Leon Fontaine - Your Identity, Your Mission
Well, I want to talk to you today about something that it's just, it's always oozing and burning out of me, just you know, and I want to talk to you because so many of us treat church and God's Word as though it's just kind of we're consumer. We need this. We need that. We need a little fix spiritually, go to church, get encouraged a little bit. And you so do not know what church is. And as you look at the world today and look at the things that are going on, it's very apparent that so much of the body of Christ has an identity crisis. They do not know who they are.
There's three things that your mouth should be speaking every day, is who you are, what you are, and your mission in life. Those things Jesus was always talking about when it came to Him. Who He was. What He was. What His mission was. And so I want to talk to you about something that if you don't begin to speak. If you don't begin to speak the Word of God. You're going to find that your life becomes such a double-minded mess. You're going to find it hard to keep God's peace in your life. You will find it hard to keep God's joy in your life. You will find it hard to stay in faith because faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the Word of God.
So although you have the measure of faith, and although it's by faith that we can overcome anything in this world, so few people understand that your confession rules you. What you say and what you continually say is ruling and reigning in your life. In Revelations 12:11, it talks about how the way we overcome the enemy on this planet. It says we overcame him by the blood of the Lamb. Another words, being born again in Christ Jesus. And then it says it's not just that position in Christ. It's yes, the fact that you're born again. But then it says and the word of your testimony.
A testimony is a verbal explaining, declaring what you are a witness to. And it says they loved not their lives to the death. What is it in your regular conversation? What is it day by day that you talk about when it comes to who you are, what you are, and what your mission in life is. In Hebrews 4:14, a really cool verse it says, "Seeing then is we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God". Then it says, "Let us hold fast our confession". Yes, we've got Jesus as our High Priest. Yes, He's died on the cross. Yes, He rose again. Man, He's seated at the righthand of the Father and He's made every promise. He's qualified you for. He's giving you the gift of righteousness. I mean, it's stunning.
But then it says, "Let us hold fast our confession". We hear the word confession for negative things like confess your sins or James confess your faults. And you need take it in context as to when you need help and how you're walking things out. But few people realize that much of the word confession profession in the Bible is your confession of faith. Your confession of God's Word. Your confession of the principles. You see, you are not trying to become something that you are not. You are trying to be who you is. And if you do not begin to speak and watch your words and declare, confess, speak proper words in your life. You are going to be, I tell the story all the time and so many of our church knew it. You're like a lion raised by a family of poodles. You already are a lion. You just don't know it because you've been raised from the cub up by a poodle. You've got poodle thinking, poodle eating, poodle fears, poodle everything. But you're actually a lion.
And when you get born again, you need to understand something that Jesus is the lion of Judah. And that you and I are joint heirs with Him. As He is, so are we in this world. But it's not your position in Christ that rules you. It is your confession. Your confessions rule your life. Not the devil, not God, not your mama, not your papa, not your upbringing, not the color of your skin, not the language that you speak. It is the words coming out of your mouth that the Bible teaches us have physical power, mental power, spiritual power. And so when you speak words, they dominate the world, spiritual world, physical world, mental world. And it doesn't matter whether it's in heaven or... Words are so incredible. So many Christians today are sincere but weak. And listen, we don't want to be sincere and weak. I don't want to be insincere and strong. I want to be sincere, but I want to be strong in the things of God.
In Psalm 27:1, David is saying, "The Lord is my light and He's my salvation. Whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life, who am I going to be afraid of"? What a stunning confession. He is singing this. He is declaring this. Much of what David wrote was put to poems or was put to songs. And he's getting out there and singing the Lord is the strength of my life. He is my light. What does that mean? When you've got darkness in an area, you don't know how to make decisions. You don't know which decision. You don't know what to say, what to do. He is illuminating your darkness. He is your strength for relationships, strength for health, strength financially. And what kind of strength? Well, the strength of God is stunning and amazing.
So my question to you is who are you? What are you? And what is your mission in life? Because the world is trying to bend you into something. It is trying, and the enemy of our souls is firing fiery darts at your heart. And the shield of faith must snuff it out and the Word of God must come out of your mouth because the Bible says, "Fight"! I don't fight devil. He's a defeated foe. I fight the good fight of faith. I fight to make sure that the words of my mouth are declaring who I am, what I am in my mission in life. In Proverbs 4 the one of the wises men that walked the planet before the cross, is Solomon.
He's talking here and he's saying, "You need to give attention to God's words. You need to keep them in the middle of your heart". Why? Because the enemy's after your heart. God is after your heart. Your heart is the autopilot of your future. When you go from Proverbs 4:18-27, it says put away from you a deceitful mouth. Now, right away we think, "Well, then just speak the truth". No! He is saying stop speaking earthly principles when a Godly principle overrides it. You see, wherever you are, what you are challenges it. Wherever you are, whatever is messing with you. Who you are on the inside rises up against the situation and goes, "This isn't who I am. These are not my rights and privileges that are being portrayed here".
