In this piece, we will be looking at something that I believe is going to be instructive. We want to consider How to Inherit the Kingdom of God. I'm sure we have heard a lot of messages around that. But now, we want to look at that matter from an angle; we want to look at it from a corner and see how we can learn basic truths that could be useful for our growth. It is not enough to have head knowledge, whatever we know in our heads should translate into our hearts, it should become something that we become one with, and it becomes our daily experiences.
So, we want to look at How to Inherit the Kingdom of God. Now, when we look at the word inherit, that we are familiar with, we know it is not a very light matter. No matter how poor your father is, it is still a joy in your heart to inherit something from him, whether your father or your mother had so much possession or not. Once they are able to pass something unto you, you become bold, you become proud of it, it becomes something you boast to others, because I remember I have boasted to some people, certain things I have inherited. I still boasted like, maybe few days ago.
So, it happens to us that when our fathers and mothers are going, not necessarily when they are gone, they pass on certain things that has helped them, certain things that has become part of their essence, they pass it on to us. So, we become partakers, we become co-users of the things they've used. We become partakers of the things they've experienced. So, let's go very basic, a father has three cars, and the man is going, he decides to give one of the three cars to the daughter, one of the three cars to the son, and one of the three cars to who again? To another daughter.
So, prior to this moment, the three cars were useful to the father. They were the things that the father used to move from point A to point B, they’ve helped the father. So, the father is saying, these things have helped me, henceforth let them help you. I have gotten to where I am right now with these things. For you to go to where you must go to, you will need to ride on them. So, use my land, use my house, use my clothes, use my cars, use my properties so that you will be great, that where I am, may be the least that you could ever be.
It is like a father saying, I don't want you to stand on the ground, come and stand on my shoulders. You know, no matter how short a responsible child is, or let's say, no matter how short a responsible son or daughter is, when you stand on the shoulder of your father or your mother, you should rise above them, isn't it? Yes! So, that is what inheritance does for us.
So, when you're looking at inheriting the kingdom of God, it means there are certain things that are of God, there are certain things that God commands or enjoys or uses, that God is saying, My son, My daughter, I extend the same thing to you. This experience that I have, have access to it. So, inheriting the kingdom of God is about access, making us to be able to enjoy things that normally, ordinarily we might not enjoy.
So, how can somebody inherit something that belongs to another father? Now, let's say Bro. Dennis has become a very great man with many children. And let's say Bro. Francis has also become a very great man with many children. How will it be possible for Bro. Francis’ son to inherit Bro. Dennis properties? Is it logical? Is it normal?
Now, if that will happen, what do we think must happen? Adoption! Now, if that son must inherit what belongs to another father, that means there must be a time that, that father chooses to adopt that son. So, it's a necessity. And you know, adoption also comes with a change of name, usually, not every time. So, you have been “so, so, so, so” before, when you are adopted by a different parent, it carries the capacity to change your name from who you used to be, to the new man using that new family name.
So, you could have been Felix Adama, and now you have been adopted into the family of Akaba. So, you then become Felix Akaba instead of Felix Adama. Something will change about your name. In fact, you will change your location. You have been living with the Adama people all along, but since you are now adopted by the Akaba family, you will live the Adama, and you come to the Akaba family. So, you are changing name, you are changing location. In fact, you are changing your residence. Now, for those who grew up in a polygamous family, your father happens to have more than one wife. So, you would have seen a situation where one wife is cooking and another wife is cooking in the same building. The tastes of the food of the two wives are never the same. How many of us are aware? Yes, I've been there!
So, even under the same roof, the taste of the food, the cooking style, is not the same. So, when that boy leaves the Adama family to the Akaba family, the things he used to eat, he will actually eat them no more. The kind of taste of the food that he used to enjoy, it will no longer continue, it will be according to the taste that is prepared by the family of the Akaba.
So, the taste. or the food preferences and the food taste changes. The name changes, the location changes. What is the goal? That you may inherit! If a boy struggles with these changes, and says I can no more cope with the Akaba family, let me return now to my Adama family, that my life may be as it was before. Can such a child then claim inheritance in the Akaba family in the future? No!
