Latest / Rick Manis Ministries Podcast / Born From Above

Transcript

Born From Above · Rick Manis Ministries Podcast

0:00
SPEAKER_00: Jesus was talking about the things of life.
0:03
SPEAKER_00: Your father knows that you need these things.
0:06
SPEAKER_00: Seek the kingdom first, because the answer to everything is in the Father.
0:10
SPEAKER_00: It's in it's in the kingdom.
0:12
SPEAKER_00: And uh we have an opportunity this morning to uh in view of the occasion that we that we have today to look at something that can help us a whole lot because today we have a birthday.
0:30
SPEAKER_00: You know, you know whose birthday it is?
0:33
SPEAKER_00: It's yours.
0:34
SPEAKER_00: It's the church.
0:35
SPEAKER_00: It's the day of Pentecost.
0:36
SPEAKER_00: This is Pentecost Sunday.
0:38
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I forgot that, didn't you?
0:40
SPEAKER_00: Because you can forget the 50 days comes quick, doesn't it?
0:42
SPEAKER_00: After 50 days after the Passover.
0:44
SPEAKER_00: This is this is this is the Sunday that that we celebrate the uh the Pentecost, which was, we know, a Jewish festival for many, many, many years.
0:54
SPEAKER_00: But when that Jewish festival had fully come, that actual day of Pentecost, that 50th day had come, something else happened that had not happened before.
1:04
SPEAKER_00: And God poured out his spirit.
1:06
SPEAKER_00: Is that what they call Shaka?
1:08
SPEAKER_00: The Jewish culture.
1:10
SPEAKER_00: There's a festival, the Jewish festival today is H A U K-A-C.
1:16
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I know what you yeah, yeah, yeah, it is.
1:19
SPEAKER_00: Uh-huh, yeah.
1:20
SPEAKER_00: And and their specific day is that 50th day, but it it has to do with that what the Jews call it.
1:26
SPEAKER_00: We uh other words are the feast of weeks because it's seven weeks uh after the Passover plus one day, 50th day.
1:33
SPEAKER_00: So, but we know something special happened that had not happened on the days of Pentecost before, all the years before, that a fulfillment happened.
1:43
SPEAKER_00: And uh and and this was the day that the church was born, because this was when the Spirit was given, and this was what uh the fulfillment of what Jesus was saying, that a man must be born of the Spirit.
1:56
SPEAKER_00: We want to look at that today because you know, we all know what we're what we're walking with, what we're dealing with, this is this new birth.
2:03
SPEAKER_00: We know we have this, we know we carry this.
2:05
SPEAKER_00: Where we see people struggle a lot of times is is that we know that we're walking in a material world in a flesh body with in this in this world, though we're not of it, but they're still in it, and this world system that we're that we deal with is not always fair, is not always pretty, it's not always nice, um, it can have hard situations, we know that.
2:27
SPEAKER_00: And um, and and and and uh because we've come, we've uh from the day we were physically born, we come we we've we've come from a place of of being totally in tune to this world, and then we come alive to the kingdom and the things of the spirit and we start seeing something else.
2:47
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said, unless a man is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
2:51
SPEAKER_00: And and I I refer to that a lot, and that's that's when you begin to see spiritually, you begin to perceive things, right?
2:57
SPEAKER_00: You begin to know God in a way because you now can understand and see things that you couldn't see because it's spiritually discerned.
3:04
SPEAKER_00: Um but the thing about it is that this world still wants attention.
3:08
SPEAKER_00: And Christians struggle because the world is still getting way more attention than the kingdom is getting, the kingdom of heaven's getting, than the spirit's getting.
3:19
SPEAKER_00: And that's where Christians struggle.
3:20
SPEAKER_00: And when you when you when you come over to where the world is crucified to you and you're crucified to it, where you are so aware of the presence of God, the kingdom of God, the reality of the spirit, that's when things get good.
3:33
SPEAKER_00: That's when you have absolute peace and joy in the midst of a tumultuous world.
3:39
SPEAKER_00: And that's where the heaven on earth is experienced.
3:41
SPEAKER_00: The kingdom is within us, right?
3:42
SPEAKER_00: So John 3 is what I want to look at, and I need to move this along because I do have a mouthful that I want to look at.
3:49
SPEAKER_00: And if we have, if we have the time, we'll we I want to run through some scriptures here.
3:55
SPEAKER_00: Because in John chapter 3, of course, this is where we find the famous verse.
4:02
SPEAKER_00: Um I was teaching the other night, and I said, Does anybody know a verse in John 3 without even looking at it?
4:08
SPEAKER_00: And everybody said, John 3, 16.
