Jentezen Franklin - How to Build a Godly Inheritance for Your Family - Part 2
The story is centered around a man named Naboth. Naboth appears in this chapter, but his origin goes back for generations of faith. He was given the name because it was in the family and his name is Naboth which means to sprout or to be fruitful and this 21st chapter starts out talking about the fact that he had such a fruitful vineyard that the king's palace butted up against his property even though the kings property was so much more fancy and so much more beautiful and taken care of. And servants and everybody, taken care of every detail. The Bible said that the king looked out and saw his vineyard and how prosperous that vineyard and he said, "I want that. That is better than all my money can buy. All my wealth, all my power, I don't have that kind of fruitfulness. I want that".
The Bible says he could not sleep, he would toss and turn and walk to the window and see that property even though he had all the hills that he could see in every direction. And everything that he owned was so much greater, but he said, "I'll buy it from you. I'm offering you money. I'm offering you wealth like I'll give you another farm that's got thousands of acres more. You'll be such a big deal, I'll do this and I'll do that". And I love this great, great lesson that Naboth had in his response. Listen to his words again, "God forbid that I should sell out what my father has handed down to me". Guard your inheritance. Maintain your inheritance. Wake up. It's in the family and the Bible said that Naboth was killed by King Ahab because his wife Jezebel said, "Why are you worried about it? Just go kill him and take it". And God got so upset when somebody touched the family inheritance that He had blessed that family with. That He had poured into that family that the scripture said that God used a prophet to prophesy, and the prophet said, "The dogs will lick up your blood because you messed with a godly inheritance".
Brothers and sisters, you better not miss with the inheritance and anointing that's on a family. When God lays His hand on a family and blesses a family it is a powerful thing and God takes note of the enemies of that inheritance. Maintain your godly inheritance. Ahab... the Bible said was part of the blessing at one point in 1 Kings 16 and 13 it said he gave up his inheritance when he married Jezebel. Y'know what can mess your spiritual inheritance up? You can give up your inheritance when you marry the wrong person. You can greatly hinder it. Who you marry can mess up your inheritance. He married the high priestess of Baal, her name was Jezebel. He was raised in the faith, taught the Torah, memorized the first five books of the Old Testament, memorized scriptures, went to the temple, offered burnt sacrifices to Jehovah God, prayed to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
And then he fell in love with Miss Jezebel, the high priestess, the highest priest to the Baal God that offered human sacrifices, and can you imagine? Who you marry can mess up the inheritance. "Well, I'm just feel like I'm in love with ‘em and I know they don't, I just feel it, I just feel it". Well, let me tell you, marriage is not feeling it, marriage is work. Marriage: how in the world can you be married to someone who has another God or no God, no interest in prayer, no interest in worship, no interest in God's house. No interest in anything that you know is right and yet you're gonna marry them. Marriage is rolling up your sleeves and going to work. There's an amazing story in the book of Numbers. The 27th chapter I think it is and this story is about the fact that there was no opening for women to receive the inheritance unless they were married. And there were five daughters in the time of Moses, their father was killed and they did not have a brother and therefore under the law there was no provision for the five single daughters to receive the inheritance.
I wanna throw this up because it's important. Then came the daughters of Zelophehad, the son of Hepher, the son of Gilead, the son of Makir, the son of Manasseh. Oh, oh? Haven't we been talking about that? From the families of Manasseh, the son of Joseph and these were the names of his daughters. Now if you are pregnant and you need a good family name here comes some especially if you've a girl on the way. Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah. She'll love you the rest of your life when you give her that name. You could call her piggy for short. Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milkah, and Tirzah. Trizah. Tirzah. I don't have time to show you all this, but this happened, you can read it for yourself later.
