Creflo Dollar - Secure In Grace, Part 2
God fellowships with you based on your faith in Christ alone, based on your faith in Christ alone. It's not God who's backing off of the relationship, just like in the Garden of Eden. God still showed up to have fellowship with them. They were in hiding. God still showed up to talk to Adam and Eve. They went and hid, and so, likewise, God fellowships with us based on our faith in Jesus Christ. And even though you're in a bunch of mess, he still gonna show up. The problem is the condemnation drives you away, and you're hiding from God because of the shame. God's always gonna show up, and I tell you, here's the confidence that you have in God.
When you have this kinda confidence in God and you don't allow yourself to be condemned in your heart and you know that God's greater than your heart, then even when you do stupid stuff and crazy things you still show up, because you know, your best chance of getting help is to spend time and have fellowship with him. And 2 Corinthians chapter 5:17 says, "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a," what? "A new creature". So, if you're in Christ, you're a new creature. He says, "The old things have passed away; and all things have become new".
So, when you get in Christ you lose that old, sinful man, and you got a new creation, and that new creation is designed to produce new fruit in your life. But sometimes we just don't renew our mind with the Word. We keep thinking the same way, and we don't produce that new fruit, when we have the root to produce that new fruit. We just maintain all the old fruit and that old fruit begins to spoil because you've got a new creation on the inside of you. And so, Scripture doesn't teach... and listen to this, I don't wanna get too far into this, but Scripture doesn't teach once saved, always saved. There are several places that discusses the possibility of a reprobate mind and losing your salvation.
Now, I just wanna show you the Scripture, and we'll do a separate teaching on this one day, but Hebrews 6, verse 4 and 6. It's just almost impossible for a Christian to lose his salvation, unless you get in a position where you allow your actions to continue to harden your heart, and then one day you get to the point, and I have met people who have decided, "Well, I don't wanna have anything else to do with God. I'm tired of fighting this demon. I'm just tired of it". And their heart gets harder and harder and harder and calloused to the point where there's no relationship. That's not 'cause God left you. It's just you just kinda renounced your relationship, and eventually you will say, "Well, I don't even believe there's a God". Man, there's a lot of that going on right now.
There are people who used to believe in God who now say, "I don't even believe there's a God. I used to believe in God. I used to be in church. I used to do all those things, but I don't believe that no more," wow. But, even then, you have to really qualify to fall back. Look at this. Hebrews 6, verses 4 through 6. Yeah, this Scripture is gonna show us that you can't sin your salvation away, but you might be able to renounce it if you do what I just explained. Rejecting your faith isn't easily done, but it's possible. And I don't believe that there are very many people who do fall away. I think it's just so, so, so, so hard to be able to do that, according to this Scripture.
Now look what he says in verse 4. "For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have tasted of the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away, for them to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame". You know what he's saying here? He says before you can even think about going back like that and renouncing God, you gotta first of all have tasted of the good Word. You gotta have revelation flowing within you. You got to have, you know, the Holy Spirit gifts operating in you.
A lotta people just don't have in full operation. God's trying to make it very difficult for you to renounce him, or to cast him away, because, you know, you might think, "Well, I renounce God". And God knows you're too immature to renounce him. He's like, "You're not even a mature Christian to do that. I ain't even paying you no attention. You'll be all right". You know, I did that one time over a little silly thing. I thought, "Well, this guy told me that, you know, because I did this, then I'm not going to heaven, and God don't wanna have nothing to do with me". I'm like, "Well, fine, then I quit, I'll just go in the world and have a good time".
And I read this, and I thought, "Oh, I have renounced God, and I have fallen away from God". And then, I started reading, and I'm like, "Wait a minute. I've not even matured into those things," so, you know, God forgave me and, praise God, we went on and we did what we need to do. But before someone would ever renounce so great a salvation, they would have to become hardened toward God. Now, think about that. So, the enemy's thing is, "How can I harden your heart"? Ultimately to try to get you to renounce God. And there are a lotta people who have hardened hearts right now, but they still don't qualify. This is so awesome. God's so full of love.
