Jesus Bought A House - Part 10 | Pastor Paul McGee

We're going to worship you forever, the angels and the 24

elders around the throne. The Bible says crying, holy,

holy, holy Lord, God Almighty, which was and is and is to come

Hallelujah forever. So it's good to get used to

worship right here. It's going to be a for

everything Amen over Yonder. This is just a little just a

little prep session for a forever praise session a man

someday and it'll be a glorious time.

Just a few reminders tonight that this coming weekend on

Saturday, there's going to be a kind of a spring cleaning type

situation going on. There is sign up list out there

if you can be a part of that. I'm hoping for that between 9:00

and 12:00 time frame of being able to get accomplished that.

And there's also going to be the travel outside is going to be

tilled up this Saturday sometime.

So it might require, I don't know yet, the time frame of all

that yet. So it might be if you're here

cleaning everybody park on one side because they might till up

one side and everybody have to move to the other.

It might overlap while you're here.

Amen. But they're going to bring that

gravel back to the top. Also, there is a sign up sheet

just for being a part of the cleaning crew or the cleaning

team that's out there in the foyer as well.

Next Wednesday will be a communion and foot washing

teaching and practice here. Next Wednesday.

This coming Sunday is our third week of Sunday school campaign

along with Pastor David Scott being here ministering in our

fifth Sunday service. Only one service in the AM, no

service in the evening. Just in the 5th Sunday that

morning he'll be here ministering the word of the

Lord. You don't want to miss that.

That'll be a good time. Amen to the Lord as well.

And then Resurrection Sunday be the week after that.

It's just that quick. That's why that's where the

calendar year goes. Folks.

We're about race. Step into April.

Blows my mind. Blows my mind.

But here we are, a man here. We are going to turn to the book

of Genesis chapter #2 Genesis chapter #2 tonight.

Just going to pluck a verse there.

Again, it's going to be a jump off point.

Also, with everything that's being said, on Resurrection

Sunday, we plan on doing a candy rain from this side of the

building to the South side of the Kingdom.

Yeah, whatever you want to call it, but none the less we're

asking for people part of the church bring candy, kid

appropriate candy, like younger vibe candy than some of the

older stuff for for throwing, for throwing off the roof.

All right, on that Sunday, say, well, you just going to throw it

away? Genesis 2 verse #8 The Bible

says the Lord God planted in the garden eastward in Eden.

There he put the man whom he had formed.

There he put the man whom he had formed.

We've been looking at this concept of Jesus by the house.

We're continuing with that tonight.

I want to talk to you tonight about the Genesis face.

The Genesis face, All right. Amen.

Can we say God bless? His word may be seated tonight.

Yeah. His words are already blessed.

I'm the one that needs to bless him.

My wife's thrown down on me up here and that's OK.

I can handle it. We've already talked about in

previous weeks. And just for a a little recap,

remember that the principles of holiness are eternal principles.

They have their origin in eternity.

We looked at that to a great length last week.

And so they do not become obsolete.

And so God really has put them on display to a certain degree

in the Garden of Eden. And they they are things that he

used. Again, if we can use Romans 120,

he uses some of the things that he created to give expression to

invisible things. The Bible says for the invisible

things of him Speaking of God, which remember when there was

nothing else, it was just kind of totally invisible because

there was no one else to appreciate.

So all of these invisible things, the traits, the

attributes of God from the creation, the world, are clearly

seen being understood by the things that are made, even his

eternal power and Godhead. And I think it's important, it

says even his eternal power and Godhead.

In other words, it's not just limited to those things are even

understood by what is made, but also other things that are

understood by what is made. And so they are without excuse.

And so the Garden of Eden showed us really God's pattern, his

ideal pattern for man prior to the fall, right?

We oftentimes go back to the fall as that, that marker on the

timeline for humanity. But really there's a time that's

between the creation and the fall, right?

There is this pristine time that God had to idolize the idea for

humanity, for mankind, for the world.

It was God intention for man from the very beginning.

