He is Beside you— I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. — John 15:15

He is Beneath you— As you come to him, the living Stone—rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him—you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. — 1 Peter 2:4-5

He is Behind you—For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin—Romans 6:6

He is Before you—Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. —Philippians 3:13-14

He is Above you—at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.—Philippians 2:10-11

He is Inside you—But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness. —Romans 8:10

Two reasons why you need to know how to do battle:

Jesus says: YOU WILL BE IN A FIGHT
“In this world you will have trouble.” - John 16:33
“All men will hate you because of me…” - Matthew 10:22

Satan is: LOOKING FOR A FIGHT
Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. - 1 Peter 5:8

What happens when I fight the battle my way?

• I’m limited to MY STRENGTH
• I’m limited to MY WISDOM
• I risk losing more than THE BATTLE

What do I need to know?

I need to know MY SAVIOR
“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” - John 16:33

I need to know MY ENEMY
For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. - Ephesians 6:12

I need to know MY STANDING
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. - Romans 8:37

I need to know MY WEAPONS
The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. - 2 Corinthians 10:4

What do I need to do?

I need to hold onto MY DESTINY
Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called when you made your good confession in the presence of many witnesses. - 1 Timothy 6:12

I need to hold onto MY FAITH
Timothy, my son, I give you this instruction in keeping with the prophecies once made about you, so that by following them you may fight the good fight, holding on to faith and a good conscience. Some have rejected these and so have shipwrecked their faith. - 1 Timothy 1:18-19

I need to remember MY REWARD
I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day—and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing. - 2 Timothy 4:7-8

I need to GEAR UP
Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. -Ephesians 6:13

I need to TEAM UP
And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it. - Matthew 16:18

Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective. - James 5:16

Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”- Matthew 28:18-20

Who are you? That’s not a question we deal with often, but ultimately it is a question we all have to answer.

Your first impulse might be to state what you do. “I’m a business man. I’m a contractor. I’m a secretary.” But as long as we see ourselves through the lens of what we do, we risk an identity crisis every time our performance doesn’t meet up with our expectations. When we do well, we feel good about ourselves. When we do not, well, lets not talk about it…

The question, “Who are you?” is a question of identity. What we believe about ourselves determines what we believe we are worth, what we will settle for, what we will strive for, and who we’ll associate with. But the most important thing our identity does is it defines to whom we belong.

After Jesus rose from the dead He gave His closest followers an assignment: to go and make disciples. The first part of the discipleship process? Baptize them. What’s baptism? Identification.

When you get baptized, you make a statement of identification. You are saying to yourself, to God, and to the world you no longer belong to who and what you belonged to before. You now belong to God, Jesus Christ and His church. You are making a public declaration that you now have a new tribe.

What makes this important is that we have a habit of slipping back to our old ways. When we do, it is much too easy to let our behavior tear down our identity. We are quickly convinced of our lack of worth. It is in that moment that we need to look back on that day when we were baptized and say, “I am of infinite worth. Not because of what I have done or will do, but because of the infinite love of the infinite One who loves and values me infinitely.”

God, for whom and through whom everything was made, chose to bring many children into glory. And it was only right that he should make Jesus, through his suffering, a perfect leader, fit to bring them into their salvation. – Hebrews 2:11

Could it really be possible that you could be considered God’s family? After all, you and God couldn’t be any more different. If it were left up to you or I, there would be no possibility of relationship with God, let alone a familial connection.

Lucky for us, we have nothing to do with it. God created everything. That means He has the power to make something from nothing. When there is no shred of desire for God, God can infuse our hearts with a love so unexplainable that it changes our desires. Everything God created, He created for Himself. God hasn’t chosen us to be a part of His family for us, but because we being in His family brings Him glory.

Do you want to glorify God? Then celebrate and live in the reality that you are God’s child and Jesus is your brother! That brings God great pleasure and shows off His power and love to a world in desperate need of both.

Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. - John 15:13

“What have you sacrificed?”

That was the question I was asked one night as I was teaching about the Christian lifestyle. The main topic that night was the the idea that if we want to see God move we need to have an unyielding commitment to the mission that God has given us. Commitment always involves sacrifice.

