When you leave your home for a weekend and ask someone to house-sit while you’re away, you would expect them to take proper care of what’s rightfully yours until your return. Just like the house-sitter’s given responsibility, God has given each of us the job of stewardship: managing and taking care of His creation. Transform your outlook as you learn how God is the rightful owner of everything, and you only manage what He first puts into your hands.
what do you have that you have not
received God claims comprehensive
kingdom ownership of all of creation so
if God owns everything you and I owe
nothing there are no other owners God
has given you the freedom to mess up
what he created in fact he’s giving you
and me so much free that we can hand it
over to the devil if we won’t if you
grab that that you will nothing
including your own life because it can
be taken you have now set yourself on a
journey of understanding life it’s yours
to manage not yours to own so in the
words of football how bad do you want
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God has a house
it’s called his kingdom that’s his house
and he not only owns the house he owns
everything in the house Psalm 24 verse 1
says the earth is the Lord’s and the
fullness thereof the world and all of
them who dwell in it God claims
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comprehensive Kingdom ownership of all
of creation he repeats this over and
over and over again in Psalm 89 verse 11
God says I own all that the world
contains in first Corinthians 10 26 God
says I owned it all in revelation 4:11
God says I own it all so if God owns
everything you and I owe nothing
God claims complete ownership of all of
his creation so there are no other
owners there are no other owners if you
grab that that you own nothing including
your own life because it can be taken
you have now set yourself on a journey
of understanding life because most
people think they own what they don’t
own just because they have it there in
the vicinity of it what God has
established is a management company
owners of property have management
companies that manage the well-being of
their property for them God has a
management company it’s called mankind
God created mankind to manage what he
owns because he owns it all before God
created man he had another management
company angels before there was mankind
there were angels and angels managed
God’s creation on his behalf until one
of the Angels went rogue Isaiah chapter
14 verses 12 to 14 explains how Lucifer
The Shining one rebelled against God and
tried to establish his own ownership on
God’s premises and tried to create a
joint venture with other angels a third
of all the angels to join him
in owning what he did not create and
that led to a cosmic Kingdom rebellion
Jesus says in Luke chapter 10 verse 18 I
was there when Satan fell from heaven
like lightning Jesus says I was there he
existed before he was born when Satan
fell that is when Lucifer got a name
change to Satan he became the adversary
of God he was kicked out of heaven to
the third planet from the Sun earth
that’s why when you open your Bibles it
says and earth was without form and void
and darkness was upon the face of the
deep
how could there be darkness when God is
light it says darkness was upon the face
of the deep so God had to create light
it says God had to separate the land
from the water whenever land and water a
mix that’s called a swamp
why was the earth in disarray because
Satan had been kicked out of heaven to
earth so this had become the abode of
the devil and his evil ones but God
decided as owner to renovate the
property so in Genesis 1 God renovates
the property he calls in light the Sun
the Moon the Stars separates the water
from the land creating continents and
brings order to a chaotic environment
but now establishes a new management
crew a new group of stewards if you will
Psalm chapter 8 verses 3 to 6 says and
you have made man a little lower than
the Angels that is constitutionally
inferior we can’t disappear we can’t fly
around
we don’t have angelic intellect we are
lower constitutionally than the Angels
but you have crowned him with majesty
you’ve hired a new crew to look after
your works
that’s stewardship so let me define let
me give you a specific definition of
Kingdom stewardship this management crew
mankind male and female has been duly
tasked with protecting and expanding the
assets of the owner stewardship is
protecting and expanding the assets of
another you protect it and you expand it
God has created a kingdom and his
management team have misunderstood their
role because they think they own what
he’s only given for us to manage and
whenever ownership and management are in
two different directions there’s gonna
be conflict because when the manager is
doing some opposite to what the owner
has prescribed there’s going to be
conflict because the owner is insisting
you work for me I don’t work for you and
so God created mankind to be his steward
and he would equip them for their
stewardship because he says let us make
man in our own image an image is a
mirror so we’re going to make them like
us so they can mirror us on that which
belongs to us and that is all creation
so you are part of a I’ll put it in
business terms you’re part of us
association of managers for stewards the
Bible calls it stewardship to protect
and expand the assets of another because
God is expecting his people to expand
what he got started in the garden
throughout all of his creation that’s
where God is after we’re told at the end
of chapter 1 every time God created
during the each day of creation he says
it is good it is good it is good he
comes to the end of creation and in
verse 31 he says it is very good he has
created a management team stewards who
he wants them to keep him feeling good
about what he started with there’s
nothing in your life in any part of your
life that you don’t have to go to
something already existing to get it why
because God packed it into creation
that’s why the Lord says in 1st
Corinthians chapter four verse seven
what do you have that you have not