What, what God had intended really for the world from the

very beginning and mankind and what he intended for mankind in

the beginning, even prior to the fall, He still has intended for

us today or he has a desire and a wish for us today.

And so with that being said, whenever we're born again of the

water of the spirit and we're regenerated or, and God desires

that we be born again, he, he wants to take us back to a, a, a

pre fall type of setting, a reset button, if you will, a pre

fall type of setting. He doesn't want us to be as the

world around us, but he wants to be as things were before

iniquity and transgression came into the world.

And we can observe then what some of those things are in

Eden. James even expresses it this way

in the New Testament. In the book of James chapter #1

and verses 23 through 25, it says, For if any man be a hearer

of the word, and not a doer, he is likened to a man beholding

his natural face in a glass, where he beholdeth himself, and

goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he

was. But whoso looketh into the

perfect law of Liberty, and continueth therein, he be not a

forgiveful, but a doer of the word, this man shall be blessed

in his deed. And so he he's likening this man

that's beholding his natural face in the glass, as a man

that's looking into the counsel of God's word as beholding his

natural face in the glass. Interestingly enough, the word

natural in this passage comes from a Greek word, Genesis.

Genesis, that's what it is. It's the same same word that is

the OR at least the transliteration of it is the

same word as the first book in your Bible.

So that whenever we look into the mirror of God's Word, we are

seeing what God intended man, the Genesis, Genesis space, but

he intended man to be. And so God shows that us by

that, by his word. Let's admit, how many times do

you look in the Word and don't see that face?

You see what it should be, but you don't necessarily see that

in you. But He has something in store

for mankind. Amen.

Even from the beginning, as we looked at last week quite in

depthly, He had all that plan in place.

And so the Bible even tells us that in the beginning, right?

These are verses that we read and have read in the book of

Genesis that so God created man in His own image.

And so this is God's plan. This is God's plan for each

individual. Amen.

Even there in the new birth experience, that He could get

them back to being conformed to His image.

The Bible states this in Romans chapter #8 and verse #29 for

whom he and we had some of this language last week.

We read some passages out of Ephesians that are similar to

these. But for whom He did for know, He

also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His

Son, that He might be the first born among many brethren, He

says, for whom he did for know. Remember.

And here in the Scripture, the foreknowledge or the foreknowing

pertains to the whom there in verse #929 for whom he did for

know. So the word whom is not

singular, the word whom is plural.

So it's not, it's not relating to a individual, It's relating

to a grouping of individuals predominantly as we looked at

last week, his church, he foreknew his church and he

predestinated his church to be conformed to the image of of his

Son. And where we talk about

predestinated, that means that he had a purpose for his church.

He had a plan for his church to be conformed to the image of his

Son. Amen.

Which is what God in human form is Christ Jesus.

God in human form is Christ Jesus.

And so Christ Jesus became a model for all of humanity, came

a model for the church. So if if you're sitting here

tonight and you have repented and you've been baptized in

Jesus name and you've been filled with the gift of the Holy

Ghost, then this is the way that God desires to see us.

He no longer sees us if we went through this plan of salvation.

He no longer sees us as the corrupt man or the sinful woman

or as the man that's bound by by lust of the flesh, but he sees

us Amen. As the righteous man.

We spoke about it just Sunday morning.

He gave us his righteousness. We we, we and he took on our

debts and our mishaps and our our shortcomings and our sin.

And so he sees them us as a righteous man, a godly man wants

to see us as a holy man and woman that would serve God, that

would love their neighbor as their self.

All of these things. And the word of God then acts as

our mirror. It tells us what we are in

Christ Jesus. It tells what we are as a new

creature in him. It tells us, Amen.

It advises us, Amen, how we should should act and how we

should do certain things in light of this glorious gospel,

in light of what God has said to us through and by his Word.

Amen. The word does this, folks.

This is a pride, if you understand how much of A prized

thing that this really is, the word of God.

The Bible says in the same book of James that I just read to you

just a little while ago, the Bible says that this same word

is the word that can save your soul.

Bible says in James 121 Wherefore lay apart all

filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with

meekness the engrafted word which is able to save yourself.

