Because when you give something up for the Lord, you get so much more back. And so we saw that if you seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, all the other things that we desire will be added to it. Now I want to continue today along the vein of the kingdom of God.

And I want to show you the next thing that is possible in your life when you learn to put the kingdom of God first. The title of my message is learning to reign. I'm going to read one verse only at first.

Romans chapter 5 and verse 17. For if one person's sin caused death to reign, how much more will those who are receiving the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign as kings and queens in life through one person, Jesus Christ. When we think about a kingdom, we think about a sovereign, a king or a queen.

Now when you're part of the kingdom of God, you're not just a subject in a king and in a kingdom looking to the king who reigns. You become far more than that because Jesus is not known as the king of peasants. He's known as the king of kings.

Jesus reigns over other kings and queens. So when you become a partaker of the kingdom of God, you actually become royalty. You become part of the royal family.

You become heirs to the throne. You have the potential to rise up as a king or a queen. Isn't that awesome? But there's a price to pay.

See first his kingdom and his righteousness. You've got to do that first. Now if you pay the price, you get the benefits.

It's going to cost you, but in the end, it's going to be worth it. Now when we look at kingdoms and queens, we actually don't have a lot to look at these days because it's kind of not in vogue anymore, except in good old England where we got the queen who'd been reigning for many years. And so I'd like to give you an illustration from England, from the royal family.

Maybe help you understand a little bit what I'm talking about. I'm sure you all know the story of Prince Harry and how he married Meghan in the big fancy wedding that they had. But recently, Harry and Meghan got fed up with the price they had to pay for being royalty.

It was great being honored and exalted and treated as royals, but there was a price to pay. And the price became a bit more and they wanted to bear. And they said, we don't want this anymore.

We'd just rather not be listed with all the royal families. I guess they kind of hoped that things would just continue the same, but unfortunately, his grandmother, the queen is very stickler for the right thing to do. And she said, okay, Harry, you don't want part of the royal family.

You're not part of the royal family anymore. That's it. You're no longer a royal highness anymore.

It's gone. There's a price to pay. If you don't want to be part of the royal family, yeah, it's inconvenient.

People demand a lot of you. It's not easy to live a normal life when you're royalty, but there are benefits. And if you want to give up the inconvenience, you're going to lose the benefits.

You want the freedom to do your own thing. You don't want this limitation and restriction that the Lord places on us to seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and do everything his way. You say, you know, I'd like to be free to do my own thing sometimes.

Can't I just have some liberty? Well, yes, you're welcome to have liberty, but you lose the privileges. You lose the protection and the blessing of the Lord. Unfortunately, that is why we've got to seek first the kingdom.

That's why there's a price to pay before we get it. Well, now, I don't want to major on the price to pay. We spoke about that last time.

I want to speak today about the benefits. If you were challenged last time to pay the price and you said, okay, I'll do it, I'll do it. So what now? What do I get out of it? I'd like to show you today what you're going to get out of it and what the advantages of being part of the royal family.

But first, it comes across. Jesus said in Mark 8, reading from verse 34, when he called the people to him and the disciples also, he said to them, whoever will come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross and follow me. And then he made it a bit clearer what's involved.

Whoever will save his life will lose it. Whoever will lose his life for my sake and the gospels will save it. What benefit is there for a person if he has acquired the whole world but has lost his life? It's not worth anything.

See, the spiritual life, folks, always begins with a death, unfortunately. You've got to die to your own desires and your own ambitions. You can't do whatever you please.

You're going to have to give up that freedom if you want to think of it as freedom. See, but when you do that, when you're prepared to pay the price to gain the benefits of the power of the kingdom, you'll find actually there is still freedom in restriction. You've ever ridden by train? You'll notice that a train can't ride wherever it likes.

Not like a car. You know, a car, you can just go off the road and run to the bush if you want to. If you've got one of these good Jeeps with four-wheel drive, you could just go bunder bashing.

You could ride anywhere. You don't have to stick to the road. But a train, unfortunately, doesn't have that freedom.