4:10
SPEAKER_00: Beautiful, beautiful, powerful verse.
4:13
SPEAKER_00: So we want to look at that whole conversation that Jesus was having when he said that.
4:18
SPEAKER_00: Because he was really saying more to us there than what we really get out of that one verse, even though that verse says a mouthful of riches right there.
4:29
SPEAKER_00: Powerful.
4:30
SPEAKER_00: Um, but let's look at what Jesus was saying here, and we'll see something that'll help us.
4:35
SPEAKER_00: John chapter 3, uh beginning in verse 3.
4:38
SPEAKER_00: Now he's talking to Nicodemus, right?
4:40
SPEAKER_00: Nicodemus was a leader in the Pharisees.
4:44
SPEAKER_00: He was a teacher in Israel.
4:45
SPEAKER_00: He was he was a high-up guy.
4:48
SPEAKER_00: And uh we know that Nicodemus said, You know, you know, uh, we know that you're a man sent from God.
4:54
SPEAKER_00: You know, how can, you know, because nobody could do these things unless God were with him.
4:58
SPEAKER_00: Verse 3, Jesus answered and said to him, Surely I say to you, Nick, unless one, now my Bible says, and unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
5:07
SPEAKER_00: Does any of your Bibles say something a little bit different instead of born again?
5:11
SPEAKER_00: Uh now, I'm not, I uh what I'm doing here, that we know that there is the born again experience.
5:18
SPEAKER_00: We know that that's that that's that's right and that's valid because we've experienced that.
5:22
SPEAKER_00: And what we mean by that is we were born of the flesh, we were born physically, and we know that we are born of the Spirit by faith.
5:31
SPEAKER_00: When we believe, when we receive, a new birth happens to us.
5:35
SPEAKER_00: Um, but literally here, and we have to do this because as we read on, we'll see he's talking more about more than just being born a second time.
5:47
SPEAKER_00: That word again is not used anywhere in the Bible, that Greek word is not used for the word again anywhere except this passage.
5:54
SPEAKER_00: Everywhere else, and here's the literal meaning, it means from above.
5:58
SPEAKER_00: In fact, I've got translations right here that actually say that.
6:01
SPEAKER_00: I've had King James Bibles that have a footnote that say what it means is from above.
6:05
SPEAKER_00: It's the word another, which does not mean again.
6:08
SPEAKER_00: It means from above or from the top.
6:12
SPEAKER_00: So he says, you must be born from above.
6:14
SPEAKER_00: He's talking about being born from heaven or from the spirit.
6:17
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
6:18
SPEAKER_00: And it has the same connotation in a sense, but about what we know about being born again.
6:23
SPEAKER_00: But he says, unless one, read it this way, unless one is born from above, one cannot see the kingdom of God.
6:31
SPEAKER_00: And Nicodemus said to him, Well, how can a man be born when he's old?
6:35
SPEAKER_00: I'm already born.
6:36
SPEAKER_00: I'm already, I was born a long time ago.
6:38
SPEAKER_00: How can I be born?
6:39
SPEAKER_00: Can a man enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?
6:43
SPEAKER_00: Now, this word second time is the word deuter, which means again.
6:48
SPEAKER_00: See, so if Jesus were only talking, nothing else, if he were only talking about a second birth, he would have used you must be born deuterot, which is, you know, Deuteronomy.
6:59
SPEAKER_00: You know, the book of Deuteronomy, you know why it's named the book of Deuteronomy, because it's the repeating of what's what was already said in the book before it, in Leviticus.
7:08
SPEAKER_00: And it means again or repeating or a second time.
7:20
SPEAKER_00: And so it has to do with twice.
7:22
SPEAKER_00: So he says, Can a man be born twice?
7:24
SPEAKER_00: Can a man be born a second time?
7:25
SPEAKER_00: And he's talking about being going back into the womb and being born a second time.
7:29
SPEAKER_00: He's not talking about being born from above or from the spirit, as Jesus was referring to.
7:34
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus said in verse 5, Well, certainly I say to you, unless one is born of water and the spirit.
7:41
SPEAKER_00: So he says, Nick, I'm not talking about going in your mama's belly, that's physical.
7:46
SPEAKER_00: I'm talking about being born of the water and of the spirit.
7:49
SPEAKER_00: Unless he is born of the water, both water and spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.
7:53
SPEAKER_00: Now, I want to throw out something to you on this verse, because this is kind of mysterious, and I've heard at least three different interpretations of what people are talking about.
8:01
SPEAKER_00: Number one, some people will teach and some people will say that what Jesus is talking about is the two births, one physical and one spiritual.
