From Guilt to Empowerment

0:00:00     Do you have the faith to be guilty? I hope so, because you’ll never understand salvation until you understand guilt. Get it on the next more faith, more life podcast. Hey, everybody, welcome again to a more faith, more life podcast. Today we’re going to talk about do you have the faith to be guilty? Faith to be guilty. Now most of the time in Christianity, almost all the time, you’re never going to hear what I’m about to tell you because traditional religion has the philosophy that what salvation is, is taking our guilt away.

0:00:34     So you’ll have thousands of songs, thousands of people writing songs saying, he took my guilt away. He took my guilt away. And I get it because God obviously does not want us to live under the thumb of guilt or under the power of guilt. But you have to have the faith to be guilty to understand salvation. In my opinion, you’ll never understand salvation until you understand the power of being guilty.

0:01:02     And that’s why I’m telling you, you better tell everybody about this one because you may never hear it from anybody else in the whole world. Now, does it hold any water? Well, Pastor JD King and I are completing a book with a publisher that’ll come out the end of this year. And in there I bring up this idea and the publishers are like, this is so refreshing. And so I want to refresh you a little bit today with understanding that. So here’s what happens in traditional religion. We’re so busy causing people to feel not guilty, and I think that’s sort of a modernized religion in our whole culture, right? We’re so busy not wanting any kids to feel guilty and to feel any shame or anything like that.

0:01:51     But the first thing you got to do, and I may have mentioned this somewhere else, but at another time, but the first thing you have to understand if you’re dealing with guilt or you put it aside and don’t understand it, is that guilt is not a feeling you’ll go through your whole life hearing, he made me feel guilty. They make me feel guilty. She makes me feel guilty. That’s the first place you’re going to go wrong, because guilt is not a feeling.

0:02:17     Guilt is a verdict, okay? Guilty people are guilty, okay? And now you can’t take a guilty person and all of a sudden say, well, I’m going to declare you not guilty. And that’s what modern religion does. It says, now we’re declared not guilty. And that really doesn’t work well, because if you’re declared not guilty, then what do you need salvation for? You don’t need to be if you’re not guilty, then there’s no reason that you need the blood of Jesus and the power of the cross and all those things that have been given, because every person that God deals with, except Jesus is a guilty person.

0:03:00     Everybody’s guilty. And that’s why salvation is for guilty people. But you lose the power of it if you go through and say, well, then I’m declared not guilty. Well, now, how can you appreciate salvation? So salvation is for everybody that ever is going to get saved. Besides Jesus, of course, who doesn’t need to get saved is a guilty person. All right. Now, what happens is then we become, through religion, we become declared not guilty.

0:03:30     So the power of salvation doesn’t mean much to us. You see, the power of salvation is guilty people. Guilty people get saved. Guilty people get to go free. Guilty people. You know, you’ve heard thousands of other songs says, you know, the punishment that was supposed to be mine and the punishment. And he took my sin away and all that. Yeah, that’s right. He took it away. He didn’t declare it doesn’t exist, of course.

0:03:58     Cause the Bible says, what? All have sinned. All have sinned and come short and fallen short of the glory of God. So every person God deals with and ever has dealt with since Adam and Eve is a guilty person. And what God did is God set up a system for guilty people to go free and to live free. But he never declares us not guilty because we have to be guilty in order to be set free. If you’re not guilty, then you are free.

0:04:32     But if you’re still guilty and all have sinned, that means all have all. Everybody’s guilty. Then we need salvation to come and save us. And the joy of it, of understanding the power of salvation, is you’re guilty and I’m guilty. We’re all guilty. And look what God has done for guilty people. And so the idea in roman times and Bible times was when people would get set free. It doesn’t mean they weren’t guilty. Remember when Pilate suggested maybe we could let Jesus go free?

0:05:07     When at the time of crucifixion? Or we could set Barabbas free. Okay, so they did what? They set Barabbas free. But they never said, Barabbas is not guilty. Barabbas, you’re not guilty. Just go be free now. No. The freedom that he enjoyed was man. Pilate just set a guilty man free. A guilty man free. And that’s one of the reasons why Pilate may not even know what he was doing, but he was creating a picture of salvation while pushing and supporting Jesus, going to eventually be crucified.

