Chapter 2

Go Tell My Brothers

In Genesis 2:22, the Lord made the woman and brought her to Adam.

Genesis 2:22-25

22 And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.

23 And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.

24 Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.

25 And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.

One of the things I want you to understand before we move to the next passage is that the woman was taken out of the man, so Eve’s make-up came from Adam. In other words, God made Adam from the dirt, but from the rib of Adam He formed Eve. He fashioned out of that rib a woman, which in strict translation of the Chaldean language, means “womb of the man.” Some theologians say that the woman is man with the womb, but a stricter translation would be that the woman is the womb of the man, because she is of the man. She is a part of him.

Ephesians 5:22

22 Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord.

When you study your Bible, consider the style used by the different authors of this book. Paul was a preacher likened unto Christ .Looking at Paul versus Peter, you see there is a total difference in their styles of writing. Paul was very efficient at taking natural things to show you spiritual reality. Paul was an expert at that, patterned after Jesus Christ, who taught with parables to make His point.

When Christ was ready to deal with an issue with His disciples, He always first addressed where they were. He considered and allowed them to know that He knew where their minds were. He would tell them what they were thinking. That puts the mindset out-front to let you how God relates to the mindset. That’s a good teacher. Teachers need to learn that. If you’re trying to win someone, you have to first deal with where they are. You have to go where he is in order to take him where he ought to be. If you don’t understand where he is, he has no confidence in where you are trying to take him, he will feel that you do not know his mindset.

It behooves us to take these little notes when you are studying for the ministry. Some of you will be used in ministry and If you want to be effective, always pick up on little things like that. Go where the mindset is, because if you do not go where the mindset is, then everything you say is bouncing off and the ministry becomes simple theology, you would not have brought the person into what you are saying. Paul was a very good teacher in that sense and so was Jesus Christ. They would come right where you live.

Ephesians 5:22

22 Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord.

Being that style of preacher, we see in this verse, Paul is using a natural situation to explain a spiritual reality. Why? Because the woman came out of the man. This is so important! The woman came out of the man, and because she is of the man, submission should never have been an issue. There should be no controversy as to whether the wife will be in subjection to her husband. She would not have even existed without him. He provided her his personage. His personage is her entirety, her entire existence. There was nothing used to make Eve except Adam. We do not read where God used the rib and mixed it with dirt. God took the rib and fashioned her out of it. It is very important that we see she is of the man. She was automatically subordinate to the man.

There is another point I must rehearse. When God gave them power, He had to be working with them in order for Him to say to them, “Subdue the earth. I give you dominionship over all the creation and everything that creepeth on the earth, and the fowls of the air and the fish of the sea.” There were great whales in the sea, all kinds of animals in the sea, all kind of animals on the land. He gave them dominionship. This has been overlooked. When Adam and Eve were given dominionship, even though Eve was subject to her husband, when she operated in the dominionship that God gave them, she was no less powerful than Adam. There is an erroneous idea that because Adam was a man and Eve was a woman, Adam’s power was greater than that of the woman. I need you to open your hearts and not fear truth.

The only thing that truth is going to strip you of are the things that God does not want you to have. You do not have to be afraid of truth. You do not have to be afraid that truth is going to strip you of some authority you think you have. If it strips you of any authority, that means you have become overly-authoritative. It is a truth that God gave the man authority. That is a truth. We have to place authority where it belongs. We have to place it in perspective in the authority of others, because when the enemy visited Adam, he put a seed in Adam that is totally contrary to the plan and purpose of God. He built something in Adam that has warred against the purpose of God. We have to go back to the very beginning to see how man moved off-course, before we can get him back on-course.

Adam and Eve were two creatures. Adam was the head of his wife. If Adam says, “Eve, don’t do this,” she was supposed to obey; she was supposed to do whatever her husband told her. The scripture said that the wife is supposed to submit to the husband in all things, and we know that all things include everything except sin. We can’t change that. You must see this because some men have a severe problem with women. God wants to relieve you of that problem because it’s a burden to you and it’s a hindrance to your doing what God wants you to do for Him.

Women are His servants too. (If you can find anywhere where this is error then I need you to tell me). Show me where the Bible does not substantiate this. Write it down and show me the scripture that negates what I am saying to you right now, because I am telling you the truth. Then, some of you must change your belief systems and your mindsets because of where this truth is going take you. I want you to visualize this: Eve being the wife of Adam, makes Adam automatically the head. She is subordinate to him as it relates to the authority in her life; the caretaker of the marriage. He is supreme in the marriage.

The scripture said God visited them and gave them dominionship. Notice it says, “He gave them dominionship over all of the fish of the sea, over all the fowls of the air and over everything that creepeth upon the face of the earth.” It didn’t say that He gave Adam dominionship over all the fowls of the air and everything that creepeth upon the earth and then gave Eve dominionship over everything that swims in the sea. I want you to see everything that we are trying to understand about the Body of Christ has already been defined in Genesis. Genesis is the book of the beginning and the end of the entire compass. The Bible is encompassed in Genesis. God is speaking the boundaries or measure of their power. God spoke to them both and told them how much power and authority they had and where the authority lay. When He gave them the authority and power over the creation, He gave both of them the same power. He didn’t give Eve any less power than He gave Adam.

But now as a woman or wife, Adam was her head. She was supposed to work inside of submission to him as her husband but it was not her husband that gave her power over their dominionship. It was not Adam that gave Eve power. The Scripture says God gave them the power. If you do not get that you will think that vessel cannot operate unless you give the power; unless you authorize her. The authorization for the wife to work inside of the creation of God was given by God.

