You are created to reflect God's character, so start nourishing your spirit with His Word and walking in His presence daily. Don't rush the process of becoming who He made you to be, but instead find your place in community and service where your identity can flourish. Embrace the restoration God offers and live out the purpose He has planned for your life.
We we are here to glorify Jesus, and it's an honor to get to do so. Amen? To get to be a part of of **"walking this thing out"**. My name is David John Phillips. I have the joy and honor of getting to be the pastor here.
There's no place I'd rather be. There's nothing I'd rather be doing. And hopefully, you feel the same way. Hopefully, there's no place you'd rather be than right here with us today. If this is your first time, we pray that you encounter the power and the presence of God, that you walk away having experienced the love and the truth of Jesus *Christ* in such a way that you're left "never the same".
Because when you encounter and you experience His love and His power and His presence, you are left never the same. You have to You are you are forced into the valley of decision where you have to either choose to believe what God did and move forward in him or to say, you know what? I'm gonna continue my own way. My prayer for all of you is that you say yes to Jesus. Amen?
Amen. Amen. I'm excited about today. I'm I'm also excited about encounter night on Friday, and I want to to open an invite to you. There's a lot of people that don't really have any kind of clue of what it takes to set this church up in the way that it's set up.
They don't understand really all of the details that go into every aspect. I mean, if you go into the men's bathroom, there's there's there's like deodorant stuff. I mean, there's all kinds of just little details that our serve team cares about trying to serve you well. And I get testimonies all the time of people coming in. It's like, man, I've never been to a church where I've been welcomed so well.
That's because of our dream team. It's because they're experiencing a relationship with Jesus Christ, it's overflowing, and you're encountering that when you walk in these doors. Then I wanna invite you to come and check out what it's like. So on Friday night, you're all invited to come participate in setup at 06:00. But here's the thing, you'll not only get to see what it's like, but you'll get to understand how fun it is as well, Because we're family.
You serve together, you stick together. Family works together. And when they're done, they hang out. Some of them go eat afterwards. Some of them just hang out talking for an extra 30, 45 minutes.
If you're desiring community and you just come on a Sunday, sit down and go home, and then don't blame real church for not being a part of community. You're invited to participate, and you will be as connected as you really wanna be. You will be as connected as you really wanna be. And let me tell you, Friday night setup is 1 way to to really be a part of it. You don't have to come every Friday night, but come and check it out, I dare you, come check it out this Friday, especially since it's encounter night anyway, you might as well, and it will be a good time.
Amen? Amen. I just want to say thank you again to our dream team, to our wrecking the wrecking crew sets up all of the curtains, and they do the heavy work. It's the it's our job, you know what I'm saying? And and then the first impressions, and I mean, So would you guys just give a big old hand to the dream team?
As a matter of fact, wait, wait, wait, If you're on
the dream team and you helped set up, would you stand up? Would you give a big old hand? It's a big deal, and and I'm very grateful. Every *salvation*, every life transformed, they play a part of. The people that are serving in the nursery, the people that are opening doors, and not just opening doors because, you know, that's they have to to be a part of the church.
Nobody has to do anything. This is a it's invite only. But I mean, not invite only, like you're all invited. But, even the littlest details when we do it as unto the Lord, it sets an atmosphere as people walk in. They notice those details without even subconsciously realizing it, and it prepares them to receive the love of God.
We wanna go over and above in every detail. 1 of our core values is to create with excellence so that you see the little things that we do, and it causes you to think of our Creator and say, wow, Jesus, you really love me. That it should be even manifested in the way that we set up and do church. Why is it that paid employees of a hotel at the Hilton, you know, have the best excellence in the world? Why is that?
It shouldn't be. Every single church the Hilton employees should be sent to to see how to really serve people. What if we're that kind of church? And then they should be dumbfounded at, wait, you don't pay all of these people to do that and they're still doing it? Why are they laying their life down to love people so well?
I don't get it. It's because of Jesus, and he laid his life down for us.
So we go over and above to serve people so that they
can experience his goodness and his love. Excellence is not perfectionism. Excellence is an act of worship, doing the best you have with what you've got. We got we got chairs with cracks in them and all kinds of stuff. But it's excellence for us because it's the best we have with what we have as an act of worship saying, Lord, take it and make it beautiful, change lives with it.
Amen? Amen. You're invited to be a part of that. Okay. So how many of guys were here last week?
