Faith and Imagination

[Speaker 1] Church and fellowships cannot be more spiritual than the individuals and families that constitute them. God greatly desires a godly home for him. These are words of restoration and instruction in righteousness from Family Tent Ministry. May you be blessed as you listen. [Speaker 2] The God who manifested himself in Jesus Christ, and that God is our Father. So if that God is our Father, if my Father is running the future and determining the future, is there anything about the future I'm to be afraid about? I can be sure that my interest will be protected. I can be sure. And what makes me to be very sure, which is the only thing I want to add to that word today before I move on quickly into our focus for today: Faith and Imagination. Is that Jesus was saying something. Jesus said, "If you, being evil..." go and check all these—we are saying that our leaders are bad, political officeholders they are wicked, they are senseless, all kinds of things. Particularly when people began to see that the palliatives meant for the general public that was supposed to be shared between April and May during the lockdown were locked up somewhere. And somebody was saying that actually, he was planning to share it during his birthday. And all kinds of uproar have gone up because people felt, "Ah, these people are wicked. These people are wicked. So this is what you should have shared to people." What I'm trying to say is if you go and check these people that are evil, the interest of their children is protected in the midst of their wickedness. They will have positioned their own children, positioned them here and there. Maybe their children are even going there to take at will during the lockdown, we don't know. I'm only saying that we don't really know. We don't know. But what I'm trying to say is you can be sure that the interest of their children is something they would have protected in the midst of all of that. So God is saying that if men, being evil, know how to do good things to their children, how much more will God give his Spirit? Now, the import of that statement that I'm bringing to you this evening is that the Spirit of God is God himself. That is, if God will give himself to us because we are his children, then is there anything about our interest that he will not protect? That is the word of assurance I'm using to conclude that series. That the Lord said always remember that if evil men do good things to their children, then you can be sure that God, who only can be described as good, God in whom there is light, in whom is light and there is no darkness at all, you can be sure that interest is secured and protected. Let us be at rest. Somebody was saying in the course of the last week when all those protests and many things were going on, "Hey, what is going to happen now? We don't know what the future holds." But I know that my interest is already secured because that future is ordained, it is predetermined by my Father. So let's be at peace. Let's be at rest. Today we are looking at the topic: Faith and Imagination. And the direction we are planning to go this evening for us as disciples of the Lord, for us as followers of Jesus, for us as children of God, the direction we want to go with this topic is that you cannot separate imagination from faith. You will begin to see that when we begin to look into the word of God, anytime God wants to strengthen the faith of a man, what God does is to change his imagination. Anytime God want to assist your faith, anytime God want to produce faith in you, what God does is that God begins to change the way you think and the way you imagine. But before we do that, go into that very well, I want you to see a relationship in something. If you look at—let's first try and do a little definition about faith and imagination. Of course, when you look at—I took a biblical definition for faith. The dictionary simply said a strong belief, but the biblical definition says, "Faith, in Hebrews 11:1, is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." Now, for imagination, I decided that we should look at some grammar representations of this word, imagination, before we begin to go into the spirituality of it. Now, imagination, if you look at it, is like a combination of two words: image and nation. It seems to be a combination of two words, although not exactly. Now, imagination, the root word is image. From image, you imagine, then in imagine, you have imagination. Now, if you look at image, the dictionary says that an image, there are several definitions, but I took this one that is more related to what we want to discuss. The dictionary says "an optical or other representation of a real object, a graphic picture of something." For example, somebody can draw something that looks exactly like our brother Ayo, exactly like him. So that when you see it, "Ah, this person tried oh! This is Bro Ayo!" When you are saying that, you are not talking about the real person. There is something representing, that is an exact representation. Another word for image is "a mental picture of something, not real or not present." You know you can be here now and you can begin to create a mental picture of something. You can stand like this and then you are looking at a ripe pawpaw. How you will pluck the pawpaw, take your knife, slice it, remove the back, begin to eat. And as you are doing that, you may start feeling hungry. Am I correct? Am I correct? The thing is not