Let me tell you what happened, this is a beautiful, this is when God joined the ERA. He did. Watch this. Women had no rights, if their daddy died or their brother didn't inherit it and usually, they would come up under him and be taken care of that way, but if these girls were all single and they had not been married and the dad died, and the law said that they had no right to the inheritance of land. And these girls got together, and I could see ‘em in my mind, I could see ‘em in my mind. They're sitting around the table and they said, "This just ain't right". Like, I could her Tezra, Tezla, she said, "This ain't right, this ain't right". And I could hear the other one Mahlah she spoke up, "Y'know it's not right, this just isn't fair". And then ol' Hoglah, boy when she got in it, she spoke up she said, "Y'know we ought to do something about this".
And all five of ‘em got so stirred up and you can read it, maybe even support this while I preach but the Bible said they went down and walked right, you understand women were not allowed to go into the temple, were not allowed to walk up to the high priest, were not allowed to walk up to the prophet Moses... The Bible said, "They walked right up to the temple", right, right there it is. They stood before Moses and Eleazar the priest. Can you see those five girls? They walked right in, and they said, "This just ain't right, this is not right. I know it's not in the book but it's not right, it's not fair". And Moses was so wise because he saw and all the priests are looking, all the elders are looking, God and everybody's looking, and these girls all so stirred up and they're single girls and they're upset ‘cause they didn't have time to get married and nobody's gon' get the inheritance and y'know what?
The Bible said, "And Moses said, ‘I'll talk to God about it.'" In other words, Moses did what every man ought to do when you're being confronted with a stirred-up woman. He said, "Let me pray about it". Boy what a great response. "Let me pray about it, I'mma pray about that". And you know what? He went... I love these girls, these are gutsy girls. They said, "This ain't right". "This ain't right". You know what God said? God said to Moses, "You know what? They're right, give it to ‘em". But one stipulation, one little stipulation, let ‘em know that if they hook up with the wrong person, they can lose their inheritance. They must marry in the tribe. That's not a racial thing, it's a spiritual thing. You can't be mixing, can you see Ahab walking in trying to worship God and there is Jezebel and she's having a séance and she's got tarot cards and she's drawing a hexagram and she's got a crystal ball and she's spreading blood and feathers and bones and throwing bones and trying to tell the future and giving herself over to incantation and manifesting demons.
All in mixing. Turn to somebody and say, "God don't mix". I know I'm in bad English today, but I feel like preaching right here. God don't mix. You gotta guard your inheritance and when you're marrying somebody the number one question ought to be, "Do you love Jesus? Will you honor him? Will you serve him? Will you build a home that will be glorifying of the Lord Jesus Christ? Will you raise babies in the faith with me"? Hallelujah. Because when you hook up with the wrong people you tarnish the inheritance. What should've took one year... God won't remove the blessing off of you, but what should've took one year may take ten years. May not even hit your generation, it may have to come through another generation. God has the best for you. Don't mess up your inheritance, shout, "My inheritance is connected to God. My inheritance is connected to obedience to this book and when I obey it and I when I connect to him, I'm part of the family of God and nothing can block the blessing".
The Bible said that Jezebel killed Naboth, and his sons and Jezebel and Ahab died one of the most horrifying, brutal, tragic deaths and so did their two sons and one daughter. God cursed that family because they touched a godly inheritance in another family. Property in ancient Israel is considered something holy and powerful. We don't think of it that way but even to this day in Rabbi's and Jewish culture it's understood that home and property are spiritual things. That families are to possess and pass on for generations ‘cause God has a long range plan. There's some things money cannot buy. Some things shouldn't die with you. You got a gift, if you know how to think and know how to dream and know how to do business, pour it into somebody. For me, the sax shouldn't die with me. It shouldn't. I can play the sax, I'm not average. I'm very good on the sax, I can hang with anybody, I can play with anybody. I can. And I'm not bragging but I can, what can I say?
And you know my little granddaughter, one of my little granddaughters, Elliott, every Sunday they come in the back door and come in of the steps and come running into my office in between services usually and then I'll have to leave, and I'll go and kind of get myself together in a little quiet room. But they always come in, we hug and kiss and all that and usually my saxophone is in the other room, and I go in this other room where I have to go somewhere and do something, and she will every Sunday like a magnet if her parents don't watch her real good. She will gravitate towards that saxophone, she's a little bitty thing about four years old. She'll gravitate, she'll take the cap off, she'll put her mouth on that mouthpiece, it's got a little wood reed that is so delicate. So important and she will chip it and break it every Sunday. I never know what I'mma get.
