Bill Winston - Awakening Your Potential
Saints of God, you've been born again. But let me tell you, redemption doesn't come without divine provision. When they released the slaves, the emancipation proclamation, thank God, they were free. But they were free and broke! I'm telling you, the devil has tried to treat the church the same way! He thinks just because you got saved, you're happy with that! No, we're not going to be satisfied anymore. This place is supposed to be loaded with billionaires! This is why he wants you to have the money, not so you can buy 14 Cadillacs! He wants you to have money because you're going to build the old waste places! You're going to help those boys in prison! You're going to help these people that can't learn! You're going to help the starving infants! You're going to help the people who have no mom and dad! You're going to help somebody! The money is to rebuild for the kingdom of God!
Your identity has a lot to do with your inheritance. Your identity has a lot to do with your inheritance. Notice I just read you the prodigal son. I read you the son that came back and got his inheritance. I didn't keep reading to the elder brother who was out there in the field working with the servants, and came in and said, "Now, what is all this dancing and partying going on"? Said, "Well, your brother, who is dead, he's alive again, and he's come back home". He said, "Oh, what"? And the father came out and treated him, said, "Son, why don't you come on in and share with us"? "I'm not coming in there. All these years I worked for you. I've done all this and never ever ran off with the money. And he went out there and slept with prostitutes".
Notice pointing of the finger, notice folks with low self-esteem always trying to point out something low in somebody else. Ha-ha, you know. Ha-ha. So notice what I'm saying here. I'm saying that we've got to rise up and realize that we have divine nature in us and that we have value. Lord have mercy, I like that. We have some value. There is some value. There is royalty in me. There is a king in here. And that's why I can decree things and they'll be carried out. Angels will carry them out because they know who they are. Remember when those boys who were preachers' kids tried to cast out those demons, and they said, "I cast you out by the Jesus that Paul preaches". And the demons jumped on them, whipped them and said this: "Paul, I know, and Jesus I know. But who are you"?
See, the devil knows when you don't know who you are. Say, "Amen," to that. Folks, I have nothing against Kunta Kinte. But the fact of the thing is the natural roots can't cast out a devil. The natural roots can't lay hands on the sick, and they be healed. Say, "Amen," to this. I'm only telling you, don't stop there. There is a spiritual inheritance and heritage that you have, that you've got to get that. God is my Father. And my Father Daddy owns everything. That devil doesn't own anything here. Say, "Amen," to that. Folks, that is the way I get most of the revelation I get, because I read it like I own something. I don't read it like I'm here catching a cab. I read it like I own the cab company. I read it like that, come on, now. I'm just saying, I know this offends some people because you hate to see anybody rise any higher than you. I'm not, you know, I'm just, there's certain things royalty, that we don't do. We don't roll down the window, "Hey, girl, where's my money"? Royalty doesn't do that. Okay, I'm just letting you know.
So, my point to you is Psalm 82. "God standeth in the congregation of the mighty; he judges among the gods". Watch this. "How long would you judge unjustly, accept the person of the wicked? Selah". Now, how long you going to let the wicked do this? So what we're talking about now is vengeance and recompense. And vengeance has to do with the justice of God. It has to do with something coming out of the heart of God that is for his love of justice. And God knows that in this world, justice has got to be here; that if justice is not here, evil will get more evil. Do you hear what I'm saying? And you and I know the justice of God because justice cannot be justice without the law. If you're going to have justice, you've got to have a law. If you don't have any law, how are you going to have justice? What's the justice going to be based on?
So you've got to have laws. So I'm saying that one of the primary focuses of the enemy to try to govern humanity is to attack the legal systems of the earth. What is he trying to do? Make unjust laws. And then keep the church so carnal and so babyhood until the church won't rise up and call it what it is. Eve didn't eat Adam out of house and home because she thought she didn't like him anymore. And she was deceived and then gave it to him. And the Bible says he was not deceived. I'm just saying, people have done things, and they've just been deceived. So the world is deceived, making laws to take Bibles out of schools. But what happened, they took the Bible out of school and had to put a metal detector in its place. I'm talking about the public schools in the inner cities. Say, "Amen," to that. So no God now, no standard now, so anything goes. And so you can't do that because chaos will cause people to lose their lives. Are you following what I'm saying? Does this make sense to you, first of all?
So the church... who is the church? We're the ones, the enforcing agents of God. We're the ones that says, "Enough is enough". We're the ones that says, "No, no, no, no, that's not going to happen". We're the ones that's got to stand up for righteousness. Said, "No, this is the way that's going to be". And I used an example, I said, "Hey, look what happened during the time of the integration", and so forth like that. The church was supposed to stand up when there was slavery and say, "Hey, no, that's not right to treat another human being like that". But somehow the church was silent. I'm not talking about just that, and I'm not getting on things, so don't write me no letter. And then it's other things that have happened, folks. It's this tax system that's going on out here.
