Greetings in the Name of Jesus and welcome to the PLN Sunday Night Bible Fellowship!

 

Welcome back from vacation everyone. We hope you enjoyed your summer and were able to use our repeat articles to strengthen your foundation on the subject of biblical PROSPERITY. With this issue tonight we resume our regular schedule on the current topic of Prosperity School 101 and let's start out by remembering where we were when we left off just before the beginning of June.

 

Hopefully you'll recall that the main purpose of PROSPERITY SCHOOL is to study what the Bible actually says about PROSPERITY and then break away from conflicting manmade traditions and thinking so we can be open to receive one of God's major blessings. As discussed previously, PROSPERITY is a word that's mentioned in Scripture almost 100 times and most of those mentions are positive. But many folks in the Body of Christ insist on casting it in a negative light because of unscriptural teachings from the past that influenced their thinking. Never mind that it's the Holy Spirit who caused it to be mentioned there so many times so we could study it and learn about it and come to understand and use it correctly. No friend, as we've already discussed PROSPERITY is a bible word and it's too good to just throw away!

 

To be truly PROSPEROUS in a bible sense means to be SUCCESSFUL in every area of life: spirit, soul and body. Sometimes we tend to just equate it to financial success but God's PROSPERITY isn't limited to finances. No, it also contemplates everything else in life that's involved in acquiring and actually experiencing His PEACE and God's kind of PEACE is the one that in Christ passes all understanding (Philippians 4:7). In other words we're PROSPEROUS when we're living IN His PEACE close to Jesus.

 

But before we get too spiritual about it, the Word of God also doesn't exclude our finances from New Testament PROSPERITY even though a lot of folks have been trying to teach it that way for centuries. Indeed, there's a financial principle involved here that was established under the Old Covenant that's never been changed: financial PROSPERITY is one of God's blessings (Deuteronomy 28:11) while lack, insufficiency and poverty are curses (Deuteronomy 28:48). What the New Testament actually teaches is that Believers were redeemed by Christ from the CURSE of the Law and reconnected to the BLESSING of Abraham (Galatians 3:13-14) and I don't find anywhere that God redefined one of His major blessings. What the New Testament actually teaches is that we should expect even greater financial PROSPERITY under Christ than before Christ and that we should allow the Word by the Holy Spirit to teach and prepare us for STEWARDING over ever-increasing financial responsibility. The truth is it's virtually impossible to live in sustained PEACE if one's finances are chronically insufficient.

 

Now I don't know about you but I want to connect to ALL of God's Blessings that I can get to. And He's the One who said PROSPERITY including financial PROSPERITY is one of His Blessings. Therefore, I would like to be able to talk about it and talk to Him about it and look forward to it and call it the same name the Holy Spirit calls it and study in the Word about it and release my faith for it and use my God-given imagination about it, and then seek after it without having to feel guilty that I'm using one of God's special bible-words. In order to do that though I'm going to have to ignore what a lot of church folks think I ought to know and are only too willing to share with me, override about 18 centuries of traditional unscriptural teaching, renew my own deeply entrenched thinking about it by growing in the Word, RESIST the enemy who doesn't want me to have any of it and learn to avoid the things in life especially from the World that HINDER me from connecting to it.

 

This has pretty much been the focus of this series for the past 50 weeks going back to October 2012, and if you'll look back over the articles in the ARCHIVES you can be reminded of the various specific things the Lord has pointed out for us to consider that will work together to eventually produce a lifestyle of PROSPERITY. It's not easy to overcome all these obstacles and find God's true PROSPERITY but it's doable because with Jesus ALL things are possible (Philippians 4:13).

 

The Need for Grace

 

Now under the New Covenant ALL blessings including PROSPERITY come by GRACE which is defined as the favor and empowerment of God. We live under a Covenant of Grace because we've been offered unmerited REDEMPTION in exchange for FAITH. He doesn't give selective GRACE in response to some righteous work we perform because by definition GRACE is unmerited, undeserved. So, there's nothing we can actually DO to qualify for GRACE in our lives other than "believe in our hearts." In other words then, blessings come by GRACE through FAITH, and GRACE has ALREADY been fully released so that anyone at any time can connect to it simply by believing.

 

Why then do so many Believers continually ask God for particular blessings and then try to impress Him with their good works so He'll send them ASAP? They're ALREADY available so that Believers can receive them by Faith whenever we need them. Jesus has ALREADY done ALL the necessary work so there's no need for us to try impressing God with our own puny little works. Do we really want to believe that the Creator God of the universe can be manipulated into sending a PROSPERITY blessing to selected Believers because they acted all religious on some occasion? How religious would we have to be for that and what particular holy things would we have to do to get Him to finally send it to us?

 

No friend, if we want biblical PROSPERITY to be active in our lives we have to connect to the unmerited, already-released GRACE for it and then receive it by FAITH. A lot of us don't know how to do that even though on paper it sounds pretty easy: we need GRACE, God has ALREADY released it all and the blessing of His PROSPERITY is a part of the GRACE. It should be easy but we're the ones who're missing the connection and as a result we hear a lot of church folks explaining that God often withholds His PROSPERITY in order to teach us something or to get our attention or sometimes even to punish us. So, according to what they believe, we're trying to manipulate God and He's busy trying to manipulate us.

