Welcome to today's inspiration with Apostle Chris Williams and I'm prophetess Tammy Williams with Evil in Space Ministry. We are excited that you have invited us into your living room. We pray today that you have the ears to hear and a heart to receive what God has for you. This word today, it is written, is for you.
So we're going to open up in prayer if that's all right. Heavenly Father God, we come before you in this hour and we ask Father God that you would tenderize the hearts to receive what you would have for them today. That it not just become information, but that it becomes revelation. That it moves mountains out of their way, that it penetrates their spirit and it pushes them and equips them as they move forward in you, Father God.
We give you all the praise and we give you all the glory and we thank you, Father. Amen. Amen. Our text that I want to glean from today is found in Matthew chapter 4.
This chapter 4 is right after Jesus was baptized and then he was led into the wilderness. And scripture says, Jesus was led up by the spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. So I understand before I read any more and I know what I said before about reading the whole text, that doesn't work that way. When I read, I read and then I start preaching right off the bat.
But Jesus understands that Jesus was led into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And scripture says he is led by the spirit. So sometimes the struggle that you go through, the issues of life that you go through, sometimes you might be led there. It's not the Holy Spirit that is actually doing it.
It could be the enemy that's new. It is the enemy that's tempting you, but the spirit has led you there. And I've always used the type of analogy. When you go to the gym and you work out, you have to put the muscle under stress and it breaks down.
But then it builds up and when it builds up on the second time and the third time and the fourth time, the more weight that you lift, the stronger that muscle gets. And so what is actually happening when the spirit is leading Jesus into the wilderness, is leading him into the wilderness to be tempted. And that through that temptation, through the temptation that we go through in life, it actually builds us. It makes us stronger to be able to resist.
Sometimes you may not be able to resist this temptation, but if you resist this temptation over here that's a little bit easier to resist, you resist this enough times, then all of a sudden when the big one comes, you've built up enough resistance, enough faith in Jesus Christ, that when the big one comes, you're able to resist this one too. And I believe that that's what's going on right here, that the Holy Spirit has led Jesus into a wilderness to be tempted. And then it goes on to say, and when he had fasted 40 days and 40 nights, afterward he was hungry. And I tell you what, if you've ever been hungry, and I'm talking hungry, there's been some times me and my wife has been on a diet and I've gotten off of work and I've just been famished and hungry and I can go home and eat three meals right then and there.
So I understand and now here in the scripture, Jesus fasted 40 days and 40 nights. And now he is hungry, so you want to say something? My wife is chomping into me as God. And how many times, let's take this into the spirit and God's called you into a prayer and fasting.
And that's, you're always hungry. That first couple days, when you're fasting and you're seeking God and you're seeking answers, and I know there's many at the sound of my voice right now that God has called you into a prayer and fast. And then, lo and behold, that's when you're starving. You know, you're hungry.
That's when you've got to feed yourself this word, hence why it's called, it is written, is that's when you've got to press through, that's when you've got to push. Now watch what Jesus does right here. Amen. When he was hungry, then it says now, and verse 3 says, now when the tempter came, which is, that's the enemy, that's the devil, came to him.
He says, if you are the Son of God, command these stones become bread. If you are the Son of God, command these stones. First off, I want to explain to you that right. See, there's so many people that have, they don't even say, I know who I am.
I know what my parents gave me, the name Chris, my middle name's O'Dell, and my last name is Williams. I know that you can never take that away, but there's a spiritual side of me that, and everybody, everybody's made up of spirit, soul and body. And your spirit and man has an identity. Now who gives that identity to you?
Well that's Jesus Christ. That's the only place that your identity and spiritual in Jesus Christ. That's where it's at. And what Satan was doing, he says, if you are the Son of God, command these stones to become bread.
Now what he's doing is he is now putting in question Jesus' Christ identity. If you are, are you sure you're the Son of God? Are you sure you say who you say you are? Are you sure that you're a Christian?
Are you sure that you're a prophet of the Lord? Are you sure maybe that you're an apostle? Are you sure that you've been called to be a preacher? Are you sure that this is a job?
Are you sure you say who God is telling you? But you know what? I have come to realize that when the enemy comes to question your identity, if you engage in conversation, well I don't know, you've made a first mistake. We need to follow because our message today is, it is written.