This is the plan and the purpose of God from the very beginning. These are one flesh. When it comes to working inside of the creation of God, God does not see personages. He does not see male and female, because it’s not the body that is going to do the work. It’s going to be the power that God Himself has given them that’s going do the work. That’s God, He is going to, and He knows that it doesn’t matter that she is the weaker vessel in the natural. This man is the bronze, made differently from a woman. He’s muscular and he can go out there and fight it out with an animal if he had to. It didn’t matter that he was more physically robust than she, because the power was not of Adam and the power was not of Eve.

The power was always of God. From the Garden of Eden, the power was of God. Do you see that? Adam didn’t have any problems with that. Adam understood that when God made his wife, He didn’t make her and put her behind him in dominionship. No, He put her by his side as a helpmeet, and this is the error that is in of some of the theologies concerning women. We have to deal with this issue in order for you to discern the Body of Christ. You have not seen the connection as yet, but you will. Some of you that are spiritual already do. God brought her and made her a helpmeet to do what? Help him do what? Adam wasn’t sitting around eating grapes. God told him to tend the garden. He was working, back in Genesis Chapter One, God said there was no man to till the garden, to till the ground.

Genesis 2:15

And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it.

God made a statement and said after He made everything, that there was no man to till the ground. In the fifth verse: "and every plant of the field before it was in the earth and every herb of the field before it grew: for the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon the earth and there was not a man to till the ground". So when He made the man, what did He do with him? He put him in the garden and told him, “You dress the garden and keep it.” That was his work. So Adam was fashioned by God and put to work by God. He was given a territory to work in, the Garden of Eden, and in exchange, what did God do? He provided for him.

You never see where Adam had to tend for himself, find his food and all of that stuff. God said, “You may eat of every tree in the garden.” God made sure the trees produced what Adam needed to eat. So Adam didn’t go out and make a living. He was working for God. He was doing what God told him to do. God set him inside of the creation and told him, “You keep the garden, you till this soil and you dress the garden.” God doesn’t want you sitting around idle. He had a revelation about that before you ever sinned. An idle mind is the devil’s workshop. God kept Adam busy. He had him doing and working. But then He noted now that, every creature had a mate except Adam. So He made a mate that was suitable for Adam. He didn’t make a helpmeet that was of one of the animals. He made something suitable for the man. What better helpmeet than one that is made of the man? So God made a helpmeet out of the side of the man. He brought her to him as a helpmeet. She wasn’t just for him only. She wasn’t created just for him. She was created to be a helper to help him work inside of the creation. She was created to work. The Bible said she was a helpmeet. ‘Help’ means “help me do, assist me in doing what I was charged to do.” She was fashioned to work for God.

Any time you have a problem with a woman working for God, go back and read where she was first called. Before she was ever called Eve, she was called a helpmate. Before she was ever made, she was called a helpmeet. The word help means to supply what is needed to be used; to be of use; to assist. Now, what was she to assist him in? Having babies?

Adam couldn’t have babies. No, she was to assist him in the work that God gave him to do. God made it very clear. He said, “I’m going to give them”-before he ever fashioned her. He said, “I am going to give them dominionship.” We demonstrated some of the key points you must get out of this little scenario. First of all, the place where they are supposed to work is determined by God. God is the one that determines who works for Him and where they work.

Their place of work was the Garden. He said, “This is where you work. You dress the garden and you keep it.” Those were the boundaries. That’s where God set them to operate. God chose the vessels He wanted to work. He fashioned them Himself. He made the man. Anybody who works for God must be made by Him. Man cannot fashion you into a vessel fitted to work for God.

Only God can create a vessel that is sufficient to work for Him. If your training comes from man, it has to be you working under the power of God and using only the material that God gave to make you with. So God Himself is the one who fashions the vessels that serve. He fashioned these two creatures and then He said, “I give you both the same power.”

Both of them had the same power because the power was of God, and God is one. God with one spirit. It was the spirit of God that was upon them, not in them, that enabled them to subdue the creation; to work inside of the creation. That had nothing to do with Adam being the head of his wife. It was the amount of authority that she had inside of working, actually doing the work of God.

In other words, Adam didn’t have power over just the elephant while she only had power over the monkey. That’s what I am trying to say. But if any creature in the garden got out of hand, Eve had just as much power with God to subdue it. If she didn’t, then God lied, and God won’t be a liar. He said, “I give them dominionship over everything…” He didn’t say, I give Adam dominionship over everything but I give Eve dominionship over some things. No, He didn’t. He said, “I give them dominionship, which means power over all creation and even over Satan or those angels.

Recognize that an angel says, “Who is man? You’re so mindful of him and give him power over all the works of your hand.” They had power over everything God had created on earth. So we must raise our consciousness. This may cut across and totally shake-up your little belief system. Let God shake it up. Allow God to shake it up. There isn’t anything better than being shaken up by God. If you accept what is being said here by God, that the power was identical; the same; that it had nothing to do with and didn’t take away from Adam’s position as a husband in her life. The husband and the wife was a fleshy relationship.

The subduing of creation was a spiritual thing. He said, “For this cause a man leaves his mother and father and cleaves to his wife.” Why? They are one flesh. God doesn’t see any difference in flesh. Flesh is flesh with God. All flesh is the same with God. When flesh decides to find itself a mate, come together, God said, “Between the two of you now, she is of the man, so the man is her head.” He is the head of the creation. He was the head of her, he was the head in the world before she was ever created. When she was created, God did not give her any less power to operate than He gave him. We all have to get that. As his wife, she was supposed to obey him.

Let us say they were allowed to make their own decisions about working, but there was something God reserved only for Himself about making decisions. If Eve had said, “Well, such and such a thing,” and Adam as her husband had said, “Well, no, not right now.” Because that was her husband, she was supposed to submit. When she was created, she was created as a wife. That put her in submission to her husband. So he had the final say-so about domestic matters or what she was doing. If the tables had been turned in the “Fall” and Adam had been enticed by the devil… Let’s say that the devil talked to Adam first, and Adam decided he was going to eat the fruit and then offer the fruit to his wife.