0:05:43     But he’s actually giving a picture, a guilty person, because of Jesus. So Jesus is going to go in Barabbas place, right? And a guilty person, Barabbas, gets to go free. That’s me. So that means Barabbas, from that moment on, he’s walking around like, lucky dog, right? He’s just like, man, oh, man, look what I got. You know, I’m guilty. I committed the crimes, they said, and I get to go free. That’s grace.

0:06:09     That’s salvation, right? Grace is not saying you’re not guilty because they don’t need grace then if you’re not guilty, guilty people get to go free and live their lives and enjoy the kingdom of God. And so that means all the time, we don’t want to be guilt ridden. Of course not. That’s not God’s plan. But to say I’m not guilty cheapens salvation. But if I am guilty, then, wow, what a gift that a guilty person gets salvation, gets to join a new family, gets to be of a new clan.

0:06:42     That is so powerful. So powerful. Now, back in roman times, again, sometimes a guilty person, or maybe a slave, but a guilty person would have a rich person come and buy them or just take them into their home. They might see a guilty person, they’re, you know, on trial or whatever, and a rich person or a powerful person or a politician would see this person say, you know what? This is a pretty sharp person.

0:07:12     I think I could put them to work for me. And it would be to my advantage to not have them go to jail. So they would go. And they. They would be the, um. The patron client. The patron, like father Potter. Patron father, where we get that word. And they would go like a father, and they would take the guilty person as their client or into the family and raise them, saying, this person is going to do me good.

0:07:43     If they do me more good working for me and making some money or getting things taken care of, then they would be sitting in a jail rotting. So by grace, see, a guilty person, a guilty person got taken in by grace. And so grace then, is a powerful thing to that guilty person. So now the reason I’m saying, do you have the faith to be guilty? Is some people don’t. They have to think it’s not my fault I didn’t commit crime, and just. So they just go to church and just say, oh, well, I’m glad for the cross or whatever, but if you’re a guilty person and you’re getting to enjoy life.

0:08:22     You’re not going to go to God’s prison. You’re not going to be sent to eternal death. You’re going to get to live. You’re going to get to survive your guilt. And so if you have the faith to be guilty, all the joy of walking without punishment, you’re not walking without guilt. You’re going, wow, I’ve been set free, and I’m guilty. I’m guilty as can be, but I have been set free. What a joy. What a joy it is. So when you hear scriptures that say, rejoice in the Lord and the joy of the Lord’s our strength, and all those things about rejoicing and joy, it kind of gets confused because people go over to their circumstances and they say, and they think, well, my circumstances, how can I be joyful?

0:09:03     You know, when I’m battling this sickness or whatever or financial crisis or whatever, how can I be joyful? How can I rejoice? Because you’re rejoicing for the wrong thing. You’re rejoicing is a guilty person now is in a new category, new family, new situation, the kingdom of God. And now you can petition by prayer, your patron, your father, who took you in to his own family or his own business or whatever, and it’s going to help you be a success, and it’s going to help you succeed and help you get out of whatever circumstances you’re in, all right? And that’s another joy.

0:09:42     A guilty person is getting help. So it takes faith to accept that all of mankind is guilty, but that doesn’t matter, because my faith tells me God has a plan for guilty people, and it makes me appreciate salvation so much more. I wrote down, I think maybe I said this line already, but faith to be guilty, you can’t understand salvation without understanding guilt, because only guilty people need to be saved.

0:10:14     Only guilty people. And so then if you get set, well, you know, I’ve been set free from guilt, well, then there’s like, it cheapens it, because what do you need to be saved for? But if a guilty person gets all this, wow, how exciting is that? So that’s why I learned this on my own, basically because I was going through some dark times and years ago, and, you know, like most people, you want to justify yourself, you want to make an excuse for yourself, you want to say it’s not my fault. You want to try to explain yourself to God and everybody else.

0:10:52     And I was like that, just like everyone else. But then I came to the point, I’m not getting anywhere. I am not getting anywhere with God. I’m not getting any help. I’m not getting my emotional, my spiritual, all the things that I’m needing in this dark time. I’m not getting anything. So I decided to flip it and said, you know what? I’m going to start telling God everything I can think of I’ve ever done and ever been.