8:08
SPEAKER_00: And they say, so what that means is that to be born of water, apparently they're referring to the amniotic fluid that's involved and so on.
8:18
SPEAKER_00: And okay, that's understandable to think that, but there's not much proof or anything else that that goes along with that that would concur with that, other than that just kind of seems to make sense to some of us.
8:32
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
8:33
SPEAKER_00: Then there's the other ones that that tell me that what it means is talking about water baptism, that you have to be baptized in water and born again of the Spirit.
8:43
SPEAKER_00: Uh, well, I'll show you as we read on here that we've got a better uh interpretation than that, because for one thing, Nicodemus, there's no such thing as water baptism, Christian water baptism at this time.
8:55
SPEAKER_00: There's no, and Nicodemus doesn't know anything about what he's talking about there.
9:00
SPEAKER_00: But there is, in what Jesus says here, there is something that Nicodemus can relate to, being a teacher in Israel.
9:12
SPEAKER_00: Verse 6, he says.
9:17
SPEAKER_00: Now notice he's talking to this teacher in Israel.
9:20
SPEAKER_00: Nicodemus, he says, unless you're born of the water and the spirit, the water and the spirit, you cannot enter the kingdom of God.
9:28
SPEAKER_00: That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit.
9:33
SPEAKER_00: So don't marvel.
9:34
SPEAKER_00: Do not marvel that I said to you, you must be born again.
9:38
SPEAKER_00: He's saying, Nicodemus, don't be surprised.
9:40
SPEAKER_00: You shouldn't be surprised that I say, and that's that word from above, that you've got to be born from above.
9:47
SPEAKER_00: Now think of this.
9:48
SPEAKER_00: Here is a man, a teacher of the Pharisees, and what they're all about is doing, is doing the law, doing good, being good enough, and has nothing to do with regeneration, has nothing to do with being made of a new person, it's just being good again.
10:05
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus says, Don't marvel that I said you've got to be born from above.
10:09
SPEAKER_00: He says, verse 9, he says, the wind blows where it wills, and you hear the sound of it, but you can't tell where it comes from and where it goes.
10:17
SPEAKER_00: And so is is everyone who is born of the Spirit.
10:20
SPEAKER_00: Now, what's that mean?
10:21
SPEAKER_00: We can say, well, it just means that they just kind of glide along and okay, that's that's fun.
10:25
SPEAKER_00: I like that.
10:26
SPEAKER_00: I can get with that.
10:26
SPEAKER_00: But but literally, he's talking about born from above here.
10:30
SPEAKER_00: He says, He says, you hear the sound of the wind, you see it see it going, but you don't know where it came from, and you don't know where it's going.
10:36
SPEAKER_00: And what he's about to tell him here says, Nicodemus, you don't, you haven't been where I've been, and you haven't been where I'm going.
10:44
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
10:44
SPEAKER_00: So you don't know that place.
10:46
SPEAKER_00: You don't know the from above that I'm talking about, and the from above that we are going to see him go return to.
10:53
SPEAKER_00: Nicodemus answered and he said, How can these things be?
10:56
SPEAKER_00: Now he's a smart man, he's a teacher.
10:59
SPEAKER_00: Jesus answered and said to him, Now watch this, it's always kind of bothered me.
11:02
SPEAKER_00: I thought, Jesus, why you gotta be so hard on the guy?
11:05
SPEAKER_00: He says, Are you a teacher of Israel and you don't know these things?
11:10
SPEAKER_00: Most assuredly I say to you, we speak and testify, and we know that which we've seen.
11:15
SPEAKER_00: Now, I thought, Jesus, how could he know these things?
11:22
SPEAKER_00: You haven't even done your work on the cross yet.
11:24
SPEAKER_00: People haven't been born again yet.
11:26
SPEAKER_00: How can he know anything about it?
11:28
SPEAKER_00: He says, Are you a teacher and you don't know what I'm talking about?
11:31
SPEAKER_00: You must be born from above.
11:32
SPEAKER_00: So Jesus thought that he should have known what he was talking about.
11:37
SPEAKER_00: You're a teacher and you don't know these things?
11:39
SPEAKER_00: I'm saying to you, surely, what we speak and what we know and testify is what we have seen.
11:48
SPEAKER_00: And you don't receive our witness.
11:49
SPEAKER_00: If I tell you earthly things and you still don't believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?
11:53
SPEAKER_00: No, what's he saying here?
11:54
SPEAKER_00: Watch this.
11:54
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna see it in the next verse.
11:55
SPEAKER_00: But he says, he says, what we know and what we speak of is what we've seen.