So, because he could not endure, because he could not endure that change of location, he could not enjoy that change of taste. Because the house he used to live in and he was comfortable in, is no more the house he is living in. Because he could no more endure these things, he returns back to where he was before. And so, the process that needed to culminate into his inheritance is terminated, because he could not continue. So, we can see that inheritance does not fall on anybody like ripe pawpaw. Except in a situation where the father just chooses to will his properties to somebody else, who never lived with him. It's possible! But these are very rare cases.
An old man cannot die at 92, and some of us who are never related to that old man, walks up to that community, walks up to the compound, walks up to the house and say, as the children are sitting, we also sit; “I want to collect my own.” If they don't beat us, they will carry us out. That’s the normal thing.
So, to inherit does not fall like ripe pawpaw, there are certain things that qualifies us for inheritance. If inheriting clothes, cars and houses demand so much requirements, what do we think inheriting the kingdom of God will require? Will it be purely on the bed of roses? You know, everything is just cool, everything is just calm, and everything is just collected, everything goes serene, it is so easy, you fall in, you fall out, you may just enter, you may just get out, and everything is acceptable.
Do we think that's the mannerism? If inheriting things that are perishable are demanding or is demanding, inheriting the kingdom of God could be much more demanding. That is why we want to look at how to inherit. In a situation like this, that many of us are, I don't know anybody here that is born by a billionaire. Many of us in the flesh, we are not basically born by billionaires, so how do we then inherit what the children of billionaires inherit? We must become adopted. That's the first thing.
Now, we know what happened, Adam was created in perfection. Eve, his wife was created perfect; both of them started their lives perfectly. But God gave them certain requirements, certain conditions to keep the perfection. They went away, they began to do things that God didn't allow them to do. And what happened? Their perfection became imperfection. Their correctness became “incorrectness.” Now look at it, their alignment with the will of God became non-alignment.
Let's get it again, they were going straight, when God is on His throne, God looks at them straight, they look at God straight; everything about them and God, what was it? Straight! So, when they disobeyed God, the matter could no longer be straight, matters became curved. They were no more straight with God. They were no more aligning with God. There is a word that can be used, they were no more righteous with God.
The word, righteous is also rooted in the word, right. Things were no more right with them. They were doing wrong things, thinking wrong thoughts. Why? They disobeyed God. Can we see that we have started looking at righteousness, and alignments? Now, later on, we're going to see how it connects with inheriting the kingdom of God.
Now let's go to 1st Corinthians chapter 6 verse 1. Let's see a background to a scenario that shows that the world is grouped into two categories. 1st Corinthians chapter 6 from verse 1, the Bible says, “1 Dare any of you, having a matter against another, go to law before the unrighteous, and not before the saints? 2 Do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world will be judged by you, are you unworthy to judge the smallest matters? 3 Do you not know that we shall judge angels? How much more, things that pertain to this life? 4If then you have judgments concerning things pertaining to this life, do you appoint those who are least esteemed by the church to judge? 5 I say this to your shame. Is it so, that there is not a wise man among you, not even one, who will be able to judge between his brethren? 6 But brother goes to law, when you hear law there, you are talking about court, goes to law against his brother, and that before unbelievers!
So, Apostle Paul is angry that believers take themselves to court before the unrighteous; eventually he calls them before the unbelievers. So, you are either an unrighteous, an unbeliever or you are righteous and you are a believer. Those are the two groups of people, who are on the earth.
Verse 7, it says, “Now therefore, it is already an utter failure for you that you go to law , that is you go to court, against one another. Why do you not rather accept wrong? “ How many of us are willing to accept wrong? You know, if this thing is easy, Apostle Paul will not be like, why can't you just accept wrong? He really felt if only anyone of them could accept wrong, they wouldn’t need to go before the unrighteous judges. So, the reason why they take themselves to court is because none of them was willing to accept a wrong.
When we do bad, and people say you have done bad, is it an insult? But when we do good and somebody say you have done bad, is it an insult? Which one gets you most angry? Which one is most offensive? You've done good and you are judged wrong. Please, is it not normal, if you are wrong, they say, you are wrong, to accept, I am wrong?
Please be looking at it, you are wrong, they say, “madam you are wrong.” What will you be doing? You will be crying? You will understand that yes I'm wrong. But you are right, they say you are wrong. That's when it pains you and you will say I will show you that I am not wrong. That I will show you; I want to prove to you that I am on the good and you are on the wrong, and that's what leads us to fighting. It leads us to arguments. That's what leads marriages into the journey of no return and they say husbands and wives, they have separated due to irreconcilable differences. But if only we can understand that even though we are right, we don't need to always prove it. We wouldn’t need to go to court.