Look at Hebrews chapter 3:13-14. Satan is trying to harden your heart. Satan's trying to get you mad at God. "I'm mad at God because this person died". "I'm mad at God 'cause I lost my job". "I'm mad at God 'cause he didn't answer the prayer that I wanted answered". "I'm mad at God 'cause he won't do what I ask him to do". "I'm mad at God 'cause I'm not successful like I thought I would be successful. Ain't no Jesus Christ. Ain't no such thing as no God, no heaven". And then, you start listening to all that other junk. All of it is designed to get you to be so hardened in your heart that you just renounce God. Look what he says in verse 13 and verse 14. He says, "But I exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; but any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin". Hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. Verse 14, "For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end".
And so, you see in Scripture that there is some deceitfulness of sin that's designed to harden your heart. Do you know anybody who's right now hardened in their heart, that, you know, they just don't see why they need to be tuning in, listening to no message? And, you know, "I got better things I need to do". That's what this whole period is about. It's a big testing time to see who's really in this thing or who may be in it for the wrong reasons, and that's why I'm saying you've got to be saved for the right reasons. You gotta be in it for the essence of the relationship. I'm in it for the relationships, not what he can do for me. I can't tell you the number of people who used to be in church, people who used to be Christians, people who used to love God, people who used to believe when God said don't do a certain thing, but now they're like, "Forget all of that. I'm gonna do what I wanna do. This is my life. I'm gonna live it the way I wanna live it. I only get one chance".
Listen, you don't wanna harden your heart. Jesus is coming back. You know what I'm saying? He's coming back. And right now, I'm sure everything look like it's okay to harden your heart and be mad at God and be upset with the only one that can help you. You're mad at the only one who can help you, the only one who can save you, the only one who can deliver you. You're mad because you're surrounded by a bunch of people whose heart has been hardened towards God because sin deceived them, the deceitfulness of sin. And although your spirit is unaffected by sin, your body and your soul are. Sin dulls your perception. Sin dulls your wisdom, and it dulls your understanding of who you are in the Spirit. And if you persist in sin far and long, just keep doing it far and long enough, you can come to a place where Satan will try to make you renounce your faith in Christ.
And that's what he's after. That brings the devil greater joy than anything. "Let me see if I can get that Christian that used to praise God in church, that used to shout unto God with a voice of triumph, that used to be on the soul-winning team and would witness to people all the time, that used to do all of these godly things because they believed God". He says, "Yeah, I got them to renounce God". Very difficult to do, because, like I said, you've gotta meet all the qualifications in Hebrews chapter 6, 4 through 6. And for the first part, most of the people who do that are just spiritually immature babies, and they don't even qualify, and God's now working to help them to mature and to understand things that they don't understand. Lemme show you something, because it's impossible. You need Jesus. You're gonna need Jesus to get out of this dilemma. You're gonna need Jesus to overcome sin. You can't do it with just your performance.
Lemme show you something in John 15:2. This is so misinterpreted, and we're gonna deal with it right now. John 15:2, I'm sure you heard of this Scripture. He says, "Every branch in me that beareth not fruit," underline this next word, these next three words, "he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purges it, that it may bring forth more fruit". So, on one hand he says if you're not bearing fruit, he's gonna take you away. That sounds to me like, what is he gonna do, kill me? He says if you do bear fruit, he's gonna purge you. Now, at first glance this Scripture seems to say that unless you bear fruit, you will be cut off from Jesus.
Now, the problem is if I'm cut off from Jesus, I'm no longer can be saved, so let's look at the phrase where it says you shall be cut off. This phrase, "take away" or "cut off," the Greek word here, and I'm gonna show you that I actually went to get it, is the word "air", A-I-R-O. Air-O. Airó. It's a Greek word that they use for the phrase "take away" or "cut off". Now, in your "Strong's Concordance," number 142, he says it means to bear away. It means to take away. It means to carry off. It means to lift from the ground. The message of the Bible, in context, if you wanna really define, let the context define even this phrase "cut off," the message of the Bible in Romans 14 and Romans 15 says that the strong should bear or shall carry the weight of the weak.
