The Divine Exchange:

This is only part of (Sermon # 176 Part 1 of 3) Why you can expect good things to happen to you, by Jo.seph Prin.ce:

“Today I want to share with you something that is a culmination of all that we have heard the past few months.  What is the attitude that we ought to have?  If God has made us righteous through Jesus’ blood, what is the attitude we ought to have?

What is our lot in life?  Since Adam fell, the consequences of the fall, the effects of Adam’s sin, has brought in all the D’s, you know, destruction, disease, death, depression…  It’s come upon men, now, man is you and I, the ground we stand on is called cursed ground, it’s like there is a cloud over your head and it’s raining all the time.  You know, everywhere he goes, the rain follows him…  It’s like he is always under depression.

What happened was that God loved us so much, that God could not leave us in this state, of death…  God sent His Son Jesus.  What was the purpose of sending Jesus?  No listen carefully, God sent Jesus to take our place – what does that mean?  That is actually half the gospel – Many places we are only hearing half the gospel.  In my previous church I heard for many years only half the gospel – how Jesus died for my sins, how Jesus came as my redeemer, as my saviour, but the Bible says that when God brought the children of Israel out of Egypt, God brought them out to bring them in.   God didn’t bring them out to wander in the wilderness.  God brought them out of bondage to bring them into a land flowing with milk and honey.  Many believers are out but they are not in…They are wondering, wandering in the wilderness…  So, they are not here, nor there…

This is half the gospel – that Jesus took our place – the other half is this:  that God put everything that you deserve – now if we stop right now… There is no end to what you and I deserve, we can say that depression, failure, poverty, curse, everything…  Because of Adam’s sin and our sin, everything that you and I deserve, Jesus came to take.  The other half is – all that Jesus deserves – you take…

In a covenant it is called an exchange – where the two parties will take each other’s place.  This is what happens in a covenant, Jesus takes our place and we take Jesus’ place, now listen carefully, now you are no more on cursed ground.

This is what happened to Jesus at the cross:  All that you deserve, Jesus became, and God did not even spare His Son, because if He (Jesus) took our place He had to suffer like a sinner, He had to die and He never sinned – he never was a sinner.  So God gave Jesus everything that you deserve – did Jesus become sin because he sinned?  Did you become righteous because you did righteous deeds?  No!  How did Jesus become sin?  He received our sin – how did you and I become righteous?  We received His righteousness.

Christianity is not what you renounce or what you do, because all of this still speak of self… It is not what you renounce or what you do, Christianity is what you receive…   Salvation begins when you receive.  Christian life is continued by receiving.

Now, what happens is this:  Many Christians are on Jesus’ ground, favoured ground, grace ground, the light shines on you, while darkness fell on Jesus…  God turned His back on Jesus, so that God can face you and never leave you or forsake you, in the countenance of God is life and light forever more and His presence is joy.  The Bible tells us in the Old Testament that the back of God is the curse, in fact there is a verse that says sickness, and inflammation is behind Him, I think it tells you that in the book of Job.  So God turned His back and Jesus cried, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”  He cried this so that you and I know that he was forsaken at the time, and He called His Father for the first time, “My God.”   He never called Him, “My God,”  it was always, “My Father,”  so that you and I can call God, “Father…”

The divine exchange took place – this is how much God loves you and me.  God loves us so much that God gave Jesus to take everything that we have, but don’t forget that is half of it, so that we can take everything that He has and that He deserve.  Now because of what Jesus has done, listen carefully, you and I, we are on grace ground…  Are you supposed to bow your head, look depressed, look sad, and expect bad things to happen?  No!  If you still expect bad things to happen, if you are still depressed, if you still act like God doesn’t love you, doesn’t care for you, you are actually pushing away all that Jesus did for you.  You are still saying that, “I am the old person,” when actually the divine exchange took place, and this is where most Christians are missing it.  Most Christians miss it right here!  They look at Jesus and say, “O, Jesus you died for my sins, O, Jesus you are my saviour, O, Jesus you are so good, so lovely…”  But then they do not know what has happened to them.

They are standing on grace ground, where ever you go is favoured ground, you can be walking with a colleague, side by side at the workplace, but the guy is on cursed ground and you are on favoured ground, and the favour of God is with you everywhere you go.  So God told me to tell you this, He wants you to have this attitude towards life, even this coming week, there is a word that He is going to give you in a while’s time, but the main thing is this, He wants you to face life believing that everything that Jesus deserves, you will get.  It will be good for you to take time, today if you can, to take time to think, “If God really treats me the way that He treats Jesus, what can I expect to face this week?”  You know, you and I, we do not know what is going to happen, we can say, Pastor Prin.ce no one knows what is going to happen in the future.  Correct!  But I can tell you my future; I will get whatever Jesus deserves.  This week I will get whatever Jesus deserves…  “Are you saying that there will be no trouble in your life?”  No, even when trouble comes, because Jesus deserves deliverance from trouble, peace in the midst of trouble, I will get that.

