Inheriting Baggage 3

We have looked at inherited baggage.

We have also looked at how we can get ourselves out of that heritage.

I want us to look at how we will avoid staining our legacy with new baggage.

And I am sure after reading the past two posts on this you may already be in the know about some of the things you require to do it.

You see, if I know what brought baggage to my inheritance, I will be a fool not to know that doing the same or similar will mean that my posterity will also inherit baggage, my baggage.

And if I know how to get rid of the baggage I have inherited, I also will know enough to insulate posterity from inheriting baggage.

In short, once I have understood the dynamics of inherited baggage, I will be well positioned to avoid doing the same for my posterity.

So many words saying a simple thing.

But it is not that simple, or easy.

That because baggage does not come packaged thus.

Many times, it is packaged as an irresistible opportunity.

Many times, it is packaged as a lifetime achievement.

And many times, it is packaged as the ultimate partnership.

It is therefore important to isolate the packaging from the package to be able to soberly assess the irresistibility of poison.

Do you know how much alcohol uses on advertisement?

Do you know how many sponsorships it offers to get some visibility?

And why do they spend so much?

Because what they sell is impossible to sell using logic.

You can’t tell someone to sample alcohol by showing him where alcoholism will get him to.

But by using blitz and glitter, it is possible to tempt them to sample because the present has become all consuming.

And you may also realise that they target the youth without many responsibilities, some who are living on their parents’ resources, meaning the cost element of the ‘pastime’ is almost zero initially.

And they do that with a long-term knowledge that once someone gets hooked, they will forego food to get drunk.

Again, look at betting, the modern crave more addictive and dangerous than drugs.

I have never heard someone saying that they experienced a string of flops when they were starting.

Many times, that first bet gave a very handsome reward because they know that once you get hooked, nothing else will matter. You could even sell the house you are living in to place that bet.

What am I saying?

Baggage does not sell itself as thus.

Let me say two main things that open us to baggage.

And he said unto them, Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth. (Luke 12:15)

Greed is the first one.

And it is dangerous because it guides us to take shortcuts and take advantage of people and situations, opening us to judgment (baggage).

It is the capitalistic spirit that wants to reap the most from the least exertion.

It is the tendency to value people according to what we can get from them.

And it makes it impossible for us to minister because self interest is contrary to genuine ministry because genuine ministry says spend without expecting any returns.

The second is closely tied to it. And it is the pursuit of pleasure.

Its problem is that it blurs boundaries relating to sin and relationships.

You see, pleasure focuses me only on me. everybody and everything else exists for my enjoyment.

Those two vices thrive in the taking advantage of others for my benefit and using others for my pursuits, the two things that will bring baggage to anybody.

And this because their pursuit will always leave bleeding hearts.

Allow me to illustrate.

Imagine being in charge of a bursary program and skewing it allocations to friends and relatives.

That in effect means that the intended beneficiaries will lose out.

And since its purpose is to support those without resources to facilitate their education, you are in effect locking out the intended recipients, effectively also locking out other opportunities that education was meant to open them to.

Once in a while we get to hear of someone who qualified to join medical school (and in our country it is akin to the needle’s eye) and has had to do nondescript jobs to sustain himself because they couldn’t afford the barest to get the loan.

They are discovered over ten years later, still yearning to join medical school yet surrendered to fate.

All the time when there are enough scholarship and bursary awards that have been going to the rich who are close to those awarding offices.

Do you think the prayers of those people you defrauded will afford you peace?

You are in effect creating a baggage empire for your posterity.

Or you think God created all the women for your pleasure and so are sampling them as a connoisseur without a care in the world.

Think of the families you are breaking. Think of the futures you are wrecking as you play with those university beauties. Think of the children who are confused as they do not know who between the present father and resource pouring father to hold on to. Think of the illegitimate children you are spreading everywhere.

Do you think there is any safety in your pride? Do you think your children are safe?

The truth of the matter is that your posterity will inherit all that baggage.

Remember Gehazi whose pursuit of that low hanging fruit of Naaman’s free offer that his boss had adamantly refused opened his generations to leprosy?

Or Joab whose ambition and retaliatory justice opened his to judgment?

Or David whose single fling opened his to unending violence?

