Mike Bickle emphasizes the significance of confessing the Word of God as a means to grow in faith, highlighting that faith is directly linked to our response to God's promises. He explains that Jesus taught extensively on faith, urging believers to approach God with confidence rather than condemnation, and to speak the Word over their lives to activate faith. Bickle stresses that the connection between what we say and what we believe is crucial for experiencing God's blessings and power. He encourages believers to engage with the Word of God actively, using their own voices to declare His promises, which leads to a transformative domino effect in their lives. Ultimately, he calls for a culture of faith that combines sincerity with boldness in approaching God.

Verse 8 to 10 is one of the most practical passages in the Bible on the subject of growing in faith or how faith operates. These three verses are very important along with verse 17 that goes with it as well. Paragraph A, Jesus is the one that taught more on the importance of faith than any other teacher in the Word of God. And because it's Jesus that emphasized the subject of faith, therefore we take growing in faith, we make that a priority. I mean here it is the Son of God tells us how necessary faith is. And so as a response we're saying, Lord if you taught it and you emphasized it more than anybody, we're going to make it a priority in our spiritual life to cultivate a life of faith in an intentional way. He said in Matthew chapter 8 verse 13, he said to the centurion, he says, as you as you have believed so let it be done to you. Then in chapter 9 verse 29 to the blind man he says, according to your faith let it be to you. And the principle is clear that what we receive from God is directly related to our faith response. He said according to how you believe me, that is what you're going to experience. There is a direct correlation between His promises and His power and our confidence in it and what we experience. We'll experience more kingdom activity if we grow in faith. We'll experience more of Jesus' provision in our life. We'll enjoy our relationship with Him in a greater way as we believe Him for more and more. Because when we have a spirit of faith in the tone and in the tenor of our relationship, we have confidence when we dialogue with Him. The enemy comes and points out our weakness. He's the great accuser. He's always telling us why what we're doing isn't sufficient and why it's why we're disqualified in the presence of God. He points out our weakness. He magnifies our failures to us. So when we approach God just in sincerity but without faith, we come and we're always kind of, Lord, you know, I just don't want to bother you and could you forgive me one more time and if you have time could you maybe consider this request? And the Word of God says no, no, that's not the way. Come boldly. Come with confidence even in your weakness, even in your brokenness. Know who you are when you stand before Him and believe Him that you will unsee His beauty and be fascinated by who He is and have that expectation in the relationship. So even the spirit of faith will affect the way we enjoy the Lord, not just what we receive from Him as as I mentioned. I mean having confidence instead of condemnation is a huge difference in the way that we dialogue with the Lord. Hebrews chapter 11 verse 6 says it's impossible to please God without faith. Impossible. We can come with sincerity. We can come with genuine love, the setting of our heart to love Him and that is really good. But we take the setting of our heart to love Him, sincerity, mix it with confidence, with faith. Beloved, that is what causes the kingdom of darkness to be troubled and disturbed. When a believer has sincerity, the enemy doesn't like it, but he's not threatened by what they're doing. He's not going to disrupt the kingdom of darkness that much with sincerity. But you put together sincerity and faith, then that weak and broken person in the flesh is going to be a vessel that's going to make an impact against the kingdom of darkness. It's going to cause the kingdom of God to increase. I mean it's good that we love Him and that we long for Him deeply. That's one of our great values as a spiritual family, loving Him, setting our heart to love Him, longing for more, believing for more. But it's not enough to long for more, we want to experience more. Some folks they've been longing 10, 20, 30 years, but there's a time where the Lord says, I want you to actually enter into that which you've longed for. And again that entering into grows and measures, but it's not only a distant longing that never happens, but it's an encountering that increases over the weeks and months and years. And that encountering will increase as our faith increases. Now some believers, they approach the Lord with believing Him for very little. Matter of fact, some believers, unbelief is almost a virtue. You know, not quite, but they say, well you know, I don't really believe all that stuff. You know, I love Jesus and I don't really engage in all of that. There's a lot of hype around the subject of faith. I've seen ministries that focused on faith and they seem to overdo it and over hype it. And so I'm not going to do all that. I'm just going to love Jesus and my simplicity. And it is true, there are ministries in the name of faith that exaggerate and hype. But the answer to misuse isn't, is to use the Bible right, is to respond in a right way. And it's impossible to please God apart from faith, Hebrews 11 verse 6 says. So we want to be determined to believe God for all that He has ordained for us. I want to have great faith. I want to believe Him for everything in the little areas of my life and the big areas of our corporate mandate together. I want to believe Him for the whole thing that He'll give us. I don't want to be content with small faith, with sincerity, but small faith. I want sincerity and I want big faith and I want to actually experience that which I am sincere about seeking. And that is what the Lord desires in His people. But we put together love and faith together in our relationship with the Lord. Well Ephesians chapter 1 verse 3 is one of the classic verses that just gives us the scope of how much God has made available