Now she was supposed to be in submission to her husband. He was eating the fruit and he gave it to her. Then, she told the serpent, “God has said…” I want you gentlemen to tell me if Adam had offered her fruit because he was her head, did she have a right to say, “No, God has said …?” Did she have a right to say, “No” to her husband about something God had said for them not to do? She had every right to say, “No,” because what God had said superseded what she had said. So there has never been a time, and there will never be a time, when anyone can tell you to do anything contrary to what God had said because of their position of authority in your fleshy life. Any authority or position in your life that anybody has is authority and position of the flesh, when they tell you to do something contrary to God.

That is the flesh talking and not the spirit. It could be your pastor. If your pastor tells you what is contrary to what God has said, that pastor is operating in his flesh and not in the Holy Ghost. You have a right to say, “Pastor, I love you but I cannot obey you because God has said…” When God spoke to them about the tree, Eve said to the serpent, “God had said,” because God had told her too. She got weak and obeyed the serpent; got weak and curious and was beguiled by her own curiosity.

But now, if the tables had been turned and her head, the one that she came out of, had told her to do something God had said for her not to do, she had a right to say to her head, “I’m not going to do that. If you want me to do that, you better check with God. If God tells me I can do that, then it will be alright, for He already said I’m not to do it.” We see this in the Old Covenant. There is an interesting story in the Old Testament. Do you all understand this?

Do you understand the power was the same because the spirit they worked under was the same? Because there is a spiritual disposition that Satan created in man at the fall, and it’s called ego. Satan created in man what he created in himself. Satan’s motivation for rebellion against God was, “I will and I am.” His motivation was exaltation of self. He wanted to be exalted above God. He created every seed. The Bible said the spirit of Satan worked in the children of disobedience. Jesus said, “Ye are of, been birthed by, your father Satan (St John 8:44).

You are of your father the devil.” Whose lust? His lust. Satan has a lust for power, a lust for authority, a lust to be exalted above God. He also has a lust to rule over God’s creation which was never allowed by God. God placed man to rule over the creation by the power and Word of God. That’s how man was to rule – strictly by the spirit and power of God. Man’s ego has been so inflated that he is at war with his God. Your oldest Brother told me to come and tell you that your ego is going send you to hell if you don’t destroy it. It has been inflated to where it opposes the plan and purpose of God.

Men that have been given power with God have abused that power because that power that God gave them afforded them influence in the lives of God’s people. They took advantage of the influence that power gave them. The advantage was so that they could be exalted to another level in the lives of the saints. In a nutshell, man wants to be worshiped. Worship means to give God what He wants when He wants it. Man wants the saints to give Him what he wants when the wants it.

You can even see it in ego. Watch ego in a simple thing. I used to get in so much trouble when I started preaching. As a little, young missionary in a traditional church, you get up behind the podium. They call you and say, “We’re going to have missionary so and so teach.” I would get up and I started teaching. “Get your Bibles and go with me to so and so.” I didn’t say “Giving honor to the bishop, giving honor to….”. I might just say, “Praise God, hallelujah, giving honor to the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of God.” I would forget the bishop, forgot the church mother, forgot the grand-deacon, whoever, all those folks. If you don’t give honor to all those people, you may never get behind that pulpit again. I would get in such trouble. By the time I gave honor to all those folks, I would forget what I was supposed to preach. So, I had to start writing out a list, and I would be looking at my list. “Giving honor to so and so.” Recognition. I am saying there is a God. You haven’t seen it yet. Go to the traditional church in America.

Go to the traditional, staunch Apostolics and Pentecostals and don’t recognize them. “Who does she think she is? Get up there start preaching, ain’t saying nothing about nobody!” Ego. Recognition. Got to have somebody call your name. Got to have somebody recognize what you have done. You’ve got to be recognized. Men, Jesus told me to tell you. You have exalted yourself so much until you are at war with God. Inside the church, men have come to a place where God gave them authority and power. They feel that they can wield that power any way they desire. The power that they’re wielding around is influence. Influence in people’s lives is power.

Influence affords you to be able to tell a man to do this and tell a man to do that. Your influence has given you … Saints are very... Saints are like lambs. When you are a man of God, they surrender. They surrender to their pastors more than to their spouses. They have more confidence in their pastors than they do their husbands. You’ve taken advantage of that. Pastors have taken advantage of that. This is not unique. Let me ask you another question about Eve.

Supposing the tables were turned and Adam was the one enticed? But supposing God had given Eve an instruction and Adam wasn’t there? Supposing God had visited Eve and said, “Eve, I don’t want you to eat the fruit of the tree.” But, Adam wasn’t there when God told Eve that. God didn’t tell Adam. He wasn’t around. Now, he’s her head, he’s her husband. And Adam doesn’t know what God told Eve. He does not know. I’m going to clear up some stuff if you let me. Adam doesn’t know what God told Eve. So Adam gets the fruit and says “Eve, come on, have some.”

Eve says, “Adam, I can’t eat that.” Adam says, “Why can’t you eat that?” “Because God told me not to.” “What do you mean, God told you not to?” I’m your husband. God is not going to tell you anything He hasn’t informed me of. Cause the Lord knows you’re supposed to be subject to me. So how is God going to tell you not to do something without telling me that He told you?” What is she supposed to do? One thing about the Word of God, it never contradicts itself. If God told her to be in submission to her husband, He means submission to her husband. If God says submit to your husband, is that what it means? There are scriptures in the Bible that say we must rightly divide.