So, as we are going on, you know we want to look at how to inherit the kingdom of God, part of the things that God will be having us to accept is to accept wrongs. It is not Bro. Gboyega that wrote this thing, it is Brother Paul. Let’s look at the way he said it, He says, “why do you not rather;: rather than bringing yourself to a shameful experience in the court, don't you just accept wrong? Why do you not rather let yourself be cheated?
How convenient is it to allow oneself to be cheated? Really, when we put believers, people that go to church, you put three people who go to church in a committee of ten people. Three people who go to church, seven people who don't go to church. Out of those seven people who don't go to church, two of them are still Christians, but they don't go to church. Now you're left with five.
Now give the remaining five to the other religious people. Those who do Ifa worship, those who are Muslims, give it to everyone. Don't forget what you have done. Cheat all of them, see the reaction of all of them, do you think a Christian will react better? In case you are worried about all these things, just look at those who you have transacted business with. I can bet that you have transacted mostly with Christians. So, how have they been accepting? How have they been behaving? Have they been accepting cheating or they themselves cheat other people?
Now, we are talking about the Kingdom of God, we are not even talking about being religious. We are talking about a state where you choose to accept to be cheated. You know, this man is cheating you, this woman is cheating you, yet you choose not to die. You choose not to fight. Do you know what I mean by die? You know, some people, because somebody cheated them, they will remove their clothes, and say, we will die here. And the way they will start, it will start from we die here to, they will bring themselves into disrepute, into shame.
Imagine women removing all their clothes because they are fighting. Somebody has cheated me, I cannot take it. And you could still be surprised that the person that cannot take it, that is arguing, is a very religious woman; she pays her tithe, she pays offering, she goes to Sunday school, she goes for midweek services, but she's still telling you, “I can't be cheated. Ah! Do you think I'm a fool? Do you take me for a fool? These people want to ride over me.” And then you can’t see a difference between one who professes to be religious and the other one who claims he doesn't even know God. Everybody is complaining about cheating. Nobody wants to accept wrong.
For those who are confused a little bit, just remember what Jesus said, if somebody should slap you on your right, what did Jesus say you should do? He said, turn the other one. How many of us have ever done that? Don't we consider it to be robbery to ourselves, to turn it? “How do I teach this man a lesson?” You know it's easy if somebody like me slap somebody like Deborah, for Deborah to turn to the other cheek. How will it be when somebody like Deborah is slapping somebody like Bro. Dennis? Now, let's look for somebody that is not young, but has the stature of Deborah, slapping somebody like Bro. Dennis.
If Bro. Dennis is able to turn, he is not turning the second because he is afraid that woman would beat him, he is turning because he decides to accept the cheating and to accept the wrong. If we disturb somebody and then we realized suddenly after disturbing the person that the person is heavy, muscular, he has a lot of things and then you now say, “I'm sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry”. That is not what we are talking about. Like you've been talking, “I can't take it! I can't take it!” Only for you to now realize the person has more than what you have. The person has more strength than you. Then you look at it, “I think this man will kill me, let me just keep quiet.” You're not in the kingdom at that point. You're just being smart. But that's not what God is asking us to do.
Even if somebody is cheating you, you cannot because they are cheating you, you want to number one, cheat your own. Somebody has done wrong against you, you will do your own wrong. If you're doing like that, you are not different from the rest. Because you don't need God in your life for you to pay evil back with evil, you don't need God. You don't need to go to church for somebody to slap you, and you slap your own, you don't need all that from God. So, what differentiates you from somebody else is that, number one, you can accept to be cheated. Number two, you can accept to be done wrong against. But that's not where we are going, that's just on the road.
1 Corinthians chapter 6 verse 8, he says, No, you yourselves you do wrong and cheat, and you do these things to your brethren! You that cannot accept cheating, you that cannot accept wrong, you are doing wrong, you are cheating, and you are doing it to your other people. You don't just do it to unbelievers; you even do it to brethren. People who are also born again like you and you are the same person, when they do wrong against you, you will say, “let's go to court, I will not agree, I will not agree, we must fight this thing to finish. You collect my land, I will collect yours, I will collect something, I will do something.”
