Jesus said: follow Me, I'll Tweet you every day! [Laughter] How about that? [Applause] You want to see heaven's Facebook? There it is there, the Bible. Get into it every day, and look up and see: oh, that's happening, oh, that's happening. If you love this, as much as you love getting on Facebook, you might find you follow Jesus, instead of someone else. Come on, think about this. Who are we following? Then the other thing is, the popularity circus in the Christian world; another celebrity circus. Should we go there? Well I can remember when I was told: you need to go to this leadership conference, this is one of the foremost Christian leaders. You need to go and hear what he has to say, and we went and heard what he had to say, and I came away with the conclusion in the middle of it: that man is manifesting, and needs help. [Laughter] Am I the only one who can see this?
Then a little while later, I was following the Christian news, and I found that someone who is a prominent leader, that's influenced thousands of churches all over the world stood up and - very courageously stood up by the way. I admire and honour his courage - and said: we got it all wrong, when we said: copy the corporate structure of the world. I first of all, had to just honour him, that he had the courage to say he got it wrong; and my thinking is: what about the thousands of churches that are all going down that route, and had been led astray by following something else other than Jesus? Come on, this has ruined churches. It's totally ruined, and changed, the nature of the western church, following those models. God's trying to bring the church back to its family origin, its supernatural origin, and to get back to following Jesus. That's what the Bible tells us to do: follow Jesus. Jesus said: come follow Me; and you know when you follow other things, you end up usually following demonic spirits. The Bible says: this whole world operates under the influence of the demonic realm; in Ephesians 2. Some people are following their offences - so you hurt me. Hello! Who's leading you now? Is Jesus leading you? If Jesus was leading you, He'd take you that way, to forgive them and bless them and connect with them. No, no, no, no, you're following your offences, and you're following your bondages, and following your addictions. Actually you're being carried around, and pushed around, by demonic spirits.
I go to many places, they don't even talk about it. I went to one church, a big church, a very famous church, and they said: we didn't realise that deliverance was part of the great commission. Who are you following? Who are you following? You got a book, you got the Holy Ghost, you got men of faith, that you can model your life on? We're not called to follow them. We're called to follow Jesus. We're called to follow Jesus. It's following people that'll get you into trouble. We do need to follow Jesus, and Jesus ministers to us through people. In fact actually, following Jesus requires we connect with people. However, we shall right at the beginning, at the core of our being: I'm following the Lord. You know, I've found in the course of my life, that lots of people had a plan for my life. My family had a plan, but it wasn't God's plan. Joy's family had a plan, and they told me it over and over, and that wasn't God's plan either. The plan God had was quite unique, and I couldn't find it until I followed Jesus. Until I made a decision to put my life in His hands, I was in a mess; and if I'd stayed listening to what everyone else said, I would never have been here. Constantly, at key points in my life, I've had to make decisions, follow Jesus. That's all I'm called to do in my life. I am not, by identity, a Pastor. I function as a Pastor, but I am a follower of Jesus. That's who I am. I'm a son of the living God; so it doesn't matter where I am, or what I do, the identity never changes. It's still: am I following Jesus? That's who I want to be, all my life, a follower of Him; who loved me, and gave Himself for me, following Jesus.