Raise your hand. Oh, there's more hands than that. How many of were here last week? Raise your hand. We had a full house last week.
It was amazing. Last week was the foundation of the series that that I'm about to start. If you missed last week, I want you to take some time out of your schedule, go on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, Google real or search Real Church Clearwater in it and listen to the message from last week. It is foundational for this whole series. Now if you missed the the message from last week, each message in the series is stands alone as well.
So you're still gonna get stuff out of it, but not as much. So I would encourage you, go back, check it out, listen to it, take notes, and we'll move forward. I want you to understand something real church. We're in the midst of revival. Pinellas County doesn't see it yet.
And many of you don't see it yet because really the only ones that that really see the revival that's happening are the ones that are involved at Real Church and really participating. You might not even know this, but in August, a 110 people were **born again** outside of Sunday morning. 110 people through Belong Outreach on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays only, not including all of the people that were born again, just as our church goes in their daily life. Like there is revival happening. Many of them are coming in and being discipled.
Others, they're they're calling and pursuing. Like, there is revival happening, and I'm inviting all of you to participate in it, and eventually, it's gonna overflow such that all of Pinellas County is going to want to come and be a part. This is the beginning, guys. 6 years old, we're still infant, in our in our infancy. And you're not you're not at this point, you're probably not gonna see it if you're not involved.
You'll see glimpses of it. You'll have a sense that something's happening. But guys, like there are people being miraculously healed all throughout the week. Prophetic words happening all throughout the week. Demons being cast out all throughout the week.
Lives and families being transformed, people, hundreds of people being born again. You're invited to participate. And we're just getting started. And I I I've heard this over and over and over from many different people, real church is at a "tipping point". I've heard it over and over, at a tipping point.
We are. We are. This series is gonna tip the scale. You're gonna see more of an overflow of the love and the glory of God through your life and through others if you have ears to hear. He who has ears to hear, let him hear.
It's that important for you to understand the principles from last week and from every message in this series. And if you do, you put it into practice in your life. You'll you won't be as discouraged anymore when things aren't going your way. You'll start to experience an overflow of his peace and his joy because you understand the process just a little bit better. And if it's that important, what I would do if I were you, is I would get my phone because you probably didn't bring paper and a pen.
I would get it out. I would sit on the edge of my seat, not because I'm super important because really, me in and of myself, I'm nothing. But man, got the Holy Spirit in me and he's commissioned me gospel to you and preach the word to you. So so I want you to listen at listen for the Lord. Don't listen for my voice.
Listen for what he wants to speak to you today. But if it's that important, if God really wants to speak to you in that way, man, I would honor it by pulling out the notes app and and taking every note possible, and then going back, listening to the podcast as if it matters, and if it as if it's really going to change my life. Because if it's really, if you really came today to hear from God, wouldn't you honor it that way? Yeah. I mean, if you didn't, then just sit there and say, man, that was a good service, and then walk out and go about your daily business.
You know?
Like oh, that's my Sunday thing.
But but for real church, this is life.
I gave my life to him. Every aspect of who I am, Monday, Friday night, Saturday. It's not because I'm a
pastor and it's my full
time job. It's because I'm a Christian. A Christian, to be a disciple of Christ, you must first **deny yourself**. Pick up your cross, and follow Jesus. And those that don't, my question is, is he really the Lord of your life?
Like this isn't just walk a walk an aisle 1 day when you were 5 years old, pray a prayer, and get to heaven. You may have
had an experience if you did that, but it did if it didn't
result in life change. My question is did was that really real? Because there will be the fruit of *repentance* in your life. There will be the fruit of repentance. And yes, you might get stuck.
Yes, you might fall back for a little bit, but I'm here to remind you, if you've given your life to Jesus, you have been forgiven. Fall forward, get back up, and start living like you've really repented, all out in every aspect of your life. Not just Sundays. Sundays is a refresher. It's a filler up to encourage you to continue to go
all out on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday.
A Christian is a Monday through Sunday Christian.
A religious person is a Sunday morning chair sitter. And if I'm stepping on your toe, like I said last week, your toe ain't supposed to be there anyway. Move it out, repent, get back up and start living for Christ.
Amen?
So are you ready? For part 1 of the glory of living, let's see that. Look at that. That's Jana Cool right there. Jenna's our designer.
She designed that thing. We call that Jana Cool. Alright. Here we go. All creation exists to **manifest the glory** of God.
