Let's jump in with Graham.

So he makes a decision.

He takes a few of his friends with him, you know, just so that they can back him up later because he knows he's going to have to explain this to the boys back in Jerusalem at some point.

So he takes a few backup witnesses and he, and he goes and finds himself outside a Gentile house.

And he's never been in a Gentile house before.

And so he has another dilemma right now.

And we have to understand how difficult this was for Peter, because what the Lord is asking him to do is go against all of his cultural upbringing and against all of his traditions.

Let's jump in with Graham.

Renewing your spiritual lens.

You know, a lens is a simple technology.

It either... bends the light so that you can see things more clearly, or it blocks the light so that what you're seeing is blurred and ill-defined.

Everyone comes into life with a lens.

It's shaped by your family life, by your upbringing.

It's shaped by your cultural values, what's going on in the world at the time.

Let's jump in with Graham.

Actually, the thing I really love about the fruit of the spirit is each one of them has a voice, and you can hear God's heart through each particular fruit.

So a, a thing I often say to people I'm mentoring is, "What fruit of the spirit do you think God is wanting to develop you into right now? Why don't you start to hear God speak in that particular way?" So for example, if, you know, if, if God wants to develop joy in you, then why don't you hear...

You can choose to hear His voice as joyful.

That's what I'm saying.

Yeah? So I want you to hear everything that follows in this series in the same voice that God is using towards you.

And when the Lord is talking with us about our process of transformation, it's always with a deeply affectionate, beautifully gentle voice and manner.

That was a beautiful, intimate moment story with God.

And I think we're in one of those moments, I think, in the spirit where the Lord is saying to people on the air right now, he's saying, you're not as close to me as you want to be and you're not as close to me as i would like i love you and i want to be with you so i would love it if you wanted to be with me so there is a new beginning for people there's some people who've been saved 30 years and you feel you're in a place in your life where Some things could have happened and should have happened, but they didn't.

And the Lord is saying that you pulled back because you were scared of doing ministry.

You didn't want to get out there.

I understand that I am a massive introvert.

Thank the Lord for that.

I love being an introvert because introverts love to think and they love to be still.

Beautiful.

Let's jump in with Graham.

You've often heard me say, "What you think about God is the most important thought you'll ever have." God's primary purpose is making us into his own image, but really, what is that image, and are we seeing him in the fullness of who he is? The true nature of God is clearly evidenced in the fruit of the Spirit, because these are not merely attributes that he has.

They are the very character of the relationship between the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit.

Because God is love, he embodies joy.

He is the Prince of Peace, and every single fruit of the Spirit is an invitation to encounter God.

It's a door that's wide open to transformation.

You know, in 40 years of ministry, I've seen a lot of people who were touched by God, but ultimately not changed, men and women who had powerful encounters with God, but never converted their experiences into transformation in the daily image of Christ.

Let's jump in with Graham.

Never think below the level of your privilege in Christ.

It's important for us.

You know, there's a lot of doomsday merchants in the body of Christ.

A lot of people looking at the news and interpreting our circumstances spiritually through what's happening in the world.

Forget that.

That's the dumbest thing ever.

We're all going to be learning

Let's jump in with Graham Cooke.

So I wanna talk to you about standing firm, and I wanna read you something from the Bible.

Don't you love this book? Like, you have to kiss the Bible at least once a day, 'cause, uh, I think it's in the Bible somewhere, I just haven't found that verse yet, but it should be in the Bible if it's not.

Kiss the word every day.

[lips smacking] Yeah? 'Cause it's absolutely amazing.

So this is Ephesians 6:10.

"Finally, be strong in the Lord." Why isn't that up front? Paul, what were you thinking? It- "Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might.

[laughs]

Let's jump in with Graham.

It's time to cross over the Jordan of our circumstances and live in the place that God has provided for us.

It's time to fight for the things that matter.

Fight for your prophecy.

Wage war with it.

With these words previously spoken over you, fight a good fight.

The Lord wants to teach you occupancy, and you must believe, He says, you must believe that I am is your, is in your footsteps of power.

Let's jump in with Graham.

Your confession in the face of overwhelming forces is really important.

Here's David's in Psalm 23:5.

