Creflo Dollar - The Value of Knowing God - Part 1
My focus this morning is going to be on the value of knowing God, the value of knowing God. It is a valuable thing to have a knowing intimate relationship with God, but I think because it's not talked about as much people don't understand how valuable it is to have a relationship with God. Everything that you need, everything that we need in our lives should flow out of this relationship. We spend a lot of time trying to do and trying to make that happen; and if we do that, and we do that, and we come to church, and we find out some more stuff to do and other thing, and we fail to value that relationship with God, therefore we think it is because of all of our doings that all these things come to pass.
And I'm trying to help you renew your mind that know it's that relationship with God, it's that intimate relationship with God without your doing that will flow from him into your life. Your deliverance will flow from that intimate relationship with God. Your healing will flow from that intimate relationship with God. The wisdom that you need will flow from that relationship with God. In fact, everything that you need in life flows from that intimate relationship with God, but somehow we've got to learn how to, listen to this, get out of the way. We keep inserting ourselves where it's not needed, and God wants to show you the most valuable thing you can have in your Christian life is an intimate relationship with God. Oh my goodness, I feel his presence in this place. That's the most valuable thing you can have.
And when you can, you know, the Bible says he says, "The only work I want you to do is to believe in the one I sent you". And we spend more time trying to do than to believe, and so the most, and it is, it is the most important thing you can... there's nothing more important than having an intimate relationship with God. A lot of times we proceed to do things without him. We proceed to go and serve people, and serving's good, but without him. Let me show you what the Scripture says again. And every time I think I'm through with Daniel 11:32, I'm like, "Wow, look at this". Daniel 11:32 says, "And such as do wickedly against the covenant shall be corrupt by flatteries; but the people that do know their God shall be strong and shall do exploits". The people that do know their God shall be strong and shall do exploits.
So exploits are extraordinary acts or extraordinary achievements. The people that know their God, they're going to be strong and they're going to do exploits; not on their own, not by their ability, not by their might, not by their power. Exploits are, they shall accomplish humanly unaccomplishable things and they will obtain naturally unattainable things. In other words, your achievements flowing from that relationship will be outstanding. But notice what it says. There are no exploits without an intimate relationship. Those that know their God shall do exploits. There are no exploits, there are no extraordinary achievements by your, you know, curriculum of your mind or some idea that you came up with or studying the success of the world instead of receiving the anointing that flows from that relationship with God.
How is it that we can study the success of the world and see how they got it and not understand that whatever they have God has something better? But do we value what comes from that relationship from God? What comes from that relationship from God? I'll tell you what comes. Extraordinary comes. Well, let me put it like this. Extraordinary stuff shows up. What comes from that intimate relationship with God? A significant, amazing thing happens, but it's not because of you. It's happening from the relationship. Glory to God. You're smarter from the relationship. You're walking in a deeper love from the relationship. You know what to do when you would normally not know what to do from the relationship. You go to bed at night, you rest in him and wake up the next day and bump into something extraordinary.
And when somebody asks you, "Where'd this come from?" you have no choice but to say, "This is the Lord's doing, and it's marvelous in our eyes". But we got too much of our doings in God's way. He wants you to do exploits, but you think you can do it without him. He didn't say they that go and feed the hungry shall do exploits. Feeding the hungry is good. He didn't say that those who go and do amazing things and they're just great servants and they've got all kinds of accolades and awards shall do exploits. No, no, he didn't. No, he didn't. Whatever your awards you got, he says, "No, I can do better. Anything ever happened to you, I can do better than that". All those things are good. Serving people, that's awesome, but it's not awesome when you think your doing is going to cause you to gain some type of position with God. Your doings don't cause you to gain a position with God. Please understand that. Your faith causes you to gain a position with God, how you believe him.
Some people get so wrapped up in doing, doing, doing, doing, doing, they're doing it without a relationship with God. They're saying it without a relationship with God. In a sense they tell you that they know God, but they don't. They know about him, they don't know him 'cause when you know God, glory be to God. That was for me. I have to shout a little bit while I'm preaching. When you know God, there's a rest that comes over you where you will cease from your labors because you know and have a relationship and everything flows from that relationship you have with God. I am convinced that he wants to do some extraordinary things in our lives. I am convinced that out of that relationship with God amazing achievements are going to show up, achievements that'll bring tears to your eyes because you will know immediately, "I didn't do that alone. This came from my"... And what'll happen is you'll go immediately into prayer, like, "Lord, you did this thing".
