Priscilla Shirer: Suit Up

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 oh I'm so moved by that aren't you that Mercy said uh-uh not today Lord we're grateful for your mercy we thank you Lord that in these moments that we have together not only are you merciful enough to have saved us and set us free but you're merciful enough to not leave us to our own own devices that you have given us your word Lord so that we can hear you when you speak so God I'm praying in these next few moments that we have together you would open up the pages of scripture and breathe a fresh word upon your people Lord we are so glad to be in the house with each other today but Jesus we didn't come to see each other we came to see you so I'm asking Lord that you would open up the windows of heaven and speak to us Lord we need a word from you oh God our hearts are hungry to hear a fresh word from your voice so Lord you take this one little simple message would you divide it 1,800 different ways so that every single person does not hear from me but they hear from you it is in the matchless name of Jesus Christ that your daughters agree and say Amen tonight everybody say amen amen amen you may take your seats I want to tell you what a privilege it is to have the opportunity to be here t tonight and to share a few Thoughts with you um uh from the word of God it's particularly a privilege to be in this house because I have long been an admirer and a and a texting friend of Pastor hiler we will just text each other encouragement every now and then and so that you would invite me to be a part of what God is doing in this ministry as a blessing now I need you to know that when the invitation came for me to be a part of this I did not know who the invitation was from at the at first I just heard that someone want you to speak at something that starts at 10: and ends at 5: I said say what now and then they said well it it's Pastor Bridget and I said well let's go then let's go let's go there is integrity and humility and faithfulness that is lost today and we have that in Bridget Hillard would you celebrate her with me it's sad it's sad that humility is rare oh it's sad that humility is rare y'all it's sad that Integrity is rare that the same person who's standing under the spotlight is the exact same person when nobody's looking y'all that's rare and when you find somebody who actually does honor their husband and who actually does prioritize their family and who is not after the Limelight more than and they're after a well done from Jesus the Christ that's a person that you seal yourself to and you sit at their feet and you listen to what it is that God is going to say to you from them not because they're better than you but because God has proven through their lives what it means to to walk in integrity and faithfulness and that it is possible to do it God's way it's possible to do it God's way so I honor her and I honor her husband I honor this house it's a privilege to be here and you know what for just to second uh I also want to honor CC wiins for the same reasons um amen I want to honor her for that cuz a whole lot of people can sing but not everybody is Anointed a lot of people want to be Superstars but everybody's not willing to be in their in their closet in prayer seeking the face of God whether or not they win a Grammy whether or not they sell a lot of Records they singing because they just love Jesus and that's what you see in in CC1 I'm going to tell you really quickly because I always uh say this of her whenever I'm with CC somewhere y'all I was probably about 14 years old I do not know how I ended up in a home after CC and B we had done a concert somewhere my parents took me to this concert and afterwards there was dinner at somebody's house and I happened to be be able to go and of course I was this star struck little 14-year-old and I remember watching her I watched her cuz you know I'm 14 and I'm like that's CC1 is right there so I'm watching her and they were trying so hard to make a diva out of her they were trying so hard to to serve her every little thing and give her every little thing and they didn't want her to do anything for herself her children were with her they kind of wanted to take care of the children so that she could be uh treated in a certain way I remember watching her and gleaning from her and learning because she would not allow them to steal from her the privilege of being her children's mother she did not hand them off to somebody else so that she could go be the diva she was like uhuh these are my babies I'm going to mother my children tonight I was 14 years old when I saw that and it informed the ministry that I did not even know that the Lord would have for me the way I mother my children today I have three boys the way I mother them today is largely because of what I saw one night off stage of CC W I'm so grateful for that I'm so grateful for that I want to share a few thoughts from the scriptures this evening I'm going to ask you to bear with me because I don't know if you can tell or not but just getting over a little bit of a cold over the past week and a half so I have a little bit of that scratchy uh voice I've been praying and saying Lord help me not to go into one of them coughing fits you know the ones you can't recover from from um so so you just pray with me in that regard that the Lord will help us to get through what I believe to be one of the most impactful Passages at least in my life over the past couple years it's going to be one that is familiar to you but I love that about the scriptures that you can read something or hear something you have read or seen a million times before but on this day the Holy Spirit can take out a Divine highlighter and cause that thing to LEAP up off the page and grip you your soul so I'm praying for that today as I mentioned I have three boys and the identifying characteristic of my sons is that they are big boys they used to be little boys but not anymore my 13-year-old is at least three Ines taller than me my 13-year-old he wears a size 14 men shoe my 11-year-old well he just turned 12 in the last couple weeks he's in a size 12 menu and my 7y old stands up about this higher so they are giant boys one of the ways that works for them though is that they do enjoy sports so it works for them in sports they kind of play whatever is in season at the time football's coming up so that's where we are most every weekend we are on a football field somewhere with one of these boys but when it is baseball season my second son has taken a liking to baseball he enjoys it very much he enjoys playing it and I got a brag on a brag on him a little bit to tell you that he he is actually pretty good at baseball and I don't know if it's because of his size or what but he really does have a really good swing when he gets a good hit because of all that strength he has because of his size he really can already I remember when he was N9 years old it was the first time he actually hit a ball over the fence line for a home run at nine and 10 years old great at first base