received and then he asked so why are
you bragging as though it came from you
everything you have you have to borrow
from the owner
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I studied the Bible in college for four
years and studied the Bible before you
as different as master’s degree another
force as negative doctor the great and
then I’ve been preaching all of these
years and I’m still learning new things
for me this awesome inexhaustibility
really that’s why I’m so excited about
the twenty Evans Study Bible and its
accompanying works the Tony Evans Bible
commentary it will take all of this
training and this teaching and make it
available to you to understand utilize
and apply God’s most powerful
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God has given you managerial
responsibilities so what does he say in
chapter 2 verse 15 then the Lord God
took the man and put him in the Garden
of Eden to cultivate it and keep it the
Lord God commanded the man saying from
any tree of the garden you may freely
eat but from the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil you shall not eat for
in the day that you eat from it you will
surely die
so he tells Adam look imma give you a
house in my home I’m gonna give you an
apartment in my house and we’re gonna
name your apartment eating this is gonna
be where you live it’s gonna be your
homestead so he gives him a homestead
and he calls the homestead Eden this
homestead was a well a tree property a
bunch of trees on this homestead he
gives him a buddy says now from every
tree of the garden you may freely eat
and I want you to keep it and cultivated
the cultivate means to unlock its
potential when you when a farmer
cultivates the soil he’s doing it the
plant seeds because the seeds are gonna
produce new things in other words I want
you to bring out of it what it can do
therefore let me say this it is a sin
not to maximize your potential it is
wrong not to maximize under God the
potential of what he’s placed in your
sphere of responsibility the first use
of the word free is the Garden of Eden
by God himself because men were created
to be free to maximize their potential
underneath God with all that God has
provided for them to do that with Adam
is a single man he’s not married yet so
I always say to the single if you are
not maximizing your freedom as
a single Christian you’re sinning cuz he
commanded him to do it and he’s not
married so he commands a single man
rather than wine and that there’s no
mate you better use these trees to the
max eat freely from all the trees
maximize your potential of the garden
that I put you in the sphere of my
ownership that I have given you to
manage I want you to get all I want you
to get everything out of creation that
creation has the potential to provide
you keep it
that means protect it cultivate it that
means unleash what it can do why would
God put a tree in the middle of the
garden that could kill you why telling
me I got all these other trees I can
have fun with let me say a word about
the tree it was a Google tree it’s a
Google tree cuz it was the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil so it was an
information center okay you could Google
any data you wanted on the streets cuz
it was an information center he says I
don’t want you to eat of this tree but
why would not I eat up the tree when
it’s got so much information in it good
and evil it’s got good information it’s
got bad information it’s a Google tree
why wouldn’t I take advantage of this
tree because God wanted to tell his
Management Association and all of the
members of it that I do not want your
basis of knowledge to be knowledge that
you reason I want your basis of
knowledge to be knowledge that I reveal
I want you to live by revelation not
human reason the worst thing that the
manager can do is put his rebellious
intellect on God’s property I tell my
father when I was growing up I’d say dad
would tell me to do something and I’d
have a different idea and I’d say I
think
he cut me off right there do you think I
don’t remember paying you to think no
not not when your thoughts are
completing with my thoughts our world is
in chaos today because people are living
their lives based on the Google tree
based on their own ability to reason
based on education information
relationships who they know rather than
the revealed will of God and God is
saying this is not your house then I’m
putting it right smack in the middle of
the garden so that you are reminded
every time you move up and down my
creation it’s not yours
this is mine I’m just letting you here
to manage it for me now when God did
this gave man the ability to unpack and
to flourish his creation giving him all
the natural resources to do it all he
also gave him the power to give it up
cuz you know management man has been
groups can quit on you they can resign
when Jesus was being tempted by the
devil in Luke chapter 4 he was being
tempted by the evil one and Luke chapter
4 verses 6 & 7
the devil comes to Jesus and he says to
them if you will bow and worship me I
will give you all the kingdoms of the
earth and then he says cuz they’re mine
– give way men I thought God owned it
all how could the devil say their mind
the gift because Adam handed the
management back over to the devil see
it’s like this okay let me show hands
how many of you own your homes no you
don’t
no you don’t know over bank-owned your
home in the bank old your home okay
we’ve all been around people who don’t
take care of their houses who don’t take
care of their lawns who don’t take care
of their trash who don’t they they don’t
take care of it and the bank gives you
freedom to mess it up even though it
still claims ownership God has given you
the freedom to mess up what he created
in fact he’s giving you and me so much
freedom we can hand it over to the devil
if we won’t because that’s what Adam did
so as a manager as a steward of God’s
kingdom you are free now to mess up the
garden or to mess up the life to mess up
the family to mess up your world – to
become an addict and just because you
were created by God doesn’t mean you
don’t have the freedom to be a bad