A train has two rails that it's got to sit on. But you know, while the train sits on those rails, it can do whatever it likes. It can go forwards, backwards, fast, slow.

It has all the liberty in the world as long as it sticks to the tracks. God's not taking away your freedom. He's just putting you in a place of protection.

He's saying, you stick to my tracks, I will take you places you've never been. You see, I'm going to be in control. And I'm going to make sure you don't go astray.

I'm going to make sure you don't get harmed. You know, there'll be no accidents. It does happen sometimes somebody messes up and there's a train coming on the same rail.

But, you know, it doesn't normally happen. It's all out of control. You don't have to worry that some bad train driver out there is going to get on your rail and crash into you, like we do on the roads.

So, yes, we've got a limitation and we have a restriction. It's a cross. There's things we've got to let go of.

There's things we've got to die to. But you know what comes after the cross? The crown. Know that old expression? No cross, no crown.

Once you face the cross, you qualify for the crown. Romans 5, 17. For if one man's sin caused death to reign, how much more will those who are receiving the abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness reign as kings and queens in life? Through the one Jesus Christ.

See, there it comes again. Now, what benefits do we have by limiting ourselves to the kingdom? Well, firstly, one of the benefits is that you're royalty. That means you're special.

That means you're going to be recognized as set apart and different. You're also going to become more visible. Those royal family, I tell you what, they can't hide.

They can't tell you to go on a secret shopping trip. You can't do it. Could you handle a bit of visibility? Could you handle it? Yeah, I know, maybe if you had as much as them, you'd want to run away from it too.

But right now, I'm tired of being in obscurity. I could handle a bit of visibility. You also carry great authority because you're reigning.

And you know what? You can get whatever you desire. There's very little limitation or restriction when you're a king. The king wants something.

He speaks, people jump. You get what you want. Yeah, I know it's not as easy these days for royalty, but in days gone by, the king was supreme.

His command is law. I want something, you do it. You know, King David just looked at the water from the well there.

That's a place we couldn't get. He said, oh, I wish I could have a drink. And his men jumped to action.

When he broke through the ranks and came back with a bottle of water just for the king. The king doesn't even need to command. He just needs to say, eh.

And everybody says, where do you want to eh? I could handle a bit of that. Your life is also free from many bad things. Poverty is something you'll never know.

Tell you what, when you are royalty, you drive the best. You eat the best. You dress the best.

Wherever you go, you get the best. You don't have to settle for anything else but the best. And you're protected by a tight wall of security.

Nobody can get close enough to breathe on you, unless it's allowed. They spend big bucks on security for these people to protect them from harm. Can you see the picture? You're a king.

You're a queen. You have all of these benefits. Oh, but it's not fair.

I have to be limited and restricted. You know what? I've forgotten what the limitations were now, after seeing all I could get. The believers are complaining, it's not fair.

You know, since I became a Christian, I had to give up all the good things. You know, I used to have such fun when I was an unbeliever. And now I can't do that anymore.

Life is so boring now that I'm a Christian. You don't know who you are. You don't know who you are.

You're a king acting like a pauper. I haven't seen real kings fall for that one yet. So why are you falling for it? Tell you why, because you've got an enemy.

You have many enemies that are coming against you to steal all these things from you. Let's look at some of the enemies that we have to face in our spiritual life. First one is a three-letter word beginning with S. I think you know what that one is.

Sin. Sin brings bondage. You find you can't do the things you want to do.

Paul says, I just stepped out with the great intention of doing the right thing. And sure as nuts, I ended up doing the wrong thing. Because I got sin inside of me.

And it frustrates me. Oh, it's me. Who's going to deliver me? We have a world system out there that's designed to make sure that you do not experience the blessings that are yours as part of the kingdom of God.

The world is set. It is absolutely determined to keep you poor. The world wants to make sure that you never ever get the blessings of God, that you never rise up and be seen or known.

