Message Title: Who are You?
Minister: Dr. D. K. Olukoya
Mathew. 16-18: “when Jesus
came into the coasts of Caes-a-re’a Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying,
whom do men say that I the son of man am? And they said, some say that thou art
John the Baptist: some Elias: and others, Jeremias, or one of the prophets. He
said unto them, but whom say ye that I am? And Simon Peter answered and said,
thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God. And Jesus answered and said
unto him, blessed are thou, Simon Bar-jo’na; for flesh and blood hath not
revealed it unto thee, but my father which is in heaven. And I say also unto
thee, that thou are peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and gates
of hell shall not prevail against it”.
John 1:19-23: “And this is
the record of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to
ask him, who are thou? And he confessed, and denied not: but confessed, I am
not the Christ. And they asked him, what then? Art thou E-li-as? And he said, I
am not. Art thou prophet? And he answered, No. then said they unto him, who art
thou? That we may give an answer to them that sent us. What sayest thou of thyself? He said, I am the voice of one
crying in the wilderness, make straight the way of the LORD, as said the
prophet E-sai-as”.
We need to identify the deepest root of failure. The
difference between the poor and the rich sometimes is information; somebody has
information, which the other does not have.
Sometimes, the difference between the great and the
small is knowledge. Somebody has also said nobody has a mountain, the mountain
we all have is ignorance. Many have made many outstanding discoveries, the
telephone – a very important discovery. When the fellow who discovered it first
started playing around with it; they said he was playing with kiddies toys that
he should become a serious person and leave it; but now we have a telephone.
When the boys who built the first airplane started doing it at the back of
their garden, people were laughing them to scorn. When the first fellow to
build a motor car was working on it; people insulted him and asked him to buy a
horse which everyone used at that time but he kept to it.
If I ask some simple questions like “who discovered
America?” For somebody who knows a bit of history, your answer will be
Christopher Columbus, he made a very great discovery. “Who discovered River
Niger?” According to our history book, there was a fellow called mongo Park,
and there was a song we sang in those days “------ at the bank of Niger
River-----“. But all these discoveries no matter how important they are, there is no greater discovery than to
yourself.
It is
possible to be born again, sanctified, spirit filled, a pastor, much more and
still you do not know you are.
That is why this question comes to you today. WHO ARE YOU? A very important question;
it is like asking for your identity card. Ignorance about your identity can
sometimes put you in hardship. The lesson on identity is very important; Jacob
learnt this secret a long time ago.
Jacob saw that by his identity he was not in the place
of blessing. After wasting his time, he got the blessing meant for his brother;
he got his brother’s identity and dropped his own. When he found he was no
longer there he ran back to God to rediscover his true identity. After he
discovered his identity, he knew his name had to be changed; for him to enjoy
true blessings. One of Satan’s most effective devices is for Christian to be
completely ignorant of their true identities and the devil is an expert at
confusing people in this area. He tried it with Jesus, so he will try it on us
as well. He told Jesus “if thou be the son of God”, if thou be “command this
stones to become bread”. What was he trying to do? He was trying to make Jesus
doubt His identity.
So if Jesus did not know who He was, the devil would
have confused Him and got away with it. You would have thought that will be the
end of it because Jesus gave him the correct answers. Again when Jesus got to
the cross, the devil was there, speaking through the men saying, “If you are
the Son of God come down from that cross.” The devil will speak to Christians,
saying if you are a child of God why are you suffering, is your God asleep and
he fills your mind with all types of evil thoughts. I am asking this important
question again. Who are you?
Some people when they pray, they call themselves all
kinds of names ---- Father Lord, thank you because I am your unworthy servant,
miserable sinner, unfit, bad believing that if he keeps saying that before God,
God will think he is humble. No. all you are doing is showing your satanic
identity card to the Almighty God. Anyone praying like that shows that he or
she does not know who he or she is. The devil will whisper dirty words into the
ear of a believer and he starts thinking and meditating on it, the same devil
will come behind you and blame you for thinking on it. If you are a Christian,
why are you thinking like this, you then start to cry because you do not know
who you are?