12:00
SPEAKER_00: I'm speaking of heaven.
12:02
SPEAKER_00: Now you've seen earth, so the things you speak of are earthly.
12:06
SPEAKER_00: He says, but I've been in heaven.
12:11
SPEAKER_00: I'm talking about a kingdom, I'm talking about a place, I'm talking about a reality, I'm talking about a life.
12:18
SPEAKER_00: And he says, and Nicodemus, you should know this because there are references to this new birth, to this regeneration in your scriptures.
12:26
SPEAKER_00: That's why he said that.
12:28
SPEAKER_00: He says, He says in verse 12, verse 13, watch this.
12:34
SPEAKER_00: No one has ascended to heaven or goes to heaven except he who came from heaven.
12:42
SPEAKER_00: That is the Son of Man who is in heaven.
12:44
SPEAKER_00: In other words, he says, I came from there.
12:48
SPEAKER_00: And I'm going there.
12:50
SPEAKER_00: And he says, and nobody goes there, nobody sees, nobody enters the kingdom of heaven except he that is from heaven.
12:59
SPEAKER_00: So what we're talking about here is we understand that this born from above is not we straightened up our act, we started going to church, that there was a literal, real birth.
13:11
SPEAKER_00: A real spiritual regeneration, a birth that that brought us, that caused us to be born, born in heaven itself.
13:23
SPEAKER_00: Now, this is a reality many of us can agree with theologically.
13:28
SPEAKER_00: But man, if the Spirit who has poured out today can open our eyes to make this reality more real than this stuff right here.
13:40
SPEAKER_00: Because this stuff right here is a very short thing.
13:43
SPEAKER_00: This stuff will can rot.
13:46
SPEAKER_00: Stuff we're talking about from heaven, the place we're from, the place we're born from is eternal, always has been, always will be.
13:52
SPEAKER_00: It'll never change.
13:52
SPEAKER_00: It is fullness, it is abundance, it is love, joy, peace, it is all those things, and it'll never be any different than that.
13:58
SPEAKER_00: It will always, always consistently be that.
14:02
SPEAKER_00: And that will that is your consistent experience when you know your citizenship, when you're when you when you when you when you're aware, when you can wake up in the morning and you know where you're from.
14:12
SPEAKER_00: Now, I man, there's so much I want to say here.
14:14
SPEAKER_00: So uh very briefly, I gotta talk fast because I got too much to say.
14:21
SPEAKER_00: Uh um, Galatians 4.26 says this.
14:29
SPEAKER_00: But the Jerusalem from above is free, which is the mother of us all.
14:39
SPEAKER_00: So who birthed us?
14:40
SPEAKER_00: Heaven.
14:42
SPEAKER_00: Where did we come from?
14:44
SPEAKER_00: Heaven.
14:46
SPEAKER_00: Now he says, he says, now he says, Nicodemus, you should know these things.
14:51
SPEAKER_00: And just briefly let me run over some scriptures that this teacher of the Old Testament should know.
15:03
SPEAKER_00: All he's got to do as Jesus is is sparking his memory is he should just remember these things.
15:07
SPEAKER_00: For one thing, uh Ezekiel chapter 36, verses 25, 6, and 7 refer to this new birth, a regeneration, that it's not just keeping laws, it's not being good enough, it's not straightening up your act.
15:18
SPEAKER_00: You've got to be born again.
15:20
SPEAKER_00: Now, now remember, as we read this, what another thing that a Nicodemus should know as a scholar of the Word of God, of the law and the prophets, of the laws of Moses, the Torah, the first five books, including Genesis, is that man ate of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and God said, What happens when you do that?
15:40
SPEAKER_00: You die.
15:41
SPEAKER_00: So, right off the bat, that tells you there needs to be a regeneration, a rebirth here.
15:47
SPEAKER_00: There needs to be a coming alive that happens.
15:50
SPEAKER_00: And we don't see it happen in any of the keepings of anything here.
15:53
SPEAKER_00: And so, what we had in the midst of that, the prophets would speak in the midst of all that uh that law that was going on, such as Ezekiel says, says, I will make a new covenant with you.
16:03
SPEAKER_00: Verse 25, I will sprinkle clean water on you.
16:08
SPEAKER_00: Water of regeneration.
16:09
SPEAKER_00: Titus chapter 3, verse 5 says, When the goodness and love of God appeared, we were saved by his love by the washing of the water, excuse me, by the washing of water of regeneration.
16:24
SPEAKER_00: It was a that that verse of Titus was speaking to these ritual cleansings that spoke of a regeneration.