to us in Christ. Look at verse 3, Ephesians 1, Paul says, Blessed be the God and the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. That's a pretty radical statement. So notice that He has blessed us. It's past tense. This isn't for a future time. The blessings that come from the throne of God, that's the heavenly places that He's referencing. The blessings that come from the finished work of the cross. The blessings that flow out of the resurrection of Jesus ascended to the right hand and causing us to be seated with Him in heavenly places at the Father's right hand. All of those blessings are fully made available to us now. Now we don't enter into the fullness of them in this age, but we enter into a dynamic measure of these things. Like those blessings, they include many things. I don't want to try to mention every one, but for instance total forgiveness. Now we all believe in forgiveness, but a lot of believers functionally they believe in 90% forgiveness. It's that final 10% they can't settle. Beloved, He forgave us all of our sins forever and He goes, I've been merciful to your sins and your sins I remember no more. I don't remember them anymore. Meaning they're not in God's heart in context to the relationship with us. They're out of the equation. They're out of the dialogue. Well most believers do that with a bunch of their sins, but those final 10% they can't quite go there. Well the spiritual blessings that are given are far more than forgiveness. That we have the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. Vast implications. We have the indwelling spirit. Vast implications. We're sons and daughters. We're the bride of Christ. We have the authority of Jesus to use His authority. Vast implications. We have the Father's promises to provide for us, to protect us, to direct us. There's all of these promises and many more. They're all ours. They're fully available. Now the problem is we can have the promises of God available to us and those promises are invitations for us to engage with Him. The promises are not guarantees that we're going to experience them in fullness in this age. The promises are invitations, but if we'll respond in faith and obedience to the promises, then we will experience so much more. 2 Corinthians 6.1, Paul talked about receiving the grace of God in vain. You know you can receive the promises of God in vain, meaning the promises are available. The grace is yours, but if you don't enter into it, if you don't appropriate it, if you don't engage in faith with those promises, with that grace, you've received it in vain. It's available, but it's not doing you any good in your everyday lifestyle. Hebrews chapter 4 verse 2 says the same sort of thing. It says the gospel was preached to them, but it did not profit them because they didn't mix it with faith. Hebrews chapter 4 verse 2. You can have the gospel preached, all the promises preached, but it won't profit you if you don't respond in faith to the preaching of the gospel. And that doesn't just mean the message of forgiveness. That's the whole message of the gospel, the whole message of salvation, the whole message of the kingdom. Those are synonymous, by the way. I mean they overlap in their meaning in a profound way, and it's not enough to be forgiven. We want to enter into the power dimension, the blessing dimension, the covenant benefits of being in covenant relationship with the Lord. Let's look at Roman numeral 2. Now we're going to begin in Romans chapter 10, this amazing practical passage on faith. Romans 10 is a must-read passage if you want to grow in faith and understand how it works. He says in verse 10, and then we're going to, I mean Romans 10 verse 17, then we're going to back up a few verses in a moment and look at what Paul said before verse 17. But let's look at the crescendo first. He says faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. So the way that you grow in faith is by hearing the Word of God, and the hearing of the Word of God implies that you're engaging with it, that you're hearing the Word of God and your heart is responding, that you're going to appropriate the promises of the Word of God. Now when it says faith comes by hearing the Word of God, it means hearing what the Bible says about the character of God and the, and the nature of God, which is the same thing, His character and nature. But another way that we hear the Word of God concerning His promises. So it's not just Bible information that builds faith, but it's particularly the Word about the character of God, the Word about the promises of God. When you hear those, those truths, that's what causes faith to grow in the heart. That's where we focus our attention to hear the Word and to speak the Word. Now the reason I'm adding speaking the Word, because back in verse 8 to 10, we're going to look at in a moment, Paul emphasizes speaking the Word. And the idea is this, you can hear the Word from a Bible teacher. Like right now you're hearing the teaching of the Word, and your faith can be stirred. But the voice that most impacts you, more than any other voice in the earth, is your own voice. When you speak the Word of God over your heart, that has far more impact that when somebody else speaks the Word of God over your heart. No voice influences you or impacts you more than your voice. And so you want to hear the Word of God and grow in faith, get the Word of God in your mouth. And you speak it, and though you're hearing it from your own lips, your heart will grow in faith. Now that's the point that Paul makes a few verses earlier in verse 8 to 10 here. Okay, let's look in paragraph B, because we want to grow in faith. We want to hear the Word. Again, it's the Word about the character and nature of God. It's the Word about the promises of God. That's the Word that we want to hear. Who we are in Christ. The authority that we have in Christ. What we possess in Him. It's those truths that build our faith. Now some people, they ask for faith. They pray for faith. And that's okay to pray for faith. But faith comes by hearing, not by praying. Meaning, a lot of believers, I'll give a teaching like this, they'll come and say, would you pray for me? I'll grow in faith. I'll say, well, yeah, I'm glad to. It's not wrong to do that for sure. But they