What did Jesus, what was the response to the temptation that Satan brought to the table? Here's Jesus' response in Matthew 4. It says, it is written. When the enemy comes at you at any point in time, your first three words out of your mouth should be, it is written.
Now Jesus went on to say, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God, which I think is ironic how my wife picked up about fasting, and you become hungry. And then that's when Satan comes to tempt you with food, but scripture says, man shall not live by steak, by gree beans and potatoes, man shall not live by that natural food alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. And what is that? That is our scripture that we're reading.
That is spending prayer time and what he is speaking to you through your spirit, man. So Jesus right off the bat, when he is tempted, when his identity has been questioned, is his response to that, as he says, hey, scripture says, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. And if you want to know because that's what he's saying that right now, so when you talk about scripture, what exactly is that? What go look in Deuteronomy 8 and 3?
And you can do that in your leisure, because in Deuteronomy 8 and 3, that's what Jesus was quoting back. Deuteronomy 8 and 3. Go baby. I want to share with you all of the time.
I got saved. I'm 55 years old and I got saved in July of 1997. And not shortly after my salvation, and I was baptized in the Holy Ghost very quickly, I began to pursue God and I began to pursue. And I remember walking into a church at one night, and this little woman came up to me and said, you're going to prophesy to the nations, you're going to walk in a prophetic office, and you're going to evangelize the world.
And I had not been saved very long. I didn't even know what those words meant. The reason why I'm sharing this with you is how many times have you heard what God said about you? But as soon as I left that church that night, that service, the enemy said, you don't even know what that means.
That is not who you're called to. But as Jesus said in scripture, he knew who he was. He knew that the Father had sent him. He knew.
I had to remind Satan, wait a minute. Once I was able to wrap my head around who I was in Jesus Christ. You may be sitting there right now going, who am I? This is the time to pursue because the purpose you have, it is written that you will fulfill that if you are in pursuit of Jesus Christ.
As your Lord and Savior, as your guide, as your mentor, as that Holy Spirit will bring you from a place of not knowing who you are to who you are. But you will be tempted by the enemy trying to rob you of your identity because once you know who you are, the enemy is not going to let up on you. I want to tell you, he does not let up. You see, he's already got the world.
He's already got the world. So he's leaving them alone. And I believe right now that there is somebody there right now that's watching me right now that is saying, I feel like I've been beaten up so bad and I don't even know who I am anymore. That's when you drop to your knees and you call upon his name and say, Lord God, remind me.
You know, when Jesus went to sit at the right hand of the Father and he gave us the Holy Spirit, that Holy Spirit is so amazing because that Holy Spirit wooed you. That Holy Spirit corrects you. That Holy Spirit can convince you. That Holy Spirit reminds you continuously of who God says you are.
You see, we're all uniquely different. We all have our own fingerprint. My fingerprint is nothing like your fingerprint. Amen.
So I get to say, I am the daughter of the king. I am a prophetess. I am a TV evangelist. I am who God says I am.
And Satan cannot take that unless. Now, hear me on this. Hear me. When that enemy puts something in your ear to contradict who you are in God, don't park there.
That's what I always say to people that I mentor. Don't park there. Resist him. Scripture says resist him and he has to flee.
As you can see here in the story of Jesus. He continually reminds Satan. It is written. You see, Satan or Jesus did never at one time forget who he was.
Amen. Never. No matter what the enemy threw at him, he never was moved. He never, you know, when we become when we become Christ like and we become saved and we're built on a solid foundation.
The more communing with the Holy Spirit, I love Catherine Coleman. And she said in one of her, I was watching her YouTube videos. And she said, when you fall in love with the Holy Spirit, you can never be led astray because you're on a solid foundation. There are those of you right now that are really doubting who you are.
I implore you. I implore you to get into a pursuit, get into communion with the Holy Spirit. Let's hear the rest of this story of what Jesus and how he resisted the enemy and how he fled. Amen.
Amen. Of course, now, that's one of the first things that I want to encourage you is to first find your identity in Jesus Christ. Jesus knew his identity. If you don't know your identity yet or you're struggling with your identity and Jesus Christ, then I would encourage you to find that first.