Or Solomon whose entrepreneurial pursuits tore David’s kingdom?

All these were for the most part God’s people committed to God’s purpose and surrendered to God’s revelation.

Yet they slipped.

Because baggage is packaged by the enemy of our souls who has been at it long enough to take advantage of our vulnerabilities

Knowing God and living according to His revelation is the only way to ensure your posterity enjoys their lives and prosperity without baggage.

But it requires constant vigilance on our side.

Fellowship Offerings

But the soul that eateth of the flesh of the sacrifice of peace offerings, that pertain unto the LORD, having his uncleanness upon him, even that soul shall be cut off from his people. (Leviticus 7:20)

Let us think about food for a moment.

Most people think of food as innocent and/or without boundaries.

But is it?

Food is not as innocent as many think.

All food carries with it some baggage.

Allow me to give some verses to set this off

When thou sittest to eat with a ruler, consider diligently what is before thee: And put a knife to thy throat, if thou be a man given to appetite. Be not desirous of his dainties: for they are deceitful meat. (Proverbs 23: 1 - 3)

You do not dine with a ruler without an invitation.

Why then should such a meal be called deceitful meat?

It is because a ruler always has an agenda. And this means that his food reeks of that agenda

You are therefore safer outside that dining table than inside if you are not aware of the agenda that required your presence as you could be heading to the gallows even as you celebrate that promotion.

Or you do not remember Haman?

We have two scenarios in Matthew 22 about a king and his son’s wedding.

The honourable who were invited to the party trashed the invitation and were killed and their city razed.

That is why I say that a ruler’s invitation is never innocent since rejecting it can easily become criminal.

But then the king orders his servants to go everywhere to look for guests since a king’s party must be well attended.

Another reality comes to play.

As he was going through his guests, he found one that had probably thought his dress was honourable enough that he refused to dress in the king’s uniform, and probably he was right.

But just as the ones who had rejected the invite he was also condemned to severe punishment. Yet he had more or less been forced into that wedding, probably being diverted from some other worthy pursuit.

That may have been the reason he did not want to change his clothes so that he could get back to his affairs as soon as the wedding concluded.

That is what food can do.

And it is not only the ruler’s food. It is any food.

But now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one no not to eat. (1Corinthians 5:11)

You see, food indicates fellowship, oneness.

I must in essence agree with what you represent to positively respond to your invitation to dine.

It is therefore utter folly to agree to dine with someone to mend fences because someone will be being bought.

We dine to celebrate the fact that we have mended fences.

But many times, we do not do that, only to discover that the wrong narrative has been painted about our unity because we agreed to dine.

I have seen that a few times, sometimes even being duped to participate, only to regret my folly.

You can’t separate food and agenda.

And that is why the fellowship (peace) offerings we see in the verse above have very solid boundaries, with death/ banishment being the punishment of any breach.

This means that fellowship is not the simple coming together to feast.

To God, it is a coming together of His people to celebrate Him.

That is why it is called a sacrifice or offering.

The community was offering their celebration and fellowship to God.

They would give God the fat and feast on the rest.

But before that they were also required to give the priests their portion.

The whole community came together to celebrate God’s goodness.

And that is why for the most part private slaughter was forbidden. Because many times someone would be drawn into honouring other gods (and effort and success are such), thus slowly leading one’s heart from God.

That is not easy when done God’s way.

There must be a priest who represented God’s ministry and who would have ensured that things were done according to God’s revelation (word).

And since it was also forbidden for that meat to last beyond two days or it would have been unclean (abominable to God), there also must have been neighbours and friends

And if any of the flesh of the sacrifice of his peace offerings be eaten at all on the third day, it shall not be accepted, neither shall it be imputed unto him that offereth it: it shall be an abomination, and the soul that eateth of it shall bear his iniquity. (Leviticus 7:18)

This because no family can eat a cow in two days.

Eating together was the Old Testament equivalent of probably what would later become synagogue and then church as it brought the community together in fellowship.

Fellowship and food are interrelated. Food builds fellowship as fellowship unleashes sharing in other aspects of community.

And as is known, astute businessmen know the power of a meal to seal a deal because having fellowship over a meal releases warm feelings all over.

This is confusing for many especially when I bring about business.