Folks, that's something I want to, you know, brush up against

day-to-day, huh? Because there is in here.

Why? Because it tells me how, how to

be saved, how to be begotten, how to maintain all the letters

of the epistles that's written to the churches, speaking to

people that's been repentant, received the Holy Ghost, been

baptized, all the instruction how to continue in my walk, Man,

that's important. It's tell me the doom and

destruction of the world to come if I reject the Lord.

I mean, that's that's tremendous.

That's tremendous information right here.

And so through God's word, he even gave us then the Eden model

where we can learn principles, Amen of holiness that God even

revealed right there in the very beginning and have a better

understanding of the expectations of the Lord.

So there are several phrases in your Bible, even the New

Testament, there are several phrases that are used that point

back that point us back like a sign pointing back to the Eden

model. We've already used one of them

of course there in James that Genesis face or that natural

face. But Jesus also used similar

language. The apostle Paul, he also used

some similar language and and when you look at this and and

please what I'm about ready to say isn't here to make any

anyone to feel uncomfortable. But whenever Jesus was asked in

the Gospels about divorce, the Pharisees wanted to discuss

this. Here's what they want to talk

about. They wanted to talk about how

and when a person can break a marriage.

They want to emphasize when can we do it?

And then Jesus and they brought up the idea of Deuteronomy 24

where Moses wrote a, a, a law and a letter of divorcement, a

bill of divorcement for the people.

Jesus didn't come. He didn't reject what Moses's

concession that he made, but he kind of recast everything in

different terms because Jesus was wanting to focus on the

sanctity of marriage. So they want to look on, well,

how can you break it? He's saying, well, how can we

just keep it whole, right? It's kind of like 1.

Kevin Deyoung actually one time said said if all you, if all, if

all you hear are the reasons a marriage covenant might be

broken. He said it's like learning to

fly by practicing your crash landings or training for battle

by practicing your retreats. He says you're just kind of

focusing on the wrong thing. He said, but here's the thing,

The law was making the best of a bad situation.

Jesus was basically giving them to them.

But he said this in Matthew 19/8.

He said Moses, because of the hardness of your heart, suffered

you to put away your lives. But here's his Eden pointer.

But from the beginning it was not.

So in other words, she's saying whatever exceptions that are

acceptable, there may be or might not be.

He says from the beginning it was not.

So he's pointing people back to the original intent from the

very beginning a man. So he's pointing backwards.

And again, there's other occasions in the scripture.

Paul used the term nature in scripture and the Greek word in

in this term where Paul was using the word nature.

The Greek word translated nature in the Greek is fusus if anybody

wants to know, but it's where we get our English word physical.

The Greek word actually refers to that which was brought forth

and therefore means the original or inherent constitution of a

thing. What that means is this the,

the, the thesis or the nature pertains all created things that

are in their original state before anything else is

happening. The original constitution of

those things before Brother Pat, they were ever corrupted by

mankind before they were ever contaminated by mankind.

If I can say it like this, the natural state, the original

constitution of a thing right in Eden before the fall.

And Paul said this is where he uses this word Bishop in first

Corinthians 11/14 when he says does not even nature itself

teach you that it's a shame for a man to have long hair.

It's in that instance, he said, does not the original intent,

the original constitution of a thing, before there's any

corruption, before there's any other way in?

Does that not teach you another less obvious place where there's

Eden reference in New Testament scripture oftimes, when we see

the word renew in the original language, that word conveys the

idea that you're returning back to the original condition to

renew to renew a commitment or to return to original commitment

or to then recommit to it. And so whenever Paul writes then

in the gospel or in the the letter of Romans chapter 2, talk

Romans 2 · chapter mention

about transformed by the renewing of your mind.

He's telling us that we need to go back and think as the

thoughts were prior to there ever being a fall, because

what's going on then Adam and Eve is walking with God in the

cool of the day, right that their their lives are absorbed.

Amen. With the presence and the power

of the Lord. The NLT says it like this.

