~Open in Prayer~

Icebreaker
• As a child what did you want to be when you grew up?
• What is your favorite time of the day and why?
• Coffee or tea?

Message Review
This is our last message in Hidden in Plain Sight. This series has helped to expose the biblical view of the spiritual realm. Just to review, the Bible talks about generational curses and yokes. Generational curses are a part of nature and are those things that flow naturally through the bloodline. You do get physical traits from your bloodline, but you also get spiritual and psychological traits from your bloodline. Next, we have yokes, which are a part of nurture. These are things that happen to us that are caused by our environment. These are our experiences. That is why we have people in their thirties and forties trying to overcome something that happened to them when they were teenagers. Strongholds are not broken easily.
They are more intentional, and they are a fortress in the mind. Strongholds are a way of thinking. Demons are cast out in a moment, but strongholds have to be pulled down. Doors are opened that let evil in, but strongholds are things that protect that evil. They are mindsets. Things you’ve been taught by your culture, your family, your neighborhood and life and they go against the Bible. So, when you start listening to your favorite preacher, there is already a stronghold in your mind contending with what is being preached about from the Bible.

Let’s Talk About It!

1 Peter 2:7-9
A stone of stumbling in a “don’t offend me” culture. “Don’t offend me” is a stronghold that must be pulled down. God will offend you and He’ll offend you to move you. For God to move you to another area in your life, He has to make you hate where you currently are. Why? Because people who have had it “bad” will stay in “good” forever because “good” seems like “great” to them when in fact “good” is not actually “great” it’s just “good”. If you’re “good” and God wants you to have “great”, He must make you hate “good”. He’s a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense. They stumble being disobedient to the Word to which they were appointed. You are appointed to the promises of God.

All the promises of God are yes and amen to you who are in the Word. To those who are not in the Word, it becomes a stumbling block and an offense. For example, if you are sick and you need healing, but you don’t believe in healing, and I tell you that by His stripes you are healed, as it says in the Bible, that is an offense to the stance that you’ve taken because you don’t believe in healing. The Word becomes a rock of offense and a stumbling block not to the obedient, but the disobedient.

You no longer belong to your earthly classifications. We must stop allowing people to label us and put us in a category that your middle class, lower class, upper class, red, white, brown, black and green. They try to put you in a corner, but when you’ve been born again those things have fallen off you. God has created unto Himself an entirely new nation. You have been a part of a new ethnicity and you have become the first fruits of His kind of creature. A peculiar person. People can’t figure you out. Why? That you might proclaim the praises of Him who pulled you out of darkness and into light.

After Jesus died and rose again, He said occupy until I come. He has instructed us to occupy until He comes back in His second coming. That word “occupy” means to do business. It means to barter, trade and bank. In other words, my warfare is not to win, but to occupy. The Bible has 2000 pages of promises that Jesus has given to me, but I have fortresses in my mind that argue with Him. As a result, my warfare is to pull down every stronghold and come out of darkness into His marvelous light, you don’t fight for victory; you fight from victory because He’s already won it.

Jesus purchased all of the promises of God for me. Now we are to pull down any thoughts in our mind that argues with those promises. Once you’ve made those thoughts obey Christ, I can possess another promise. That is called a “Kingdom life”. You’re not living according to this world, but according to heaven on earth. You’re walking in the blessings of heaven on the earth. Your life is governed by heaven and not by earth. And it doesn’t matter what men do to you. It doesn’t matter who walks out. No one can separate you from the love of God that is in Jesus because your life is ruled by another world.

God was in a bush and Moses was running for his life for forty years. God went to Moses and said I have given you a land filled with milk and honey. It’s done. It’s already yours, but it took them forty years to occupy it. God’s already won it, and they wandered around for forty years because you can get them out of Egypt, but you can’t get Egypt out of them. Every time they were supposed to get into the promised land, they had something in their mind that said we are grasshoppers. As a result, they couldn’t occupy the promise because of what they believed about themselves. It says that because they were grasshoppers in their own sight, they were grasshoppers in their enemies’ sight too. Always know that people will always view you how you view yourself. If you don’t value you, no one will either.