real, but you are creating a mental picture. And it can be very negative. What people do in fantasy when they fantasize, they create a picture and they are locked inside their fantasy. So a mental picture of something. And sometimes it can even affect you physically, even though the thing is not real. I remember one of my—in the days of our undergraduate, we went to visit a sister. So myself and some of the other brethren, we were seated. Sister was trying to prepare something for us that came to greet her. So she was at the pot, she was doing something. Suddenly she just jumped from the pot, "Jesus! Jesus! Jesus!" We just ran to her, "Sister, what is it? What happened?" She just sat down. She sat down on one of the seats. "Sister, what happened? The way you shouted, you were afraid." She just said, "Don't mind me. Don't mind me." "But Sister, what happened?" She said what happened was that she watched one film like that, that in that film, a woman was trying to cook a particular fish. Suddenly the fish spoke to her and said, "Don't cook me!" And then so she said as she was trying to turn the fish, I don't know what happened, that it just looks as if the fish she was cooking want to behave like that fish. So that was why. But that's the power of imagination. You must have created the imagination of what happened in the drama that you watched or something. But that was what happened. She created a mental picture of that thing. And that is why I tell people one strong gate to your life is what you set your eyes upon. The things you watch is a gate to your life. The things you set your eyes to watch, we need to be careful about some of those things. Now, that's image. Then from image, you now imagine. Imaging, imagine. You get it? To imagine or imagining or imagined, which is the past tense and past participle, it says "is to form a mental image of something or envision or create something in one's mind." So it means from image, which is the root word, imagine is when you now create something in your mind. So there is creation. In imagination, you are creating. You are creating. Creating is so important because don't forget that actually, in the real sense of it, what God made us in Christ, if you want to look at it very well, is gods. That is why we say when you say, "Oba awon oba, Oluwa awon oluwa, Olorun awon olorun." There are some other gods, not those useless ones they call Ogun, Sango. Those are nonentities. I'm talking of us, the Lord of lords, the God of gods, the King of kings. So in a way, in our walk with God, actually what God want to use us to do, because he created man to take charge for him, is for man to be creating under the dictates, under the influence and the power of God. You understand it? You create. You bring to pass. You establish counsel. You will say, "Ah, what do I really mean?" You will notice that Jesus said when you pray in the Lord's Prayer, two key things: "Thy kingdom come, then thy will be done on earth." So we are to create his kingdom. When I say his kingdom, I'm talking of, for example, when you bring salvation to somebody's life, you are creating God's kingdom. You are bringing that kingdom. When righteousness and holiness is established in a family, what are you doing? You are bringing God's kingdom. You are creating. You are bringing to pass. Things were null and void, then God spoke and then life began to come. In the same way, a life may be dead in sin, a life may be wasting away in ungodliness. And then you speak the word of God and what happens? There is a turnaround in that life. And then good and mighty things begin to come out of that life. I'm going somewhere with this issue of imagination. That you notice that in imagination, you are creating. You are creating. You are creating something in the mind. I'm pressing this word "mind" particularly because actually you will see that in Romans 12:1-2, it says, "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind." So the renewal that God wants in our life is a thing that is created where first? In our mind. By imagining. By imagining. Imagining. And then when you now take imagination, imagination says "the image-making power of the mind." The image-making power of the mind! The mind can create image. The image-making power of the mind, the act of creating and reproducing ideally an object not previously perceived, the ability to create such image. That is imagination. We are looking at faith and imagination. And the first thing I want to after those definitions, the first two things I want to point our attention to is in Ephesians 3:20 and then 2 Corinthians 10:3-4. Please, let's look at those two scriptures for our background discussion. Faith and imagination. Ephesians 3:20. [Speaker 3] Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us. [Speaker 2] Now unto him. Who is that him? Now, can we have another translation that says is able to do above what we think and imagine? Who has that translation? That word "think", another translation used as "imagine". Okay, maybe I should pick it from here. [Speaker 4] Ephesians 3:20, New Living Translation: "Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think." [Speaker 2] "More than we can ask or think." Now, let me take some other translations here just trying to establish that word "think", that imagination working something around it. Now, look at it. It says, "Now to him," Amplified, "to him who by in consequence of the action of his power that is at work within us is