Greetings,
I believe that God desires to raise up fathers in the earth that will turn their hearts to the children and empower the children to turn their hearts to the fathers. By this, the curse of the earth is broken. A multigenerational inheritance of life comes into the earth when the head of a family recognizes the importance of the things of the future and the things of the past.
Matthew 13: 52 Then He said to them, “Therefore every scribe instructed concerning the kingdom of heaven is like a householder who brings out of his treasure things new and old.”
As leaders we must embrace being fathers and mothers who teach the church to be strong and overcome in order to see the things that God has yet to bring come to pass and to see the ancient things of destiny advanced in the generations of today.
In many ways the church has become weak, because the nations of the world are weak. We all come from fatherless societies and our ability to become fathers and mothers of inheritance has been weakened and diminished by self-focused people who believe that life is more about entitlements than about empowerments. This entitlement mentality has infiltrated the fabric of the church. Little is known about overcoming, but a true father has overcome many things and can therefore empower their children to become strong in the overcoming grace of Christ. Being a child is a wonderful thing! The focus of a child is knowing how much they are loved. This is a great thing and should never be lost in our thinking, but we must move beyond simply knowing we are loved to become those who are willing to do whatever it takes to demonstrate our love for God and for others. A child knows their sins are forgiven and that they are loved by the father. This has become a major sound in the body of Christ. I hear it everywhere! He loves us! He forgives us! He is our daddy! These are all wonderful truths, but it is the testimony of little children.
As a father in the faith I want to first express that I am constantly growing in my understanding of God’s love, forgiveness, and His presence in my life. I also want to confirm that I have also grown in seeing to it that my presence is in God’s life. I have learned to overcome in my 43+ years of knowing Him. Overcoming is the process of becoming a responsible head of a household and it is to be the testimony of the maturing body of Christ – men and women who live to love God and love others. These are men and women who are more concerned with taking responsibility for who they are in Christ than what they can get from Him.
1 John 2:12-14 I write to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for His name’s sake. I write to you, fathers, because you have known Him who is from the beginning. I write to you, young men, because you have overcome the wicked one. I write to you, little children,
because you have known the Father. I have written to you, fathers, because you have known Him who is from the beginning. I have written to you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the wicked one.
We must overcome the wicked one. We must be strong and allow the word of God to abide in us. That word that abides in us is not just the freshly spoken rhema word of God in our hearts. It is the logos word, the words that God has spoken. An overcomer knows how to stand on what God has said even if they don’t feel the freshness of His word within them. They know how to constantly hear God and how to stand fast on what He has said. This includes doing due diligence to study God’s written word and to know the kind of things God says so we will not fall for covenant breaking, character compromising thoughts and words that come from other sources. The cares of the world, offenses of the flesh, plans of the devil, and many other things want to keep us as mere children who know that God loves us, forgives us, and is present in our lives. God comes into our lives to reveal that He loves us, but that doesn’t mean that He approves of everything we are doing or even the present character of our being. We were born naturally in societies of compromise, but we have been born again to become who we were meant to be as the people of God in Christ. God wants us to move into His world and become like Him. To do this we must understand that empowerment is more valuable than entitlements. Giving life to others is greater than simply receiving the life that God gives to us. It is not about what God can do for us, it is about becoming like Him in all things!
We must know how to test the spirits. We must know the difference between a word that promises blessings and a word that reveals the testimony of Christ within us. We must know the difference between words that are self-empowering and words that are Christ empowering! We must all learn to depend upon the One within us who is greater than the world. He is greater than our worldly attitudes, thoughts, desires, and actions. We must grow in maturity to embrace the overcoming power of Christ within us. No man has the answers to our problems. No pastor has the ability to bring to us the testimony that God desires each of us to have. Only God can do this and it is by the power of Christ within each of us. We must all grow in maturity and not merely blame our circumstances and situations upon what others do to us or some character way of the world. We were of the world, but now we are children of God!
1 John 4:1 Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world. 2 By this you know the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God, 3 and every spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God. And this is the spirit of the Antichrist, which you have heard was coming, and is now already in the world. 4 You are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world. 5 They are of the world. Therefore they speak as of the world, and the world hears them. 6 We are of God. He who knows God hears us; he who is not of God does not hear us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
The test is confirmed by the testimony of Christ in each of us. We must grow in maturity in recognizing the witness of Christ within us. It is not the testimony of external blessings, but of internal convictions. As leaders we must grow in this process. As fathers we must seek to empower a maturing family to do the same.
Food For Thought,
Ted J. Hanson