Let God transform you into a new person by changing the way that

you think. Amen, by the way, that you think

it's not, it's not a way necessarily to change, to think

like the world, but it's to change back to the original.

Change back to the original, to the Garden of Eden mentality,

the Bible says in Ephesians 423 and be renewed in the spirit of

your mind that you may put on the new man, which after God is

created in righteousness and true holiness, our minds are

renewed. We become what God intended at

the beginning. All right.

We'll also then be able to recognize then our walk and be

able to participate in things such of righteousness and true

holiness when our minds are reset to back to where they

were. The original Constitution, the

original constitution. In a letter to Titus, Paul

described, he described God's merciful salvation and he

described it like this, that it came through Titus 35, that it

came through the washing of regeneration and the renewing of

the Holy Ghost or the Holy Spirit.

Amen. Because how many know tonight

that the Spirit has power, Amen, To help us with our mind, with

that regeneration of our lives, to take us back to an original

form. Hey, man, take us back to

original form. Not only that, John said that

Spirit then can lead us and guide us into all truth, Amen.

And so it's the objective of the Spirit's work to do that in our

life. Going to return them back.

We're going to have a factory reset on them.

You ever you ever heard of that? You know, you do that sometimes

you go sell your computer you like, go do a factory reset, get

rid of everything, take it back the way it was when you got it

out-of-the-box. Factory reset.

I mean, we'll take it back to a factory reset.

And so Genesis 127 told us that God created man in his own image

and the image of God created he him male and female created he

them. Here's the thing.

Your God, we saw this last week. Your God is not some impersonal

force so distant from you. He's like, not some inexplicable

mystery, huh? No, he's not.

He's a personal God. He's a personal God.

And he's identified himself to us, brother Fred, with a

personal name. What's his name?

Jesus. Not only that.

He even allowed us that before a person, before a person was born

again, before we can move onward.

I believe this is this is very much so contingent here on His

word. Before we can move forward after

being born again into areas of holy holiness, we must come to

terms with who God really is. We we got to get the identity of

God down. I mean, New Testament, whenever

some came to Lord and said which are the great commandments you

have all these commandments. You know, when he goes to 1st

the Shema hear O Israel, the Lord our God.

Why was that so important? Because if you don't have God's

identity right, you'll get a lot of other things wrong.

Amen. And so it's vital, it's vital to

know about the identity of God. And we looked a little bit last

week. We know that God is God all by

himself. He alone is God.

There are no others in the New Testament scripture, I believe

was Paul said, he said they speak of gods and this, they're

gods, but they're no gods. He said.

They talk about Lords and gods, he said, but they're in reality,

there is no other Lord or God. There's only our Lord, So if

they want to talk about suppose Lords, then we'll just say that

he's the Lord of Lords, huh. If they want to talk about

suppose that their gods, then we'll just clarify that he's the

Almighty God. There's no others, Amen.

The Lord even affirmed in Isaiah we we read it probably last week

or one of these other weeks, Isaiah 45 and verse 21 and there

is no God else beside me. Again, the the exclusiveness

that's quite exclusive, Amen. A just God and Savior.

There is none beside me. That means there's nothing else

that can be identified as God except God.

And that's important because I can't start talking about

holiness and this holy God from which holiness comes from if I

don't even know who God is. See, you've muddled the whole

waters. If you don't have a clear

identification of your God, you won't have a clear

identification of His attributes and His traits.

We know John 4/24, the Goddess Spirit, we said.

We know in Hebrews 9 that he's also spoken of as the eternal

spirit, meaning he's always been, he is, He always will be.

He has no beginning, He has no ending.

He's the Alpha and the Omega, beginning and ending.

Beginning is something that begins and continues to begin.

It's like a circle. You don't find where it starts

or where it finishes. There's a beginning and the

ending. He's also called the Holy Ghost

or the Holy Spirit. So that tells me then that this

same God, this true God, is eternal, but he's also holy.

And we start then picking up on things about the identity of our

God, even from the book of Genesis, that no one else is in

reality except him. In John, in Genesis 11, we pick

up on the identity that He is identified as the creator of all

things. No one else has that office.

