Priscilla Shirer - The Importance of Finding Your Identity in Christ
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Summary
Using a personal story about changing her name to «DK» in high school and her mother’s firm reminder of her true identity, the preacher illustrates that only God has the authority to define who we are—not others, not circumstances, not our past or feelings. Drawing from Gideon’s encounter with the angel of the Lord in Judges 6, she shows how God personally meets us in our hiding places to reaffirm our identity as chosen, royal, redeemed children made in His image. The key takeaway is to live in alignment with who God says we are, breaking free from false labels so we can fulfill our destiny and impact generations.
Opening Prayer
Lord Jesus, we, your sons and your daughters, are literally sitting on the edge of our seats in anticipation of what you came to say to us tonight. Father, we are so glad that we are here with each other, but we didn’t really come to see each other; we came to see you. So speak, Father; we are listening. In Jesus' name, Amen.
A Mischievous Teenager and a Name Change
I will tell you that I was a little bit of a mischievous teenager. Among the four of us, I gave my parents a run for their money. I was the one who was always coming up with things to do as a teenager. One of the things I decided to do in my freshman year of high school was change my name. I came up with a little nickname and decided to change my name.
Now, just to give you a little context for that choice, I went along with my three siblings to a little private school around the corner from my parents' house, the house they still live in to this day. Brook Hollow Christian School was the name of the school, and we attended there from kindergarten to eighth grade.
Then, in our freshman year, we transferred to the neighboring public school district. To give you context here, the largest my class ever was in this private school was about 20 kids at its peak; by the time I got to eighth grade, there were about 13 kids in my class. For ninth grade, I transferred to Duncanville High School, which is one of the largest school districts in Texas. It’s more like a college campus than a high school.
The New Identity: DK
When I transferred from 13 students at Brook Hollow Christian School to the freshman year at Duncanville High School, there were 753 kids in my freshman class—not in the entire high school, just my freshman class. It was a completely different context for me, and most of these people did not know me, nor did I know them.
So, I thought this would be a fun opportunity to change my identity entirely. I would change my name and give myself a brand new name. I had heard of a student I met through other acquaintances at another school; her initials were DK, and people called her DK. I thought it was clever, so I adopted this nickname. My new name was DK.
I remember telling my friend from youth group at church—someone I had grown up with in church—she was already in the Duncanville High School district. I remember telling her about my plan; she was the only one who knew about it because I knew she would be the connective tissue between me and most of the new friends I was going to make.
How the Nickname Caught On
I said to her, «Listen, girl, when you introduce me to people at this new school, don’t introduce me as Priscilla; go ahead and introduce me as DK.» She said, «Girl, what?» I said, «Yes, introduce me as DK.»
I remember showing up that very first day of school, walking into this brand-new, huge world, this new campus. I remember her introducing me to people; she would look at me inquisitively to make sure I was still on board with this plan before she began to introduce me, one person after the other, as DK.
I introduced myself to my teachers and my new friends as DK, and to make a long story short, it caught on. For the four years that I was in school there, not one student, not one teacher, not one school administrator, not one principal, not one athletic coach referred to me as anything other than DK. Most people didn’t even really know that my name was Priscilla; everybody called me DK.
In fact, to anyone in that whole season of my life—people, coaches from other schools we competed with—they all called me DK. It was monogrammed on all my athletic uniforms; it was monogrammed on my Letterman’s jacket. Every single person in that season of my life called me DK.
The Day Mom Stepped In
In fact, still to this day, if someone refers to me as DK on social media or yells across the mall, «Hey, DK!» or across the aisles at the grocery store, I automatically know it is somebody who knew me in that season of my life because everybody called me DK.
Now, this didn’t bother my parents too much; they didn’t say anything about it until one day I remember getting sick at school. I had a fever, so they had to call my mom to come pick me up. I remember laying on that little cot behind the curtain they pull in the nurse’s station.
I remember hearing my mom come up to the counter at the nurse’s station. I remember hearing her say, «I’m here for Priscilla.» I also remember the nurse saying, «Who?» I heard them toggle back and forth for just a few moments before they decided she was there for DK/Priscilla. My mom picked me up and took me home.
She didn’t say anything to me for the first evening because I didn’t feel well, nor the next day, nor the next day. She waited until I was 100% before she hemmed me up in the corner with the «Mama I.» Y’all know what I’m talking about when I say the «Mama I.»
Only the Giver of Life Names You
She said, «Now, Priscilla, I want to be clear about something. Neither your father nor I have minded this little nickname business; it has not bothered us at all. We know it’s just been a little high school experiment, no big deal; it’s all in fun. But, ” she said, „I want to be clear about something. Graduation is coming, and when graduation comes, there’s going to be a ceremony. Somebody’s going to have a microphone in their hand; they’re going to say your name, and your name is going to be amplified in that room.“
She said, „Not only that, but they’re going to hand you a piece of paper, and when they hand you that piece of paper, there better not be a D or a K anywhere in sight.“ She said, „Here’s the reason. It doesn’t matter what everybody else calls you; it doesn’t even matter what you call yourself. There’s only one or two people—me and your father—who have the rights and the privilege to give you your name. Only the one who gave you life has the authority to identify you.“
God Alone Has Authority to Name You
I came tonight, flying over from Dallas, Texas, earlier this afternoon because I want to tonight just speak a word of identity over you. I want so much to remind you who you are. I want you to know that it doesn’t matter what other people have called you; it doesn’t even matter what you’ve called yourself. There is only one who has the right and the authority to tell you who you are.
