Core Values of the Believer - Part 2 - Pastor Philip Steele - June 21st, 2026

Hi, my name is Michelle Steele.

Pastor Phillip and I want to thank you for listening to this message from Life of Faith Earth.

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Let's go to 1 John 4.

And this is where we want to begin.

We're talking about the core values of the believer.

Uh in uh April of 2024, uh Brother Jerry, Jerry Savelle, had asked me to fly with him to Branson.

He was going to be speaking at uh Life of Faith uh or Faith Life Church there uh with Brother Moore.

And uh we were there for three days, and I was sitting on the front row, the last meeting that we were gonna be in Saturday morning, and uh at 1045, and the Lord spoke to me.

He said, uh, these are the core values of the believer.

And he said seven things to me.

And uh I'll I'll go through them real quickly.

If you were here Wednesday, we dealt with uh we gave these, but we'll give them out again.

Number one, the first core value is put the word first place.

Put the word first place.

Secondly, is determined to walk by faith.

Determined to walk by faith.

Uh the third is refuse to be critical.

Refuse to be critical.

The fourth is determined to be thankful.

Determined to be thankful.

I'm thankful for everything and expect nothing from nobody.

Hallelujah.

Be thankful, determined to be thankful.

Number five, determined to walk in love.

Determined to walk in love.

The sixth is determined to be led by the spirit through the inner man.

Determined to be led by the spirit through the inner man.

And then the seventh is refuse to be double-minded.

Refuse to be double-minded.

So put the word first place, determined to walk by faith, refuse to be critical, determined to be thankful, determined to walk in love, determined to be led by the Spirit through the inner man, and then seventh is refuse to be double-minded.

And we've been centering up on this walking in love, and one of the main reasons is because the operation of everything on this list requires the walk of love.

Everything.

I show you a super excellent way.

Now, that doesn't mean that we don't need those gifts and they're not important.

We shouldn't honor them and respect them.

What it means is that you can walk in those gifts, and if you're not operating in love, the more super excellent way is what the Amplified Bible says.

If you're not operating in love, then all that you're doing really is counting for nothing.

Because love has to be the driving force.

Amen.

He said in 1 Corinthians, you'll remember uh uh, or 2 Corinthians chapter 13, 1 Corinthians 13, 1 and 2.

2 Corinthians 13 · chapter mention

He said, if I have the gift of prophecy, I understand all mystery, I speak with the tongues of men and angels, I know all wisdom, I have faith, so I can move mountain after mountain.

He said, and I do not have love, God's love in me, I'm a useless nobody.

That's what he said.

Well, what does that mean?

That means that all of those gifts, all of that faith is for me to do two things to do what God wants me to do and to help other people.

Because love is about the other person.

Now, while that sounds simplified, we're getting to 1 John 4, bear with me.

You know, over the number of years in in ministry, pastoring people, you know, I've had a lot of marriage counseling.

And and people will come in, you know, people come into marriage counseling and they want to get the first word in, they want to get the high ground because they want they want to make sure you hear their part.

And I I understand it.

I mean, I do.

I do, and I'm not being critical.

But I will stop them every time say, well, but hang on, hang on.

Let me ask you a question.

Do you love her?

Do you love him?

And usually the response is affirmative.

Well, yes.

Okay, then we can work this out.

Because it doesn't matter who was right and who was wrong, if you're both walking in love, love will figure out a way to work it out.

Right?

Love will forgive the one that was wrong.

Love will forgive.

And and right on the other hand, love won't be prideful about being right.

Because if we can walk in love, we can fix anything.

Is that right?

Say it out loud.

God's love in me can fix anything.

Hallelujah.

And very often when we talk about love, people want to go down the road, you know, and they, you know, just not being offended and forgiving.

Folks, listen, things like that, that that is just maturity.

If if a person is easily offended, they're just immature in Christ.

They're a baby.

I don't care if they've been saved 50 years, if they are easily offended, they need to grow up.

Amen.

A little quieter than I wanted it to be, but it's still the truth.

Right?

I I said Wednesday night.

You know, people talk about how traffic uh enrages them and they get upset.

Are you are you kidding me?

That we're born again and we're filled with the Holy Ghost, and a guy's bad driving in front of me can enrage me?

I don't understand it.

I'm not saying I've never been there.

I'm just saying that that seems very immature to me.

What does love do?

Love grows you up.

Love grows you up, it produces maturity in our lives.

In 1 John 4 and verse 8, these are some verses that we taught on in depth about a year ago here.

And um I'm looking back on some of them because you know the Word of God is expanding revelation.

1 John 4 and verse 8.

Notice it says, He that loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love.

So we want to focus on those last four words.

God is, for God is love.

All right.

And then in verse 16, and we have known and believed the love that have that God hath for us or to us, for God is love.

So again we see for God is love.

God is love.

Present tense, that's what he is.

God is love.