he makes lots of stops and outs as the team's first baseman so we've been pretty proud of Jerry Jr as he has played uh baseball I like baseball season mostly because it starts in the springtime I enjoy it very much because you know you go out there for the practice at 700 p.m. or so and there you sit on the bleachers while your kid is out there underneath the lights of the baseball diamond enjoying the Cool Breeze of summer so I enjoy baseball because it starts in the spring the only problem with Spring ball is that it is going to become Summer Ball and see I live in Dallas so so I got it like y'all got it here in Houston during the summer it does warm up a little bit the Sun comes out in full Vengeance like it is mad at you like you did something to the sun and the Sun is trying to get you back you know what I'm talking about and it's still okay when you only have practices in the evening and then that early morning game maybe on a Saturday at 8 or 10 o'clock in the morning it's still okay when that's the case but the problem with B baseball season is that at the end of the season they have the nerve to have a tournament this means that you going to go out there on a Thursday at at 8:00 a.m. your kid is going to play on Thursday at 8:00 a.m. then they're probably going to play again at 10:00 a.m. then they're going to give you a lunch break but you have to come back for the afternoon 2:00 p.m. and 4 p.m. game then depending upon how your team did they're going to switch that team to another bracket they will face a whole another list of teams on the next day you will play at 8:00 a.m. then you will play at 10:00 a.m. then you'll take a little bit of lunch break but you got to come back for the 2 p.m. game and the 400 p.m. game and then if your team had the nerve to do well on Friday you have to come back on Saturday for the 8:00 a.m. game and then the 10:00 a.m. game and then you have a little lunch break and then 2 and 4:00 and you're sitting out there trying to be happy that your kid is doing well can I get one witness in the house that knows what I'm talking about you're trying to be okay with this whole situation but really you are wondering if it is ever okay to pray your kid loses so you can go home anybody what I'm talking about so this is the case a couple of seasons ago I remember it was a particularly hot summer in Dallas and there we were sitting in the bleachers we could not wait for the lunch break we were three days into the tournament we just wanted to go to lunch so we could go to a restaurant that had air condition that's what we were after was the air condition and some ice water with ice that was actually still in the glass after a while we came back refreshed ready for the rest of the day opened up the back of the SUV got all the gear out the ice chest the umbrella that you get from The Outdoor sporting goods store we got all our stuff and we took it over to the baseball diamond for the next game we were walking I was walking right behind my son he is the gregarious outgoing personality ready for the next challenge excited he had a little skip in his step step and his chest was poked out and his chin was up he was ready for this next challenge that was in front of him but from the car over to the baseball diamond I watched my son's countenance change just from the parking lot to the baseball diamond he he was excited at first but the closer we got to the to the Dugout I I watched his entire countenance change I watched his chin begin to hang down I watched as his shoulders were a little bit hunched over I watched as he started ringing his hands just a little bit I did not understand what was going on but it was very clear that there was something bothering him so I was trying to look around to figure out why my boy's countenance was changing so severely and as we walked over toward the Dugout we passed some other players from another team they were all strown across the grass underneath the shade of a big oak tree they were getting rest themselves before the next game we had to pass right by them to get to The Dugout so as we walked right by I got a good look at all of these players and as soon as I did I knew what my boy's problem was this was the team we were about to face and these boys we had faced earlier in the season and when we had played this team this team had annihilated my son and his team it had been a complete upset a complete embarrassment when we had played these boys right here and these boys were the ones we were about to play now this team this little Little League team y'all was filled with serious baseball players you know the kind with the real serious parents y'all know what I'm talking about ain't nobody got time for all that these are the kind of parents that when they gave birth birth to their boy they put a mitt on one hand and a baseball on the other they've been waiting for this their whole lives you know serious we were about to play them as we walked by we heard two of the teammates talking to each other I think they thought they were whispering but they weren't doing a good job one leaned over to the other and said there goes that big kid from the Red Sox team was that the one that hit the ball and it went over the fence yep that was the one at first base remember he's the one that caught all those outs that we had so you mean that's Jerry Shire when my son heard his name cross the lips of the opposing team members that head that was hung down all of a sudden it popped back up again I watched him sitick his chest back out and I watched my boy get his swag back I saw his countenance completely become transformed because it really is amazing how your countenance changes when you overhear and understand what the enemy really thinks about you when he sees you coming the reality is in a room this size with this many women from this many different backgrounds this many different marriages and families that are represented family Dynamics careers that are represented the reality is that most likely there are challenges that are spread out in front of many of our lives and if we get a good look at them if we look at them too long and too hard the reality is we will want to hang our head in discouragement and shrink back in fear and insecurity that is unless you really overhear and understand what your enemy thinks about you when he sees you coming because listen the reality is even if you don't believe what the word of God says to be true about you even if you don't believe it even if I don't believe it the enemy does does y'all he knows that we have already been forgiven he knows that he is already underneath your feet he knows that he can form a weapon against you but that that weapon will never have the opportunity to prosper he knows that you have been made competent by the spirit of God he knows that you have been equipped for every good purpose to you have been called in Christ Jesus and he knows that in the end we win he already knows so what ashamed it would be for the enemy to believe more about your potential than you do what ashamed it would be for him to be able to just tussle out a little challenge in your line of sight in your marriage or in your finances or in your singleness or on your job or in your school or at your University just throw it out in front of the daughters of God and we are already so insecure that we won't even step up to the plate of being who God has called us to be and so when you and I leave here at 5:00 in the morning help us Jesus cuz listen then she had the nerve to give us 