The world wants to make sure that you are hidden away in obscurity and spend the rest of your life in loneliness. Shame you poor Christian. Just look at all you had to give up while the rest of us have fun.

And we take care of our own. And we lift up those who are like us, who are full of themselves and full of pride and want to exalt themselves. We put them on the movie screen and promote their sin.

And you poor, miserable, silly Christian, what do you got? Nothing. If that's not enough, we have problems in our bodies as well. Sickness, pain.

It just doesn't kind of sound like somebody has whatever they want and has the best, does it? The enemy doesn't want you to experience what the Lord has for you. That's why he tries to sidetrack you to get you away. He wants to get you like old Harry to say, you know, I'm tired of all of this.

I would rather do my own thing than I could be happy without these lines that are going to run on all the time. I want to get out there. Oh, we get so expressive.

I'm bored. I want to do something exciting. Instead of just being a Christian, go to church every Sunday, sing some songs, listen to the preacher, go home again, pray, read the Bible, get up in the morning, go to work.

What a dull existence. Everybody else has these having fun. Oh, it's such a lie, folks.

Such a lie that the enemy is sold and we believed it. In fact, he got so clever about it, he made you think that this is what God wanted. And he told you that poverty is a blessing, that sometimes God wants you to be sick and suffering to keep you humble.

And many Christians just took the bait, took line and sinker, as they say, and they fell for it. Got bitter at the Lord and said, it's not fair. It's not fair.

You're a king. You're a queen. You're supposed to be reigning.

Let me tell you something. Do you know what it means to reign? Firstly, you make a choice. You decide what you want.

You don't let other people decide for you. You don't put it out to a vote and go with the public opinion. It's not how a sovereign works.

That's not what reigning means. Reigning means I make a choice. I make a decision.

I decide what I want and what I don't want, what I'm prepared to accept and what I'm not prepared to accept. But I get up in the morning. The Lord began to show up the other morning and I felt, oh no.

What happened during the night? I feel foggy. I've got a pain in my head. Oh, it's going to be one of those days again.

The Lord just spoke up in my spirit and he said, are you a king or not? And I said, hold on. Hold on. Hold on.

I don't have to accept this. This is not what I desire. This is not what God has for me.

Why should I accept it? Oh Lord Jesus, please will you heal me? No. Please Lord, no. Okay.

Is that the way we do it? I said, don't you dare devil. Don't you dare. You think you caught me while I was asleep? I'm awake now.

I'm putting on my kingly robes and my crown and I'm going to reign and I'm going to get on my throne and you better put your running shoes on and get out of here because you're in trouble.

I just took a few minutes, and boom, it was gone. Now, I could have wallowed for a while, panicked, and seen what tablets I needed to take. Wonder whether something came on me during the night. Am I going to die?

Oh, the devil's got many suggestions for you if you believe them. Yes. He's got a flip chart there. You know, he says it's a stroke.

Now it can't be a stroke. I don't believe that. Would you believe a heart attack? Till he finds one that you believe.

Yeah. That's what it is. There's a tumor on the brain.

Look it up online. You see all the symptoms. Come on.

It would be funny if it wasn't true. I've been there many times. Lord said to me, stop looking up medical things online.

He said, I'll show you what's wrong and I'll show you how to deal with it. Start to reign. You need to realize your authority, but you also need to know that it's not your authority it's his authority because you may feel very weak and very lacking in authority, but you're not standing in your own authority.

You're standing in his. See, that's what it means to come in the name. And a lot of people, they don't realize the power of the name.

They think the name is something that I just throw around and scare everybody off. In the name of Jesus, in the name of Jesus, Satan, I come against you in the name of Jesus, in the name of Jesus. And I often said that five times, the devil knows I'm not sure.

He knows I'm panicking. In the name of Jesus, in the name of Jesus. Jesus said, I came in my father's name.

Would you ever once hear him say in the name of my father? Don't you know what it is, folks? To be in the name, to be in the name means to be as, to represent, to stand in the place. You stand in this world, not representing Jesus. You stand in this world as Jesus.