want somebody to lay hands on them, so they walk away with faith. That's not how faith grows. Faith grows by hearing over and over. You can't hear it too often. That's why you want to sit under the hearing of the Word of God, particularly the Word about God's nature and character, and the Word about God's promises, and who you are in Christ, your authority. You want to hear it, but you want to hear yourself say it as well. So I'm happy to pray for somebody to grow in faith, but that isn't what's going to make them grow in faith. They're going to grow in faith when they hear the Word, particularly out of their own mouth, as well as from the mouth of others. So let's back up from Romans 10 verse 17. Let's back up to the context of what Paul is, the context earlier in verse 8 to 10. He starts off in verse 8, and he says, the Word is near you in your mouth and in your heart. That is the Word of faith. Verse 9, in other words, if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, you believe in your heart, you will be saved. Verse 10, for with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. Now there's many principles that deserve attention in these three verses. The first point I want to mention is that Paul joins the idea of your mouth and your heart, what you say with your mouth and what you believe in your heart. He puts those ideas together in verse 8, he does it again in verse 9, and he does it again in verse 10. That what you say with your mouth greatly impacts the faith that grows in your heart. There is a dynamic connection between what you say with your mouth and the pace and the measure in which your faith grows. There is an activation of faith in your heart when your mouth is in agreement with the promises of God or with who God is, the character of God. So make the the clear identification in your mind of these two realities, what you say and the quality of how you believe or the measure are deeply connected to one another. Now many believers, they don't know that. That's a new idea to them. They want to believe, but they don't actually speak the word of God over their heart, over their circumstances, against the devil's attack. When their emotions, they have dark emotions, negative emotions of fear and lust and anger and despair and depression. When those negative emotions, they just ride the storm out. I mean they love Jesus, but they ride the storm, shame, condemnation, despair, all of those emotions and they just kind of grit their teeth right in the storm and they love you Jesus. I love you Jesus. I want more of you Jesus. And the scripture exhorts us, speak the word of promise over your emotions. That your emotions, negative emotions would not dominate your life. Or when the enemy is encroaching on our circumstances and attacking us, we can say no to him and we can resist him by the authority of the word of God, the authority of Jesus. And the enemy will actually flee from us, but he won't flee if we don't resist him. And so a lot of people believe at a certain level, but when they have negative emotions or the enemy's attacking their circumstances, they ride the storm out. They just kind of, you know, grit their teeth and just hang in there when they don't actually engage with speaking the word of God over their heart and over their life and over their circumstances. Let's look at verse 8. We're going to break this down just phrase by phrase. When he said, first of all I want to mention that verse 8 is actually a quotation from Deuteronomy 30 verse 14, the teaching of Moses. Paul is looking back to the Old Testament, Deuteronomy 30 verse 14. Moses is the one who said, the word is near you in your mouth and in your heart. Moses was the first one to combine what we say in our mouth and what we believe in our heart. Moses combined that reality first. Paul's referencing it. And then, so in verse 8, he's quoting Moses. Verse 9 and 10, he's elaborating and giving insight into what Moses said. He's giving us even greater understanding than beyond what Moses said in Deuteronomy chapter 30. So again, verse 8, the word is near you. It's in your mouth. It's in your heart. That is the word of faith. So Paul says that when you, Paul coined the phrase the word of faith. Now a lot of folks use the phrase the word of faith. And it's associated with what is commonly known as the faith movement. And some folks in the faith movement over the years have exaggerated the application of how they use the word of faith. Many have not, but some have. And we see the exaggeration. And we go, I don't want to get into hype. And I don't want to get into that. And I don't want to get into all that. I'm just going to forget that. But remember, it's Paul the apostle. He's the one who coined the phrase by the word of, I mean by the Holy Spirit. So we want to be word of faith believers. We want to grow in that. Now the word of faith is the two components earlier in verse 8. It's what you say with your mouth and what you believe in your heart is what constitutes the word of faith operating in your life. So you want to be real aware of the two components. What you say and the level of what you believe are connected together. And that's what, I mean, that's what Paul was pointing out. Now he's going to develop verse 8. He's going to elaborate on it. He's going to add more to it than Moses said back in Deuteronomy 30. He says first, verse 9, he goes, if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart, you will be saved. In verse 9, he's saying, in other words, here's what I'm saying in verse 8. If you confess with your mouth, there's that twin component. Confess with your mouth and believe with your heart. He puts them together in verse 8. He puts together in verse 9. He puts it together in verse 10. What you say and what you believe are deeply connected and you can't separate them. What God has joined together, let no man separate. We can't neglect the confession of our faith and still grow in faith in our heart. Our heart will diminish in faith if we don't join it with confession. And if we do join it with confession, our faith will grow and get stronger and stronger. Now first in verse 9, I want to point out, he says you will be saved if you confess the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart. You will be saved. Now