Creflo Dollar - Is Your Belief System Offline? - Part 3
Last week, we began a series just dealing with, you know, I think we called it "Is Your Belief System Offline"? And we focused on how important it is to believe and to understand that, but today we're gonna talk about that part too, but we're gonna deal with, you know, we're gonna talk about obedience to the faith. We shared with you on some things on obedience, and we're gonna do that again today, but in Deuteronomy chapter 28, just as a brief review, 28, verses 1 through 13, it talks about the rewards and blessings of perfect obedience to the law, and they were listed about those blessings in Deuteronomy 28, but we said to you that, since no one except Jesus has been, has ever obeyed the law perfectly, and please understand, nobody but Jesus has obeyed the law perfectly.
You may preach obedience, but you don't do it perfectly, heh-heh. There are 613 of those of boys, and it's like you hadn't done it perfectly, and so, if you can judge somebody else for what they are not doing, somehow, you've gotta say to yourself you've done it perfectly. If you have any room to say somethin' so judgmental about someone else, you have to change the rules and say that, you know, lie to yourself and say that you've done it perfectly. Nobody has kept the Law of Moses, 613 of them, perfectly except for Jesus. And so we are disqualified from these blessings, based on our performance, because we could not keep the law perfectly. We're disqualified for all the blessings that are in Deuteronomy 28; however, the good news is these blessings are a part of our inheritance because we have been given, not earned, given, we have been given the gift of the perfect obedience of Jesus.
So you and I get none of the curses but all of the blessings, heh-heh. We have been given the free gift of perfect obedience of Jesus Christ. So while we are not perfect, the day you got born again and made Jesus the Lord of your life, you received this gift of perfect obedience, wow. So you say, "I've received Jesus into my life". You've received the gift of perfect obedience, which means you qualify for all of the blessings without any of the sweat or the work or the effort on your part to try to get 'em. Before Jesus came and died and rose again, everything was a performance-based gospel. You had to perform in order to qualify to get these blessings, but we have the free gift of perfect obedience through Jesus Christ. We are not blessed because we obey perfectly. We are blessed because Jesus obeyed perfectly. We are not blessed because we obey perfectly. We are blessed because Jesus obeyed perfectly. And besides, in the New Testament, the Bible says that we are blessed because of Jesus.
Put up Galatians 3, verse 19, in the King James. We are blessed because of Jesus. We are blessed because of Jesus. Look at verse, let me see somethin' right quick. Hold on, guys. I got a bunch of notes up. Look at Galatians 3:14. We're blessed because of Jesus, not because of what we do, but because of Jesus. He said, "that the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles". Go to verse 13 and let's read through it, Galatians 3:13. "Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law," okay, delivered or redeemed from the curse of the law, "being made a curse for us, for it is written, 'Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree, that the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles,'" how does the blessing come now in the New Testament? "Through Jesus Christ". So we are blessed because of Jesus. Say this out loud, "I'm blessed because of Jesus".
Well, we gotta stop trying to earn the blessing. We gotta stop tryin' to say, "Well, I'm blessed because of my perfect obedience". You don't have perfect obedience. You're blessed because of Jesus. Say it again, "I'm blessed because of Jesus," praise God. So, once again, we are blessed because of Jesus. We are blessed because Jesus obeyed perfectly, okay? He came to fulfill all of the law, and not one jot or tittle of that law will be given away until Jesus had come to fulfill it, and he has come to fulfill it. Now, let's go to Hebrews 3:18-19 in the New King James Version. Now, I'm starting off a little slow because I want to reestablish some of these things so, when I get to the radical stuff, you will see whether you agree with it or not. You'll see I got it find the Bible, and if you're gonna say you live by the Bible, then you gotta check out what you believe and what your tradition is versus what the Bible actually says.