But the purpose is to show that it is not only in the faith where meals have a greater purpose than just filling a stomach.

What is the summary of this whole thing?

Watch out where you eat. Watch out with whom you eat.

Even more important, pray about those invitations and respond as God would have you.

And I am not scaring you.

Christ protects us in our ignorance, though we may have to go through some consequences.

But He does not cover our rebellion or folly.

Official Secrets

I recently wrote about the people Jesus promoted from servants to friends (the Hagar series) with the main point being that any breach of such trust results not in a demotion to our former positions but to complete banishment.

Let us deal it in a slightly different way by looking at the public service.

When I joined the government many years ago, there was a form we had to sign that was taken from the Official Secrets Act.

In it, you agreed that you will not share anything you came across by virtue of your position.

This meant that doing so would be a criminal offence punishable by a fine or prison sentence.

Why am I bringing it here?

Nowadays it happens so often I wonder whether anyone signs such a document on joining the government.

I remember listening about a senior government official who resigned because he disagreed with his boss on an action the boss took using the information he got by virtue of his position.

However, the saddest part of that drama is that he wrote a letter, available to the media, explaining his reasons. And people were lauding him!

You wonder how we can be so foolish as to praise a snitch!

Reminds me of someone some time back in our country who secretly recorded his colleagues and made the recordings public to score a political goal as an anti corruption champion.

Again, he was praised.

But that prise was very short term as he disappeared completely.

Yet it was said that he made his name working for international NGOs before returning home to make a difference.

Who do you think will be comfortable with such a person in their boardroom?

I have heard pastors complain that nobody goes to them for prayer or counselling. Only to discover that it is because they cannot keep their mouth shut.

You share something with them and hear it in the sermon with only your name omitted.

Will you ever go to him again? Will anyone who knows the story you shared with him trust him with theirs? Will you ever recommend him to anyone else, however desperate their situation is?

Trust is like a rare clay or ceramic jar.

It is priceless but also fragile.

You break it and there is no way of reconstructing it.

Let us get back to official secrets.

You get a senior position because you are trusted.

Incidentally, that comes even before competency.

That trust means that your boss will be vulnerable to you because he knows you will always have his back like they say.

It is therefore immoral to use that vulnerability to expose him.

Leviticus 18 talks about sex and uses the term nakedness.

Sleeping with someone’s wife is called exposing his nakedness.

And that is the vulnerability I am talking about. Her husband has exposed his vulnerability (and nakedness) to her and you are exposing it.

No wonder the sentence for that was stoning.

It means that if I occupy an office, everything I encounter in that office literally belongs to that office whether I have taken any oath or not.

Incidentally, the law also says that anything I receive by the virtue of being in that office belongs to that office, even personal stuff.

A former prime minister in Asia is dealing with a case where he sold a watch they were given when on a state visit to another country.

Yet most will simply transfer the ownership of everything they receive to themselves.

That is why we have people who have insane amounts of land and shares in almost all profitable companies operating in their countries as well as having properties and money in safe havens abroad.

Yet they do not call that open pilferage as theft of national wealth. They do not think (or choose not to think) of that as grand corruption.

They will call that traffic cop receiving half a dollar bribe as corrupt when they are transferring wealth their office (through them) receives to their person.

The cop is bending the rules for a pittance when his boss is stealing truckloads from the nation he is pretending to lead.

The education official in charge of scholarships rigs the system to ensure his unqualified child gets that scholarship at the expense of the validly qualified needy student when his salary is adequate to educate his child.

The health official must travel outside the country for a flu shot when the ministry he leads is unable to provide care for the masses, the same ministry that is paying for that overseas treatment, yet his salary could afford that treatment.

And I must not leave the pastor of course.

A pastor who makes his living from a church in the slums lives on the suburbs on the land that slum church bought him and travels with the guzzler they bought him when they can hardly afford to put food on their tables.

His children will be taken to premier education institutions and even universities abroad when his parishioners struggle to take theirs through public schools, yet it is these same people who pay for that education.

And pastors also travel abroad and receive gifts that they quietly transfer to their persons. Yet he was sent by the church.

Ruffling feathers is fine when you are the one doing it but very bad when you are on the receiving end.