Hallelujah.

God is love now.

And here's what's so important.

Whatever God presently is, he has always been.

And whatever he's always been, he will always be.

That's the aspect of God's faithfulness.

That's why the Bible refers to God over and over as something immovable and unchangeable.

A rock, a high tower.

Amen.

A utterly uh inescapable thing.

The Bible refers to God as immortal, eternal, forever.

All right?

His name, Jehovah, that he introduced himself to the people of Israel in the very beginning of the Bible.

His name, Jehovah, means the eternally self-existent one.

He is eternal.

Everything that God does is eternal.

Everything that God is is eternal.

Amen.

When we think of eternity, we've got to think in terms of what the word means.

Eternity, by definition, is the absence of time.

And so people, I've had people ask, how old is God?

Something eternal doesn't age.

You can't age it, you can't quantify it because it's eternal.

So why is this so important?

Because anything connected to that eternal being is the same way.

You can't plumb the depths of it.

How much love does God have?

Enough for the entire world?

Enough for everybody that ever lived, ever will live, and ever has lived.

And here's the thing: it didn't drop the needle on it a centimeter.

Because God is love.

He doesn't have love.

He doesn't just possess love, he is love.

Hallelujah.

Tell your neighbor, say, God is love.

See, this is important.

And when I begin to grasp this, and we're going to look at some other things, when I begin to grasp this, I begin to understand the depth of it.

That's why Paul wrote in the book of Ephesians, and he said, I want you to be able to grasp and understand the height, the depth, the breadth of the love of God.

If a person understands that, life changes.

Because there are people who say, well, God loved me so much he saved me from sin.

That's part of it.

Well, God loved me so much he did this.

That's part of it.

What's the beginning of each of those conversations?

God loved me so much.

John 3.16, you know the verse.

God so loved the world he gave.

How much did God love the world so much that he gave?

Hallelujah.

So he loved the world so much that he gave.

So we know that's part of his character.

How much does God love you so much that he'll give you whatever you ask for?

That's what the scripture says.

Whatever you ask in my name, I'll do it for you.

Amen.

How much does God love you so much he'll heal you when you ask him?

How much does God love you so much he'll give you a blessing when you need it?

How much does God love you?

He loves you so much he'll save your children.

He'll save your grandchildren.

How much does God love you?

He'll release that bondage that's in your mind.

How much does God love you?

He'll turn everything around that seems to be going wrong because that's just how good he is.

But where's all that goodness stem from?

His love.

Why am I good to my children and grandchildren?

I love them.

Why am I good to my wife?

Because I love her.

Not good because I think I have to be.

Not good, right?

Not God is not good to us because he thinks he has to be.

He's good because he's good.

God doesn't love us because he has to, he loves us because he's love.

Oh, hallelujah.

Do you see that?

And so when when someone says you cannot escape the love of God, they're exactly right.

You cannot.

It's everywhere, it's all around us.

You're running into it every day.

Every time the Holy Spirit deals with you about something you didn't know, you just ran into the love of God.

Every time that the word of God comes to pass in your life, you just ran into the love of God.

Why is it that God cannot lie?

Because God is love.

Why is it that God cannot change?

Because God is love.

Love doesn't lie.

Love doesn't change.

Love doesn't love you today and not love you tomorrow.

Hallelujah.

Amen.

The word is agape.

And everywhere you see agape in the scripture, it's always defined as divine self-sacrificial love.

We're not going to get into this today, but that's the love that God said he wanted us to love each other with.

He said in John 13, he said, by this what?

By this agape, will all men know that you're my disciples, that you have love one for another, this divine self-sacrificial love with no strings attached.

So we don't love expecting something in return.

We just love.

God didn't love expecting something in return.

Hallelujah.

God's nature is love.

Now many have a tough time walking in love because they're not aware that if they are a believer, their nature is love.

Their nature is love.

Now just bear with me on this point.

Because you'll hear people and they'll talk about their nature this way.

Well, yeah, I got upset, you know.

That Italian came out in me.

The Cajun came out in me.

Well, you know, I can be stubborn because you know I am from Missouri.

The show me state.

Well, no, I mean, that's comical.

I mean, it's humorous, but what are they saying?

This is my nature.

My nature is I'm stubborn.

My nature is, and you name the ethnicity.

You know, we get mad.

Right?

Remember what Jesse always says?

A tabasco started coming up my leg, right?

Anyway.

What stops that Tabasco?

Understanding what my nature is.

Under understanding who I'm of.

Right?

Because the re the reason that's so important is the way that you believe your nature is, is the direction you're gonna go.

Hallelujah.

And uh when we were born again, we were saved, rescued from sin, and we were redeemed from the curse of the fall of Adam, and redeemed from the curse of the law.

Now there are people that they won't disagree with that, but here's something else.

Our nature was transformed, and our nature was transformed from a nature of sin to the nature of God.

