Believe His Love And Receive All Blessings
Sunday, 30 December 2018
These are notes on the sermon, Believe His Love And Receive All Blessings, preached by Pastor Joseph Prince on Sunday, 30 December 2018, at The Star Performing Arts Centre, Singapore. We hope these sermon notes will be an encouragement to you!
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What’s the key to experiencing Jesus’ miracle-working power in your life? Go beyond knowing that God loves you to really believing it.
In this sermon, Pastor Prince dives into an exciting study of the ark of the covenant—a powerful visual aid of Jesus and His finished work—and shows you why you can live life fully assured that God is for you and wants to bless you.
We hope these notes will help you understand that when you allow God’s love to sink into your heart, you will:
Live life confident of your heavenly Father’s compassion and favor, and experience a harvest of blessings like you’ve never seen before!
2018 has been a great year of God’s mercies. We might have experienced valleys, but we also experienced mountaintops.
Pastor Prince shares how the Lord gave him a picture of His posture towards us this 2019: a posture of His hand raised over us, ready to bless us.
God has many good things prepared for us in 2019. It is not going to be like the years gone by.
He is yearning to pour out His blessings on us. He has a storehouse packed with good things for us. He wants us to experience the fullness and richness of all that He has prepared for us!
There is a tsunami of blessings coming our way. We can’t fight it. We can’t but be carried by it—it will sweep us away!
In 2018, many of us experienced little drops of mercy, but in 2019, we will experience showers of blessings.
Our part this year is to prepare bigger vessels to contain God’s blessings. We should prepare for growth, enlargement, and increase.
We are not going to stay at the same level that we’re at now.
Pastor Prince gives a special word for those who are believing God for a life partner—“2019 is going to be a year of harvest for you!”
The Lord is able to do great and mighty things.
Today, Jesus is physically in heaven. He rose from the dead in a glorified body, not as a spirit. One day when Jesus returns, we will be transformed and have a glorious body like His.
Physically, Jesus is now in heaven at the Father’s right hand. But that doesn’t mean that He is ineffectual on earth.
On earth, His Spirit (the Holy Spirit) is with us. And His power can flow in our lives as if He were right beside us.
It is the same power with which He walked on the lake of Galilee. The same power that turned water into wine. The same power that healed the leper and all the sick who came to Him.
Pastor Prince shows a short video clip of the earlier service where a woman stood up to testify that she had received healing for a growth in her liver during one of the services in 2018.
Pastor Prince uses this example to show that Jesus is now everywhere, still doing miracles.
The Holy Spirit in us is as effective as Jesus with us.
Today, Jesus is present with us and active on the earth.
Jesus’ value and power did not dissipate when He went back to heaven in His physical form. God sent the Holy Spirit down to earth, and now the Holy Spirit is everywhere—demonstrating the same power as Jesus when He walked on earth.
When Jesus was on earth, He demonstrated that He’s the Lord of space and time.
That’s why you can be sure that your 2019 will be good—because God has gone ahead of you to prepare wonderful things for you.
It’s always good to invite the Lord to be part of your life at the beginning of a new year. You need Him to walk you through every journey you will take, every situation, every circumstance. He has gone ahead and He knows how to lead you and provide for you.
Jesus’ first miracle
Jesus’ first miracle was for a couple who invited Him to their wedding in Cana of Galilee (see John 2:1–12).
The father of the bride paid for the wedding, as was the Jewish culture. He was a wealthy man—we can tell from how he lavish he was with his spending.
But despite his wealth, the wine ran out. This is one of the most embarrassing things that could have happened. The wine—an indicator of wealth and celebration—ran out.
Jesus told them to fill the 6 stone waterpots that were at the wedding with water.
6 — the number of man; represents self-effort.
Stone — represents the law because the law was written on tablets of stone.
