TD Jakes - I've Got The Hook Up
And so there is this war going on and it is a war so brutal that Paul writes him, at one point in his letter, he says, who hath bewitched you? What kind of spell did they put on you that you forgot your God, that you're so easily turned away from the faith? I'm concerned today because we're living in a world today, and I think it starts at the pulpit. The preachers are more concerned about making you shout, than teaching you truth. And consequently, because you don't get a steady diet of the Word of God, you just shout off of anything. Anybody can say anything, it sounds good, you go with it, but you need to be built on the Word, on a solid foundation. You need to know in whom you have belief, because the enemy is gonna try your life and you need something solid.
If Jesus quoted scriptures, you know you need to quote scriptures when you're up under attack, you need to be built on the Word of God. Say amen, somebody. Oh I got something for you today, we're gonna have a time this morning. We're gonna have a good time this morning. See, the struggle is with the Mosaic Laws, because you must understand that the children of Israel found their identity up under Mosaic Law. That was when they came out of 430 years of captivity in Egypt, actually 400 years of captivity, 30 were good years, and then 400 years they were enslaved. They lost a sense of who they were, slavery had demoralized them, slavery had anesthetized them to who God was in their life. They had adopted the culture of the heathens and God sends Moses down there to say, let my people go, so that they might find themselves, and they found their identity as God got them away from the heathens.
See, you have to be willing to get away from certain types of people in order to find out who you are, because the influence of certain types of people will make you lose your identity. It's not that you're a weak person, I don't care how strong you are, if you get around the wrong crowd, you'll lose sight of who you are. He got them off to themselves, and he began to teach them again, and he gave them the Ten Commandments and he gave them the ordinances and he gave them the sacraments, and it established them as a people in the earth. That's what he did, so that they will begin to understand who they were.
Now, the reason that God did that was that he might have a representation of himself in the earth, but his long term strategy has never been for one group or race or color or country or culture to have a franchise on him. They didn't get that. It has never been God's plan for one group or culture or class or color or group of people to have a franchise on him, on the expense of other people. God has always had a strategy that opened up for all mankind to come... for God so loved the... oh, yeah. Not just your community, not just your voting party, not just your ethnicity, not just your crowd, not just your generation, not just your age group, not just your sociological, economical group, God so loved the poor folks, the rich folks, the black folks, the white folks, the brown folks. He loved, God so loved the world.
So anybody coming to you, demonizing another group of people as if all of the glory rests on you and none on them, you always know that's not of God, you always know, even if it's in your favor, even if it's in your favor, you still know it's not of God. You know that this is a theology rooted in bitterness, contaminated by culture. Are you hearing what I'm saying? See, the law made them a people but it failed to really redeem them. You must understand, the law was what Paul later would say was weak through the flesh. In fact, it says, by the law shall no flesh be justified. The law is designed that if you are... let me... where are my... get me my little cartons. Not that one, give me the other ones. Yeah, y'all wasn't ready, but God bless you, you're gonna make a quick recovery. Thank you Jesus.
I'm older than all of them and they can't keep up with me. I need three people, just three. Come on, sis with your hand up, come on, brother, I'll take you, and you right here, the three, y'all perfect. Y'all just perfect. Glory to God, glory to God. And I'm gonna give you one of these and I'm going to give you one of these, don't be slow, baby, come on, get up here, I got to preach, and I'm gonna give you one of these. Now what you got? You got a carton of eggs and what does it say on it? It says how many... a dozen, one dozen eggs. All of them say one do... that says one, yours say one dozen, yours says one dozen. That's the law, that's the standard, one dozen, now, if I remember correctly, one dozen is 12. Okay, each one of them says what the standard is. One dozen, open yours up. Oh. Open yours up.
Wait, now he's missing one, but this brother over here, he's missing three. Open yours up, let's see how you came out. She's scared, oh, Lord, you did real bad. She missing six. She's a long ways off from having a dozen, he's a shorter way off from having a dozen, he's just a little bit off of having a dozen. But the truth of the matter is... you understand what I'm saying? No matter whether you're a little bit off, or a whole lot off, off is still off. You can't sell me this as a dozen eggs if you're one short. The same thing is true about the law. If you come up short in any way, you can never say I have kept the law. Not when the law said the very thought of foolishness is sin. The law said if you mix wool with cotton it's sin, you can't even mix fabrics. You can't do anything on the Sabbath day, you can't eat, you can't make some kind of meat, you can't eat this, you can't do that, you can't do the other. If you miss any part of it, you missed all of it.
Come on with my other eggs, come on with. I'm gonna show you something here. So what the law could not do, in that it was weak to the flesh, God sent his Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and let me tell you what the Son did. He fulfilled the law. Everything you were missing, everything you fell short of, everything that you couldn't do yourself, Jesus came on the cross to pick up what was lost and what was lacking, so that you would be pure. He is my righteousness, I am complete in him. I am complete, because he came and made up the difference in my life. If you understand that, give him a praise right now.
I want you to see that, especially for all you goody-two-shoes people, who was looking down your nose at me because I didn't have but six eggs and you had 11, you still going to hell. You might as well have got out there with me and done what I was doing, because if you're guilty of a little bit, you're guilty of the whole. You need salvation just as much as I do. If it's gonna come up short, you should have got all that up there then. Jesus came to fill in the gap between what was missing in your life. If you understand that, praise him for what he filled in. Yeah, yeah. Now, now, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. The people... see, I don't understand y'all, because some of y'all is praising like you had 11 eggs. You know you might not have had but two eggs in your whole carton and you ought to praise God like you lost your...