So you can no longer say "I live by the Bible" if you choose to disregard when I'm showin' you the Bible and choose to believe what you believe. The Bible says, "Your tradition has made the Word of God of no effect". And so it's like throw the Bible away if you're not gonna live by it. If you're just gonna live by somethin' you heard somebody say, and say, "Well, I just decide to, I agree with that, but I don't agree with this," no, no, no, that's not what this is. You can't pick and choose Scripture. You gotta look at what it says, see what it says, and you gotta make your mind up that "I'm not gonna try to change the Word. I'mma let the Word change my thinking," okay? Now look at this, Hebrews 3:18. Put it on the screen so everybody can see that. He says, "And to whom did He swear that they would not enter in His rest, but to those who did not obey"? So, according to this verse right here, he said, "Those who did not obey were not gonna enter into the rest".
Now, he's makin' reference to Israel entering into the rest from their enemies. "For those who do not obey, they will not enter into the rest," all right? So now look at verse 19: "So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief". Isn't that interesting? In verse 18, he says, "They could not enter in. Those who did not obey did not enter in". And then he says, "They didn't enter in because of unbelief". Did you see what happened there? He defined obedience. "Those who did not obey could not enter into the rest," and so we see that those could not enter in, and he calls disobedience "unbelief". He calls disobedience "unbelief". So, in the New Testament, disobedience is unbelief. In the New Testament, disobedience is unbelief. So if Israel's unbelief was called disobedience, then belief on their part will be called, what? Obedience.
So you see how we derived at that particular point? It's not complicated. It's like he just said, "Disobedience is unbelief, and if disobedience is unbelief, then obedience is belief". So in the New Testament, disobedience is unbelief. In the New Testament, obedience is belief. So when you talk about being obedient in the New Testament, you're talkin' about believing. When you're talkin' about being disobedient, in the New Testament, it is called unbelief. So this is so interesting because, all of a sudden, we thought that obedience would only occur, you know, during our actions, so, you know, to be disobedient means disobedient in your action; to be obedient means obedient in your actions, but that's not the first place that obedience or disobedience should occur. Obedience and disobedience should, first of all, occur in your belief.
If you believe, you're obedient. If you don't believe, you're disobedient. That's what it is. It was not so in the Old Testament. In the Old Testament, it was about your actions. Your actions demonstrated obedience or disobedience, but under the New Testament, it is no longer about your actions because Jesus is now, has acted on our behalf. Praise God. So, in the New Testament, it is when you are obedient, it's because you believe. In the New Testament, when you are disobedient, it's because of unbelief. Renew your mind with that because everything in this New Testament is gonna be based on you understanding what is so simply described to us here in Scripture. Now, Hebrews 4:3, if you go there in the New King James, he says, "We who have believed do enter that rest". Hebrews 4:3, "For we who have believed do enter that rest". So there's a rest that still remains for those who believe. "He who believes," or obey, "do enter that rest".
See, if you're reading the New Testament and you don't understand that, you will continue to make obedience about your actions and not your belief. You'll continue to make disobedience about your actions instead of your believing or not believing. You have to understand that to get the right interpretation. And then, in verse 11, Hebrews 4:11, he says, you know, he wants you to "be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of unbelief or disobedience," of unbelief or disobedience. So every time you see "obedience" in the Word of God, it's attached to belief. Every time you see "disobedience" in the New Testament, it's attached to unbelief. If you understand that or you want me to stay there all day long, say, "Amen," heh-heh-heh.
Now, listen to this carefully. I'm gonna say this, I need you to write it down 'cause it's something that's gonna be big in this teaching. In light of God equating belief with obedience, that's what he does. He equates belief in the New Testament with obedience. He equates unbelief with disobedience. He does that very clearly in Scripture, you see that. In light of God equating belief with obedience, our actions are not the first place where obedience must occur. In the Old Testament, our actions was the first place that obedience had to occur. But in this New Covenant, our actions are not the first place where obedience must occur. Obedience begins in the same place where everything in our relationship with God and the gospel is concerned. Obedience, it starts with believing the gospel. Obedience begins in the same place where everything in our relationship with God begins, with believing the gospel.
