Gregory Dickow - No Record Against You
Welcome to another episode of, "Think Like a Champion," a podcast dedicated to helping you win in every way and enjoy every day. And I want to thank everyone who's written a review or shared this podcast on social media. Appreciate you partnering with me and helping us expand our community of champions, because that's what we're building. We're building a community of champions. It doesn't mean that you have to be an athlete or in a competitive event or a competitive business to be a champion. Thinking like a champion is what we're after because God created us to be more than conquerors. And this Holy week we're going to get right into content that I really believe fits perfectly with what we're celebrating. And a lot of people ask me, because a lot of people ask me often how to be free from guilt and condemnation; how to be free, how to break free from guilt and condemnation.
So, this podcast is dedicated to showing you how to be free from guilt forever. Most people think that the way to be free from guilt is to not do anything wrong, to not do anything bad, to not do anything negative. And that's just not possible. So how can we live with our humanity without beating ourselves up and without inflicting ourselves with self-punishment? Because that's what so many people do. That's what religion teaches people to do. And I believe that is a debilitating force that prevents us from moving forward in life over our guilt, our shame, our condemnation. So, we're going to smash it into pieces today, and we're going to experience freedom, true freedom. There's a story that I like to tell of a man in England who years ago had purchased the most expensive car in the world, a Rolls-Royce. At that time, he decided to take his Rolls-Royce on a vacation to France. And he wanted to take his Rolls-Royce with him to drive through the countryside of France.
So, he put his car on a ferry and then went across the English Channel. And as he was enjoying the French Riviera in his beautiful brand-new Rolls-Royce, it broke down. And there was nobody there who could fix this unique and complicated engine. So, he contacted the company's headquarters back in England, and they flew a man over immediately who performed the repairs on this Rolls-Royce. And the owner, he knew the repairs would be expensive because it's the most expensive car made. And the work had to be done. But to his surprise, when he returned to London, he never received a bill for the repairs. In fact, the Rolls-Royce company never sent a bill for the repairs. So, this man sent a letter to the company communicating what had happened and how the mechanic had come over from England, fixed the car and was still wondering what he would be charged. He got a letter back from the Rolls-Royce company saying as follows.
Dear Sirs... Dear Sir, thank you so much for your letter. You need to know that we have no record in our files that your Rolls-Royce or any Rolls-Royce has ever broken down at any time, in any place, for any reason. Therefore, you owe us nothing, and you never will. Whew! What a story. This story really spoke to me, and it tells me that no matter what is broken in our lives, no matter what we've done, no matter how many flaws we've had, our great manufacturer, our master builder, forgives us and fixes us by His grace. And He declares over us there is no record against us. There is no debt to be paid. We owe nothing for our sins and we never will. Through the blood of Jesus and only through the precious blood of Jesus, God declares us not guilty. Not guilty. It doesn't mean that you're completely innocent. It means you're not guilty.
Are you guilty of having done things that you should be condemned about and you should feel guilty about? Yes, we've all done those things. But God declares us not guilty. God has washed it away, and He will never remember our sins any more. Now the devil remembers our sins. And we remember our sins. And our spouse remembers our sins probably more than anybody, right? Come on who's married out there? Just having a little fun. Forgive them and everything will be all right. But I love what Job says in this beautiful verse, in Job, chapter ten, verse seven. I love it. And it's dear to my heart. He says, "According to your knowledge..." Job says this, "According to your knowledge I am indeed not guilty". Job says to God according to Your knowledge indeed, I am not guilty now.
Now, notice, he says, according to God's knowledge, as far as God is concerned, we're not guilty. According to our sins, according to our mistakes, according to our shortcomings, our failures, even according to our own opinion and that of others, we are guilty. But according to God's knowledge, as far as God's concerned, we can live a life free from guilt, from condemnation, and the misery, and the failure, and the defeat that accompanies these negative emotions. I love what Paul says in Ephesians, chapter one. "In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace".
Wow, I am so convinced that you and I have been this way. And multitudes of believers around the world are suffering from a sickness that eats them up inside, a sickness called guilt. Guilt is that horrible feeling. That feeling inside when you do something wrong or fail to do something that you know you should have done. And you feel terrible about it. Maybe you're struggling right now. Maybe a lie you told caused a lot of pain and you feel tremendous guilt over it. Or maybe you've been struggling because of a sexual sin from your past, distant or past recent. Maybe it was last week. Maybe it was last month. Maybe it was even 20 years ago. Maybe the enemy condemns you about a divorce that you had or a selfish mistake that you made during your marriage. Perhaps it's even destroyed your relationship, or it's simply destroying you and eating you up inside. Maybe you feel the burden of guilt for something that was done to you. Perhaps you were abused and the enemy bombards you with the shame and the guilt of it as if you were the reason. Nothing seems to rob us of our true vitality.
