Sheryl Brady - It's Time to Kill the Kings

The book of Joshua, I love. I really love this book because, number one, this book is for fighters, and I’m not a fighter, per se. I was talking to—believe it was Anna—yesterday when I was discussing my sisters, and I showed her a picture of my sister Kay. I said, «Just look at her. She’s so peaceful; in her eyes, they’re just so loving and warm. She’s the purest thing ever.» Then I mentioned my sister Elaine and remarked, «I don’t know if there’s anyone or anything more pure than her.» Somewhere along the way, I’ve got Kay on one side, Elaine on the other, and I’m in the middle—not the middle child—but just to give you some framework regarding what I’m saying, I’m not a fighter. I don’t necessarily like to fight, but I will fight if you mess with the wrong thing. Amen? And don’t act like you wouldn’t, because you would. Sometimes, you gotta get an attitude. But I have a sweet side; if you mess with the wrong thing, there’s something that takes over in me that’s going to take you out—in the name of Jesus, of course. Yep, I’ll get you, and then I’ll pray for you and ask God to heal you.

The book of Joshua is for fighters. It is also a book about moving Israel into and settling into the Promised Land—or the prime real estate that God had already given them. However, it was not going to happen without a fight. It would be nice if God would just give us a promise, and then we could possess that promise without having to fight for it, but very rarely does it happen that way. Most of the time, when God tells us, «This is yours,» he also says, «It is yours to possess.» So you have to know it’s yours, but you also know that you must possess it, which means you have to take someone out of it before you can move into it. Taking possession of what God has promised is usually a process, and it almost always involves a fight. Often, I can tell the closer I get to taking possession by the fierceness of the fight I find myself in. Does anybody witness to that today? When the fight gets fiercer and fiercer, and you feel like you have it under control, but then it all gets out of control, you have to pause before you totally lose it and say, «You know what? I know what this is about. I’ve figured this out. I’ve been through these things long enough to know that there is a purpose behind this fight.»

So when God promises you something, he takes you through a process, and it does not just happen overnight. Most of the time, when God promises you something, there is a process. Somebody say «process.» Now, the minute he gives it to you, it is yours, but it is yours to take dominion over. It is yours to possess. There has to be a strong commitment inside you that says, «Whatever I have to do, whatever I need to stop doing, whatever I’ve got to learn, whatever I’ve got to unlearn, whatever I have to go after, whatever I have to stand still and wait for, whatever I’ve got to change—whatever it takes, that’s what I’m willing to do because I want to obtain and I want possession of what God has given to me.»

Does anyone feel that way here today? If it means I have to move outside my comfort zone, I’ve done it before, and I can do it again. You never get what God promises you by just laying low and staying in your comfort zone. Sometimes, you have to be ready to move out of your comfort zone. It is something that just has to be done, because while I’m grateful for where I am right now, I understand it’s going to take more for me to get where I’m going than where I am by receiving what I have right now. So I might have to be uncomfortable; I might have to confront some of my own traditions in order to get what God has for me. I might have to break some bad habits. I had to step out of my culture to pursue what God had given me; I had to unlearn some things that I had learned. But I never, ever want to be stuck between what God has made me thirsty for and the traditions of men. I never want to be caught between my thirst and my traditions. There have been many times in my life when my culture wanted to go one way, but my thirst was calling me to go another way. Has anyone ever experienced that? My culture, everything in me says this is the right way, but the closer I got, the more miserable I became because I realized my thirst was different from my culture. So I had to decide to make some changes. I say this to say: don’t be shocked if God starts requiring you to learn a new culture or to adopt a new way of thinking when it comes to possessing the promises.