And there's something within you that confronts when you know who you are, what you are, and your mission in life. We've got to begin to do what the Word says and not because, "Well, you know, this confession Leon, I've got trouble with that". Well then, just go do what you want to do but you're going to have what you're going to have. And you're not going to be able to control your own beliefs because speaking is one of the most important parts of the process of faith, a process of who you are, your identity. Romans 8:14 says that we are children of God. From verse 14 all the way to 17, it says that we are His children. We are His heirs. That we are literally joint heirs with Jesus. Whatever Jesus inherited, we are joint heirs. It says here that when we, that we are literally in God's family to such a degree that it says whereby we cry Abba, Father.
Well, what does it mean in our society? That means looking at someone and going, "Dad"! If I go to the airport and there's people that are meeting as they come down off that escalator, and there's family you know, or they're on the hug rug or whatever it is. If someone runs towards a guy going, "Dad"! I know who that person is in their life. And the Bible says that who am I? That my very heart knows dad when I think about God. That word "Father" bring such phenomenal love, such attention. Well, what about what am I? Well, 1 Peter 24 says by whose stripes you were healed. So health and healing and vitality and strength. That's what you have. It's not trying to get. You've already been given it.
The Bible says in Romans 8:2 that you're free from the law of sin and death. There is no addiction. There is no sin that can hang on to the believer who is born again. But you've got to begin to know who you are, what you are, and what your mission is. And when you begin to realize and declare this in your prayer closet every day, I'm telling you where you are in addiction, where you are in sin, whatever is controlling you and shutting you down and destroying your relationships, your health. The Bible teaches us that who you are and what you are begins to confront that and you walk out free. Not just some magical little prayer, what's going on on the inside of you. What am I?
James 4:7 says that when I resist the devil, he flees from me. Now, that's not there for those who don't know Christ. But because I am in Christ, the Bible says I'm submitted to God. I resist the devil and he will flee, run in terror from me. That's what I am. That's what you are. Philippians 4:13, what are you? You can do all things through Christ who strengthens you. Romans 8:37, it says, "No, in everything you are more than a conqueror". Do you know what more than a conqueror is? I'm so tired listening to Christians fight the devil. Oh, I'm fighting the devil in my marriage, and I'm fighting the devil in my health, and I'm fighting the devil over my kids, and I'm fighting the devil over our finances and our career.
Oh, the devil's after us. Nowhere in the new covenant does it tell you that you are fighting the devil. It says he's defeated. And it says you simply resist him. It doesn't say pray to God to resist the devil for you. It says you resist him, and he flees. You and I need to recognize what we are. We are overcomers, born of God, made by God. And on this planet He's designed everything for you to walk in such success, such overcoming power. The problem is that we are sincere in our relationship with God but weak in our identity and what does this all mean. So what is my mission in life, pastor? Well, let's look at a few things.
In John 10:3, it teaches us that we follow Jesus to such an extent that He uses your name. Hey, Leon, this way. Hey, Bert, this way. Hey, Ronda, this way. He literally leads you by name. Every one of us individually He leads you through choices on who you marry, where you work, how to handle things, etcetera. That our mission, follow Jesus. Jesus said in Matthew 16:18, I'm building my church. Well, if Jesus is building His church, and you're following Jesus. Then whether you're in medicine or business or the arts. Whatever you do is to assist Jesus in building His church.
Now, look around you. I'm glad we've got properties and buildings and lands and television stations and radio and all. Yes, but that's not the church. You are the church, and Jesus is building you. And we're using all these things to reach people and to build people up. So what is our mission? We're helping Jesus build His church. And wherever the church is strong, countries are infected, affected, influenced. Wherever the church is strong, that grassroots affects leadership in every area of that city. Every area that is ahead when the church is strong. But when the church is not strong, then leaders can rise up all around you that you don't want. The Bible actually says you get leaders after your own heart. So guard your heart. Declare the Word. Let the church of Jesus Christ rise up in such a way that our hearts and our prayer together changes our nation, our cities. It changes whatever is needed to bring the peace and the blessing that God has given us.
In Matthew 6:33, what's our mission? It says to seek first the kingdom of God. Not seek first your career, not seek first your marriage, not seek first your sex life, not seek first whatever pleasures you've got. Pleasures follow us. At his right hand are pleasures forever more. But we are to seek first His kingdom. How can we help His kingdom advance? How can we help Him reach the hurting and the lost? How can we let this world know that the greatest joy and peace and success is in knowing Jesus. What's our mission in life?