Psalm chapter 19 verse 1 says this, the heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. *Isaiah-6* and verse 3. And 1 called to another and said, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is. Everybody say is.
Is. Not will be. The whole earth is full of his glory. Everywhere we look, are surrounded by glory, if you have eyes to see. There's glory in every tree, there's glory in every flower, there's glory in every blade of grass, there's glory in every animal, every mammal, reptile, amphibian, every fish.
There's glory in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and they exist to manifest the glory of God, albeit a tainted version since *sin* happened. So the question then is what is glory? What really is it? Growing up in church culture, you've probably heard all kinds of stuff about glory glory, and I don't know about you, but for me it was kind of confusing. Like, pray, Lord God, let your glory fall, but yet we lift you up and glorify you, Lord.
Is it up? Is it down? Is it all around? Yeah? And then Jesus said in John-12:32, he said, now is the time for the Son of Man to be glorified, talking about himself.
But then in John-17:22, *Jesus* said, I have given them, talking about you, those that the future who would believe in him, I have given you them the glory that the father gave him so that the world would know that the father sent the son. So now is the time for Jesus to be glorified, yet he gave us the same glory the father gave him. What is going on? What is glory? And then to make matters even maybe a little bit more confusing, the verse that we talked about last week, Colossians-1:27, is this mystery, this grand mystery, the deep things of God as we talked about.
And it is what? It's Christ in you, the hope of glory. And then you have that verse that almost every Christian would know, Romans three:three, it says, for all have and of The glory of God. For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. When I memorized that as a kid, because you know, every church kid does, I memorized it like this.
For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Why? Because I didn't really understand what that second part meant. Jesus came and died on a cross to forgive me of my sin, but that's the cause. The cause of sin ravishing the world was the effect had the effect of a lack of glory, a lack of God's intended glory being shown, a causation of of us having less of a manifestation of the glory of God through our life.
Cause and effect. *Jesus* came and died on a cross, yes, forgive us of our sin, but also to restore our capacity to manifest the glory of God. So the question then is, what is the glory? What is glory? English definition, I like I like dictionaries.
I when I don't know a word, almost every time that I'm reading, I I immediately stop and go look it up so I can grow a little smarter. English definition of glory is high renown or honor, won by notable achievements, magnificence, or great beauty. In the Bible, some of you may not know this, but there's the Old Testament and the New Testament. The Old Testament was written in Hebrew, the New Testament in Greek. So there's a word for glory that's from Hebrew and Greek.
If we understand both of them, we can probably understand a full definition of what glory means. The Hebrew word for glory is the word kabad. I got my teacher's cap on for a little bit. Okay? The Hebrew word for glory is the word kabad.
It means representation. No. No. No. Sorry.
That's a different word. Chabad means weight or fullness, like fullness of weight. You ever heard the term in church, the weight of glory? Okay. I'll give you an example of what that means.
When you're you're really comfortable in your job or your role, your responsibility, and then your boss comes and says, hey, I'm gonna give you this assignment or I'm gonna give you this promotion. And with that assignment or that promotion comes a lot of a lot more weight of responsibility. And you're not sure if you really have it in you to be able to do that thing, but you press on anyway, and you sacrifice, and you learn, and you grow, and you're stretched, and eventually you fulfill all of that responsibility, and that becomes your new normal. It becomes comfortable, and it's glorious, and you realize you really did have it all in you because your work is showing what was in you now. That's the understanding of Chabad.
Another example, you go many of you have have graduated high school. So maybe you got your bachelor's in in college or your master's or your doctorate. I mean, it took 13 years to graduate high school. You had to persevere through a lot of tests that you thought you were going to fail, and you ended up doing it anyway, and all of these assignments and all kinds of stuff. Right?
And you thought, man, my graduation will never come when you were in seventh grade. Yeah? And then finally, you walk across the stage, everybody's applauding you, and and at the after party, you go and your family comes up to you and they say, somebody inevitably says, man, great job. I didn't know you had it in you. *Glory*.
It's an example. Carrying the weight of glory, accomplishing it and glory being seen. So that's chabad. If you look at its connection with God, theologians define chabad as a **visible manifestation** of God that is directly related to God's self disclosure. Meaning, it's God revealing himself.
Put another way, glory is God putting his attributes, his character, and his *nature* on display for all to see. You guys with me? Yeah. Okay. So that's the Old Testament Chabad.