So, you wanna be obedient today as a Christian under the New Testament? It requires you believing the gospel. It requires you believing Jesus. To not believe the gospel, to not believe the finished works, to not believe his love, to not believe Jesus puts you in a place where you are disobedient because your unbelief. If you understand that, say, "Amen". Now, for the Galatians, for us today, for all of us today and who are in here today, obeying God is a matter of believing the gospel. That's what it is. Obeying God is a matter of believing the gospel of grace. It is a matter of, that's what the gospel is. It's the gospel of grace. It's a matter of us believing the gospel of grace. This is strong. People who always talk about "I got a problem with that grace teaching, I got a problem with the gospel of grace," you are in unbelief. You are in disobedience in the New Testament. Your disobedience is a result of your unbelief.
Unbelief in the gospel of grace, unbelief in this gospel of grace. I know it sounds strange because we're used to being taught all of the traditions of the Old Covenant before Jesus. Do we continue to live the exact same way? What changed? I mean, you celebrate Jesus on a cross, celebrate his death, burial, and Resurrection, celebrate all of that and still go back to living the exact same way before he died and was raised from the dead? So it changed, but the preaching didn't change, and what you heard in church didn't change, and we celebrated a resurrected Jesus while we remain dead in the law and in performance, trying to earn things that Jesus had already done for us and continue to frustrate the grace of God because we would not accept what he had done because it was always, "Yeah, but I feel like I need to do something," "Yeah, but I feel like I need to do something, but what do I do? But what do I do? But what do I do"?
And this system is based on believing what he has done, but it wasn't enough, Jesus wasn't enough. "I gotta do this, I gotta do that, I gotta change". And you kept tryin' to do stuff that never really was sustained in your life because you wouldn't believe. "We just gotta do more than just believe". "Well, believing is just not enough". "Well, it's gotta be more than believin'". And under this New Covenant of grace, your obedience is believing. Under the Old Covenant, your obedience was what you would do. In this New Covenant, your obedience is what you believe. If you understand that, say, "Amen". So this is a matter of believing. Praise God.
Now, how does God deal with disobedience or unbelief in the New Covenant? Well, sin and disobedience are not a issue. God has already dealt with those things through the obedience of Christ and has sworn not to be angry with us and to never rebuke us, but the church and the body of Christ, we have made it an issue. The church and the body of Christ, we have made it an issue. Look at Hebrews chapter 9:28, in the New Living Translation. Now, you talk about renewing your mind. You renew your mind with this New Testament gospel of grace. That's what you renew your mind with. Renewin' the mind is not just learning a lot of facts in the Bible. It's renewing your mind from the old way of living to the new way of living. That's what that renewing of the mind is all about. Now, look at verse 28, in the NLT. In the NLT, he says, "So also Christ was offered once". How many times was Christ offered? "Once and for all times as a sacrifice to take away," what? "The sins of many people. He will come again, not to deal with our sins".
Okay, why is he not gonna come again to deal with our sins? Because everybody in church thinks that Jesus is coming to deal with our sin. "You better get it right. Listen, you better obey God in your actions 'cause, if you don't, then you're not gon' be blessed. You better obey God in your actions because, if you don't, then you're not gon' have wisdom. You better obey God in your actions 'cause if you don't, you're goin' to hell". All of these things that are not true. You're not blessed because of your actions. You're blessed because of Jesus and his actions. So why is he not comin' back to deal with your sins? 'Cause he's already dealt with your sins. So what do you have to do? Believe it. He says, "I'm not to deal with our sins but to bring salvation to all who are eagerly waiting for him".