Stone was an expensive material for waterpots in that day because stone waterpots had to be carved and sculptured in such a way that the stone didn’t crack during the process. Once it cracked, it couldn’t be fixed. On the other hand, clay waterpots were much easier to make because you could fill in the cracks/mistakes. Clay was more forgiving. Stone left no room for mistakes.
Just like the stone waterpots, the law is unbending. It cannot accommodate weakness.
The 6 waterpots were filled with water—not wine, which was required—indicating man’s inability to keep the law.
Where man’s effort is not enough, where a wealthy man’s provision is not enough, Jesus shows up and does the impossible.
He turned the water into wine. And not just any kind of wine, but the best wine.
For wine to be created, you first need grapes. The grapes take a few years to grow and be ripe enough to be harvested for wine. After the wine is made, it has to be kept for many years (20, 30, 40, 50+ years) for the wine to be “good wine.”
Jesus made the BEST wine, and He did it without going through that process. He created the best wine in a single moment. He compressed time, demonstrating that He is the Lord of time.
Pastor Prince shares how the Lord impressed on his heart to pray for the renewal of youth in 2019. This renewal of youth is not only about how you look like on the outside. It goes beyond what cosmetics, lifting, and surgery can do. It’s a renewal of youth that’s from the inside out—where there’s a sparkle in your eye and you feel young and excited about life!
Pastor Prince plays more video clips of the earlier service when he called out people’s physical conditions and prayed for them. These conditions are:
Jesus is a compressor of time. What might take years of medication, Jesus can do in one fell swoop.
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Jesus’ second miracle
Jesus’ second miracle was the healing of a nobleman’s son (see John 4:46–54).
Jesus did not go to the nobleman’s house to heal his son. He just spoke the words: “Go your way; your son lives.”
The nobleman’s home was in Capernaum, many miles away from Cana of Galilee where he found Jesus. He had to spend the night at Cana then return to Capernaum the next day.
The Bible says, “... the man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him, and he went his way. And as he was now going down, his servants met him and told him, saying, “Your son lives!” Then he inquired of them the hour when he got better. And they said to him, “Yesterday at the seventh hour the fever left him.” So the father knew that it was at the same hour in which Jesus said to him, “Your son lives.” And he himself believed, and his whole household.” (John 4:50–53).
With this miracle, Jesus demonstrated that He is the Lord of space.
He does not need to be physically present to touch or heal you.
Pastor Prince shares how he has received many testimonies from people who wrote in to share about how they were healed when they listened to a sermon where he had prayed for people to be healed of specific conditions. These testimonies are coming from people who were not sitting in the healing service; they were watching or listening to it months or years after the service happened.
Pastor Prince prays for people with:
Jesus calls healing the children’s bread (see Matt. 15:26).
Pastor Prince also encourages people holding bitterness in their hearts against someone to let it go. He encourages them to forgive the person, whether it’s a spouse or friend who hurt them. Harboring bitterness and unforgiveness is like preparing poison for someone but drinking it yourself instead.
He also prays for people experiencing fear and anxiety about the future.
Pastor Prince shares 2 testimonies of people who were delivered from sexual addictions.
The turning point came when they believe that Jesus loved them despite their addictions and when they believed that they were made righteous in Him.
We have been made justified in Christ.
Justified = just as if I’d never sinned
“being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed, to demonstrate at the present time His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”
— Romans 3:24–26 NKJV
“Propitiation” — This is the Greek word “hilastérion,” which means “mercy seat.”
What is the mercy seat? It is a crucial part of the ark of the covenant. *See slide 7 for picture of the ark.
The ark of the covenant
“And the cherubim shall stretch out their wings above, covering the mercy seat with their wings, and they shall face one another; the faces of the cherubim shall be toward the mercy seat. You shall put the mercy seat on top of the ark, and in the ark you shall put the Testimony that I will give you. And there I will meet with you, and I will speak with you from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim which are on the ark of the Testimony, about everything which I will give you in commandment to the children of Israel.”
