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Now that we know that all transformation comes by the renewing of our mind, the next question that we want to ask is how that renewing takes place. Let me tell you something, you will be transformed. Stop asking what steps to take but get ready to renew your mind and be transformed in the end and you will be ready for what God has called you to do. You will be ready to be a father. You will be ready to be a mother. I didn’t go through a fatherhood course to be a father. I didn’t go through university to get a degree to be a husband. It’s by the renewing of your mind and the transformation that takes place!
Let’s turn right now to 2 Corinthians 3. The same word ‘transformed’ found in Romans 12 you will find in 2 Corinthians 3. It says that but even to this day when Moses is read, when the Old Testament is read, a veil lies on their heart. When Moses is read, when the law is read, there is a veil so that we can’t see. Remember this, when we read the Bible we don’t read from a perspective of the law. We read it from the perspective of grace because it is in grace, in Christ Jesus that the veil is taken away. All spiritual eyes are awakened when the law is removed from our minds.
So it says: “Nevertheless when one turns to the Lord…” How is that veil taken away? How is that system of law, of performance, of do good get blessed, do bad get beat, taken away? It’s taken away by turning to the Lord. When you turn to Jesus your bridegroom, because we are all the bride of Christ, the veil is removed. Can you imagine a bride? They all have a veil. Who removes the veil? The groom, right? It’s not the pastor that removes the veil, it’s not the father of the bride, it is the groom that removes the veil. So that’s why the Bible says when you turn to the Lord, the veil is removed. So whenever you turn to Jesus, the veil is removed. Then the bride can kiss the groom.
Then it says: “Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom and liberty.” That’s why you see, whenever we turn to the Lord, whenever we turn to Jesus, the veil is removed. And then it says the Lord is a Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. When the veil is removed, there is always freedom and liberty. You are liberated. I say you are liberated! You are not kept under law. You are not prisoners of law today. You are prisoners of freedom! Amen!
Let’s move on to verse 18.
18 But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.
We with unveiled face, that means the Law has been removed because we have turned to the Lord, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image. What image is that? The glory of the Lord. That’s why the Bible says whom He justifies, He glorifies. Justification speaks of you having a clearance of your guilt and your sin that you have a right standing with God. But God does not just leave you there. God did not just justify you. God wants to glorify you on this earth. God wants to glorify you in your career. God wants to glorify you in your studies. God wants to glorify you in your marriage. Amen! God wants His people to be filled with His glory, a glory that people can see, touch and feel. We are being transformed into the same image of the glory of the Lord!
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Posted on 5 July '10 by Pastor Benjamin Lim, under Blog. 3 Comments.
To read Part 1, click here.
The mind is closely linked to the spirit and the spirit to the mind. It says that: “Who knows the mind of Christ except by the Spirit of God.” Right? The Spirit of God knows the mind of Christ; knows the mind of the Lord. So in the same way there is a connection between the mind and the spirit. So every time when we are transformed by the renewing of our mind, we are connecting into our spirit and the spirit realm. It is flowing out of our mind because by right believing we will always beget right living. Amen.
Then Paul says: “So that you may prove for yourselves what is the good and the acceptable and the perfect will of God.” So every time I read this verse again, God begins to open my eyes because I always used to read this verse in a very traditional manner that I must prove the will of God by renewing my mind. No. Actually what it says in the Greek here is that you may have practical proof. You may have practical proof of what is the good will of God in your life. What is the good will of God in your life? That means that every time when there is a renewal of your mind that takes place you know you will have a practical proof that God is good in your life. And the word there ‘acceptable’ means ‘well-pleasing’. So whenever you renew your mind, there is a practical proof that God will have a well-pleasing result in your life. That is good news for us!
You know last time I used to teach this about the “good and acceptable and the perfect will of God” that there is a “thirty fold, sixty fold and hundred fold.” Actually there is no thirty, sixty and hundred. It is one will of God. The will of God is good, it is well-pleasing and it is perfect. It is complete. Amen! So every time your transformation takes place by the renewing of your mind you will begin to have the practical proof of God’s good, well-pleasing and complete will. That means you will always be living in the will of God.
Have you ever asked questions like these: “What is the will of God in our lives?” “God, what is your will in this place? What is your will in that?” Then I realized that I began to systemize God’s will, I began to create steps and formulas to walking in God’s will. But actually walking in the will of God is as easy as allowing your mind to be renewed. Then you will have practical proof of His good, His well pleasing and His complete will in your life.
You know, a man of God once said that when the will of God is known, faith is. When you begin to understand that God is willing, you know God’s will is nothing more and nothing less than God is willing. The leper said: “If you are willing.” You know today it is not an issue of whether God can heal. It is an issue of whether we believe that God is willing to heal you. It is not an issue of whether God can prosper you. We know that God has a thousand cattle on His hill. We know that up there in heaven, it is streets of gold. Not streets paved with gold but it is streets of gold. But do we believe that God is willing to prosper us? When you believe that willingness that is where faith is. And faith is the hand that receives the grace of God in our lives!