this is one of the most well-known verses in the Bible. And you hear it all the time. But the problem with verse 9, confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, believe your heart, you'll be saved. We've almost always used that verse for an unbeliever as the way into the kingdom of God. So a person hasn't given their heart to Jesus yet and we tell them, if you'll confess Jesus as Lord with your mouth, believe in your heart, you'll be saved. And they do it and they are then saved. Now that's a good application. That's a biblical use of that word. But the problem is, is that we've used it in that context so often, we've reduced it to only meaning how to get forgiveness. So after we get our forgiveness for sins, we move past that verse and we ignore it. We think, I'm saved, I have my forgiveness. Well the New Testament idea of salvation begins with free forgiveness. But it doesn't end with free forgiveness. The subject of salvation includes the power of God, the authority of Jesus, the indwelling presence of God, the glory of God in your life. All of these dimensions are captured under the words, you will be saved. So yes, we were saved the day we were born again. But now that we have our forgiveness, now that we're in the family of God, we want to walk out the practical dimensions of being saved. We want to walk our salvation out now. And Paul has the idea of the whole of salvation when he says, confess with your mouth, believe in your heart, and you will experience the salvation power in an ongoing way. So don't reduce verse 9 to forgiveness of sins and then move on. This is the principle of faith by which we experience power. Now in place of the word saved or salvation in verse 9 and 10, I encourage you to put the word power, put the word promises, put the word blessing, so that you get a feel for the greater implication of this passage. So it goes like this, you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, believe in your heart, you'll experience more power. You'll experience more of the promises. You'll experience a greater dimension of his presence. Put those words in where the word you will be saved are here in verse 9, you will be saved. Now when we confess the Lord Jesus, this is a very important point, that our initial thought is when we confess the Lord Jesus, we confess he is supreme. He's the supreme leader. He's the king of kings. He's the boss. And it does mean that. He is Lord. He is the leader. But the confession of Jesus's lordship doesn't end with the idea that he is chief among all. He is the supreme. It also is a confession of all of the resources of his lordship are at disposal, are made available to your life. So when I say you are Lord of my life, I'm not only saying you're the boss, I'm saying the resources of your lordship are available to me as a son and daughter of the king, as the bride of Christ, as priests and kings, as being in the family of God, your Lord. When sickness attacks your body, Jesus, you're the Lord over sickness. When guilt and condemnation come and the enemy lies to us, Jesus, you're the Lord over my heart and my salvation. When fear attacks us, we don't only say you're the Lord, you're the boss, but you're the Lord. All the authority that you possess and all the provision and resource you have, it is available to my heart. So don't limit the confession of his lordship to only the fact that he's supreme in authority overall, but he actually makes that authority available to those that live under his lordship. So there's a practical application to this principle as well. Verse 10, Paul now is going to say the same point a little differently. He's going to add a few more elements to it. So remember, verse 9 and 10, he's elaborating on verse 8. Verse 8, he's quoting Deuteronomy 30, verse 14. And he's going to say, let me tell you what Moses said, and let me break it down for you, so you can grow in faith. So after he teaches verse 8 to 10, then in verse 17, he gives us the conclusion in terms of how to grow in faith. He goes, faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word. So we put all these principles together, and we have practical ways to grow in our faith. Let's look at verse 10. He says, with the heart, one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth, confession is made into salvation. Now again, for the word salvation, put the word, and with the mouth, confession is made unto experiencing the power of God. Experiencing the presence of God. Experiencing more of the promises of God. Put that, those ideas under the word, the banner of the word salvation. Second point I want to make in verse 10 is that with the heart, one believes unto righteousness. With the mouth, a confession is made unto salvation. Righteousness and salvation are speaking of the same thing. Meaning in this context, when he's talking about righteousness, he means the gift of righteousness, but also the power to walk out righteousness. It actually means a little more than that. It's the gift of righteousness, the power to walk in righteousness, but it also includes the rightness of God's order in your life. So righteousness is more than a moral virtue. It is God's order, the rightness of God being established in your life. So with the heart, we believe for the gift of righteousness, for the ability to walk in the character of righteousness, but also for the rightness of God's will and God's order in my life. The word righteousness here could be used interchangeably with the word salvation at the end of verse 10. They are two sides of one coin. So you don't have to work hard to kind of split hairs and figure out, well what does he really mean? He's saying the same thing two different ways. And now he makes the principle again in verse 10 that with the heart, we believe and with the mouth, we make confession. Now it's this principle of the word of faith, the mouth confession and believing in the heart. This is the principle by which we receive forgiveness. This is the principle by which we receive healing. This is the principle which we receive God's supernatural blessing on relationships, God's supernatural favor in circumstances. How this is the principle that we grow in the anointing of God in our ministry. This is the principle that we grow in our revelation of