If you go into what God has for you wearing
the shame of what was done to you… You have to get it off you. I realized a couple of years ago that what
the Enemy would do to shut down my gift God gave me was to try to put layers of guilt
on me. He would want to use things that were imperfect
about me or others to keep me from ministering freely. I'll tell you about one thing. Holly leaned over to me one night. I was struggling with feelings of resentment. People were criticizing our ministry a lot
in this particular season. I'm sure they still do now. I just don't look as much because I'm not
as stupid as I was back in the day, thinking God had prophets in the comments section. Listen to what happened. I began to think everybody was like that,
and I took it on me. She looked at me one night and said, "You
can't keep preaching out of anger, and you can't keep leading this defensively, because
you love people." Well, when she said that, it contradicted
exactly how I felt about this species she mentioned called people. Even the look on my face… I remember her rubbing my eyebrows a little
bit because they were so furrowed. Sometimes I have that RBF, resting believer
face, resentful believer face. She was rubbing my eyebrows, and she goes,
"You've always loved people." She said, "Do you remember in college how
everybody on that campus…?" We couldn't even go when we were dating… We went to this strict school, this Baptist
school. They wouldn't let you go into each other's
dorms, and that was probably a good thing. Co-ed dorms… They didn't let us do that, so we'd be trying
to sit outside on a bench or something. She said, "There was always a receiving line
of people who wanted to talk to you, not because you had a title, just because of what was
in you. You've always loved people." She said, "I was scared to go outside with
you, because I didn't feel like talking to them, because I don't love people like you
love people." But there was a lot on me. Jacob said, "You put a lot of trouble on me." I was allowing what was on me to make me forget
what was in me. Have you ever done it before? She said, "You love people. You had a secret handshake with everybody
on that campus." It's really true. Then I was thinking, "Well, you don't even
know the half of it." When my high school class was graduating,
280 people at Berkeley High School, I hugged every one of them on our graduation night. I mean, down to the last one of them, the
people I couldn't stand, and all of them. That was in me. Now I realize the pressures and the problems
of what life puts on you, things like offense and bitterness, can keep you from remembering
what's in you, but if you really go back to Bethel and remember, it's always been in you. Tony, I had my best friend Eric come with
me to the recording we did in January, because he was with me at the college when we had
a choir. My choir was not good, but it was in me then. Then through what God has given you… It was amazing, because Eric said, "This is
it. This is what you were trying to do in college,
but you sucked at it, and that guy did it, and now you took part." I said, "Yeah, it's always been in me." It's always been in you. You were beating on that… It sounded like a trash can, but it was in
you. The rhythm was in you. It's in you. What you have to be so careful about is not
to let people put anything on you… I'm not just talking about failure; I'm talking
about success. Jacob's biggest issue is that he always identified
himself by something external. So, when it came time to make peace with Esau,
he sent gifts ahead of him, because he thought, "Maybe my gift will bring me peace." Some of us are like that. We always think we have to make a good impression. We're always living in an avatar. We're always living in some version of ourselves
that seems presentable. Or we're always identified (I talked to you
about this last week) by what we can do. In doing what we can do, other people will
identify you by what you can do, and then they will limit you by what you can do, and
then you will begin to think you are what you do, and then you will lose yourself and
gain the world, and Jesus said, "What good is it?" Don't let anybody put anything on you that
will cause you to forget what God put in you. That goes for your struggles. See, I think Jacob… His name means supplanter, but his new name
Israel is almost just as bad. It means struggles with God. So, he's trying to get him to see, "You've
never been fighting with Laban. You've never been fighting with Esau. The fight you have to win for your life has
not been with them. It's always been in you. Because if you believe it's in you, there's
nothing anybody can put on you that can cancel what I put in you." "Before you were born I appointed you a prophet
to the nations." It's always been in you. That teaching gift has always been in you. You just had to get past what you had put
on yourself, the idea that "I'm not a preacher; I'm just a little girl. I don't have anything to say." That was always in you. It was in you when you were sitting at Life
