Breaking Free (1 of 2)

Mike Connell

Page 4 of 10
Now you and I are called - the Bible tells us very clearly in Revelations 1 Verse 5, He has made us kings and priests unto God. In Revelations 5 it says: He has made us kings and priests to God, and we shall reign on earth. So you have been given a kingly anointing, and you are expected to reign, or to have a kingly influence in the earth, in the earth. It's not about waiting for some great thing one day. We are expected to advance the kingdom today, and all the teachings of Jesus talk about the kingdom, and the advance of the kingdom, and the stewardship of individual believers, of the gifts that God has given them - and God expects an increase from us, all of us. He expects us to be productive, expects us to be fruitful. So David was anointed king; you were born for dominion, and you should dream of it, so if there's anything in your life, if you've got a bondage in your flesh, a bondage in your life, you are called to have dominion over it. Set your face, you'll find the way to break free. Set your face, that this is not acceptable any longer.

If you have an addiction to smoking, then this is a bondage. Set your face, that you will expand the kingdom in your life, and have dominion over it, and begin to figure out or find out or get counsel how to break through that limitation. If you have a sin area in your life, a habit in your life, a fear in your life, determine this year, I will break through that. Then there are other parts of the kingdom and that's where we represent Christ in the community, so every one of us has a positioning in the community assignment. You have people you meet I'll never meet, and probably most of the people in this church won't meet either. They're in your territory, so wherever you go, your territory includes your personal life, your finances, your relationships, and wherever you are. So wherever we are, that's our territory, and we're not to rule over people. We're called to rule over spiritual influences, and to advance the kingdom of God, by being His representative to people, serving people as you heard of earlier on today.

So you are a king, and we have a commission, and it's a very clear commission: Go, make disciples. Go, make followers of Christ. Don't make church sitters and pew warmers. Don't make people who just come along, and Sunday's their church thing, and the rest of the week they'll just do what they like. That is not a Christian, that's not a disciple. That is not a disciple. A disciple is a follower of Jesus. We're following Jesus, then we align our life to begin to walk with Him, to discover His purpose, and to fulfil that purpose in our life - that's a disciple. Disciple, He said, follow Me, I'll make you a fisher of men. A disciple is a fisher of people. That means you put the right bait out, and you catch the fish - aha! How many did you catch last year? How many did we catch? How many did we catch for Christ? I love fishing.

I absolutely love fishing. I like going fishing with Brent Douglas. Brent's a great fisherman, he knows how to catch fish. A lot of people go out, you go out in the boat, catch nothing much - I hate that, just boring, get sea sick, and come back tired and cranky - but it's good tiredness. But when you go out with Brent, Brent is very focussed on fishing. I went out in the boat with him one time, and he said well here's the rule in the boat: don't talk. I said well that suits me fine, I don't want to talk anyway so that's great. We talked all day then. [Laughs] But we were focussed on fishing, and he showed me how to put the bait - how to hook it on properly. He showed me how you set your line up so you can catch these snapper, and he had this big chest there, and we come home full of snapper. I've been out several times with him. He knew how to set the bait, and he knew how to catch them, and he showed me some things that you do - I can't remember them all but he showed me so I caught fish. I didn't catch the big ones he caught - there's a way of catching the big ones too, a real way of catching the big ones.