Now, let's continue, verse nine. It says, 9 Do you not know that the unrighteous, you know we are looking at two groups of people. We are not looking at Christians and non-Christians, that’s not what we are looking at. We are looking at two groups of people in the world. Do we remember them? The righteous and the unrighteous! That’s it. He says, “do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?” Now, let’s look a little bit at the things the unrighteous do. And let’s introspect in case we have done it or we do it. He says, “do not be deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, 10 nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners:” Do we know the extortioners? Some of it looks strong and some of it looks not strong. Some of you will say, me I can’t do this.
Let's look at it. I can see extortioners, I can see covetous, and let's stay with the two. Who is an extortioner? What does it mean to extort? For instance now, you work with the local government and you are supposed to collect levies in the markets. You go to the market, people are supposed to pay two hundred naira each originally. Then you say, “I catch you! I catch you this morning! And your money is five hundred naira.” The official money is two hundred naira, you've extorted with three hundred naira. When you are going on the road and you meet a policeman that stops you. He is supposed to stand there to safeguard the road, but now, he is standing here, making sure that you pay money. I don't know if we’ve heard of stories of people that refuse to pay money and policemen shot their car.
So, those are extortioners. Things that people shouldn't pay for, struggle for, you make sure people will pay for it, they struggle for it, they sweat before they get it, you're extorting them. And the Bible says the extortioners will not inherit the kingdom of God.
Covetous! Jesus said beware of covetousness. What’s the latter part of that verse, He said for a man’s possession does not consist in the abundance of the things that he possesses. A covetous person wants to possess and possess and possess and possess, and there's a thin line between those of us who are not covetous and those of us who are covetous. You wouldn’t know when you have started been covetous. You see something that belongs to other people and in your mind, it is doing you like you should be the one that owns it.
Are you not just desiring good things? But, look at the motive and look at the insatiability or the insatiableness of your desires. You see something other people are using and it is doing you like collecting it from them. And when they don't give it to you or when they don't give you access to it, in your heart, you're like, “ah!” and you go to another place you want to collect. In your mind, anything others are having should be yours.
You know, I don't know whether I read it in a book or I heard it, that it is possible for a pastor or a man of God to be covetous. Your members have just bought a new car, “Daddy come and pray for the car” and in your mind you're like, “this is the type that a pastor should be riding.” And the only prayer in your mind is how the man will change his mind and give it to you.
So, you know, there is no problem in you desiring good things. Bro. Dennis is doing great, Lord help me to be great like him. But it gets to a point you can't control it again. Anything Bro. Dennis has or possesses or just got, you want to have your own, the same thing. Jesus said beware of covetousness. What defines your life is not going to be by the things you possess. It is not everything that you can possess.
Look at it in another manner, God has allocated a wife for you, and then you see other women and you are uncomfortable. Be aware of what? Covetousness! All beautiful women have not been allocated to you. Only one! Yes, your wife. Isn’t she beautiful? She has been allocated to you. When you see another person's wife or another potential wife and you want to have her, you are being covetous.
David had some wives. I don't want to say many because he didn’t operate like Solomon. David had some wives, and if he needed more, he would have asked God and God would have given him. But he saw a wife, he was just on his house, the Bible says it was at a time when kings were in the battlefront. But David was relaxing in the house. And he saw a woman taking her bath behind the palace wall, in her own house. Don't forget this man had wives and he was the king over the entire kingdom.
He could do a contest and say he needs a new wife, all virgins should come, that he needs to choose an excellent new wife. Do you know nobody will complain? But this man called Uriah, who had one wife, who had also gone to the battlefront. The king decided to take his wife, because the king saw her and the king went to meet his people and say, who is that woman that I saw? And they said, she is the wife of Uriah. And the king said, get her for me. That is what? Covetousness! He was greatly punished by God.
You can’t inherit the kingdom of God in covetousness. Apostle Paul said desire earnestly the best gifts. Apostle Paul did not say covet, he said desire earnestly the best gifts and he is talking about spiritual gifts. You are not to covet, because there is no good in covetousness.