able to carry out his purpose and to superabundantly far over and above all that we dare to ask or think, infinitely beyond our highest prayer, desire, thought, hopes, and dreams." What I'm trying to make you see is that when God, the power of God that is at work in us, is working not only on what we ask, it is also working on what we imagine, what we think. You'll be saying, "Ah, how is this so?" I'll just illustrate this. Do you remember the story of Jesus Christ when he went to visit a Pharisee? And then a woman who was a prostitute came and Jesus accepted the woman and was attending to her, delivered her. Then the Pharisee said in his heart, he said, "If this man," he called Jesus "this man", "if this man knows that this woman is a prostitute, he won't be relating with him like this." He didn't speak to Jesus. But when Jesus want to respond, Jesus called him, said, "Simon." He now said, "Yes, Lord." Mind you, in his mind, what did he call him? "This man." Now when Jesus called him, he said, "Simon." He said, "Yes, Lord. If two people sinned and then one is forgiven more than the other, who will appreciate more?" He said the one that is forgiven more. He said, "This woman..." Jesus was responding to his thought. I will show you another scripture in Psalm. The Bible says, "A fool says in his heart, there is no God." How did God know that he was saying that in his heart? He was imagining in his heart, "No God, there is no God." A fool says in his heart. It has not come to his lips, but he's saying where? In his heart. You get it? You notice that when God was speaking to—when David was speaking to Solomon when he was about to hand over to him, what did he tell him? He said, "Solomon, serve God with a willing heart and a ready mind, for God understands the imagination of your thought." Even the imagination of your thought, God understands. He said, "If you serve him, he will be found of you, but if you reject him, he will reject you." He said to Solomon that even in your thought, God understands the imaginations of your thought. What I'm saying is this: God's response to your life is a response to both what you speak and think. God's response to your life is a response, is a response to both what you say, our asking, and our imagination. Don't forget our topic: Faith and Imagination. Because I'm going to show you, I'll soon go to—these are just background discussion. I'm still coming into biblical example. You will see how God begin to deal with men on this matter of imagination and faith. And you will see what Jesus actually calls faith. You'll be surprised to see what Jesus called faith in some passages of the Bible. So that you can appreciate that if there's something you must work on in your life, you must do everything about your imagination, the mental image you create about your life, about God, about your walk with God. That image, that image, that image. Imagination is so crucial to our life. The imagination is also the dream nation. That's why you note that in some things, when people begin to have some kinds of dreams, some kinds of mysterious dreams around them, they begin to see it in their physical lives. If you look at what Solomon said, he said, "Dream also come out of multitude of thought." Even the dream when you sleep and you are dreaming, dream can be a product of multitude of thought. Now, so we are looking at our faith and this matter of our imagination. Now, another scripture I want you to see is that 2 Corinthians chapter 10. It's a very popular scripture, we are very familiar with that scripture. Chapter 10, we'll take our reading from verse 3 where he was talking about, "Though we walk in the flesh," it's a very familiar scripture. [Speaker 3] "For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds." [Speaker 2] Rather, they are mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds. What are these strongholds? [Speaker 3] "Casting down imaginations." [Speaker 2] Now, are you seeing something? That strongholds can be what? We are casting down imaginations. [Speaker 3] "And every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ." [Speaker 2] I don't know whether you are getting something. Are you seeing that in the spirit realm, when we are—when you say you are taking war in the spirit realm, what you are dealing with in the spirit realm are what? Imaginations. You may be saying, "Ah, how is this so? Why is it like that?" Brethren, if you go to Psalm 2, he says, "Why did the nation rage and the people imagine a vain thing?" Do you see that God war with the nation is at the level of where? Imagination. It is not when they begin to speak that the nations are at war with God. It's not when you begin to act that you are speaking to God. You are speaking to God from the point of where? When you begin to imagine. He says, "Why did the heathen, why did they rage? Why did they imagine a vain thing against the Lord?" So God began to deal with the matter of the nation not from the point when they began to speak. As they were forming the imagination, as they were forming the nation, they were forming the nation and they were forming the image, they were forming the image. They were imagining it. Yes, we'll bring down God. We'll do this. We'll do that. We'll do that. We'll do that. You'll say, "Ah, is this really true about just the psalmist?" No. Let's also go to Genesis 11. Look at Genesis 11. Just trying to establish some background before we go into the main thing. Look at Genesis 11. Are