I'll show you how to get there shortly. We come to pray and we pray these long prayers. Lord, please heal in the name of Jesus.

I'm trying to shake it in. In Jesus' name, Lord, please heal. Heal, Lord, heal, heal.

We shout a bit louder because maybe you didn't hear properly. Well, yeah, I tried my best. I really thought I had the anointing, but yes, I don't.

You know, the shortest prayers in the Bible were prayed by Jesus. Be healed. Rise up, stretch out your hand.

Really long one. Get up and take your bed and walk. Oh, that is a long prayer.

It doesn't sound like a king talking, does it? It sounds like a peasant trying to pretend he's a king. But we have to pray these long prayers and plead with the Lord. Jesus never ever once told us to pray for the sick.

He said, go and heal the sick. We're going to heal the sick. We should do it his way.

It's his authority. How are we going to wield that authority? How are you going to wield that authority? Well, Jesus, I get the authority from you and I stand in it and I wield it. That's the way we normally think, isn't it? You know, if you're a little kid and your dad's giving you permission and some big bully comes to challenge you and dad's not there, do you know how confident you are? Oh, my dad said, I don't care what your dad thinks, I'm going to pound you in the face.

I'll tell my dad on you. You can do that later. And that dad steps around the corner.

Dad just pops up behind me and says, you were saying, oh, that's the end of that bully. He's gone. I got good news for you.

Dad's always with you. He's inside of you. When you stand up in his name, you don't stand up on behalf of him.

You stand up as him. And he stands up in you. See, Jesus once walked this earth in a body.

He had to take a body. Because God is the omnipotent, all present spirit. He had to take up the form of a body and limit himself to a body in order to do the things that he did in this world.

And he came as the king. Right back in the day of Bethlehem, a king is born. He was born to be a king and he showed us how to live as a king.

He acted like a king. But Jesus is in heaven now at the right hand of the father. And if he wants to continue doing what he did when he walked on this earth, he needs a body to do it.

Have you ever wondered why the church is known as the body of Christ? Because you're the body that he's living in. You're the body that he's continuing to do the things that he did. And he said, these things are going to become a little bit higher because I'm going to go to the father and I'll get even more than we had before.

Because when I was here before, I came with limitations, but now I'm coming without limitations. Therefore, the things that I do, you're going to do them, but you're going to do greater things than that because I've got more to offer now. I really tried to duplicate what Jesus did.

Who told you to duplicate what Jesus did? He just wants to carry on doing what he always did. He just needs a body. That's all he needs.

We know that body of Christ is the church universe. It's all believers, but actually it gets closer down to that. And I'll show you now how close it gets.

You must know your authority because it's his authority. You must know your power because that power comes from the Holy Spirit. And where's that Holy Spirit? He's living inside of you.

From the moment you were born again, he came to take up residence in you. Yes, he fills the universe. He's everywhere, but he's living inside of you.

And you know, with his power, he reinforces the authority. You know, you've heard the whole picture of the little traffic cop standing, put his hand up and the big truck has to stop for him. And we like to use that illustration.

But what happens if the big truck says, you puny little cop, I'm going to ride you right over. Is there anything to stop him? No. Even though you have the whole law on your side, if he flattens you, you're dead.

See, God didn't make you a little traffic cop with a badge. He put you in a tank with missiles. And when you pull into the road and you say, hey, Mr. Truck, stop.

And Mr. Truck says, I'm not going to stop. You say, I'm warning you one more time and I'm going to blow you out of the road. Because I've got power.

I don't just have authority. I have power. In Jesus name.

In Jesus name. In Jesus name. Maybe I'll eventually convince myself I have authority.

You can see when somebody don't have it. It's his authority and it's his power. But you know, I don't have that much anointing.

I'm not really that spiritual and close to the Lord. I haven't developed the power yet to the point where I can challenge a big enemy. It's not your power.

It's neither your authority nor your power. And his authority and his power are unlimited. He created this world.