So, you get the idea in context, what he's talking about. That the strong bears the infirmities of the weak. The strong doesn't cut them off from themselves. The strong says, "No, I got your back". The strong says, "I'm gonna carry you until you can bear fruit". The strong says that "if you're weak, I'm gonna be your strength for you". That's in context exactly what he is saying here when he talks about being cut off. He says those that don't bear fruit, he says, "I will bear you up". Cut off. "I will lift you up". Cut off. "I will take care of you. I got your back". That's not the heart of God that says if you don't bear fruit he's just gonna cut you off. "I'm gonna cut you off, and I'm through with you". You know that's not the heart of God. The heart of God is, "If you don't bear fruit, what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna bear you up until you do". Glory to God. "I don't know why you not bearing fruit, but I'm gonna be there until you do".
My God. The strong is gonna bear the infirmities of the weak, but we have taught this thing that, you know, if you're not bearing fruit God's gonna cut you off, and he gonna be done with you. And that is not the heart of God. That's not even the meaning of what he is saying here. He's talking about holding you up, bearing you up, just exactly what he talked about in Romans 14:15. Let the strong bear the infirmities of the weak. And so, that's the first part of this Scripture. The second part of this Scripture in John 15:2, where he talks about, "And if you do bear fruit," this is so good. "If you do bear fruit, I'm gonna purge you, or I'm gonna prune you". And I believe that much of this pruning is removing the religion and the mixture from our lives so that the gospel of Christ can do its full work in and through us.
Now, I felt like God really spoke to me on this, and he really gave me some answers, 'cause I used to ask myself, well, before I understood the grace of God, I got some results. I got fruit. Before I understood the grace of God, I'd mix some of the law and grace, and I was in religion, but I still saw some fruit. That's what he's talking about, he's talking about the people who have been in church all their life, and they've done things, and they saw some fruit. He says, "All right, I'm gonna prune you. I'm gonna purge you. I'm gonna get the religion outta you, and I'm gonna get the mixture outta you, and I'm gonna teach and train you in what grace is all about. And you're gonna have better fruit. You're gonna have more fruit".
Oh, and I know that's the truth, because things in my life mature and they're manifesting at such a better level now than they were, you know, 20, 30 years ago when I didn't know the difference between law and grace. I didn't understand the grace and mercy of God. I didn't know the gospel of grace, so I put a little law with a little grace, and it was, I guess it was just the mercy of God that allowed me to bear some fruit. There were some things that I did and I believed God for, and it happened, and I bore some fruit. And, I mean, I guarantee I have evidence of the fruit that I bore, but now that God has purged those things from me, I now can bring forth more fruit. I can bring forth a fullness in my life that I've never seen before. That really blessed me.
I always had that question. "Well, how come, Lord, if it was so bad why did I see some areas where it worked"? "Yeah, it did work. I allowed some fruit to come, but now I'm gonna purge you so you can bring forth much more fruit". Praise God. You see what I'm saying? See how important it is for us to get into the Word, find out what the Word says so you're not misled by somebody's comments, somebody saying something they don't even know what they talking about, somebody telling you that, and it brings condemnation. It's like, "Yeah, yeah. Well, if you sin, you ain't saved no more". It's almost like, "You, too, so who do you think you are? How do you tell me that and not tell yourself that"?
Because here's the deal: all of us got to have Jesus, 'cause everybody in your house got a issue. Everybody, and so we all need Jesus 'cause we all have issues. The only way we get out of our issues is through Christ. We don't get out of our issues through, you know, life coaches and self-coaching and all of that... no, no, no. We need Jesus. We need Jesus. Self-help doesn't help. Heh-heh, you think it helps 'cause you get some result, but like I say, you need to be purged and you can bring forth much more fruit. And if you start believing Jesus and getting under this grace of God, you can bring forth much more fruit.