New Testament is the word doxa. So New Testament is Greek. Old Testament is Hebrew. The Greek word for glory is the word doxa. The the definition of of that is the manifested perfection of God's character, especially his righteousness, and the showing of his attributes and his ways.
So that's doxa. *John-1*, which was written in Greek using this word doxa, verse 14. This is talking about the word that was with God and was God. Everything was created through the word. Verse 14, and the word became flesh and dwelt among us.
That's Jesus. And we have seen his glory, glory as of the 1 and only son or the only son from the Father full of grace and truth. *Hebrews-1:3*. He, this is Jesus, that same word made in flesh, is the radiance of the glory of *God* and the exact imprint of His nature. And He upholds the universe by the Word of His power.
After making purification for sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty. So, in short, *Jesus is the doxa of God. Jesus is the kabad of God, meaning Jesus is the glory* of God. He is the manifested perfection of God's character, especially His *righteousness* and the perfect showing of God's attributes except in bodily form. You guys with me?
Yeah. Just follow me here for a second. Okay? We're gonna make it real practical to you. You gotta understand this.
So if we combine the Old Testament word, kabad, and the New Testament word, doxa for glory, then we have glory is the weightiness of God's person, the fullness of his presence in the earth, the visible manifestation of his attributes, his character, and his nature. In other words, the glory of God is the fullness of who God is and what he does on display for all to see. That's God's glory. The fullness of who he is and what he does on display for all to see. You with me?
Alright. 4 principles of glory in creation I want to give to you semi quickly. Number 1, *God* created everything with glory. If he created it, then his intention was that his character, his *nature* and his power would be on display through it. Think about an artist creating a piece of artwork.
You can see the character and the nature of the artist if you study the artwork. If you study a type, like let's say he has his this artist has his pastels collection. You study the pastels collection, you can see aspects of the character and the nature, the design of the artist. And then you study the oils collection, you can see different aspects of who the artist is. You study his potteries and his his his metalwork or whatever it is.
You see different aspects of the character, nature and design. It's the same way with God. In *Romans-1* and verse 20. For the invisible attributes, namely his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world in the things that have been made so that they are without excuse. The question, what about the people that have never heard the gospel before?
What about those that grew up in a Hindu society or Muslim society or an atheistic society or throughout all of all of the world, all of history? What about them that they never heard before? They're without excuse because the the nature, the characteristics of God are clearly seen throughout nature. And if you seek, you will find. You have a hole in your heart that's destined to be filled by God and God alone, and you you try to put anything else in that, you're going to live an unfulfilled life.
But if you just look around at the glory of creation, you'll see an aspect of the creator that will cause you to want to go after him, and he will reveal himself to you. Seek and you will find. Amen? So glory resides in every created thing. God made everything with its own unique glory.
Every part of creation doesn't show you all of the creator, but it does show you an aspect of him. The *glory* is the nature of God. I'm gonna read this to you. The glory is the nature of God residing in that thing, a hidden reality that God placed inside, which holds the full essence and potential of what that creation is supposed to be and do. So when it realizes what it's supposed to be and does what it's supposed to do, it is "manifesting the glory" of God.
The glory of its creator. You understand? Alright. So number 1, everything that God created is created with glory. Number 2, God created everything to manifest its glory.
And by manifesting its glory, it's manifesting the glory of the creator that he put inside of it. So it's reflecting *God's character in nature*. You understand? Let me show you. Genesis-1, verses 11 and 12.
And God said, let the earth sprout vegetation plants yielding seed, and the fruit trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind on the earth. God made seeds according to their kind, and in that seed is all that is needed to manifest all of the *glory* that he put within it. Every aspect. In an apple seed, you have a tree with bushels and bushels of apples. And if you think even further into it, in that 1 seed, you have a whole orchard or more.
The *glory* is in the seed. The earth brought forth vegetation, plants, and seed according to their own kinds, and trees bearing fruit, which is their seed, each according to its kind, and God saw that it was good. Verses 20 and 21. And God said, let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the heavens. So God created the great sea creatures and every living creature that moves with which the waters swarm according to their kinds.
Why? Because they're supposed to reflect and manifest a kind of the glory of God. An aspect of it. And God saw that it was good, and God blessed them in saying, "be fruitful and multiply" and fill the waters and the seas, and let the birds multiply on the earth. Verses 24 and 25.