you in Genesis 11? I want you to know something. I read from here. I'm reading from the New King James. "Now the whole earth had one language and one speech. And it came to pass as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and they dwelt there. Then they said to one another, 'Come, let us make bricks and bake them thoroughly.' They had brick for stone, and they had asphalt for mortar. And they said, 'Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower whose top is in the heaven. Let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.'" Verse 5: "But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built. And the Lord said, 'Indeed, the people are one, and they have one language, and this is what they began to do. Now, nothing that they...'" What are you seeing there? "Nothing that they imagine to do will be withheld from them." Where is God dealing with the matter from? Imagination. I'm trying to make you see a very important thing about your imagination. Now, I want somebody to read that 2 Corinthians 10 in another translation for us. Another translation for us. Okay, somebody's giving us NLT there. Another translation to us. I want to read The Message, but I want to read it last. Let's have NLT, 2 Corinthians chapter 10, verse 3 and 4. Are you set? [Speaker 4] "We are human, but we don't wage war as humans do. We use God's mighty weapons, not worldly weapons, to knock down the strongholds of human reasoning and to destroy false arguments." [Speaker 2] To knock down the strongholds of human reasoning and to destroy false acts. [Speaker 4] "We destroy every proud obstacle that keeps people from knowing God. We capture their rebellious thoughts and teach them to obey Christ." [Speaker 2] Are you seeing something there? What keeps people from obeying God? Reasoning. Reasoning. So I want to ask you, the thing that keeps people not to obey God, where is it? In the imagination. It's in the imagination. It is not in what they say, it's in the imagination. There is something, until you scatter that image—that is why if you look at the Old Testament, anytime they want to be a—you know, a revolution of godliness, God want to visit Israel, a king will arise that will destroy all the carved images. He will destroy the images, he will destroy those things, those idols. He will destroy them. Those carved images are the images now inside people. When the Holy Ghost want to deal with you, when God want to change you, what God begin to deal with is what? The image. The carved images. That images now, they are your reasoning, your thought, your way of thinking, ideas, ideology, principle, philosophy to life. Those are the images now. That is the imagination. So I'm trying to make you see this thing clearly. What keep people from obeying God are reasoning. Now, that tells you—I will soon link it to something. But let us take the NLT translation. Let's have NLT translation, please. [Speaker 3] "We are human, but we don't wage war as humans do. We use God's mighty weapons, not worldly weapons, to knock down the strongholds of human reasoning and to destroy false arguments. We destroy every proud obstacle that keeps people from knowing God. We capture their rebellious thoughts and teach them to obey Christ." [Speaker 2] Are you seeing something there? So in the spirit realm, when we are praying, "Oh Lord, oh Lord, give us that brother. We capture Nigeria. We come against Nigeria." What will the Holy Ghost be dealing with? The imagination. The imagination. That is why if you have not captured the imagination in prayer, evangelism, going to speak is useless. I'm showing you the link between prayers and evangelism. You'll be preaching, because you have not knocked down—there is an imagination. You won't see that one. It's in the imagination, the nation. But when you get there and you have done your proper work in the place of prayer, then as you are speaking, the person will be heeding to you. The person will be listening to you, will be giving hit to what you are saying because images had been what? Cast down. You have cast down images. What I'm trying to make you see is that there is a strong relationship between the workings of God and the imaginations of men. Can you see it from all that we have read? That there is a strong relationship between the workings of God, the way God works, and the imaginations of men. For the unbeliever, what God want to capture to make them obey him, what God want to capture, what God want to deal with is their thought and their imagination. So that if God has been able to capture that, he has been able to properly deal with that and capture that in people, then God is able to bring them to the point of obeying him. I hope you get the point I'm making. You get that very clear. Okay. Now, let's now see, let's now see some important biblical—in fact, before we do, let me read that same scripture to you in The Message. I like—I said I want to read it in The Message. It says, "The world is unprincipled. It is dog eat dog out there. The world doesn't fight fair, but we don't live or fight our battles that way. Never have and never will. The tools of our trade aren't for marketing or manipulation, but they are for demolishing the entire massive corrupt culture. We use our powerful God's tools for smashing warped philosophies, tearing down barriers erected against the truth of God, fitting every loose thought and emotion and impulse into the structure of life shaped by Christ." Are you see