actually spiritually dead on the inside. We actually then are driven by our natural sinful instincts towards it's kind of a roller coaster or a snowball effect towards sexual sin, towards idolatry and towards greediness. It's just natural. Nobody has to teach us that because it's actually our human nature, our sinful human nature to go downward, to spiral downward. But look at what he says in verse 20. But you have not so learned Christ. If indeed you have heard him and you have been taught by him, and look at this next line, as the truth is in Jesus. Everybody say that with me. As the truth is in Jesus. One more time. As the truth is in Jesus. You should underline that market, highlight it, sprinkle glitters and dazzle that verse in your Bible because that is good for anything in your life. The truth is in Jesus. If you're ever wondering, the truth is in Jesus. But then it goes on. That you put off concerning your former conduct, the old man, which grows corrupt according to deceitful lust and be renewed in the spirit of your mind that you put on the new man, which was created according to God in true righteousness and holiness. Paul's contrasting two identities. He's saying this is how you used to live. When you were in this world, if you go back and read all of Ephesians one and Ephesians two and three, in Ephesians two, you quickly find out Paul says this. He says, before you were in Christ, before Jesus saved you, you were lost, darkened, you were dead in your trespasses, you were in this world without hope and without Christ, without God. That's who you used to be. And Paul is now saying don't live like that anymore. Remember that everything's changed in Christ, everything's different. And because of that now, I want you to change the way that you think and I want you to change the way that you live. Put off, put off that old man and put on the new man that is created according to the image of Christ. What Paul's literally saying is this, is that there is a battle going on on the inside of every Christian. And the battle is this. I know I'm saved, I know I belong to God, I love God, I want to please God, but I've got this other thing going on on the inside of me, the old me that wants to rise up and wants to have its way the way that it used to. Literally what Paul is saying is you've got two selves. You have two identities that are competing for dominance in your life. One is your old self, the old man he calls it, which is the old sin nature that every one of us is born into this world with. It's in Adam and the new, the new self is created in Christ Jesus. It's righteous, it's holy, it wants to please God, it submits to God, it's created into the image of God. That's who you really are, that's your new identity. You've been issued a brand new passport in Christ from the kingdom of God that says son, that says daughter, that says righteous, that says holy. Heaven, you are now a citizen of heaven, Philippians 3.20 says. That's your new kingdom, that's your new nationality. And so you get this new passport, but you still have your old passport hanging around from the kingdom of Adam, which is not blessed, it's cursed, which is not a son, it's a slave, which is not full of the spirit of God, it's full of the spirit of fear, and it's not driven or led towards destiny, it's actually deceitful and driven towards sin and death and destruction. And you and I decide every single day that we wake up, what identity we're gonna walk in, what passport we're gonna take out that day. Paul says it this way, he says put on the new man, put off the old. If you think about it, it's like an outfit of clothes. How many know every day you get up and you choose what you're gonna wear? Have you ever looked at somebody and thought to yourself, why in the world did you choose to wear that? I mean, for real. I was scrolling through USA today and on the app and there was a very famous person and they were on there and rich people can wear whatever they want to, right? I mean, this guy is like a movie star, he's wearing this outfit, but nobody told him that his shirt was too tight. I mean, some people can wear tight shirts and they look good. I mean, they're just, they're built right and it looks right. But when you don't have a six pack and you got a six gallon around your midsection, you should not be wearing one of those Euro fitting, suction painted on shirts that's like stretching across here. And some photographer caught him with his like shirt pulling apart like that. And I'm just like, ooh, why did you think that was okay? We choose what we wear. And we choose every day what outfit, what man we choose to put on. As long as we think, as long as we think that nothing has really changed in us other than our sins have been forgiven. But I'm still basically the same person that I was before Jesus. As long as we believe the lie that says, this is just who I am. As long as we believe that, then we'll continually put on the old man, the old outfit, the old identity because that's all that we think that we are. See, I believe one of the greatest lies that the devil has perpetrated to the church, to Christians, to humanity is this, is that, however you are born the first time into this world is how you will always be. Well, if that's the case, then Jesus just becomes a holy eraser and graces just about, it's okay, I know that you can't help yourself. So every time you mess up, God's just gonna allow you to erase it as if it didn't happen, but nothing can really change on the inside of you. But that's a lie because the whole reason for Jesus coming and dying for our sins was not just to forgive our sins, but grace was meant to empower us from the inside out so that we could become who we were always