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Posted on 1 July '10 by Pastor Benjamin Lim, under Blog. 1 Comment.
Recently I was looking at my life and I was asking myself, “How did I come to the place where I am ready and prepared for the kind of responsibility that God has given me today?” Whether it is being a father, being a youth pastor, being a leader in a business out there, or managing the church. Where did I come to this place, how come I am ready? What prepared me? And the Lord told me that our life is a life of transformation.
You know, the last 10 years of my life have been nothing but transformation. You know, a Christian’s life is a life of transformation. Transformation is effortless. Transformation is from the inside out. The word that the Bible uses for the word transformation is “metamorphosis.” You know when we talk about metamorphosis; let’s say using a butterfly as an example, a caterpillar will metamorphosis into a butterfly. It is from one state of being into another state of being. And that’s our life.
Before we received Christ we were in one state – the state of sin and death. But the day we received Jesus, we were metamorphosis into a state of life and resurrection. And that is the state that we are in now and the state into which we are undergoing a continuous transformation.
Let’s look at Romans chapter 12 right now. It says in the Amplified version – “I appeal to you therefore, brethren, and I beg you in [all] the mercies of God to make a decisive dedication of your bodies [presenting all your members and faculties] as a living sacrifice, holy (devoted and consecrated) and well pleasing to God, which is your reasonable (rational, intelligent) service and spiritual worship.”
Paul exhorts us that in our lives, in our bodies, we are to continuously bring it as a living sacrifice. In the King James Version it says – “a living sacrifice that is well pleasing to the Lord.” And then it says in the next verse – “Do not be conformed to this world (to this age), [but fashioned after and adapted to its external, superficial customs], but be transformed (changed)”. Actually I don’t like to use the word ‘changed’. I like to use the word ‘transformed’ because I love transformers. “Autobots, roll out!”
Paul goes on to say, “But be transformed by the [entire] renewal of your mind [by its new ideals and its new attitude], that you may prove [for yourselves] what is the good and the acceptable and the perfect will of God, even the thing which is good and acceptable and perfect [in His sight for you].
So the Apostle Paul was saying in the second verse that – “Do not be conformed to this world.” To not be conformed to this world is speaking of an implicit transformation that God is talking about. It is not like makeup. Or guys, it is not a makeover for a car. It is not cosmetic surgery. It is a change from one state to another state. Amen. I mean if I was to use transformers as an illustration, it would be from robots to vehicles. You understand it is from one state to another state. You know what I mean?
So when God talks about transformation, it is from one state to another state, from one nature to another nature. It is not trying to put up makeup so that you can go to church and look pretty. It is not wearing a new hairdo. You know, that is not a transformation.
And you know Paul says, “Don’t be conformed to the world.” Don’t be conformed to the world’s standard. Every time when I read this in the past, it says do not be conformed to the world, I always thought it meant ‘don’t be conformed to the low moral of the world.’ But actually it is talking about the workings, the system of that world. And what is the system of the world? The system of the world today is that you need to perform; you need to be good to get blessed.
That is our nature. You know that? That is our nature. In us, we have a very legalistic nature. That’s why the law is natural. It is easy for us to understand. If you do good, you get blessed. If you do bad, you get beat.
But today when God saves us, He brings in a new nature. It is called the nature of grace and that is supernatural. God says that we don’t conform to this system of legalism, this system of performance, that you always need to achieve in order to be blessed; God is saying to us today, the transformation that He wants us to go through is to receive and not to achieve. It is not to attain but to obtain all that God has provided through His Son who died for you and I at the cross!
And that transformation is effortless. It is without stress. You know whether you are using self-effort or not, you can gauge by the level of stress in your life. You know you’re really stressed out about your job. Not that you should just throw away the job’s demands, but you are looking at yourself to perform that task that is demanded of you. You have to be supply oriented. Have a supply mindset. Yes, there is a demand but don’t focus on the demand. Focus on the supply! God is your strength! In your weakness, He is your strength and His strength is made perfect in your weakness. Amen!
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Posted on 28 June '10 by Pastor Benjamin Lim, under Blog. 5 Comments.
I feel a strong word from the Lord that for many of you there is a new season that God is bringing you into. Don’t be afraid of new things. And don’t be afraid of change. Change means growth. And with God, growth can only be from glory to glory. From one good thing to another good thing. From one level to another level. Amen!
You will never degenerate. The Holy Spirit is not here to degenerate our lives. He is here to regenerate our lives. We have to regenerate because you know that we live in this fallen world, in this fallen body, but His regeneration will always bring the life of God into our personal life and as well as the atmosphere and the environment around us. Amen.
Being a believer is an exciting life. This is not a religion, but a relationship. This is not a set of rules or regulations that we are following here. We are following the Spirit. Amen! And where the Spirit is, there is life. This life will transform you from single-hood to courtship, and then from courtship to marriage. Hallelujah!
