If you look at the box that God has given you to live in, you live inside your own Garden of Eden.
You live in your own place called space, time, energy and mass, and you cannot get out of it.
It is the place that you are in and just like Adam, you have four areas God wants to be first in - faith, family, finances and physical health.
Faith.
I realize that there have been countless books written on the subject of Faith and my goal in this section is not to write another one.
I am trying to convey the importance of a covering when developing and growing our faith.
Every student needs a teacher and every child needs a parent and when it comes our faith we need a covering.
This is where Adam made his first mistake.
God was Adam's covering, there was no one in between Adam and God.
He could walk and talk with God in the cool of the day.
A true symbiotic relationship for us to follow, but Adam removed his covering and promoted himself to become his own teacher.
God has to be the center of your faith and it has to be based and determined by what He says.
It starts by having a spiritual covering and body that you are connected to in order for you to grow spiritually - church.
When choosing a church, you are to put our faith in the Holy Spirit when choosing which church you will go to.
Since He may lead you to a church that you may not initially want to go to.
I have seen many people choose their church based upon some laundry list they have put together, not realizing that God has his own list.
He will most likely choose a church for us that he wants us to get involved with, and sit under a pastor that may not always stroke our ego, and surround us with friends that won't always agree with what you say.
It will probably be a place that is filled with some challenges and needs that God wants you to help in.
There are far too many churches filled with people that do nothing but be entertained.
Our faith should stimulate action in the body of Christ.
We should be involved because we are saved, not because we want to be saved.
We should surrender to the author and finisher of our faith so that He can develop us into his nature and character and this starts with a covering.
Family or influential relationships.
If you have in a one-kingdom mindset, God determines who you will have relationships with.
Relationships can make or break our relationship with God.
The company that we keep will either push us closer to God or pull us away from God.
This is why it is vital to give God charge of our relationships.
At this point I want to define what I mean by relationships since there are different levels of influence our relationships have.
I would define relationships as a social connection of choice that influences our present and future outcome.
God gave Adam all authority to reject the serpent and rebuke Satan out of the Garden but he dismissed it.
Adam allowed the enemy to influence him with the bait of what he might be missing to distract him from his God given responsibilities.
He decided to reject God's plan and see about developing his own kingdom and build relationships on his terms.
We call this expedient compromise.
This is when we know we are rejecting God's word for a personal gain.
We must surrender every relationship to the word of God.
I was challenged by an acquaintance about a young man that is a homosexual.
He asked me if this was the big sin that God hates.
I told him, "No, sin is sin in the eyes of God.
He looks no differently on a homosexual than He does a couple living together that isn't married.
" He stepped back and thought for a moment almost refreshed at the objectivity of God's perspective and said, "yeah, I guess that's right.
" You see God isn't worried about who we associate with as much as what level we allow ourselves to be influenced by who we associate with.
Have we established our own kingdom that determines our values and rules of who we associate with? Are we allowing a relationship to whittle away at our biblical value system? Are we allowing a relationship that is inappropriate to keep us in the bonds of sin and judgment for the sake of convenience and social acceptance? If so, I say tear down the walls to your kingdom, surrender, repent and give it all to God.
Finances.
When you are a one-kingdom minded person, God decides the inflow and outflow of your pocket book.
He is the one that determines what you spend, save, give and keep.
God makes the decisions and God bears the responsibility.
If something breaks - He has to fix it.
You need more money - it's up to Him to get it to you.
A two-kingdom mindset says it's all yours, you make the decisions and thus you have all the responsibility.
If it breaks, you have to fix it.
You need more money, it's up to you to get it.
You'd better be a miracle worker because without God your going to need every miracle you can get.
God was very explicit with Adam about what he was not to touch in the garden.
It was just one thing, it wasn't a list of 400 things but just one - don't eat the fruit of the Tree of The Knowledge of Good and Evil.
How long do you think it took for Adam and Eve to blow this? One day? A Million Years? Well the time it took is way less important than the amount of temptations it took.
Think about this for a moment, they failed the 1st temptation known to man.
It wasn't the 5th or the 500th, it was the 1st temptation that brought down the whole of mankind.
That must have been quite the notch in the devil's belt.
It only took one temptation to convince Adam that he could supply his own needs and that he could be his own provider.
Just imagine how devastated God must have felt.
This would be like the husband on his honeymoon finding out that his wife ran off with the first man that she met that showed interest in her.
It's not like Adam and Eve worn down over time and finally gave in, they caved in on the first temptation.
Now how does this relate to finances? The Tree belonged to God, it is known as the law of preeminence.
God laid out in the Old Testament that the first was his.
The tithe, the first born and so on.
Now many would say that I am speaking of the Old Testament and not the New Testament.
That is correct, after Jesus conquered death hell and the grave, we moved from giving God a Tenth to everything belonging to God and we are now stewards.
We have been bought with a price and we are not our own.
This is one-kingdom theology and surrenders all to God.
So tithing only really falls short of how much more we are to do for God's Kingdom.
If we have torn down the borders to our Kingdom and surrendered all to God, then there is no argument.
But if your heart is burning and you are rejecting this one-kingdom theology, then what you are feeling is the poison of selfishness and greed seep into your system reinforcing the walls of your domain known as the Land of Mine.
You will forever fight with this mindset until you cast your crown at the feet of Jesus and confess He is Lord.
Now I am not promising financial bliss and no more financial faith opportunities if you have a one-kingdom mindset.
But God promised that He would meet every need that is according to His will.
Physical health or physical body.
If you have a one-kingdom mindset you will know that your body is not your own - it's God's property.