If that seems to be in contradiction to submission, then maybe you need to re-check your definition of submission. Brothers, what would you say she is supposed to do? How many would say she’s supposed to obey her husband, even if God did tell her not to eat the fruit and her husband wasn’t around? The question is this, plain and simple. God told Eve not to do something. Eve represents any woman, today, right now, 1999, in this generation. God told her, “I don’t want you to do this.” He told her He didn’t want her to do it. Or, He told her to do something. Either one. Married woman. I’ve got to go here so you can discern the Body. You’ll see how it connects in a minute.

God told her to either do something or not to do something, and her husband was no where around. Now, the husband confronts her and says, “What do you mean, God told you? God is not gonna by-pass me and tell you anything. He knows I’m your husband. He’s not gonna take my wife and tell my wife that He wants her to go over there and do something and He’s not going to tell me.” Who is the authority? Is not the Word the authority? What does the word ‘espoused’ mean? It means given to.

The Bible says, Mary was espoused to Joseph. She had to be. This is ‘espousal.’ She had to be legally his, even though the ceremony hadn’t taken place, because when Joseph found out her state of being, he tried to privately put her away to keep the people from killing her. The law said, if you are espoused to a man, you belong to him, and if you come up not being a virgin, you must die. So she was legally his, even though the ceremony had not taken place. She had been set aside for Joseph. That was his wife. When God visited Mary, Joseph was no where around. Men, this is where you are. You have put yourself in God’s place. You have forgotten that God is your head and your wife’s head.

God rules the two of you, and God does not need your permission to do what He wants to do. God came to Mary, sent an angel to her, and told her she was going to have a baby. First of all, she was a virgin. Secondly, the girl was espoused legally to a man. Thirdly, God hadn’t said anything to her husband. Fourth, the penalty for what God was talking about was death. Lastly, it was God’s law that was supposed to put her to death. But what God is trying to say is, “If I tell you something I am a prudent God.

Don’t you know I’ve considered all things? If I come and tell you to do something and it is out of the ordinary, don’t you know I was the one that gave you the law of submission, I’m the one that gave the law of stoning for any woman that comes up pregnant when she is espoused? I’m the one that gave those laws. So if I tell you to do it, don’t you worry about the law. I’m the Law-giver and I’m the one that can protect you from the law.” What are you going to do? “I’m God and I tell you to do something and you’re telling me you have… I’m the God of your husband. If I tell you to do something, don’t you know I know how to deal with your husband? You just obey Me. I will deal with him. You just keep flesh out of the way.”

Don’t you see, Mary didn’t try to defend herself. The angel said she was going to get pregnant and have a baby and even told her what the name was. He didn’t even give Joseph the right to name the child. What were men going to say about Joseph? “You married a woman that already fornicated on you. That woman you got was already defiled when you got her.” They said that about him all along the way, because when Jesus came they called Jesus a bastard. Mary’s reputation was ruined and so was Joseph’s. And tell me God won’t set you up to be humiliated.

He will set you up to be humiliated. When God told her to have that baby, Mary said, ”How can this be since I know no man?” After the angel told her it was going to be a holy thing, she said, “Let it be according to Your will, Your word.” God didn’t go to Mary and tell Mary what would happen and then get in agreement and delay it, waiting until the news got to Joseph before He performed the miracle. No. When Mary yielded to the word of God, God immediately overshadowed her. The Holy Spirit overshadowed her and put the baby in her womb.

The baby was growing in her womb; growing to a point where folks knew she was pregnant. God still hadn’t said anything to Joseph. God still hadn’t said anything to the woman’s husband; the one who had to bear the shame of this woman. See man, your ego is still at war with God. Get out of God’s place. Go back to your place as a man. You’re not God. God operates inside of the boundaries he set inside your life. He’s a prudent God. And anything God comes in and changes, He has already considered everything He has said. He’s never going to contradict His own law, nor will He deal with His law. That woman was showing. Her pregnancy had become revealed. And then what did God do? He didn’t do anything.

The people found out about it and they were willing to … they were going to kill. Joseph said, “Lord let me put her away privately.” He didn’t even want her. Once he found out she was pregnant, you couldn’t tell that man, immaculate what? God? You gotta a baby from God? What would you say if your wife came and told you she has conceived a baby from God? Joseph didn’t believed that, and neither did her parents. And Joseph said she must be off the deep end; somebody probably deceived her. I’ll put her away privately. I don’t want to make this a public thing, because I really care about her, but if everybody finds out and gets down to the church, they’re going to kill this woman. She’s supposed to be mine. Do you want to know what he did?

Nothing. Because Mary had obeyed her God, her God was obligated to save her. Look when God came. It was the man’s right. God won’t take from you what He gave you. If He gave the law that says your wife is not supposed to touch another man and if she does touch another man, he has the right to put her before the council to be stoned. If God gave you that law, don’t you know God knows how to live by that law? And He knows you are subject to enact that law. God Himself puts the woman’s life and reputation on the line. Didn’t he do that? He knew how her husband was supposed to respond according to the law.

You have see the mind of God. God wanted Joseph to know something too. Joseph represents you. God wanted Joseph to know that “I don’t need your permission to do anything with anything I made. Not only did I make your wife, I made you too and I expect you now, when you see Me using your wife; I expect you to back off.” Joseph did not have to agree. When God came to Joseph, God let Joseph know that no law had been broken. She wasn’t pregnant by a man. Was she pregnant for a man? The law said that no man was supposed to touch her.

od had considered everything. What did He say to Joseph? He said, “That thing that is in her is of the Holy Ghost.” He told him no man had touched her. “This is I God using your wife. You got a problem with it? I am the one who overshadowed her. I’m using her to bring forth My child. Now tell Me, Joseph, do you have a problem with it? I need to know boy. Did you remember I’m your creator? Or have you forgotten? Do I need your permission for Me. No man has touched her, but do I have to have your permission to use her? I came out of respect for who you are in her life. You are her husband.” Once God tells you His need, you need to take this attitude. It’s God, I’m finished with it. That’s the response I’m supposed to give.