created to be. We were called to walk in the image of Christ, we were called to live in the purpose of God and to be victorious over sin. Yes, we're gonna sin, I mean, human being sin, but you know, you can actually get to a place in your life where the sins that used to dominate, you don't dominate you anymore. And it's not because you're smart, it's because God's great. Jesus, listen, Jesus did not come to make all right people better. Jesus came to make dead people alive. And Jesus didn't come to make sinners modified, Jesus came to make sinners saints. He didn't come to just modify you, tweak you a little bit. Like you were just, look, you were dead in your trespasses. You are a mess, somebody said to me, man, you're always so wired up. I'm like, you should have seen me. If you can imagine it, don't try and imagine it, but I would have been a mess in this world without Jesus because I do not take no for an answer. The Holy Spirit has really worked in my life and developed patience and trust. But man, I'll tell you what, I'd have been one intense puppy running around this world. And some of you, I know some of you, and it's like, man, I'm so grateful for the grace of God in their life. Because I can't imagine what they would have been like without Jesus. So as long as we, listen, as long as we look at ourselves and say, well, this is who I am, I can't change it. I've always been like this, I'm always gonna be like this. Then the devil's got you on lock, he's got you right where he wants you. But Jesus came to set us free from the old identity and by his Holy Spirit and his word working on the inside of us, become who we were created to be. Not according to your image, but according to his image. That's why Paul says, be renewed in the spirit of your mind. Be renewed in the spirit of your mind. There's the story in the Daily Telegram, or the Daily Mail, which is a British paper. This was a couple of years ago about this man from Maryland. His name is David Howe. He was 45, he was an auto mechanic in Maryland. And he discovered through genetic testing and doing his background, like I was talking about, that he actually is the heir to the throne of a British province called the Isle of Man. Now the Isle of Man is a historic island. The kingdom there dates back about 900 years. So it's kind of like Scotland, Wales. It's part of the British Empire. The Isle of Man, though, has its own throne. And this man discovers that he actually is the rightful heir to be king of the Isle of Man. But he's a mechanic living in Baltimore, Maryland. So TLC did this whole reality show on him called Suddenly Royal. And what the show is about is, it's a true story. He travels there with his wife Pam and their daughter Grace. They go to the Isle of Man. He's never been there before. And he goes there because he's claiming his rightful inheritance to be the king. Just sit right back and hear it tell you. And he goes there and he's not the Prince of Valera. I mean, he's going there to be the king of the Isle of Man. And when he gets there, people do not receive him. People are like, we do not want an American as our king. I don't know what they got against Americans, but you know, I mean, we're pretty nice people. But he shows up over there and he had two great challenges. Here were his two biggest challenges. Number one, in order for him, and once they validated that he actually was the rifle heir, he had two choices. Number one, he had to first make a determination that if he was going to accept the throne, he was going to live there permanently in the kingdom. He had to leave behind the old and he had to move there permanently to sit on the throne. He couldn't fly in on weekends to be king on the weekend, body shop Monday through Friday, king on Saturday and Sunday. He had to leave the old, his old life behind to live there. And the second thing was this. Listen, he had to learn how to be a king because there were expectations about how a king lives that are different, vastly different than how a mechanic lives. You think about it. A mechanic is used to being under a car all day long. A king sits on a throne. When a mechanic walks into a room, he says, how can I help you? When a king walks into a room, he says, how can you help me? Vastly different. He had to hire actually a specialist from the royal family to actually teach him how to conduct himself like a king. So he taught him how to hold a tea party, how to walk, how to sit, how to shake hands, how to receive honor, all these different things that were brand new to him. And the story is fascinating, partly because it's true, but the second reason why it's fascinating is because you and I are presented with this very same thing every single day as children of God. We have gone from being slaves to sons and we have suddenly become royalty. In Christ, we have suddenly become royalty, but every day we also have to make the decision, am I going to leave everything behind and live in the kingdom of God? Because that's what it requires to really step into the full measure of our authority and the full measure of our calling and the full measure of our identities. We gotta leave the old behind. There's no part time identity in the kingdom of God. Jesus said this, if a man wants to set his hand to the plow, looks back, he is not worthy to come into the kingdom of God. In other words, we can't have hesitation. If we go in for Jesus, we need to go all in for Jesus. And we need to make the determination, I'm stepping into the kingdom and I'm gonna take my rightful place and walk in my identity. The second biggest challenge we have, just like this gentleman did, is we have to now learn how to live like kings and queens. To reign with Christ, because