And it is comedic when you are pointing out the sins of others when you are guilty of the same or even worse sins. Remember Romans 2?

That is why I have put the minister of the Gospel on that list, because I am a minister too.

You will see such a preacher pouring hell and brimstone on thieving politicians and other public officers from that ornate pulpit he forced his congregation to buy when they could not afford because he felt the previous was beneath his status.

He will then get from that pulpit to drive that guzzler he forced his congregation to buy for him, a congregation less than 5% can afford a bike, let alone a barely moving jalopy.

Then he will drive to his mansion on the leafy suburbs that the same congregation was forced to buy, a congregation where less than 1% have their own homes, a majority barely able to afford decent abodes.

No wonder the church has lost her cutting edge.

Most of the leaders at the top carry the same rot the politicians and public officers carry.

And it is also no wonder that the same politicians are completely at home in our churches. The people at the top are kindred spirits.

They probably gave the pastor a gift and saw him swallowing it alone instead of taking it or even sharing it with his congregation.

Some are thinking that I am hitting so low.

But as a minister I am fully aware that I must intentionally be very careful how I handle any gifts I receive. I must pray and listen very keenly to know what to do with any gift I receive.

This is because there are two offices in one; minister the person and minister the office.

I must establish with God which one received the gift in question.

Incidentally it is the same way in a church where the leadership must (though I doubt any does) establish where the giving was directed to before spending it.

This is because most givers trust the spirituality of the managers of that gift to know the focus of their giving.

Imagine the pain the giver will feel and the prayer he will pray when his focus was on missions and you diverted it to maintenance of structures!

Imagine the pain the giver will feel when he gave his offering to minister to the needy in the church and you divert the same to beautifying the steeple or buy a new pulpit!

Imagine the pain the giver will feel if he gave toward neighbourhood evangelism and you used it to buy new instruments when the old ones were almost new!

And I am not saying that those other needs are unimportant. I am not saying that the pastor should not eat of live well.

Thou shalt not muzzle the ox when he treadeth out the corn. (Deuteronomy 25:4)

I am simply saying that the ox should be eating as it is treading the corn. It is not released to feed on the corn

It is a travesty when the ox is released to the corn when it is not treading it.

It is a sin when the incidentals (structures, emoluments) take the lion’s share of the offerings.

This is because very few think or pray about them when considering giving to the church

Elevating them to primary focus is therefore a clean breach of trust.

It is akin to releasing the ox to the corn before it starts treading it.

I hope I am making a point here.

I am dealing with things that bring judgment to us because we are like that ox that thinks the corn belongs to it and therefore gets to the store to eat it because it does not see any difference between eating as it treads it and eating it from the store.

In any case, it is easier and fills faster eating from the store.

Sawasawa?

Of Yokes and Burdens

Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. (Matthew 11: 28 – 30)

We love it when our ease is at someone else’s expense.

No wonder motivation sells, especially the preaching aspect.

It is all about God doing this or the other and our part is receiving and allowing it to sink in

Any teaching on Deuteronomy 28 only focuses on the blessings without explaining the conditions.

But is that the truth?

Allow me, however, to get us to the verses above.

Like we do with many other passages, we have over the years overlooked the key provisions of that promise because we want to enjoy the bounty without paying the cost.

We are being overworked and overloaded when the invitation is being made.

We have therefore focused on being relieved of the burden and think that is the end of the story. But that is not true.

Christ takes the burdensome yoke off our necks and places His yoke on that same neck. In fact, the call is on us to willingly take His yoke upon us because He has released us from the burdensome one.

But we jump off because we are free of any yoke and start running around yokeless.

That however becomes more dangerous than the yoke we had because we attract the attention of other yoke givers.

When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through dry places, seeking rest; and finding none, he saith, I will return unto my house whence I came out. And when he cometh, he findeth it swept and garnished. Then goeth he, and taketh to him seven other spirits more wicked than himself; and they enter in, and dwell there: and the last state of that man is worse than the first. (Luke 11: 24 – 26)

You see, God created us to have one yoke or the other. We are supposed to have a master to function right.

No wonder we are told that we cannot serve two masters since there must be a master one way or the other.

It is like we reason about animals.

Except probably in the places where they worship cows, there is no cow without an owner. There is no sheep without an owner.