Folks, some of this stuff is plain old illegal. And I'm saying that unless the church takes their blinders off and just look at, all you've got to do is look at the laws on the books. So I'm saying, God's going to do some things through the church in these last hours, because we're getting ready for Jesus' return. And so every system that's out of line with heaven, we're going to put it back in line. Amen. Say, "Isn't that wonderful"? It says, in Psalm 97:2, he says, "Clouds of darkness are round about him: righteousness and judgment are the habitation of the"... Now, when he says, "clouds of darkness," he's not talking about darkness around God. He is saying that God is lighter than anything around him. So because he's lighter than anything around him, everything around him seems dark in terms of how compared to him. You follow what I'm saying. And then it says this.
Ecclesiastes 8:11, "Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil". So people think it's okay to do evil when you don't invoke justice, when you let injustice go on like that. They think it's okay. So we found that justice is vital to the kingdom of God manifestation. Now, let's branch off right here. One of the main conditions through which heaven's economy will manifest is through justice. Let's go back to Isaiah 61. Isaiah 61. Are you with me? Verse 1, "The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me; because the Lord has anointed me to preach good tidings to the meek; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, proclaim liberty to the captives, and opening of the prisons of them that are bound; to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord", watch this, "the day of vengeance of our God".
Now, what did we say vengeance was? Vengeance has nothing to do with hatred or some kind of emotional resentment or some kind of retaliation. Vengeance is not that. Vengeance of God is something that proceeds from the heart of God, from the love of justice, and is necessary for punishing offenders. So vengeance has nothing to do with some kind of, "I'm going to get you at 3:00". It's nothing to do with that. It's something that comes from the love of justice, and it comes out of the heart of God, and necessity for punishing offenders. Got it? "The day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all in mourning". Now, Jesus didn't read that. And we went over this before. He didn't read that. He broke off and stopped right here, halfway through Verse 2, "to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord". He closed the book, gave it to the ministers, sat down. "Eyes of all them in the synagogue were fastened on him. And he began to say, This day is the scripture fulfilled in your ears".
So what we said is, now vengeance takes up. And vengeance starts where the latter reign begins. Jesus stopped. But the latter reign prophesied in Joel 2 is now the day of the vengeance of our God. Now, we said, in this day, all the enemies of God's people will now be found up against the vengeance of the Lord, because whatever now is tampering with your destiny God is going to now start commanding vengeance upon them. Now, it doesn't make any difference what it is, whether it's natural or spiritual, because God knows that the people are not the problem. It's the devil who is using demonic forces and the system that he has built up to try to regulate the minds and hearts of all the people that are in it. Say, "Amen," to that. But you and I are in the world, but not what? Not of the world. Moses needed vengeance to take his place. He couldn't take his place without vengeance.
In other words, God had to come in and assist him in doing what he called him to do. Moses went down there and said, "Let my people go. If you don't let them go, this is what's going to happen". And as fast as Pharaoh refused, that happened. Now, what was Moses? He was just a mouthpiece. So he didn't hate Pharaoh. He just loved God. And as he did, he followed God's commandments. But at first, he didn't want to follow them because he knew that Pharaoh was powerful. But God demonstrated to Moses how powerful he was. And I believe that the problem in the church is that somehow they think the system of the education is more powerful than the system of God. And so we need to go back and recalibrate ourselves in terms of how powerful God really is.
I'm telling you, the God that we serve took one man named David, slayed a giant, and whipped all the enemies. One thing God did was split the Red Sea. God called people back to life who had been dead four days and stinking. God called the man to feed 5,000, plus women and children, with two fish and five loaves. God stopped the storm. God did that. "But I and my Father are one"! So as we move into these last days, God knows he's got a shield around you called the Holy Ghost. And anything that's going to tamper with you, the Holy Ghost has been authorized to deal with it. Say, "Amen," to that. So God said, over in Isaiah, "No weapon formed against you", come on, "shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against you in judgment shall be shown to be in the wrong".
So I'm saying, in Deuteronomy 7:1-2, "When the Lord thy God shall bring you into the land where you go to possess it, and has cast out many nations before you, the Hittites, the Girgashites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mighty than you are". These enemies are mightier than you are. I'm saying there are spiritual forces that you cannot see with your natural eyes. You cannot feel them with your natural hand. You cannot hear them with your natural ears. And there are forces that are there to stop you from reaching your destiny. If I were to tell you you're supposed to be much further along than you are right now, you might have some objection to that. But if you ever get in this Bible and be led by the Spirit of God and let God himself show you that you should have three businesses by now, that you should have that schooling completed by now, that you should have the orphanages built by now, that you should have that ministry going by... say, "Amen," to that. If he were to show you these things, you will say, "My goodness, what happened"? The enemy robbed you of it.