Let's look at a few verses.

Romans 7.

Now, a lot of people go to Romans 7 to discuss the struggle that people have with the flesh, but the issue is, is Paul's not writing Romans 7 from the standpoint of a born-again man.

He's talking about him before salvation, before Christ.

He says in Romans 7 and verse 4, notice this.

Wherefore, my brethren, you are also become dead to the law by the body of Christ, that you should be married to another, even to him that's raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit to God.

For when, now, now notice the words, for when we were in the flesh, when we were in the flesh.

If he's saying, when we were in the flesh, he's insinuating we're not there anymore.

Now, when people hear in the flesh, they think, well, I'm in the flesh, I'm in my body, I live on this earth.

It's not what he's talking about.

He's talking about when you were living out of the flesh, when you lived your life from the flesh, notice the motions of sin which were by the law did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death.

But now, everybody say, but now.

All right, see, but now.

So what he said in the verse previous was what it was previously.

But now, notice, but now we are delivered from the law, that being dead wherein we were held, that we should serve in newness of spirit and not in the oldness of the letter.

So he uses this word over and over again in his epistles: newness, new life.

You know, anything new is not just a revamped version of what was.

Anything new is not used.

When you got born again, you did not just become a better version of what you were.

The Bible says you became a new creation.

Now, again, that seems elementary, but if I'm a new creation, then all that other old stuff doesn't apply.

Because my nature is new.

Is that right?

My nature is new.

Glory to God.

So our nature was transformed from a nature of sin to the nature of God.

Let's look at John 3.

John chapter 3.

And verse 3.

Jesus, speaking to Nicodemus, he said, Truly, truly, I say to you, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

Now there's two things.

The kingdom of God is not heaven, the kingdom of God is the system that we live in.

So he said, if you're not born again, you can't see the kingdom.

But when he said born again, it means born from above.

Born from above, born anew from above.

Now take the time to explain all this because we have to understand this.

When you were born naturally, fleshly, when you were born into this earth, you had never existed before in the earth.

So they called you a what?

A newborn.

That person has a newborn baby.

They've never been here before, they're new.

Right?

They're new.

We understand that.

Well, the Bible says that when you came to the knowledge and made Jesus your Savior, your Lord, you were born again.

Born again.

But when where were you born from?

Above.

Anew.

That's why the scripture in 2 Corinthians 5 17 that says, if any man be in Christ, he's a new creature.

The word means literally a species of being that's never existed before.

So when you were born again by the power of the Holy Spirit, a being that never existed before showed up.

Now, how can I still be what I was when the Bible says I'm new?

How can my nature still be what it was when the Bible says the nature of God has been placed in me?

Hallelujah.

So what's my life source now?

God.

The nature of God.

But what religion has done over the years is taught people to expect a struggle with the flesh.

Well, you know, you're gonna struggle with the flesh, the old flesh, but oh the old flesh, old flesh is just waiting.

The old flesh has no power over the new nature.

You the Bible says that I am not a debtor to the flesh to live after it anymore.

I owe the flesh nothing.

Now, let's just be honest.

I don't know maybe how long you lived in the flesh before you got saved.

But your flesh has never brought you anything good into your life.

Ever.

It's only ever been a problem.

Why?

Because the Bible says the flesh does not want the things of God.

That the old nature.

So when you were born again, you received a new nature.

You weren't only saved from hell, you were totally made new.

And that's where we do ourselves a disservice.

We look in the mirror and we think that what we're seeing is us.

The Lord told me one time, he said, never make the mistake of looking in the mirror and thinking that's the real you.

It's the carrying case, it's what carries you around.

This body gives you license and authority to be in the earth.

It carries the one with the authority around.

The one with the authority is the one in me.

Where's he at?

In me, in my body.

Is that right?

And so when I look at myself, I look at myself, I see what I look like in the natural, but I understand what the man of God always said, and people would quote it.

And if you think about it, people will quote it and they'll be like, oh, isn't that wonderful?

That's what he thought.

John Lake would look at himself in the mirror and say, There stands a man full of God.

And people say, if you want to see all those miracles, that's how you have to think.

If you want to see all those miracles, you have to understand that your nature has been changed, and there's nothing in you to stop those miracles from coming to pass.

My nature has been changed.

Say it out loud, my nature has been changed.

Oh, glory to Jesus.

Now, verse 6 of the same chapter, it says, That which is born of the flesh is flesh.

And that which is born of the spirit is spirit.

The amplified Bible says, What is born of the spirit is spirit.

Well, the Bible says you were born of the spirit.

So what does that mean?

I am spirit.

Yeah, but Pastor, I see myself.

I'm flesh.

No, you're not.

You're spirit.

This is not you.

You are inside this.

Hallelujah.

Just do yourself a favor.

Hold your hands out and look at it and say, This is not me.

This is not me.

You never age.

You will never die.