Man is supposed to live like this: “Once it’s God I’m okay with it. If it’s something else you’ve gotta deal with me. If it’s God, what’s my problem?” God wants to know if it’s God, what is your problem. Are you telling God He doesn’t have a right to use His own creation? No man defiled your wife. This thing is of the Holy Ghost. That’s all He told him. Joseph shut his mouth from then on. God said, “Don’t you touch her until after my baby is born.” Won’t be any wedding night and any honeymooning now. This man had to stay with this woman another six months until the baby was born before he could even touch her. God is trying to make a point here. Don’t exalt yourself in God’s place in anybody’s life.

If God tells a person something, respect what God said to that person. Because if they’re lying, that will be proven, but if it is God, it will be vindicated. All you have to do is wait and see. When you can’t wait, it’s because you ego has exalted you above God. There’s a story about two men. Both of them were prophets. God spoke to this prophet and sent him to a city and God told him, “Don’t stop, don’t spend the night any where, keep walking, keep going until you do what I told you to do.” He was on his way to do God’s business and he came into the city and went to another prophet’s house.

They were both men of God. The first prophet, the travelling prophet told the prophet whose house he stopped at, “I’m on my way. God told me to do thus and so...” Whatever God told him to do, he told the prophet of it. He said, “Okay, but rest here first.” And he prepared a meal for him. God told him though, “Sit down and eat.” While he was sitting down and eating, now the prophet told him, “Stay here and rest. Stay for a while a let me feed you.” He sat down. This was a prophet talking to him. A prophet of God. God told the man what to do. “Don’t you sit down and eat.”

1 Kings 13:11

11 Now there dwelt an old prophet in Bethel; and his sons came and told him all the works that the man of God had done that day in Bethel: the words which he had spoken unto the king, them they told also to their father.

God already told him what to do. What did the second prophet do? He started reasoning things. “You’re tired, you’ve been travelling a long way. Come on, let me refresh you.” Flesh now, saying you can do something that God told you not to do. It’s alright. That’s the sin growing in the church today. Men you have this thing… pastors have this thing, if the pastor tells the members to do something, they’re supposed to obey without thinking and go pray about it later. Just obey your pastor and if you don’t think he’s right just go pray about. “No. Anything you doubt about, if it’s wrong or not, you don’t go do it. If you think it’s sin, you don’t do it. No man has a right to tell you to go against something your conscience is telling you differently.

Your conscience is the seat of the Holy Ghost. If you don’t feel good in your conscience what does God say about your conscience. Pastors put themselves in places, which are reserved for God only. God says, if your conscience doesn’t condemn you, then neither will I. The same truth is parallel. If your conscience does condemn, well so will I. The same truth is parallel. If I’ve got a problem with something you are saying… if you’re telling someone to do something and he feels that this thing is going against his conscience, you don’t have the right to force him to do it or tell him that he is in rebellion. His conscience is the seat of God, and when you tell a man to go against his conscience you oppose God. That’s what He told us to do. He said, “commend yourself to every man’s conscience.” You know why? The conscience is the seat of the Holy Ghost, it is the seat of authority, it’s the knower; it’s the one that judges.

If a man or a woman feels that his conscience is going to be defiled if they do this thing, you have no right to force them to do it or put them on a black-list and say that they are rebellious because they won’t do something. You don’t have the right to do that, because you are the leader. If you know there is no sin, you have a right to go back to God and say, “God, this person needs to do this, but he feels it’s going to be sin. You need to give me wisdom in how to instruct them so that they won’t feel it is sin.” Now that is what’s righteous. You aren’t supposed to tell anybody to do something they feel is sin. You’re supposed to submit. You can’t take that out of the script.

The Bible instructed everyone of us… this is what keeps us from sinning against one another. For everyone in the Body of Christ has submitted himself to every man’s conscience. What are you going to do with that? Are you going to tell a person to override his conscience and obey you? Do you know what you have done? You have made yourself an idol. That’s blatant idolatry, when God told you to submit to a person’s conscience. When you tell somebody to oppose his conscience, that is not submitting to it. If God wants that person to do something, it is your responsibility to go back to God and say, “God, I told them what You said, but they think it is sin because they have a weak conscience.”

A weak conscience means that the new man is a babe has not yet been developed in the knowledge of God. Paul explained what it was when he talked about eating food that was offered to idols. He said some brothers cannot eat food offered to idols because their conscience condemns them. We eat it because we know it is just meat. We are not. studying the idol. We don’t worship the idol. We’ve got a matured conscience. We have a matured conscience as yet. Let’s not offend him. Don’t force him to eat it. Let’s teach him, and when he comes to a place where he can eat, it will be cool then. But forcing our will on him is condemning his conscience God is saying, “You’re sinning, Paul, if you do that.

You become an idol. You set yourself up as an idol. Anytime you take the place of a person’s conscience, you’ve set yourself up as an idol. The conscience was given to man to judge the deeds of the flesh. If his conscience is telling him not to do something then you’re supposed to respect that. Your big Brother is talking to you. A lot of times we’ll operate in a thing and it is idolatry. We don’t see it as idolatry because we don’t have a full enough understanding of what we’re doing. We have not investigated all scriptures pertaining to that thing. You can easily move into idolatry and don’t even realize it. Husbands are operating in idolatry, and pastors are operating in most blatant idolatry. And that is what God is trying to destroy. Returning to the story of the prophets…

The prophet persuaded the guest to eat. Guess what happened while the man was eating? God spoke through that same prophet again. He told him, “On your way out of here a wild beast is going to eat you up alive ‘cause you disobeyed God.” Watch this. When God tells you something to do, you don’t consult with flesh and blood. When God told that prophet what to do, when he went to the other prophet’s house…who was a man of God, a man with influence. This was another prophet. He wasn’t supposed to be off course with God. When that prophet went there, after the prophet told him what God had commissioned him to do … this is what people will do. You’re supposed to maintain your own convictions toward what God told you.