it? Loose thought, as you are imagining anyhow, loose thought, loose thinking. We fix it into the one structured by Christ. What I'm trying to make you see is that there is so much about what you call the move of the Holy Spirit and the imaginations of both godly men and of godly men because God deals with the imagination. Now, let's look at how God relates to our fathers. I have about—how many of them here? I trust that we'll be able to look at all of them today possibly. I have six instances here. And I'm beginning with God and Abraham. Then we'll come to the New Testament. We want to look at God and Abraham and this matter of faith and imagination. Let's look at Genesis 13. Let's go to Genesis chapter 13. Genesis chapter 13. I will read from verse 5. "Lot also who went with Abraham had flocks and eggs and tents. Now the land was not able to support them that they might dwell together, for their possession were so great that they could not dwell together. And there was strife between the herdsmen of Abraham livestock and the herdsmen of Lot livestock. The Canaanites and the Perizzites then dwell in the land. So Abraham said to Lot, 'Please let there be no strife between you and me and between my herdsmen and your herdsmen, for we are brethren. Is not the whole land before you? Please separate from me. If you take the left, then I will go to the right. Or if you go to the right, then I will go to the left.' And Lot lifted up his eyes and saw all the plains of Jordan that it was well watered everywhere before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt as you go up to Zoar." Then what did Lot do? The Bible says, "Then Lot chose for himself all, not some, all the plain of Jordan and Lot journey east and they separated from each other." Please, what have Lot done? He took all the best part of the land and left what for Abraham? The part that was not well-watered. You understand me? Now what followed? I skip to verse 14. In verse 14, it say, "And the Lord said to Abraham after Lot had separated from him, 'Lift up your eyes now.'" Now, what do you think happened to Abraham? He was depressed because he didn't expect Lot. This is somebody who fathered you and brought you up that you should choose does not mean that you should now take everything that is good. So Abraham was somehow depressed, he was cast down. Now look at what God did. What God did is what I want to show you. He said, "And the Lord said to Abraham after Lot had separated from him, 'Lift up your eyes now and look from the place where you are, northward, southward, then what? Eastward.' I hope you know, if there's no obstruction to your seeing, you know your eyes can see till infinity. Are you aware? If there's nothing obstructing your sight. You just be seeing, seeing, if the place is open, you can be seeing and you be seeing, you be seeing endlessly. God said, 'Abraham, look northward, look southward, look eastward, look westward. Lift up your eyes and look. For all the land which you see, I give to you and your descendant forever. And I will make your descendant as the dust of the earth so that if a man could number the dust of the earth, your descendant can also be numbered. Arise, don't be depressed, arise, walk in the land through its length and its breadth, for I give it to you.'" Now, what was God trying to do with Abraham? When he say look, look, look. What did God try to bring? Faith is imagination. I'm trying to make you see that when God want to bring faith to your heart, what God begins to deal with is your imagination. "Lift up your eyes." Abraham took look, look, look and he could see, he would just see, see, see, see. And then he turned this way. And then Abraham would begin to imagine: as much as the sand of the sea. What is God doing? Changing his imagination. Sand of the sea. Who can number the sand of the sea? Sand of the sea. Is this a joke? Sand of the sea. And then he's changing. He's changing from the level of—and God now say arise after his imagination was affected. What was the next thing? Arise. God began to deal with the way he was thinking, he was thinking. He was thinking all was finished. He was thinking, "Ah, what will happen to me?" He was thinking, "Yeah, my cattle, my goats, my turkeys." And he was just thinking about all of those things. How will happen to all of them? And God began to change that way of thinking. No, they will not all die. They will not all—you will not finish here. Look this way, look that way. The sand of the sea. And God was affecting his imagination. I leave Abraham, I move on quickly: God and Moses. Let's move to Exodus, this time Exodus chapter 4. I want to see God again and Moses, how God affected the imaginations of men. I read from verse 1: "Then Moses answered and said, 'But suppose they will not believe me or listen to my voice. Suppose they say, "The Lord has not appeared to you."' So the Lord said to Moses, 'What is in your hand?' He said, 'A rod.' And he said, 'Cast it to the ground.' So he cast it on the ground and it became a serpent and Moses fled from it. Then the Lord said to Moses, 'Reach out your hand and take it by the tail.' And he reached out his hand and caught it and it became a rod in his hand. 'That they may believe that the Lord God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob, has appeared to you.' Furthermore, the Lord said to him, 'Put your hand into your bosom.' And he put his hand into his bosom and when he looked at it, when he took it out, behold his hand was leprous like snow. And he said, 'Put your hand into your bosom again.' So he put his hand into his bosom again and drew it out of his bosom and behold it was restored like the other one. 