And God said, let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their livestock and creeping things, and beasts of the earth according to their kinds. And it was so. And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds, and the livestock according to their kinds, and everything that creeps on the ground according to its kind, and God saw that it was good. Everything that we just read about was created to act or behave according to the nature that God put in it. They were created to manifest their glory.
So think about it. The glory of a bird is to fly. The glory of a fish is to swim. The glory of a tree is to grow and become shade and to produce fruit and wood. *God* doesn't wait to add swim to a fish.
He doesn't wait to add fly to a bird, or moo to a cow. They're born with it. They're conceived with it. It was in the seed. So what does it take then for glory to be revealed?
So number 1, God created everything with *glory*. God created everything to reveal, manifest its glory. But what does it take for glory to be revealed, to be manifested? It takes 3 things. It takes the "right environment", it takes nourishment, and it takes time.
Pull up that picture. Is that glorious? No. It's ugly. For those of you listening online and you can't see this, it's a baby type of bird with no feathers and skin over its eyes.
It's about the most revolting thing that you can see. It is ugly. And yet, even that has all of the *glory* that God created it to manifest hidden within it. And you give it the right environment, you give it nourishment, and you give it time, the right amount of time, and it will become that. A toucan.
Look at your look at your reaction. You looked at it and you said, wow. People travel from a long ways to go and find the toucan in its natural environment, take pictures of it, do documentaries of it because it's so gorgeous and so beautiful, so that others can see the pictures and do what you did. Wow. Why?
Because it's manifesting the glory of its creator, a kind of its glory. Because it was in the right environment, had the right nourishment, and waited the appropriate amount of time for that glory to be matured and fully revealed so that everyone else could see it and say, wow, and be drawn into relationship, hopefully, with God. If it doesn't have the right environment, if as a baby, before it's fully matured, it's outside of that, I don't know, 65 to 90 degree window, 95 degree window, it'll probably die. And when it dies, all of the glory that was inside of it will die with it. If it doesn't have the right nourishment, not enough food and water, it'll either be sickly or it will die.
And both will limit or inhibit the glory of God, all of the full glory of God that he's created to be manifested through it, and it will die with it. If it doesn't wait the right amount of time, it's like, oh, it's been 2 weeks. I'm not flying yet. It kills itself. The glory will die with it.
The devil comes to steal, kill, and destroy. Why? Because he doesn't want your life to manifest the glory of God. And he wants to pull you out of the environment with which in which you were created to manifest God's glory. He wants you to neglect the nourishment you need in order to fully mature, to manifest the glory of God that he's put within you.
And he wants you to rush it and step outside of the time and the process without enjoying him in the process to prevent you from manifesting the glory of God. Do you know what the right environment is for you to manifest the glory of God? It's **God's presence**. A "fish in water" is glorious. Swimming around, it's beautiful, it's wonderful.
You take a fish out of its environment that is created to manifest its glory and put it on land, just flops around. It's kinda dumb looking. Kinda laugh at it. Right? You were created to manifest the glory of God, but you can only do so in God's presence.
*Sin* tainted *creation* and separated mankind from God's presence. So he's not experiencing the result of God's presence, righteousness, peace, and joy, and is hindered from representing the glory of God as he was created to. The proper nourishment. It's the Word. It's food and water.
It's the Word and the Spirit. It's getting in His Word and diving into His presence allowing the Holy Spirit to speak to you and fill you up. If you only eat on a Sunday morning you're gonna be sickly spiritually. You need to dive into this thing for yourself every single day. Daily.
Daily. *Lord*, give me this daily bread. *Worshiping* the Lord and learning to hear the voice of the Holy *Spirit* day in and day out so you have the proper nourishment so that the glory that he put in you has every every chance to fully manifest because he wants you to walk in every good work he prepared for you so that you can manifest his glory through your life. Time. Don't rush it.
So number 1, *God created everything with glory*. Number 2, God created everything to manifest its glory. Number 3, God is pleased when glory is seen. Why? Because it reveals the creator.
We see in Genesis, after God finished creating something, it says, he saw that it was good. After each day, God finished creating for that day, and it says, and he saw that it was good. Why was it good? Because he was seeing his character and his nature revealed through his creation. It was manifesting the glory of the creator.
The final day of creation, *God* created man and woman, His "crowning achievement", his masterpiece, and it was done. When he was done, he said, and it was very good. Why? Number 4. God created mankind as the ultimate exposure of his glory.
