Destined to Reign (22 page)

Now, imagine that one day, Henry hears about your debt to Lawrence. And let’s say that Henry is a billionaire and a good friend to you. He needs to fly off to Paris, but before he leaves, he goes to Lawrence to find out how much you owe him. Lawrence tells him that you owe him US $50,000. Henry gives him US $1 million! Of course, Lawrence is shocked. He protests, saying that you do not owe him that much money. But Henry insists on giving him US $1 million because Henry loves you and wants to make sure that you will never feel the debt on your heart ever again.

So your debt is more than paid. But two things could still happen that would result in the debt remaining on your conscience. Let’s imagine that Henry had to rush off to Paris and had no time to speak to you, so he tasks one of his assistants to inform you that your debt has already been paid. But when the assistant speaks to you, he fails to fully convey the fact that your debt has been paid, and that Lawrence has in fact, been enriched by Henry because of the debt you owed him. The assistant says, “Er… I was told to tell you that your debt has been paid. But I’m not very sure of the details, so maybe it would be good for you to continue paying Lawrence whatever you can.”

What happened in this scenario? The messenger failed to convey the good news, and you are left with no assurance that your debt has really been paid and that you are free of it. This is sad, but do you know that this is precisely what is happening in the body of Christ? People are being told by preachers that Jesus did cry out “It is finished!” on the cross, but they are also being told that they still have to continue paying for their sin debts!

Let me ask you, once you have finished repaying the bank loan that you took for purchasing your house, do you still have to send in the monthly payments? Of course not! You should stop sending your checks to the bank because your debt has already been paid. If you continue to send those checks, you are wasting your time and money!

Let’s look at another possible scenario. Let’s say that Henry could not get in touch with you before flying off to Paris, so he tells a good friend of yours to tell you the good news that your debt has been fully paid. Your friend is so excited for you that he drives to your house even though it’s midnight and tells you, “Hallelujah! I’ve got good news for you! Your debt has been paid. In fact, it’s more than paid! You owed Lawrence US $50,000, but Henry gave Lawrence US $1 million to settle your debt!”

The messenger has conveyed the good news to you. It’s now up to you, the hearer, to believe the message. You can respond in disbelief, asking, “Are you sure? I’ve owed this debt for such a long time and now you’re telling me that it’s all paid up? You’re pulling my leg!” Or you can shout, “Hallelujah!” and rejoice over this unmerited gift from Henry that has cleared your debt completely!

When the messenger has conveyed the good news to you, it’s now up to you to believe the message.

Let me ask you this: If you don’t believe the good news, is your debt still paid?

One more time: If you refuse to believe that your debt has already been paid, is it still paid?

Yes! Your unbelief does not change the fact that your debt has been fully paid. BUT your unbelief means that you will still have debt on your conscience, and this will affect you negatively because every time you see Lawrence, you will still feel ashamed and want to avoid him! In contrast, if you believe the good news, you will not be avoiding Lawrence. In fact, knowing that he has become a millionaire because Henry overpaid your debt, you may even be bold enough to call him up and ask him for a treat!

My friend, Jesus has already paid your sin debt fully. Do you know what you are doing each time you allow that debt to remain on your conscience? Every time you are sin-conscious, you are insulting the payment of our Lord Jesus Christ. You are saying that it is not enough. You are saying that the cross is not enough. And you know what? You are also insulting the One who received the payment for your sin debt. Each time you try to pay off your sin debt which has already been paid, you are saying that God is not satisfied with Jesus’ payment even though the truth is that He is more than satisfied with Jesus’ overpayment. Jesus is the beloved Son of the living God. How can you say that His sacrifice is not enough?

Does it really matter if you condemn yourself and allow your sin debt to remain on your conscience even after Jesus has overpaid it? Yes, it matters because apart from dishonoring the work of Jesus on the cross, sin-consciousness makes you avoid God, and can produce in you condemnation, sicknesses, diseases, depression and a cycle of sin!

Listen closely, my friend, because of who Jesus is and the value of that one Man, the price that He paid for our sins was an
overpayment
. All the sinners put together cannot compare with the value of that one Man. Believe the good news and draw near to your Savior today! The Word of God declares to you that you can have “boldness to enter the Holiest by the blood of Jesus”
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. It declares to you that you can draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having your heart sprinkled from an evil conscience and your body washed with pure water
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. Rejoice, beloved!

Listen More To The Gospel Of Jesus

“Pastor Prince, I want to stop being so conscious of my sins, but how can I do that?”

The way out of sin-consciousness is to hear more teaching on the finished work of Jesus, and how His blood has cleansed and forgiven you of all your sins. When you receive Jesus as your sin offering, your heart will be sprinkled with His blood from an “evil conscience” because your sins have already been punished on His body. An evil conscience is a conscience that is constantly conscious of your sins. As you listen to Christ-exalting teachings, you will begin to be more conscious of your forgiveness than of your sins. And the moment you stop carrying sin-consciousness and condemnation in your mind and heart, you will be washed with the pure water of God’s Word, which will begin to affect your physical body and bring healing to every part that is not well!

Some Christians are not able to receive healing because they are not able to receive forgiveness. They are still sin-conscious and doubt their forgiveness. They believe that God may have forgiven their past sins, but not the sins of their whole life. God knows that people need the assurance that their sins are forgiven before they can receive healing in their bodies, so the Bible makes this very clear. In Psalms 103, when the psalmist lists the “benefits” from the Lord, he starts with “who forgives all your iniquities” before moving on to “who heals all your diseases”.