16:31
SPEAKER_00: They had ritual cleansings there, but God was speaking that cleansing will be a real cleansing, a real purification.
16:38
SPEAKER_00: He says, I will sprinkle clean water on you and you shall be clean.
16:42
SPEAKER_00: I will cleanse you from all your filthiness from all your idols.
16:45
SPEAKER_00: I will give you a new heart, I will put a new spirit in you.
16:48
SPEAKER_00: Pentecost.
16:50
SPEAKER_00: I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh, I'll give you a heart of flesh, I'll put my spirit in you, I'll cause you to, I'll cause you to walk in my statutes, and you will keep my judgments and do them.
17:03
SPEAKER_00: Nicodemus, you ought to know what he's talking about here.
17:05
SPEAKER_00: He's gonna make something new, he's gonna make us new, he's gonna do a new thing here, a new birth.
17:10
SPEAKER_00: He also speaks it, he repeats the same thing in chapter 11 of Ezekiel.
17:15
SPEAKER_00: Um Jeremiah chapter 31 says, But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord.
17:23
SPEAKER_00: I will put my law in their minds, I will write it in their hearts, I will be their God, they shall be my people.
17:28
SPEAKER_00: Let's go to look at uh at something at the book of Job here.
17:37
SPEAKER_00: Book of Job, verse 15, verse 14.
17:40
SPEAKER_00: Just a couple of verses here that that we pull out of here, but it shows the condition of man.
17:44
SPEAKER_00: So we know the story of Job and what condition he was in.
17:46
SPEAKER_00: And in verse 14 of chapter 15, Job says, What is man that he could be pure?
17:53
SPEAKER_00: So there there was this obvious, all through this, there was this acknowledgement of a need to become pure.
18:00
SPEAKER_00: And who is born of a woman that he could ever be righteous?
18:07
SPEAKER_00: Why?
18:07
SPEAKER_00: Because we've all come from Adam.
18:09
SPEAKER_00: Everybody died.
18:12
SPEAKER_00: He says in verse 25 of Job, how then can a man be righteous before God?
18:19
SPEAKER_00: Or how can anyone be pure who is born of a woman?
18:24
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so they're at talking in Matthew 11, they're talking about John the Baptist.
18:30
SPEAKER_00: Talking about Elijah, and he says, I'm talking about John the Baptist.
18:32
SPEAKER_00: He says, now John the Baptist, he says, There is no man born of woman better than him.
18:39
SPEAKER_00: But how can anyone born of woman ever be pure?
18:42
SPEAKER_00: How can anyone born of woman ever be righteous?
18:45
SPEAKER_00: But in all that group, John's the greatest of all of them, yet not pure, yet not righteous.
18:51
SPEAKER_00: So I say to you, he that's least in the kingdom of heaven, he that's least that's been born from above, because of your birth, because of your citizenship, because of your nativity, you're greater than him.
19:06
SPEAKER_00: So it's all about the birth.
19:08
SPEAKER_00: That means it's all about what Jesus has done.
19:11
SPEAKER_00: Right?
19:12
SPEAKER_00: Now, let me let me show you something, how, how, how, how powerful and easy this is.
19:17
SPEAKER_00: I'm an American by birth.
19:19
SPEAKER_00: Anybody like else like that?
19:20
SPEAKER_00: You're an American by birth?
19:23
SPEAKER_00: You didn't have to do anything except draw a breath.
19:27
SPEAKER_00: Boom! American! From that moment, you can leave this country and you can come back anytime without any problem because you're a citizen.
19:35
SPEAKER_00: Why were you a citizen?
19:37
SPEAKER_00: Did you, you now you're not a citizen the ways other people become citizens.
19:40
SPEAKER_00: There have been other people that become citizens of America and not by birth.
19:44
SPEAKER_00: You know what they gotta do to really become citizens, legal citizens?
19:47
SPEAKER_00: They gotta study.
19:48
SPEAKER_00: They gotta know history, they gotta know government.
19:52
SPEAKER_00: Huh?
19:53
SPEAKER_00: I know lots and lots of natural-born Americans that don't know our history, that don't know that much about our government and the way that it was set up and working, all that.
20:01
SPEAKER_00: They gotta study and know this, and they've got to pass a test.
20:05
SPEAKER_00: I never had to pass a test.
20:07
SPEAKER_00: I was just born.
20:10
SPEAKER_00: People that people that became legal immigrants, they they they probably know more about our government and history than most of us that were born here.
20:20
unknown: Huh?
20:22
SPEAKER_00: But we're just natural born.
20:24
SPEAKER_00: And and because of that, we didn't have to do anything.