— Exodus 25:20–22 NKJV
The ark of the covenant was made up of 4 parts:
The box: The box was made of acacia wood overlaid with gold—both on the inside and outside (see Exod. 25:10–11). It was a picture of the person Jesus: 100% man and 100% God. The strong and sturdy wood represented Jesus’ incorruptible humanity, and the gold represented His divinity.
The contents of the box: The box contained 3 items, but the main item was the Ten Commandments. The ark of the covenant was also known as the ark of the law. The law was kept inside the box and covered by the mercy seat.
The mercy seat: The mercy seat was one solid slab of gold beaten into shape. It covered the Ten Commandments. On the Day of Atonement, the high priest of Israel would sprinkle the blood of a sacrificial animal on the mercy seat (see Lev. 16:14). The blood signified that the punishment for sin had been paid. The mercy seat is a picture of the perfect work of Jesus on the cross.
How the book of Hebrews describes Jesus as the true ark of the covenant:
“who being the brightness of His glory [gold without] and the express image of His person [gold within], and upholding all things by the word of His power [crown of gold], when He had by Himself purged our sins [mercy seat], sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high”
— Hebrews 1:3 NKJV *See slide 4
No one can keep the law. The law does not understand, “I am doing my best.” It doesn’t matter what you wanted to do, what you intended to do, what you hoped to do. All that matters is what you did.
Only Jesus’ has the law in His heart (like the box contained the Ten Commandments), and He fulfilled the law for us.
As long as blood was on the mercy seat, Israel could expect blessings from God. They could expect to defeat their enemies, they could expect a rich harvest, they could expect a blessed family life.
The cherubim: The cherubim whose eyes were fixed on the mercy seat were archangels—guardians of God’s holiness. They were only satisfied when they saw the blood on the mercy seat, signifying that payment for sin had been made.
The first time we see them is in the book of Genesis: “So He drove out the man; and He placed cherubim at the east of the garden of Eden, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life.” (Gen. 3:24)
Because of sin, the cherubim had to drive Adam and Eve out into a world that was slowly falling.
The first mention of “sword” in the Old Testament is in Genesis 3:24, “... He placed cherubim at the east of the garden of Eden, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life.”
The last mention of “sword” in the Old Testament is in Zechariah 13:7, “Awake, O sword, against My Shepherd…”
The death of Jesus is all that’s needed for our complete, once-and-for-all forgiveness.
Because of Jesus’ finished work, blood has been sprinkled on the mercy seat and before the mercy seat 7 times (see Lev. 16:14).
Why 7 times?
7 = the number of perfection, representing our perfect standing before God.
7 = to tell us that we need to be reminded again and again and again that in spite of our sins, we can come to God without looking at ourselves but looking at the blood of Jesus that justifies us.
We can be conscious of Jesus’ blood and know that Someone has died and paid for our sins.
The fullest payment that the curse can exact from man—beyond disease, poverty, depression—is death.
Blood is a symbol of death. On the cross, Jesus shed His blood and paid the full payment for our sins.
God doesn’t need to be reconciled to us. We need to be reconciled to God!
Nowhere in the New Testament does it say that God is reconciled to man. It always says that man is reconciled to God (see 2 Cor. 5:18–19, Rom. 5:10, Col. 1:20).
The enmity is not in God’s heart. It’s in man’s heart. It is OUR hard thoughts about God that need to change.
Man thinks, “God is not for me. God is angry with me. God is holding back good things from me.”
The devil is always planting hard thoughts against God in your mind and your heart.
The repentance toward God that the apostle Paul talks about is all about turning our hearts back to God—whose heart is already turned toward us!
God already loved us before Jesus came. God’s love for us is the reason Jesus came.
“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”
— John 3:16 NKJV
Jesus’ blood made God righteous in making us righteous.
All the claims of God’s righteousness are fully met in His blood!