Action revival listening to Steve Canfield six nights a week and God was filling you
with his Word. It just took the right rain to bring the seed
out of the soil for what God put in you when you were just a little girl. It's always been in you. There's nobody who can leave my life who can
keep God from keeping his covenant with me. I'm not in covenant with a person. I'm not in covenant with a political party. I'm in covenant with God Almighty! "I am God Almighty." Get that off you! That's not your name. That's not your station. That's not your end. It's in me! It is God who worketh in you! It's always been in you. The struggle has never been with someone else;
the struggle has been within yourself. God gave Jacob a new name, Israel, but he
still has to struggle. Are y'all confused? I'm confused. God already gave him his new name in Genesis
32. I'll show you. This is right before Jacob made peace with
Esau, and Esau had already made peace with Jacob. Jacob had to make peace with Jacob. It's in you. This is what the Lord said: "Your name will
no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with humans and
have overcome." Hold on. Why is he telling him again in Genesis 35? I'll tell y'all next week. Goodbye. If y'all want to know now, call me back, because
I already… I thought, "Well, God must have told him something
extra the second time that he didn't tell him the first time," so I compared the two. In Genesis 35:10 he says, "Your name is Jacob,
but you will no longer be called Jacob; your name will be Israel." God actually said less the second time than
he did the first time. Then I thought maybe it wasn't what God said,
it was what he didn't say that would show me what we needed to know about the struggle
we find ourselves in right now. See, the first time, God focused on Jacob's
struggle. "I'll call you Israel because you've struggled
with God and men and have overcome." The second time, God didn't mention his struggle. He mentioned his seed. Because Israel was more than a name. Look at verse 11. "I am God Almighty; be fruitful and increase
in number. A nation…" Did you catch it? "A nation." Israel wasn't just a name; it was a nation. Simeon and Levi, the ones that Jacob said,
"You're bringing me all this trouble," who were teenagers at the time, were the forefathers
God would use to birth a nation through which God would extend his covenant with all peoples. But you will never produce your nation if
you don't know your name. This word is for anyone who has had so much
on you. I'm talking about shame. I'm talking about regret. I'm talking about pressure. I'm talking about the things that make you
anxious, questions, that you've forgotten what's in you and how God met you in your
Bethels along the way. This season of your life is going to be a
Bethel you will return to in future days. There are kings in you. There are crowns in you. There's legacy in you. There are dreams in you. There's ministry in you. There is medicine in your leaves. There is healing in you. There are things God desires to release through
your life that will change the generations that will share your last name. So, do not let what's on you kill what is
in you. You are Israel. There are nations in you, and it's always
been in you. There was nothing you could do to change it. The gift has always been in you, and so has
the fear. They both wrestle with each other in the same
womb until the day you die. But do not let anybody or situation or setback
put a name on you by which you call yourself that will cause you to forfeit what God had
put in you. I believe there are some things I need to
bury under the oak in Shechem today. I believe God wants me to turn this church
into a changing room today, where you remember that it is not circumcision or uncircumcision
that counts. None of that external stuff matters, not when
it comes to the heart of God. What matters to God has always been in you. If you win this in you, there is nothing that
will happen around you that can keep God from establishing his covenant in the earth. You have a covenant with God. Have you made your covenant with your struggle
greater than your covenant with your God? You allowed the pressure of it, the fear of
it, and the terror of it… God was dealing with all the external stuff. God was preventing the enemies from even attacking
Jacob. If you pay attention to what's in you, God
knows what's on you. He knows you've been trying to manage and
multitask. He sees all of that, and he knows all of that,
and he knows you don't know what's next. That's why he gave me the Bethel revelation. "I'm the God of Bethel. I'm the God of 'I don't know what's next.' I'm the God of your new name, and there are
nations in you." And it's always been in you. It's always been in you, since you were a
little girl, since you were a young boy. God said, "Be fruitful and increase. Bring forth what I planted. Don't let anything stop you from it. For I am God Almighty. I put a nation in you. Those teenagers you stand with today are going
to be the heads of the nations."