The prodigal son was rotten and he had done a lot of
terrible thing but the bible tells us that he came to a stage in his life, he
came to himself, using our local English it means his “head became correct”,
when his “head became correct”, he knew the son of who he was and that he was
not a slave. Then he said to himself I will arise and go to my father; I have
had enough of this……
The devil whips people forward and backward if they do
not know who they are. You must know who you are. Note the life of Jesus in
your Bible from the beginning of His life to the cross. He was always talking
about who He is, what He is, what His mission in life is. He kept telling them,
“I am the light of world, I am the bread of life, I am the living water, I am
the son of God, I am the way, the truth and the life”, he repeated these over
and over.
WHO ARE YOU?
I am not asking you what your name is because at this
level your name is no longer important at all. You could put a donkey down and
call the donkey a horse and you say donkey do you hear you are a horse and you
dress the donkey like a horse. When the time comes to run everybody will know
it was a donkey and not a horse, so the name is not important now.
Who are you, what is your spiritual identity? If you
do not know this then the person is like Peter, who was free from jail but he
knew he was free.
The day you know who you are, that day you have won
the greatest battle. A time when we are asked to go and pray for somebody, you
say “who born me well?” Preach in the bus, you say “my heart is dirty”. Command
the enemies to lose their hold and you say “if I do so now and they fire back,
how do I respond?”
This feeling of unworthiness has made many Christians
targets for the devil. When you know who you are and you keep confessing it,
things then begin to happen. They said unto Elijah “man of God come down from
the mountain” and he said “if I be that name your called me, let fire come
down……” and it was so. If you ask many to say “all the witches and wizards in
the whole of this environment cannot overcome me”, many will be afraid to
repeat this statement because they don’t know who they are and they won’t say a
word.
WHO ARE YOU?
Many do not know who they are so when the devil comes
to them, they do not have the right answers to give him. They asked John Who
are you? Are you Elijah, he said “No “. Are you that prophet he said “No”. Then
who are you? Thank God he knew who he was. He said “I am the voice of that
crieth in the wilderness……”
Many years ago, there was an unusual man in my former
church. He was an unusual man because when they said pray he prayed the
hardest, when they said evangelism 3 o’clock and he will be waiting for the
Pastor to arrive and he used to prophecy. One day he stood up in the church and
he began to prophecy --- “thus says the Lord in the next two years, men will
begin to walk on the moon and they said “Pastor this is one of the prophets
that confuse people in the church, tell them to keep quiet if they have nothing
better to say”. The prophet died and went. Seven years after he died, the first
men were on that moon that he prophesied. The man knew who he was. Do you know
who you are?
Many who call themselves witches and wizards are very
foolish. Because what benefit is it that you are a witch, wizard or that you have
a familiar spirit. What sense is in it for you to eat your children or other
people’s children? Why should you hinder or debar the progress of those who
will help you at old age. It does not make sense. How many children of witches
have scholarships, it is pure foolishness. Anyone in their group should know
that it is the group of limitation better get out and discover your true
identity.
It has been well said that the greatest enemy of man
is himself, not the devil or witches. The most terrible form of man’s ignorance
is what we are discussing now, ignorance of himself. People who do not know who
they are, they are very dangerous people. For example, a particular religion
believes that people who die reincarnate in form of animals. In that country,
it is against their religion to kill cows or kill rats. The cows are growing
fat on the street while the people die of hunger in that country.
Every cow in that country eats food that can be used
to feed seven people and there are about 200 million scared cows in the
country. If the people in that country stop feeding the cows they will have
enough to feed a billion people and this is almost about 1/5th of the world’s
population. What is the problem in that place? They have not discovered who
they are.
A woman told me that while she was in the world, she
normally helped her friends get customers of men. One day she got a customer
for her friend, normally she waits outside when they are busy so that she can collect
her own commission from her friend after her friend has been paid.
On this particular day she took her friend to the
hotel to meet a man. They entered into the room while the woman waited outside
as usual. Suddenly, she heard her friend screaming in the room and the whole
thing was becoming scary so she decided to look through the key hole at what
was happening. She found that her friend was naked but the man who entered just
now had become a big snake and had coiled around the woman. The woman wanted to
run but something told her “if you run the man who could become a snake inside
only God knows what will happen, so wait”. So she waited.
When they finished, they were paid and they left the
place. But to her amazement, her friend did not tell her what happened inside
rather she was encouraging her that the man was good and nice, that she should
go and try. This woman did not know herself. If you don’t know yourself, how
can you know your friend? She did not know the kind of friend she had been going
out with.
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