“Pastor Prince, I don’t think you are that smart to receive this kind of success, this kind of church success and your career success…”  You know what, I agree 101% with you, but you know what?  It’s not what I deserve, it’s what Jesus deserves.  Do you think Jesus deserves this kind of success?  Well, he gives me what He deserves…

So once you think like that, once you focus like that, the devil has nothing on you.  The devil wants you to focus on what you deserve, do you understand?  You see this is the word God told me to give you, write it down somewhere, you know the things of God are simple but powerful, this is what God said;  “Tell the people, expect good things to them, not because they deserve it, but because I love them.”  Once again, “Expect good things to happen to you, not because you deserve it, but because God loves you.”

You see if you think you deserve it because today you are extra holy, allright, you gave money to the poor or you went to do some charitable work or you got involved with more work in church or whatever…  You think you are extra holy, you know something, the devil will find something wrong and he will pull that little string and the whole thing will unravel.  But…  You say that; “It’s not because I deserve it that I expect good thing to happen this week, it’s because Jesus loves me…  God loves me,” you know what?  The devil has nothing to pull, when it’s God’s love in your life.  Amen?  Praise the Lord!”

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How To Receive God’s Best

Yesterday I said I want to be a victorious Christian.  This morning I came across this seminar:  http://www.awmi.net/extra/conference_videos/houston11, it’s called How To Receive God’s Best.

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I want to be a victorious Christian!

I have been a bad blogger.  I had such a busy week, that I had almost no time for myself and therefore no time for writing.  I have barely been able to comment on Fertilicare, and I’m so far behind with reading blogs!  I’ll try to catch up this weekend…

The little spare time I had I wanted to use to catch up on teachings, because I have found so many, but they all take time.  I found a brand new teaching from Cur.ry Bla.ke called the Ne.w Ma.n and you can download it for free for a limited time here if you are interested.  I have been able to listen up to number 5 so far and it’s really good, but I would recommend you listen to the Di.vine Hea.ling Tech.nician first if you haven’t done that one yet.

I have come to a conclusion this week and it’s one that should have come to much earlier, but I didn’t really want to.  I have heard so many preacher’s teachings about the supernatural healing power of God and most of them said that they had trouble to learn it all because of the “sacred cows” they had to unlearn from the churches they grew up in.  I’m sure I’m in the same situation. 

The church we are in at the moment is the same denomination that I grew up in as a child, and they do not operate in the Gifts of the Spirit.  They believe God can heal, they pray but most of the time they are not successful because the healing does not manifest.  I don’t want to say bad things about our church, because they do a lot of good.  They really want to reach the lost, that’s why they are so involved in the feeding scheme, the street outreaches, and they support a lot of missionaries in other countries as well as 2 children’s homes in our town.  They also have 2 services in Afrikaans and 2 others in African languages every Sunday, because they want as many people as possible to hear the Gospel message and in their own language.

But the other night I realised that they are not victorious Christians.  We went to an evening service and the minister was clearly upset because of two incidents that happened during the week.  The first one was a member of our congregation had a heart attack and passed away – I don’t know how old he was, but I assume not too old as he had 2 children in school and this specific minister is very much involved with the youth and he knows these children well, and I assume he knew the dad well too.  The other instance was one of the other minister’s (we have 3) found out that his dad had cancer, lung cancer but the cancer has spread from his lungs into his brain too.

The whole service was sombre and depressing, because everyone felt bad about what they heard.  The minister preached about the fact that we as Christians go to heaven when we pass away, and that it must be consolation for us.  The whole time I felt like screaming, “No!  It doesn’t have to be this way!  It is not a defeat!”  That father could have been raised from the dead, the minister’s dad can be healed from cancer, but how do one convey something like that to a whole congregation and your ministers?  They definitely don’t believe in raising the dead.

Since the beginning of the year I have felt that it’s time to move on to a different church, but to tell the truth I don’t know which one.  I haven’t even discussed it with DH.  All I know is I want to go to a church where they operate in the Gifts of the Spirit, and specifically in healing as I need to learn as much as possible. 

I don’t want to be a defeated Christian anymore but a victorious one, living in all that God wants to give to us.  I’ve been thinking a lot about John 10:10 again lately but this time I’m focusing on the second part of the verse not the first part like I have done so many times in the past on this blog: 

John 10:10 (Amp):  “¹⁰The thief comes only in order to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have and enjoy life, and have it in abundance (to the full, till it overflows).”

I heard a message from An.drew Wom.mack earlier this week and he said, “The same power that raised Jesus Christ from the dead, is in you.”  Wow!  Isn’t that amazing?  We have that amazing power of God living in us and working through us, if we just use it! 

Ephesians 1:19-20 (Amp):  “¹⁹And [so that you can know and understand] what is the immeasurable and unlimited and surpassing greatness of His power in and for us who believe, as demonstrated in the working of His mighty strength, ²⁰Which He exerted in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His [own] right hand in the heavenly [places],”

I want to live life to the full, have all that I can have and help others to walk in victory too!

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