the fascination of the beauty of the king and the glory of his worth. This is the way we go forward by the word of faith. These are all components of being saved. And so we don't use faith to get forgiven and then after we get forgiven, we kick into a different gear and we just kind of hang in there with sincerity. No, we use faith with sincerity and we grow in all of the aspects and the facets of our salvation. Now let's look at the word with the mouth confession is made. Now again, this is not a one-time confession the day you're born again, like I confess you were Lord. So now I'm saved. I mean, that's powerful. That's important to do. And by the way, if you haven't made that confession, you could make that confession today and you can be saved today and walk out of this room with the assurance of salvation. That salvation is free to anyone who wants it, but the confession is not limited to the day you confess Jesus. When you're born again, the confession of your mouth is a principle of the word of faith reality that we engage in all the days of our life. So it's not a one-time confession. Now we understand that we speak the word of God when we pray for the sick, meaning a guy comes up and says, I'd like prayer for healing. You put lay hands on him and you say in the name of Jesus, Lord, would you release, would you release your healing? So we speak over them. Lord release your healing or whatever phrase you might use, but it's the principle you speak the word of God over the person who's sick. That's very common. We understand that. Or we're in a prayer meeting. We're praying for revival, revival to touch the nations of the world, a particular city. We, uh, uh, declare whether on the microphone singing it or speaking it or, or on roast, you know, 10, just whispering it to God. We say, Lord send revival. We understand that we speak the word when we engage in intercession, we have to speak the word. So whether we're praying for the sick or whether we're in an intercession for revival, it's the same principle. Well, whether we're in a situation where we give a prophetic decree, like Jesus taught, he said, you'll speak to the mountain. You speak to circumstances and they change. He spoke to the fig tree. Moses spoke to the red sea. Zerubbabel spoke to the obstacles in Zachariah four, he spoke grace, grace. So we speak to circumstances. So we all get that. So we're, we're happy about that. Genesis one, when the earth was formless and void, Jesus spoke the word of God, let there be light and light came. So we know in creation, he had to speak. So whether we're praying for the sick, we speak the word praying for revival, we speak the word speaking, uh, uh, to a situation, a circumstance, we speak the word to the fig tree, to the mountain, to the red sea. We understand that Jesus in creation spoke the word, but when it comes to our own individual heart and life, we don't speak the word. That's the, as though the principle is entirely different when we're being assaulted by fear or despair or lost or anger, we just kind of grit our teeth and endure the storm. I mean, how many sincere believers speak when they pray for the sick, speak the word when they pray for revival, speak to a circumstance, understand Jesus spoke in creation for it to let there be light and the power went forward, but they never speak the word of God over their own heart, over their own life circumstances. They just bear the storm. I mean, they let it ride out, you know, the crazy dark emotions emerge and they just, Oh, hanging in there. Oh, the devil's winning. I'm sinking. I'm poor and broken. And as though that's the final word. Yes, you might have these negative feelings and it might look despairing, but beloved, that's not the final word. The dark emotion, the, the, the negative circumstance, the reversal of a, of a situation. Suddenly there's trouble. That is not the final word about your heart, your life, or your circumstance. But we'll say, you know, I'm just really going under and I'm really sinking and the devil's having his way for me. And, you know, I'm just so sick and tired of this. Well, the words that we speak need to line up with the word of God, not us just venting our negative emotions. Now there's a time in a, in a friendship context to say, I'm struggling with this. There's a time where you're open and honest about how you feel. That's not what I'm saying, but you say what you feel in that, in a limited sense, in a friendship context, but then you say, that's not the final word. That's not the final word. I'm not, I feel overwhelmed, but you know what? I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me that I can do the will of God in victory. I can walk in peace. I know it's a difficult circumstance, but I don't have to sink under it. I can do all things in the will of God through Christ, who strengthened me. When there's a financial setback related to your, your life assignment in the will of God and you're obeying biblical principles, you don't just accept the setback. You know, the devil's a liar. He's a devourer. He's a thief. He attacks your money. He really does. Now again, I'm talking about people who are embracing the biblical principles of finance in their life, and they're getting attacked to their assignment, their ministry and their assignment in the will of God. They need to speak Philippians 419. God will supply all my needs in the will of God. He will supply. It's not the final word that I've had a setback. We get the, the report from the doctor, a terrible report about our health, or we have pains in our body. Beloved, that's not the final word. I mean, I'm all for telling a friend, this is how I feel, this is what's happening, but that's not the final word. There's another word that needs to be spoken. Yes. I feel discouraged. I feel fearful. I feel despair, but that's not where I'm camping out. There's a word that has authority over those, and I'm going to line up with the word and the words of my mouth are going to agree with, uh, with, uh, the word of God. And I'm going to speak the word and I'm going to employ the promises of God. And you know what will happen? You speak the word of God, your faith will be activated in your heart. It creates a domino effect. When you speak the word of God, the promises of God, your