20:27
SPEAKER_00: You can be just as ignorant about it as as a rock about the birth birth of this country and all that.
20:33
SPEAKER_00: But it doesn't matter.
20:34
SPEAKER_00: You're an American because you were born here.
20:36
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to know all the Bible, you were born in heaven.
20:39
SPEAKER_00: Huh?
20:41
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to be able to quote it backwards and forwards, you don't even have to do all the law.
20:44
SPEAKER_00: You were born here.
20:46
SPEAKER_00: And you're always going to be a citizen of heaven, and that's why the Bible tells us our citizenship is of heaven.
20:52
SPEAKER_00: And from there, it says, from there we look for the Savior's return who will say, who will change this vile body.
21:04
SPEAKER_00: But we do it from a place.
21:06
SPEAKER_00: So now we know we talk about that, we can see that that we that there's sort of this parallel life.
21:11
SPEAKER_00: We understand that we're that we are in the world, but not of it, but because there's been another birth.
21:15
SPEAKER_00: We are not just of this world anymore, there's been another birth.
21:18
SPEAKER_00: Jesus did this miraculous thing where we could at literally be born of heaven.
21:22
SPEAKER_00: So that's who I am.
21:23
SPEAKER_00: Rick, what you what what is your nationality?
21:25
SPEAKER_00: You look a little funny there.
21:26
SPEAKER_00: What's my I'm uh what nation?
21:28
SPEAKER_00: I'm holy.
21:29
SPEAKER_00: You are a holy nation.
21:31
SPEAKER_00: Now, here's what we know, because you know, and I tried this in a meeting the other night, and I said, So, you know, if I ask you, where are you from or where were you born, immediately the natural place would come up, and understandably so.
21:45
SPEAKER_00: I knew you know that know that's gonna happen.
21:47
SPEAKER_00: But what happens if you get if you if you become so aware of reality, not this temporal stuff that comes and goes.
21:58
SPEAKER_00: Since the things of this World are temporal, right?
22:03
SPEAKER_00: How can they ever define who you truly are?
22:07
SPEAKER_00: They can't.
22:08
SPEAKER_00: The only thing that can define who a true born of heaven person is, is heaven itself can define you.
22:15
SPEAKER_00: Now we partake of our natural things and we have natural cultures and all that, and that's cool, and that's fun enough.
22:20
SPEAKER_00: But but it but but but beyond that, and more real and more enduring and more lasting is what we are in our temporary cultural ways is not who we will be eternally.
22:39
SPEAKER_00: Who we will be eternally is who we have been eternally, born in heaven.
22:48
SPEAKER_00: So who are you, Rick?
22:51
SPEAKER_00: What nation are you from?
22:53
SPEAKER_00: I'm of a holy nation.
22:55
SPEAKER_00: A royal priesthood, a peculiar people.
23:00
SPEAKER_00: Now, it crosses over to where it's like, yeah, I get that theologically, haha, that's cute, Rick.
23:05
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we can say that.
23:07
SPEAKER_00: Or when you wake up in the morning, you know that you're there.
23:12
SPEAKER_00: Now, how does that affect things?
23:15
SPEAKER_00: When the world's throwing its worst at you.
23:17
SPEAKER_00: How does that affect things when you know what country you're really from?
23:26
SPEAKER_00: You know why Americans sort of have a reputation over in other countries of that a lot of time they don't they don't get because we're American.
23:38
SPEAKER_00: We don't put up with this.
23:39
SPEAKER_00: We're American, by God.
23:41
SPEAKER_00: We're used to how it is back home.
23:44
SPEAKER_00: We like good service.
23:46
SPEAKER_00: We're used to getting what we want.
23:50
SPEAKER_00: Maybe that's not the best analogy and example, but but when you know where you're from, I'm from heaven.
23:58
SPEAKER_00: Well, the doctor said this, I'm from heaven.
24:03
SPEAKER_00: Well, the economy's doing that, but I'm from heaven.
24:07
SPEAKER_00: Uh-huh.
24:09
SPEAKER_00: My citizenship's of heaven.
24:11
SPEAKER_00: I operate under a different.
24:13
SPEAKER_00: Do you how is your how is the economy of your of your home country?
24:19
SPEAKER_00: Man, it's it's never had a problem.
24:22
SPEAKER_00: And this is real, this is true.
24:23
SPEAKER_00: This is this is gonna be your reality for all of eternity.
24:26
SPEAKER_00: It might as well be your reality in this little time right now.
24:33
SPEAKER_00: This is why I say, see, in the natural uh Judy, our money goes up and it goes down.
24:39
SPEAKER_00: You know which ones are more fun?