Boy, this is what I've found in my life. Nothing seems to rob me of my true purpose or my joy more than guilt. We feel the guilt of what we've done, what others have done to us, or not having done what we should have done as Paul wrote in Romans, chapter seven. Remember this verse? I'd always wondered about it, and this really helped me to see it and understand it. He said, I do not do the thing, the good thing that I want to do, but I end up doing the evil thing that I don't want to do. And I keep doing it. Anybody feel like that? So, how do we deal with that? Is the way to be free from guilt is to never do it again? Because that no one can actually achieve that. No one has ever achieved that except Jesus.
You see, guilt is the root to so many things in our lives. It causes us to make bad behavior, causes us to continue bad behavior, to make bad decisions. Because we feel so beat up and we feel like we failed and we feel so guilty about it, we just stay in that condition. So, it hems us in. It ties us to our past. It causes us to be angry and harsh so that we can deflect our guilt to somebody else. It causes us to feel unworthy of blessing, unworthy of favor, unworthy of opportunity. Guilt causes us to make promises to God that we can't keep. Guilt makes us judgmental. It drains us of strength. It makes us feel low self-worth and low self-esteem. Boy, everyone needs to feel relieved of guilt. So, we either temporarily cover guilt with our excuses, or we forever settle this issue through the depths of God's grace, and we become completely liberated from guilt forever. That's where I want to be. That's where I want you to be. And that's what I believe this episode is going to help you experience.
I want you to imagine something for a moment. Like, this is something that I've done and I've tried to write it down just so I'd never forget. Imagine for a moment what it would be like. I just want you to imagine for a moment. You don't have to try to make this happen in your life. But imagine for a moment how it would feel to be totally free from guilt. Here are some things that it makes me feel when I think about this. It would make you able to handle your mistakes and your weaknesses or criticisms and critiques that we have towards us or others have towards us. We can handle criticism without crumbling, or without having to be defensive. We'd stop beating ourselves up to pay for our guilt. If we can imagine what life would be like without feeling guilty, we would have more energy because guilt sucks the life right out of you. Guilt just eats away at your energy and takes away the joy out of life.
What else would it feel like if we were not guilty anymore? You wouldn't be manipulated so easily by others through guilt manipulation. Anybody have a relative like that or somebody that you grew up with like that? And we wouldn't use our guilt against ourselves and start hating ourselves. You would forgive freely because you'd realize that you've been forgiven freely. And one of my all-time favorite things when I imagine what life would be like to be free from guilt, is, it would be a life free from depression. Now, I understand that depression comes in many different forms and there's different levels of depression. There is depression just from daily life. There's the depression that is deeply spiritual. There's depression that is clinical. But most depression in our lives is rooted in guilty feelings. Because guilty feelings are the building blocks of depression. For many people, depression is just self-inflicted punishment. We just lose all the wind in our sail. We just are depleted of all energy and all happiness because of guilt. We're trying to punish ourselves for our guilt.
We say, "I'll make myself feel bad to pay for what I've done". Now you don't use those words to describe it that way, but that's what we do subconsciously, without realizing it. Studies show that we've been, we get angry. Everybody gets angry about 20 times a day. And it's usually anger at ourselves for this guilt, the frustration of personal disappointments. And if we believe our anger is bad, we keep it inside. It takes so much energy to keep that anger bottled up, you know? That we get drained. We keep it inside because we don't want to lash out at anybody. And what does it do? It drains and wears us out. And when we don't keep it in and we lash out, we use it as a weapon. We weaponize our guilt and depression against other people. And when we're not using our energy, when we when we're using our energy to to vent at others or using our energy to punish ourselves internally, we're not using our energy to fulfill God's purpose.
And we are losing the energy that God gave us to fulfill our God-given purpose, because we're using that energy to keep silent about our guilt or to vent towards others about our guilt. And it makes life miserable. The weariness of that adds up, the losses of life add up, and it makes us feel hopeless, and lethargic, irritable, sad, depressed, angry. We've all experienced or witnessed a child being yelled by their parent, "You're bad, or shame on you", right? If we've done that to our kids, let's stop doing that. Shame on you. No, we need to say shame off of you. We need to declare that we're not going to put shame on our kids. But people use these words and they don't realize how powerful they are. They make a child feel guilt and feel shame. If the parent's guilt trip works, the child might cry for a minute or silently feel bad as guilt shapes that child's soul.
Now the parent thinks the guilt worked because the child feels bad, but it really hasn't worked. The child hasn't learned to do good. Rather, they've just learned to feel bad so that they won't get punished. Or they learn to feel bad until they stop getting punished. And then when the parent stops the punishment, the child may feel like feeling bad is what rescued that child. Thus, this cycle of coping through guilt and staying in bondage just keeps viciously keeping you bound and angry at yourself. Now look, this is not meant to explain all depression. But it's something we have all experienced or witness. Guilt is a terrible master. That's why Paul went on to show us the secret to living free from guilt and condemnation. It's not by feeling bad, but by embracing our new identity in Christ. In Romans chapter eight, verse one, it says, "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ".