Thou shalt not see thy brother's ox or his sheep go astray, and hide thyself from them: thou shalt in any case bring them again unto thy brother. And if thy brother be not nigh unto thee, or if thou know him not, then thou shalt bring it unto thine own house, and it shall be with thee until thy brother seek after it, and thou shalt restore it to him again. (Deuteronomy 22: 1, 2)

That is why a believer who has been freed from all yokes will soon find himself yoked by a worse master, who in effect is the former master enraged by his escape and guarding against the repeat of its recurrence.

You also realise that we are supposed to take Christ’s yoke.

This means it is an initiative on ourselves.

Christ offers the yoke and we decide whether we take it or not because only then can we be able to learn from Him.

One thing we need to realise it that a yoke does not become functional after placing it on our neck

Placing it on our neck is the first step in the process.

And I will take us to the farmer and his methods.

What is the most effective way for a farmer to train oxen?

He will yoke an untrained ox to a trained and much stronger one. Then they will get to the road or a safe place to break the resistance of the untrained ox. This is because an ox is very strong and powerful and will destroy everything in its way, from fences to vehicles blocking its freedom from that bothersome yoke.

They will be trained when they are very young because of that power they possess.

And I write this as someone who has seen some of that training.

It is after some training that he will yoke them to some work, either a cart or a plough. And even then, it will still be yoked to the same ‘trainer’.

That trainer will show the new yokefellow (haven’t you read that somewhere in the New Testament?) how to function.

The trainer will give the yokefellow the assurance and confidence to attempt new things.

And the trainer will show the yokefellow how to function in his new role as a productive worker as he shows him how to interpret orders and know his bounds.

Eventually, the young bull becomes a master of the game to the point that he can function without any trainer.

That is Christ’s method too. No wonder He talks about yokes.

Or do you not realise that it is what He did with His disciples?

And he ordained twelve, that they should be with him, and that he might send them forth to preach, (Mark 3:14)

He did not open a university or Bible School to train them. He did not start a Bible Study group to train them. He did not start a church congregation to get them off ministering.

Though I have nothing particularly strong against those institutions, it is very evident that what Christ did with His twelve in three years was able to produce a better and more lasting impact in the world than the whole conglomeration of institutions has been able to produce in two thousand years.

What I mean is that our discipleship methods are woefully inadequate in reproducing ourselves as Christ’s did.

Even our way of doing church falls flat in that reality.

The yoke dynamic has been replaced with the classroom and lecture theatre one; creating a superstar in a room of affirmation addicts since what most running those rooms are products of the system whose sole object is making the room compliant and happy.

A yoke, however, is work. It is labour. It is intense exertion. It is pain.

One must learn to handle the pressure of the yoke as well as the pull of the burden.

Incidentally, even a yoke without a burden is its own burden.

And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks. (Acts 9:5)

That prick, or goad, is the tool a farmer uses to train an ox on the yoke. And that because it is not a pleasant training.

That it was Paul who was told that after his conversion tells us that the yoke is not a pleasant thing to have on our necks.

No wonder Christ yoked him to Barnabas.

And this gets us to the discipleship I am pointing at.

And I pick Barnabas because he is to me the best representation of Christ’s discipleship method.

He picks Paul when he was rejected by the church in Jerusalem and walks with him.

We later see him going all the way to Tarsus to get him when a ministry opportunity opens up.

They part ways when they disagree on his picking another discipleship project, Mark, when he was being rejected by this same Paul.

He appears to have disappeared because his disciples appeared to outshine him. But the success of his method is proven by the fact that we have their writings.

I am convinced he continued picking on other failures and rejects as yokefellows and raising their ministerial stature to that of the two I have mentioned.

We eventually see Paul taking after him when he picks his own partners.

Apart from Silas who was already ‘qualified’, he picks unknowns and raises their statures in ministry; Timothy and Titus are some examples.

But I believe that Onesimus is the prime example of his copying his discipler.

Which in time past was to thee unprofitable, but now profitable to thee and to me: (Philemon 1:11)

And he also treats them as his equals in all ways as he was treated by Barnabas.

Whether any do enquire of Titus, he is my partner and fellowhelper concerning you: or our brethren be enquired of, they are the messengers of the churches, and the glory of Christ. (2Corinthians 8:23)

Handing them responsibilities as they grew in handling Christ’s yoke.