faith grows, your emotions change, your circumstances change. The anointing on your life increases that domino effect that begins in that critical moment. When the bad report comes, the negative emotion swells up in your heart. Again, whether it's fear, despair, lust, it's what we do at that moment. We say, yes, I do feel that, but I'm not going to give it dominion. I'm not going to let it have dominion over me. It's not the final word. It's not supreme in my life. There's an authority. There's a King. There's a Lord that has all resource. He is my Lord. I'm under his leadership. I'm in covenant relationship with him. This is the word that is the final word over my life. And you speak the promise of God. Now you don't have to, you don't have to make a big show out of it and, and you know, make a big proclamation to everyone every time and get on the rooftop and shout it. You can, there's nothing wrong with that. But, uh, I'm talking about you, the whispering of just throughout the day, intermittently through the day, when those dark emotions, the negative reports come the negative response of our unrenewed mind, but we go, no, no, no, no, no. And we speak the word of God. We redirect our heart in a different direction. That's and we just whisper those words to God throughout the day. I don't mean every minute or all day, but those intermittently through the day, when, uh, when the times come, when our heart is troubled a little bit, we go, no, no, no, I'm not going there. I'm not giving my heart over to the confession that this is the final state of affairs. No, this is not the end of the story. There is more resource and more power. I know who I am in Christ. Okay. Let's look at, uh, uh, uh, paragraph two, paragraph two at the Paul is quoting. So Paul in verse eight of Romans 10 says, the word of God is near you in your mouth and in your heart. Let's go back to the passage. He's quoting and let's see what Moses was talking about, because that's the context of which Paul, uh, is expecting us to understand when we read Romans 10. So you want to understand Deuteronomy 30 as well. So let's go down to back to Deuteronomy 30 verse 11. Now I should have started in verse 10 because verse 10 is the commandment. Really it's verse one to 10, but I'll just, it summarizes in verse 10 verse 10. I should have on the, on the path, on the notes here, but God says, I want you to turn to me with all of your heart. I want you to love me with all of your heart. And he gives promises that he will multiply and bless your life. There's several promises in verse one to 10, but the, the overall, uh, idea is it's the command to obey God and to love God with all of your heart with the promises of the Lord's supernatural provision in your life. That's the context verse one to 10. So now in verse 11, Moses picks up on that and he goes, this commandment, he goes, it's not too mysterious. This commandment to love God with all of your heart, to turn your heart to him. He goes, it's not too mysterious for you, nor is it a far off. It is not in heaven that you should say who will ascend into heaven for us and bring this promise, this command to us. Verse 13, nor is it, that means the command and the promise and the ability to experience it, nor is it beyond the sea that you should say who will go over the sea and bring it back to us. Here's verse 14, the crescendo verse 14. This is the verse 14 is the verse that Paul quotes in Romans 10, the passage we just looked at. Moses explodes. He goes, the word is near you. You don't have to go to heaven or go over the sea or go find out some mysterious insight. It's near you. The word, the ability to experience the power and the promise is near you. How near is it? He says in verse 14, it's in your mouth. It's as close as you saying it and activating your faith. Then your emotions are changed. Your circumstances are changed. The anointing of God increases on your life. I mean, progressively these things happen. He goes, it's so near to you. If you say it, the domino effect, the glorious domino effect takes place. That kingdom domino effect. You say it, your heart gets activated. You're in faith. Your faith is moving. Blessings start coming to you. Paul, uh, Moses says, why don't you say it? Just say the promises of God, say them to God and take your stand on them. And he goes, you'll be surprised. You'll actually over time, find out that they're within reach of you to walk in them. Now in this verse, 11, 12, and 13, Moses answers four common arguments that I'm assuming he's heard over 40 years because Deuteronomy 30, he's at the end of the 40 years of the wilderness and Moses, uh, he's at the very end of the 40 years. Israel's about to go into the promised land under Joshua's leadership. Moses hears his last message. He's giving his last sermon. He's been their leader 40 years. And he goes, now, as you go into the land, Moses is going to go to the Lord and he's not going to go into the land, but he goes, as you go into the land, remember the promises, remember the command to turn with all of your heart. Now, in that context, he goes, he addresses four common arguments that I'm assuming he's heard over 40 years. He says, number one, this command to love and obey God, this command to walk in the promises of God, this command to walk in the spirit. If you want to use new Testament terminology, it's not too mysterious. He goes, it's not so hard to understand. I mean, how many times do you hear somebody say, I don't know how to love God with all my heart. I don't know how to walk in the promises. I don't know how to walk in the spirit. Moses says the promise and the commands, which go together, they're simple. Actually they're simple. He goes, they're not as complex as you make them. He says, they're not too mysterious for you to understand them and walk in. If verse 14, you'll start speaking them because beloved, if you start speaking these promises, then the Holy spirit starts teaching you more about them. They connect in a deeper way by revelation in your heart. And the, the fog lifts over time, start speaking the word of faith, the confession of your mouth and the, and the fog of confusion, even about things like, how do you love God? How do you grow in prayer? How do you walk in the spirit? How do you walk in the