So, as we intend to inherit the kingdom. Let's look at these things. The first one is, be willing to accept wrong. It doesn't mean you are wrong. Number two, be willing to be cheated. It doesn't rob you of heaven. You know, I used to tell my wife that it's easier for people to cheat me once, but really, I don't worry about that once. It is when you cheat me again and again, I will now be asking, how I allowed you to be cheating me? But for me to now be fighting over the cheating, it must not be, because life is more than that. You cannot in the place of fighting then be demonstrating the life of God before men.
You know, there is an example, something happened to me some days ago, maybe last week, I was going to Zuba. So, I didn't drive, I was in a taxi. Those of us that enters taxi will know that if you don't want people to disturb you, you will go to the extreme behind the driver. You will sit down there, nobody will disturb you. So, I've been fine there from town. Suddenly, one man came with a girl on his lap at the extreme. So, he just commanded by the virtue of, everybody should know what to do; that everybody that wants to come down must be coming down from the other side. So, I came down to allow the person to come down.
So, I wanted to enter, and the driver wanted to carry another person. So, I entered and I was expecting the person to come in from the other side because since I've been following taxi, people don't come through this other side, so I just entered. So, the man said he wants to pass through where I am, so I came down so that he would go inside. The man said no! He would not go inside, he wants to sit here. That’s how we entered and I and the driver; and the driver does not even try to calm down at all, he was just insulting me and shouting. Like instant insult and shouting. So, I was like, there's a way to talk now. Why are you shouting? I was even saying, why are you shouting? And he was even insulting me the more, that I should come down from the taxi if I can’t adjust. And I was like, how do we do the money if you want to drop me before my time? He said I should come down if I can’t shift and me, I don't want to shift.
So, when I came down; because two things, the guy is not like Bro. Dennis, but he was aggressive. And the way he was talking to me and insulting me, I was like; just understand that I'm not somebody that is like this. Like there's a part of me that wanted to say my life is not this simple, it is more complicated than this. I wish I could show but there is no opportunity; so I was just like, why are you shouting? That’s all I was saying but inside, I wish I say something else.
So, I came down so that the matter will not become fight because the man was ready to beat me. So, the driver of the car coming behind stopped and I just quickly went to him. Because that one is like, “what's going on?” I just gave the man the one thousand naira and I said please Oga, help me pay him, so that he would give you change.
Guess what the man said? Because I tapped him when I wanted to come down. He said, I was beating him and he was ready to fight me.
So, I said, “Oga, just give him the money. He was like, why would you be tapping me? Why would you tap me? Get out, rubbish,” all those things. I just said, “alright.” I'm like, okay, how do we start this argument that it will not become fight? Okay, is it my wife that will see me fighting and hail me, “my husband?” Or who will see me fighting? Fighting on top of what?
So, I just choose to be saying, alright, alright! My own is, let there be peace. Just be going. But don't forget, I had two options. I could say I want to prove. The guy actually dropped me on the road and he left, and I was almost like the first passenger he carried. So, he has been carrying me before he started enjoying crowd. Him and I have been coming a long way and he just dropped me. Those who know that brick, along that railway place. The place is almost empty on the bridge. He just dropped me there and left. And I am like, oh, alright!
So, I stood under the sun and am looking for another vehicle. Initially, I was soaking it in. Because, one thing I was trying to do, I didn't want God to judge him. I was really offended, but I didn't want God to be involved in this matter. So, I didn't want to let God know I'm angry. So, I was like everything is fine. It's okay. You know, that kind of thing. I really hope we understand? I didn't want to let God know I'm angry over the matter. I didn't want to say “God, as he is going, show him that he has dropped a man of God on the road.” You know, I didn’t want to do that because that means I didn't want to accept and I didn't want to be cheated. So, I just kept quiet. So, when I saw another person, I followed. So, I just became very gentle in the new one, hoping that nothing like that will happen again. I didn’t utter anything.
So, basically in life, people will step on us. People will cheat us. People will make us think we are not wise to be quiet. But we must choose to either show that we belong to the kingdom of God, or we are just like one of them.
Don't forget you are either in the kingdom of God or you are in the kingdom of Satan, there is no other kingdom again. You are either righteous before God or you are unrighteous, no other group. You are either a believer or you are an unbeliever, no other group. And Bible says, no unrighteous man or woman will inherit the kingdom of God. So, every moment, I must keep checking myself, am I being unrighteous? Am I being unbelieving? Because once I do this, I'm no longer qualified to inherit the kingdom of God.