Lemme show you something else. Hebrews chapter 10. Hebrews chapter 10, because most of this goes under the heading of unbelief. Most of the stuff that people misinterpret and get in religion, it goes under the heading of unbelief. Look at Hebrews chapter 10:26, and I'll show you these things real quickly. Hebrews chapter 10:26. He says, "For if we sin willfully", underline "sin willfully". First of all, let's talk about that, sin willfully. Is he talking about, you know, you know, you slap this lady in the store, and you went to your priest, and you said, "Oh, I sinned. I slapped this lady in the store"? And he ask you, "Well, did you slap her willfully or was it a mistake"? See how crazy that is? All sin is willful. All sin is an act of your will. There is no sin that is not a sin that's act of your will.
In other words, you know, that's not what these two words mean. It doesn't mean, "Oh, I decided to do it. Now, it's one thing if I made a mistake to do it 'cause I was mad, and I just kinda made a mistake to do it". No, you're deceiving yourself. You're trying to change the rules again. You're trying to change the rules again so you can preserve what you do. First of all, that's not what he's talking about here. He says, "For if we sin willfully," when? "After that we have received the knowledge of the truth," so this willful sin has to do something with the truth that we received in the previous verse of Scriptures. He says, "There remaineth no more sacrifices for sins," if you don't receive the knowledge of the truth.
Well, what was the knowledge of the truth? Well, if you back up in the book of Hebrews and you start reading, let me give these verses to you. I've taught this before, but we need to mention it again. In Hebrews chapter 10, I'm gonna give you the exact Scriptures that you need to read so that you can bring it into context, all right? Every verse of Scripture is defined by the context that it is found in. You define verse 26 by allowing the context to tell you what verse 26 is about, okay? So, we're gonna define verse 26 by looking at verse 5. "Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and offerings thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared," so he's talking about the sacrifice and the offering of the body of Jesus.
Then verse 10, "By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once and for all," so he's talking about the body of Jesus Christ being that sacrifice. Verse 11, "And every priest standeth daily ministering and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices," those animal sacrifices, "which can never take away sin". So, all of the animal sacrifices that the priest is offering, it can never take away sins. Verse 18, "Now where remission of sin is, there is no more offering for sin," so Jesus's body and the remission of sin. There's no more offering for sin, not animal offerings. And then, you go to verse 26. "For if we sin willfully".
So, what is the willful sin? Rejecting Jesus as the final and the only sacrifice of sin. The willful sin is rejecting Jesus as the final sacrifice and the only sacrifice for sin. He says for if we now sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge that Jesus's body is the final sacrifice for sin, and there is no more need for other sacrifices. He says if you don't believe that, then there is no more sacrifices for sin, if you don't believe the only one sacrifice for sin. You see what I'm saying?
You got all these people who saying they know God, all these people saying, "Well, praise God I go to church, and I know Jesus," and we still don't know how to read the Bible right. And only God knows how many people are walking in such deception because we don't know things like... if you're gonna define verse 26, you gotta go back and read the beginning of the chapter so you can get the context, and the context defines the verse of Scripture. We've been taught to define it like this: "Let's go see what that Greek word mean, and let's go see what that Greek word mean".
And then, we tell you all the Greek words and see all these Greek words that don't nobody know what you're talking about and still don't know what it mean. And in some cases, even when you define the Greek word but you don't allow the context to give definition of the verse, you still don't come up with the right interpretation. Are you listening to what I'm saying? This is so, so very important. So, let me see, the sin of not believing in the power of the blood of Jesus Christ and according to the context, we can see that specific sin was to renounce faith in Jesus Christ and return to the sacrifices of the old covenant, and they counted the blood of Jesus as nothing special, basically, and they returned to the sacrifices of animal's blood.