'Then it will be if they will not believe you or heed the message of the first sign that they may believe the message of the latter sign. And it shall be if they will not believe even those two signs or listen to your voice, then you shall take water from the River Nile and pour it on the ground, on the dry ground. The water which you take from the river will become blood on the dry ground.'" I'm trying to show you something. Moses was to go on a journey to go and deliver the people of God from Egypt. His fear was what backing do I have to go and face these people. Now, what is it that God want him to be thinking about now to be able to go? What are the things God want to be thinking about to be imagining that "I put my rod down, it became snake, that is power. I put my hand here, I brought it out." God want his imagination and his thought to be centered around that the power of God is with him. The power of God is with you. There is power, you are not just an ordinary person. This your rod has become this, that your this has become that. And that is what, as he's going, he will be thinking of those signs, he will be thinking of the signs. And as he's thinking of those signs, what will happen to his faith? His faith will be rising. His faith will be rising. God has begun to change the way he thinks. "If I go like this, don't worry. When I get there, I will just do like this and then this will happen. And I see God backing me." Now he was just creating images, creating images. And he was just imagining how some people will just first not want to agree, what how he will speak to them, how he will show them this one. He was just creating images, creating images. And as he's creating those images, his faith is going up. And that is why the Bible says the book of the law should not depart out of your mouth, but you should meditate, that is create images, create images, be creating images from it. Be creating images. Be creating images. As you create them, what happens is that they become strongholds in your life. That until you cast down those images, you cannot affect the thinking and the speaking of that person. Except the person cast down the image. And that is why you notice when the enemy want to attack somebody, what do they first do? Fear. They use fear to arrest the images that are in you. And as you are creating that image of all those images, what happens to you? You begin to retreat. But when you smash the image and say, "No, nothing can kill me, my God is with me, I will overcome," what happens? You begin to go forward. I'm talking about images. We see God creating images for Moses, for Abraham. Let's look at Joshua, Joshua chapter 6 verse 1 and 2. You find similar thing in the same place. Just trying to make you see this thing. Joshua 6:1 and 2, look at what the Bible says here. It says, "Now Jericho was securely shut up because of the children of Israel. None went out and none came in. And the Lord said to Joshua, 'See...'" See! See! What are you seeing? See! See something else! What was he seeing initially in the verse 1? They were seeing shut down walls, shut down gates, shut down—all those things were shut down and that wall of Jericho, nobody can break through it. It's a wall. Houses were built, you remember? Houses were built on the wall, so it was also—the wall must be a very thick wall. So because the gate was shut and the wall so high and the wall so wide in diameter, Joshua was wondering how are they going to go? What is going to because what he was seeing was obstacle. What is it that God needed to change? The imagination. "See! See! This one that you are seeing is not correct. See another thing." And what should he see? "See, I have given Jericho into your hand." Noted! Not, "I will give." What was he seeing before? A city that cannot be conquered. What does God want him to see? That is in his hand. See, I've given it. So Jericho is in our hand. See something else. See! I'm just trying to make you see something about God and his people. Why it is so crucial that we deal with our imagination. Why it is so crucial that we sort out what are you subjecting your thought to? What do you give your thought into? Because your thought determine what you begin to imagine. Whether you are imagining vain things or you are imagining good things. All of these things, they are all in the power of the imagination. The imagination. Why you may get to church and call him Lord, in your mind, it may be "this man." And you want God to deal with you that you are calling him Lord when he can see that you are calling him "this man." These are very crucial things about our imagination. I move on quickly. Oh, our time is almost past spent. But I want us to get to this very popular one. Maybe we'll be dealing with the other two next week, but I want us to get to this popular one. Please let's get to 2 Kings. 