I want you to know that other people aren’t qualified to name you, and circumstances may have made things difficult for you, but they actually aren’t powerful enough to define you. I want you to know that your history may have marked you, but it is not authorized to label you.
I want you to know that what your mama called you and what your daddy did to you may have hurt you, and it may actually take real emotional work and years to come out of the unhealth that it rooted into your life. I understand that, but I want you to know that it does not have the power to shape the totality of who you are called to be.
You Are Who God Says You Are
Listen to me: you are not defined by your past. You are not defined by your behavior. You are not defined by your failures. You are not defined by your struggles. You are not defined by your feelings. You are not defined by your circumstances. You are not defined by the here today, gone tomorrow false ideologies and philosophies of our current culture. You are who God says you are. Point blank, period. That doesn’t change; your Father has given you a name.
Did you know that He has said that you are a chosen race? You’re a royal priesthood. You are a person that has been redeemed, chosen, adopted, and qualified. You are not a mistake. You are not an afterthought. You are not a liability. You have been created in the very image of God.
That means every aspect of your physicality— it means the skin you’re in, it means the hair texture on your head, and it means the structure of your body— every unique aspect of your physicality and my physicality has been made in the very image of God. That means that any person or system that seeks to diminish the value of the uniqueness of who I am is actually anti-God because I am an expression of the creative genius of God.
Your Personality and Weaknesses in God’s Image
Not only that; it not only means that physically you are created in the image of God, but did you know that even your personality is a unique expression of the creative genius of God? You are made and fitted with the uniqueness of your personality and your temperament in the image of God.
You are not introverted by mistake; you are not extroverted by mistake. You are who God created you to be. Even your weaknesses aren’t a liability; they are actually a unique fitting by God, because your weaknesses just become a platform for the strength of God to be displayed through your life.
When we surrender all of who we are— physically and in our personality— when we surrender all we are to God and place faith in His Son, Jesus Christ, and give Him our body and our personality to be used as tools and instruments for His glory, the Holy Spirit of God takes up residence inside of us. We are now becoming temples of the Holy Spirit of God. God’s actual presence lives inside of me.
With this presence in me, I am an overcomer. I’m an overcomer.
The Critical Issue of Identity
This issue of identity is so important because the enemy wants so much to twist and turn your identity— your image of who God has created you to be— because you will either live up to or you will live down to whatever you believe to be true about who you are.
This issue of identity is so critical that it is one of the theological threads we see threaded throughout the pages of Scripture from the beginning to the end. There are some theological principles that relegate themselves to one sliver of the Bible, maybe one book or one Testament, but not identity.
Identity is from the beginning in Genesis all the way to the end, all the way to the maps at the end of the book. You see this issue of identity from the very beginning. We see God call an obscure man named Abram, pluck him up out of an obscure town, and the very first thing He does when He finds this man is change his name.
God’s Name Change for Abraham
He changes his name from Abram to Abraham, and after He changes his name, He changes the GPS coordinates on his destiny. That’s what happens when God changes your name. He changes where you’re headed; He changes where you’re going to end up.
He changes Abraham’s name and says, „Abraham, I am now going to create out of you a brand new group of people. They will be mine, and I will be theirs. I will set them apart; they will now not be who they used to be. They will bear My name. My provision and My promises and My blessing will be their staple. They will be Mine, and I will be theirs if only they will choose to align themselves with their new identity.
If only they’ll sink in alignment with their new identity. If only they’ll behave in alignment with their new identity— not how they feel, not according to their circumstances, not what other people are saying about them. But if they will just act like who I’m calling them is who they really are, they will see My blessings explode in their lives.“
Israel’s Struggle with Identity
But the children of Israel in the Old Testament are exactly like us. If you read throughout the Old Testament, you see that over and over again they’re seduced by the idols of the culture. Over and over again, we see the children of Israel running in fear from foreign enemies.
Over and over again, we see that they keep forgetting who they are. They don’t live up to the standard of who God calls them to be. They keep bending, bowing, settling, and living below the standard that they were called for— that they were freed from 400 years of slavery to receive the blessings of God. They don’t get to enjoy them.
We literally find in the two verses that I’m going to read to you in just a second that the children of Israel are actually in the land of milk and honey. They are on the real estate of Canaan and can’t enjoy the blessings. They’re in the place where God’s blessings are supposed to abound, but they can’t enjoy them simply because they didn’t get this identity issue straight.
The Enemy’s Attack on Identity Today
We live in a day and age where, if you haven’t noticed, the enemy is running rampant with this issue of identity. We can tell this because everything is being redefined. The things that God has already given definitions to— everybody’s trying to redefine. But you are who God says you are. You are who He has created you to be.
Everything for the children of Israel, and everything for you, can completely change when God meets with one person and reworks their view of their identity. It’s the hinge that changes the course of a life.
Gideon’s Encounter in Judges 6
So in Judges chapter 6, if you have your Bible and you want to turn with me, you can, or it’ll be on the screens. Judges chapter 6, I just want to read two verses, because these two verses have been messing with me recently.