When they hand me that horn my greatest fear is not can I play this song, I don't even think about the song. My deal is, what has Elliott done? The moment my tongue touches that little mouthpiece I know if it's rigid, oh God. Elliott got a hold of this one. It might not play. And you know I was thinking about that and I kind of got on Courtney not too long ago. I said, "You got to control your child, you cannot let that child". And the Lord convicted me this weekend and he said, "How do you know that I don't want you to die with saxophone and take it to the grave but maybe she loves that horn so much that by the age of 12 you can pour everything inside of her that you know every lick, every scale, every bit of knowledge that you've learned from playing since you were 12. Put it in her before she's 12".
What about you? Some things shouldn't die. The Christian inheritance, listen now, I close with this, is based on a relationship with the family of God. The closer you get to Jesus the more inheritance you get. When you become born again, God becomes your father and the closer you get to Jesus. The closer you draw to Jesus all the inheritance of everything it, I mean, we need to get a mentality that is so much bigger and broader than. We act like we're guilty if God blesses us. God says, "You don't get it. I died to break the curse off of you and your family. I wanna bless your exceedingly, abundantly above all you could ask or think". The spiritual inheritance that you have is so much powerful than any manifestation of the enemy in your family. Satan is a liar. And I don't know why but that just set it up, that just made it right, that just gave me what I needed. I needed to hear that Satan is, if he's saying it, he's a liar.
If he's decreeing it and manifesting it, he's a liar and if I'll hold onto the inheritance, if I maintain the inheritance God will bring it to pass. I'll leave the how up to him, I'll leave the when up to him, but Satan is a liar. Raise your hands. You say, "My sons on drugs". "My daughters lost". "My kids gay". You don't understand but Satan is a liar. Throw your hands up and say, "God I receive the blessing, I receive the inheritance". I want every one of you out there if you have a family member around you, throw your arm around ‘em right now. And if you don't then that's alright, you represent your family here today. Receive this today. Receive what I'm preaching today. Receive the spiritual inheritance today. Make up your mind if you are another generation. You're at a deciding point now. God's not requiring perfection, God doesn't wanna take life from you. He wants to give it to you. He's got the long-range plan for your life. And it's all gon' work out. You don't understand it, you can't put any sense to it but God has a long-term plan for every one of our families and here's what I hear, Satan is a liar.
My mother is somewhere over here, saw her during the... is she still here? Come up here mom. Eighty-six years young. I go by every morning I get a chance, she's already got her Bible open, already been with the Lord, already called her children's name out. Her grandchildren. Great grandchildren. Thank you for a godly inheritance, thank you for that. It's more to me than silver and gold and so much more, so much more. I just want you to pray over the people, Speak the word of God over the people, just pray over their families ‘cause we're so blessed. You got something to say?
Katie Franklin: Well, this morning at 6:00 A.M, I believe it's around 6, 6:30 A.M when I went down to have and talk to the Lord about this service today. I had an unusual assurance that He was going to be here in a special way, and He is. He's in the house today. His praise is in here. He said, "Those that are planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the house of the Lord". So, if you want your family to flourish for the kingdom and for God. Bring ‘em to the house of God. He said, "They that are planted in the house of God will flourish, they shall bring forth their fruit in the season. Their fruit, their spiritual fruit". So, He's here today. But He was in my house when I went downstairs and sat down and opened His word. He came near and I said, "Lord, what are you gon' do today in the house"? "Give everybody that is planted in the house today a revival in their home. Bring their families in. Bring their families in". And I'm so thankful for my son, for all five of my children that love God and are in the work of the Lord. And witness and nearly I'm sure every day of their life of the goodness of God. God has been good to me. He's been good to me and He's no respecter of persons but remember those that planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in his house.