You think this world can stand against it? It's no creative thing in this world. You can stand against the creator. Creator is living in you folks.

The one who made this universe is living in you. And he hasn't stopped creating. So how do we apply the benefits of the kingdom? He must reign through you.

And to do that, he must live his life through you. You see, now here's the part where you have to be involved. Because he will never ever, ever impose himself on you in any way.

If you want him to live through you, you must invite him to do that. You must invite him to come and live in you. As they say, you must give him carte blanche.

Whatever you want to do, Lord. It's not my life, it's yours. As the scripture not say, your life is hid with Christ in God.

And he's on the right hand of the father in the realm of glory. That's where your life is. So if you want your life to manifest, your life brings Jesus with.

Because your life is hidden in him. And you know, when something's hidden, you don't see it. So Jesus stands.

And who do we see? We see Jesus. But you're hidden in there. Who do we see? Jesus.

Who do we not see? You. We don't see you. Because you become so part of Jesus, you can't tell the difference.

So you stand in him. And he stands in his authority. And he stands in his power.

But he'll only do it, folks, when you invite him to come and walk this earth again, and live his life in you and through you. Now he wants to take control, total control of your spirit. But you must submit to him.

James 4.7 says, submit yourselves to God and resist the devil, he will flee. What about your body? If he's going to walk this world again, he's going to be living in your body. Think about it.

You mean this ugly, useless body of mine? Would Jesus want to live in an ugly body like mine? You're telling me that a bad job when he made you? Are you telling him, Lord, I hate what you created? He doesn't feel that way when he looks at your body. He says, this is my temple. This is where I want to live.

This is where I want to walk and operate. It's from here that I want to speak, reach out and touch the world. But again, he will never impose himself.

He will never force himself on you. You have to make a choice. And so in Romans chapter 12 and verse 1, Paul says these words.

I owe you, therefore, brothers and sisters, because of the compassions of God, to offer your bodies specifically as a living sacrifice, dedicated completely, pleasing to God. Which is really the logical thing for you to do. He's not commanding it.

He's saying, I owe you. Guys, doesn't it make sense? Isn't it logical? That's the thing you should do. He's not going to grab you and possess you.

He doesn't work that way. You offer it to him. What's a living sacrifice? Well, you know, sacrifices are normally dead, slit their throat, put them on the fire.

When something is a sacrifice, it's given up its life. So when you make a sacrifice, you let it go. If you giving your body as a sacrifice, it means you effectively said, I give it up.

This is not my body anymore. But you know, you see him dead. That's why he wants a living sacrifice, not a dead one.

You're not going to burn you. It's going to live in you. Do you want to make that step? Okay, Lord, here it is.

I don't know why you want to use this body, but hey, if you want it, Lord, you got it. Here it is. I give it completely to you.

You do with my body as you please. Oh, now that could be a challenge. What does Jesus like to eat? Well, you know, I have my favorite foods.

These things I like to do is my body. It's not your body anymore. You've asked Jesus what he wants to eat before you sit down to a meal.

That's foolish, is it? Go out and buy a new dress or suit or something. You've asked Jesus what he wants to be dressed in. Well, you know, I'm concerned about what people think about me and how I look.

And then we get very spiritual and we say, I need to dress in a way that represents the Lord. Sounds very spiritual. But at the end of the day, you follow your fashion and your desire.

And sometimes what other people want. There's a little bit more involved when you make a sacrifice. When you give your life to him, he's in control now.

He makes the choices. Oh, there we go again. It's all the things I have to give up.

Yeah, it's those two railway lines, I'm afraid. When you do this, folks, this is what happens. Firstly, he overcomes the power of sin in your life.

He sets you free totally from the effects of sin. Romans 6.12 says, do not allow sin, therefore, to continually reign in your mortal body, causing you to listen and obey it and its evil desires. Don't let that happen anymore.

No, Jesus is reigning now, not sin. Sin is still there. It'll be there until you die and get your new body.