In these two verses, we find God showing up and meeting with one person. Do you know that I believe the reason why you’re in this room tonight is because He intended to meet you? You’re the one person. In other words, He came to just meet with you. If He can shift your perspective of who you are, if He can make you start lining up your thinking, your perspective, and your behavior to match up with who He has called you to be, it’s going to change the course of your whole life.
Judges chapter 6: let me just tell you before I read these two verses, the children of Israel have opened themselves up to enemy attack because of this identity issue because they’re not living in alignment with the truth. The enemy has kept coming for them over and over again.
Israel Hiding in Caves
The Midianites have ravaged them so severely for seven consecutive years that they can’t even enjoy their communities anymore in Canaan. They are running in fear; they have left their homes and now live in the caves on the sides of mountains, because they are running in fear from the enemy over this issue of identity.
In the midst of a culture and a country that is suffering because of this misplaced identity, Judges chapter 6, verse 11 and 12 says this: „Then the angel of the Lord came and sat down under an oak tree that was in Ophrah, which belonged to Joash the Abiezrite. His son Gideon was beating out wheat in a winepress in order to save it from the Midianites.“ Verse 12 says, „The angel of the Lord appeared to him and said, ‘The Lord is with you, O valiant warrior.’“
These are the two verses that are the hinge in Gideon’s story. We know Gideon; he’s the guy that set the fleece out before the Lord just to make sure that the Lord knew what He was talking about, right? You remember Gideon because he’s the one that went into battle with 300 soldiers as the underdog and won victory against 140,000 Midianite enemies.
The Angel of the Lord Appears
He is the guy where we know the highlights of his story, but oftentimes we jump over these two verses. These two verses are the hinge that shift everything.
Please don’t let the very first line of these two verses roll off your shoulders as if they’re no big deal. The angel of the Lord came and sat down with Gideon underneath the shade of this oak tree. The angel of the Lord came.
Scholars say that this was the great presence of Israelite history. In the original Hebrew language, this is translated from „Malak Yahweh“ is the phrase, „the Malak Yahweh.“ You recognize, in other words, this ain’t no regular angel. This is the presence of Almighty God stepping out of the heavens and interjecting Himself onto the landscape of planet Earth.
This is God Himself determining that the situation is so dire, that it is so deeply in need of His presence, that there is one individual that is important enough and significant enough to change the trajectory not only of their lives but the lives of everybody who is around them. He says, „I’m gonna come out of the heavens and take care of this myself.“
God Comes for You Personally
The angel of the Lord came to meet with one person who needed a shift in their identity. I can’t get over the fact that God keeps coming for me like that. I can’t get over the fact that the angel of the Lord loves me that much that He would keep coming for me and pursuing me and making sure He shows up to speak to me when I most need it.
I want you to know that you are never lost in the crowd. No matter how big this gathering becomes, no matter how big the church ever gets, you need to know that you are never lost in the sight of God. Your friend might not notice, and your spouse might not notice; your employer might not know, and your coworker might not be aware of what’s happening around you. But you need to know the angel of the Lord has His eyes on you. He knows exactly what’s happening in your life and in your circumstances.
So, the angel of the Lord comes. He steps out of heaven. Never should it roll off our shoulders casually that the God of the universe— I’m talking about the God who held the sun up in its place all day long and made sure that it did not move.
The God Who Controls the Universe Sees You
He is the one who made sure that the earth spun on its axis at just the right speed today so that you and I could sustain life here. He’s the one who made sure it rotated at just the right pace to make sure that at the right moment the sunlight was swapped for the light of the moon on us today.
He is the one who is gonna hang every single star in its place tonight. He will not only know their number; He will know them all by name. He is the one who is controlling the throes of the universe— I’m talking about the galaxies of the universe that the scientists have not even yet discovered. Our great God is controlling the throes of the universe, and even while He’s taking care of all of that, He is stopping in this room tonight to come in here and see about you.
It should never roll off our shoulders casually. He loves us that much that He keeps coming for us. Did you know that’s the story of the whole Bible? Did you know that in every single book of the Bible that’s the story that He’s trying to get across to you?
God Keeps Coming Throughout Scripture
He’s trying to show you how in Genesis He came for you, and then in Exodus He came for you, and Leviticus, He came for you, in Numbers, in Deuteronomy, Joshua, and Judges, He keeps trying to figure out ways to come to get you until the Old Testament closes.
For 400 years it’s silent, and it seems like there is no hope. It seems like the enemy has won, and He will not come until the New Testament opens and Matthew says that God Himself put on skin. Basically, He said, „I’m gonna come down here and take care of this myself.“ He loved you that much; He keeps moving heaven and earth to come after you.
In the Old Testament, we keep seeing the Malak show up; it’s called the theophany. It is a God appearance in the Old Testament. It’s the pre-incarnate Jesus Christ stepping out of the heavens and into time and history.
We see the Malak show up, and most of the time when He shows up in the Old Testament, He is coming to an individual that needs to be reminded about their identity. Most of the time, when the Malak finds it critical enough to show up, it’s because there’s a person who forgets who they are.
The Malak Meets Hagar and Moses
It’s important to Him that you remember who you are enough that He would wrap a whole 30-minute message around the topic tonight, so that when you leave, when I leave this place tonight, we are not the same people that we came in here as.