One day this carrying case will outlive its usefulness and they'll put it in the ground somewhere, but you will never die.

Why?

Because you've been made alive with the life of God.

God cannot die.

God cannot be weak.

God cannot be sick.

God cannot, right?

God cannot be overcome.

There's nothing the devil throws your way that you cannot overcome.

There's nothing that the flesh may want that you cannot overcome.

Putting the flesh on the same level as your new nature.

It's not there.

It's not on the same level.

It has no hope of running the show when you're constantly turning back to the new nature.

Hallelujah.

It can be something as simple as you saying, I am the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus.

I'm a new creature in Christ Jesus.

I'm holy by the blood of Jesus.

I'm consecrated by the blood of Jesus.

You know why holiness is such a problem for some people?

Because they live like they're fleshly, not like they're a spirit.

I'm just going to be very honest with you.

Sin is not a problem when you're living like you have a new nature.

I know what some are thinking, well, you know, we all sin.

We all can sin.

We all can sin.

Everybody can sin.

Doesn't mean you have to.

I say it doesn't mean you have to.

The grocery store I like to go to.

I don't know why they set it up this way.

But to get to a certain part of the grocery store, you almost have to walk through the wine aisle.

Right?

You know why.

Yeah.

Amen.

You know, I never have to grab myself by the collar and say, no, no, boy, come on.

No.

I never have to do that.

It holds no allurement for me.

Right?

Amen.

I was standing waiting on Liliana the other day.

She had to go to the ladies' room.

And I was standing, and right there where I was waiting was right in front of the Copenhagen and the Marlborough.

You know?

Hallelujah.

You know, Copenhagen snuff, you know, snuff.

My lord, five dollars and eighty-nine cents a can.

People talk about how bad the economy is and putting another dip in their mouth.

I don't, I don't, man, you could, you'd almost make a house payment if you saved all that up.

What's that got to do with the message?

Nothing.

Other than I did not have to fight the urge to buy Copenhagen.

I do listen to Copeland Hagen, but I do not, I did not have to fight the urge.

Why?

I have a new nature.

I say I have a new nature.

That's an elementary illustration, but think about that.

So why does a person, why does a person struggle with these things?

Because they're not living fully in who they are.

You got to give the new nature free reign.

That's why he said over and over again in the epistles, Paul uses the word yield.

Whoever you yield your members to, you're their servant.

But notice, I have to yield.

So the flesh can't make me do anything.

The devil cannot make me do anything.

I have to yield.

If you look at something, you gotta give your eyes to it.

Let me come right here in the middle where they think I'm teaching the right thing.

Right?

If you hear something, you gotta give your ears to it.

If you act a certain way, you gotta give your members to it.

It doesn't just happen.

I was talking to a guy one time and he told me he accidentally committed adultery.

I said, accidentally?

Now I'm I'm I'm gonna lighten the conversation.

I said, you mean to tell me that you just showed up in the hotel room and your pants accidentally fell down?

No, that wasn't an accident, brother.

That was an intentional act.

And people say, well, you know, the devil hated my ministry.

The devil hated my ministry, and that's why I fell into sin.

That's a bunch of baloney.

That's as much garbage as anybody can shovel in one direction at any time.

The devil hates everybody's ministry, but too bad, so sad, he doesn't have a say over what goes on in it.

Because he's defeated.

Who defeated him?

My elder brother Jesus.

And then what did he do?

He gave me the nature of a conqueror.

He said, I am more than a conqueror through him that loves me.

I can do all things through Christ.

Greater is he that's in you than he that's in the world.

Amen.

Those are things we quote.

That's how you live.

Amen.

I've had people ask me, how do you know, Pastor?

How do you know that you're you know how do you know that everything's gonna be all right tomorrow?

Because the one that holds tomorrow that said it's gonna be alright, he's in me.

And he said everything's gonna be okay.

I just gotta follow him.

I've done it, I preached myself happy.

My nature is not the nature I was born with.

Why, flesh is not my nature.

Flesh will do what I, what the new nature allows it to do, what I tell it to do.

In Colossians 2 and 20.

Now I'm going through all this because I want you to see what your nature is.

It it we do people a disservice when we tell them to do something that they're not sure their new nature can do.

Amen.

Now I'm not asking for a show of hands, but I've dealt with people over over the decades I've been pastoring.

You just, you know, you just you just learn things.

I dealt with a lady one time I was ministering on walking in love.

I'd never seen her before in the church.

And she came into church and I happened to be centering up on forgiveness and forgiving those that have done you wrong.

And she came up to me after church and she said, I want to ask you a question.

And it wasn't very a very nice, you know, sound in her voice.

So I didn't know, you know, if I said no, she might whoop me.

So I said, Okay, I'll answer your question if I can.

She said, Are you telling me that I gotta forgive this man that did this to me and did this to me and this other?

And you know, the the simple answer, of course, is yes.