Today, even though we are still not perfect in our actions and thoughts, we can rest assured that our right standing before God is not based on us—good or bad—but based on Jesus.
That’s how you can know that God has nothing but good for you!
God wasn’t reconciling Himself to the world. He was reconciling the world to Himself.
As a God of justice, God said that the soul that sins must die (see Ezek. 18:20).
As a God of love, He Himself provided that death.
There is nothing but love in God’s heart for you.
There was only one time when someone removed the mercy seat and looked into the ark of the covenant. It was in Beth Shemesh, and many people died that day (see 1 Sam. 6:19).
God wants the law under the mercy seat. If you bring out the law, you must either keep it all, or you expose everyone to the curse of the law.
Today, Jesus is our mercy seat who cannot be removed.
“And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him.”
— 1 John 4:16 NKJV
It’s not enough for us to just know that God loves us. We must believe it.
In 2019, believe that God loves you.
The greatest demonstration of His love is the cross. And every day, you can be conscious of His personal demonstrations of love for you.
Why is it not enough to know that He loves us? Why do we have to believe it?
2 examples of Bible characters who did not believe that they were loved:
1. The prodigal son (see Luke 15:11–32)
The prodigal left his father’s house and wasted his inheritance on prodigal living. When he began to live in abject poverty, he didn't go home immediately. He stayed on until he ended up working with pigs, unclean animals, and even thought about eating their food. All this time, he could have gone home and been welcomed into the arms of a father who loved him deeply. But he stayed in poverty because he didn’t believe that his father still loved him.
We need to believe that God loves us or we won’t go to Him for all the things He wants to provide for us.
Repentance toward God is believing that God loves you and has forgiven all your sins.
This forgiveness is complete. God has forgiven us based on His knowledge of sins, not on our knowledge. He has forgiven us according to the richness of His grace, not according to how many of our sins we confess.
2. Mephibosheth (see 2 Sam. 9)
Before David became king, he cut a blood covenant with Jonathan (1 Sam. 18:3). So when David ascended the throne, he wanted to bless any son of Jonathan he could find. But Mephibosheth, Jonathan’s son, was in hiding because he thought David wanted to kill him and get rid of Jonathan’s entire line. He lived a life of poverty and fear in Lo Debar (which means “no pasture”), when all this time, he could have lived in the palace with David. He had a title to the King’s table, but he didn’t claim it because he didn't believe that David loved him.
Whether we believe God’s love for us affects the kind of life we live or the kind of life we settle for.
When we didn’t care about God, when we didn’t care that we didn’t care, God cared. And He sent His Son.
The sun shines on everyone. But those who open the blinds get to feel its warmth.
Pastor Prince encourages us to stop looking at our good or our bad, and start looking at Jesus’ blood that justifies us.
Because of Jesus, our mercy seat, we can come boldly to God to get real, solid answers. We don’t pray just to soothe our soul, just to find comfort. We pray to experience God’s divine, miracle-working power in our lives.
God can give you restoration for all the years the locusts have eaten. He can give you the best wine that other people take years and years to produce.
Closing prayer
“This coming week, the Lord bless you and your families with the blessings of Abraham, the blessings of Deuteronomy 28, the blessings of the first born. The Lord make His face to shine on you, smile on you. The Lord make the crooked places straight this week and prepare you for 2019 with no stress, no fear, and no anxiety. The Lord give you shalom peace in your heart to govern everything that you do. The Lord lift up His countenance and keep every one of you safe next year. Safe from all harm, safe from all danger, safe from all evil. The Lord grant to you and your loved ones His wonderful peace that protects your heart and mind from all fears, anxieties, and worries. In Jesus’ name, and all the people say? Amen.”
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We hope these sermon notes blessed you! If they did, we encourage you to get the sermon and allow the Lord to speak to you personally as you watch or listen to it.
© Copyright JosephPrince.com 2018
These sermon notes were taken by volunteers during the service. They are not a verbatim representation of the sermon.
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