Creflo Dollar - How To Avoid Identity Theft - Part 3
We're quick to say, "I'm redeemed". We'll say that real quick. I'm redeemed, but we're slow to agree that we're also righteous. We're quick to say, "I'm redeemed," but we're slow to say, "I'm holy". What's that? "Oh, yes, Brother Dollar, I'm redeemed". Are you holy? "Well, you know, God's holy". Yeah, but ain't you in him? If you believe it, because he said he made you holy too. He said he made you pure. My goodness. "Oh, yeah. I know what you're saying, Brother Dollar, in Christ. Ha ha ha. In Christ". As if that's some sort of distant, far off righteousness that is useless for us now. But how righteous are you if Christ has become your righteousness and how holy are you if Christ has become your holiness? These are qualities that we possess because Jesus has become our life.
Colossians 3:4, flip over there. He said, "And when Christ, who is your life, and when Christ, who is your life, when Christ is your life, Christ is your life. And when Christ, who is your life, is revealed to the whole world, you will share in all of his glory. When Christ, who is your life, is revealed to the whole world". So once we realize our crucifixion and burial and resurrection with Jesus Christ, once we realize that, we can see that God announces us as righteous and that God announces us as holy because he is describing our nature. He does more than put a righteous label on us. He does more than merely adopt us into the family.
In our human spirit, he has made us like him. We are righteous. We are holy. God sees us this way because we are this way. We don't get a final polish right before we go to heaven. We get a new body when we escape this world, but not a new human spirit or soul. Why not? Because our inner man is heaven-ready. Our inner man is heaven-ready right here and right now. In our human spirit, we are already seated in heaven. What? Ephesians 2:6, Ephesians 2:6. This is just stuff you gotta make up your mind to believe and have confidence in. "For he raised us from the dead along with Christ and he seated us with him in the heavenly realm because we are united with Christ Jesus".
So he mentions heavenly realms. So there are two realms that coexist. There is the physical realm and then there is the spiritual realm. One realm is no less real than the other. This physical world is not more real than the spiritual world. But from the physical side, you see that. You feel like, well, this is more real because you can touch it and you can hold it and all that stuff and you're gonna find out when you die where you going is gonna be as real as where you left. Hm. In fact, the spiritual world has preeminence. It's above in importance. And it has a higher level than the physical world because the spiritual world gave birth to the physical world. Think about this. A world and a realm that you can't see is responsible for the world and the realm, you can see.
That this physical world, matter, physical matter, came. It is a child of the spiritual realm. The spiritual realm is more real than the physical realm because the physical realm is destined to pass away. But the realm that cannot be seen right now is going to be for eternity, for eternity after eternity. The physical world will one day fade away and be replaced. Everything that we see and touch will be destroyed and replaced. But our human spirits will live forever. The spiritual is the lasting reality. You think this is me, Creflo Dollar. No, this is just the house I have to have in order to have comprehension of physical matter. Without this body, I cannot have authority and pick up and have contact with physical things. It takes physical things to have contact with physical things. Hm. But I know that one day this physical man is gonna pass away and I'll have a spiritual man that will have the same access to spiritual matter as my physical man had access to physical matter.
Those of you who think that when you die, you just gonna fall asleep and out of consciousness and that's it: not gonna happen. There is a spiritual world where there are angels and seraphims. There's a spiritual world where there's spiritual matter, praise God, and physical body can't function in a spiritual world because the speed is too quick for physical matter. Jesus did something that was so amazing that a lot of Christians don't get, that when Jesus was raised from the dead, he walked through the door, the door being shut. Which means somehow his glorified body had the speed up greater than matter to walk through it as if it wasn't there and yet slowed it down to be able to sit down on a physical chair and eat some fish and honeycomb. And now he has authority in two realms.
And one day, the dead in Christ shall rise first to meet him in the air, when we get our glorified body. You think this is it? This ain't it. I tell you, I tell you, I don't know what God was doing. Why, why, why, why are we, what, why we got these bodies and why are we in this physical world? And I can tell you what I think. I can't prove it, but you can't disprove it. We missed the part that God made man in his likeness, just like him. And we missed this part that he was clothed with glory, not with artificial clothes. He was not naked. You couldn't see the nakedness of that body because it was clothed with glory. I believe Adam and Eve had their glorified body. That's what we're trying to get back. Because when he sinned, the Bible says he lost the glory of his body and they hid themselves because they had shame of their nakedness and they started making coverings with fig leaves.
There was no need to try to find coverings because they were already covered. I don't believe we were ever supposed to go this route. A bear has a natural coat on and a dog has a natural coat on and everything God created has a natural coat and the only one that's got artificial clothes on, I want my coat back. I said, I want my coat back. How did he get that coat? He stole their identity and the consequences of identity theft was nakedness and having to wear artificial clothing and having to kill somebody else who had their coat to get their coat. And that's why I'm like, dude, I'm not gonna go around here as a man, "Oh, I know it all. Oh, I know more than any preacher in the world. Oh, I know everything".