When the man sick with the palsy was lowered through the roof and placed before Jesus, Jesus said, “Son, your sins are forgiven you,” before telling him to arise, take up his bed and go to his house
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. Your sins are forgiven you, beloved. Stop punishing and condemning yourself. It’s time for you to freely receive your miracle from God!

“But I have sinned. How can there be no punishment for my sin?”

I do not deny that sin must be punished, but I am declaring to you that
all
your sins
have already been punished
on the body of Jesus. He is your perfect sin offering and we who have received His forgiveness should have no more consciousness of sins. Stop examining yourself and searching your heart for sin. Remember that when someone brings his sin offering to the priest, the priest does not examine him. He examines the sin offering. The priest is a picture of God. When you go to Him today, God does not examine you. He examines your sin offering. He examines Jesus, who is completely perfect and sinless, without spot, wrinkle or blemish. God accepts Jesus as your sin offering, and every one of your sins has been transferred onto His body!

Stop punishing yourself. Jesus has already been punished for your sins. Believe it and let your conscience be satisfied! Start enjoying all His benefits because they are your blood-bought rights. Read Psalm 103 and realize that forgiveness is yours. Healing is yours. Redemption from destruction is yours. Being crowned with loving kindness and tender mercies is yours. Renewal of youth is yours. Hallelujah! Simply believe that your sin debt has been settled and walk in these blessings today!

Stop punishing yourself. Jesus has already been punished for your sins. Believe it and let your conscience be satisfied!

Chapter 15: The Road To Emmaus

Whatever your need is today, whether it is physical, emotional, mental, social or financial, your solution is found in a greater revelation of Jesus. When Jesus is unveiled in all His magnificence, the poor will prosper, the weak will be made strong and the sick will be healed. In Luke chapter 4, He declared, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach the gospel...”
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Jesus was anointed to preach good news to you. So whenever you hear Jesus preached, good news will be proclaimed over your life, finances and marriage, and your entire household will be blessed beyond measure.

Whatever your need is today, your solution is found in a greater revelation of Jesus.

When Jesus rose from the dead, He ministered comfort to two disciples who were walking back from Jerusalem to a village called Emmaus. When He drew near to them and walked with them, they were feeling sad and discouraged as they conversed about the events that had transpired. The Bible says that the disciples’ eyes were restrained, so they did not recognize Jesus in His resurrected form.

Jesus asked them, “What kind of conversation is this that you have with one another as you walk and are sad?”
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The disciples then began to narrate the events that had happened to Jesus, and how He was condemned to die and was crucified. From the way they spoke, you could tell that they did not believe that Jesus would be resurrected. They said that they were
hoping
that it was Jesus who was going to redeem Israel and were
astonished
when certain women of their company, who had gone to Jesus’ tomb, told them that they could not find His body. When they finished, Jesus said:

Luke 24:25
25

“O
foolish
ones, and
slow of heart to believe
in all that the prophets have spoken!”

These are the two indictments against the body of Christ today. The first is that we are “foolish”, that is, we are suffering from ignorance and the lack of knowledge of and revelation from the Word of God. The second is that even when we do have knowledge of the Word, we are “slow of heart to believe”. Now, our Lord Jesus is so loving that He would not just tell them what their problem was without giving them the solution. Look at what Jesus did immediately after He pronounced the two indictments:

Luke 24:27

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And beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures
the things concerning Himself
.

This is amazing! Right there, on the road to Emmaus, Jesus began to expound the Scriptures. He started at Moses, which refers to the first five books of the Bible (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy), before moving on to the rest of the Old Testament, which would include the major and minor prophets. He expounded to them all “the things concerning Himself ” in every single book, showing them pictures of Himself in every page. What a tremendous time of Bible study it must have been!

This tells us that every page in the Bible is about Jesus. Jesus is in the Old Testament
concealed
, and in the New Testament
revealed
. There are no insignificant details in the Bible and everything in it is there to point to Jesus.

I can just imagine their excitement when Jesus began to unveil to them that He was the promised seed in the garden of Eden who would crush Satan’s head. Then, He would have moved on to share about how each of the five Levitical offerings depicted His one perfect work on the cross. He would have shared about the high priest and how even the high priest’s garments spoke of Himself as our perfect representative before God. Can you imagine it?

Jesus would even have unveiled all the typologies embedded in the Old Testament stories. He would have told them how He was typified in Joseph’s character — how He was rejected by His own Jewish brothers, but would become the bread of life to the Gentile world and marry a Gentile bride (that’s the church today — we are His Gentile bride!). He would have expounded all that and much, much more! One day, when I am in heaven, I will ask the Lord to show me a video of this wonderful Bible study that the Lord led the disciples through on the road to Emmaus!

Jesus Showed Us How To Study The Bible

I used to wonder why the Lord restrained the eyes of the two disciples from seeing that it was Him when He first spoke to them. Then one day, the Lord spoke to me about this. He said, “I didn’t want them to see Me as the risen Jesus because I wanted them to hear the Scriptures first. I didn’t want them to have faith in Me simply because they saw Me. I wanted them to have faith in Me because they heard the Scriptures talking about Me. And that’s the same privilege I am giving the church today.” I was so glad when I heard that. Today, we don’t have to wish that we were living in the days of Jesus or that Jesus would appear to us — His way is for us to see Him in the Scriptures!