(I Corinthians 6:19).
You live in your own place called space, time, energy and mass, and you cannot get out of it.
It is the place that you are in and just like Adam, you have four areas God wants to be first in - faith, family, finances and physical health.
Faith.
I realize that there have been countless books written on the subject of Faith and my goal in this section is not to write another one.
I am trying to convey the importance of a covering when developing and growing our faith.
Every student needs a teacher and every child needs a parent and when it comes our faith we need a covering.
This is where Adam made his first mistake.
God was Adam's covering, there was no one in between Adam and God.
He could walk and talk with God in the cool of the day.
A true symbiotic relationship for us to follow, but Adam removed his covering and promoted himself to become his own teacher.
God has to be the center of your faith and it has to be based and determined by what He says.
It starts by having a spiritual covering and body that you are connected to in order for you to grow spiritually - church.
When choosing a church, you are to put our faith in the Holy Spirit when choosing which church you will go to.
Since He may lead you to a church that you may not initially want to go to.
I have seen many people choose their church based upon some laundry list they have put together, not realizing that God has his own list.
He will most likely choose a church for us that he wants us to get involved with, and sit under a pastor that may not always stroke our ego, and surround us with friends that won't always agree with what you say.
It will probably be a place that is filled with some challenges and needs that God wants you to help in.
There are far too many churches filled with people that do nothing but be entertained.
Our faith should stimulate action in the body of Christ.
We should be involved because we are saved, not because we want to be saved.
We should surrender to the author and finisher of our faith so that He can develop us into his nature and character and this starts with a covering.
Family or influential relationships.
If you have in a one-kingdom mindset, God determines who you will have relationships with.
Relationships can make or break our relationship with God.
The company that we keep will either push us closer to God or pull us away from God.
This is why it is vital to give God charge of our relationships.
At this point I want to define what I mean by relationships since there are different levels of influence our relationships have.
I would define relationships as a social connection of choice that influences our present and future outcome.
God gave Adam all authority to reject the serpent and rebuke Satan out of the Garden but he dismissed it.
Adam allowed the enemy to influence him with the bait of what he might be missing to distract him from his God given responsibilities.
He decided to reject God's plan and see about developing his own kingdom and build relationships on his terms.
We call this expedient compromise.
This is when we know we are rejecting God's word for a personal gain.
We must surrender every relationship to the word of God.
I was challenged by an acquaintance about a young man that is a homosexual.
He asked me if this was the big sin that God hates.
I told him, "No, sin is sin in the eyes of God.
He looks no differently on a homosexual than He does a couple living together that isn't married.
" He stepped back and thought for a moment almost refreshed at the objectivity of God's perspective and said, "yeah, I guess that's right.
" You see God isn't worried about who we associate with as much as what level we allow ourselves to be influenced by who we associate with.
Have we established our own kingdom that determines our values and rules of who we associate with? Are we allowing a relationship to whittle away at our biblical value system? Are we allowing a relationship that is inappropriate to keep us in the bonds of sin and judgment for the sake of convenience and social acceptance? If so, I say tear down the walls to your kingdom, surrender, repent and give it all to God.
Finances.
When you are a one-kingdom minded person, God decides the inflow and outflow of your pocket book.
He is the one that determines what you spend, save, give and keep.
God makes the decisions and God bears the responsibility.
If something breaks - He has to fix it.
You need more money - it's up to Him to get it to you.
A two-kingdom mindset says it's all yours, you make the decisions and thus you have all the responsibility.
If it breaks, you have to fix it.
You need more money, it's up to you to get it.
You'd better be a miracle worker because without God your going to need every miracle you can get.
God was very explicit with Adam about what he was not to touch in the garden.
It was just one thing, it wasn't a list of 400 things but just one - don't eat the fruit of the Tree of The Knowledge of Good and Evil.
How long do you think it took for Adam and Eve to blow this? One day? A Million Years? Well the time it took is way less important than the amount of temptations it took.
Think about this for a moment, they failed the 1st temptation known to man.
It wasn't the 5th or the 500th, it was the 1st temptation that brought down the whole of mankind.
That must have been quite the notch in the devil's belt.
It only took one temptation to convince Adam that he could supply his own needs and that he could be his own provider.
Just imagine how devastated God must have felt.
This would be like the husband on his honeymoon finding out that his wife ran off with the first man that she met that showed interest in her.
It's not like Adam and Eve worn down over time and finally gave in, they caved in on the first temptation.
Now how does this relate to finances? The Tree belonged to God, it is known as the law of preeminence.
God laid out in the Old Testament that the first was his.
The tithe, the first born and so on.
Now many would say that I am speaking of the Old Testament and not the New Testament.
That is correct, after Jesus conquered death hell and the grave, we moved from giving God a Tenth to everything belonging to God and we are now stewards.
We have been bought with a price and we are not our own.
This is one-kingdom theology and surrenders all to God.
So tithing only really falls short of how much more we are to do for God's Kingdom.
If we have torn down the borders to our Kingdom and surrendered all to God, then there is no argument.
But if your heart is burning and you are rejecting this one-kingdom theology, then what you are feeling is the poison of selfishness and greed seep into your system reinforcing the walls of your domain known as the Land of Mine.
You will forever fight with this mindset until you cast your crown at the feet of Jesus and confess He is Lord.
Now I am not promising financial bliss and no more financial faith opportunities if you have a one-kingdom mindset.
But God promised that He would meet every need that is according to His will.
Physical health or physical body.
If you have a one-kingdom mindset you will know that your body is not your own - it's God's property.
(I Corinthians 6:19).
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