You know what? I got up one morning, and I said, "God, there's so much I don't know". Because the little he lets me see, lets me realize how much I don't know. And we Christian people and we can't even get together with one another because we still fussing about who taught what, what they taught, what I agree with, what I disagree with. But God gonna fix all of that when we get him. All of us might have missed it. It's gonna be something. Ain't all of us missed it, but I'm just trying to be nice. But I'm just saying. Shoo. So God invites us to recognize an invisible yet enduring reality that we are new, that we are one with him, and that we are seated with him in heaven already. It's good for us to set our mind on things above where you've been raised and seated with God. You're free to choose but don't use your freedom as an opportunity for food is living.
The outcome of those choices is going to be shame and disappointment. They are an expression, shame and disappointment in choosing to go down that crazy path. It expresses death. And we, on the other hand, are designed to express God's divine life. We're not designed to express death. God not only forgave me, but also made me new at the core and allowed me to participate in Jesus's death, burial, and resurrection so that I might truly live and have life. But I got to have confidence. Christianity at its core is not about modifying your behavior. It's not a behavioral improvement program. Real Christianity is about regaining what was lost in Eden: life, regaining life, and a personal relationship with God that gave us his life, gave us his likeness, gave us his image, gave us his zoe. So when we were sinners before salvation, you could have engaged in behavior modification. But like I said before, you'd still be spiritually dead.
As a sinner, you may have started reading your Bible, you may have started going to church, you may have started acting loving towards other people, but you're still spiritually dead. We're born on this planet with Adam's spiritually dead genes. And when we were born, we arrived in a spiritual location in Adam. So if God is going to fix our problem, he has to change our location. 1 Corinthians 5:22 and then Colossians 1:13. He says in 22: "For as in Adam, all die. Even so in Christ shall all be made alive". Yeah, in Christ, in Christ, in Christ. Colossians 1:13: "In Christ, all shall be made alive". We're in the right location. If you're in Christ, you're in the right location. "Who has delivered us from the powers of darkness and has translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son". It is by God's doing, that we are in Christ. You notice that already. By God's doing, we're already in Christ.
As we're placed there in Christ, we obtain not only a new future but also a new past. You know that? When you're in Christ, you got a new past, as well as a new future. See, Adam's past consisted of, we died because he died. We were condemned because he was condemned. But now in Jesus, we have a new past. We are crucified with Christ. We are buried with Christ. We are raised with Christ. So Adam's DNA extracted, replaced with Christ's DNA. We inherit Christ's spiritual characteristics. So we don't do anything to make ourselves new. Instead, something is done to us. God didn't just change us. He exchanges us. In place of our old self, he makes us into a new self. In 2 Peter chapter 1:4, we become partakers of his nature, but you gotta believe that. You gotta have confidence in him. And as you begin to see this and have confidence in this and you don't let go of your identity, you have to believe what he already said, spiritually speaking, you're heaven ready. And check it out. That's what's gonna be moving on.
Now, I warned you that there is no way that you should justify just doing things that put you in bondage, crazy stuff. There's consequences. Sin has consequences. All that stuff has consequences. But the problem with most of this is that you let the sin you commit rob you of your identity just like the sin in the garden, robbed Adam and Eve of their identity. You can't let that happen. I don't care how bad it feels. I don't care how crazy it feels. I don't care how condemned you feel. The condemnation and conviction is just a sign that you are changing and you don't like that no more. I don't know where this thing came from. I'm born again, so now I should be flawless. You will raise more hell after you prayed in tongues than... what are you talking about? What is this? It's like everybody knows it. Why are you trying to act like you have had no issues since you've been born again.
But, but please, you know, you talk about you don't have no problems testifying about before I got saved. I used to be this, this, this. Let's talk about after you got saved. Let's talk about the new habits you created after you got saved. Okay, let's talk about the hours of porn you watched after you got saved. Let's talk about the weed you smoke after you got saved, praying in tongues. Wouldn't trust his rest, so you went back to the rest you was used to.
Don't you know God know you? And he can't change you if you keep lying to yourself and creating this mythologial, this mythology of Christianity. I'm in Christ. That's all I know. And he gonna take care of everything else and I'm going to trust him and what he says, I am, I'm gonna say I am. If I died with him and I was raised with it and I had been seated with him. And if he say I'm righteous, and if he say I got wisdom and if he say I'm pure and if he say I'm holy, I don't care what's happened in this physical life, I will not relinquish my identity to my feelings because God is greater than my feelings.
Father, we, oh God, we need you. We need you to help us to maintain confidence in our identity. We need you to help us to accept the reality of our spiritual position in you, our spiritual location in you. Help us to stop trying to achieve okayness with you and help us to believe that we're already okay with you. Help us to stop trying to pursue what you've already obtained for us. But to pursue the confidence in what you've already done, and then trusting that if we hold on and maintain our identity, that everything else will just fall into place and all will be well. Help us, Lord, in these times that are to come, men who starve for the Word because a drought of the Word has gone away and been replaced with weird sayings. Help us to hunger for your truth of grace and to trust that you know what you're doing. Thank you for not letting us go. Thank you for adopting us as your real children with all rights and privileges of Christ and anointings. But we take a deep breath sometime and we just wonder because we're in this physical body and there's no way we can do what you're calling us to do without you. So here we are, Lord. If you can use us, use us. Bring us to the place of our calling, our purpose, that you created us on purpose for a purpose and for that, we praise you for it.