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 blankets the problems that you left last night will likely still be there tomorrow when you get home there in front of you and you will have a choice to make will I step up to the plate and believe that my God will hand me the bat and give me the power that I need the instruction that I need to hit this thing over the fence or will I allow just the the presence of the enemy the Fingerprints of the enemy in this division in this relationship or this Discord in my heart or this unrest in my mind will I allow it to be enough to cause me to shrink back in fear and insecurity and never experience all of the Power that I really have as a daughter of the most high King and it is to this end that I believe the Apostle Paul writes what I believe to be one of the most powerful passages in all of scripture cce's already set it up for us and talking about going to war cuz you do know y'all that life is not a playground it is a battlefield and the the enemy is hoping that we will just go to church and clap our hands and wave our hands and do the religious thing but nobody will go home and go to war with weapons that work so the Apostle Paul writes a letter to a group of Believers in a place called Ephesus he writes the book of Ephesians now y'all know the Apostle Paul was a bad boy he gave us most of the New Testament he wrote letter after letter penned instruction after instruction but of all that he wrote Scholars say that the cream of the crop of all of his writing like the cherry on top of the cake is the book of Ephesians because in the book of Ephesians he spends the first half of the book just rehearsing who you are as a daughter he wants you to know that you are forgiven that you have been lavished upon with the grace and the goodness of God he wants you to know that even if everybody else has rejected you that God Almighty the father of the universe has chosen you and called you by name he spends the the majority of the book of Ephesians just telling you who you are and then he gets to the end in Ephesians chapter 6 and he says I've got one final word just to make sure that you are secured and ready for battle he says in Ephesians chapter 6 beginning in verse 10 he says finally he says finally you ought to be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might he says you put put on the full armor of God so that you may be able to stand firm against the schemes somebody say schemes sches the schemes of the devil he says for our struggle it is not against flesh and blood it is against rulers and it is against Powers it is against the world forces of this Darkness it is against the spiritual forces of wickedness in Heavenly places he says so therefore you ought to go ahead and just lay down all of the weapons of this world which aren't doing you any good pick up some weapons that actually work he says take up the full armor of God so that you may be able to resist in the evil day and having done everything to stand firm he says in verse 14 you stand firm therefore the Apostle Paul sets out almost for the first time in the New Testament the principle of spiritual warfare this is the first time it is said this overtly this conspicuously this is the first time a spotlight is shined on it there are other places in the Old and New Testament where we can infer it we can gather that there is spiritual warfare we can derive it from the text but this is the first time within the New Testament that a writer comes right out to make sure that nobody misses it to make sure that we don't walk out of here at 5:00 a.m. with any questions on our mind he says I want to make sure you know you have an enemy and the enemy that you have is not the person that you are sitting next to you your enemy is not your husband your enemy is not your boss your enemy is not your coworker I'm talking about that one that if she says one more thing to you you going to knock her out that one it's not your problem your enemy is not flesh and blood anything you can relate to with your five physical senses in the external world is not your problem and the enemy wants you to think that just because he is invisible he is all so fictional so what he does is he disguises himself cleverly behind something that you can see in hopes that you will forget he's back there because he knows once you do that you will direct all the wrong weapons at the wrong culprit then he's got you in the palm of his hand so he begun to disguise himself so much so that we forgotten that it is the enemy that is behind much of the strife and much of the division and much of the financial difficulty and much of the struggles that we are facing that it is not the flesh and blood that we can see it's the enemy behind the scenes pulling the strings and hoping you will forget he is there there was a little small church around the corner uh from where I live I take the boys there for their Harvest Festival we love it it's it's around the October time frame sort of their answer to Halloween uh we will go to the Harvest Festival and me and my little one Jude I've got Jackson Jerry Jr and Jude Jude is our surprise baby y'all we still don't actually know how Jude made it you know how he got here and I named him Jude on purpose cuz that's as close as I could get to Revelation cuz it's finished that's it so I take them to this Harvest Festival and I stand in line with Jude Behind these cars they have a trunker treat at this church does anybody know what I mean when I say trunker treat okay a lot of churches don't do it anymore but this church still does they have volunteers from the congregation bring their cars into the parking lot they lift up their trunks and each one of those car owners will basically uh make a fair game some sort of Carnival like game in the trunk kids line up one trunk after the other playing these games and normally whether they win or lose they give the kid a whole bunch of candy and send them home with with a bag full of candy the parents we are just you know so grateful for that the most impressive game last year was a truck actually they had put a little step ladder so that kids could climb up into the bed of the truck they had attached to the side of the bed of this truck a tabletop a board that was about the same size as the bed of the truck they had cut six holes in it draped it with some fabric and out from those holes every few seconds a puppet would pop through they would give the kid a plastic a huge plastic Mallet so that the kid could stand there and try to hit all of the puppets on the head it was a homemade whack-a-mole game is what it was right this