24:44
SPEAKER_00: But sometimes it goes down.
24:49
SPEAKER_00: What do I always say when it's down?
24:51
SPEAKER_00: I feel so rich.
24:57
SPEAKER_00: And yeah, there's natural reasons, you have love and family and so on, but but all that, but but I'm going beyond that.
25:01
SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm so rich because our economy is wonderful right now.
25:08
SPEAKER_00: The kingdom.
25:12
SPEAKER_00: How's your health?
25:13
SPEAKER_00: Well, my country, we don't have that kind of disease.
25:17
SPEAKER_00: We don't get it.
25:20
SPEAKER_00: Oh, see, this is how faith works.
25:21
SPEAKER_00: You got it's it's simply by knowing.
25:23
SPEAKER_00: Knowing, he said, knowing that our old nature, the old man, the old identity, is passed away, and all things become new, and now we are made alive unto God.
25:34
SPEAKER_00: See, when we were born from above, we were, you know, Jesus identified with us in death, burial.
25:39
SPEAKER_00: He he made us alive together with him, and where did he take us with them?
25:42
SPEAKER_00: When he ascended on high, we were we we uh we we are we ascended with him and we were made to sit with him where?
25:50
SPEAKER_00: Welcome home, church.
25:53
SPEAKER_00: Huh?
25:55
SPEAKER_00: We were born of the Spirit, we were born of the of the regeneration.
26:02
SPEAKER_00: Now, see what this this this is simple stuff, I understand, but but what we're what all that's necessary is is for a lot of us, it's not just more Bible information, it's awareness of reality.
26:14
SPEAKER_00: Escaping to reality.
26:24
SPEAKER_00: Philippians 3.20 is where he says, our citizenship is in heaven, which we eagerly wait, from which we eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform this lowly body, that it would be conformed to his glorious body according to the working by which he's able to subdue all things to himself.
26:41
SPEAKER_00: Now, now look at this.
26:43
SPEAKER_00: When you, I mean, this is not, see, it can be theology.
26:49
SPEAKER_00: And and and and and people people want help a lot of times with this with this stuff.
26:57
SPEAKER_00: They they they they'll approach us and they're like, I believe it, I believe it, but all this, no, no, no, no.
27:05
SPEAKER_00: No, you agree with it theologically.
27:09
SPEAKER_00: You have your doctrine right.
27:10
SPEAKER_00: You have you you you agree with it, you're not fighting it at all in your in your theology, you say, This is what I believe, this is my creed.
27:19
SPEAKER_00: But the Bible never said what you believe with your brain, that piece of meat up there that's going to deteriorate if your body does, it'll go with the bones and the tissue and everything else.
27:29
SPEAKER_00: He's talking about, he says, but if you believe with your heart, your inner man.
27:35
SPEAKER_00: So you can have a mental ascent and a mental theology.
27:39
SPEAKER_00: But what we're talking about is a reality.
27:41
SPEAKER_00: We're talking about an awareness.
27:43
SPEAKER_00: We're talking about where it's not just in your conscience, it's in your subconscious.
27:46
SPEAKER_00: When you wake, it's always there.
27:48
SPEAKER_00: Because you know something, you're aware.
27:50
SPEAKER_00: And what happens is when you see these things, you slide away from being 90% conscious of flesh.
27:56
SPEAKER_00: It's what always causes the fear and the and the and the frustration and the anger and all these things that are going on.
28:02
SPEAKER_00: There is none of this back home.
28:06
SPEAKER_00: We don't know that, we don't have that phenomenon in heaven.
28:10
SPEAKER_00: And so what we do is we do what the Bible says.
28:14
SPEAKER_00: We remember the rock we've been cut from.
28:18
SPEAKER_00: We remember from where we've been carved.
28:21
SPEAKER_00: We remember where we're from.
28:22
SPEAKER_00: We remember that we have a country.
28:25
SPEAKER_00: Come on.
28:26
SPEAKER_00: And not only that, is that now what we're talking about here is we have been born from.
28:32
SPEAKER_00: We're not looking to be born again.
28:34
SPEAKER_00: We're not looking to be born from above.
28:36
SPEAKER_00: We're not waiting for that.
28:38
SPEAKER_00: We have been born from there.
28:40
SPEAKER_00: And because that's our home, that is our experience now, if you can receive it, if you can see that.
28:45
SPEAKER_00: Are you are y'all here?
28:46
SPEAKER_00: This is what let's watch this.
28:49
SPEAKER_00: Creation is groaning to see, is looking to see.
28:55
SPEAKER_00: The manifestation of the sons of God.