The Malak keeps showing up. He shows up in the book of Genesis for a lady named Hagar, who was discarded and misused and abused by the people who were supposed to cover her and protect her and love her. They discard her, and she sits out in a dusty wilderness feeling forsaken, forgotten, and unknown.
Right there in the middle of her loneliness and isolation, the Malak finds Hagar and reminds her who she is. Oh, Hagar, if you’re in the room tonight, because the people you were supposed to be able to trust betrayed you, the people who were supposed to love you, the person that walked down the aisle and said „I do“ to you and promised a lifetime to you, and yet they have betrayed you and turned their backs on you, you need to know that in this wilderness where you are sitting feeling alone and forgotten, the Malak will come and find you in that wilderness.
But He doesn’t just show up for Hagar; He shows up for men like Moses. He shows up for Moses when he’s out in the dry, dusty desert tending sheep— a job that is below his pay grade and below his educational level.
God Meets Us in Our Consequences
He was raised as the Prince of Egypt; this is not the job he anticipated having to deal with. But for 40 long years, he is in this dry, dusty, barren situation, and by the way, he’s there as a result of the consequences of his own actions.
I wonder if there’s anybody in the room sitting in some dry, dusty, barren circumstances, but honestly, when you look back on it, you realize that you did it to yourself. I wonder if there’s ever been a time in your life when you’ve been sitting right smack dab in the middle of some consequences, and honestly, you can’t blame anybody because when you look back on it, you realize it was a decision you knew you shouldn’t have made.
I don’t know about y’all; maybe this doesn’t happen in Miami, but listen, there are whole seasons of my life I look back on and I don’t even recognize that person back there. Can I get one witness in the house today? There are whole seasons of my life I look back on and I cannot believe the decisions I made.
I can’t believe the relationships I allowed. I can’t believe the paths that I walked down. I can’t believe the influences that I let into my sphere and into my space. When I look back on it, all I can be is grateful for the delivering power of Almighty God. So, maybe you are sitting right smack dab in the middle of the consequences of your own doing.
The Malak in the Fire and Beyond
I’ve got good news for you: Moses’ bush is burning in deserts like that, and when this bush burns, I want to tell you— this ain’t no regular fire. This is the Malak showing up to remind you who you are.
But Hagar, He doesn’t just show up for you and Moses. He doesn’t just show up for you; He also shows up for you if you’re the Hebrew boys standing in the middle of fire. I mean, there are trials all around you; life is just hot right now. Once you get through one thing, there’s another thing, and once you get through this thing, there’s another thing— life just feels like a fiery furnace.
The Hebrew boys can testify to the fact that sometimes when you’re in the fire, He doesn’t take you out of it— the Malak just meets you in it so that you’ll know what it feels like to have the presence of God covering you so comprehensively and completely that you can emerge from a season of life that’s just like a furnace and not even have the smell of smoke on you. That’s the protective care of the Malak.
This is what God does: He protects, and He keeps, and He keeps on showing up reminding us who we are. Even when we’re in the consequences of our own sin, even when we’ve been abused and misused by other people, even when we’re in the midst of trials and circumstances in our life, He keeps on coming.
Contrast with Distant Gods
He keeps on coming because you mean that much to Him. He cares that deeply about you.
I remember watching The Today Show several years ago when Campbell Brown was the main reporter. The boys were little; I have three sons. They were little, and I remember sitting on the edge of the bed folding a load of laundry and watching The Today Show.
Every day that week, Campbell Brown was doing a report on the religions of the world. Every day was a different religion. That day that I caught it, they were doing a story on the Buddhist faith, and I remember I didn’t know much about Buddhism, so I thought I’d watch for a little while.
They had traveled halfway across the world, she and her camera crew, so that they could not only travel halfway across the world, but then ride down a winding road for hours to get to the side of a mountain where they climbed up 268 stairs so that she and the camera crew could be beside one of the five Buddha statues that stand in and around the area.
She did the story from there; we could see the statue behind her as she described the Buddhist faith. There are many layers of thought that I had while she was discussing Buddhism, but one of the things that she said I can’t forget: she said that people who subscribe to that faith aspire at least one time in their life to save up enough money to be able to travel halfway across the world so that they can drive for hours down this winding road, climb up 268 stairs so that at least one time in their life they can pray to their little God.
Our God Comes Down to Us
So, I’m watching this, and I’m thinking to myself, if I had to save up all that money and fly halfway across the world, and drive down that winding road for hours and climb up 268 stairs to pray, I would never pray! Can I get one witness in the house today? Ain’t nobody got time for that!
But while they are climbing up to talk to their little God, our God, the one true God— He comes down to talk to us. Oh, it’s good news. It’s the message of the Gospel, amen? I can’t get over the fact He keeps on coming down. I can’t get over the fact He keeps on condescending for me, and He loves me that much that He would keep coming for me.
So, He keeps on coming, and He keeps on coming. He doesn’t just come for a moment. Judges chapter 6, verse 11 says the angel of the Lord came and sat down, meaning He nestled Himself underneath the shade of the same tree that Gideon was under.
God Moves into the Neighborhood
The Midianites are right outside his window, and the angel of the Lord didn’t just come and give a little wink and a nod and go on about His day. No— He came and made Himself at home in the situation with Gideon.
This is what the New Testament writer John would say in John chapter 1, verse 14: „The Word became flesh and He dwelt among us.“ I want you to hear the shock in John’s voice: the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we got to behold the glory of God the Father.