was the longest line everybody could not wait to play this game I'm standing in line holding hands with little Jude he could not wait and behind us there was probably a four-year-old or so five maybe that was waiting with his mother we were laughing hysterically y'all at this little boy because he was going on and on about several things that he was annoying with in this whole situation he was first of all quite annoyed because he did not understand Mom why I have to stand in this long line aren't I supposed to be having fun at the carnival mom I have an idea mom how about you stand in this line while I go over here and do these carnival games and then I'll come back when it's our turn cuz Mom I'm supposed to be having fun and I'm not having fun but that's not the only thing he was annoyed with he was also annoyed because Mom I don't understand what the point of this game is do you see that those kids keep hitting those puppets on top of the head but every time they hit the puppet on top of the head the puppet just comes back what's the point of hitting the puppet on top of the head if the puppet's just going to keep coming back every time I hit the puppet on top of the head the kid was going on and on and we were all in the line we were all laughing hysterically at this little boy and before any of us could say anything we just saw a 4-year-old flashed by our peripheral vision as he ran forward grabbed the drapery off of the table and pulled it clean off underneath there were three adults puppets on each 
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 hand so that day we laughed but we also learned a very valuable lesson that there is always something you can't see controlling what you can and if you spend and I spend all of my time and my money and my manipulation and my anger and my frustra popping at all of the trouble that keeps coming up and showing itself in my marriage and in my finances and my school and on my job and in my career I will at best exhaust myself but I will not have hit hit the enemy where it hurts the Apostle Paul says in Ephesians chapter 6 would you pull back the curtain once and for all and let the enemy know that we got our eyes on you that we're not going to let you play us for the fool any longer that we know how to use weapons that hit you where it hurts so the Apostle Paul says today is the day to stop directing the wrong weapons at the wrong person would you please look at the person next to you and say girl you are not my problem I thought you were but it's not 
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 you so the Apostle Paul lays out what I believe to be not six but seven pieces of armor traditionally it is taught as six because he does say in verse 13 in verse 14 that your your loins need to be garded with truth and he does say that you need a breastplate on called righteousness and then in verse 15 he does say that you need something for your feet they better be shot with the preparation of the gospel of peace and then he does say in verse 16 that you do need to erect Faith over your life because it will act as a shield that will extinguish all the Flaming missiles of the evil one then he says you need something for your head to protect your mind against the schemes of the devil so he says you need a helmet on called salvation but then he says not only that you need a sword a dagger really of the spirit it is the word of God but he does not stop at those six because in verse 18 He says pray you cannot have Victory are y'all listen to me me tonight you cannot have Victory unless you are a woman of prayer you cannot have Victory unless you take seriously a conversation with your God prayer is the key that unlocks all of the blessings that your God already has plann for you but cannot dispense to you until you are found on your knees before him and if I were the enemy I would want to devalue the potency of what I know to be the most valuable weapon you have against me that is why he has made our churches a house of great preaching and a house of great programs and a house of great impressive uh possibilities for the community all of those things are great but Jesus said let my house be called a House of Prayer y'all prayer is what pulls the curtain back it is what allows us to direct all the right weapons at the right culprit prayer is what activates all the other pieces of armor so that they are infused with the Divine activity they need to cause you to be able to stand firm against all of his schemes so he says to pray you and I don't have time to March through every single one of these pieces of armor but just a couple of them that I thought you and I could talk about tonight is that all right just a couple of them to help us to stand firm against his schemes somebody say schemes schemes schemes the Apostle Paul wants you to know how serious this business is of warfare with the Enemy because he wants you to know that the devil is not haphazard in his attacks against you he says that your enemy is scheming okay y'all listen if somebody does me wrong I'm a pretty easygoing personality I mean it'll hurt but I can get over that but if I find out somebody has been scheming to do me wrong oh that's a whole another thing that's a whole another thing because when I find out you've been studying me you've been watching so that you can see what my habits are and when I come and when I go you've been studying so that you can see what my weaknesses are so that you can best take advantage of me and Lead me astray you've been trying to find out what the proclivities of My Flesh are so that you can tantalize me in a way that will lead me in a path of rebellion against my God and when I find out that not only have you been studying me so that you can take advantage of me but you've been studying this man that I've been married to for 17 years so that you can figure out what his weaknesses are so that you can lead him astray and you've been studying him looking into his history so that you can figure out how to cause there to be combustion between his history and my history so that there is no unity and Oneness in our relationship and then when I find out that not only have you been studying me and not only have you been scheming against my man but then you've had your eyes on these three boys that the Lord has given me to raise up to be Warrior men for Christ so that you can take advantage of their weaknesses and stand against them as they try to walk forward to the destiny to which their God has called them when I find out you've had your eyes on me and my husband and these boys well now you better believe that if you've been SK against me I'm sure enough going to be scheming against you that I'm not just going to stand back and and let you run rough shot over my family I'm not just going to stand back and let you uh play me for the fool and and let you run rough shot over my peace of mind and my peace of heart and this marriage that I have and these boys that I have been given to raise just like you should not just allow the enemy to come in y'all we're the ones that