Don’t let anybody rob you of your conviction toward God. That’s how people are going to hell. They have been robbed of their convictions to obey God. That’s deception. That prophet deceived the first prophet. Do you know what deception means? Deception is not believing something is true which is false. Deception is taking some of the evil out of sin to make it alright. Satan told Eve, “You aren’t going to die. God just told you that, because he doesn’t want you to be like him”. Took some of the evil out and the consequences out. That’s what deception is. That’s what that prophet did. Both of these men were men of God. God is trying to tell you is that a man of God can walk in the flesh. When that prophet came there he started reasoning. he said, “Man you’re tired. Sit down and eat. Let me refresh you.” He sat down and started to eat. He was in the flesh when he told the man to sit down. As soon as the man started eating, the Holy Ghost started talking through him. The same man that was talking in the flesh, suddenly was talking in the spirit. He told the man, “When you get up from the table and go, a wild beast is going to eat you alive.” Don’t tell me that God can use a man and the devil can’t. I’ll prove it to you. Jesus asked, “Who do men say that I am?” Peter responded, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God.” Jesus immediately recognized it and said, “Flesh and blood didn’t tell you that Peter, My Father which is in Heaven revealed that to you.” In the next three verses Jesus said, “I’m on My way to Jerusalem, they’re gonna kill me now.” Peter replied, “Not so Master.” And Jesus said, “Get behind Me, Satan.” God and the devil spoke out of the same vessel in the same chapter. That’s why the Scriptures tell you to put no confidence in flesh. None. And never put flesh on the same level as you do the Spirit of God. Never. It’s unlawful. Flesh would change on you. That’s why God put that story of the prophet in there. God spoke through the prophet after he lied and said, “Stay here.” Read it.

Some of you have a problem with what God tells people. You don’t respect what God tells a man. There are people in God’s house that have no respect for your convictions in God. That’s why the house of God is off-course. There are men who have set themselves up above God in your life. They have no respect for what you say God said. They want to force you to honor what they say God told them. They don’t feel they have to respect, because their positions take them out of the arena of respecting the little people under them. It is as if the little people under them don’t have the same God as they have. Their positions have elevated them above the little people and the little people’s God. “Now you obey me! I’m the leader here.” This is why everybody is trying to be a pastor, because men see the pastorate as a place to rule over God’s people. They see it as a kingdom wherein they are the kings and you all better come out of those kingdoms and get in God’s kingdom. Get out of man’s kingdom.

I used to have this thing where I wouldn’t tell folks to leave their churches, but I’ll tell you in a minute now. Leave, if your church is set up where your pastor is a dictator and he doesn’t regard God and your conviction. You’re reading your Bible and you see what God has said. If your pastor has no respect for that, it’s time to leave that. That thing you are in is not God’s kingdom, it is that man’s kingdom. He is the lord of the house and whatever he says in that house, you better do it, regardless of what your conscience says. You don’t have a conscience when it comes down to the lord of the house. You’d better not confront him with your conscience, because if you do, you are in rebellion. God is calling for people to come out from under that bondage. Come out and start hearing me stop following traditions.

Stop following doctrines of men, stop following men’s egos. They are the blind leading the blind. Soon they will be cut down. Every man operating in idolatry in God’s house will be cut down. If he doesn’t move himself out of it, God is going to move him. That’s the message God told me to tell His brothers. What does man say?

1 King 13:8-9

8 And the man of God said unto the king, If thou wilt give me half thine house, I will not go in with thee, neither will I eat bread nor drink water in this place:

9 For so was it charged me by the word of the LORD, saying, Eat no bread, nor drink water, nor turn again by the same way that thou camest.

This is the travelling man saying what God told him. God told me not to eat any bread or drink anything, and don’t go back the way I came. Just keep going straight through. He said unto him, “I’m a prophet too.” It sounds like Korah and them, doesn’t it? Korah went up against Moses, wasn’t Korah. What did he tell Moses? “We’re hearing from God too.” Watch this elevation of a man’s ego. God already told you what to do, and you tell somebody what God said. And then that man says, “I’m a pastor too and God talks to me too or I’m your leader.” His being your leader doesn’t change what God has said. This is what God wants you see. Who are you going to follow? The Scriptures say that Paul told all those people, “Follow me as long as I follow Christ.” You only follow a leader that is following Christ. If God has told you something and the leader has told you something different you better not do what that man says. You’re the one who is going to pay the cost. God knows your heart. You have more confidence in what men tell you to do than in what He told you. But they can’t save. A man didn’t give you his spirit. God doesn’t tell everybody what He tells you. Some people are not worthy to hear. Some of you are jealous of what God does in other people’s lives. You’re jealous because you see God using some people in certain ways and won’t use you that way. God is saying, “If you had the heart that person has maybe I could use you.” If God is not using you, it is because of you. God is looking for people He can use.

If God is by-passing you and using someone in a greater magnitude, it is because there is something wrong with you. There is something lacking in you. There is lack of submission in you. There is somewhere you have exalted yourself above the Word of God. There is no need to be jealous. God said, “We have a lot of Sauls in this house. Some of you are mad because God didn’t raise up a David. You are mad even though David is working for you. David is working for you, letting you look good and you’re still mad because you can’t do what David does. That’s ego. You aren’t satisfied with the piece God gave you. You have to have the whole thing. Can’t anybody outshine you. That’s ego. You’ve got to be the one that does the most. You’ve got to be the one that shines the most. You’ve got to be the one to be in the spotlight. You’ve got to be the one they talk about.