But I said, Dear sister, you know, I don't know you.

But if, you know, what you're telling me is true, if you're gonna move forward in your life, just in your life, you're gonna have to forgive.

Well, she got mad and left.

Now I'm not I'm not criticizing her.

Why did she get mad and leave?

She couldn't see herself doing it.

Why?

She didn't know who she was.

The one in me is the one that hung on the cross and said to the people that killed him, Father, forgive them.

Why, why forgive them, father?

Why forgive them?

They don't know what they're doing.

That's why he said, forgive them.

They don't know.

So he wasn't mad at them.

He wasn't hurt at them.

He wasn't frustrated with them.

He said, forgive them because they don't know what they're doing.

What if I live that way?

Father, I know that person said this, but I don't think they knew what they were saying.

Forgive them.

What if I treat people that way?

Somebody just gets mad and chews you out.

Man, I know you love me.

You you're having a they're having a bad day.

They must have had a bad day.

You remember what Brother Moore said?

He said, if they walk up and slap you, you say, You tripped.

You you tripped.

You you tripped and hit me accidentally.

You didn't mean to do that.

Now he's saying that's how love responds.

But here's the thing: if you don't realize your new nature, how can you respond that way?

And so it is it is an exercise in futility to try to teach people to walk in the God kind of love without them realizing the God nature on the inside of me.

Hallelujah.

So Colossians 2 and 20.

Notice he said, if you are dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why as though living in the world are you subject to ordinances?

If you're dead with Christ, in other words, why are you living like you're not?

I died, Galatians 2.20.

I died with Christ, but yet I live, yet not I.

Christ lives in me.

Amen.

As a believer, my nature is not the nature that I was born with.

The amplified Bible says of Colossians 2.20, why do you live as if you still belong to the world?

Why do you live as if you still belong to the world?

That's not just talking about sin, it's talking about all of these other issues.

As believers, we were born again, born from above, with a new nature.

It's what?

The nature of the Father.

If people are not aware that their nature has changed, they'll continue to live a defeated life.

They'll continue to live a defeated life.

In Romans 6 and 4.

Romans chapter 6, verse 4.

Romans 6:4

Notice what he says here.

Therefore, we are buried with him by baptism into death.

That like as, or just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so, we also should walk in newness of life.

We walk in newness of life.

So believers have been separated from the evil nature.

I'm separated from it.

By what?

The death of Christ.

That was the separation point.

Hallelujah.

If people are not aware that their nature has changed, they'll continue to live a defeated life.

My nature has changed.

Your nature has changed.

Whether you know it or not, whether a believer knows it or not, their nature has changed.

Hallelujah.

You take on the nature of your father.

Your father God.

Everything that you can find about God in regards to his makeup, his personality, if you will, that's part of you.

And so when he says in 1 Corinthians 13, remember he says, love is.

I can say God is.

I can say I am.

And then he lists all these attributes of love.

How can I be so patient?

Because I have the nature of love.

How can I be so kind?

Because I have the nature of love.

How can I be forgiving?

I have the nature of love.

How can I pay no attention to what somebody did to me?

I have the nature of love.

How can I refuse to be offended before the opportunity to be offended ever shows up?

Because I have the nature of love.

I can go around every day saying I am unoffendable because I have the nature of love on the inside of me.

You can't offend me.

It's impossible for you to offend me because I have the nature of love residing on the inside of me.

Love does not think that people have an ulterior motive.

Love doesn't run around saying, well, what do you mean by that?

How come them to respond that way?

How come them to say that?

Love is looking for a way to think the best of every person.

That's the nature of God.

I say that's the nature of God.

Wherever God found you, however God found you, he thought better of you than you were thinking of yourself.

He thought better of you than anybody had ever thought about you.

As good as your mama was to you, she was not nearly as good as you to you as Ma as God was and is.

So every time every time, every time we're facing a challenge, the devil brings up something we did, and the flesh starts agreeing.

And God says, This is what I've done for you.

This is what I've made you.

Now get out of that doldrum, get out of that fog, and see yourself the way I see you.

You know, Brother Hagin used to make this statement.

He would say, I've gone months and years at a time, and I didn't even know I had a body.

And people would always refer that to him talking about healing.

It wasn't just divine healing.

It was talking about I live so much from my spirit, man, my body doesn't give me any trouble.

You see this?

Well, we just need more teaching on holiness.

We need more teaching on our nature has been made holy.

And we just walk out that nature, that holiness in our nature.

Folks, it's listen, it's not what you wear, it's not what you watch or don't watch, it's not what you do or don't do that makes you holy.

You were made holy at the new birth.

You've got to live it out.

The holiness of God on the inside of you, it just will not allow you to do, see, say, do certain things because it's the holiness of God.

You're you're holy in your nature.

You're holy.

Don't try to make yourself holy.

I'll tell you what, I'm holy.

I don't watch that show.