You'll start looking at all of the stats, and you'll try to figure it out, and you'll look at all of the analytics, and you'll think, "It's him". To the point, and I'm telling you, it's going to get like this. People are going to come to you, you know how people are, "How did you," watch this, "do that"? And you'll say, "Well, really, I can't do nothing without him". Now you understand what Jesus said. When Jesus said, "I do nothing except the Father," Jesus depended on the Father while he was on the earth. And you saw the extraordinary things that operating in his ministry because he was like, "I don't do nothing alone and by myself except the Father do it". That's the only way you get to see what you see. Oh, I believe God's going to touch you today, I believe God's going to do something extraordinary in your lives today, I believe God's going to dig so deep on the inside of you and cause you to move from doing to believing, and I believe in Jesus's name that the things you cannot and have not been able to do in the natural, you're going to be successful, but it flows out of that relationship.
Oh, if anybody understand, may you say, "Amen". Praise God. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Bless his name. I didn't mean to come ahead and get so excited so quickly, but I'm telling you we are going to a deeper level in God. We're going to the place where we can see this happen. He said, "I will do exploits in the lives of people who know me, know about me and know me". A part of this relationship with God, a part of knowing God is experiential. It's not just knowing about him, it's now gathering the experiences with him. Lord Jesus. And most of the time, and the Scripture says this clearly. Hopefully we'll get to the day. We probably won't get to it, but he talks about experiencing his love and he says, "It's deeper, wider, too deep for you to understand, but I'll give you some experiences". Oh my goodness. "I'll give you some experiences". What experiences do you have?
Those of you who say, "I know God," those of you who say, "I know him," well, where are the experiences? Do you have an experience where he delivered you out of a ditch? And you might have earned that ditch. Watch this. You might have deserved that ditch. Oh, glory to God. But he showed up anyway, delivered you out of a ditch, placed your feet on a solid ground, put a new song in your heart. And when somebody asks you how you know him, see, that's your testimony, that's your flashback. "I'm going to tell him how I know him. I was in a ditch, deserved every bit of it, but he showed up anyway with his mercy and his grace and lifted me up on a solid ground and put a new song on and he changed my life because I experienced him". Christianity should not be just about taking a quiz when you come around somebody that asks you a question about Jesus. Honey, I might not know the answer to your question, but I know him. I know him. Oh, glory to God. I know him. I've experienced him.
All right, no crying today. I've experienced him. I know him. And then you start pulling, this is what I'm talking about. I'm not talking about, you know how most Christians do. They know about God. I've exchanged my knowledge about God for intimacy with God. That's what I'm talking about, intimacy with God, where you find yourself talking to him really throughout the day. You find yourself talking to him about things that, I don't know, maybe you go through. Maybe you said something that was not nice, and you say, "God, that wasn't nice". I know that's right, baby. I know that's right. And you know what he does? He will sit there and counsel you about what you just said and he'll say to you, "Now, the reason why I don't want you speaking like that is because the fruit of an intimate relationship is love".
The fruit of an intimate relationship is how we treat people. Okay, so let me begin this sermon this morning. My God, he's so good. We left off at John, I think, chapter 1, verse 1 through 14. I said John. This is these Scriptures I'm going to share with you this morning are so intimately filled with his presence that I want you to just see it. "In the beginning was the," what? "And the Word was with", "And the Word was God". Can you see the equality of the Word of God and God? I know when I open the Bible up and I begin to read it and study it, and especially when I start studying it out loud and saying things out loud, I'm in the presence of God. I don't have to prove to you that the Word is God. When you get into Word and you stay in there long enough, you'll start sensing his presence.
Verse 2, "The same was in the beginning with God". Verse 3, "All things were made by him," or the Word. "And without him," or the Word, "was not anything made that was made". That's powerful. So the Word, because the Word and God are the same, has creative power. And look at verse 14, he says, "And the Word was made flesh", there it is. You know, somebody says, "Well, how did Jesus come"? Well, he found a incubator in a woman by the name of Mary and he spoke the Word, sent the Word by angel. In fact, the Greek word for that Word that the angel brought was spérma. He sent the Word by the angel. The angel spoke to her that, "You're going to conceive". Mary said, "How is this thing going to happen seeing I know not a man"? He said, "The Holy Ghost," oh, "shall come upon you". And that Word was planted on the inside, and she went and told Joseph, "Joseph, I'm pregnant, and I promise you ain't had sex with nobody".