are supposed to stand in the doorway of our homes in the doorway of our cities and say not today Satan not on our watch not on our watch so the Apostle Paul says you got to be dressed right for victory you got to be dressed right and he starts with two pieces of armor in one simple verse that I want to share with you for a moment in verse 14 he says stand firm therefore having girded your loins with what come on y'all having girded your loins with with truth I want you to picture the Apostle Paul sitting in what would have been a jail jail cell it probably would have been more like house arrest he was on house arrest in a Roman prison for about two years at the time he penned what was a letter at the time to the first century Believers in Ephesus I want you to picture him sitting on the cold hard floor of his prison cell sweat pouring down his brow ink quill in in hand as he hung over the parchment paper to pen this letter and he gets to this final portion of the letter really what is the exclamation point the ceiling Mark to everything he's wanted to say throughout this letter and he's trying to figure out the best words to be able to help the Believers at that time and the Believers in this time on this evening at this church in the middle of the night how they can figure out how to best wear these pieces of of armor how to best make sure that these spiritual virtues aren't just something they applaud because it sounds good in the message but they walk out of here with this P these pieces on infused as a part of their life picture him looking up from where he is trying to find the right words and looking up to the doorway of his cell where there would have been a Roman Centennial standing guard Roman soldiers were a ubiquitous presence during in the first century meaning they were everywhere civilians everybody knew what a Roman soldier looked like and they knew the features of the Roman soldiers um gear they would have known for example that the most obvious thing they could see from AF far off was a helmet that most of the time had brightly color colored feathers that were standing high above them they would have noticed that it would have been impressive not only that but they would have seen the breastplate the breastplate was the heaviest piece of armor that the Roman soldier would wear so they would notice that first they would notice first of all what would be most obvious to them was not only the helmet not only the breastplate but that impressive Shield y'all The Shield was like a door there were iron uh sorry wood planks that were sealed together there was an iron Hub right in the middle and it was tall enough and wide enough that when crouched down two or three soldiers could get behind the shield when you first saw a soldier you would see that Shield you would see that helmet you would see the breastplate those were the things that were most impressive and applaudable when you saw a Roman soldier coming but when the Apostle Paul looked to see what piece best correlates with truth he did not pick the obvious he did not pick the impressive he did not pick the applaudable he picked the piece of armor that the soldier put on first because underneath all that impressive stuff there was a belt that held every everything else together Paul said now that's truth right there I cannot assume that because you came tonight you are a woman who is GED in truth oh I hope you go to a Bible teaching Church like this one we are in tonight I hope you are planted in the house of God somewhere wherever you live whether it's on this side of the planet or on the other side of the planet where whatever it is that you have come from I pray that you are planted in a Bible teaching church but I'm afraid that just because you go to church does not mean you are a woman who is guarded in truth oh y'all I'm hoping you're in Bible study I'm hoping you don't just hear the the the word preached on a Sunday morning I mean that's great but you need something midweek to just keep you going all the way through I hope you're in Bible study but I'm afraid to say that you can be in Bible study after Bible study and still not be a woman who is garded in truth and the sad thing about this generation I'm putting myself in this generation 45 maybe and under the sad thing about us y'all is that we are impressive and we are applaudable and we have Instagram likes and we've got a whole bunch of followers on Twitter but we have no belt of Truth there is no allegiance to the truth of God I'm talking about an allegiance that is not politically correct I'm talking about an allegiance that will make you at your University be the only one that the professor doesn't give the great grade to because you did not agree with his philosophy I'm talking about the only one that on your job says uh I'm not getting the promotion that way because my word says that I will follow my God in integrity and I will honor him all the days of my life only you can make a decision whether or not you going to wrap yourself in the truth of God it does not mean you applaud it it means that you live according to it y'all let me tell yall why truth is so important are y'all with me everybody with me Amen Let Me Tell yall why truth is so important because the enemy's number one M Mo are you listening in the balcony listen the enemy's number one M Mo I mean his calling card where you can see him coming from a mile away is deception 
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 here's the tragedy with deception embedded within deception is a blinding agent so that the person who is being deceived doesn't know what's so dangerous about deception is that it's not a plain old flat out lie y'all what's so dangerous about deception is that you if you're being deceived you're standing on the edge and you're about to take a step off and everybody else around you can see that if you take that step it is not going to go well for you but you can't see it the danger of deception is that you think this is the best relationship for you so you walk down that path the danger of deception is that you were sure this was the the business acquisition that you should make this was the partnership that you should have this was the road that you should walk down and the truth is if we were to take this little microphone that I have on and pass it around this room there would be testimony after testimony of people who have been deceived oh the enemy pulled the wool over your eyes you've seen it so clearly before because y'all are just like me you've had friends who were trying to explain to you why this relationship they are choosing is the best relationship for them to them it makes complete sense why they would leave their spouse and choose this relationship because this is going to be healthy for them this is going to benefit them and you're listening to their explanation and the more they talk the more your eyebrow lifts up in curiosity because you cannot see how they can't see that they being deceived oh and that's the danger of deception is that when it's you you don't 