manager because the bank gives you the
freedom to do that and so does God and
so he says I want you to live under me
and I want you to make my creation
fruitful the interesting about fruitful
he said be fruitful and multiply that’s
not just having kids that’s one way your
fruitful and multiply but it means to
unpack potential that did not previously
physically exist okay watch this
Deuteronomy 28 for says being fruitful
includes what you do with the lamb what
you do with the pure produce so he talks
about fruitfulness in in a variety of
different ways so fruitfulness is
everything you unpacked that God is
creating but what’s this the only way a
couple has a kid is that they are
intimate intimacy produces pregnancy
and the intimacy that produces the
pregnancy produces something that didn’t
exist before so a lot of people want
God’s rule who don’t want intimacy with
God’s relationship that’s why he says in
verse 15 the Lord God the word Lord
refers to God’s relational common mental
term for those who’s designated to rule
under him so what God is saying is you
must pursue an intimate relationship in
order to express my rule as my manager
because the intimate relationship will
give you the information for my rule so
that I can produce something that was
not there when you started the potential
was there but your job was to craft it
develop it a lot of us have good motives
but we’re making bad decisions because
it’s not coming from our steward
relationship it’s coming because we
think we have the right to do it even
though the owner has not given us
permission God says I want to unpack
want you to unpack the potential and so
Kingdom stewardship is our earthly
responsibility psalm 115 verses 14 and
16 says the heavens belong to God but
earth belongs to man in other words God
is up there and we’re down here and he’s
expecting us to do down here what comes
from him up there because it’s his
kingdom but he’s put it under man’s
management it’s under management and you
can manage it badly or you can manage it
well we are the caretakers of God’s
property now what’s the benefit what’s
the consequence what comes out of this
if you decide beginning today you don’t
own anything that’s my challenge and I
know that’s gonna get something used to
because we used to saying this is mine
it’s yours to manage
not yours to own okay he told them in
verse 28 and I will bless them and they
will rule of Genesis one blessing is the
experience of God’s favour blessing is
the favor of God entrusted to us for
ourselves and for the benefit of others
now here’s the key ruling was tied to
relationship reflecting God’s image and
this ruling in concert with relationship
for the purpose of managing what God has
placed in you is the key to experiencing
blessing if you are opposed to the owner
what you think you own is in trouble now
you may not see it right now but over
time when Adam and Eve blew it their
whole world fell apart emotionally they
were now scared of everything
their marriage was in trouble he and his
wife were in conflict with one another
it says and she will seek to rule over
you and you will seek to rule over her
so there’ll be a battle of battle in the
house it says that she’s gonna have pain
and childbearing he says you’re gonna
sweat by your brow when you go to work
and so what God is saying is if you want
the full expression of me working in
your life give up ownership give up stop
owning you or anything that is under
your care manage it as according to my
will in my word and our relationship but
don’t claim ownership in fact first
grimsey 619 says don’t even claim
ownership over your own body I mean
that’s how God gets down to that kind of
detail you don’t own you you’ve been
bought with the price he says that’s why
the Bible says lean not to your own
understanding you have been here long
enough don’t know enough
this is mine but God now has to contend
with the generation of Benedict Arnold’s
people who claim God but who work for
the opposing management company who
works for the other team while claiming
a relationship with God and rulership
under God when God says if you will give
up ownership and come under my ownership
and accept your managerial
responsibilities that’s where the
blessing is so the question is how many
owners are in the house
well now nobody’s hand goes up okay
understand but in all seriousness if you
will decide if I will decide if
collectively we decide if your family
decides every sphere if you decide I
give up ownership I give up ownership
because I tried to own it and it’s not
working give up ownership become a
manager instead because our owner
already owns it and he’s not requesting
joint ventures so why fight it it’s not
available but management opportunities
are so the question is will you give up
ownership in terms of God become a
manager and find out what the owner
wants in every sphere of everything
under your sphere of influence give him
permission to use all that he’s given
you to unleash the potential of all you
are all you have and all over with
you’re responsible and then watch what
he does in your life in your world for
your good because you will now be giving
him pleasure see now you’re gonna smile
oh because we all have met people who
don’t know that place we tell them you
don’t know your place God looks at
humanity and said they don’t know their
place that’s what happened at the Tower
of Babel they said we will be like God
we go we don’t we don’t need God we’re
gonna build a tower we gonna get to
heaven ourselves good the Bible says in
Genesis 11 God came down is that they
don’t know their place so we gonna cause
havoc so all this havoc you see
political havoc racial havoc social
habit kneeling had had havoc all this
stuff you see it’s it’s God saying they
don’t know their place but if God can
get a group of people who know their
place who understands you are a manager
not an owner and you give it up you have
positioned yourself for the God of the
Bible to bless you so in the words of
football how bad do you want it
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you
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