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Introduction
Obedience Opens the Heavens
Acts 26:19 “Therefore, King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision”
Paul was not disobedient to the vision and call which God gave him. Paul was obedient unto death to the call of God over his life.
When I speak about obedience, I am not speaking about works! I am not speaking about not sinning! I have a secret for you, every single one of us in this place will sin today, tomorrow and the day there after, but I have another secret, and that is that the power of the blood of Jesus Christ takes away your sin as far as the east is from the west!
So I am not even speaking about sin, I am speaking about aligning your life through surrender into the will and call of God for your life!
Now many of you might sit here and say that I do not know what the will of God is for my life. I love what my senior Pastor always says, “When you don’t know what the call of God is for your life then right now the will of God is for you to find out what the call of God is for your life!”
Every single one you sitting in this place has a call of God over your life, whether it is sporting, business, or ministry.
The first step of obedience is to say, "Lord, here is my life, take it, it is yours! I surrender my life to you and want to walk in Your will for my life!"
When you start walking in the call of God for your life or at least start finding out what the call of God is for your life then you become obedient! Then you are obedient!
Results Of Obedience:
1. The Heaven’s Will Open Over Your Life!
Luke 3:21-22 “When all the people were baptized, it came to pass that Jesus also was baptized; and while He prayed the heaven was opened. And the Holy Spirit descended in bodily form like a dove upon Him, and a voice came from heaven which said, “You are My beloved Son; in You I am well pleased.”
Jesus was obedient to the fact that he had to be baptized. Because of that obedience we see the heavens opened over His life!
Scholars tell me that the water baptism was a sign of Him going to the cross. The water baptism represents death, burial and resurrection. Christ was obedient until death at the cross. The water baptism was a sign, a public sign of His obedience.
How many of you know that if Christ was obedient to the call of God over His life until death, it certainly mean that we must be obedient.
As Christ was obedient and the heavens opened over His life, just so, if we become obedient by aligning ourselves in line with the call of God, then the heavens too will open over our lives!
2. The Power Of The Holy Spirit Will Come Upon You!
Luke 24:48 - 53 48"And you are witnesses of these things.49 "Behold, I send the Promise of My Father upon you; but tarry in the city of Jerusalem until you are endued with power from on high." 50 And He led them out as far as Bethany, and He lifted up His hands and blessed them. 51 Now it came to pass, while He blessed them, that He was parted from them and carried up into heaven. 52 And they worshiped Him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy, 5 3 and were continually in the temple praising and blessing God. Amen. (NKJ)
These followers of Jesus, however, took Jesus seriously and returned to Jerusalem and waited for the Promise. When He came they went into their entire world and touched it for the Lord. They made such an impact that they were accused of "turning the world upside down," (Acts 17:6). They were able to accomplish these great feats because they did what Jesus had said to do. They were obedient! They tarried until He empowered them.
Acts 1:8 “But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth”
When you become obedient to Him, then the power of the Holy Spirit will come upon you.
Acts 10:38 “how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him.
John 20:21 “ So Jesus said to them again, “Peace to you! As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.”
1 Cor 6:19 “Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God and you are not you own?”
We like to look at this scripture and say, no tattoos, or no piercings.. But that is not what it means.
God is saying: Listen.....
You are the carriers of God Himself, that means when you leave here and you are in your classroom that you can give God to someone else, you can express God. God can move and breath and live through you.
We as Christians have everything we need on the inside of us.
Eph 3:20 “Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us.”
Eph 1:3 “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ...”
God ordained every single one of us to operate in the power of the Kingdom of God. It is His will for us to cast out devils, to heal the sick, and to raise the dead!
Listen, Jesus loves it when you and walk in the power of the Kingdom, He loves it when we step into that place and cast out devils! The bible says that after He sent out his disciples to cast out devils and heal the sick they came back saying “Lord, even the demons are subject to us in your name”... The bible carries on and says that Jesus REJOICED in the spirit. He was so happy that someone actually walked in the power of His Kingdom!
3. You Will Receive The Attention Of Heaven!
Acts 7:55 “But he, being full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God”
Stephen was not much different from you and I. He was not a spiritual superstar, not an apostle, nor a radical preacher, in fact he was chose to serve table, feeding widows!!! How glorious! Feeding widows!!! But, Stephen was full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom. This guy was so full of the Spirit and wisdom that the head council could not resist him. He started preaching to them under the power of the Holy Spirit and they got so enraged that they dragged him out and stones him to death! As they were stoning him to death, the heavens suddenly opened and Stephen as his face shone like an angel saw Christ standing up! Listen, Christ was usually sitting down according to scripture, but now he was standing! Stephen managed to get the whole of heaven’s attention!
I can just imagine, as Christ stood up to see what is happening to his boy, I can just imagine the whole of heaven, as silence came upon them with their eyes fixed on Jesus and Stephen. Stephen managed to get the whole of heaven’s attention in one moment! Why!? Because Stephen was obedient until death! He was obedient to the call of God for his life!
Your obedience will cause you to get heavens attention! Your obedience will cause the whole of heaven to gaze upon you!
You can get heaven’s attention!
Conclusion:
2 Cor 10:6 “...and being ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled.”
I am saying again what I mean by obedience. Obedience is very simple, it is when you are obedient to the call of God for your life! If you don’t know the call of God for your life then you will be obedient by finding out what the call of God is for your life!
When your obedience is fulfilled then you can punish all disobedience...
When you know that you are where God has called you to be, or even if you are busy finding out and doing everything to find out then you become obedient, and then you have the power to punish all disobedience which is coming against you.
That means, that whatever the enemy is throwing at you, you can say, listen here devil, I am obedient, the heaven’s are open over my life and you have nothing on me, therefore I can punish you right now!
You can punish the devil when he comes against you simply because you are obedient!!!
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