He said, "You prepare a table for me in the presence of my enemies.

You anoint my head with oil.

My cup overflows.

Goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life, and I will live in the house of the Lord forever." What's that? It, it ...

Let's jump in with Graham.

Well, let me read you the last part of that, Joshua.

"This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so you may be careful to do according to all that's written in it.

For then you will make your way prosperous, and you will have success.

Have I not commanded you, 'Be strong and courageous'?" Three times it uses that phrase in this passage, and what the Lord is saying is, "Get a mindset that's based on majesty so that you're always strong and courageous, just like us.

Do not tremble or be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go." Being in Christ means that we're more like God than we realize.

In Christ, we are elevated to a place of passion beyond our natural selves.

Let's jump in with Graham.

Key number two is that majesty is defined as having a glory, as being part of the glory of God in His presence.

The, the Bible says that God will not give His glory to another, but you're not another.

[laughs]

Right? You're not another.

You are the bride of Christ.

You're definitely not another.

He's definitely committed to bringing you into that space of glory in His presence, where there's something about you that resonates in the earth, something about you that radiates.

Let's jump in with Graham.

It's a mindset that's learning by experience that Jesus is head over all things to the Church.

Let me read you something that's actually in the Bible.

Ephesians 1:18, "I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you will know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the surpassing greatness of His power towards us who believe.

These are in accordance with the working of the strength of His might, which He brought about in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come.

And He put all things in subjection under His feet, and gave Him as head over all things to the Church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all and in all." And Chapter 3 verse 14, "For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner man, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God.

Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or even think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be the glory in the Church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever." The language in scripture about Jesus is so strong, so powerful.

Let's jump in with Graham.

I want to talk to you about something that's very dear to the heart of the Holy Spirit, which is the majesty that belongs to Jesus.

You know, the Bible says in John 16 that the Holy Spirit is the spirit of disclosure.

He takes everything that belongs to Jesus, and He makes it real to us, and one of those things is majesty.

So I want to talk to you about the identity of majesty and how majesty changes us.

If we're to walk with God in the fullness of all that He is within Himself, then we must obey the relational word to give Him the preeminence in all things, and that's in Colossians 1:18.

It says, "He also is the head of the body, the church, and He is the beginning.

[laughs]

You gotta confess what you are called to, and then you gotta turn that into an overcoming language that makes you press in.

Standing is cool.

Pressing in, I think is better.

Walking forward under pressure saying, "You can't beat me.

You can't beat me.

You can't beat me." I love it that, you know, God gives us levels.

Whoo.

Let's jump in with Graham Cooke.

We're learning to see ourselves in Christ in a more dynamic way.

And so those truths give you a new language.

Jesus came saying, "You have heard it said, but now I say." What was he doing? He came to transition us from an old covenant to a new one, from a visitational relationship to a habitational relationship.

He came to teach us about the kingdom and to give us a language from that domain.

So every one of us has to learn a foreign language.

That means for me, there came a point when I had to make a decision to be an Englishman second and be a man of the kingdom first, 'cause I had to learn a foreign language different than English.

Let's jump in with Graham Cooke.

Here's the thing.

If you're in Christ, it is your birthright as a born again believer living in the new man to present yourself to the enemy as one who is alive to God in Christ, and therefore, overcoming is now genetic.

It's in your DNA as a born again believer.

You're born again into Christ.

That means you're dead to who you are, but you're born again into Christ.

You have a different DNA in Jesus.

Let's jump in with Graham.

If we don't surrender to sovereignty, we can't have any authority.

Otherwise, you'll be trying to drum up your power, you'll be trying to exercise your authority, and you'll be in the flesh.

Authority comes through surrender.

You surrender to sovereignty, authority is the result of that surrender.

Really important that internally you submit to lordship.

He is Lord, you're not, and so you can't make yourself strong.

Let's jump in with Graham Cooke.

What do we get to inherit in this conflict? What territory could become ours? We stand in this space and we occupy it in our standing in Jesus, and we learn how to prosper in it because majesty is with us.

It's a perspective.

In 2 Kings chapter six, the prophet Elisha, he'd been a problem to the enemy for years.