You mean, Jesus died so the blessing of Abraham could come upon me? Absolutely, absolutely. You're supposed to be blessed. I rebuke every devil that's been telling you you cursed that this is your life and you just got to make the best of it. The devil is a liar. Jesus hung on a tree that the blessings of Abraham might come upon you. Slap your neighbor and say the blessing is on you. You're supposed to be walking in the blessing of Abraham. Somebody say, I'm gonna walk in the blessing of Abraham. I'm glad you said that, let me show you what the blessing of Abraham is, and I'm gonna sit down, put my blessing up there. Glory to God, glory to God, the blessing of Abraham, hallelujah.
Touch three people, say, the blessing of Abraham. Number one, God says, I will make thee a great nation. I wanted them one at a time, but I'll take them since you got them all up there. He says, I will make thee a great nation. Wait a minute, he took a man whose wife was barren and his body was impotent and said, I will make thee a great nation. The blessing of Abraham means that God will bring greatness out of your limitation. I don't care what's broken, you could have come from a broken home, a broken neighborhood, you could be broken in your body, you could be brokenhearted. God says, I'm still gonna make of thee a great nation. This is the blessing of Abraham. Get your mind off of anything other than greatness. God said, Jakes didn't say this, Jakes didn't say this, I didn't write this. This was here before mama got pregnant with me.
God said, I will make of thee a great nation. Somebody say, great nation. Number two, God says, I will bless thee. I will bless thee. It's one thing for the choir to sing, the blessing of Abraham is on you, is on you. But if you don't know what it is, you don't know what you got. It's a nice song, they got all that harmony, and all of that, but what does that mean? It means that I have a promise, I will bless thee. I will bless thee. We gonna make it personal. Say, God will bless me. Oh, that sounded good. Say that again. Oh, yeah. Oh, that's better than all that old negative talk you've been talking, all that stuff you've been saying to yourself. If the just should live by faith, and faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word, then you gotta start talking what you believe.
Say it again, God will bless me, say it again. God will bless me, God will bless me, God will bless me, God will bless me, God will bless me. In my senior years, God will bless me. In my youthful years, God will bless me. With my single self, God will bless me. With my married self, God will bless me. Say it again. See, I want your spirit to hear you say, God will bless me. Oh, I wish I had time. I got time, I'm doing good.
Okay, listen, let me tell you, the reason your spirit is down is because your spirit heard what you said. Your spirit eats what you say. I just don't know how I'm gonna make it, I'm just had my wits end, I don't have nobody, nobody loves me, I got nowhere to turn, and the more you speaking, the more your spirit is eaten, because faith covered by hearing and hearing by the Word, so when you start saying negative words, you start believing them. And the more you say it, the more you reinforce it in your life, but we get ready to reverse the curse. Say it again, God will bless me. Say it again, God will bless me.
Number three, God says I will make thy name great. I will make thy name great. God said, let me tell you something, in this country, people who have a great name don't need a title. They don't need a title, their name is great. Sometimes they don't even need a last name. Their name is just that great. You understand what I'm talking about? You understand what I'm talking about? When you say Colin Powell, you don't have to say general. You don't have nobody asking you, which one? Denzel Washington. You were gonna say T.D. Jakes? I was looking for another example, God says, I will make your name great.
That don't necessarily mean you have to be famous, I'll make your name great in the school you work in. I'll make your name great with the children you raised. I'll make your name great in the office you're in. I will make your name great on your level. Your name will be synonymous with greatness. I will make your name great. This is what you're supposed to expect. If you ain't expecting that, then you do not believe in God's Word. Because I'm teaching it, and if you ain't getting it, it's not my fault. If I got five kids and I'm feeding them, and all of them getting big but one, it ain't the food. Come on somebody. And I see some folk growing up in here. I said, I see some folk growing up in here. I see some folk growing up in here. God said, I will make your name great.
Can I go further? He says, thou shall be a blessing. Now, wait a minute, that's different from, I will bless you. I will bless you deals with what I receive. Thou shall be a blessing. Whenever you walk in the door, people will smile, because God said, I will make you a blessing. Thou shall be a blessing. Look at somebody and say, you're a blessing. You are a blessing, you're a blessing, you're a blessing, you're a blessing. Do you know you are a blessing? I said, do you know you're a blessing. Do you know you're a blessing? Do you know you're a blessing? Stop being afraid to come in the room, because when you come in the room, a blessing has come in the room. God said, thou shall be a blessing. Shout, I'm a blessing.
Number five, I will bless them that bless you. Let me tell you something, I've seen it all my life, people that bless me, God blessed. They just got blessed, they just got blessed, they just got blessed because I am walking in the blessing of Abraham. And God said, I will bless them that bless you. I will bless them, I will bless them that bless you. That when you bless somebody that has the blessing of Abraham on them, God said, I will bless them that bless you. You know why, you are fulfilling God's promise in their life. So when you bless them, God says, I'm just doing it through you. So you ain't gonna lose it, I'm gonna give it back to you. Somebody who got that, shout right now. I will bless them that bless you.
Oh, and this one here, I like this one too. He says, I will curse them that curse you. You don't have to fight, you don't have to get even, you don't have to go off. God said, I will curse them that curse you.
And through thy seed, number seven, shall all nations of the earth be blessed. All nations of the earth shall be blessed. All of these blessings shall come upon you. Cursed is he that hung on the tree, that the blessing of Abraham, do you feel that? Do you not know you dressed in the blessings of Abraham, that God's got you covered in the blessings of Abraham, that you have survived everything you've been through because the blessings of Abraham are upon you? Do you understand what I'm saying? Do you know how many diseases tried to take you out, but the blessing of Abraham. Some of your schoolmates are dead, some of the people you grew up with are dead, but you're still standing in the blessings. Stand on your feet, you got the hookup, stand up on your feet. If you got Jesus, you got the hookup.