Rooting Out The Broke Image
I.
The only way you change
what you believe, root out that image, and prosper your soul is through the
Word
A. The Word of God is going
to prosper your soul (Isaiah 55:1-3)
1. The Word of God will prosper
your soul, change your image/belief, to where you’ll see yourself the way God
sees you
a. Hearken-Hear, Give your
attention to, Obey---Diligently-Steady in application, constant in effort, not
idle or negligent
b. He’s talking about eating
his words-Jeremiah 15:16, Job 34:3,1 Peter 2:2, Ephesians 5:26
c. That which is good-The
gospel is the good news
d. Fatness-Prosperity,
abundance
e. Let your soul-Permit your
soul to prosper by feeding it the Word of God
f.
Hear
and your soul shall live prosperously
2. James 1:21-You have to
stay attached to this Word if you’re soul is going to prosper
a. Put away stuff that’s not
prospering your soul; Why do you labor for that which
isn’t satisfying you?
(1)
People
want to plump money into a bucket and then prosper in abundance, but there’s
much more that goes into financially prosperity than just sowing and
reaping. Sowing is one principle
involved in the law of prosperity, but there are many other principles that
must be in place for this law to work the way it’s supposed to work. People don’t mind plumping money into
the bucket, because that takes little time and effort. But when you start getting into the nitty gritty things of financial prosperity must people
want no part in them & that’s why they don’t prosper to the degree that I
would like them to.
b. The engrafted Word
(1)
Grafting
is the process by which two different objects become one by staying attached to
one another & growing together
(2)
Will
you stay attached to the Word of God on financial prosperity long enough to
prosper your soul and see yourself that way God does-Diligence?
c. An old broke soul needs
to be saved/made whole by this Word
(1)
An
unwillingness to stay attached to this Word in the area of finances will lead
to soul poverty and poverty in life
d. Receive with
meekness-without disputing or resisting
3. This is how God sees you
financially-2 Corinthians 8:9, 9:8, 11, Luke 6:38, 1 Tim 6:17, Matthew 6:33, 7:11,
Romans 8:32, Galatians 3:14, Proverbs 10:22, 3 John 2, Malachi 3:10, Proverbs
3:9-10, 1 John 4:17, Philippians 4:19-This is how he sees you
a. You get the image of that
on the inside of you by staying attached to the Word
b. Proverbs 22:9-He that has
a bountiful/rich eye shall be blessed
B. You’re money seed
independent of the Word seed has no future
1. The word-seed in you is
going to determine the future of that money seed
a. If you have no word in
you, then your soul won’t prosper and that money-seed won’t harvest or will
harvest little
2. The Word seed and the
money seed work with one another, not independent of one another
a. The Word is the seed
that’s going to change the inside of you, your inner image (Luke 8:11)
(1)
That
money seed has no power to change the inside of you
(2)
You
sow financial and drop money in the bucket, but that won’t change the inside of
you
(3)
This
Word is responsible for changing your image and until that changes you’re
financial well-being will won’t change
3. The money seed is
responsible for multiplying and coming back to you, but only to the level of
the image that you have (Luke 6:38)
a. If you don’t sow the
money seed then the word seed and the image it produced has nothing to support
and work with
b. Your image/the word seed
in you is literally going to support and determine the future of that money
seed
C. The poor need the gospel
preached to them, because the poor man is poor outside because he’s poor inside
1. The answer for a poverty
is the Word of God-Matt 11:5, Luke 7:22, 4:18
a. The answer for the poor
is to have the gospel preached, not their needs met
(1)
Jesus
fed 5000 people in a desert place. He was capable of doing the same thing with
every poor person that he saw.
(a) He said I only do what
hear and see of my Father to do (John 5:30, 8:28,29)
(2)
In
dealing with the poor Jesus 1) Gave alms 2) Gave the Word---He gave them both
seeds
(a) You do the poor an injustice
when you only give them one type of seed
b. Proverbs 10:15-The
destruction of the poor is their poverty (inside)
(1)
They
need to find out what the word says, prosper their soul and do it; That’s the
way out of poverty (Deut 15:4)
(2)
If
we’re going to address the poverty in a poor man’s life, then we must first all
address the poverty of his soul
2. Somebody has to preach
prosperity to you; the same way somebody had to preach salvation to you, you
had to act on it and then you got saved; you have to prosper in your soul
financially, know the principles that make the law work and do it (Romans
10:8-15)
a. People don’t believe in
the God that will make you abundantly rich; they believe in the God that will
meet your need
(1)
14-They
haven’t believed God will make you abundantly rich because they haven’t heard
it
(2)
14-How
can they hear it without it being preached? How can it be preached if God didn’t
send them?
b. 15-This is a prosperity
gospel not a poverty gospel
II.