28:57
SPEAKER_00: I love the J.B.
28:58
SPEAKER_00: Phillips translation.
28:59
SPEAKER_00: He says, All, even all of creation is standing on tiptoe to see the wonderful sight of the sons of God coming into their own.
29:08
SPEAKER_00: Why?
29:09
SPEAKER_00: Because only those born of heaven have what's going to help this world.
29:14
SPEAKER_00: Please believe me.
29:24
SPEAKER_00: Now I'm very interested in politics.
29:26
SPEAKER_00: I'm conservative.
29:26
SPEAKER_00: I mean, have always voted that way.
29:29
SPEAKER_00: But I understand where my real kingdom is.
29:33
SPEAKER_00: And I understand that what creation is looking for, what creation is groaning for, is not another four years of Trump or a Democrat taking office.
29:41
SPEAKER_00: That's not what creation is groaning for.
29:48
SPEAKER_00: Creation is groaning for the sons to know who they are.
29:52
SPEAKER_00: Why?
29:52
SPEAKER_00: Because the sons that know who they are, born of heaven, they got the good.
29:55
SPEAKER_00: They got the thing that'll really turn this thing into heaven.
29:58
SPEAKER_00: They got the thing that'll really change this world.
30:00
SPEAKER_00: What'll change this world?
30:02
SPEAKER_00: A change in worldly government?
30:08
SPEAKER_00: What'll change the world?
30:09
SPEAKER_00: All the evil, all the anger, all the hatred, all the ugly, what is ever going to change that world?
30:16
SPEAKER_00: Just bomb all the ugly and just leave all of us good ones?
30:19
SPEAKER_00: Well, they think the same thing.
30:25
SPEAKER_00: What'll change this world?
30:26
SPEAKER_00: The same thing that changed you will change that world.
30:29
SPEAKER_00: The same thing that changed me, being born of heaven.
30:42
SPEAKER_00: Being born of heaven, we carry the kingdom within us.
30:45
SPEAKER_00: We carry something here.
30:48
SPEAKER_00: So many Christians are carrying this thing, and they still think they're trying to get it.
30:53
SPEAKER_00: If I can just get there, if I can just cross over, if I can just you don't have to cross over.
30:57
SPEAKER_00: You've been born from there.
31:02
SPEAKER_00: The chicken don't need to cross the road.
31:04
SPEAKER_00: He's on the right side.
31:09
SPEAKER_00: Been born from there.
31:10
SPEAKER_00: So we carry.
31:10
SPEAKER_00: He said the kingdom lives within you.
31:12
SPEAKER_00: We have this thing.
31:13
SPEAKER_00: We have all this heaven allows.
31:15
SPEAKER_00: Righteousness, peace, joy in the Holy Ghost.
31:19
SPEAKER_00: That means I'm not praying for peace on earth.
31:23
SPEAKER_00: I'm carrying peace on earth, more rightly so.
31:29
SPEAKER_00: And it does happen one heart at a time.
31:32
SPEAKER_00: And knees do bow one knee at a time.
31:41
SPEAKER_00: And we carry this person of God Himself.
31:48
SPEAKER_00: This treasure in earthen vessels.
31:51
SPEAKER_00: And God is agape.
31:57
SPEAKER_00: Unconditional, unbounded, unlimited.
32:02
SPEAKER_00: Love with no requirements, no conditions, enough love to change a world, to change a heart, enough world to melt the hardest, enough creations groaning.
32:13
SPEAKER_00: Creations looking.
32:15
SPEAKER_00: They don't might not know what they're looking for, but the one thing, Romans 8, read it, that sets creation at liberty.
32:21
SPEAKER_00: Creation, oh listen, creation will come into the glorious liberty of the sons of God.
32:30
SPEAKER_00: They're looking for the sons, walking in their liberty.
32:35
SPEAKER_00: Why are we in liberty?
32:36
SPEAKER_00: Because we weren't born of this world anymore.
32:38
SPEAKER_00: We're born of heaven.
32:41
SPEAKER_00: The sons are free.
32:43
SPEAKER_00: While the children of this world, Galatians 4 tells, they were born of the bondwoman.
32:49
SPEAKER_00: But we were born of the heavenly Jerusalem, and she's a free woman.
32:55
SPEAKER_00: We were not born into the slavery of this world.
32:58
SPEAKER_00: We're born free.
33:01
SPEAKER_00: Born free.
33:03
SPEAKER_00: And we got the papers.
33:05
SPEAKER_00: It's in heaven, though.
33:06
SPEAKER_00: It's called the Lamb's Book of Life.
33:09
SPEAKER_00: Would y'all stand up?