John, y’all, couldn’t believe he got to lay his eyes on the Holy One. Eugene Peterson of the Message Bible would put that same verse this way: „The Word became flesh and moved into the neighborhood.“
This is the beautiful thing about our God: He keeps putting on flesh and moving into the neighborhood. That means He is fully engaged and aware of what’s going on in your marriage. He knows what’s going on in the recesses of your heart.
I want you to know He knows the details of your financial dilemma. I want you to know that He is fully aware.
God Is Immersed in Your Details
He doesn’t just sit on high and look down low and give a wink and a nod; He’s all up in the business of what’s going on in your relationship. I want you to know He is fully aware of what’s going on between you and your mom or you and your dad.
He’s fully aware of what’s happening in that pool of friends where you’re having a little betrayal and strife. He is fully aware of what’s happening in your ministry, on your job. He knows what’s up with your teenager or your young adult daughter.
You need to know that your God sees you, and He’s fully immersed and engaged with the details of what’s going on in your life. I want you to know there’s not one tear you are crying that is getting lost in the carpet fibers of your bedroom floor. Every single one of those tears is being captured in the palm of Almighty God.
He sees you, and His eyes are on you. There is not one night that you are spending awake wrestling over what you’re gonna do with that issue. The hours you’re spending awake and your spouse is asleep— they don’t even know how your heart is in turmoil and how you can’t sleep at night because of that issue you’re facing. You need to know that your spouse might not know, but God sees.
God Present Even When Unnoticed
He comes and He sits down under the shade of that oak tree. He is immersed and engaged with Gideon. I want to make sure you’re aware of the fact that verse 11 says He came; verse 12 says He appeared to Gideon.
In verse 11, He’s there but Gideon doesn’t know it. It’s not until verse 12 that there is some sort of supernatural unveiling of the eyes of Gideon so that he becomes aware of the presence of God near.
We don’t know if 20 minutes passed or whether it was 48 hours. We don’t know how long, but there is a lapse in time here where Gideon is completely unaware of the presence of God there. But that does not make God any less there— just because he’s not aware of it.
God is fully immersed underneath the shade in the shadow of that difficult situation and circumstance, and He is studying Gideon even though Gideon is unaware of His presence.
That means He sees the lines of worry and frustration on Gideon’s forehead. He’s fully aware of the fear and the skittishness that Gideon would have had while he hides out from the Midianites.
Gideon Hiding in the Winepress
He is fully aware of everything that is happening as He watches Gideon go over and over again about the threshing of the wheat— the mundane, tedious job that Gideon would have been engaged in. He’s fully aware of all those details even though Gideon is unaware of His presence.
That means that it is possible, and it is so, that God is near and hovering and presiding and aware of everything that is happening in your life even when you’re unaware of Him. When you cannot trace His hand, trust His heart— He’s there. He’s there.
Can I just tell you that threshing wheat was usually an open-air activity? Threshing floors were on the top of hillsides. The reason why they were on the top of hillsides is because that’s where the wind blows.
The goal of threshing wheat, of beating the wheat, was to dislodge the nutrientless chaff from the wheat. When they were in an open-air setting, when the chaff was dislodged, the wind would drive the chaff away. You’ve read that poetic phrase all throughout the Old Testament: the wind driving the chaff away.
That’s why threshing would normally take place in an open-air setting on the top of a hill. But where we see Gideon here in verses 11 and 12 is not in an open-air setting; he’s in a winepress.
A winepress was the opposite of where a threshing floor would be. It was usually in a deep concave depression at the base of a rock. So, he is in a place of hiding.
God Finds Us in Our Hiding
The reason why is because if the wind carries the chaff away, the scent of it might reach the Midianites. If the Midianites became aware that there was another harvest, they would come back to pillage the Israelites again.
So, when we meet Gideon in these two verses, y’all, he is hiding. He is afraid. He is trying to keep his harvest from being discovered. When we see Gideon in this passage, he’s trying not to be found.
And in the place where he’s trying not to be found, the angel of the Lord finds him. Let me tell you why this is good news. This is good news for any of you who have family members or loved ones or children, and they’re trying not to be found.
They have dug their heels into the ground; they refuse to respond to the gospel of Jesus Christ no matter how much you share with them no matter how much you pray and ask the Lord. It seems like they are on the run from God and that they will never be found.
I want you to know there is a Hound of heaven that will find them wherever they are. There ain’t no hiding from the Almighty God. He will find you. He sees you. Even when you have turned your back on Him, He still does not turn His back on you. Isaiah 65 says, „I allowed myself to be found by people who weren’t even looking for me.“
Open the Eyes of Our Hearts
Hello, I wonder if we had listened. I think if I took this microphone and we just started right here on this very front row and went all the way around this entire room, we would be here well into 2020 giving testimony of the people who were found when they weren’t even looking for a relationship with God.
So, finally, Gideon’s eyes are open. He becomes aware. He becomes aware that God is near. This is one of the consistent prayers in my life: „Open up my eyes.“ It’s what the Apostle Paul prayed in Ephesians chapter one.