John 15:8-9 says that we are to bear much fruit. We are to get results everywhere. He'll, they look at you and go, "How do you get results in your marriage like that? How do you raise kids and get results like that? How do you have sickness and disease pushing at you and healing and health just keep rising up. How do you get results"? That is for the believer who follows Jesus Christ. 1 John 3:8 says, "For this purpose was the Son of God manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil". So you and I need to know. That yes, everywhere we go, when we see poverty and sickness and disease and anger and jealousy and self-centeredness.
Those all weren't in the garden that God created. But this fallen angel Lucifer, in him when he began to use whatever creative power he was given to create sin and self-centeredness. All of this followed him, wasn't God's original intention. Did you know that when it comes to you and I serving Jesus and declaring our prayer every day. If you want to know how to pray. Get up and take His promises and His Word and declare who you are. Because who you are will begin to push out where you are that is not in that same line. When you begin to declare what you are in Christ, it begins to push off situations. It begins to bring the miraculous into your world when you begin to declare what you are.
When you begin to declare your mission in life and I'm here to rise up and to influence this world for Jesus, to destroy what the enemy has done, to bring results in my life so that people are attracted to the Jesus that I serve. I follow Jesus and He leads me by name, and I know His voice and another I won't follow.
Listen to me, your world changes. My question to you. Do you speak every day who you are? That's the most powerful praying you could do. Do you speak out loud and declare God's Word as to what you are? Do you speak His Word and His promises as to what your mission is in life? If you'll begin, that's what you need to do in your prayer closet. That's what you need to do when it's you and God alone in your car as you begin to find the promises. And today, I've given you a few promises in each category and they overlap. But your words that you speak out of your mouth. They rule your life and they rule your future.
Now, where you are in life today is probably a result of how you were raised and what your parents taught you or schooling or whatever. So, but where you want to be for your future from today and on. Make a decision, that I'm going to rule and reign with Christ. Not when you get to heaven. Right now. It's your words. Your prayer time needs to be. My challenge to you is you got to start. You got to start. You know, when my kids were younger. I can hold them in my arms night times and pray and speak the Word of God over them and see health and life flow into them. As they got older and got into their teens, I began to notice that it was up to them and what they believed about who they were. What they believed about what they are. What they believed about their mission. That I couldn't just use my faith and get whatever I wanted for them.
As you grow and rise up from a child into an adult, if we don't teach and show and model our children what we do in these areas. They won't be able to. I can come along with my kids now and agree with them what they believe. What they believe about what they are. What my kids believe about who they are. What my kids believe about their mission. They're an adult. They need to decide that. I was walking down a really bad street in one of our cities. We're just sharing and reaching out, walked up to this group of five guys and just kind of started talking, and they got up angry and mad and surrounded me right on the sidewalk on the street there. And they said, "This Jesus is your friend. Yeah, right". He started cursing and swearing. He says, "These are friends".
He's pointing the guys that are standing around me in a circle. And he says, "Me and my friends are going to kick the beep, beep, beep, out of you. What's your friend Jesus going to do for you now, huh"? I looked him right in the eye the ringleader and I said, "Interesting". Says the Bible says God's angel will protect me from you. So you got trouble or He's going to give me the ability to take all five of you right now. He looks at me and he pause, and he goes, "What kind of Christian are you"? He was convinced that Christians are weak. That Christians are meek. That Christians are wimpy. That Christians need excuses. And he found and talked to somebody that spoke so differently.
I said, "I'm the real kind of Christian. Can we talk to you about it"? They all sat down on the fence. There's a board fence right there. And I talked to these guys for 45 minutes to an hour about the Jesus that I serve and what He look like according to Revelations 1. And the power, the authority that's invested in Him. That's been given to us. And it was an amazing time. I want you to understand something. You've got some choices to make. You go ahead and keep blaming God, your mom, your church, the color of your skin, your language. Go and blame whatever you want. But according to Jesus Christ the King of kings and the Lord of lords. When you give your life to Him, you're a part of God's family and you are now designed to bring results, designed to win. You are more than a conqueror.
What is more than a conqueror? Well, you know, if you're going to go conquer a country, it's one thing to destroy it and fight. It takes real wisdom to put in power grids and roads and neighborhoods and houses and fresh water and stores and a democracy and system of government. You know, you can push a trigger and bomb the thing down in no time. But to be more than a conqueror. It means not just to win. It means to build the life that you've dreamed of. Whenever I meet Christians who are always fighting. I know they don't understand what it means to be more than a conqueror. They don't understand that you are salt and light. We are wise master builders. We can build communities and homes and marriages and families and careers and nations. We are the ones who should rise up in this area.