You can call it anything you want brother, but God calls it jealousy. It will not be ransomed. Do you know what that means? You never satisfy a man that is jealous of you. Nothing you do will ever satisfy him. He will always resent it. The more you do and he sees the more, he will resent what you’re doing for God. You can be doing unto Him as David was. David was fighting God’s enemies and Saul’s enemies, but he was a better fighter than Saul. Some of us are in the Body fighting God’s enemies and our enemies, and some of you are jealous of folks who can fight better than you. God said, “Men you are not jealous of women, but you are jealous of one another.”

Pastors won’t even fellowship with one another. They won’t even take their church to that man’s church because you know that man can preach better you. It’s not about the people any more. It’s about you. Some pastors have folks in the churches that can preach, that can teach, and they will not expose their ministries. They will not let that person teach, because they are afraid of the people giving accolades to that person and saying a little bit more about that person than about the pastor. The best you will do is put

them up at a time when you know not too many people will be there. You have to pacify him. I heard a man telling my husband in a counseling session, “He does me wrong.” He was talking about another pastor. “He won’t let me preach on a Sunday morning because too many people are in church on a Sunday morning. So he puts me up on a Tuesday night when he knows three or four people are coming to church. That’s when he makes me preach, and then he won’t even tell me in advance that I’ve got to preach. He waits until we get to church. When he sees it’s only four or five, then he tells me I can preach.” Why? What has happened? This is no longer about cultivating the flock. It’s about shining in the light. My ego has to shine.

Nobody cares about the people of God. Nobody cares that this man can out-preach this man. This man has a revelation of the Word of God, and I need that gift flowing so that the people can grow. If that man starts teaching and the people start growing, guess what? He will set men free. You can’t control folks who’ve got knowledge. The more knowledge a person gets from God, the more tradition loses its power. Traditions got to keep you in ignorance. They are not going to let a good teacher get up and teach you anything. They’re going to suppress that teacher. I’ve got a whole lot of preachers here that are BT preachers. Stand up, BT preachers! All these BT preachers stand up. Is there anybody here in this bunch that can say that Dr Banks or Bishop Banks will suppress your ministry? Keep you from…or is jealous of your ministry…or will not do everything they can to push you forward in your ministry, will do everything they can to put you out there? Does anybody out here have anything contrary to that to say? Are we that kind of ministry? What we’ll do is put you out there. We’ll put you in a safe environment first: our own. Let you preach, to train you so if you mess up, afterwards we can show you, we can help you. We can say, “Brother, you should have done this way or that way. You left out this right here. The next time you get up, do it this way.” We’ll critique him to make him better. We want every one of our preachers to stand on any platform in the world. We want them to be better than us. Thank you.

1 King 13:18

18 He said unto him, I am a prophet also as thou art; and an angel spake unto me by the word of the LORD, saying, Bring him back with thee into thine house, that he may eat bread and drink water. But he lied unto him.

Preachers will lie to get you to do what they want you to do. A man of God will lie just to get what he wants from you. His lies will get you off-course and in trouble with God and leave you out there to pay the consequences.

1 King 13:19-20

19 So he went back with him, and did eat bread in his house, and drank water.

20 And it came to pass, as they sat at the table, that the word of the LORD came unto the prophet that brought him back:

The word of God came to the man of the house this time.

1 King 13:21-24

21 And he cried unto the man of God that came from Judah, saying, Thus saith the LORD, Forasmuch as thou hast disobeyed the mouth of the LORD, and hast not kept the commandment which the LORD thy God commanded thee,

22 But camest back, and hast eaten bread and drunk water in the place, of the which the Lord did say to thee, Eat no bread, and drink no water; thy carcase shall not come unto the sepulchre of thy fathers.

23 And it came to pass, after he had eaten bread, and after he had drunk, that he saddled for him the ass, to wit, for the prophet whom he had brought back.

24 And when he was gone, a lion met him by the way, and slew him: and his carcase was cast in the way, and the ass stood by it, the lion also stood by the carcase.

God spoke to him and told him what he should not do. That prophet knew the voice of God. When God tells you to do something, He makes sure you know it is Him. He will not give you a dark dream or a dark vision and you have to wonder whether it is God talking. If God wants you to do something, He’s going to make it plain. God spoke to me years ago, when nobody was around. God spoke to me and said, “I don’t want you to mix the manna. I want you to separate My people from the traditional teaching. I don’t want you bringing in traditional teaching.” This was two years after BT started. He stopped me. I was bringing in celebrities. I was bringing the people you see on TV. God stopped me in my tracks and said, “I don’t want the manna mixed. I’m going to teach you My word and I want you to feed My people a strict diet from heaven. Don’t take My people into traditional settings: swapping money and all that stuff.” God told me that. God told me not to get into the money-swapping games of preachers. He told me not to mix the manna. That’s why BT is always growing. Nobody was around when He told me that. Just like when nobody was there when He told His prophet what He told me, but that prophet knew it was God. If he didn’t know it was God, he wouldn’t be going where God sent him. He understood the voice of God. So here comes a man that says he’s a prophet, some strange man declaring himself a prophet. He know he was a liar. The Scripture says he was a liar. Just because he was a prophet means he was holy. Just because he was a prophet means he was hearing from God. He told that man an angel came and told him to tell that man to come back to his house. He told, him that because he wanted the man to think he was on the same level as him. Flesh was trying to exalt itself to the same level. That’s how you all get tricked.

People trying to exalt themselves to a certain level, and they use God to do it. They use the name of the Lord to do and they say “thus saith the Lord”. God has told you something and you know it is God. Why do you now put your confidence in flesh? You know the voice of God. You were persuaded by the voice of God. But all of a sudden the persuasion is gone because flesh has said something. No. Do you know why he obeyed? What the man said failed the test. People obey false leaders, because false leaders providing them with something to feed their flesh.