0:11:19     Cause being is more. Being is more powerful than doing. Doing follows being. So I had to realize what I had become first and then deal with what I have done because of what I had become. And I don’t think I was in some deep, dark sin problem. I was just in a dark place because of, really because of other people. But that doesn’t matter because I wasn’t getting anywhere. I wasn’t getting out of trouble in my own heart.

0:11:50     And so I decided, you know what? I’m going to be guilty. I’m going to quit blaming everybody else, and I’m going to be guilty and stand before God and declare my guilt. Everything I can think of and mostly everything, I’ve become out of sorts, right? And I started realizing that as I began to be honest with God, the love of God and the power of salvation began to flow in my life and just me and God. I was just standing out in my garage years ago, praying as loud as I could because, you know, Kathy never came into the garage anyway.

0:12:24     So I’m in the garage, and I’m just crying out to God and thinking everything I can think of. And all I was doing was getting more free. I was getting more free as opposed to trying to cover up and make excuses and try to be not guilty. It was a joy. It was a joy. And just what do they say? They lift off a weight off my shoulders. All of a sudden, here I am. I’m guilty as guilty because all have sinned and I’m guilty.

0:12:50     And you’re taking me in, and you’re loving me and you’re talking to me. And the power of God began to operate through me, because in this vessel, I wasn’t trying to find something good. I was trying to find something of God. And that’s a whole other story. And so I had to have the faith to be guilty so that I could receive all that guilty people get to receive in the kingdom of God. And that’s freedom and that’s joy and the power and the Holy Spirit and salvation, eternal life, every one of those things, even some I didn’t even name, they’re all for guilty people.

0:13:32     What a relief. What a relief that all these things have been added unto me and you, guilty people and guilty people are walking around free in God. Free, indeed, freedom. And the Bible says, for freedom, Christ has set us free. And it doesn’t say not guilty. Now, again, I understand sermons. Not guilty sermons. I understand it because we live in sort of a guilt ridden society. In fact, Christianity is guilt ridden.

0:14:08     Martin Luther started it and he wanted to know, how can I get free from the guilt of my sins? And then that’s when he came up, well, I can’t do it my own. It’ll have to be by grace. So he got it right, but at that point, then we turned it around to something it was not meant to be and turn us. And so now I’m a not guilty person, and it just doesn’t work because that’s the joy of everything God’s given us to guilty people, taking us into his family, allowing us to be part of the kingdom of God.

0:14:37     And so as you begin to think on this and deal on this and don’t get offended by it, and don’t go into shock, right? You know, don’t go get your spiritual epi pen and stick it in your leg. Cause now you’re gone in shock. Cause you heard something that you didn’t ever hear before. Take it and run with it. And you’ll find out that although, as we said, we don’t want to be guilt ridden and guilt conscious, we need to be freedom conscious, though.

0:15:05     Freedom conscious. We’re conscious of guilty people going free. Jesus took our punishment. Well, why did he take my punishment? If all that’s going to happen is you’re not guilty? Well, then there’s no reason for anybody to be punished for a not guilty person. But if a man would go and pay the price for my sin, if he would love me enough and he’d lay down his life for my sin, a guilty person, somebody died for a guilty man like me.

0:15:36     Powerful, powerful, powerful. And just receive it and have the faith to say, I have the faith to be guilty because I have the faith to be free in the name of Jesus, in his kingdom, in the word of God. And this is the way God treats guilty people. And that’s really good news, right? All right, well, make sure you check out the website. You got to get some of these books. You’ve got to. You need to start operating in faith and start, you know, you need to make a donation, give a gift. And it’s, you know, it’s not so much trying to raise money or make money, but it’s the idea of supporting what you hear as truth as opposed to supporting something that you feel is compromised religion.

0:16:24     And so that’s the only reason you need, for your sake, you need to support uncompromised truth that’s really being spoken the way it is and not playing along, making you the poor victim that you know, that you’re not guilty, you’re just a poor victim of society or whatever. So that’s why for your sake, you need to show you know what to support and you know what not to support. All right? So send a gift, donate, get some books. If you only knew, you know, a guide to the clueless generation, my absurd religion. All the books that are there, including a CD, I think.

0:16:57     So get all that stuff, get going with truth and be sure and tell friends, pass this around, subscribe to it. Do what you got to do to get other people to listen, because where else they going to hear this kind of truth, right? So I hope I’ve helped you today. Till next time. Bye.