Israel were always getting out of trouble because they realized, in the, in, in the camp of Midian, they realized that Israel were always prospering in battle because they had a prophet who could hear from God and who heard the words.

Even when they had secret meetings, they realized that he was hearing stuff.

They realized they've got a supernatural presence that tells them everything we're doing.

[laughs]

Let's jump in with Graham Cooke.

So here were guys who had no intimacy, so when they went out there, what the enemy was doing overwhelmed them and overcame them, and they came back and they gave this report.

They said, "We're not able to go up against the people," Numbers 13:31, "for they're too strong for us." So they gave out to the sons of Israel a bad report of the land which they'd spied out, saying, "The land through which we've gone, in spying it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great size.

Therefore we also saw the Nephilim," the sons of Anak, a part of the Nephilim.

They were just a race of giant guys.

"And we became like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight." That's the language of someone who is utterly overwhelmed by the circumstances of life.

Here's the thing we have to understand.

Let's jump in with Graham Cooke.

So I wanna talk to you in this session about what makes a good fight.

My own particular promise from the Lord was given to me as a baptismal verse e- about 100 years ago, and it's 1 Timothy 6:12, "Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold of eternal life to which you were called and you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses." And really since that moment, you know, because we had faithful elders who prayed for weeks about the right verse to give me when I got baptized.

And, and, and then they not only spoke it over me, but beforehand they said, "We chose this verse because of this." And what was fascinating was these guys didn't believe in the prophetic, but they prophesied over me.

[laughs] It's like the Holy Spirit is like, "Whatever, we're still gonna do it." Right? [laughs] Whatever.

[laughs] God is present future with us, which means He's entirely prophetic in everything that He does.

And so when they explained to me why they gave me that verse and what they really felt about the dynamic of where my life would go, it really created something in me and, and I began to be fascinated by the idea of what is a good fight and how can we win every time, no matter the odds against us.

Let's jump in with Graham Cooke.

So the f-first battle, and it's gotta be a joyful battle that we're engaged in, is reclaiming our inner territory for Jesus.

That's what we're doing this weekend, making sure that the door is closed on the enemy and it's open to the fullness of who we really are, and how to turn the tables on the enemy who may have turned the tables on us.

Warfare is about taking ground in people's lives.

It's about changing the climate, shifting the atmosphere away from negativity towards kindness and laughter and peace and so on.

And it's about occupying that space in a way that glorifies the Lord.

We are engaged as a community in Santa Barbara in pressing into people exactly what we believe about the Lord Jesus and how wonderful He is.

Let's jump in with Graham Cooke.

I often tell people in, when I'm doing schools of prophecy, if you wanna speak the words of God, you've gotta stop gossiping.

You've gotta stop slandering people.

You've gotta stop speaking negatively.

Yeah, you've gotta stop speaking harshly, and so on.

You have to watch your mouth.

Watch your tongue.

Let's jump in with Graham Cooke.

[upbeat music] I've been privileged to have a number of warfare dreams throughout my four decades of walking with the Lord.

One of my favorite ones was in this dream.

We'd just won this fight, but we paid a heavy price, and we were much reduced, and we, we were outnumbered, but we won.

We're all high-fiving each other, those of us who can lift our hands, [laughs] you know, 'cause we're so tired.

And I remember we're talking, and suddenly trumpets are blowing and a new big army of the enemy takes the field, and it seems to be bigger than the one we've just defeated.

And I look around and we have no reinforcements.

What changes when we start living from that truth? Let's jump in with Graham Cooke.

Jesus paid a price for us to be here, and we pay a price, too, but it's not something we're bothered about.

It's actually something we're excited about.

I love that.

I was reading a biography of J.C. Penney, and his whole goal was his...

I loved his whole attitude and approach.

He said, "My goal in business is to tithe at 90%, 'cause I figure if God can live on 10%, so can I." But here's the thing.

Let's jump in with Graham Cooke.

We are unashamed triumphalists.

2 Corinthians 2:14 says, thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ.

What we're learning is the always part, that we have an expectation of fighting and winning.

My baptismal verse, 1 Timothy 6:12, was, "Fight the good fight of faith.

Lay hold of eternal life." Fight the good fight.

This is a good fight because we get to win, and we get to learn how to win in increasingly more powerful ways.