promises of God? That fog will start lifting. If in verse 14, you simply start speaking with your mouth, the Holy spirit will be more active in your life. Well, the second, uh, common argument is they said it's too far off. The children of Israel said to Moses, you know, it's out of reach. It's outside of my ability. I can't walk in the love of God. I don't know how to do it. And Paul and Moses said, well, it's not too mysterious. If you'll engage in the process. Well, it's too hard. It's out of reach. And yes, it is out of reach by purely our human ability for sure. But in context to being in a covenant relationship with God in the grace of God, it's not out of reach. Every one of God's servants, the heroes of faith in Hebrews, Hebrews 11, or just the Hebrew. I mean the heroes of faith through history, they're all weakened, broken people. There are no super saints. James chapter five, verse 17, uh, James tells us Elijah was a man just like you. He had a temptation and a propensity to despair. He had a temptation to depression just like everyone else's. There are no super saints. It's not out of reach for anything. Everyone who walks in victory starts out broken and confused with fear, hampering them. So Moses said, don't say it's out of reach. It's not out of reach. Verse 14, you start speaking it. You know, there'll be a kingdom domino effect. You'll activate your faith. The spirit of God will start talking to you and leading you in a greater way in this. Again, that's new Testament language. Verse 12. Well, the third common argument is I got to go to heaven and have a heavenly experience. Cause you know, Moses went up on the mountain and saw God, uh, nearly face to face. He had these supernatural encounters. And so the children of Israel says, Hey, if we go on the mountain like you did, we won't have any problems. That's our anger will go away. Our bitterness will leave. Our lust will leave. If I can just have a heavenly experience, it's not a problem. Or if I don't have one, I want to meet, you know, a famous prophet who's gone to heaven, comes back. They lay hands on me, imparts the blessing, breaks the power of negativity. I no longer have depression. I don't have lust. I don't have problems. I don't have bitterness. The devil didn't attack me. I want someone who goes to heaven to come lay hands on me. Beloved every prophetic person. I know they're still struggling with lust and fear and depression going to heaven. Doesn't make that go away. That's not how it goes away. It goes away by activating the word of God in your life. And you don't have to have a new supernatural experience. Why? Because the man in heaven came to the earth or the person in heaven. It was before he was a man. Jesus became a man. He came to the earth. He died, paid the price. He ascended back into heaven with victory over death. He seated at the right hand of the father. He gave his authority to us. He put his spirit in us. He gave promises and said, I'll never leave you and forsake you. Beloved the man's in heaven right now. You don't have to go to heaven to activate the power and blessing of God in your life. Well, let's go to verse 13, the fourth common argument. It says, don't say it's beyond the sea. You know, let's go to some expert that lives on the other side of the world. You know what? One preacher said that an expert is anybody that lives a hundred miles from you. They're an expert. And that's not exactly how it works, but I think you could follow the joke. But or let's, it's like, let's go to the revival center on the other end of the, of the world. Go to that revival center. Then we will get some, and then our problems will go away. And people are traveling around the world to go get set free by the environment of another place. Now there's a blessing and going somewhere and learning and growing and impartation, but you don't get set free from dark emotions and the attack of the enemy by going to the revival center. And they lay hands on you. And then you come back. There's no problems because they still have problems in the revival center. The leaders of a do they're humans. That's not how it happens. Paul says verse 14, he says, you don't have to go to heaven. You don't have to go far away to get prayed for. It's not too confusing. It's not too mysterious. It's not out of reach. It's within the boundaries of grace of the covenant. He says in verse 14, the word is very near you. It's in your mouth and in your heart. And then in Romans chapter 10, he combines those two realities together. And he says, it is the word of faith. Let's look at page two. I'm just going to go about two more minutes, page two. I want to just bring you to most everything on page two. I've already said, I just like to leave you with the notes. Paragraph I at the bottom of page two. Our words are powerful. Our words create faith or they create fear. When the negative report comes, the dark emotion rises up. What we say with our mouth will lead us into faith or lead us into more defeat and more fear. And we don't, we got to be careful that we align with the word of God. The fight of faith is fought with words, not only with words, but the fight of faith is fought with words. Paul said, fight the fight of faith and beloved. There's a war of words. We have to agree with God's words. The words of our mouth need to line up with God's truth and not the words of our mouth line up with the devil's lies. Many believers have more belief in the devil's lies. They're under condemnation. They're hopeless. They'll never get set free. They'll never be any change. They'll never break through. Those are lies. They believe the lies of the devil more than they believe the word of God. We change our confession and we redirect our heart and we redirect what happens in our emotions, in our circumstances, et cetera. Let's look on the final paragraph, paragraph K. Now, I encourage you to get about five or 10 verses in the Bible that have your name on it. I mean, you use them all the time. And I have about five or 10 that when I hear the negative report or the dark emotions hit me, that I don't do them all the time, but many times I'll whisper those words to the Lord. And here in Philippians 4, I use these three verses all the time. And I urge you to engage with the Lord with these three