These things speak, and exhort, and rebuke with all authority. Let no man despise thee. (Titus2:15)

Eventually allowing them to thrive on their own as Barnabas did to him.

This for me is what Biblical discipleship looks like.

And even in my story, the success stories I can quote are not the ones we had fruitful Bible Studies with but the ones (some who were rejects in one way or another) I simply walked with and gradually allowed to minister alongside me until their call to ministry materialised. Then I used my stature to open those doors for them to outgrow me.

And I didn’t know much of what I know now. I was just walking in simple obedience, sometimes even making enemies with my ‘superiors’ because I was unable to let go of somebody they strongly felt was draining the swamp that was ministry.

Incidentally, after the yoking started bearing fruit, the same people who were warning me against the yokefellows I was picking would use every effort to snatch them from me by offering them good incentives and packages. They would even try their best to isolate them from me. They would then start boasting about their new sons.

But I never whined because I had done that as obedience to Christ and was not looking for acclamation or affirmation from anywhere else.

I pray that we start looking at discipleship (and even mentorship) with those lenses.

Treat this post as a challenge to pray and consider whether what you are doing in Christ’s vineyard is what He would have you be doing.

One thing I must say in closing, however, is that the expectation of doing discipleship that way is that the disciple must be allowed to outshine his discipler, Jesus being our example.

Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father. (John 14:12)

We have also seen Barnabas demonstrating the same thing.

And in the Old Testament we have Moses and Jonathan operating the same way

Inheriting Baggage 2

We closed our last message with asking how we can escape the negative spiritual inheritance due us.

And this because some can clearly see that the trajectory their lives are taking either points at some negative inheritance (many talk of generational curses) or know that we deserve that negative heritage since we know where we come from.

We can therefore deduce that we have some inherited baggage we are carrying, baggage that is causing unpleasant consequences that we interpret as inherited judgment or habits.

Examples are drunkenness that can’t be explained, fights, broken families, unending health challenges however strictly we adhere to diet, exercise and lifestyle, and many other uniquely us barbs we continue experiencing.

This despite the fact that we have believed in Jesus and seek to follow Him.

However, I will avoid the route most want you to follow.

Do not start looking backward to get a solution. That is unless you already know what you are reaping from. And even then it won’t be of much help.

Do not look for those hidden covenants that you were not part of. Do not be a sleuth in your family affairs since you will most certainly offend many; some who do not know what you are doing and others who will call you a meddler in their affairs.

Chances are none of those alive have any idea the covenants binding you to that judgment since they were sealed many generations before your time. It is akin to examining the fruit to trace the roots and the specific conditions under which the seed was planted.

Determine to know Christ and follow Him completely and wholeheartedly.

Determine to intimately know His word and live according to it. Determine that whatever God says you will do unreservedly.

You see, Christ took our curse by being made a curse for us. He took our judgment by dying in our place.

Unhitching from my past and hitching to Him is therefore the only sure way of escaping from those chains holding me to my heritage.

I have used superlatives intentionally.

No other degree is acceptable when it comes to Christ and our relationship to Him.

Then Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life. (John 6:68)

It is when He is the only option that He becomes the ultimate prize and solution.

Many times, we will struggle with bondages because we have not completely left our perch on our heritage.

No wonder we hear of believers who are unable to leave their tribal or racial leanings. No wonder we have believers who are unable to stop bad language. No wonder we have believers who are unable to stop unhealthy relationships.

They choose to take Jesus but are not willing to completely let go of their past. They want to hold on Jesus but are unwilling to completely let go of what they were holding on before Jesus came around.

And I am not talking about growth since, though salvation takes a moment, growth takes time, again depending on my level of surrender.

I am talking about a church elder, pastor, bishop who are unable to let go of booze. I am talking of the same leader who is unable to remain faithful to his wife. I am talking about such a leader who does not see any problem with greed.

But fornication, and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not be once named among you, as becometh saints; Neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient: but rather giving of thanks. For this ye know, that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. (Ephesians 5: 3 – 5)

If your conversion is unable to rid you of such, we can confidently assume that either, it was fake, or it did not go far enough.