He's a creator of all things. Genesis 127 we pick up on the

identity that He is the maker of humanity.

There was not a committee. God did along and all by

himself. Genesis 216 identifies him as

the Lord and the Lawgiver of humanity.

Genesis 317 through 19 identifies him as the Judge of

humanity. Genesis 321 identifies him as

the Savior of humanity. All of these roles, they belong

to God alone. He is our creator, he is our

maker, he is our Lord, he is our lawgiver.

He is our judge, he is our savior.

All of that belongs to God alone.

And perhaps one of the greatest identifier marks of our God is

this being that he came and was our savior.

Our God came in flesh. Paul declares concisely the the

the verses bigger than this of First Timothy 316.

God was manifest in the flesh, and throughout the New Testament

that flesh is called the Son, the Son of God.

When you read terminology like that in scripture, the Son of

God, it is talking about the flesh of the Lord Jesus Christ.

It's that which was made of a woman according to Galatians 44

John, though, does something like many things happen greatly

in the Bible, but John connects that son, that son identity to

God when he wrote in first John 520 these words and we know that

the Son of God has come and have given us.

I love this and have given us an understanding.

I got to pause here because Christ Jesus didn't just give us

an understanding by what he said.

He gave us an understanding just by being, because he was the

express image of the invisible God.

The moment that Jesus came, he was the expression of God.

He's what John, the Saint John chapter 1 talks about that He

John 1 · chapter mention

was declared. That's what you have, Christ

Jesus. He's the declaration of God.

He gave us understanding that we may know Him.

That is true and we are in him. That is true even in his Son,

Jesus Christ. Look at this next phrase.

This is the true God and eternal life.

You know, John's right, John's saying the Son of God has come.

He was saying God has come in human form.

God has come in human form and through this human being we can

identify the true God and also receive eternal life.

That's awesome. We got to understand we got to

have the identity of God, right? And with the identity of God

then comes the name Jesus. Amen.

Because God has chosen to identify himself to all of

humanity by his name, Jesus, that name which literally means

to us salvation. And so when the Bible tells us

to call on God by the name of Jesus, it means that we can be

certain we're calling on the only true God that there is in

the universe. Whenever we can call on God by

the name of Jesus, Jesus, that means we're calling on that

creator, that Lawgiver, that maker, that judge, that

Redeemer. Yes, he identifies himself,

identifies himself by the name of Jesus.

You know the verse of Scripture, Brother Reese of Acts 412.

Why? Peter declared neither is there

salvation in any other, for there is none other name under

heaven given among men whereby we must be saved.

It's through the name of Jesus, and that name is attached, Amen

to our Savior, Maker, Creator who manifested Himself in the

flesh, who is the Holy One. And that's important.

There's this connection. Jesus also even stated that

basically the identity of God cannot be separated from the

name Jesus. John chapter #16 verses 23 and

24 you can read, but he says, she says whatever you ask the

Father in my name, He will give it you, because the identity,

the identity of God is inseparable from the name Jesus.

There's no other name, no other name.

So Moses again, he summarizes this whole principle of identity

in the Shema, or what the Jews call the Shema of Deuteronomy 6

and 4. Here, O Israel, the Lord our God

is 1 Lord. And after that you start to get

these commands, how you should love the Lord your God with all

of your heart and your mind and your soul.

But those things are true, and those things are meaningful, but

they are secondary to recognizing who God is.

How can you direct love appropriately if you don't know

who you're really directing it to?

Well, do you love Mabel? Well, I would love Mabel if I

knew who Mabel, You know what I'm saying?

I have a, I'm not sure what you know, maybe you talking about,

well, you know, she's got the long hair and she's got, you

know, freckles on her cheek. You know what I'm saying?

You cannot direct your love if you don't have an identity.

David Hustin, he said this. He said until we can accurately

identify the true God, we could never be certain we are

identifying anything else accurately.