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 know it's only in hindsight that you look back and realize he played you for the fool oh and if the truth be told some of us in this room right now y'all we are reeling right now from the consequences of signing our name on a contract that the enemy did not let us see the fine print of we didn't see all of those warnings you know like when you see those commercials you can take this for your headache but you may lose your eyesight and you may lose your left arm and you might have a stroke and you might not wake up tomorrow morning but your headache will be gone 
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 so we walked down that path and we did that thing and we agreed to that and now we realized he was taking us for a right the only way that you and I can have any defense against deception is if we are girded in truth it is the first line of defense against the enemy because when you're being deceived you don't know right y'all there's a movie that was out uh several years ago called Inception I didn't see Inception uh Pastor Bridget I didn't go see it the reason why is because when I go to the movies I just want to relax I don't want to use any brain capabilities at all at the movies I want to chill out which is why I did not see Inception cuz I heard it was serious business dad told me about inception he loved it he said Leo DiCaprio's character was in reality but would often fall asleep when he would fall asleep he'd be in a dream world and the problem was that in this dream world everything was so real and so tangible that he thought he was in reality so he would make decisions as if he were in reality but they were getting him in trouble cuz he wasn't he was in a dream if that weren't confusing enough sometimes when he was in the dream world he would fall asleep and enter a second layer of dreaming and in this dream world everything was so real and so tangible that he thought he was in reality so he was making decisions based on reality but he wasn't there so they were getting him into trouble and if that wasn't confusing enough sometimes when this brother was already in the second layer of dreaming he had the nerve to fall asleep and have another layer of dreams so now he is three layers deep he's not just in a dream he's in a dream that is within a dream that was already within a Dream Within his reality and it it's too much isn't it it's too much too much brain requirements for that movie so about halfway through he starts taking the spinning top with him wherever he is he finds a flat surface and he spins the top and he watches it if it spins endlessly if it never slows down if it never Falls well he knows gravity is not at work so this in the real world if it does slow down if it falls over eventually he knows that there's gravity at work here I must be home he has stopped trusting in his own perception he stops trusting in what what his feelings tell him are real he has a standard that is outside of himself to look to to help him to determine whether or not he's being taken for a ride oh y'all the enemy hopes that you will trust your feelings he so hopes that you will lean to your own understanding he so hopes that you will not make a choice to gge yourself in truth that you'll have an objective standard that is outside of yourself cuz he can deceive you you need something that is an objective standard the same yesterday today and forever more never changing Hallelujah and when you have this set as your standard he can't play you like he can play everybody else cuz you've got a standard that is not subject to the way you feel I wonder if there's anybody in the room that's ever been taken on a ride by your feelings o he hopes you'll trust what you feel but if you are a woman who is gerded in truth you have just uh aligned yourself with the first line of defense that the enemy cannot take advantage of just one more for tonight he not only says say in that same verse verse 14 that you need to have your your loins girded with truth but he also says you need a breastplate on he says you need something to guard your heart he says you need a breastplate and your breastplate is called come on y'all it's called righteous righteousness Jerry and I live in a fairly rural part of the Dallas Fort Worth area we like it that way kind of out in the country but we're close enough to the city we can get there in 10 minutes really easy but we live on a little quiet two-lane um Road somebody's got horses over there and somebody's got cows over there and and there's creeks and uh bugs and mud and things boys need in their life I'm one of those mamas who believes in outside go outside that's what I say anytime they have the nerve to come to me and say that they are bored I say no you're not you see that tree right there go play with it go play with it so that's why we live out there I love it I love that they have room to run that's what I like one of the other reasons why I like it is because a friend of mine lives across the street that's how I kind of discovered that place when my boys were little I'd take them to go visit Rachel because she lives across the street she has a pond I love seeing my boys throw that stick out on the pond and her dog go out and Chase that stick and bring the stick back I loved who my boys were out there so still to this day my boys and I will go to the pond we grabb the two fishing po holes that I bought on sale at the local Super Walmart around the corner I also have a tackle box that I got on sale at the at the Super Walmart because we do like going fishing and and I like fishing I don't mind fishing with the boys but you know I I need some gear to go with me so in that in that little tackle box we have extra hooks we have extra Bobbers and we also have gloves cuz I don't mind going fishing but I ain't going to touch no actual fish so we go fishing and we stand in this little corner of the pond on underneath the shade of some trees most of the time we stand right there on the shallow end where we're just going to catch sun perch real small fish nothing major we'll walk walk over there cross the street grab the extra hot dog meat from the week that's our bait we're real professional we're real professional and we fish sometimes I'm feeling adventurous y'all my neighbors have this little old metal rowboat they bought on Craigslist some years ago they always leave it turned up down on the edge of the pond it's turned upside down because any water that collected the last time it was out the water needs to drain and of course if they left it right side up you know it would fill up with water if it rained so they they need to leave it upside down but if I'm going to get in it with the boys I always have to think twice about that choice because the environment that has been created underneath that Bo boat is moist it's shap he it's cool it's the perfect environment for Critters so I have to brace myself if we getting ready to turn this thing over cuz I know if we turn it over something is inevitably going to hop out from underneath it something's