In short, Christ was not taken as the Lord He is.

And this because only Christ as Lord is able to conclusively deal with any baggage we have when we allow Him.

Nothing less than full and complete surrender can move Him to deal with issues His way because then He will ultimately have to share the spoils with our effort and ingenuity.

Remember when Gideon was told that his completely outnumbered army was too big for God to use?

Imagine God saying that a 4 to 1 disadvantage is way too advantageous to His people.

That He needed a 450 to 1 disadvantage to function properly.

Because then there would be no argument about the source of the victory since nobody would have explained away God’s hand in the whole thing.

This means that for God to fully manifest in one’s affairs, there has to be no doubt about His singular involvement. That my part in it is my agreeing with Him and doing exactly what He tells me to do.

We love having bragging rights and so will very easily discount His intervention by our determination or effort.

Many will very comfortably talk like God was powerless until they gave Him the permission to intervene. Many talk as if their salvation was the result of their untiring pursuit of God. Many talk of their victory as the product of their spiritual stamina and prayer.

But God does not operate under those conditions since He cannot share His glory with His creation.

That is why we have Gideon’s story. And many other similar stories in the scriptures.

Gideon still takes us to the main point I am making.

He broke completely free from his past spiritual baggage by demolishing his father’s (and clan’s) spiritual bulwarks and making fuel of the same in building an altar and offering sacrifice to God thereon.

No wonder they wanted him lynched.

It was from that point that God could then issue the command we have just looked at.

It is impossible to access God’s breakthrough if my security is elsewhere.

And that elsewhere may be that good job, that stable family, that worthy investment, etc.

I must let go of them to be able to accurately see God’s hand in my affairs.

And where better to see than in being rid of that bothersome baggage that holds me back from exploding in my spiritual impact.

Elisha did that.

Ruth did that

Rahab the harlot did that.

That is why we read their stories for our instruction.

But it has a cost; a very high cost that many find forbidding.

Even Abraham battled with it for long; until his father finally died.

What I am saying is that it is impossible to conclusively deal with inherited spiritual baggage unless I am willing to completely let go of everything tying me to that heritage, especially security.

Even company and peer pressure are symptoms of a lack of that breaking through because it indicates an insecurity about standing alone.

I know believers who will thrive in the right company but become scoundrels when that support system is no longer there.

These are those who are on fire for Christ at home or in college where fellowship is fine yet will break down when they are sent to remote stations where there is little or no fellowship.

And it is not that their decision to Christ was fake.

They find it impossible to stand on their own, especially against the security company offers.

Can you imagine such a person doing what Gideon did?

Can such a person make the decisions Rahab and Ruth made?

That is the simplest reason many are unable to break free of inherited baggage. That is why many are unable to break free of ancestral yokes.

I do not know where you stand in this.

But would you rather stand up ALONE with God or be surrounded with all the right people with baggage?

That is the reason we have serial repenters.

They are always weeping over their sins yet are unable to make a clean break with whatever is leading them to those particular sins.

No wonder motivators thrive.

They keep them comfortable by helping (killing is the right word) them from taking responsibility for their choices and decisions.

And they do it by prophesying this or the other breakthrough, declaring and decreeing this or the other monumental victory.

Yet never holding them accountable for their actions, thoughts, attitudes.

As an example, you will never overcome sexual immorality by grabbing and holding and possessing this or the other decree or prophecy. Otherwise, Joseph’s story should not be in the Bible.

Flee youthful lusts is an admonition in the New Testament for those who are scared of instruction from the Old, as if the Bible is two books!

I appear as if I have run off the rails.

But it is for the simple reason of wanting us to connect our victory to choices and decisions.

It is to show us that a clean break is possible but not automatic as it needs sweat on our side.

Christ’s victory is available but not free for the picking of whoever, however.

And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me. (Luke 9:23)

There are choices to be considered.

There are dangers to be faced.

There are decisions to be made.

There are things to done.

And there is a cost to be borne.

And it is foolhardy to imagine that you can break through that spiritual baggage without a struggle.

It is foolish to assume that the ropes binding you to that baggage will break on their own or after a prayer or anointing from whoever.

You are the sole determinant of your breaking free because God is just waiting for you to make that single break.