But it's no longer your fight. It's no longer you that has to struggle with it. You've handed that fight over to him.

And he actually won the battle over 2000 years ago already over your sin. He conquered sin in the flesh. Now, if you let him live his life in you, he will overcome sin in you.

And he will not do it by condemning you and browbeating you every time you fail. Thought you said you were a Christian. And yet you do this.

Sin, it's wrong, it's bad. Preachers are always helping that along by telling you all the things you're allowed to do and not allowed to do, and what's sin and what's not sin. The Bible says, whatsoever is not of faith is sin.

What's faith? Lying totally on him alone. So when you allow Jesus to live his life in you, you don't struggle with sin anymore. Those sinful habits that you battled with, those sinful tendencies that you tried again and again to overcome and found yourself in Romans 7, who owes me, they just vanish.

They vanish in the same way that darkness vanishes when light comes, without a fight. Because he's there. He's in control.

And now he lives in your body. Now, let me ask you a simple question. Did Jesus have a sick body? Could you see Jesus being happy in a sick body? You know how he felt about sickness.

He attacked it on every count and destroyed it. How would Jesus want to live in a sick body? So when you've given your body to him, he's going to do a bit of rejuvenation, a bit of housecleaning, because this is his home. He's going to clear out all that stinky rotten stuff that you've hidden away in the cupboard.

All those secret sins, he's going to clear them all out. He's going to deodorize the air. He's going to get rid of all the junk.

He's going to do a spring cleaning, so that he has a good clean body and spirit that he can now walk this earth in again. 1 Corinthians 6.19 says, Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, which you have from God and you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price, therefore glorified God in your body and in your spirit, which are both God's. They don't belong to you.

There's a famous saying out there in the world, my body, my choice. All these women who want to have abortions, that's their claim to fame. My body, my choice.

It's not your body. He bought you at a very high price for it too. You had to give up his body on the cross to buy your spirit, your body.

You've been bought with a price, folk. The price you could ever pay. And you owe him.

You owe him. It's not your body. It's not your choice.

You've been given the privilege of living and enjoying life in the body that he's given you and appreciate the body he's given you. Stop downplaying it and complaining. Say, why did you give me such an ugly body? Why can't you give me a body like somebody else? He thought your body was valuable enough to die for.

Why are you ready to throw it away? And you know, when you allow this to happen, when you allow him to take over, and to reign through you, to live his life in you, you actually become very attractive to people all around you. You don't have to try. There's something shining in you.

And you know, a shining light always attracts attention, especially in darkness. You see a light shining in the darkness, your curiosity will get the better of you. Where's that light coming from? Man, that's such a bright, beautiful light.

Just look at the colors. Can I get a bit closer and have a look? People want to come watch. They want to come see what's going on.

But you know, I really, I really try so hard to spread the gospel and tell people about the Lord. But you know, they all reject me and say, stop preaching at me. And Baba, punch me.

I'm not interested. You know, personal sway, you come into Southern Life Insurance. You know, you become so attractive, people want to find out more.

In fact, here's how Peter described it. You become like a star in the sky. Come on, you know what it's like? You step out at night and you see this beautiful bright star.

Oh, did you see the star? Everybody's looking up at the sky. Man, that is such a beautiful bright star. In 2 Peter 1 19, Peter made an interesting statement here.

He just shared with them how he'd seen the glory of God. And it shone through Jesus on the night of transfiguration. And then he said, we have also the established word of the prophets.

That was basically their Bible in those days before the New Testament was written. He's basically saying we have the Bible and you do well to pay attention because it's like a light shining in a dark place. It's the light that you have.

So start with that light because it's the only light that you have. He said, but we're not going to stay there. He said, keep your eyes fixed on that light until the day breaks and the morning star arises in your heart.

The morning star will arise. Oh, the morning star is the most beautiful one of all. Just as the sun comes out, they often appear, they're still in the sky.

Huge, beautiful star. Bright and morning star. Jesus is likened to the bright and morning star.

