Destined to Reign (19 page)

Rejoice, my friend — there is now no condemnation for you because you are in Christ Jesus!

Your Daddy loves you and accepts you just as you are, and He has all the power to help you when you fail and feel defeated.

Chapter 13: The Gift Of No Condemnation

When I had just completed my studies, I decided to take on a part-time job teaching in an elementary school, while waiting for my academic results to be released. I was made the teacher in charge of a class of about thirty 10-year-old students.

One morning, one of the girls in my class did not turn up. I didn’t think much of it as it was common for students to be absent from school for a day or two for various reasons. But as I was praying at home that day, the Lord brought this particular girl to my mind. I prayed regularly for my students, but it was usually a general prayer for all of them. Because it was so specific this time, I knew that it was the Lord leading me to pray for her, so I prayed for the blood of Jesus to cover her. Even though my understanding of the blood of Jesus was rather limited at that time, I knew enough to know that His blood protects, so that was what I prayed for.

Several days after that, the girl still had not returned to school. Then, her name and picture appeared in the news. Her story was covered on national television and in all the major newspapers. This student of mine had actually been kidnapped by a notorious local serial killer by the name of Adrian Lim. A murderer who was involved in the occult, Adrian Lim kidnapped children and offered them as human sacrifices to the idols that he worshipped.

To the surprise of many, this girl was actually released by the serial killer! When interviewed by the press, the girl shared that she had been taken to a small room reeking of burning incense. The room was very dimly illuminated, but she could see Adrian Lim performing some kind of ceremonial rite and offering prayers before his idols. Suddenly, he stared at her and said with disgust that his gods did not want her. She was then set free, becoming the only girl to have been released by Adrian Lim. The other children who were kidnapped had been brutally murdered. When I heard that, I knew that it was the Lord who had protected her. No other god could have her because she was covered by the blood of Jesus! Today, this girl is all grown up and happily married with kids. Praise the Lord!

The Blood Protects You From Condemnation

At that point in time, I did not know what the main function of Jesus’ blood was or why it provided protection. I just covered everything with the blood of Jesus. I am not against Christians applying the blood of Jesus for protection, but today, I have a deeper understanding of His blood.

Do you know what Jesus said about His blood on the night that He was betrayed? During the last supper, when Jesus held the cup in His hands, did He say, “This is the blood of the new covenant, shed for your protection”? No! He said, “This is My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.”
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His blood was shed
for the forgiveness of all your sins
. Does the blood of Jesus protect? Yes, of course it does! But even though His blood protects us from the schemes of the devil, that’s not the main reason His blood was shed.

Knowing you are protected from condemnation will cause you to reign over that sin, addiction or depression that is holding you in bondage today.

My friend, the main reason our Savior’s blood was shed was for the forgiveness of our sins. This means that the blood of Jesus also offers us protection from any form of condemnation. When you have a revelation that Jesus’ blood has made you righteous and that all your sins are forgiven, you are protected from condemnation from the accuser. It’s imperative that you understand this because it will give you the confidence to come before the throne of God boldly and see Him as a loving Father. It will cause you to reign over that sin, addiction or depression that is holding you in bondage today.

My Struggle With Condemnation

I wished that somebody had shared this revelation with me when I was going through the ordeal of thinking that I had committed the unpardonable sin. The condemnation that I felt and the belief that I had blasphemed the Holy Spirit were actually from the accuser. It was a terrible season for me and all the teachings that I received then did not help.

Today, I understand that it is impossible for a believer to commit the unpardonable sin — the sin of constant and consistent rejection of Jesus Christ. So if you are a believer, you have already received Jesus and there is no way you can commit the unpardonable sin.

But there I was, a young man with almost no knowledge of the new covenant of grace, no revelation of my righteousness in Christ and no understanding of the main function of the blood of Jesus. Without these truths, I fell for the great deception. I believed that I had sinned irrevocably against God. I thought that I had blasphemed against the Holy Spirit because I had bad thoughts about God and the Holy Spirit. I was relentlessly bombarded with feelings of guilt and condemnation, until I felt like my mind was about to snap.

All that condemnation was from the devil. The accuser had put negative thoughts in my mind about God and I did not know how to resist him, so I took the thoughts as my own, and received his lies and condemnation for those thoughts. Back then, I did not even know that God had a call on my life. How could I? I really believed that I was not even going to make it to heaven because of the unpardonable sin that I had committed!

Plagued by the overwhelming sense of condemnation, I went to a man of God for prayer, hoping that he would be able to free me from my fears and oppression. His name is Percy Campbell and at that time, he was overseeing one of the prominent Bible schools in Singapore.

Percy laid his hands on me and prayed over me. Even now, I can still remember exactly how Percy, with his distinctive New Zealander accent, said, “Joe, I see you in the spirit. I see you preaching to thousands of people.” Now, at that time, I was still in high school, and could hardly speak in front of a crowd without stammering and stuttering. In fact, there was this really cruel teacher who would always get me to stand up and read in class. All the girls would end up giggling and laughing at me as I stammered and stuttered, trying desperately to get one sentence out. My face would turn red and my ears would burn. Those were painful moments indeed. So when I came to Percy for deliverance from my oppression, but received instead his prophecy that I would speak to thousands, it actually scared me.