But still, the ones that were mentioned, that were sophisticated was fornicators, adulterers, drunkard, sodomites, thieves, they are not less, they are important. You do them or you celebrate those who do them, you are part of them. Now, look at it, he said none of these things will inherit the kingdom of God, Verse 11 says; “And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.”
And such, look at it, such that we have read now. What are the such? Adulterers, fornicators, homosexuals, sodomites, thieves, covetous, drunkards, revilers, extortioners; such! Let me read that again. ‘And such were some of you’. “But such were,” he didn’t say such are. Do we see? What is the difference between are and were? Past! Such were some of you. That is, some of you were like that before, some of you were adulterers, some of you who are now believers, who are now righteous, “you were.” What now happens to a man that the Bible does not say you were, but now you are?
So, such were some of you. But look at it, he says but you, you were washed. And I will list a couple of things. Again, he says, but you were sanctified. I'm sure we are seeing comma, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God. This is how you have been different from the rest. In fact, you were just like the rest of the people before. The only thing that is different between you and the people is that three things have taken place in your life. Number one, you were washed. Number two, you were sanctified. Number three, you were justified. And these three have brought a new experience to your life.
So, some time ago, there came a time, while you were being an idolater, an adulterous person, a fornicator, or a drunkard, an extortioner, a covetous. You know we have listed three things that have taken place in your life. And the Bible says, those three things took place in your life, by two means; in the name of Jesus, and by the Spirit of God.
So, another word for the name of Jesus is what? Authority! If you come to a person and you say, “I come to you in the name of the king,” it is not just the word, it is the authority of the king. And the Bible says where the word of the king is, there is power. So, when you come in the name of the king, you have also come in the power of the king. So, the Bible says, by the power of Jesus, by the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ, you were washed.
So, in case somebody says, you are filthy, you are dirty, you are unclean. Say, I have been washed. By what? By the authority, by the power of Jesus. You could also say, I have been washed by the word of the Lord. There's a place the Bible says, we are washed with the water of the word. The word of God is able to wash us. We could be in our uncleanliness, unrighteousness until the word of God appears to us. Suddenly, we now see.
How many of us have eating vomit before? It is not normal, right? Okay. But imagine, the vomit is your food and you just eat it back. If nobody has ever told you that it is wrong. Do we think a child of one year is aware vomit is wrong? So, what's the difference between that one year old child and we, who are 70 years? What's the difference? Knowledge! And that knowledge is an expression of the word. Somebody spoke the word. Somebody said, “don't do it.” Somebody said, “stop, don't do it, it is bad, do you want to have stomach upset? Do you want to have stomach infection? Don’t eat it!” That’s the word, and what does the word do to you? The word cleanses you, it keeps you clean.
So, you that could have been playing in sin and playing with sin, suddenly, you can no longer do that because you now know that the wages of sin is death. So, you stay away from sin. What happens to you? You become clean. So, the word of God has the power to wash us like thoroughly, literally wash and it has the power to keep us away from dirt, from uncleanliness. The word of God can wash, wash!! You that you came with a polluted mind, suddenly after the message, your mind is no more polluted. What has happened? The word of God has washed you. But if you are the way you were before the word, that means the word of God did not successfully wash you. The word of God came to wash but you were not washed. But the Bible says you were washed.
Again, he says, you were sanctified. Jesus said in John chapter 17 Verse 17, “Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth”. So when we are sanctified, that means, the word of God has taken or has achieved His purpose in our lives. That means Jesus as the word of God has visited your life, not just washing you of every uncleanliness, but making you to be set apart. The word of God, telling you that your life will not be the way other lives have been. Many people live their lives anyhow, you will not. You will live your life the right way. This is how you will live. What the word of God is doing to you is that, the word of God is sanctifying you.
This child that you're expecting that will be born, no razor shall touch his head, the mother must not drink wine, any alcoholic substance. Do this! Don't do this, for he is a Nazarene unto the Lord. What the word of God does is that, that word of God sets him apart. The mother must not do this, even he himself must never do certain things. If he chooses to do what the word of God says he should not do. What will happen is that, his life will be like the life of other people.
This is what sanctification does to you. It takes your life from the rest of us and put it in a special place. He says, your life is a special life. When you choose not to enjoy the sanctification of the word, you take your life from where God has put it, and you put it back where other lives are. So, as other lives are afflicted by Satan, your life is afflicted. As other lives are deprived of the things that concerns life and godliness, your own life is denied, or is deprived.