2 Kings chapter 5, that's the story of Naaman. I read from verse 1: "Now Naaman, commander of the army of the king of Syria, was a great and honorable man in the eyes of his master because the Lord had..." We are familiar with that story. Let's go to where he got to Israel. Let's go to verse 8: "And so it was when Elisha, the man of God, heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes, he sent to the king saying, 'Why have you torn your clothes? Please let him come to me. He shall know that there is a prophet in Israel.' Then Naaman went with his horses and chariot and he stood at the door of Elisha's house. And Elisha sent a messenger to him saying, 'Go and wash in Jordan seven times and your flesh shall be restored to you and you shall be clean.' But Naaman became furious and went away and said, 'Indeed, I said to myself, he will surely come out to me.'" Are you seeing his imagination? What made him furious? His imagination. "He will surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of his God and wave his hand over the place and heal the leprosy. And heal the leprosy. Are not the Abana and the Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the rivers of Israel? Could I not wash in them and be clean?' So he turned and went away in rage." Please, what was the problem of Naaman? His imagination. That as he's getting there, he was imagining that Elisha will come out and then stretch his hand on the leprosy and call on the name of God. "Oh God of Israel, we call upon you now as I touch this leprosy, cause them to disappear." That was his imagination. But because the thing went contrary to his imagination, what happened? He became furious. He wasn't seeing how it will work. What I'm trying to make you see is this concept of imagination. Now, his imagination ran contrary to how God wanted to work. And because it's now contrary to how God wanted to work, what happened? He almost missed out of that miracle. The same thing with us and our imagination. When God want to do things in our life and the kind of imagination that we have formed, "In Nigeria, is there anywhere you are like this? This should not be easy to do." But in Nigeria, such things cannot happen. You have built some imaginations. When God begin to give you instruction, "My son, arise do this," "Not in Nigeria! This idea would have worked in the US. It would have worked in the US." The Holy Ghost come to you again, "Take this step," "If I were to be in Canada, how this idea would have worked. This thing that God is saying, this thing that is coming to my heart, it cannot work. You know in Nigeria, when you tell people this, the first thing that they will laugh at you. And when you try to bring this one out, people will be looking at you, you don't know what you are doing." But you begin to give one thousand and one excuses for why that thing cannot work. And as you build those imaginations, what happens to your faith? What happens to your faith? Your faith dies. His imagination could not make him to have faith in the word of God. That's what I'm trying to make you see. And so, you discover that when God want to help us to strengthen our faith, what he deals with is our imagination. Our imagination. Our imagination. You know, we still have two more references and these references will take us some time. Maybe we should stop the meeting here today because of time. Stop the meeting here today. I will try and capture these other two things next week if that will be sufficient for us. And if not, we'll move on to something else. But I want us to close the meeting now. All we have been trying to tell ourselves is what is your imagination? God begin to deal with us from our imagination, the nation we form. What are the things you give your thought to? What are the things you set your eyes on? What are the things that create images in you? How are your images created? There are images that when they are inside you, your faith can never rise. And there are images that when you begin to form, your faith begins to grow. Your faith begins to grow. Your faith begins to rise. And all of these, they are just products of the gateway to our heart: what we see, what we hear. These gateways. What you see, what you hear. What you give your time to. These things, they may look very casual, they may look very small, but they so much affect your imagination. Why you may get to church and call him Lord, in your mind it may be "this man." And you want God to deal with you that you are calling him Lord when he can see that you are calling him "this man." These are very crucial things about our imagination. I want you to pray. Lord, change my imagination. Change my imagination to agree with your purpose, to agree with your intention, to agree with your will for my life. Lord, thy kingdom come. Your will be done. Thank you, Eternal Father. Blessed be your holy name, our God. Thank you, Jesus. In the name of Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen. [Speaker 5] This message is coming to you from Family Tent Ministry, a Christian ministry involved in enriching the lives of singles and married through preaching and teaching of God's word, discipleship, family life enrichment, social and community development, and mission heat. Our regular activities are discipleship class every Monday, 5 PM; Adolescent and Singles Club, every first Saturday of every month at 10 AM; Marriage Forum, second Saturday of every month at 10 AM; family life seminars, regular school outreaches, and everyday counseling. For further counseling, you can reach us at our location, Life Camp by the first bridge, Ilere community, opposite Very Joy filling station along Idjare Road, Akure, Ondo State, Nigeria. You can also reach us through our social media handles: familytent@yahoo.co.uk, familytentministry01@gmail.com, www.familytentministry.org. Our phone numbers are 08033861136, 07033613848. God bless you all.