So with the with the concept of identity comes the needs for

distinction. What makes that Mabel the one I

love rather than that Mabel with identity then is the need for

distinctions. So we talked about the principle

of identity, also known as could be the principle of distance

distinctions because it's the distinctions that help identify

a person or a thing. It helps us tell them apart.

Roberta Rebecca supposed to be identical twins.

Supposed to be supposed to be. But there are distinctions.

There are distinctions. They was harder to tell apart

when they were younger. The reason why Grandma McGee fed

one of them twice rather than one of them starved.

Had a hard time finding those distinctions, but they're there.

What are you saying? I'm saying the fact that a male

cardinal bird is red and a blue Jay male is blue helps us

quickly tell them apart just by their colors.

If I say like this, their identities are partly defined

just by their colors. So when this this true God comes

in the flesh and he comes a part of the fabric of humanity, he is

still distinguished from other humanity and absolutely, Sister

Sheila, distinguished from other things that are so-called gods.

He came in the flesh for one, it's not wood, stone or

something like that that they had to their gods.

So coming in the flesh alone is solidifying identity.

But now he's among mortal man. So there's got to be

distinguishers. So the principle of of identity

or distinction teaches us that then God has sharp lines about

himself that distinguish him from us and he from any other

so-called God. Where we look at the Garden of

Eden, we read in scripture that of course Adam and Eve were

forbidden to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

And the serpent wove into their minds that the day that you eat

of that, you'll be like gods. They did, they did thought they

were going to maybe have the transformation, I don't know, to

be gods. But they found out that

absolutely known the intent of people's hearts of good and evil

is a prerogative that belongs to God alone, all by himself.

Even trying to blur the line couldn't be blurred.

There is a distinction between them and God.

There are qualities that make God God, There's qualities that

make us human, so on and so forth.

And so God has always wanted to make it very clear who he is and

who we are, and he started that right from the beginning.

I'm not God. I know everybody's surprised.

I'm not God. You're not God, it's not our,

it's not my identity to be God number one.

I'm not inherently eternal or holy, just saying I can

participate in holiness, but I'm just not inherently holy.

And someday I hope to participate in eternity, but I'm

just not inherently eternal as I stand here today without a

change happening. Oh, and I'm longing for the

change. So that means, Sister Sheila,

I'm not creator, I'm not Maker, Lawgiver, Lord, Judge, whatever,

but I have been made in the image of God.

And if I've been made in the image of God, he's given us the

ability to participate in some limited ways.

And those traits, attributes and characteristics of himself.

Someone say Amen. So, Bishop, I'm not trying to

be, not trying to be what I'm not, but he's established

distinctions for himself and mankind.

And since I know this, and since I was bought with a price by

him, one of the distinctions is I don't own myself.

I don't own myself. He purchased me by his blood.

No one had to purchase him. He purchased me by his blood.

I'm the property of another right?

So it's a distinction again, we'll look at this verse 1000

times before we're done with all this.

First Corinthians 619 What know ye not that your body is the

temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which he have of God,

and ye are not your own for your bought with a price.

Therefore glorify God in your body and your spirit, which are

God's. Now what that is not saying,

that's not telling us you no longer have free will.

It's not what that's saying. It only means that if I'm going

to fail to live the way that my owner would like for me to live

and deny that I belong to him, then I might as well go on and

deny that he ever purchased me or shed blood for me.

There's another place the scripture says even denying the

Lord which bought you. I'm not my own, but if I'm if

I'm going to fail to live according to the manager of the

house, then I might as well just be rejecting that he has any say

any ownership or ever shed any blood.

Someone say Amen. And if that's the case, Bishop,

if that's the case, you know what that means for me is

humanity. If that's the case, if that's

the way I want to live, then then that would mean that I

would still be in my sins. I would still be in my sins.

And I don't think there's a single one of us that want to

continue living in sin according to the word.

We know the wages of sin. According to Romans, it is

death. I don't think any of us want to

live in that. So I want to acknowledge and

live in the reality that yes, he shed blood and yes, it was my

purchase price and yes, he purchased me and yes, I don't

belong to myself. But with these sharp lines of

distinction, God has also brought then an understanding of

what's good, what's evil, what's true, what's false, what's

right, what's wrong, distinctive lines, what's holy, what's

unholy, what's of the spirit, what's of the flesh.