We must create a new
image on the inside of us
A. You can’t build a new
image with the old one still standing
1. You can’t put new wine in
old wine skins
a. EX: You can’t put a clean
diaper on top of a new one
2. The seed of God’s word is
going to bump into an old broke
image that’s been built up over the years
a. The are strongholds that
get built up in our mind through our experiences,
exposures, and instruction (2 Cor 10:5)
(1)
Stronghold-Fortresses
of thought (ways of thinking), built by what you’ve been exposed
to, designed to trap you in a way of life
(2)
EX:
Bold Eagle and a buzzard-At the edge of the woods, near a small farm, a baby
eagle fell out of the nest. The farmer found the
eagle, and thinking it was one of his own, brought him to the chicken
coop with his other chickens. As time passed, the baby eagle
grew up learning to do what chickens do. He clucked, he
strutted around the coop pecking at the corn and even tried his voice at the
morning wake-up call. A neighbor came to visit his friend the chicken farmer.
He was surprised to see the eagle strutting around the chicken coop, pecking at
the ground, and acting like a chicken. The farmer explained
to him that he had brought the bird to the coop as a chick and only later
discovered that it was an eagle. He further told his friend
that since the bird had been raised a chicken that the bird actually
believed himself to be a chicken. The neighbor knew there was more to
this noble bird than his behavior showed as a chicken. He was born an
eagle and had the heart of an eagle, and nothing could change that. The
neighbor reached down and lifted the eagle onto the fence surrounding the
chicken coop and said, “Eagle, you are an eagle.
Stretch your wings and fly.” The eagle only look blankly at the
man and clucked. He jumped off the fence and continued doing what chicken
do. The farmer was satisfied. “I told you - he thinks he’s a
chicken,” he said. The neighbor couldn’t sleep that night and returned the next
day to convince the farmer that the eagle was born for something greater.
The man took the eagle from the dirty coop and carried him to the top of the
farmhouse. Setting the bird down on the roof, the neighbor spoke to
him: “Eagle, you are an eagle. You therefore belong
to the sky and not to the earth. Stretch your wings and fly.” The
large bird blinked at the man, clucked, and then jumped down into the
chicken coop. After another restless night, the friend returned the next
morning to the chicken farm and took the eagle and the farmer away from the
chicken coop to the foot of a high mountain. They could not see the farm nor the chicken coop from this great height. The
man lifted the eagle on his outstretched arm and pointed high into the sky
where the bright sun was beckoning above. He spoke: “Eagle, you
are an eagle! You therefore belong to the sky and not to the
earth. Stretch your wings and fly.” This time the eagle stared
skyward into the bright sun, straightened his large body, and stretched his
massive wings. His wings moved, slowly at first, then surely and powerfully. With
the mighty screech of an eagle, he flew away.
b. In a lot of believers
minds there’s a middle class stronghold; a paycheck to paycheck stronghold; a
just enough stronghold; where they can’t see themselves as ever being rich
(1)
Those
strongholds are designed to trap them in a why life financially that will keep
them from being a greater blessing in the Earth
c. If Satan can plant
something in, build a stronghold in you, he can trap you in that way of life
(1)
So
even though there is scripture after scripture about God’s will for you being
abundantly prosperous, he knows it, but he wants to build something else in you
to trap you in a lifestyle that opposes God’s Word
(2)
So
the last thing he wants is for someone stand up here a preach something that’s
going challenge your stronghold
(3)
The
spiritual warfare is this: Can he, through experiences, exposure, and teaching
build a stronghold in you that opposes the Word?
3. 3-The battle is not in
the physical, natural realm – (Just like in Numbers 13)
a. We’ve thought the battle
was physical; you’ve thought I can’t be rich b/c I work here or because of this
or that. But what I’m here to tell
you is that your
financial prosperity has nothing to do with where you work or what’s going in
the natural realm, but everything to do with the image you have and the seed
you sow.