going to Waddle out from underneath it or worst of all something's going to so anytime I'm feeling brave and adventurous I stand way back way back I get the back end of the boat the boys get the sides and we flip it over inevitably something comes out from the boat it's always interesting to me that never once never once have I had to write a golden sealed invitation and send it into the brush nearby inviting the critters to come and join us at 1:00 on Saturday we'll be there never once have I had to send out a Clarion call into the to to the trees nearby to let them know that they are invited to come and join us I've never had to invite them because the environment created by the upside down boat is invitation enough righteousness is right side up living that invites the sunlight of God's favor and blessing on your life unrighteousness is upside down beh behavior that is out of alignment with the truth that you just said you would affirm for your life and that upside down Behavior means you don't have to invite the devil and demonic activity into your life that upside down behavior is invitation enough it creates an environment in which the Demonic influence can be cultivated in your life to where they won't only feel welcome but they will flourish it means you can be in your War Room play praying against the devil till you are blue in the face but if you come out of your war room and live a raggedy Wayward lifestyle that is outside of the alignment with the truth of God's word you got to know that the enemy is on his way in fact if you are seeing the Fingerprints of the enemy in any place in your life or in mine I'm talking about a lack of peace uh jealousy Strife I'm talking about the Fingerprints of the enemy sickness and disease on your life just ask your yourself it might not be the case but just ask God just like David did search me oh God examine me let me know if my boat is upside down let me know if my attitudes and if my actions are out of alignment let me know Lord if in some way I'm creating an environment where the devil feels like he can make himself at home up in here so that by the empowerment of the Holy Spirit I can get on with the business of right ing myself so that I can have your favor all over my life y'all that's what I'm after anybody want God's favor on your life y'all we don't have time to play games we need God's favor when Moses was on his way to the promised land remember God got so upset with them he was like y'all go ahead I ain't going to the promised land and Moses said uhuh hold up Exodus 33:15 he said if your presence is not going with us I ain't going yeah because he said what will Mark us if we do not have your presence y'all that's what's going to Mark us it's God's presence on us it's his favor on us y'all it's not Instagram followers that's going to Mark us it's not impressive pictures that is going to Mark us it's not the Applause and the celebrity the appreciation of people that is going to Mark us it will be the anointing of God Upon Our Lives that will Mark us and separate from everybody else Paul says if you want a breastplate that will cover the most vital spiritual organ that you have listen y'all a soldier are y'all still with me a soldier could be strong he could be well-versed in battle he could have tons of experience cuz he's done this before he knows all of the formations I mean he's a good soldier all the way around if he was a great Soldier but he had no breastplate one blow to the heart would wipe him out didn't matter how smart he was didn't matter how impressive his formation was it didn't matter the T-shirt he had on or the bumper sticker that was on his car didn't matter how much religious activity he participated in no breastplate one blow to the heart will wipe you out what the physical heart is to the physical body the spiritual heart is to to your spiritual life all of the Vitality that you need to be pumped into your spiritual life so you keep walking in fervor and in passion and you have a vibrant relationship with Jesus Christ so that your relationship with him so that your uh Christianity is not dumbed down to just a religion where you read a verse a day to keep the devil away but where there's a conversation and vitality happening with your God where you serve him in spirit and you serve him in truth that kind of vibrancy comes from a healthy spiritual heart which is why if I were your enemy more than anything I'd be after your heart because one blow to the heart and I can wipe you out so when the enemy schemes against you y'all listen to me when he schemes against you he's trying to figure out how to get that breastplate off do you think it is by chance that that particular Temptation that Temptation that's your thing that same temptation to your friend would make no difference cuz that ain't they thing but that temptation is your thing come on come on it's the one that suits your fancy it's the one that tickles your inclinations it's the one that makes your eyes take a second look do you think it is by chance that that Temptation happens to show up in your life when you are particularly hungry particularly tired overwhelmingly lonely and then the Temptation shows up y'all that's not a coincidence that's a scheme of the en come on cuz the enemy wants your breastplate off because then he knows that the most vital spiritual organ that you have is at his disposal one more thing and then I'm going to be done your heart y'all with me everybody okay listen your spiritual heart is the centerpiece of your soul it's the Hub of your soul okay your soul is composed of your mind what you think your will what you purpose to do your ambition or your uh emotions what you feel and your conscience your conscience is not the voice of God but your conscience is like the microphone that the Holy Spirit uses to help you hear the voice of God okay if I were your enemy ooh I'd be after your heart cuz with one blow to the heart I automatically have access to your mind now I can Tinker with your thoughts to cause them to be so distorted you don't know what it is that God thinks and how to align your thinking with him anymore if I were the enemy I'd be after your heart cuz Not only would I have access to your mind now I have access to your emotions I can mess with the way you feel and not only that if I could just get your heart I'd not only have access to your mind and to your emotions but also to your Ambitions I would make it so that you what you want to do does not align with what God desires for you to do oh but not only that more than anything I'm after your heart cuz then I'd have access not only to your mind not only to your will not only to your emotions but then I could Short Circuit the wires in your conscience so that you can no longer hear and sense the conviction of the Holy Spirit oh he doesn't want you hearing the voice of God he wants the Bible to look nothing like vibrancy and fervency and a personal intimate word he wants it to just look like Black Ink on a page he doesn't want it to be valuable and intimate between you and God and so he wants to