You see this in God's word, God's word.

I mean it, it is quite, quite exclusive as far as in how it's

not like again, choices, you understand me, a few weeks ago I

talked about, you know, there's no middle of the road.

There's only two ways. It's not like we're given

multiple choice, Amen. Lines have been drawn, the lines

of identity. So what do we get?

Then we go back to Eden. I won't hold you much longer,

but we go back to Eden and we find that it's important to God

that everything that he created that he clearly identified what

it was he did. We see him stating things.

He even has Adam stating things. Certain parts of creation,

stars, moon, light, darkness, firmament, waters, male, female

gives distinct categorical items, Animal Kingdom separate

into what the Bible calls kinds, right?

Each kind has its own distinctive traits and each

reproduce according to its own. Each reproduce according to its

own kind. Not one could arbitrarily move

to another kind and reproduce. If an animal was born a monkey,

it would always be a monkey, can never be a lion, and each bears

all the distinctive marks of what it makes to mean and

identify a monkey. We do OK, so for the monkeys,

for so for so for so the monkeys.

It's wise for them to accept the reality that they're a monkey

and commit to acting like 1 But Eden also teaches us that in the

beginning, God made everything exactly like he intended.

He created them, man and female, in his own image of the image of

God created him, male and female created he them.

It's a clear illustration of the principle of identity or the

principle of distinction. Some members of humanity are

identified as being male. Some members of humanity are

identified as being female. Listen, I know that's not

popular today because we have a list.

I don't remember the last time I checked, there was like 42

different classifications of who you are or what you are.

But let me be like the Lord talking about divorce for a

moment. From the beginning it was not so

it was male. God help me to be good boy

tonight, folks. I'm, I'm, I'm just a little bit,

I'm a little bit biblically frustrated because how in the

world you expect people to get God right when they can't get

themselves right concerning who they are.

And part of the problem of not knowing who they are is because

they don't know who he is. And the world is pumped into the

system, all of these multiple choices of what God could be or

God should be or what you would want God to be.

And as a result of that, we got a identity crisis on our hand,

not just about our God, but about ourselves.

You can't see who you are, who you were made in the image of if

you got him incorrect. It just messes everything up.

So I'm not baffled. I'm not baffled.

Let me tell you this. This is what happens when you

don't just push the envelope. You tear the envelope up.

Everything's chaos. I know there ain't going to be

no popularity votes on this one. That's OK.

There's distinctions. Does that spill over in our

holiness? Yes.

We'll look at it probably eventually in the next century.

There's distinctions. I am not trying to be frank

here, but before the fall, before there was shame because

of the neckedness of man and woman and no fig leaves and no

clothes was required. There was automatic distinction

by there was automatic distinction by the image of the

body, who was male and who was female.

Oh, God, let me know. No bunnies, Lord, no bunnies, no

chase, no rabbits. We're just staying right here on

the trail. But it's identity, it's

distinctions. And so we got to recognize that.

Mm hmm. Affirm the distinctions of God,

affirm the distinctions of ourselves, affirm the

distinctions to put between a man, affirm the distinctions of

a woman, and then live according to our nature.

Men distinctly men, women distinctly women.

Am I doing OK? I don't know, folks.

Something just kind of clicked in there.

This is a little while ago. Listen, I'll make the

disclaimer. Here at the First Apostolic

Church, we love you as you are. You can come here, smoke to

cuss, shoot up heroin, lesbian, homosexual, cum.

OK, but I will teach still what the word says about these

various items. But you're welcome 100% in that.

And just for a little mind shift here folk.

And God, I hope you're here with me.

Here you are. If you take two people with the

same sex, they enter a relationship with one another.

In today's world, often one of them, whatever part they are

supposed to be playing, is going to take on the attributes or

remove other parts of a certain genders attribute in order to

play the role. Now if there are no

distinctions, why do you do that?