I want you to think about that. There's no condemnation for those who are in Christ. Now we'll visit this idea of being in Christ another time. There's a lot to be said about that. But notice this concept. The Spirit... He says those who walk according to the Spirit and not according to the flesh in that verse, later in that verse. What does it mean to walk according to the Spirit? Well, the Spirit is whatever agrees with what Jesus has done and the flesh is what doesn't agree with what Jesus has done. Freedom from guilt, shame, and condemnation begins with the acceptance of what Jesus has done for us, and the acceptance of who we are in Him, forgiven, redeemed, and free. You see, when we're walking, people have thought walking in the Spirit means being holier than everybody. And walking in the flesh means being more sinful than everybody. But that is not what those words mean. Walking in the Spirit means you're in agreement with the finished work of the cross.
You're going to live your life from a finished point of view, seated with Christ in heavenly places. But there is an accuser who is working overtime to accuse you, to condemn you. Continually I've lived with this accuser for weeks, and months, and years. The accuser is none other than Satan himself. But we've started to... We've allowed him to train us so good, that he doesn't even need to show up for work anymore, because you do enough accusing of yourself without him. And that needs to be turned around. We're going to silence the accuser, and silence the accusations of our inner soul.
And I love what he says in Revelation, chapter 12. You remember that passage in verse ten and 11? It says salvation and power belong to the Lord Jesus Christ, the kingdom of God. For the accuser of the brethren... "For the accuser of our brethren who accuses them before God day and night..." It's continual. But the accuser has been thrown down. One translation says the accuser has been cast down. I love these translations, thrown down and hurled down. Being accused continually is what many of us have experienced in life because the enemy is the accuser. The word devil comes from the word diablo. It means to... We all know the word Diablo in Spanish means devil. Maybe you have a tattoo that says Diablo on it somewhere on your body. Because you don't. You just think it's a funny word or it's kind of cool. Sounds cool, Diablo, right? I mean, it's kind of got a cool sound to it. But it literally means to throw at until it penetrates; to throw accusations at you until it penetrates and subdues you, oppresses you, and controls you. That is what the word Diablos comes from.
Wow. So, this is how the devil operates. He throws accusations that you and at me day and night until he penetrates your soul. And there he releases his explosive power through guilt, condemnation, and shame. So, if we deal with this the way Jesus intended us to, by taking these accusations captive and overcoming the accuser, we're going to experience real joy. You are going to experience joy today. So, we know what this voice sounds like, right? You never do enough. It says that you never are enough. You don't get it all done. You don't do enough for your children. You don't do enough for your parents. You don't do as much for others as they do for you. You always seem to blow it when you seem to be making progress. You always say things you regret. This is what the voice says. You get angry too easily. You think bad thoughts. You don't have the right clothes. You eat too much. You don't exercise enough, you don't pray enough, you don't read enough. You don't serve enough.
Does that sound familiar for anybody? They stop coming in the form of "You don't do enough," and then these accusations start coming in the first-person form. I don't do enough. I don't have the right things. I don't do good enough. I say the wrong thing. I get angry. You see, as you begin to agree with these accusations, you begin to get weighed down with guilt that brings you into a place of sadness, ineffectiveness, lacking purpose, lacking strength, lacking the energy to move forward in your life. But if we could throw down these accusations once and for all, we could experience real freedom, the Jesus-paid-for freedom. And we could experience a peace that passes understanding. That's the life God has for you this week, this day, this month, this year. Let me give you the steps. Back to Revelation, chapter 12. He says the accuser has been thrown down, and then he tells us how to throw down the accuser. It says, and they overcame him by the blood of the lamb, by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives unto death.
Here are the three things that empower us to throw down the accusations of guilt, condemnation, and shame. Number one, the blood of Jesus. Jesus blood not only cleanses us from sin, but cleanses us from guilt. Listen to this verse in Hebrews, I believe it's chapter ten. "Let us draw near with a sincere heart and full assurance of faith, having our heart sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water". Wow, it says we draw near in verse 19 by the blood of Jesus. So, notice what the blood of Jesus does. It brings us into God's presence, and it gives us a sincere heart, a heart that is with full assurance of faith. God will do what He says because the blood of Jesus guarantees the promises of God. And that's why our hearts are cleansed from an evil conscience, by the blood of Jesus. Not by making promises to God that you're going to do better. What cleanses you from an evil conscience and a guilty conscience is the blood of Jesus, number one. So, speak forth. Jesus' blood has made me not guilty. Jesus' blood has not only washed my sins, but also made me free from the guilt of my sins.