Short Circuit these wires and if you have no breastplate on you have given him full access right righteousness does not mean Perfection it means a lifestyle that you have made a choice as for me in my house we're going to serve the Lord and unrighteousness doesn't mean that you are walking in continual obedience it just means that you have made a choice in a specific area of your of your life I'm talking about where you already know after this session you plan to go home because you've already made an appointment for 1:30 a.m. somewhere you have no business being it's a planned Disobedience it is a lifestyle you've already decided that you don't want this breastplate on righteousness is not Perfection it just means that you have chosen I'm not going to plan obedience dis obedience it's not going to be scheduled in to my life I am not going to knowingly walk down a path that I know is dishonoring to my god when I sense the conviction of the Holy Spirit saying whoa I'mma hold up when I sense him saying stop I'm going to stop not by my own strength and power but because the Holy Spirit lives in me to empower me to be what I cannot be in my own strength and in my own power the armor of the Roman soldier y'all it weighed about 70 lbs can you imagine trying to be nimble and quick and agile in battle with 70 extra pounds on you the heaviest portion of that weight was in the breastplate the breastplate could weigh so heavily on the shoulders of the soldier that it would wear him out before the battle even started I mean that thing was so heavy that before he even started before he even took his first step in the real Act of battle he would have no energy left with which to advance against the enemy because he was already so weighed down because the breastplate was so heavy to carry on his own part of the job of the belt was to take some of the weight of the breastplate off of the solders shoulders so that the soldier didn't have to carry all that weight by himself righteousness your own it's too heavy a weight for you to carry by yourself if the enemy can't shackle You by sin and addiction he's going to Shackle You by perfectionism so that you're so weighed down trying to impress god with your own righteousness that you don't even have any energy left to live free and fully for your God cuz your own righteousness is weighing you down y'all it's too heavy a load for you to carry all my your but there's some truth God there is some truth that can take that weight off of your shoulders there's some truth that can set you free and here's the truth the truth is that 2,000 years ago a man named Jesus Christ he died on the Cross of Calvary and when you accept his gift of Salvation in your life not only does he withdraw from your spiritual bank account the sin the debt the wages you owe for what you have done and what I have done but he doesn't just withdraw then he credits you with something he credits your spiritual bank account with the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus this is some truth that will set you free because now you know righteousness is not on your shoulders anymore because now you know that the truth of God takes the weight off of you trying to have your own righteousness because his righteousness has been your gift and I just wonder if there's anybody in the room tonight and you are so weighed down trying to impress God that righteousness is wearing you out you've got perfectionism on you like a shackle trying to be something that only the gift of Jesus Christ can be and give to you in your life I want you to Bow your heads and I'm going to ask you a question that right now in the middle of the night is the best question you could ever be asked I want to ask you if you have ever received the gift of Christ righteousness on Calvary I want to ask you if you have that weight on you that is weighing you down so much so that honestly you can't live free and fully because you realize today you've been carrying your own righteousness and you are show enough tired you need something to take the weight off yeah as your head is bowed and your eyes are closed can I just ask you that if you need this gift tonight if you've never just received Jesus Christ is your savior I don't want to assume tonight that you have just because you're here spiritual Victory and in Warfare starts here it starts with you having a relationship with Jesus Christ and so as every head is bowed and eyes clo if closed if you are in this room you've never made that choice to accept Jesus Christ as Savior and receive his righteousness would you just lift your hand and lift your eyes so that my eyes see yours and I'll know this is a decision that you need to make tonight is there anybody that does in the balcony or on the floor 
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 anybody just 10 more seconds or so is there anyone it's good news if there's not anybody well then I ask if there is anyone in the room and you are space facing such serious spiritual warfare and you've been directing the wrong weapons at the wrong culprit and today you realize that it's the enemy who is behind the scenes stirring up trouble and you want to commit today to exchange the weapons of this world for weapons that actually work you want to be a woman who makes a decision to gge yourself with truth and to put on a breastplate of righteousness if you have a particular issue in your life and you need prayer in this regard would you please just stand to your feet let me pray for you as we 
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 close Lord I pray for my sisters who are standing up they are saying by their boldness that there is an issue in their life where they see the Fingerprints of the enemy upon it so Lord I ask right now in the name of Jesus that if there is any assignment that the enemy has against these women and against their families I pray that that assignment would be canceled in Jesus name and by his blood that has been shed on Calvary Lord I speak against the enemy and I say that he will leave these women alone Lord that he will not mess with their minds and not mess with their hearts he will take his hands off of their marriages and off of their kids and off of their health and off of their finances in Jesus name and Lord I pray that you would make us women of Courage that you would make us women of Victory I pray that when we leave this place in many hours from now Lord that we will be women GED in the weapons of warfare that are divinely empowered for the tearing down of strongholds Lord I pray that today we would be the day we pull back the curtain let the enemy know that he cannot take us for a ride not one more day Lord because we are women dressed for war it is in Jesus name that everybody agreed and said amen amen amen 
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 hallelujah praise God can everybody just bow your heads just for a moment and even though she made the appeal and no one raised their hand I don't want to just take for granted we're all born again so if everybody would just repeat this prayer