Christ has already dealt with our sins on the cross. Christ has already dealt with our sins on the cross, and the church today still makes sin the primary issue. We make sin the issue while we judge people of their sins, while you try to ignore that you have 'em or not. You can't judge somebody of their sins. Everybody got 'em. You talk as if you don't have 'em. You preach Scriptures like you don't have 'em. You judge people like you don't have 'em. You tell people, "You better obey 'cause God ain't gon' do this," like you perfectly obey. You don't perfectly obey, and you are not... if you could perfectly obey and if you could be flawless with no sins, there would be no need for Jesus to be sacrificed because you got it together. You're good. You're celebrating a Jesus as a symbol and not understanding that your whole life is based on what that guy did for you.
You've got to understand, without him, you're messed up. Without him, you're hell-bound. Without him, if you're gonna try to do what you do to get healed, then you ain't gon' get healed 'cause you ain't got what it takes because, if you're gonna decide to live under the Old Testament, then you gotta live with the wages of the Old Testament, and "the wages of sin is death," and hell and the grave. You've got to come to the end of yourself where you recognize "I can't do this no matter how hard I sweat to do it. I need a Savior. I need an advocate. I need a peace offering. I need Jesus". And the world has done everything they can to eradicate him. They refer to Jesus as "the universe". They refer to God as "the universe". "The universe did this. The universe did that".
Honey, Jesus didn't come out of the universe. The universe came out of him. God didn't come out a stork. Stork came out of God, and you know what's happened? The religious propaganda of this time has been received by so many people that call themselves "Christians". You gotta understand another thing: Christianity is responsible for America. America didn't produce Christianity. Christianity produced America, and then America got rid of Christianity. It's like your mama gave birth to you, and then you gon' go get rid of your mama, and you invited all other, you invited a bunch of fake mamas to come around. And all America gotta do is recognize who gave birth to you, and quit tryin' to compromise with everything else, and quit substituting Christianity with all these sugar mamas and all that other stuff you're tryin' to do, all the mamma-mamas and all that other kind of stuff.
America would not be America, "we're a Christian nation". Well, god-doggit, go back to the Christ. But we won't do that because, "Well, you know, I don't believe in that. I believe in the universe". Girl, you ain't even never seen the universe. "What you talkin' about"? The universe came out of God. The moon and the stars came out of God. The sky, the wind, the rain came out of God. You came out of God. Everything came out of God. There is nothin' that exists that didn't come out of God. Somebody said to me, "Well, everybody can't be wrong". Oh, so, you're gonna settle on deception 'cause you figure everybody can't be wrong?
"But Pastor Dollar, you ain't the only one that could be right". Well, I'm not the only one preachin' this either. Jesus is revealing that this gospel has got to be preached throughout the world, and then the end shall come. This gospel. What did Paul say? Paul says, "There's not but one gospel". What we've been doin' is preachin' stuff and callin' it the gospel. Are y'all good? Ya still love me so far? Well, let's see if I can change that right here. John chapter 16, verse 8 through 9. We still in review. There's a lot of stuff gon' on. All right, 16:8-9. Verse 8, he says, "And when he has come, he will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment". Of sin, he says, "because they do not believe in me". What matters is not your lifestyle but your belief system.
Now, let me put a little bit more meat on that. What matters as in the primary focus as Christians, the primary focus is not your lifestyle but your belief system because what you believe will directly influence your behavior. See, what we've done is we've made the primary focus our behavior, what you doin', what they doin', how they livin', what they've done, but you understand, the Holy Ghost got a plan to change all that, but he can't do nothin' until you, first of all, make your primary focus your belief in him.
See, the Holy Spirit says, "I'm gonna go to work". See, we forget about the Holy Spirit. "Well, you can't be a Christian 'cause you're doin' that". Yeah, but the Holy Ghost says, "If they believe in me, I'm gon' change 'em". "Well, they can't be a Christian 'cause of their lifestyle". Oh, no, Holy Ghost say, "Oh, yeah, but I'm workin' on that right now". He says, "I can do the job. I'm equipped to do the job. I just need you to believe it". He says, "I'm even workin' on people who don't know me. Because they don't believe me, I'm tryin' to convince them to believe me, and I can change their behavior". We got it backwards. We have churches all over the world tryin' to change people's behavior.