Well, you don't watch that one, but you watch that one.

See, what you watch on TV or don't watch doesn't make you holy.

But whether or not you believe you're holy will determine what you watch.

That's good preaching.

Amen.

See, this is important, and that's why people struggle, and that's why they can even go to churches where holiness is taught hard and holiness is taught hot, and they can go out and live unholy because they don't see themselves as capable of living holy.

They have a list that they're trying to hit.

And whenever you come up with the list, you have now attributed your success as a believer to the flesh.

Well, as long as I don't do this, and if I don't do that, well, that's called your righteousness.

And he said that was as filthy rags.

How do people with a new nature approach things?

Now, Father, here's the issue.

I've struggled with that in the past, but I'm a new I'm a new creature.

I have a new nature.

I'm expecting not to not to struggle with that.

I have power over that in the name of Jesus.

Amen.

And then what do you do?

He said you put it away from you, you put it out, and you don't deal with it anymore.

Again, I'm not going to ask for a show of hands, but there might be somebody in here for you guys saved, you cussed.

One very honest man over here.

And Joe's like, well, yeah, yeah, oh yeah.

I bet you made up cuss words.

Yeah, amen.

Anyway, but think about this.

Think about this.

One day, just the desire to cuss was gone.

Didn't even come to your mind, did it?

Why?

The nature had changed.

Pastor Michelle would say the cusser was cut out.

Whatever it was.

That's why we hear these stories.

There are people, maybe under the sound of my voice.

You you know my wife's testimony.

Addicted to to uh uh uh narcotics all those years, never heard the gospel until she was 23 years of age.

Went into that that that meeting, and the man of God, my dad, asked her, Do you want do you want change?

Do you want God to change your life?

She stood up and said, Yes, I want God to change my life.

Had hands laid on her, the power of God came on her.

You all know the story.

Instantly delivered.

Thirty-five years ago that happened.

Never went back, never wanted to go back, never had a slip-up, never had a relapse.

Well, she must have had a strong constitution.

No, she immediately began learning that her nature had been changed.

She was no longer an addict, she was a delivered child of God.

Nature had changed.

Nature had changed.

What if she'd have hung around a bunch of people and said, now, look, you know how you addicts are.

So we got to get you in a program.

We got to make sure you you go through all now, and I'm not against any steps.

The 12 steps, 10 steps, 42 steps, 89 steps to the 25 steps.

I'm not against any of it.

All right?

You understand?

In my heart here.

But what if that had been the thing?

I've known people that were born again, that every day of their life they got up and called themselves an alcoholic and they lived in fear of their next slip up.

When are they gonna fall off the wagon?

I don't have and you'd say, Well, brother, you got victory over that.

I'll never have victory over it.

I'll always be an alcoholic.

You're a new creature.

You have a new nature on the inside of you.

You cannot be an alcoholic and be a new creature.

You cannot be an alcoholic and have a new nature.

You might have to put up safeguards.

You don't want to go hang out with the people you used to hang out with.

You got to change your playground and change your playmates, but you're not doing it because you're an alcoholic.

You're doing it because darkness doesn't hang out in the light.

Jesus said that when you live as light, you'll reprove the works of darkness.

Not succumb to them, not fall prey to them, not be sucked into it.

Am I helping anybody?

Why did that happen?

Because she got around people that taught her, your nature has changed.

Your nature has changed.

Amen.

Glory to God.

Ephesians 4.

And verse 20.

It says, but you have not so learned Christ, if so be that you heard him and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus, that you put off concerning the former conversation, the lifestyle, the old man which is corrupt according to the deceitful lust, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.

So the new creature, the new man, was created in the image of God in righteousness and true holiness.

If there's a true holiness, there's a made-up holiness.

So how was I created?

In righteousness and true holiness.

And what do I have to do?

Live it out.

Live that out.

One translation, the Weast Bible says, you've put off once and for all your former manner of life, the old self.

You've put it off.

And then he said, you have put on once and for all the new self.

So the old self is put off once and for all.

The new self is put on once and for all.

There are believers that live their life like nothing has changed.

They get saved and they live like nothing has changed.

I don't just mean sin.

I mean all the things that came about through the old nature.

They just live like nothing has changed.

They live with the temper, they live with all this frustration, they live with all these fleshly traits that their family has, and everything has changed.

Everything has changed.

I can't tell you how many times I heard growing up that steel temper, steel temper, steel temper.

All those steel men, steel temper.

Oh, they just they get mad, they want to fight, they want to this, they want to that.

Man, and and and one day I hadn't been married very long.

Michelle and I hadn't been married very long.

And that that temper, you know, I don't think there's anything worse than an unbridled temper.

I just don't.

It causes so much destruction.

And and and it wasn't Tabasco, I don't know what it was.

But I was, I, I'd I'd just get angry.

And and in, you know, in the past, you know, the Steele family, it's the louder you are, the righter you are.