we're not used to reigning. We're used to being slaves. Slaves to our desires, slaves to what other people think, slaves to fear. You think about how many, I mean, really, can we just take an honest moment here? I want you to think about your own life. Don't advertise it, but just think about it for a minute. How much of our lives, the way that we live it, is controlled by fear? The fear of what other people think, the fear of missing out, the fear of rejection? Think about it. Think about how many things, why do you do the things that you do? Why do you wear what you wear? Why do you go where you go? Why do you work where you work? So much of it is motivated by fear. Kings don't live by fear. Kings are 100% confident. Queens are confident. Royalty is confident because they know who they are. These are the decisions that we make. In order for you to fully make them, you need to understand two things. You need to understand, you need to make a decision whether you're going to live from the fall and find your identity in the fall or whether you're going to live and find your identity in the cross. Because in order for you to fully understand why you are a saint, you also have to understand what Jesus has redeemed you from. Jesus has redeemed you. His ultimate goal is to restore you, but it requires a process of renewal. What I want you to do is turn with me way back in your Bibles to the first chapter of the book of Genesis. So I want to show you what took place. What was God's original purpose in creating humanity? Why you are here? Before you can say who you are, you have to know why you are here. And only the Creator can tell you that. So all the way back in the book of Genesis, in the very beginning where we have a record of how God created the heavens and the earth, it says in chapter one, verse 26, God said, let us make man according to our image. In our likeness, let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, over the cattle, over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So ladies, God gave you authority over all the creeps. Sorry. Okay, so it says so God created man in his own image, and in the image of God, he created him. Male and female, he created them. And then God blessed them, and he said, be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth. Four things right here that we can find that are reasons the why behind God creating humanity. First thing that you'll notice is this. God didn't just pick out an animal and say I'm gonna change your name to man. God created all the animals. He created the birds, he created the fish, he created the giraffes, the dogs, the hippos. God even created cats. I know it's hard to believe, we all just assumed they came from hell, but God really did create cats, and they were good in the beginning before the fall. And all you cat lovers have to forgive me right now because you're a Christian. God created man with his own hands and breathed his life into him. Man was the chief crowning achievement of all of his creation. God spoke everything into existence, but he formed man with his own hands. It's different. Man was created different. And it was created different because God had a different purpose for man. And here were the four purposes that God had for creating humanity, creating you. Number one is identity. He created mankind so that we would bear his image, reflect his image back to his good creation. God wanted everything that he made to be able to see his image. When you talk about image, I'm talking about his likeness. I'm talking about his ways. I'm talking about his wisdom, his truth, his power, his authority. I'm not just talking about looks. We're self-aware. We're creative. We're spiritual. We're full of wisdom. We know justice in our original creation. We bore the image of God to the rest of creation. Number two, we were created for intimacy. When I talk about intimacy, I'm not talking about sexuality. The best definition of intimacy is this. Intimacy is when we invite others into our experience and our inner world. The why behind what we do. Remember Jesus said to his disciples, I no longer call you servants, but I call you friends. What does that mean? It means I'm inviting you into my inner world. I'm inviting you into my experience. When God created mankind, he created us to bear his image, but then he also created us so that he would have a friend. God would come down after he created man and he would walk with man every single day and he would explain to man, I created that and here's how I did that and here's my plan and here's truth and here's wisdom. But he also invited man into his creating process. He says, look, I'm creating and I'm building a beautiful world. I want you to help me do it. And so God allowed Adam to name all the animals. Says he brought all the animals and Adam named them. God created them but he says, now what do you want to call them? Dog, good. Pig, good. Horse, good. Hey, can we, you know, maybe make it a little bit more sophisticated Adam? Platypus, great. Hippopotamus, woo, now we're rolling, baby. Chicken, all right. He invited man into partnership. That's what intimacy is, it's partnership. So he created mankind for intimacy, number two, for intimacy, for identity, number two, for intimacy, number three, relationships. After he created man, he realized the only thing that God had made that wasn't good was that Adam was alone. He said it is not good that man is alone. And so he created woman out of Adam's side. He didn't find a compatible partner in the animal world and so he created exactly what a man would need to compliment him and to find companionship in this world. He had a relationship with God but God knew that he needed horizontal relationships as