You know, Joseph had a problem with that. Like, "I don't know about this now. I don't know if this going to work". But the Word becomes flesh. I need you to know that's what God's trying to do with all of us. Don't throw this Word away because this intimate relationship starts with this Word. The conception of what God's trying to do in our lives starts with this Word, and he wants this Word to settle in the incubator of our heart. And that's why the Bible says to guard your heart, for out of it flows the issues of life. Life itself flows out of your heart. But do you know the number of people in the world today that just are, they don't see the light of God's Word? They only see the darkness of the words from the enemy. And the light of God's Word is the only antidote, the only answer for those who are in darkness. You cannot be free from darkness without the light of God's Word.
So as Christian people, we have the responsibility of walking around as living epistles of God's Word, not arrogant, not knowing who we are, but we're living epistles of God's Word. So I believe that this relationship, this intimate relationship begins with God's Word. I believe that's where it starts. I believe it starts with getting in the Word to know about him, and then the more you know about him when you start spending time with him, that knowing about him turns into a knowing of him, a knowing of him because of what you learn about him. I don't think that a Christian can ever be successful in a intimate relationship with God without the Word. You're here today to get the Word. People have different reasons for coming to church, but sadly most of the time that reason is not to get the Word. And we've got to take our churches and back up from turning our buildings into entertainment centers and turn them into chapels where we can get fed.
We need to turn them into stables where we can show up and be fed the Word so we can take that Word knowing about him and see it transform into a intimate relationship of knowing him. See, I don't want you to think, "Oh, I'm going to get an intimate relationship with God". And then you're going to be rolling around and crying and, "Oh, God, I love you and everything". And then you spend no time here because now you open the door for spooky-pookies to come in, and now you're doing some extraordinary things but it's extraordinarily demonic, and you open yourself to demons because they can deceive you because you're not here. And this helps you to know who's talking to you. Oh, you didn't think God is the only one that talks to you. The devil trying to talk to you every day.
Look at what happened in the Garden of Eden when he had showed up and start talking to Eve. "Hath God said"? He know what God said. His job is just to put a little doubt in there. "Hath God said that you shall not eat of the trees of the garden"? And she told him what God said. "God said we can eat of all the trees of the garden". And so he got started. He's talking to you. And if you don't know the Word of God, you won't realize whose talking to you 'cause the devil will use some Scriptures, watch this, and he'll twist them. Y'all don't understand what I'm saying. Wickedness is just truth twisted. That's what wickedness is. Are you familiar with the type of furniture, wickered furniture? Twisted, right?
So Satan will take a Scripture that you don't know real good and twist it and feed it to you and you'll go out preaching it to everybody. "Like the Bible says, 'The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away.'" Yet the Bible does say that, but it wasn't God who said it. It was Job who said it in a deranged mind. Twisted truth. Everybody say, "Twisted truth". And that's why you got to get intimately involved in his Words and know about him because if you don't know him you could have the wrong perception of him and you'll start thinking he's a killer, and you'll start thinking he wants you broke, and you'll start thinking that he wants you to suffer, and you'll start thinking all of these things about your God because you were busy trying to develop a intimate relationship with him. And he'll talk to you, but even with the Word helps you to hear. The Word is what tunes your spiritual ears to hear from God. And the more of this Word you digest, you literally tune your ears to hear from God. And so when he speaks, you're like, "That's God". Your spirit bears witness. The Word bears witness. You bear witness. Amen?
All right, that's good. I think y'all got that. All right, now let's sort of start today. John chapter 17 and 3. So this is the beginning of today's sermon. Somebody say, "Dollar, dawg, you just preached for 30 minutes". That's all right. I don't know when Jesus is coming back. I am not rain or rush. What I want to do is make sure you got this because when you walk out of here you're going to walk right into ministry, and everywhere you go, the atmosphere is going to change. Whoo, and why will the atmosphere change? 'Cause you walked up in there with him. So you got to remember when you walk in some place, it's just not you that showed up. The presence of the Lord showed up. And if there are demon-possessed people in there, they're going to respond kind of weird because they know who just walked up in here.