Impossible Is Nothing

A week or two ago, I was heavily mentally interested in North Korea. (aka- it was on my mind a lot). I wasn't reading news about DPRK or necessarily even praying about it. It was just on my mind and I kept thinking about it so I decided I should stop and listen as to what I was thinking about. 

So I looked up a song I knew about called "Finish What You Started" by Sean Feucht and watched the story behind it which was probably more impactful. In the story behind Sean describes how the average life expectancy in DPRK once you become a Christian is 2 weeks. Yet I know "to the increase of His government there will be no end." (Isaiah 9:7) so it has to be up from here... don't know how but it has to be up. I began thinking about the hindrances in DPRK - but then I thought about the stories I've heard out of there. Of people meeting Jesus in dreams, of angels singing and leading them in, of people encountering the Holy Spirit and changing their life. I read a story in this book I have that talks about the entire idol worshiping country being changed around and becoming Christian in a 15-30 min time period (Daniel 3). I was overwhelmed with the fact that anything is possible with God. And if anything is possible, we should ask for impossible things. So I asked to see a North Korean at church that morning. I actually saw a ton of Asians at church that morning but either didn't get to talk to them or chickened out when I did get the chance. I'm still looking, maybe today. 

I looked up this idea "nothing is impossible" in the Bible because I wanted to make sure I didn't confuse my ideas, mixed with Adidas, and the Bible together. Here's that I found:

"For nothing is impossible with God." Gabriel speaking to Mary just after he explained she and her old cousin are both going to be/are pregnant. - Luke 1:37 

"With man this is impossible, but with God, all things are possible." Jesus talking to his disciples right after he explained that even rich men with all their money can't get into heaven. It'd be easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle. So they freak out and ask how anyone could get into heaven? Is it possible? -Luke 18:27, Matt 19:26, Mark 10:27

There's many other options as well like throwing the mountain into the ocean (Matt 21:21/Mark 11:23), or cursing a tree and it dying (Mark 11:12-25), or making a donkey talk (Numbers 22:28), or an sea moving out of your way (Exodus 14), or being transported over a hundred miles away (Acts 8:39), or undoing that physical death thing (1 Kings 17:17-22; 2 Kings 4:32-35; 2 Kings 13:20-21; Matt. 27:50-53; Luke 24:5-6; Luke 7:11-15; Luke 8:41-55; John 11:1-44; Acts 9:36-41; Acts 20:9-10) and you get the picture.

But this is the capstone, my favorite: "All things are possible for one who believes." Jesus replies to the man who asked if He could cast out the demon from his child that the disciples couldn't do. But He just says it...all things are possible. ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE. So nothing is impossible anymore. Nothing is impossible. Nothing is impossible. Nothing is impossible. Nothing is impossible. No matter what country, region, situation, heritage, complexion, navigation or standard I see - Nothing is Impossible.

I got a surge of creativity one day so I sat down and started trying to hash out which way it was going and this is what came out. "Nothing Is Impossible" to be proclaimed first in every nations own language because it's for them to know. God is for them and speaks their language, knows their heritage and their culture and is involved in it. Then the translation for all of us Americans. In the background is a phrase I felt like God was saying or wanting to declare over the nation as I was making it.  

So that's where this came from:

Mark 9:23 - North Korea - His heart. 

DPRK - North Korea

Japan

Oman

United States of America

India

Russia

Macedonia

China

Norway

Israel

The Real Inmate

Satan is the biggest inmate of Hell that tries to convince everyone he's the warden. Truth is the Warden set me free.


Many times in church, I've found that our life BC (before Christ) as our testimony and say we're free from that. But due to our lack of honesty and realness, we claim all freedom as "salvation" rather than admitting we got free from many things after salvation. We say "He set me free, when I met Jesus all my chains fell off." This is true theologically. When you became a Christian you died to sin and it no longer has any grip on you (Romans 6:22). Sometimes though we still deal with parts of our life we don't realize we have victory over. I struggled with masturbation off and on for 12 years of my life. It was 7 years in before anyone ever talked about it so I knew I wasn't alone. Then once people talked about it, I heard lots of bad teaching from people telling me "I would struggle with it the rest of my life" or that "it was normal for all guys to deal with it and that's just part of being a guy." Well, I would agree that most guys are hit with this same temptation of lust, porn, and masturbation, but that doesn't mean we have to put up with it or let it linger. Girls may get hit with self-image issues or eating disorders but that doesn't mean it's going to be like that forever. That's believing a lie about the freedom we have and making small the power of Christ.  It's been close to two years of freedom, but I still would hear lies that it wasn't real freedom but like I had snuck out. That I wasn't set free, but I had kind of gotten my own freedom and was ready to be busted and put back in at anytime. That I would slide back in to the addiction at anytime and be neck deep again. 

Sometimes we rush to make sense out of life events and create theology to support it. We say addictions are broken but be careful, your spirit is willing but your flesh is weak. According to Col 3:3, I've already died so that doesn't work anymore. We believe the lie that the power of the addiction and our hold habits are stronger than the power of the cross and what Jesus did. No doubt that beliefs are powerful and for too long we've been believing that addictions are things we need to watch our whole life rather than things we're already free of and just have to realize that. (I can go into more reasons why we deal with addictions, possible reasons for addictions, and how to get free/walk in that freedom another time, but this is the big principle we need to understand is that we are free.)

Satan is the liar. He's the one who tries to convince us that he has power over us and our addictions that he can make us stumble at any point (not true Jude 1:24) then lock us up and torture us with guilt and shame afterwards and punishment in the form of distance from God and His love (not true Rom 8:35). So this bring us to our analogy and to the truth:

Satan is the biggest inmate of Hell that tries to convince everyone he's the warden. Truth is the Warden set me free. 

He didn't give me parole papers. Because parole means your punishment isn't complete- we don't fully trust you. He gave me freedom papers because my punishment has been fully paid for and I switched places with a good man outside. He doesn't say "how much freedom you have is up to you." He says, "You're free. You have all freedom." (John 8:36) But the enemy pretends you've escaped from prison. He tries to convince you that you're only out for a short time, but one little slip up and you're back in bondage again to your addiction, to your sin, to that lifestyle. But the truth is the only lock-down he has me in is lock-down of the mind, but I have the key. I realize just because he's been in the prison the longest doesn't mean he has seniority or power- it just means he's the one prison was created for and he's the one who will suffer the most.

I've got freedom papers. I've got keys to every cell. I've got visitation rights without the fear of being thrown in again. In fact, the cell doors are open- but most prisoners can't see the doorway out. It's still lock-down of the mind that inmate #0001 tries to keep them in so he's not alone with his people. He threatens me with that I'll be thrown back in a cell, that I'm just on parole and can slip up and be addicted again, locked up again at any moment. 

But I have freedom papers. I have papers that say I'm bound by nothing.  There's no addiction that's going to pull me back, there's no lifestyle that will pull me back, there's no nature that will pull me back.  I'm free. Completely free. I can walk into the police station, walk into the prison, into brothels or gyms or buffets or look in the mirror. I am free and have complete freedom. No fear of being locked up, no fear of being chained again, no fear of proclaiming my freedom because it's not true. The only lockdown is the lockdown of the mind, and I chose to unlock it and walk in freedom because that's the power of my Jesus. It's already been taken care of and I don't have to deal with this. I have become as moral and as clean as the One they based the laws off of. I can go anywhere or do anything. I am free and only the the one who is not tries to convince me otherwise.