If it don't matter, then why do people cut their hair?

Or why do people and not anatomically or dress certain

ways to fit a gender? If it don't matter?

If distinctions don't matter. To live according to our nature.

Stay with me. So before sin never entered the

picture back. And even God was trying to show

a picture of life, of identity, of holiness.

And even after the fall he had to go.

I want to, I want to take them back with there to be a

regeneration, with there to be a reset.

I want to restore what was lost. So as we opened in the pages of

Scripture, Brother Fred again, it's not that just we're just

reading Thou shalt not, thou shalt not thou shalt type of

thing. No, we're looking into the

mirror of what he intended it to be as and who we were meant to

be as. Question we need to walk away

with tonight. Is this right?

To get real honest with ourselves, the question we need

to walk away with is this have allowed the world to redefine

what God has already defined. Because man, the pressure is

heavy, isn't it? To have unlikeness compared to

everybody else that looks like cookie cutters?

Have we blurred the lines of what God drew in the beginning?

So we live in brother Trout according to culture or

according to creation. So what we do about that as a

church, what we do about that as Christians, we go to the Lord as

often as we need to and we're like, God help me help help

realign, help realign my identity.

God, I, I, I recommit, yes, kind of went off left field today,

but kind of recommit today will respond in obedience because my

life really don't belong to me. God, God, what's your wishes

today? How do you want Paul McGee to

act today? How do you want Paul McGee to

talk to today? Where do you want Paul McGee to

go today? How do you want me to

intermingle with other humans today days?

I get it wrong. I go back.

Lord, let me realign with identity.

Let's go back to the beginning, back to the beginning.

I'm not done with the identity, but there's probably going to be

a pause, OK? Next week we're going to wash

and body and blood and so on and so forth leading into our

Resurrection Sunday service. I wonder if we could pray

together tonight, if you could just join your voice with my

voice right now, and that we would ask God to allow us to

have an awareness in these respects and that we would be

easily led by His Spirit in these respects.

Father, I come to you tonight, God.

I'm thankful, Lord, this evening that God, you are who you are

and help us start to recognize and realize who you are.

God in the totality of it being the God that was manifest in the

flesh, being the God who was Spirit, who came down and robed

himself, came a part of humanity for the saving of the soul.

God, There's distinctions about you, Lord.

There's there's distinguishments, Lord, about

you, Lord, that's been from the very beginning.

And you've also created some, Lord, for us as humanity, God,

male and female and otherwise, Lord, even within your Kingdom,

Lord. And that's for the purpose of

identity, God. There is no confusion.

There is no chaos. I pray, O Lord, today, God,

bring that type of harmony, God back, Lord, into the life, Lord

of the church. Bring that type of harmony,

Lord. I pray, God, for our world,

Lord, though it may never get there, I pray, Lord, it doesn't

keep us from praying the prayer. It don't keep us, Lord, from

speaking it, Lord Jesus, over our generation and our community

and our homes and our families. I pray, O Lord, bring an

awareness, God, to ourselves and help us, Lord, to walk.

God, will you want us to walk, Lord, to live as you would have

us to live. Lord, help me to realize the

blood that's been applied to my life.

That's not my blood. That's the blood of another.

That's the blood of the purchaser, the Lord, the

Redeemer, the Savior, the Maker, the Creator, he who is alone all

by himself. That one has done it for me.

Help me, Jesus, to acknowledge that in the lovely name of the

Lord Jesus Christ and will not fail to thank you.

In the name of Jesus, we pray Hallelujah and Amen of the

church say Amen, Hallelujah. A reminder sign up sheet for

cleaning on Saturday is out there.

They'll start around 9:00 on Saturday.

Also there is for cleaning crew for any time of the year to

become a part of that that's out there.

So you have any questions concerning those things?

You can see Brother Reese, third the week of the campaign coming

up this Sunday, folks, third week of the campaign.

Amen. Invite someone, get the people

that are on your team here, Amen.

And God bless you in Jesus name. Have a great rest.