Recently I was talking to some of my ADCs in my room and I was telling them that I advocate early marriage. You know in this church, we encourage people to have a short courtship, and of course to be able to have a short courtship means that before you enter into a relationship, there is already a certain level of emotional maturity.
You know, we are always maturing. We are always maturing emotionally. You know I have seen “kids” who are seventy years old, so it doesn’t mean that just because you are older that you are more mature. And I think that there is a certain emotional stability and maturity that we want to trust God to arrive at, so that when you enter into a relationship you are not trying to mature that emotion in you. In this way, you go into the relationship from a place of strength rather than from a place of weakness.
In fact, some advice that I will give to all of you is, never enter into a relationship to fill some need in your life. Remember your boyfriend is never an answer to your loneliness. Jesus is. Your boyfriend can’t be with you all the time. Trust me. You know for a while he may find you exciting because you are always so needy, and he feels like a hero. But after a while, once you have depleted him after days and months of hounding him, he will become zero, you know. But when you make Jesus your first love, your romantic love will all work out by itself. Amen.
Today, just following the Spirit in what the Lord is saying to us, there is a new season in our life. I believe that God has seasons in our life. There are seasons of preparation. There are seasons of promotion. There are seasons of protection whereby God is protecting us from certain things and therefore not allowing certain doors to be opened. I want you to know that sometimes when doors are not opened to us the way we want them to be is perhaps because God is protecting us. Amen.
It may be a dream that you have, it may be a desire that you have, but there doesn’t seem to be an open door. It is not because God is angry with you. It is not because God is judging you. It could just be because God is protecting you. God’s love provides, yes, but God’s love also protects. You know, He does not just provide you freely but He also protects you from any kind of unwanted liberty that you will regret later. Amen.
And we are just following the Spirit of God into that new season that I believe many of you are going into.
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Posted on 24 June '10 by Pastor Benjamin Lim, under Blog. 10 Comments.
At the first mention of David’s life in the Bible, we see that it begins with God’s anointing. And it reads in 1 Samuel, chapter 16, the NIV version, “The Lord said to Samuel, ‘How long will you mourn for Saul since I rejected him as king over Israel? Fill your horn with oil, and be on your way. I am sending you to Jesse of Bethlehem. I have chosen one of his sons to be king.’”
Every time when I prepare for a service, I always go back to meditating on God’s word. And let me tell you that God’s Word is inexhaustible. So, even as I was meditating on this verse again, the Lord said to me, “Son, look up the word ‘Saul’ and the word ‘Jesse’. There is some significance there that I want you to share.”
And as soon as I looked up the word “Saul”, I saw that the word “Saul” means “petition”, and that the Hebrew noun for the word “Jesse” means “wealth”; “wealth” as quoted in Proverbs before. And you will find that in Proverbs it says, “I will fill your house with wealth.” And so God was speaking to me in 1 Samuel, “How long shall you mourn for your petition (Saul) since I have rejected him as king over Israel? Fill your horn and be on your way. I am sending you to the wealth (Jesse) of Bethlehem.”
The Lord said to me, “Don’t look at the petitions. Don’t focus on your prayers. Go to the wealth of Bethlehem,” and “Bethlehem” means “the house of bread”. Go to the wealth in the house of bread.” Who else is the wealth in the house of bread but Jesus, Amen?
You know sometimes we are so caught up with focusing on our prayer. “Oh Lord, I pray about this, Lord. Lord, I…I thought I prayed already, so should I pray it again? And must I pray it again? So If I pray it again, was I not in faith the first time?”
God says, “Don’t worry. Focus on Jesus.” Amen? Because when you begin to focus on Him, and bring Him into your situation, it’s not about how powerful your prayer is, it’s not how powerful the prayer of your care group leader is, it’s not how powerful the prayer of your pastor is. You are involving Jesus, because He is the wealth.
He is the wealth in this house of bread and whenever you go to Jesus, the wealth, He has more than enough to answer; He has more than enough solutions for you, amen? If it is wisdom that you lack, God will give it from heaven. If it is family restoration that you need, God will give it from heaven. If it is understanding in your studies, God will give it from heaven. If it is a life partner you are looking for, God will give it from heaven, and you will never have a girlfriend from hell! Hallelujah guys! Never! It will always be from heaven, amen?
And if you say, “Pastor, you know, but I look around in the ministry, and there is none that is my type.” Go to Jesus, and Jesus will create your type, and get that guy born again! Amen?
God can do miracles, Amen? But don’t focus on your prayers. Did I pray wrongly? Did I pray accurately? Is this the way to pray and all that. God spoke to me, “Don’t focus on the prayer, focus on Who you are praying to.” He is Jesus, the wealth in the house of bread. I love it. He is the wealth, and He has got more than enough!
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Posted on 3 June '10 by Pastor Benjamin Lim, under Blog. 10 Comments.