Now look what it says over here in Verse 8, why the Lord loved judgment, and I hate what? Robbery. How many of you know the devil is a thief? I said, "How many of you know the devil is a thief"? Now, my point to you is, he's been stealing from God's people. He's been keeping you from your destiny. That's Exodus 7, and also that's over in John, glory to God, it's over in Luke 4. He's been trying to keep you from winning. That's found over in Joshua 9. Notice what he did with Joshua. He sent a spirit of deception to deceive Joshua, and Joshua made the wrong decision and now ended up having to be allied with his enemy versus destroying his enemy. I'm saying that's deception. But it happened on a level that the natural mind can't catch. But those that are led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God, and will catch this thing. Say, "Amen," to that. The enemy is out to keep you from your peace.
I remember when the people at Lake and Pulaski, when we were down there starting the ministry, and the lady broke in the door. She said, "Hey, I got problems. Where is the pastor"? I said, "I'm the pastor". "Pastor, they're selling drugs on my block. They come out there at 4:00. They don't leave till sometime after 12:00 midnight, and they, well, kids can't play anymore and do anything". I said, "Sister, get in this circle and pray". We prayed. God spoke to me. I said, "Sister, God said, take this bottle of oil, and we're going to bless it and take it and go around to your block and start at one end of it and pour that down the other". Now, notice. That has nothing to do with the drug dealer. He didn't say, "Go get the police". He didn't say, "Go get the lawyers". He didn't say, "Go get a vigilante". He said, "Go get a bottle of oil"!
I'm telling you that you've been trying to fight battles naturally, and your battle is not natural, for you wrestle not against flesh and blood, but you wrestle against principalities and powers! Now, why is the devil out to stop you? Because he knows that if you win, you're going to get the victory over him. You're going to get the money. You're going to get the souls. You're going to get the building project. You're going to get everything that Satan has stolen. Are you with me?
So what am I telling you? She spread that oil down that block. Now, understand what she had to do. She had to obey the Spirit of God. I'm telling you, many of God's people haven't seen the outcome and the victory because they refused to do what God said do! Because you're looking at yourself and your little old fine self with your fine dress on. You don't see how you can do that! You've got to come down off of that arrogance and get that bottle of oil, and go in that house and pour it all down that house! Every devil in there that's holding your children, got to let them go! Every demon in there that's causing sickness in your family, got to let them go! Every spirit at your job that's holding back your promotion, got to let you go! That lady came back rejoicing. She said, "Oh, Pastor, guess what happened"? I knew what happened. God got the victory. Because whatever he tells you to do, if you've got guts enough to do it, you will get the victory! Not one time; he always causes you to triumph!
So what am I saying here? The enemy resisted Israel's release. And what did God do? He warned Pharaoh one time, warned him again, warned him again, and then told Moses this: "Moses, tell him this. They're not going to come out empty. So don't just be satisfied with getting loose. Make him pay damages". And that's what I'm telling you right now. Saints of God, you've been born again. But let me tell you, redemption doesn't come without divine provision. I'm going to just use an analogy, and don't write me no bad letters because I can use it because that analogy, I know that analogy well. But when they released the slaves, the emancipation proclamation, thank God, they were free. But they were free and broke! They were free, not having a job, not having tools. Why? Because somebody vetoed a "40 acres and a mule". They wouldn't let them have any property. They wouldn't let them have any possessions, nothing to start their farming with. I'm telling you, the devil has tried to treat the church the same way! He thinks just because you got saved, you're happy with that! No, we're not going to be satisfied anymore. We've got some stuff in there! We go get our stuff, everything! I'm telling you, this place is supposed to be loaded with billionaires! I said it. Praise God.
I know some of y'all can't take it! But let me tell you, there's a reason why you will get it! God is going to do some things with you. Look at Isaiah 61:4. This is why he wants you to have the money! Not so you can buy 14 Cadillacs! He wants you to have money because you're going to build the old waste places! You're going to raise up former desolation! You're going to repair the waste cities and many desolation! You're going to help those boys in prison! You're going to help these people that can't learn! You're going to help the starving infants! You're going to help the people who have no mom and dad! You're going to help somebody! Praise God. This is why you're getting the money! The money is to rebuild for the kingdom of God!