Oh, it is so beautiful. You can't hide it. Everybody wants to see it.

Start with the light you have, get into the word, keep your eyes fixed on that and look to him to bring the dawn, to bring the fullness of the day as his glory becomes manifest in you. You begin to shine. You'll stand out like that star and everybody will notice and everybody will want to come and look.

You know, we use this expression, getting on fire for the Lord. Oh, if only I could get on fire for the Lord to have his power and his glory, to have magnificent things happen, signs and wonders, then I could do so much. But actually, you know what? If you get on fire, there's not much you need to do at all.

Somebody said, if you get on fire, people will come and watch you burn. He will come watch you burn. And the burning bush caught fire in the desert.

Moses turned and said, hey, what's going on here? A burning bush. Now then somebody throws matches out here and the grass is all dry and a fire starts out. Everybody's at the fence and they gaze to see what's going on.

There's a fire. What's happening with the fire? What's burning? See the smoke in the sky. Somebody's house on fire.

Is their car on fire? What's burning? You want to rise up in ministry? You want to start attracting attention instead of being so alone? Oh Lord, I've got no friends. I've got no relationships. I just sit here at home by myself.

Become on fire. Get his glory to become manifest in you. The star will come in the sky and everybody will be gathering and say, what's that? Isn't that beautiful? Let's go have a look.

It's all you need to do. Well, you know, you've got the crowds. You've got more than enough work to keep you busy.

You know, most of the revivals of the past started that way. Sometimes a small little group of people and God's power fell and God's fire was manifested and signs and wonders began to take place. Everybody hears about it and they say, oh, I want to come look.

I want to come see. It's possible even in your puny little life and your obscurity that you had for so long. It's possible.

All you need to do is invite him. So, Lord, here we are. So, if you've been complaining about your life as a believer, if you're feeling like you didn't get what God promised you, my question to you firstly is, have you paid the price? Have you paid the price? Have you sought first his kingdom and his righteousness? Have you invited Jesus to come and live in you? Have you offered your body and your whole life to be a living sacrifice to him and to him alone? If you have, then my next question to you is this, don't you think it's time you start reigning? Don't you think it's time you start acting like the king or the queen that you are? If you do that and you continue to do that and his glory comes upon you and his glory is manifest in you and the day star, the morning star arises in your heart, there is nothing in this world that can stand before you.

There's nothing in this world that can stop the blessing of God from coming upon you and as the scripture says, overtaking you. It's coming so fast you can't catch it. You can't grab it as it goes by.

You can only grab so much and it's running ahead of you and you've got to run and grab more and grab more and you know it's coming so fast you just can't get enough. You know I'd like to be the place where I can't spend the money fast enough wouldn't you? It's coming in faster than I can spend. I'd like to get to the place where I'm getting new friends and contacts all the time.

I can barely handle the ones I've got. Well I've got so many ministry opportunities that we're running out of days and time but so many work opportunities that you don't have to look for them anymore. You've got so much energy that you don't have to think about your diet and your exercise and joining the gym and all that extra money we've got to pay to lose weight.

Why can't he take care of it if he wants to live in a slim body? He knows how to make it fat mouth away. But while you're thinking about it, it grows and when it grows as you're watching it. Recently I tried to get on the scale again.

Okay Lord I'm going to try and change my diet and I'm going to lose weight. Oh the first two days it dropped then it shot higher than it was before. It's not going to work.

See because it comes from within you. Everything that you have, your healing, your health, your energy, your weight loss comes from within your spirit and you know Jesus is quite capable of doing that. He knows your desires.

If your ugly body is putting people off and stopping him from doing what he wants to do, he'll take care of it. He'll take care of it because his kingdom comes first and he's going to remove from you everything that stands in the way of him extending his kingdom in the earth. I hope I've inspired you today to realize who you are, what you are, that our spiritual life should never be a struggle, should never be a battle, should be a rest.

A rest in him. When you face those conflicts during the day, when you face the stresses of life, you stop right there. You say okay Lord I can't take this.