well. And so he created woman, he put man asleep, took something from his side, his rib. He formed woman and God was the first matchmaker. He came walking down the aisle between the trees and he brought Eve to Adam. And the reason why woman was called woman is because when Adam saw her, he went, whoa, man. Whoa, man, whoa, man. I'm just keeping you awake, all right. And he's like, yes, flesh of my flesh, bone of my bone. And God said to them, I want you to be fruitful and multiply. Be fruitful and multiply. Everything that God blesses grows and multiplies. And God, this is marriage. God created the first marriage. God brought the bride to the groom and he said, now I'm blessing you. And now because I created you and you come together and you compliment one another, she has things that you don't and you have insight that she doesn't have and she's got strengths that you don't and vice versa, you compliment one another. In our world, we're trying to strip down all gender identities and distinctions and can I tell you what we're really attacking is the image of God. Because God created male and female in the image of God. And it's not an attack on sexuality. It's not an attack on traditionalism. What it's really an attack on is the image of God because the devil hates the image of God. When God created man, he created male and female, brought them together. He said, it is good. And the offspring of that was, they began to have children. Children are good. Isn't it amazing that in our world, we talk about kids as an inconvenience, keeping us back? I mean, it's like, well, you know, I got kids, man, kids are a blessing from the Lord. I know they worry out sometimes but children are a blessing from the Lord. And we want our church full of kids. So everybody get to work. All right, so number four, here's the number four reason that God created mankind to exercise dominion over all creation. So he wanted them to bear his image, intimately partner with him, have horizontal relationships that would be the stable building block of God's good world and then fulfill their destiny by subduing the world, subduing everything. The only thing that man was supposed to be underneath was God himself. It was supposed to be God, man creation. That's how God originally created. And you know that when God created, when God created man perfect, there was perfect peace in the earth. There was perfect harmony. Man was not created for death. Death only came in after the fall. There was no sickness, there was no disease. That all came after the fall. It was not God's originally designed. And the reason why I tell you that is because I think it's really important that we understand this. In our world, a lot of people ask questions and say, well, if God is such a good God, then why is there so much evil and so much bad in the world? Can I just tell you when God created the world, He created zero sin, zero envy, zero greed, zero death, zero sickness, zero disease. There wasn't any of that in God's good creation. But in order for God to have a loving relationship, He had to create free will agents because love requires risk. If you're going to have true love, true friendship, true partnership, you have to take risk. And man ended up being deceived by the serpent, the devil, who came and whispered in Eve's ear. And here's, listen to what she said. She said, that fruit really looks good. The serpent said, that fruit really looks good. Oh, I can't eat that because God said I can have everything in the garden. It all belongs to me except for the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Why in the world did God put a tree that they're not supposed to eat out? It's because it's a test of loyalty. And that's exactly where the enemy challenges us. You may not have a tree of knowledge of good and evil growing in your backyard, but you've got things in your life that are a test of loyalty where God says, don't do this. Well, I want to do it, it looks good, looks fun. Looks like it tastes really good. Can I tell you that is the area that the enemy will always come and whisper in your ear and say the same thing that the serpent said to Eve. Here's what the serpent said. Has God really said, is that really applied to you? Second thing that he said was this. He said, God knows this. God knows that in the day that you eat of that fruit, your eyes are gonna be opened and you're going to become just like God. God's trying to keep you from being the best that you can be. God's trying to keep you from pleasure. He doesn't want you to have. God's trying to keep you back because God just wants to keep you under his thumb. And the lie that the serpent told man and woman was this. God doesn't want you to realize that if you eat that fruit, you'll become just like him. But what was the truth? The truth was they already were just like God because they were created in the image of God. The only difference was now because they've chose independence from God. They rejected his commands and they believed the lie of the enemy. Now they came in under the authority of the devil, the serpent and when they came in under the authority, all the keys that God had given Adam over all of creation, over all the world to have dominion over it that were supposed to be partnering with God. Now mankind began to partner with hell and the keys to the world were handed over to the enemy and that's where sin, that's where sickness, that's where isolation, that's where death all entered into the world from. What happened at the fall? Well, our identity was broken like a mirror. It's distorted. Most of the identity issues that we have in the world today are the result of you and I looking into a broken mirror and we can barely see the image of