or any of the many promises in the New Testament. Number one, when fear and anxiety attack us and we lie on our bed trying to go to sleep and fear and anxiety are attacking us, beloved, we can speak the promise. Philippians 4, 7, the peace of God will guard our minds and our hearts. The peace of God is your destiny. It's your inheritance. Say, Lord, your peace is made available by the indwelling spirit, the fruit of the spirit. He dwells in our spirit. Then he affects our emotions and he affects our thinking when we talk to him. But the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace. All the heavenly resource of peace dwells in the Holy Spirit who lives in you. I thank him for peace. I don't even ask him. I say, thank you for the promise of the peace of God. The bad report has just come. The anxiety, the fear is attacking. Lord, I thank you for peace. For you said, peace will guard my heart. Beloved, it will activate your faith if you stay with it. I don't mean if you do it for a moment once. You make that a rule of your life, that confession. It will impact the way you're, what you feel in your heart. Verse 13, daunting circumstances, overwhelming. I'm about to give up and give in. The Lord says, don't, don't make that the last word. Don't give up and give in. It is worth it. I've heard it many times. It's not worth it anymore. I can't take it. I'm burnt out. And the Lord says, that's not the final confession over you. You can do all things in the will of God for my strength is in you. Start speaking that you can do this in peace and victory. You really can't. Well, it's daunting. It's overwhelming. I know it is, but let's line up with the word of God. So when I don't like a circumstance, which happens all the time, I mean, the most simple, annoying circumstance or a real big crisis, I like to say in my heart, Lord, I can do everything. I mean, I can walk in peace in this. I can walk in victory. I can do the will of God. Even under this assault against me, I can do the will of God. Even if the leaders don't believe in me, people stand against me. My family turns on me. The finances go bad. Sickness is encroaching in my body and in my family. I can do the will of God. I can do all things in the will of God. That's the word over my life. Beloved, it'll change the tone of your heart entirely. Then when finances, again, I mentioned this already. You're in the will of God. Financial attack comes. We don't just lay down and accept it. There are demonic powers that are involved in devouring finance. Now, some people really abuse this doctrine and use it in a false way, but beloved, Jesus, the word of God says, He will supply all of your needs, all of your needs. This is the final word. So when I run into financial challenges, which I do all the time, leading the base and in my own life and in the lives of people I love, I go, no, it's, He will supply, I'm in the will of God. I'm doing my assignment for this season of my life and Lord, I believe you for supernatural supply. Amen and amen. Let's stand. Well, I'm going to stay on this theme quite a bit in the months ahead because I want us to grow in a culture of faith so that our hope and our love will abound. Our love and hope will not abound if we're stuck tripping in the faith department. So father, we come before you in the name of Jesus and Lord, I ask you, you would renew hearts. Even now, as we listen to you, Lord, I ask that everyone in the room that's endeavoring to grow in faith, that's endeavoring to grow in faith. I ask you that you would, you would encourage them. You would strengthen them in the name of Jesus. Now, some of you are, everyone in this room is struggling with fear, by the way, fear attacks, every human being on the earth. Someone goes, I'm struggling with fear. And I go, yeah, I know. Of course. How'd you know? Did God tell you? I said, no, you're human. Therefore you're struggling with a fear. The devil assaults every human being with some kinds of fear. But if you're being assaulted with a fear and you want prayer and I tell you, feeling afraid is not the same thing as living in bondage to fear. We can resist those fearful feelings and not be paralyzed by them. But if we speak the word of God over our hearts. So if you're struggling in fear, again, the whole body of the whole earth is at one level or the other, they're, they're being attacked by fear. I'll say it that way. But if you would like prayer for that, I want to invite you to come to these lines up here. If you would like prayer this morning for fear, you're saying, I just want somebody to stand with me. And again, everyone praying for you is, is being attacked by fear too. So just understand that because it's human. So come stand on these front lines. If you do that, then if you have sickness in your body, you would like prayer. Go ahead and come on forward too. And I encourage you to stand up front first so that the folks behind you coming behind you can be on the back line. Lord, I just take authority over the spirit of fear. Your word said that you didn't give us a spirit of fear. You gave us a sound mind because fears are always irrational. I mean, demonically inspired fears are irrational. They don't make any sense, but they make, but we feel them anyway, because the devil is assigned to torment us with fear to harass us. I take authority over the spirit of fear over everyone in this room is being attacked or harassed by any kind of fear whatsoever. In the name of Jesus, I cancel the assignment of the evil one against you. I cancel the assignment of darkness against you in the realm of fear. Lord, I ask you for healing. I ask you to release healing in bodies right now. I ask you to release your power. Now, I invite you all, many of you to come forward and pray for folks. And just every week when folks begin to come forward, just automatically begin to come up and pray for them. Lord, I believe you for healing. I rebuke cancer right now. I rebuke sickness, the flu that's going around. That's not our destiny to get the flu that's going around. There's always a flu going around in the name of Jesus. We say not in my home, not in my body. I rebuke that, that, uh, attack of the enemy in the name of Jesus. Lord, release your power, release your presence, release your authority even now.