It took Moses and Israel forty years to enter the promised land. It took Jesus forty days in the wilderness. The choice is yours because how long it takes you to enter your promise, will depend on how much you confront the things in your head that contend with that promise. It can take forty years or forty days. When you believe something, you can become it so make what God says the standard in your life regardless of what you’ve been taught. When you believe the promise, you can enter it.

In the Bible you have this constant thing with God and light. In the Bible darkness is always symbolic of ignorance. Light is always indicating knowledge. You are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a peculiar people, but that is not what you’ve always been taught. Generational curses, your neighborhood and the culture have taught you something else. But God has called you out of ignorance and into His marvelous knowledge. If you don’t pull out all of the old stuff and put in the new stuff, then you’ll never know how chosen, peculiar and royal you are. You are all these things, but it’s not in your head yet. He’s called you out of the darkness and into his marvelous light.

• When the Bible says that the Word of God becomes an offense and a stumbling block does it refer to unbelievers or believers?

• What is the warfare that you are in and what do you do to win the war?

• How can you enter the promises that God has for you? What do you have to do?

Jude 1:6
We know Satan rose up against God in his pride and a third of the angels were cast down with him. Most theologians believe this happened between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2 after God created the heavens and the earth and there was a void. After God created the heavens and the earth, he said it was good then something happened that turned everything to chaos. That’s when God went back to work. A third of the angels were thrown out with Satan. Most people think that they were thrown into hell, but the Bible says that hell is reserved for him until judgment. So, where were they cast out to? Where are they?

God has built a reservation for those fallen angels. They have a boundary. Outside of their boundary, they can’t do anything. Where is that boundary? Darkness and ignorance. Satan has been bound to ignorance. In other words, what you don’t know can hurt you. “My people perish for lack of knowledge,” the Bible says. When you don’t know God’s knowledge and marvelous light, anything goes. They cast off restraint and they do anything they want. That’s what’s happening in the world right now. They don’t know the light of God, and anything goes. Don’t buy into “anything goes”.

Satan has been given permission by God to operate in what you do not know. If you get sick and you don’t know about what God says about being healed and restored, you’re vulnerable. If debt has gripped your life and you don’t know about God’s blessing, you’re vulnerable. He has permission to operate in what you do not know, which is why you have been appointed and called to light.

Why do you think Satan is called the prince of darkness? He is the king of ignorance. He’s called the father of lies and prince of darkness. He knows that the kingdom is set up this way: What you believe in your heart, so are you. Satan doesn’t have to make it happen. He just must make you believe it. He’s the father of lies so you are believing lies if you don’t contradict his lies with the light of the Word.

• How important is it for you to be knowledgeable of the Word and know God’s promises and why?

• Can Satan make something happen in your life?

• What kind of power does he have?

2 Corinthians 11:14
Satan walks around masquerading himself as an angel of light. He walks around trying to tell you that his way is true.

• How do you know if a lie is from Satan?

Luke 11:33-35
Jesus said who do men say that I am? Some said Elijah, Jeremiah and one of the prophets. Jesus asked, “Who do you say I am?” Peter said, “You are the Christ; the son of God.” Jesus replies blessed are you that flesh and blood didn’t tell you, but you had revelation from God. The next verse says that the gates of hell will not prevail against you because where you have revelation, hell can’t prevail. However, where we are ignorant, we are vulnerable.

• Can Satan succeed in his plan if you have revelation and why?

• Can he succeed in his plan if you don’t know God’s promises for you and why?

Prayer Focus and Requests
Ask your members if they have any prayer requests or praise reports. Encourage one another to stir up your faith and pray BIG prayers this week and expect God to blow your mind with His answers.