(1)
You’re
not broke because of your job, your broke because of your image
b. The battle is inside; the
biggest enemy is your inner-me
(1)
There
is a stronghold in you right now that was created to trap in a way of life
(2)
If
you’re going to prosper to the degree that God wants you to you’re going to
have to go after that stronghold
(a) You target that
stronghold the way a guy with a rocket launcher would target a building. You fire the Word of the living God at
that thing until it comes down.
4. 4-Your weapons are not
carnal-bodily, temporal, pertaining to the flesh
a. Don’t bring carnal
weapons to a spiritual battle
(1)
You
want to get another job, change jobs, ask for a raise, refinance, invest, but
those are carnal weapons. You can
get a new job and do all of that, but your
image is going where you go.
And that’s why you did something in the natural and thought it would
really make a difference only to find out that you’re about where you were
before you did that thing. It might
even have helped temporarily, but before you know it you’re life is back to the
image you have.
b. Your weapons are powerful
through God (the Word)
(1)
This
Word has the power to destroy that stronghold and it’s your answer
5. 4,5-You pull down strong
holds by:
a. Casting down imaginations
that exalt themselves against the Word
(1)
Destroying
and demolishing reasonings and thoughts that oppose the Word
(a) You need power to
demolish and destroy
(2)
One
of the main problems with this is that most people don’t even know what God’s
Word says about them financially, so when something exalts itself against that
Word they don’t know it and they just take it and before long they’ve got
stronghold of it, that the word didn’t build
(3)
Every
thought that rises up against what God’s word says you got to destroy with the
Word of God coming out of your mouth (How to destroy a thought)
(a) Any bill, circumstance,
person that transmits a thought that’s not in line with the Word has to come to
down
b. Then bring (force into
submission) your thoughts into obedience to the Word
(1)
You
force yourself to think this way if you have to stay in the Word every waking
second of every day
6. If you’ll do that you can
build a stronghold of God’s word in your mind that will trap you in a
prosperous life
B. Paint a new image
1. You’re going to have to
go to the paint of God’s word, use the brush of your tongue, and paint an image
on the canvas of your heart that you are a rich man (Psalm 45:1)
a. You have to take the
thought and say it until you don’t have to think to say it (Philippians 4:8, Matthew
6:31)
b. You have to do that until
the word in you becomes more real than the world outside of you (EX: In my eyes
I was rich long before I had any money)
2. Matthew 12:33-37
a. 33-Make the tree good
(1)
Like
the type of tree determines the type of fruit, the type of image determines the
type of life
(2)
The
tree is known by its fruit and your image is known by the life that it produced
(3)
Make
the image rich and prosperous
b. 34-You’re going to speak
based on and from the image in your heart (Num 14)
(1)
You
got to get to the place where it’s not just coming out of your head, but your
heart
c. 35-You bring forth things
from your heart
(1)
37-By
your words you’re justified and condemned
(2)
Believing
& speaking is how you got into this thing & this is how it works-Mk
11:23
3. Your words and your image
are hindering your money seed; they are stout against it
a. You’re sowing seed, but
your image and your words are disabling and crippling
it
C. Meditation is the key to
inner transformation
1. Joshua 1:8-His victory
was not determined by the strength of his opponent outside, but by what was
going on in his heart
2. Meditate so that you can observe/see
to do
a. Meditate the word to see
yourself rich and then do rich
b. Meditate-Utter a sound,
thoughtful deliberation with the implication of speaking to oneself, to
imagine, to speak, to talk
3. Don’t take a broke image
into battle
a. It seems like we’ve been
trudging through the mud financially because we’re taking a broke image into
this financial battle
(1)
You
give and tithe and little happens
(2)
You
can’t sow and tithe with a broke image and then stand in holy wonderment about
why you don’t prosper
b. Ps 1:1-3-No matter where
I go I’m bringing the Word & my prosperous soul w/ me
D. 8 Keys To Effective
Meditation
1. Separation is key in meditation
2. Meditate the Word with
purpose
3. Speak the Word out loud;
this controls your thoughts
4. Apply the Word to
yourself personally
5. Place yourself in
agreement with what the Word says about you
6. Ponder how that changes
your situation
7. See yourself as the Word
says you are
8. Remember the blood
covenant and that God can’t lie
E. 2 Corinthians 3:18-That
image is going to change as you look at the right thing
1. As we look in this Word
it’s going to change us inside and then we’ll change outside