I can't do it. I don't know what to do next. I'm perplexed.

I'm confused. I'm frustrated. I'm angry.

I feel like throwing in the towel. He'll say I've been waiting for that. Would you let me take over now? Yeah well I suppose I might as well hand it over to him now seeing as I've tried my best and I failed.

You should have done that at the beginning. Oh we don't. Where do we hit the wall? Again and again and again.

Got big bumps in our head. And then we suddenly realize you know maybe I should have handed it over to the Lord first. Learn from your mistakes folks.

Once bitten twice shy they say. We never learn this in spiritual life do we? Let's learn it. Let's rise up and be the royalty we are.

Act like a king. Act like a queen. Put that crown on your head and stand tall.

Look at me. Peter and John walking up to pray at the temple and the poor beggar who's lame comes and says can you give me some money? Peter looks at him and says look at me. Well that wasn't very spiritual.

Jesus said look at us. Look at Jesus. Oh it sounds so spiritual.

Don't look at me. Look at Jesus. You know where he's going to see Jesus? Look here.

Jesus said he's going to see me. He's going to see the Father. Oh when Jesus starts to live his life in you what's he going to say? See look here.

See here's Jesus. You want to see the Father? Come and look. Here I am.

Hi everybody. I'm going to pray and bombard the heavenly realm and find him and break through. And then he's going to tap you on your shoulder and say um are you all ready? Let's invite him.

Daily. You wake up in the morning. Before you plan your day.

Before you let the stress of the day get to you. Before you brush your teeth. Stop there and say Holy Spirit.

I'm handing the day over to you. Lord Jesus I'm giving you myself. My body, my soul and my spirit.

And I'm giving you the license to live through me today the kind of life you want to live. Live Lord. Here it is.

I step back. It's called making Jesus Lord. When you do that you'll be amazed how well your day goes.

And if in the middle of the day Satan tries to intercept you, you stop right there. After a while you'll see it. And you'll say don't you dare.

What do you think you're doing devil? Hey. Do you know who you're dealing with here? Hey. And you know you'll say I'm sorry.

That's what he'll do. But he'll try again. Try and catch you off guard.

Convince you that the Lord's forsaken you. Convince you that things are going to carry on going wrong like they always did. And take away your hope and your faith.

All you do is say Holy Spirit it's over to you. When that irritating person that you work with does what they do best. Pull every string you have.

You're ready to kill. Stop right there. Holy Spirit.

Lord Jesus I don't know how you can love a person like this but I know you can. So I trust you to love them. I can't.

I admit it I can't. But I give you permission to love them through me now. You know where the strings all disappear.

The stress goes and vanishes away. You'll come to the end of the day and you'll think do you know what today was one of the busiest days I've had in a long time. So many things came across my path but I still have peace.

I still have joy. I still have love. I still have the fruit of his spirit in me.

Paul writes and he says we've had all these things come against us wherever we go. We're persecuted. We're thrown in jail.

And he says but none of these things move me. There's only one thing that moves me. That's his spirit and his word.

If I'm going to get moved I get moved because he wants to move. Not because Satan out there wants to move me. I'm standing right where I am until he moves.

You try it this week. Make that commitment. Try it daily.

It gets easier after a while. The beginning you've got to fight in your hands. You're going to get challenged.

I just learned to get into that place again and again and you'll be amazed. Be amazed what he can do. Jesus I thank you for your word.

I thank you for your spirit and for your anointing and I thank you for each dear child of God that's here today and those that are watching because we're all special to you. We're all part of your royal family and you want us to rise up. You want us to be seen.

You want to be seen in us. And so I ask you to help each one now to take this principle and learn to apply it practically on a day-by-day basis and Lord I'm asking you that in each one the day will break and the morning star will appear and we come together and we share the light that you put in each one of us. The radiance will be so great Lord that people out there will start to get drawn.

Won't be able to keep them away. They'll know this is one place where they can get their needs met. Thank you for it father in Jesus name.

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