You could not go to gatherings because there'd always be an argument.

Well, what do you expect when you got a bunch of flesh people that can't discuss anything, and so they'd just shout you down till your opinion was irrelevant.

Amen.

And and one day I got up and I said, now, Father, I'm not gonna be that way.

I'm not gonna be that angry man.

You said in your word, make no friendship with an angry man because you'll learn his ways.

Isn't that important?

He says, Don't hang around angry people because you'll learn how to how they do things.

And he went on in the book of Proverbs, and remember what he said?

He said this.

He said, A man that has no control over his spirit is like a city that's broken down and without walls.

And I made the determination right then, that's not gonna be me.

Amen.

Now, now I'm not bragging on me, I'm just saying.

I decided I don't have to have this, so I'm not gonna have it.

My wife has said to me over the years, she said, I'll tell you what, everything could fall apart and it wouldn't bother you at all.

Now, in a good way.

Oh no.

I'm like Brother Hagin.

Remember, he was, he was, he said he was going in the house and they'd come back from church, and he said, I had uh I had Pat in one arm and I had Ken Jr.

in another arm, and he said, I'm fumbling with the keys, trying to unlock the door, and Miss Oretha was upset about something, and she said, Well, I'll tell you what, if me and these kids just fell dead on the porch right here, it wouldn't bother you at all.

He said, I said, No, you'd be dead.

What what worried but what trouble would there be worrying about it then?

I'm not suggesting that you say that, but that that that was his mindset.

There's nothing what I can't do anything about, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna get upset about it.

I'm not gonna get frustrated about it.

Hallelujah.

It is not I, in these verses, is not a reference to my body.

It is a reference to the new man.

It's not a reference to my body.

If you have heard, you put off the old man, you put on the new man.

Hallelujah.

Your body, we've said this is not you, it carries it with you.

I, the new man, I want to walk in love.

I the new man, I want to forgive.

I the new man, I want to be kind.

That's why in Ephesians, you'll remember in Ephesians, he said, Be kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God, for Christ's sake, has forgiven you.

So I can do just like God did.

Right?

I can I can do that.

Now we have to deal with the flesh, but we deal with it from the new nature.

Look at Colossians 3.

You know, the Bible has a lot to say about this.

Colossians 3 and 9.

Lie not one to another.

Well, now why, Paul?

Why why is should we not lie?

Seeing you've put off the old man with his deeds.

So what does he say?

Lying is the deed of the old man.

What else does the Bible say about the old man?

He's dead.

Old man is dead.

Amen.

I had a friend one time, uh, there was a uh a Christian rock group when in late 70s, early 80s that we all listened to, and they had a song called Killing the Old Man.

And uh that's how it went to kill the old man, right?

And his dad wasn't saved, and he didn't understand this terminology.

And my friend had this up loud in his in his uh uh uh room one day, kill the old man.

And his dad came in and goes, son, do we need to get you some help?

He said, What do you mean he said you're listening to a song about killing your dad?

He said, No, dad, no, that's that's not what I'm talking about.

All right, but the old man is dead.

Said out loud, the old man is dead.

Hallelujah.

See?

So he says in Colossians 3 9, don't lie because you put off the old man with his deeds, and you have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge, after the what?

The image of him that created him.

So I have been created after the image of God.

Hallelujah.

And notice it it doesn't say recreated him, it says created him.

My new man was not a recreation, it was a creation.

To be recreated, I existed before.

No, I was created.

If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation.

So why is it new?

I've been created in the image of God.

Amen.

The Weast Bible says that person you were before you were saved.

And then it says, with his evil practices, and you have clothed yourself with the new man, the person you are after you are saved.

And he says that we should live according to the image of the one that created him.

We talk along these lines Wednesday night that the Bible says over and over again that we are of God.

We are begotten of God.

We are sons and daughters of God, we are the children of God.

First John says, uh beloved, now are we the children of God.

And it does not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when we see Him, we shall be like Him.

Amen.

So the person you were, and the person you are.

The person you were, He said, Put off who you were and live in who you are.

I'm not who I was.

Say that out loud.

I am not who I was.

Now let me finish with this last verse.

1 John 4.

I started to ask you if I'm helping you, but I know I am.

See, this is the answer.

Brother Hagin would make a statement.

He's talking about natural children.

He said, you can't put a 20-year-old head on a three-year-old's body.

In other words, a three-year-old's not going to act like a 20-year-old.

You can't expect them to.

Right?

You just cannot expect them to.

When all of our children, but our most recent, Liliana, uh, she'll be, you believe she's gonna be 10 in November.

Ten years old.

Uh in any event, when she when she when we were starting to train her up, you know, we had to start, we had a song that we would sing.

It's from Miss Patty Cake.

And it was, it went clean up, clean up, everybody everywhere.

Clean up, clean up, everybody do your share.