God. It's there, but sin has broken it and it's marred and it's distorted. It affected our intimacy because now we're not walking with God the way we were designed. The human heart was never meant to be separated by God. The human heart was never meant to just have a checklist and say, all right, here you go. Here's how to behave yourself. Now we were created to be heart to heart with our father walking in partnership and in intimacy with the world but after they believed the lie and ate the fruit you know what happened? Says God in Genesis three, God came in the garden and he said, Adam, where are you? Adam was hiding behind a tree and here's what he said, I heard your voice in the garden and I was afraid. It's the first mention in the Bible of fear. It comes because of sin. You were not meant to be motivated by fear you were meant to be motivated by intimacy. God says, where are you? How many know that God knew right where Adam was? Wasn't looking for information. He was asking the question, so Adam would evaluate his own life. Where am I? Look at me, look at what believing the enemy has done in my life. It has got me isolated and broken away from the God who loves me. It's broken my image. It's broken the image of God in my life now by sin. It separated me and my identity, my relationships are broken. Genesis three said that now you're not blessed. Mankind was cursed, the earth was cursed, marriage was cursed. It says that to the woman you're gonna try and control him and he's gonna dominate you. And then ultimately it stole from us our destiny to be kings and queens. Now here's the good news. Everything that we lost in the garden because of sin, Jesus has restored at the cross and the resurrection. Everything that you and I lost in Adam, God has restored in the garden. No, believe me, listen, Romans chapter five, it says in verse 17, for if by one man's offense, that's Adam, death reigned through the one, much more those who received abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness, listen to this, will reign in life through the one, Jesus Christ, for as by one man's disobedience, many were made sinners. So also by one man's obedience, many will be made righteous. Galatians three says that Jesus hung on the cross and became cursed for us so that you and I could experience the blessing of Abraham. We could be blessed because Jesus took our curse upon him. Jesus broke the power of sin. He broke the power of the devil. He took back the keys of authority over the earth when he ruled and he reigned on the cross and in the resurrection. And every one of us who come to Jesus, we are completely restored in our walk with God. We are made new. We are redeemed. We are taken out of the pit of slavery and brought into the throne room of royalty. Our sins are erased. We're put a robe of righteousness on. He puts a ring of authority on our finger. He writes all the days of our life. He calls us his children. We've got royalty flowing through our blood. And listen, instead of you having a written curse against you, you've got nothing but God writing a story of blessing over your life from beginning to end in Jesus. It's in Jesus. So Jesus restores us at the cross. He redeems us at the cross in order to restore our destiny so that we can reign in life. You were created to reign in life. You were created to reign in life through Jesus Christ, not by your efforts. But how do you get from over here where I just gave my life to Jesus? I'm a Christian and I got all these hang-ups. Anybody ever had a hang-up? I got hang-ups. But God's working on the hang-ups because here's what I refuse. I refuse to live my days believing that hang-ups have authority over me because I belong to Jesus. And there is no hang-up that can stand in the shadow of my Jesus. Every chain is broken at the name of Jesus. And so how do we get from being restored in Jesus to walking in death? It requires a process of renewal of our thinking, changing the way that we think. Put it to you this way. In order for paradise restored to become a reality in our life, we have to have a paradigm renewed. Our way of thinking. We have to change the way that we think. Romans chapter 12, verse two says this. Do not be conformed to this world. But be transformed by the renewing of your mind so that you can prove what is the acceptable, perfect will of God for your life. Next week we're gonna talk about how do we change the way that we think? Because now if we've made the decision that I'm going all in, I'm gonna live in the kingdom. Now we gotta learn how to live as overcomers, as kings and queens, as victorious, as saints. As saints, everybody say the truth is in Jesus. Come on, say it like you mean that. Say the truth is in Jesus. Come on, not like a pack of Cub Scouts. Say the truth, I'm gonna, come on, don't make, everybody stand up, you're gonna get this, trust me. Everybody hands up in the air, stretch, touch your toes. No, seriously, touch your toes. I can't but you, please. Now I want you to say this. The truth, that's a little bit better. One more time, say the truth is in Jesus. That's it, that's it. That's it. The truth is in Jesus. It's plain and simple. You wanna live by the world, guess what? The world's cursed. Whoever you put your life in subjection under gets to determine your final end. You live in the world, all it has to offer you is death. And the goal of life is not to arrive safely at death. But if you subject your life under Jesus, he's the one that has overcome death, hell, and the grave. And in Christ, you can find the resurrection power you need to fulfill the purpose, the destiny that God has always had for your life. You can find peace, righteousness, and joy. It's in the kingdom. But if you're gonna