„I’m praying that the eyes of your heart would be opened so that you would know some stuff you can’t know unless He opens up your eyes— so that you would know what is the hope of His calling and choosing you, so that you would know what are the riches of the glory of the inheritance of the saints that has been dispensed upon you, sons and daughters, so that you would come to a full awareness of the presence of God.“
I don’t know if there’s ever been a greater thrill in my life— if you’ve experienced it, you’ll know what I’m talking about— than when your eyes are opened and you start detecting the fingerprints of God in your circumstances.
Seeing God’s Fingerprints
Sometimes it’s the gift of hindsight; it’s when you get to a certain stage and you look back and go, „Oh, God was all up in that right there. God was— He was doing all that.“ It’s when you recognize that what somebody else is calling coincidence is actually the sovereign hand of God working stuff out in your favor.
It’s a thrill, right, when you look back and you see God’s fingerprints and His footprints and you realize that it wasn’t happenstance that you just happened to be there at the right time to meet the right person to be in position for that place. It just so happened that it all was put together; it wasn’t the stars that aligned in your favor— it was the Maker of the stars orchestrating the details of your life. The sovereignty of God at work, it’s the manifest presence of God.
I appreciate His omnipresence; I’m grateful for His omnipresence. Omnipresence means that God is everywhere at once. Omnipresence means that when I get on a plane and fly back to Dallas, God ain’t just going with me. He won’t still be here with y’all. That’s omnipresence.
Omnipresence means He’s just as much in my house as He is at Jo’s house. That’s omnipresence. And while I’m grateful for His omnipresence, what I’m after is His manifest presence. I don’t want to just know He’s there in theory; I want to see Him at work.
Craving Manifest Presence
Oh, churchgoer, aren’t you just tired of hearing about what He did in the Old Testament? Aren’t you tired of hearing about how He raised Lazarus from the dead in the New Testament and caused the walls of Jericho to come tumbling down in the Old Testament? Aren’t you grateful for the testimony, but doesn’t it whet your appetite to want to see it for yourself?
When our church was smaller— Mary and Martha have both been to our church; they can attest to the fact that it is a large church like your church is— when it was smaller, we used to have testimony service. I don’t know if any of you have ever gone to the kind of church where they have old-school testimony service.
I’m talking about where the mother of the church comes up to tell you what the Lord has done for her. When I say the mother of the church, some of you don’t know what I mean! I mean back in the day when they would not dare dream of wearing skinny jeans into the house of God. There would never be tennis shoes in the house of the Living God!
The mother of the church would come in, and she would come in with a suit. I’m talking about a whole suit where the skirt actually came with the jacket— she bought them together; it was a whole suit, right? And she didn’t just have the jacket, she didn’t just have the skirt; she had the shoes that matched the skirt that matched the jacket— probably in patent leather!
Old-School Testimony Service
And then she wore pantyhose because she wouldn’t dare not wear pantyhose in the house of God. You could hear them when your mother walked down the hall! And then she would not only have the clutch that would match the jacket that would match the skirt that would match the shoes, but no church mother outfit was complete without the— oh yeah, y’all went to the same kind of church I went to! But it was never ever ever just a regular hat! There was always some sort of situation that was on the hat. I mean, it was something on the hat!
I remember that she would come up to the front; she would grab the microphone and say, „First, giving honor to God who is the head of my life.“ She would go through all the details, and then she would give a testimony of what the Lord had done on her behalf.
I remember sitting on the front row piano side, and I remember watching the feather. And y’all, I would ask— just honestly, at 10 years old, I remember thinking, „Man, if that thing would fly off, we’ll have a real good service today!“ But I would listen to the testimonies of what God had done, and I remember— I was so old I was— but I remember there being a switch where I listened to the testimony and I still celebrated, but really, it wet my appetite.
It was now the testimonies were like divine antagonists stirring up my soul. I wanted to hear the voice of God like that. I wanted to experience God like that. If He was still doing that kind of stuff, I wanted to know what it was like to not just celebrate Him in other people’s lives, but expect that He could move in my life as well.
God Reminds Gideon Who He Is
At a gathering like this one where you are for these few days, this is the kind of setting where every now and then what He does is just use it to stir up your soul to mess with you so that you’re just not satisfied with being a Christian in name only— just coming to church, just reading a verse a day to keep the devil away. That’s not your goal anymore. Now you want to hear from God. You want to see God, you want to experience God.
And let me tell you something, once you start to experience God, you are ruined for church as usual. It ruins you because what you’re after is what Gideon had an opportunity for: your eyes to be opened and for you to see what you’ve been reading about your whole life.
So once Gideon’s eyes are opened, God says two things. He says, „Let me tell you who I am and let me tell you who you are.“ He says, „Gideon, brother, sister, that’s why I came tonight. I came to tell you two things: this is who I am, and this is who you are.
I know the Midianites are right outside your window. I know your marriage is in trouble. I know the bank account’s low. I know the struggle on your job is hard. I know the ministry is faltering. I know you’re struggling in your parenting. I know you’ve got unrest in your heart and mind. I know things are tough right now, but even with those Midianites right outside your window, I came to remind you that I am who I said I am, and I can still do everything that I said I can do.“
You Are a Valiant Warrior
He looks at Gideon in the midst of the turmoil while he’s currently hiding out in fear and trembling, and He says, „The Lord is with you just like I said I always would be.“ We know that Gideon didn’t believe him because he spends the next verse disputing what it is that God said.
