Theme: Spiritual growth: Understanding the What and How of Growing Up unto God’s Life in our Souls
Topic: Leadings/Dealings of the Holy Spirit: Understanding how Lines Translates into change of nature in our souls Pt. 2
Minister: Pastor David Kilanko
Romans 1:5 – “By whom we have received grace and apostleship, for obedience to the faith among all nations, for his name…”
Romans 8:14 – “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God”
Romans 8:16 – “The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God…”
Acts 14:22 – “Confirming the souls of the disciples, and exhorting them to continue in the faith, and that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God”
Tribulation means pressure, we can also say through much tribulation we would grow up into the life of God because entrance into the kingdom is a function of what has been done into your soul. You cannot enter into the kingdom if your soul has not changed.
John 21:18 – “Verily, verily, I say unto thee, When thou wast young, thou girdest thyself, and walkedst whither thou wouldest: but when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee, and carry thee whither thou wouldest not”
A sign of growth is that you can be led, that we are more dependent on and reliant on God. Childishness in the spirit is that we can do what we like. In the spirit,a sign of growth shows when, for every decision and every step you want to take, you still consult God and not assume.
Last week, we were saying that the adversary of what God is saying now is what God has said before using the analogy of Nehushtan in (2 Kings 18: 4 – 8). It is a sign you are growing when you are following God anywhere He says you should go.
Lines are visible expressions of the Divine life that come from not just hearing but obeying the revealed truth. The revealed truth here is the revealing of the word of God by the Holy Ghost. No one can reveal the life of God except by the Spirit (1st Corinthians 2:11)
Titus 1:16 “They profess that they know God; but in works they deny him, being abominable, and disobedient, and unto every good work reprobate” God doesn’t just want us to profess we know Him, but in our works, we must reveal him. From revelation to obedience to lines, that is how life is manifested.
Lines Are The Lives Of Precepts
Titus 2:1-2 “But speak thou the things which become sound doctrine: 2 That the aged men be sober, grave, temperate, sound in faith, in charity, in patience”
Sound doctrine is a sound life that a man becomes by things that have been spoken. A man is not naturally sober, grave, or temperate. Temperance is a fruit of the spirit, which means you can adjust to every situation, and you are still faithful to the path, meaning that pressure doesn’t change who you are. Sometimes we blame our expression of life on the conduct of another person, but the truth is that whatever ill action we exhibit has always been there; it just needed a situation or kind of environment to show.
God wants to actually bring forth his own nature from our souls by speaking things that would bring forth His life, and our souls can have the nature of God if we obey (this is conditional because you can hear and not actually evidence the life) because it is obedience that actually brings forth the manifestation of life.
The degree to which the life of Christ has been formed in you is the lines that your soul would show. As children of God, we should never be content with the level of life we have in God; we should always desire the best of God’s life. We should never be a people content with our state in God. Man should not give a verdict about you and accept it; God should be the one who gives a verdict about you.
The life we have trapped is what we will express when situations come around us.
Lines become life through obedience, as knowledge alone is not life. Knowledge fails when you have heard so much, but your yieldedness to the spirit is very low.
1st Corinthians 13:8 – “Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away”
Knowledge that doesn’t receive a commensurate obedience will vanish. Yieldedness is what will bring forth lines and not the abundance of revelation.
Matthew 16:18-22 “18 And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. 19 And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. 20 Then charged he his disciples that they should tell no man that he was Jesus the Christ. 21 From that time forth began Jesus to shew unto his disciples, how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day. 22 Then Peter took him, and began to rebuke him, saying, Be it far from thee, Lord: this shall not be unto thee”
That you shared a revelation doesn’t mean you own it. Every revelation has a line for you to walk in, and as those lines are obeyed, divine life is progressively formed in the believer. Romans 8:14 “As you are led” means you should follow. The life of a son is a life of obedience, obedience to the spirit of God. A son is an expressed life. One can have so much knowledge, but knowledge that is not obeyed can easily make one puffed up, but knowledge should land in charity. Now Charity is not knowledge; charity is a person. The ending of knowledge obeyed is the framing of a person called “Charity.” Lines are actually a pointer to how much conformity you have come into in the life of Christ, not just how much of Christ you can talk about.
Luke 2:49 “And he said unto them, How is it that ye sought me? wist ye not that I must be about my Father’s business…”
Lines are ways; it is the defined paths of life that proceed from knowledge (precepts).
Psalms 103:7 “He made known his ways unto Moses, his acts unto the children of Israel.” Ways are called understanding, and Acts are called manifestation. We must not be a people who only know ACTS
Teaching produces understanding; doctrine is not merely information, it is the instructions that form a way of life. God is not talkative; God talks with an intent when he speaks. There is something he wants to achieve. Doctrine is not information; it is the instruction that forms the way of life. The best way to read is to have heard first.
Our approach to the Bible should be from what we have heard. Ephesians 4:11-12“ 11. And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; 12. For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ…”
To be perfected, you need to be pastored; you need to be taught. The things we hear and see shape our perception. Satan is very deliberate about what he wants you to see. Mark 4:24 Take heed of what you hear because what you hear affects how you read. In short, hearing gives interpretation to reading. What you have heard can stand against what you need to hear, and it will wear down what you need to hear because it has given you a different perception of life. God does not just inform; he transforms. God is a transformative being and not an informative being; He does not just tell you what he wants to do, he wants to transform you by what He has said. You can’t separate Feeding from Leading and from Dealing. You can only be led if you are heard well. Many times, it is what you hear that leads you. You must be careful about what you hear. Understanding that has been obeyed is what will lead to transformation. God is not just interested in what you know but in how you walk.
Round Up: Pastor Oreoluwa Idowu
Beyond preaching, the revelation is the life that our parents are trusting the Lord to be evident in us. (Matthew 7:12-26). How you know a man is not by the revelation he preaches but by the fruits. Beyond revelation, trust the Lord for this message to actually be interpreted as a walk. It’s in the little things that we are transformed and changed. There are always commandments after we give ourselves to the word.
Message Ends