In 2004, Percy visited our church and saw for himself just how much our church had grown by God’s grace. When we finally spoke after the service, it was with tears in his eyes that he said, “The prophecy has come to pass.” He remembered what he had spoken over me many years ago when I was still a teenager struggling with oppression and condemnation. All glory to Jesus!

My friend, I know what it means to be under guilt and condemnation from the accuser. He is using the same strategy to afflict believers today. The devil will come at various times to make you feel guilty for anything you can think of. He makes you feel guilty in your role as a father. He makes you feel guilty as a provider. He makes you feel guilty as an employee. He makes you feel guilty as an employer. He will even make you feel guilty for being sick!

By the way, a believer should never feel guilty for being sick. We have to be careful not to create a culture in the church where people think that you will never be attacked by symptoms of sickness if you are walking with God. Having a sickness or disease does not mean that you have sinned or that God is teaching you a lesson. It just means that your healing is on its way!

When Jesus and His disciples saw a man born blind, His disciples asked Him if the man was born blind because he had sinned or because his parents had sinned. Jesus answered, “Neither.” He went on to say, “I am the light of the world,” and proceeded to open the man’s eyes
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. I love Jesus’ style!

My friend, when there is a problem, deal with it. Don’t ask whose fault it is! Don’t ask if it is your father’s fault, your grandfather’s fault or your great-grandfather’s fault. No, let’s learn to handle situations Jesus’ way. When faced with a man who was blind, Jesus declared that He was the light of the world and proceeded to heal the man. So don’t let the devil make you feel guilty for being sick. It is guilt that will keep you sick!

Eradicate All Condemnation From Your Life

The devil is smarter than many psychiatrists and psychologists because he does not deal with what is peripheral. He does not get distracted by superficial details. Do you know what the devil’s name is? His name is not “murderer”, even though he kills. It is not “thief ”, even though he steals. It is not “destroyer” either, even though he destroys. His name is Satan. In Hebrew, it means “the accuser”
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. He is the prosecutor against you. A prosecutor never talks about any of your good points. He is there to prosecute you for every one of your failures. He will bring back every piece of dirty laundry and show you evidence after evidence of your failures.

While we are trying to deal with stress and fear, the devil goes straight for the deepest root, and uses the law to heap guilt and condemnation on you. He knows that when you are under
condemnation
, fear, stress and all kinds of sicknesses will follow, so he goes straight for the jugular.

When you are under condemnation, fear, stress and all kinds of sicknesses will follow.

What should we do then? We should kill condemnation at its very root and eradicate it from our lives. So when you hear the voice of the accuser, remind yourself that there is now no condemnation to those who are in Christ
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. Why? Because no matter what the devil condemns you of, the truth is that the blood of Jesus has been shed for the forgiveness of all your sins. There is not a sin, not one iota of guilt or condemnation that the devil can throw at you today that Jesus’ blood has not completely removed.

No wonder Isaiah chapter 54 says that no weapon formed against you shall prosper. What is the weapon that the devil uses against you? We have learned that it is the law. The devil uses the law to condemn believers and remind them that they have fallen short. But the Word of God declares, “No weapon formed against you shall prosper, and
every tongue which rises against you in judgment
you shall condemn.”
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The devil uses his tongue to speak words of guilt and condemnation to you, but by the blood of Jesus, you have the authority and the power to condemn every word of judgment that comes against you!

The Gift Of No Condemnation

“Pastor Prince, if believers know that there is now no condemnation for them, won’t they go out and sin?”

Well, it is obvious that Jesus did not think so. Do you remember what He said to the woman who was caught in adultery?

John 8:10–11

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When Jesus had raised Himself up and saw no one but the woman, He said to her, “Woman, where are those accusers of yours? Has no one condemned you?”
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She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said to her, “
Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more
.”

Now, pay close attention to this: Jesus gave her the gift of “no condemnation”
before
He told her to go and sin no more. Yet, the church today says, “Go and sin no more first, and only then will we not condemn you.” That’s the reason people are shying away from churches. It is not because they are rebelling against Jesus. It is because they have not been introduced to the Jesus who gives the guilty sinner
the gift of no condemnation
!

Too often, non-believers have only been introduced to Christianity as a set of rules that only judges and condemns them. If you conduct a poll among non-believers to find out what they know about Christianity, many of them would probably be familiar only with the Ten Commandments. They know only about the law that kills and not the Person who came to bring life!

But my friend, Christianity is not about laws. It is about Jesus and how He shed His blood for the forgiveness of our sins, for without blood, the Bible says that there is no forgiveness of sins
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. That is why Christianity is a relationship based on the shed blood of Jesus Christ. His blood washed away all our sins, and the laws that we were supposed to fulfill, He fulfilled on our behalf. Even Jesus Himself came against legalism. His strongest words were said to the religious Pharisees and not the sinners. I challenge you to find any instance in the Bible where Jesus called tax collectors or prostitutes a “brood of vipers”!

Now, let’s come back to the story of the woman caught in adultery. Let me ask you a question: Was the woman guilty? Yes, she was, absolutely. There is no doubt about that. The Bible states that she was “caught in adultery, in the very act”
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. But instead of condemning her according to the law of Moses, which required her to be stoned to death (the law of Moses always ministers condemnation and death, it cannot save the guilty sinner), Jesus showed her grace and gave her the gift of no condemnation.