Creation displays aspects of the glory of God, but only mankind was created in the image of God. *Genesis-1:26* 27. Then God said, let us make man in our image, after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens, and over the livestock, over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So God created man in his own image. In the image of God, he created them male and female, he created them.
The word for image, that's Genesis, so that's Hebrew, it is the original language, the word selem. It means likeness, representation. You were created to be a representation of God on the earth. You were created in His likeness. You're not created to physically look like Him.
*God is spirit, but you're created to reflect His character and His nature*, His attributes, His personality, His kindness. The fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, meekness, faithfulness, self control. You're created to reflect that to the whole earth. That's your purpose. Psalm, the Hebrew word also, when it was used, also meant image in in English or idol.
So you're you were created go with me here as God's idol. Let me explain. When other religions create this "dead false god", this idol thing, They believe when they create this golden calf or whatever it is, that it is a representation of the god that they're worshiping, and then that it is filled with an aspect of the spirit of that god. Now you're not created as God's idol, the word to be worshiped. No.
*God is the only 1 that is worshiped*. We we give our worship to him and and push all of creation around us to worship God, but you are created as his representation to be filled by his spirit. Amen? Created in the image of God to be his represent representatives on the earth. So if God is the artist and we are his masterpiece, painted by the hands of the master, no other creature in all of creation has this distinction.
You're created in the image of your heavenly father, meaning whatever your daddy got, you got. Everything God intended you to be, you already have. Infinite hidden potential is inside of you, if you've been born again. Remember, sin separated people from the presence of God and tainted the image of God. For all have sinned, Romans-3:3, and fallen short of the glory of God.
Now, there is a reflection, a dim reflection of His glory. People still have smarts. They have capacity to do creative things and to grow emotionally mature and to to do all kinds of stuff. But until you're born again, you still have a sin nature. You were born with a nature towards selfishness.
Everybody was. 3 year old, you don't teach them to disobey. They naturally do. You don't teach them to steal, but they naturally take and say mine. Why?
Because there's a nature inside towards selfishness that came back from the first man and woman. People say, how could God judge me? I was born this way. He made me this way. That's an assumption that's based off a fallacy.
You were born the way you were because of sin. *God* created Adam and Eve and said it was very good, and then he gave them a choice, and they chose selfishness, and that nature to sin was passed down. And now, the sin of your father, and your father's father, and your father's father father, back 4 generations, generations is passed down to you. So you have a proclivity toward alcoholism or towards addiction? It's because of the sin in the generations past.
*God didn't create you that way, but he wants to restore you and recreate you, make you a new creation in him, and take away the sins* of
your fathers, and restore your ability to reflect his glory. *God* didn't create you a homosexual or a transgender or someone like that. That is a lie from the pit of hell that culture has sold, and you better not believe it anymore. Instead, realize that that's from lust from generations past. It's been passed down to you.
You were born in it, but God wants to recreate you. You're to be born again, and him to renew your nature and your passions for him. *Colossians-2* says, he circumcised. He circumcised your heart, cutting out the nature of sin. When you're born again, God circumcises your heart and cuts out your old nature, and then puts you on a path of renewing your mind, so your life can be transformed and restored to be able to reflect the very glory of God, so that you can be who he created you to be.
When you're born again, pull up that bird, the first 1, you're still that. The nature of your heavenly Father inside. A lot of people get born again, they say, I'm good. And they don't spend time in the right environment with the right nourishment. They don't persevere so there's no time.
And they never experience the full manifested presence and power of God through their life. See, 1 John-4:17 says, in this world, we're like Jesus. It says, be imitators of Ephesians-5:1, imitators of your heavenly father as dearly loved children. You're created, a new creation in Christ when you give your life to him. *Restored* he restored your original created value, Put the Holy Spirit inside of you to lead you to be able to reflect the character and nature of God.
You need the right environment, the right nourishment and time. Persevere. You know what the right environment for you is? It's His presence. Walking in the *Spirit* by the Spirit, learning how to live every aspect of your life from his presence so every aspect of your life can reflect the glory of God.
You know what the nourishment is? It's his word. It's His Spirit, the drink. Daily getting in the Word, daily taking drinks from Him, daily obeying, putting it into practice in your life. It's like working out.
In time, be okay with where you are in him. Don't rush it, and enjoy His process. And 1 day, you'll live out every good purpose that He's planned for you. And the glory He put inside of you won't die prematurely. So quit making excuses and get back in the right environment.
Start being obedient to get the right nourishment and quit being in such a rush.