Make sure you know who you are in Christ before moving forward because verse 5 is actually Jesus. He can do this because he knows his identity. He knows who he is. But if you don't know who you are, then excuse me.
If you don't know who you are, then I would actually encourage you to stay away from verse 5. Now, let's look at that. Verse 5, actually verse 5, it says, then the devil took him up into the Holy City, sent him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, see verse 5, first of all, let's look at that real quick. The devil took Jesus up to the Holy City and sent him on a pinnacle.
So here we see that Satan is leading Jesus to a certain place and to a certain point. Jesus can be led there for the simple reason is Jesus knows who he is. His identity is intact. But if you don't know your identity, I encourage you not to follow the enemy.
If you know he is the enemy, stay away from him. Don't engage in conversation with him. Only when you know who you are in Christ Jesus and you know as you know who you are, then and only then would I say, okay, follow the words of Jesus. But going on it says, Satan says, if you are the Son of God, throw yourself down for it is written.
Oh, wait a minute. Now we see something that Satan is doing because if you look at what he is saying, now he's going to quote the Bible back to Jesus. He's going to say something and he says, if you are the Son of God, throw yourself down for it is written. He shall give his angels charge over you and in their hands they shall bear you up lest you dash your foot against the stone.
So understand that now Satan, just like he done in the Garden of Eden, he took scripture. He took God's word and now twists it. And that's a lot of times what Satan always presents to you. He tries to twist and get you to justify something that's within you, something that God is trying to move you out of, but he is trying to justify it.
But here is the response that Jesus said. Now let me explain to you that in Psalms 91, 11, and 12 is where that scripture comes from about he shall give his angels charge over you and in their hands they shall bear you up lest you dash. That's found in Psalms. So Satan knows scripture backwards and forwards just like we do.
So you have to know what scripture says otherwise Satan will try to twist it and conform it to what he is wanting you. I got to stop you right there for a second just for a second. This is what he's talking about as far as do not engage the enemy. When you start hearing things contrary to God's word, then that's when you've got to start resisting him.
If you don't know what the word says about you, then it's time to get out your word. Shake that desk off that Bible because this is your sword. This is your authority. This is where all power and authority comes from.
So if you don't know this, you're going to find yourself in a place to where the enemy is twisting everything up like he tried to do. He's going to cause you confusion. He's going to cause you. He can even bring you into a place of isolation because when we're in a place of confusion and isolation, we tend to forget who we are.
Amen. We lose our peace. We lose our joy. We lose love.
Then we think, oh, he's forsaken me. Well, the enemy's right and you're parking there. So when he said don't engage in the enemy, you have to be a good steward with your spirit life that you can continue to grow in spirit and not in flesh. My husband has a great message about spirit and flesh.
We're going to have to bring that one sometime. Go ahead, baby. Well, when Satan led him up there and quoted scripture to him and twisted him, Jesus' response was, you shall not tempt the Lord your God. And a lot of times people forget that.
They try to distort and twist the word of God to justify their sin and their life. And what they're actually doing, if they're not careful, is they're tempting God. They're tempting God with their own faith, with their own salvation, with their own walk. And you shouldn't do that.
And scripture says, it is written again, you shall not tempt the Lord your God. So when Satan comes at you, no matter what he comes at you with, always go back to scripture. And if that's how you battle, then do it just how Jesus does. Jesus basically dealt with Satan by scripture.
He says, it is written. Man shall not live by bread alone, by every word out of the mouth of God. You shall not tempt the Lord thy God. And that you shall not tempt the Lord thy God, actually comes from Deuteronomy 6 and 16.
So write that down and go back and read that if you don't believe me. Moving on in verse 8, it says again, the devil took him, Jesus, up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. Now can you imagine that at that moment, Satan was presenting all the kingdoms of this world and all their glory, and he said to him, all these things I will give you if you will fall down and worship me. First off, the mistake that Satan made is he doesn't own any of this.
It's already owned by Jesus Christ himself. He's the one that made it. He's the one that put it together, built it, organized it. He done all of that.
So all of it belongs to God himself. It doesn't belong to Satan. So Satan is trying to twist it again and say, hey, if you worship me, I'll give you this, but he has nothing to give. Jesus said in his response, away with you Satan.