It was a tough question for me. You see, I wouldn’t trade my life and what I am doing for anything. I am convinced I am right where God wants me doing what God wants me to do. It was hard to think of what I had given up because what I have received from God has been so much greater.

The truth is, anyone who seeks to lead people sacrifices greatly. The greater one’s leadership, the greater the commitment. The greater the commitment, the greater the sacrifice. I could talk all day about the time, the money, the career, and the emotional sacrifice required to make a mark for God’s kingdom. The price is steep.

The Christian life is not a life of ease. It is one of determination and grit. It is one of selfless love. The kind of love that says, “I will give up my rights so others can know the freedom I know.” Jesus puts it plainly: the greatest love is the love expressed by someone who surrenders his or her life for others. And He didn’t just say it. He demonstrated it. That’s sacrifice.

This isn’t news, really. We all understand that the greater the commitment the greater the sacrifice. That’s why so many of us don’t really want to step into this deep a love. We see the cost as too high. It’s just not worth it to us. So, we regulate the sacrifice by regulating the the commitment. But here’s the thing: The greater the sacrifice, the greater the reward.

Jesus gave it all and inherited the universe. When we live out the kind of selfless love Jesus does, we become co-inheritors of that very same kingdom. Not in the future, mind you, but right here and right now. We get front row seats in every situation to see the power of God work in people’s lives. We get to experience the daily touch and feel the warp and wane of the movement of the Holy Spirit. We get to dream dreams and know that God is the author and sustainer of those visions.

That’s why it was so hard for me to answer that question that night. When what you get in return is so much greater than what you give up, it’s hard to see anything as a sacrifice. But you have to give it up before you can experience that perspective. On the backside, all you can see is the reward. It’s only sacrifice on the front-end.

I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. - John 15:11

I hate unfinished projects. Unfinished projects have a habit of remaining unfinished longer than you ever expected. To make things worse, most of the time the reason an unfinished project doesn’t get finished is because another project gets started before the first project finds its end. Then, of course, there is always a third, or fourth, or fiftieth project. Before you know it you have more unfinished projects than you know what to do with.

As much as I hate unfinished projects, I find I am a master at them. I have no end of good ideas and good intentions. There is no short supply of motivation at acting on a good idea. It’s the follow-through to the end that is hardest for me.

Jesus has a project for each and everyone of us. His project is that we live lives of joy. He isn’t satisfied with us experiencing moments of joy. He wants us to not only to experience joy but to own it. Partial joy is not enough. He wants us to have a joy that is complete. A complete joy is a joy that is still there when the bills are due. It’s there when we get the breakup call. It’s there when we don’t get the job. It’s there when we get the flat tire. It’s there when we don’t get the grade we wanted. It’s there when we don’t achieve our goals on time. It’s there when we find out we won’t achieve a particular goal ever.

How do we do that? Jesus says, “Love each other as I have loved you.” (vs. 12)

That’s the trick. The better we learn to love others, the more complete our joy is. God-powered, God-sustained, God-oriented joy is always, always, always gained in the context of relationship. If your relationship with God is great, and all your other relationships are great, the external circumstances of life won’t touch your joy. If your relationships are out of whack, you joy will suffer.

Want joy? Finish your “loving people” project.

“As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now, remain in my love. If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in his love.” – John 15:9-10

It’s not enough to be loved by God the Father and by Jesus. Jesus says we need to remain in His love. Implied in that statement is the idea that we need to receive the love that God has for us through His Son, Jesus. God can love us all day long, but we don’t experience life change until we open ourselves up to that love.

How do we do that? By saying to God, what you want is what I want. That’s the essence of loving God–total surrender. Too often we wonder about (or completely doubt) our ability to give ourselves totally to God. But ask yourself the question, can you do it now? In this moment, for this moment alone, can you want what God wants and only what God wants? Great. That’s one moment, now string two moments together.

Stringing moments together requires that we have moment-by-moment fellowship with God Himself. It requires that we be constantly aware of His presence, His care, His power. When we do that, we remain in His love.