He says, „If the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us?“ In other words, he doesn’t believe him. But God says, „Your beliefs don’t shift the truth. The way you feel doesn’t change who I am. Your circumstances don’t determine whether or not they do not govern who I am. I am still seated on the throne; I am still God. I still made the covenant, and I will still follow through.“
So God comes and tells him the word. He says, „This does not change even with your circumstances.“ „Gideon, I still am who I said I am.“ But He said, „I didn’t just come, Gideon, to tell you who I am. I came to tell you the truth about who you are.“
Remember, Gideon is currently operating in fear and insecurity, and He speaks to a person who is currently behaving in a way that is out of alignment with the truth. He comes to him in the midst of that lapse in behavior and integrity and says to him, „Even though I see you operating in a way that is totally incongruent with My truth, I have come to remind you who you are.
You are not your behavior; you are not your feelings. Your circumstances do not dictate and change the intrinsic value of who you are as a son or daughter of the Most High God. I have come to remind you that you are still who I said you are, and you can still do everything I said you can do, Gideon. Even right now while you’re operating in fear and insecurity, I came to tell you that you are a mighty, valiant warrior.“
Align Your Life with God’s Truth
And if, Gideon, I can get you to come up out from underneath these shadows, if I can get you to start acting and behaving and thinking in a way that is congruent with the truth, it’s gonna change the course of your life.
Gideon, you have no way of knowing that in the year 2019 there are gonna be a bunch of people gathered in Miami that will be reading Judges chapter 6 and chapter 7. Gideon, you could never know that there would be chapters of the Bible— the very word of God— that are gonna be written about you.
You have no way of knowing, Gideon, that if you will come out from underneath these shadows and stop operating according to the way you feel, stop operating in accordance with your circumstances, stop letting the enemy dictate the way you behave, you don’t even know, Gideon, you’re about to come out from the shadows of this tree, and you’re going to go straight to your house!
That’s what Judges 6 says. You’re gonna go to your house and you’re gonna break the idols that are indicative of your entire family line. For years, y’all have been worshipping idols, but you’re gonna break the curse of idolatry over your home if you believe what I’ve declared to be true about you.
Do you understand that your whole family is dependent on you? Do you understand that your sons and your daughters, your grandsons and your granddaughters, and our great-grandchildren that we may never actually lay eyes on— do you realize that they are counting on you rising up and being who God has called you to be?
Breaking Generational Curses
Do you know that there are whole generational curses that can be broken if you get a handle on your identity? But not just that, Gideon. You have no way of knowing that not only is there a Judges chapter 6, but Gideon, there’s gonna be a Judges chapter 7!
Because you’re gonna roll up out of your house and you can go straight into battle against the Midianites, and with 300 soldiers as the underdog against 140,000 Midianite enemies, you are gonna win a battle for the entire nation. A whole nation is going to be changed because one man gets a handle on his identity.
Do you know what would happen if the men and women of God in this house today get a handle on who they are? Do you realize how the entire nation will be transformed when God’s people just recognize who they are?
The enemy doesn’t want you to know who you are. Oh, he’s just trying to get you to believe that you are the way you feel, that you are the way you behaved, that you are your past, that you are your circumstances, that you are what other people have called you, or that you are what you have even labeled yourself.
As long as you won’t rise up and be who God has called you to be, you are not a threat to the kingdom of darkness. But once the sons and daughters start stepping into the truth of „I am who God said I am; I can do what God says I can do; I will behave in alignment with the truth of God, ” then everything begins to shift and everything begins to change.
Gideon’s Legacy in Hebrews
The enemy is counting on you not getting this message tonight because he knows if we roll up out of here and do right, our whole family line will be changed in Jesus’ name. He knows that not only will our whole family line be changed, but he knows there’s an entire nation that will be completely transformed once the people of God discover who they are.
And Gideon, you don’t even know that there’s a New Testament coming. Gideon, you have no way of knowing that in the New Testament there will be a book called Hebrews. Gideon, you can’t even recognize the fact that there’s going to be a great hall of faith in the book of Hebrews and that the writer is gonna need a way to close the chapter.
You cannot even imagine, Gideon, that when the writer is sitting back trying to figure out how do I close the Great Hall of Faith, that the writer is going to conclude the chapter by saying, „I don’t even have time to tell you everything about Gideon.“
He’s gonna say that this is a man who by faith conquered kingdoms, performed acts of righteousness, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions, quenched the power of fire, and escaped the edge of the sword. From weakness, he was made strong; he became a mighty man of war and put foreign armies to flight simply because he got a hold of who he really was.
Reminding You Who You Are in Christ
So, if you don’t mind, as the band comes, I thought there would be no better way to close tonight than by simply reminding you who you are.
You are a child of God; you have peace with God; the Holy Spirit lives on the inside of you; you have access to God’s wisdom; you are reconciled to God; you are not condemned by God; you have been justified; you have Christ’s righteousness; you are Christ’s ambassador; you are completely forgiven and you are tenderly loved; you are a sweet fragrance of Christ to God; you are a temple in which God dwells; you are blameless and you are beyond reproach; you are the salt of the earth; you are the light of the world; you are chosen by Christ to bear fruit; you are a joint heir with Christ; you share in His inheritance with Him; you are united to the Lord, one spirit with Him; you are a member of the body of Christ; you are a saint; you are hidden with Christ in God.