Yes, come on. For it is written, you shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve. Now understand, that's exactly what Jesus and going back to where that scripture is coming from, Deuteronomy 6, 13. And so if you notice that all the scriptures that Jesus used, it is written, it is written, all three times, we're all found in the Book of Deuteronomy.
There are sometimes, and I know that we live in the New Testament in the New Covenant, but understand that we take the Old Testament, that there are so much food in the Old Testament that we can use, utilize in today's society. Understand that this is a wilderness that we're in, and we're here just the same as the children of Israel was in their wilderness. What did Jesus say to Moses when he says, hey, go tell Fayro to let my people go, and he told him this, and I think it was in Exodus chapter 7 somewhere. I can't remember, you can Google it and find it, I'm sure.
But he says, tell him to let my people go so that they can serve me in the wilderness. So understand that our job today is to serve God, but this is the wilderness. Our promise land is over on the other side. Our promise land is in heaven.
This is the wilderness. So understand that Jesus, in all his temptations, dealt with, he combated Satan with scripture. He used scripture against him. That is the only way that you want to fight against Satan.
Matthew 4 and 11 says, then the devil left, and behold, angels came and ministered to him. So at that moment when Satan left, then all of a sudden the angels showed up and ministered to him. What was that ministry? Well, it was encouraging.
It was building up. It was everything that we have spoke about before and others, sermons and everything about encouraging and building up. So that's what the angels were doing. So in this written message, maybe you found yourself confused.
Maybe you are dealing with confusion in your mind. I encourage you in your state of confusion, go look in 2 Timothy 1, 7. It says in 2 Timothy 1, 7, for God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. So maybe you are feeling a little confused today, but I encourage you to go to scripture.
Find every scripture that talks about a sound mind, a mind of Christ. Wash your mind with the word, because only Satan tries to confuse you, but God is trying to give you a sound mind. I'm going to do the next song. Oh, my wife is chomping at a bit.
And I know that we're in an hour right now that many of you are facing depression and oppression. Scripture says in 1 Peter 5, 7, cast all your care upon him for he cares for you. Saints of God, he wants to be welcomed into every box in your house. He wants to be welcomed into every situation.
And you may be feeling that depression. You may be feeling oppressed right now. Cast your cares upon him. Say, Lord God, here I am.
I'm sad and I'm depressed and I don't see breakthrough. He says, give it to me. I'll carry that burden. I will lift that off your shoulders.
All you got to do is ask him. All you have to do is invite him in. Sometimes that's hard for us to say, come in. I need you.
I want you. I can't fix this anymore. I often say to a lot of people when they say, well, I don't know how to do that. Or I've done this and I've done this and I've done this and I've done this.
And my question is to those that I counsel, how's that working out for you? Cast your care upon the Lord. You know, she mentioned oppression. She had coupled depression and oppression together.
Oppression in Psalms 9 9 says, the Lord also, and I've spoken this before, will be a refuge for the oppressed. A refuge in times of trouble. Luke 4 18 says, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointing me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recover sight to the blind and to set liberty to those who are oppressed.
So if you're feeling oppressed, God will set you free. I say, let's go ahead and pray. We thank you all for joining us today. I have so much more.
I just don't have the time to do it. So we're going to just close this out. We thank you. Go ahead.
Lead us out in prayer. We pray today for you. Heavenly Father God, we thank you for those that have joined us today. We give you all the praise, God.
Welcome, God bless you. Until next time, be encouraged. Trust Him. Amen.
I appreciate you all watching our show this evening. If there's anything, anything whatsoever that you have heard that has spoken to your heart and you feel the need to either rededicate your life or turn your life over to Jesus, I encourage you to reach out to us. We would be more than happy to speak with you either on the phone or via email or however you can reach out to us. And it's easy.
We can say a prayer for you. Jesus says to Nicodemus that you must be born again to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. So I encourage you to turn your life over. If you need to rededicate, that is also to turn your life back to.
Repentance is simply turning from the direction that you were going to a new direction. You're no longer the old person that you are. You become a new person through the gift of salvation. So I encourage you to reach out to us at Eaglewingsfaith.org.
You can click on the tab, Contact Us, and you can put it through the website or you can email us right at ewfmchurch at gmail.com. And we look forward to hearing from you. God bless you and we will see you later.