So, the word of God set us apart, makes us to be special, makes us to enjoy the things that God has for us. The Word of God! Do we know that many things we’ve started to do, many places we have joined, we have joined because somebody said something, something, and that thing encouraged us to join, or to start or to stop. So, by the words that we hear, we join. By the words that we hear, we start. If you have started a business, and somebody told you the business is good. Somebody taught you, somebody trained you. While they were teaching you, while they were training you, they were sanctifying you, setting you apart, that your life would be for this.
But if you abandon what they say your life would be for, and you take your life back to where it was, what have you done? You've removed yourself from the experience. Sanctify these people, by Your truth, Your word is truth.
And the Bible says you were justified. At the beginning, I was talking about righteousness. I talked about alignments. What happens is that you are aligned, you are made righteous by the Spirit of God. The Spirit of God bears witness with our spirit that we are sons of God. As a son of God, what that means is that you are eligible.
But, what bears the witness? The Spirit! So, you could be reading the Bible and you are confused. The Holy Spirit cannot speak to you and you're confused. So you could hear a voice telling you so, so, so and so, and that voice does not still make sense to you. You don't understand. The Spirit will make it clearer to you. So, when you were washed, you were washed by the word. When you were sanctified, you were sanctified by the word. When you were justified, you were justified by the Spirit.
Now let me give us a Scripture that we are also familiar with, the Bible says in Romans chapter 5 verse 1, therefore, having been justified by faith. That really shows us that the issue of justification is a faith thing. How many of us can see angels behind me? You can’t see it. Don't you know I'm not alone? Now, you can’t see it. But, should you think angels are behind me and you believe it, is it not a faith issue? Are you not having faith for a spiritual matter?
So, when we're dealing with faith, it's about things we can’t see. Our justification is about things we can’t see, it is a spiritual matter. That we are sons of our fathers, do they write it on the head? You have faith in you. You have this belief in you. I am so, so, so and so, the son of so, so, so and so, or the daughter. It is a spiritual matter. Nobody ties rope on your body and connect you to your father. Does anybody do that? No! What links you to your father that makes sure that you are accepted as a son is a faith thing. I know you are my son, wherever you go, I am your father. It's an understanding. And again, the blood of the father is in the son and the blood is also spiritual.
When we are dealing with justification, it is not necessarily the things you can see, the things you can figure out in your head. You have to believe that I, Adegboyega Adedeji I belong to God. I, Adegboyega Adedeji, I am God's righteousness in Christ Jesus. Your head will not swell up when you are believing it.
Many of us doubt our identity in God. And suddenly, we are waiting for fire to fall. We are waiting for thunders, we are waiting for earthquake so that we will suddenly believe that God loves us. No! Nothing like that will happen, you must believe it. Your justification is a faith thing. And it is executed by the Holy Spirit. The Spirit bears witness with our spirit, that we are children of God, and being children of God; we are heirs and joint heirs with Christ Jesus.
If these three things can take place in our lives by the Holy Spirit and the word of God, we will inherit the kingdom. If you can be sure that in spite of your past, you were washed. In spite of your past, you were sanctified. In spite of your past, you were justified. You don't sit down in your past. You leave the past to the present, believing that the past is past, you are a new man in Christ Jesus. You are going to inherit the kingdom. This is how we inherit. This is how our lives become different. They are not physical things. They are not things that are tangible.
When you see Pastor Adeboye or any great man that you think you know in the world, or a great woman that you know, you will never see anything physical that makes them to have a different life. You will see somebody just like you and I.
The Bible says, Elijah was a man of like passion. Moses was a man like you and I. All of them went to toilet. When they ate their own kind of “Akpu,” they went to toilet. They had to urinate. They had to do everything. They sweated; water came from their skin under the sun. They were not angels. They were not ghosts. They were people like you and I. But what happens to them? They were washed, they were sanctified, and they were justified by the word of God, by the power of the Lord Jesus Christ, by the Spirit of God.
So, we can do so much, we can do valiantly by the Spirit and by the word of God. So, if you want your life to change, engage the word of God, engage the Holy Spirit. That change is a matter of time, it is not in doubt.