And she would waddle around, clean huh, clean, huh, huh?

She wasn't cleaning up or doing her share.

Right?

She'd pick up one little thing.

And what would we do?

We'd celebrate.

Why?

Because she's getting it, she's doing her best.

Now she's 10.

She's still the cutest thing in the world to me.

But I don't want her waddling around singing clean up, clean up, and picking up one thing.

No, now it's sweetheart.

I ask you to go clean your room.

I need you to go do what I what I ask you to do.

Right?

Why?

Because we're growing up.

I'm maturing.

I'm not who I was.

I'm not three anymore.

I'm growing up in the things of God.

That's why you don't call yourself a sinner.

That's why you don't call yourself unrighteous.

That's why you don't say those things.

You're not who you were.

You're not who you were.

So 1 John 4, verse 4, it says, Notice, we are of, you are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because greater is he that's in you than he that's in the world.

1 John 4:4

They are of the world, therefore they speak of the world, and the world heareth them.

You are of God.

He that knoweth God heareth us, because uh uh he that is not of God heareth not us.

Hereby we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.

Now, this is something as we're wrapping this up that you got to keep continually in your mindset and in your spirit.

I am of God.

Preposition of the the channel, the source.

All right?

Um it speaks of being begotten.

It speaks of a parentage.

My parentage is God.

God is my father.

When we say that, that's not just a spiritual jargon.

God is my father.

God is your father.

All right?

The Bible says we're the children of God.

If I'm God's child, I am his, he's my father.

And people are very quick to say, yeah, but that just means we were adopted.

Wait a minute, hang on.

Yes, I was brought in.

He he adopted me, he predestined me, he chose me, but it cannot just be talking about adoption in the way we talk about it, because the Bible says over and over again, God created us.

We just said the image of him that created him.

That denotes parentage.

That denotes parentage.

Scripture says in the book of uh of in Peter's writings, it says that what happened was the seed of the word of God gave birth to me.

The parentage, the DNA of God.

So when you heard the word, what did you hear?

Either repent and be baptized, or you've got to make Jesus the Lord of your life.

The word of God, the seed of the word of God went into you and created something that had never been there before.

A new creature in Christ Jesus.

Hallelujah.

And when you start telling people that God's your father, you'll get in the same trouble Jesus got into.

Because Jesus never got into trouble until he started saying God was his father and he was the son of God.

You're not the perfect son of God, you're not the sinless son or daughter of God, but nonetheless, you are a son or a daughter of God.

And the Bible says you're an heir and a joint heir with Christ.

The Bible says you're seated at the right hand of God the Father with Christ Jesus in the heavenly places.

The Bible says as a son of God, a daughter of God, you have a right to boldly enter the throne room and to find help in your time of need.

The Bible says as a son or a daughter of God, that whatever you ask the Father in the older name of Jesus, our brother, God will do it for you.

Why?

He'll withhold no good thing from his children.

Nothing.

And when Jesus used the illustration of God being our father, he said to those natural fathers, he said, None of you, if your son asked for a fish, would you give him a stone?

Or if he asked for bread, you wouldn't give him a serpent.

He said, If you being wicked and dead in your sin know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more does the Father know how to give good gifts to his children?

He called us his children.

He said in John 17, when he was praying that great high priestly prayer, at least three different times, or excuse me, two different times.

He was talking about the disciples that were there presently and those that were to come, you and I.

He said this.

He said, Show them that just like I'm not of this world, they're not of this world.

If I'm not of this world, if this is not my parentage, if this is not my DNA, where is it?

The Bible says Jerusalem, which is above, is the mother of us all.

I'm not only heavenly minded, that's where my parentage comes from.

That's home.

Oh, hallelujah.

So I can walk in love because my nature is love.

I can walk in forgiveness because my nature is forgiveness.

Your nature is forgiveness.

And that's where the power principles come in.

You cannot be defeated because love cannot be defeated.

It says love will never fail.

And this has just recurred in my spirit over and over again, even this morning while I was praying about the service.

Those things that you've been reaching for and reaching out for, they're there.

That God has presently has them ready for you.

You just got to reach out and take them.

He said to us in prayer this morning, over and over again, he said, I'm drawing back the curtains.

And he said, You've got to go possess it.

Love has presented everything.

Love has positioned everything.

I've just got to go get it.

I've just got to go receive it.

And even those things that may seem that they've been out of your grasp or out of just out of reach, they're coming close.

They're coming close to you.

You're going to receive them in the name of Jesus.

Why?

Because it's God's plan.

If we are as close to the return of Christ as I believe and other people that I respect believe, then the things that God has said, they're going to come to pass.

Because everything he promised you on this earth, I've heard people say, well, you know, if we don't get it here, we'll get it there.

Well, there are things that he's promised me on this earth that I won't need in heaven.

So it's going to come to pass now.

Hallelujah.

Hallelujah.