Number two, it says the word of their testimony. We silence the accuser through words. As we declare what Jesus has done... He saved me. He's forgiven me, He's healed me, He's redeemed me, He's loved me. He's made me a king and a priest. He saved you. He's redeemed you; delivered you. This is how we throw down the accuser, when you begin to say what Jesus has done for you, when you begin to say who you are. I throw down the accuser who is telling me that I am broken and unfixable, and I declare I'm a king and a priest. I'm more than a conqueror. I throw down the accusations that say I'm a loser and I declare I am the head and not the tail above only and not beneath. I throw down the accusations that I don't do enough by declaring that Jesus has done enough for me. I throw down the accusations that I'm not a good parent, because I trust God to make up for the difference for wherever I've failed my kids. I throw down the accusation of I don't pray enough because the Holy Spirit is praying through me all the time.
So, I'm already prayed up. And I'm staying prayed up because I'm trusting the Holy Spirit to pray through me. Whew! This is how your words... You throw down the accuser by the words of your mouth; the word of your testimony. Not the word, "Well God healed me back in the day", or "God did this in my life". It's not testimonies in the sense of all the great things God has done, although there's nothing wrong with that. But it's the testimony of what Jesus has done. That's the word of our testimony. The word of we're testifying that Jesus has made us sons and daughters. We're testifying, that Jesus has made us the head and not the tail. We're testifying that Jesus has made us above and not beneath. We're testifying that Jesus has made us kings and priests. And when we say that out loud, it throws the accuser out of our minds; out of our lives.
And then the third thing is, he says, and they did not love their lives, even unto death. Now. While this speaks of. A willingness to lay our lives down physically. It also speaks to what they truly loved. They loved not their lives. In other words, they were in love with the life. Their life with Jesus. They were now they were no longer in love with their former life. They did not love their life any more. Their life without Jesus. The life they loved. Because you can love life. But they did not love their lives. Which life are they talking about that they didn't love? They didn't love their former life without Him. They loved their new life with Him, so they were willing to die to their former life, the life without Him. They were in love with Him who saved them? They were not in love with their former reputation. They were not in love with their former life. They were not in love with being popular with everybody. They were in love with the life Jesus gave them.
We must love finding our identity in Christ and love the new you that God made you to be. This is how they were able to throw down the accuser of the brethren. Jesus threw them down. And now we must continue to remind the devil and to remind those accusations that we are above them, not beneath them. And we need to refuse to let them back into our heads and back into our hearts. Remind yourself of what the blood of Jesus has done for you. Speak over yourself and declare. Who you are in Christ and what Jesus has done for you and love the life that you now have with Christ, love the life that you now have with your church family. Love this life that we now have, this community of champions.
Let's love this life. Let's not love the life that we lived as losers and with losers. Nope, No offense here, but let's not love that life. Let's love the life that God gave us to love as new creatures in Christ, as people that truly surrender to God's will for our lives. This puts the enemy on the run and silences him from your mind. It's time for you right now to stop beating yourself up. We are good fighters. We're good punchers. But the person we fight the most and the person we punch the most is our self. You're a knockout champion, man. You're a heavyweight champion at beating yourself up. And it's time to stop. Stop beating yourself up about your mistakes, your past, what others have done to you, what you've done. Because we're so accustomed to these familiar feelings of guilt. We've allowed them to control our lives, and we're putting an end to that today. Are you ready? Are you ready?
Look, you don't have to pay for your sins or your guilt any more. Jesus already did that with His blood. No matter what you feel like, no matter how many mistakes you've made, no matter how far you've fallen, you can live a life where you're not guilty by putting your trust in Jesus' blood in what He's done and speaking it, and falling out of love with your old feelings of guilt. It's time to fall out of love with them. It's time to stop spending time with them. How do you fall out of love with someone? You stop spending time with them or you get to know their flaws so good that you don't want to be around them anymore. So, you need to realize how flawed guilt is. It's something that we never need in our lives ever again. Well, we're out of time, and I want to encourage you. Do not miss our Sunday services. They are going to change your life. Tune in anywhere you want. Anywhere you can, from wherever you can. We will be in-person. And we will be online. But I want you to experience this freedom. Can I pray for you?
Heavenly Father, I thank You that Jesus' blood has declared us not guilty. That in Christ we are no longer victims of condemnation and victims of our past reputations. We're no longer victims of our past failures, no longer victims of our former self. But we now find ourselves hidden in Christ, completely loved, completely forgiven, and completely washed of all guilt. We will not listen to accusations. I prophesy over you. You will not be under the control of the accuser anymore. You will speak back to the accuser and throw him down, and throw the accusations down, in Jesus' Name, amen.