live in the kingdom, you gotta leave the old behind. You gotta put on the new and leave the old behind. Today, we all get to make that decision. Would you bow your heads with me all over this room? Today, I want you to examine your heart. I wanna say this different, and please, no one looking around, this is a sacred moment. I just want you to close your eyes and examine your own heart and really listen to what the Holy Spirit is saying this morning. I wanna ask you this question. If you're here today and you know beyond a shadow of a doubt that you're saved, your sins are forgiven, Jesus is Lord of your life. Not saying you're perfect, but you have made the decision to make Jesus the king of your life. Not the world, not other people's opinions. You believe that Jesus died on the cross, rose from the dead, and that he is the king, and you've personally invited him into your life. Today, when no one looking around, that's when you raise your hand if you've made that decision. You know that Jesus is the Lord of your life. You're confident of that. Thank you, you can put your hands down. Would you pray? Because there are some people that are in this room who either don't know the answer to that question or very honestly know that they've never done that. There's even some that are here that say, you know what, Pastor Lee, I prayed that prayer, made that decision a long time ago, but the truth is I walked away. Kind of like the prodigal son in the story that Jesus told in Luke. He asked his father for his inheritance and he left home and he went and lived in the world and did the world things and spent it all on himself and his desires. One day he woke up in the pig pen and the Bible says that he came to himself and he realized what he had done and he decided to go home. Some of us are in that place today. Some of us are here and it's like, I knew God, I grew up in church, right? Pray to prayer and ask Jesus into my heart, but the reality is I've spent good portion of my life living for myself, the way of the world, not concerned about what God thinks. And now I find myself in a place in my life where I'm in the pig pen and I wish I could go home. I want to go home to the Father. You need to come to yourself, you need to come to yourself, which means remember who you are. Today some are here today and you've never made Jesus Christ the Lord of your life. You've never done that. You've maybe believed in the existence of God, but I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about you having an intimate relationship with God where he comes in and forgives you for your sins against him and he gives you a new heart and a new life and a new calling and a new identity. And you repent of the old and you say today, I want to live in the kingdom. I want to reign in the kingdom. I want to be a child of God. And so I reject my old identity. Today God forgive me. If you've never done that, today's your day. If you're a prodigal, today's your day. Today if you say I just don't know, today I want to make sure that every single one of us lead this place confident that we're right with God. That doesn't mean you have all the answers. It doesn't mean that everything's fixed. It just means that you have God, the Holy Spirit living on the inside of you. You're right with God. All over this room right now, please if you're hearing you say, Pastor Lee, I know I need to get my life right with God. I couldn't raise my hand a moment ago because I'm either unsure or I'm positive that I'm not right with God. Maybe you're a prodigal and you say, I need to come home today. I need to get right with God. All over this room, I want to pray with you. If you say, I know I need to get my life right with God. Pray for me. We're going to do just that, but I want you to take a step of faith. I want you to acknowledge that before God. I just want you to lift your hand. No one's looking around, just me, but indicate and say, pray for me. I need to get my life right with God today. I want you to just raise it. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. I see your hand, thank you. Over here to my right, I see your hand. Come on, just raise it. Say, pray for me. I want to be in this prayer today. I want to get right with God. Yes, I want to make Jesus Lord of my life. I see this hand over here all the way in the back. If that's you, you just raise it. I just sense that there's a couple of people in the back of the room who don't have their hands raised right now because you're fighting an internal battle. Today, let Jesus win that battle. Just take that step, raise your hand. Thank you, all the way in the back. Thank you, thank you, sir. I see that hand, lots of hands. I'm so proud of all of you. Would you just put your hands down right now? Thank you for your honesty. The Bible says this, if we believe in our hearts and we confess with our mouth out loud that Jesus is Lord, we will be saved. It will begin the process of following Jesus. It's how we're born again. So, I'm gonna lead us in a prayer. I want everyone in this room to say this prayer out loud. Say it with me. Say, Heavenly Father, I come in Jesus' name. And I confess that Jesus is Lord. I believe he died on the cross for all of my sin, taking my penalty, so I don't have to. And I believe that you raised Jesus from the dead physically, alive, forever. And I believe that he's seated on the throne, reigning and ruling. And today, I bow my knee and I say, forgive me. Cleanse me of my sin. Jesus, come into my heart and be my Lord and Savior. From this day forward, I put off my old self and I choose to follow Jesus. I turn my back on my past and I set my face like flint to following Jesus. Teach me, fill me and lead me in Jesus' name. Amen.