 

The truth is we don't deserve God's PROSPERITY but He's already made it available anyway and in its fullest possible manifestation. Nothing's been held back so forget about manipulating Him for it. You don't need to. You can have it but not by begging and pleading for it. You can have it by asking Him HOW to connect to what He's ALREADY done and then releasing your FAITH over His response, over what He teaches you, over His Word and what it instructs you to do. The fact is we really have to learn how to do this so we can fulfill our callings and purpose in the Kingdom of God.

 

The Place to Find Grace

 

Now one of the things I was meditating about over part of the summer was where God keeps His GRACE. Where is it most likely to be found so we can go there and connect to it when we need to? The Bible clearly tells us where that is in this following scripture:

 

"Let us draw near with confidence (boldness) to the throne of GRACE, so that we may receive mercy and FIND GRACE to help in time of need" (Hebrews 4:16).

 

So we need to go to the throne of GRACE and it's there that we'll find God's favor and empowerment when we need it. Did you ever ponder this? First of all who's on the throne? Is it not our Father God sitting there in His rest (Hebrews 4:10) and is He not inviting us to come near to Him with confidence that by doing this we'll FIND the GRACE we need? To come near with confidence means to come into His presence in FAITH believing that His GRACE is there for us to receive. The GRACE is always there near God, in close proximity to Him. The favor is there with Him, the blessings are there with Him in His presence, close by. The PROSPERITY is there with Him in His presence, close by. The closer we are to Him the easier it is to perceive His GRACE and connect to it. God has made blessings available but we have to pick them up, take possession of them and then use them. And we have to stay close to Him in order to be able to do these things.  

 The context of this scripture is NOT to draw near to God just when we have a need. No, God wants us to come into His presence and stay there because that's where the GRACE is and that's where we can perceive it. When we don't connect to His GRACE it's because we can't perceive it. It's already available and it's already present but we need to be near to the presence of God to perceive and receive it. The way we stay near to God is by developing a close and intimate relationship with Him. And we do that in several ways. One is by acknowledging the presence of the Holy Spirit allowing Him to direct us and teach us and disclose to us the things that are to come (John 16:14). We also stay near to God by maintaining contact with His Word so we can learn to keep the commandments of Christ and abide with Him in His love (John 15:7-11). We don't want to be apart from Him because apart from Him we can do nothing (John 15:5) which is to say apart from Him we're unable to perceive His GRACE. And, we stay near to God by spending quiet time with Him, quality time instead of running around doing all our own things in our own strength building our kingdoms instead of His. The farther we get out there in our own strength the farther away we get from the presence of God there in the throne room and the harder it becomes to find His GRACE in a time of need.

 

Friend, an intimate loving relationship with God has a powerful result. In fact, achieving our potential in the Kingdom of God can only be accomplished in the presence of God, by drawing near to Him, the closer the better. The Flesh doesn't like it but it's true anyway. The Word says so and we can trust the Word. Jesus FREQUENTLY went off by Himself to commune with the Father. In fact, He said more than a few times that He didn't do anything until He had SEEN/HEARD the Father do/say/teach it (John 5:19, 8:28). When did that happen? It happened when Jesus went off by Himself to visit the throne room. We need to be the same way. Jesus is our example of the right way to do things to get the right outcomes. By drawing near to God and staying there we can connect to His GRACE for every area of life and His PROSPERITY will then surely manifest through FAITH.

 

Thanks for stopping by tonight. We'll be looking for you again next Sunday night on September 22. In the meantime may the Lord bless you with every spiritual blessing and cause you to PROSPER in every area of life.

 

Sinners' Prayer 

 

If you've never invited Jesus to be the Lord of your life, you need to and you can do it today just by saying out loud the following simple prayer:

 

Jesus I declare today with all my heart that I believe in you and that God raised you from the dead. I acknowledge that my sins have been forgiven and I ask you to come into my life today and be my Lord and Savior. Thank you for salvation and eternal life.

 

If you were sincere as you prayed this prayer, God has already come into your life and you are a new creation, a totally new species recreated in His image. Now ask the Lord to lead you to a good faith-based, bible-teaching church where you can be equipped to fulfill your potential in the Kingdom of God.

 

And, when you get a chance have someone help you look up the following scriptures because they confirm what you've done by saying this prayer today and believing what you said:

 

Romans 10:9

2 Corinthians 5:17

Ephesians 2:8

 

Prayer Requests

 

If you have a Prayer Request, please connect to the Link below and follow the promptings. The PLN staff members pray over Prayer Requests every Tuesday morning at 10:00 AM eastern time. Agree with us for God to answer your petition.

 

http://www.creditcounseling.net/prayer-request.aspx 

 

Donations

 

If you've been edified by Prosperous Life Newsletter, you may want to consider making a SEED FAITH offering to support the Ministry (Galatians 6:6-7). God has instructed us to simply provide folks with an opportunity to sow seed into good ground so in due season you'll be eligible to reap a harvest and the rest is up to you as the Spirit leads. For your information PLN is a nonprofit gift to the Body of Christ so your financial offerings will usually be tax deductible (consult your tax advisor). Just go to the secure Shopping Cart on the Cornerstone web site by connecting through the following link. We appreciate your support and generosity.

 

http://www.creditcounseling.net/shop/item.aspx?itemid=1 

 

 

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