You are chosen by God; you are a child of light; you are holy and you share in God’s heavenly calling; you are sanctified; you are one of God’s living stones being built up in Christ as a spiritual house; you are a member of a chosen race; you are a royal priesthood; you are a holy nation; you are a people for God’s own possession created to sing the praises of God; you are firmly rooted and built up in Christ; you are born of God, and even the evil one cannot touch you; you have the mind of Christ; you can approach God with boldness, freedom, and confidence; you have been rescued from Satan’s domain and you have been transferred into the kingdom of Christ; you have been made complete in Christ; you have not been given a spirit of fear, but of power.
Oh, your needs, they’re met by God; you are royalty in God’s kingdom; you have been bought with a price, and you belong to God; you have been adopted as God’s child; you have direct access to God through the Holy Spirit; you can be assured that all things work together for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purposes; you are free— somebody needs to hear that today. You are free from any condemning charges that are against you; nothing, and I do mean nothing, can separate you from the love of God in Christ Jesus.
You have been established, anointed, and sealed by God; you can be confident in this very thing that the good work God has started in you, He will be faithful to bring it all the way to completion; you are a personal witness of Christ; you are a citizen of heaven; you are God’s co-worker; you are seated with Christ in heavenly places; you are God’s workmanship; and you can do all things through Christ, amen?
Invitation to Align with Your Identity
If you are in this room and you have not been living in alignment with the truth, you know you have been living in a way that is congruent with the way you feel or with what you’ve been told or the lies the enemy has been feeding you— you are like Gideon, operating in fear and insecurity instead of in alignment with who God has called you to be.
If you want to break free from that misshapen identity today and leave this room with your identity in Christ intact so you can change the course of your life— if you know this word was for you, don’t even think twice— just run forward. I cannot wait to pray with you that today will be the day of the rest of your life. Come on!
Closing Prayer and Exhortation
Not against me, I am who you say I am. I am chosen. I am a mannequin. I am, I am, you are, I am.
Lord, I pray over my brothers and sisters right now in Jesus’ name. I pray, Father, against every scheme of the enemy to deceive, every scheme of the enemy to distract, every scheme of the enemy to discourage. I pray right now in the matchless name of Jesus Christ that You would stave off every scheme of the enemy, Lord. I pray that these believers would be fitted with the mind of Christ. I pray a helmet of salvation over their heads in Jesus’ name, so that it would block out the schemes of the enemy.
Lord, if there’s any scheme, any battle, any curse of the enemy, I pray that it would be destroyed right now in Jesus’ name by His blood that has been shed on Calvary. Father, I pray for supernatural courage by the Holy Spirit that beginning today she and he will be able to walk in alignment with Your truth.
We say no more to the enemy’s attacks against us, Lord. No more to being played for the fool. No more to being taken advantage of. We are walking in freedom and wholeness and health starting right now in Jesus’ name!
Right now in Jesus’ name, Lord, I lift discouragement off their lives in Jesus’ name. Would You blanket them with courage in Jesus’ name? A holy boldness in Jesus’ name to walk in authority. You are who God says you are. You are chosen. You are free. Walk in freedom. You are victorious; walk in victory. You are His, God’s child. He will empower you by His Spirit.
So, Father, I pray right now in Jesus’ name that Your Spirit would rise up in Your people, Father. Make it so that they cannot live in a way that is incongruent with the truth anymore. I’m saying make them so uncomfortable— make it so uneasy for us to not live in alignment with You that we just can’t do it no more, Lord. Disrupt our sleep at night. Make it uneasy for us to not honor You with our lives, Father.
For everyone that is walking with shackles on their lives in some area, I pray right now in Jesus’ name You loosen those shackles off their lives, Father. I pray for freedom in Jesus’ name!
Lord, I pray You would take the taste for the drug out of somebody’s mouth, take the taste for the alcohol out of somebody’s mouth, take the desire for the immoral relationship out of somebody’s mouth. Let it be known in Jesus’ name. Change their desire, Lord. Heal a marriage right now in Jesus’ name as they unify underneath the umbrella of who You’ve called them to be. Do it today in Jesus’ name.
Father, I speak victory over Your sons and daughters; victory in Jesus’ name. We give ourselves to You, Lord. We honor You in this moment. We thank You in advance for what You’re gonna do, for how You’re gonna free us and set us free and change our life and wipe the tears from our eyes. He’s got your back; He has got your back. He is on your side.
Look at me, look at me: this is what you do now, this is what you do. Are you ready? Before you make that choice again, you pause. The Holy Spirit’s gonna give you a holy pause before you make that decision again— there’s gonna be a holy pause where for just a second, you can take a breath and ask yourself, „Is this decision in alignment with who God says I am or not?“
If you find that you’re about to do the thing you always do and you see that it’s from a place of insecurity or fear— or lack, something that does not line up with truth— then that’s the moment where you say, „Lord, by Your Spirit, restrain me from doing what I always do and help me to live differently.“
Then, whether you feel it or not, you start acting like who God says you are. „I’m not gonna tweet that; I’m not gonna Instagram that; I’m not gonna say yes to that relationship; I’m not gonna go on this date. I’m not gonna do this person this way; I’m not gonna respond this way; I’m not gonna react this way. I’m not gonna go down the same way because I’m not who I used to be. I am now who God has called me to be.“ In Jesus' name!