Remember Who You Are

November 29, 2009 by PastorDave.

#369, Remember Who You Are, Pastor David McIntosh, Sunday, 11-29-2009

Title: Remember Who You Are
Text: 2 Corinthians 5:17

Introduction

• We are in the 4th Sunday of a series focused on healthy relationships. We have looked at taking care of offenses, family relationships, our attitude, today we want to focus on the most important person you talk to every day: YOURSELF.
• What we say to ourselves each day often determines the kind of person we become; which directly affects our relationships with other people.
• What we believe about ourselves is often controlled by other people, culture around us, or it’s just what I want to believe.
• The question we need to be asking ourselves is: What does God and His Word have to say about who I am?
• 2 Corinthians 5:17 – “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!”
• “But when we live more according to our own design than God’s we suffer. We have our own ways of coping with life and its hurts instead of searching for God’s principles that will lead us into the light.”  –How People Grow—
• For many of us, the biggest obstacle to healthy relationships is us! We have believed lies about who we are and even though we became born again by repenting and receiving Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior we still believe the old lies and have not understood who we have become in Jesus. (“The old has gone the new has come!)
• It is my desire today to share two things: Remind you who you are and expose old lies that still control our relationships in life.

REMEMBER WHO YOU ARE

1. 2 Corin. 5:17 – “new creation” (the old has gone; the old ways, the old relationships)
2. 1 Peter 4:3,4 –For you have spent enough time in the past doing what pagans choose to do—living in debauchery (pleasure without restrain), lust, drunkenness, orgies, carousing and detestable idolatry. They think it strange that you do not plunge with them into the same flood of dissipation (extravagant waste), and they heap abuse on you.
3. In Jesus Christ your relationships are not rooted in the activities or the lifestyle that you used to live in. In the world, most of our relationships are based on this way of living.
4. You are a “new creation.” And here is the thing that makes everything about who you are and what you do NEW:

5. John 14:15-17 – If you love me, you will obey what I command. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever—the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you.
6. The Holy Spirit (Spirit of Truth) lives inside of you!
7. John 14:23 – If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.  (YOU HAVE NEW ROOMMATES)
8. What are the results of the Holy Spirit living in my spirit?
9. 2 Peter 1:3 – His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.”
10. Result: DIVINE POWER (inside of you lives a power to make the right choice ever time)
11. 2 Peter 1:4 – so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.
12. Result: PARTICIPATION IN THE DIVINE NATURE (inside of you lives a nature that is perfect & sinless)
13. You are a new creation, which means that the Holy Spirit lives inside of you and is making His home with you. This results in a divine power & nature that now live in you giving you the power to escape the evil desires of this world and become the person you’ve always wanted to be for God!!     HOW MUCH POWER IS IN YOU?
14. Romans 8:11 – And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you.
15. Resurrection power lives in you. The Spirit that has enough power to raise Jesus from the dead (resurrection power) lives in you. Now that is power. (STOP & PRAISE GOD)
16. See, we forget who we are when we become a born again child of God.
17. If we would remember who we are in Christ and surrender to it and believe it in faith then we could overcome the lies we believe about ourselves.

LIES WE BELIEVE THAT HINDER HEALTHY RELATIONSHIPS

1. “I AM WORTHLESS” This is a lie that results from us living inside of the painful memories & consequences of our past failures & bad choices. Not only do we now live with the power to change the future but our value is not based on our achievements, our value is based on the eternal truth that we are God’s workmanship!
2. Ephesians 2:10 – For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”
3. “I AM A FAILURE” This lie results from the thought that we can achieve our own success and that we will be judged on our success rather than our faithfulness.
4. Luke 18:8 – However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?
5. “I DO NOT FIT IN” The lie here is that we are supposed to fit in with our secular culture. We are not called to fit in; we are called to be a light in a dark place!
6. Romans 12:2 – Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
7. “I MUST HIDE MY FAULTS” The lie here is that if people really know who I am they will despise me and laugh at me. The second lie is thinking that no one else has faults like I do. (most people admire those who can humbly share their faults, it is inspiring)
8. James 5:26 – Confess your faults one to another, and pray for one another, that ye may be healed.
9. “I AM ALL ALONE” This lie twists the truth about loneliness. Loneliness is not the absence of people but the fear of sharing my inner most thoughts and feelings with another person. (no one wants to do this with you more than God does)
10. Hebrews 13:5 –I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.
11. “I CAN NEVER CHANGE” This lie is based on the thought that change depends on our human efforts or performance. True change does not happen by the efforts of our intellect, emotions or will, but by building a new believe system in our hearts based on the Word of God and letting the Holy Spirit be in charge.
12. Philippians 4:13 – I can do everything through him who gives me strength.

OUR PART

1. In Jesus Christ we are new creations. The Holy Spirit lives inside of us and pours out divine power & nature in our lives. It is resurrection power, because it is the same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead.
2. With this truth, we have great value, we are God’s workmanship, we are lights in a dark world, our faults & weaknesses can be used by God for His Glory, we are never alone and we have supernatural ability to change and be transformed!!
3. But this does not mean that we do not have to do anything!!
4. “We have to risk. We have to love, open up, confess, reach out, repent, obey, and do all the things we are commanded to do. Our part is to live the life.”  –Dr. Henry Cloud—
5. Ephesians 3:16-19 – I pray that our of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you being rooted and established in love, may have power, together will all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

ALTAR: Altar of Filling (Divine power/nature) Freedom (lies) Faith (live the life)

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