The only reason why I was able to stand where God put me was because men didn’t have anything in this world to offer me. There’s not a man in this world who has anything to offer me. There’s not a woman in this world who has anything to offer me to pull me off-course with what God has said. When you want something from people, when people got something you want or when you are living up under, when you are still as Eve was, smitten with her emotions in captivity. If a man or woman is pulling your emotional string, controlling your emotions, you just obey God following that emotion. When you’ve got power over your own emotion and you don’t want nothing from the world and you’re not looking for exaltation and you have no confidence in flesh, you will do what God tells you to do. When you want something you will compromise. If a man has something you want, you will do what he says, regardless of what God says.

If a woman has something you want, you will do as she says, regardless of what God says. Wantonness has to be dealt with in you. That’s why the people that God who choose to lead reformation have to be made by God. When God makes a leader, God takes the wantonness out of him. God takes the pride and lust out of him. Otherwise they’ll get up … we see it all the time. What do you think took these men that have fallen off-course? Their lust and wantonness. They wanted money, women, things of the world. What do you think takes women off course? They want love from men instead of looking for it from God. They’ll do anything that man says so that man can give them a little attention. After you get that little attention and you have disobeyed God, God will blow on the things you’re lusting for. He’ll let you have it with torment or take it from you all together.

People who don’t want anything… what that man said was flesh. He was tired, he was hungry, so he went back and did what the man told him to do. He disobeyed God to get what somebody else had. That’s why I can stay flat-footed when I preach. I am no shaky bootleg preacher. Some of us have been made. The people chosen by God been made by God. God got all that stuff out of us. We can’t be bought. We’ve been full circle. We know what it is to have and to have not. We’ve had the material wealth and we’ve been poor. I’ve been a bean-picker and I’ve lived in the best hotels there are in the world.

I’ve been full circle. I’ve rubbed shoulders with the top people in the world. So what does that mean? What do you have to offer me? I know what it is like to be with a man. I know what it is like to be without one. I can live either way. So what does the devil have to offer you? If God let you live through some things, tested you in some things, made you some things, made you immune to some things and made you where there is no lust pulling on you, you don’t have a problem then. But if your emotions are in captivity, you are going to disobey God. If lust is running rampant, you are going to disobey God. It is like my husband teaches. Lust has no contentment. You can’t contain lust in a wandering arena. If you have lust for a woman you will have lust for other stuff. If you have lust for things out there you will have lust for sex. Lust is lust. It just keeps spreading and spreading, it is like a cancer. That prophet knew God and knew what God told him. Let me tell you something.

What God says should become the most precious thing in your life. You better examine everything people tell you. I don’t care who it is. He is the Lord of the house and He’s taking His Church back. Are you hearing me? God is taking His Church back from men. The only men that are going to survive are the ones that relinquish it to Him. Those who are holding God’s people in captivity, He says repent. “Repent before I destroy you.” Only the men who relinquish their control over God’s creation will survive this move of God.

There is a move now where God is sweeping like a big massive broom. God is sweeping the house now and men are going to be destroyed. They will not step back and let God have His way with His people. God is judging everything. He says, “Judgement starts at My house.” God is judging every man that is sitting in His churches with all these young men and women with gifts that God gave them. The man of the house is intimidated by the gifts, and will not let them flow to God’s people. God is going to judge that man severely. One thing about God, He will never destroy a thing before warning it. That’s His grace, His love for us. I knew a time when God was about to cut me down. There was something God told me to do and I was procrastinating about doing in it. I knew my time was winding up, I knew it. I said, “Lord, if I don’t obey you quickly, You can easily raise up another.”

When you are in touch with God, you have relationship and you and God talk. God says, “I’m not gong to do this without telling my friend Abraham.” God is my friend. God isn’t gonna kill me without letting me know He’s gong to do it. God lets me know, “If you don’t obey Me, I will raise up another one like that.” Nobody is off-limits to God. Look at all the revelations coming and you’re dispensing them over here and dispensing them over there and God is raising you to raise up this church and that church. Everybody is prophesying and talking about how their lives are changing because of your ministry, and you have video tapes and lessons everywhere. God can raise up somebody overnight and take your place, like you never existed.

“Mary Banks, just don’t obey Me.” Who knows it is dangerous not to obey God, especially when you know it is God? There are people who have tried over the years to move me out of this track I walk in; this ministry. See, a leader is a person that is not better than anybody else they are leading. They’re just at the front of the line. Leaders try to get so high and mighty. They don’t sin; they don’t do anything wrong. That’s a lie, y’all. Ain’t no pastor in this house that stands up here and tells a lie and that they don’t sin, they ain’t done nothing wrong. Yeah, you do. All of us have done something wrong and are still doing something wrong, and we have to repent more than you all do. We don’t practice sin as a lifestyle but that doesn’t mean that we’ve made it to perfection yet.

But it doesn’t mean perfection is not attainable. We can attain perfection, but I don’t know anybody here that has attained it. I know I haven’t and have to repent. We aren’t “all of that.” The leader is just the person that’s at the front of the line. The person at the front sees what is up there before you do, and tells you what is up there, and carves the path for you to walk. He’s the one that gets hit in the face with the branches and gets the persecution and all of the stuff, so that you can walk clean. We take the heat. Don’t you know God could have sent a man over here to do this? Why didn’t He? Cause it’s His business. I’m not great. What in the world am I? It’s His business. He says, “I use who I want.” He says, “The part you think is more feeble and comely, that’s the one I’ll put more grace on, that’s the one I’ll use the most, the one you say I shouldn’t be using.” That’s what 1 Corinthians 12 says. The very part that you say is feeble and uncomely, she’s a female, that’s the part I’ll pour out more grace on. The body will be like this … wobbly. See, you men already have honor. The woman has no honor in the Body of Christ. He said, “The parts that don’t have honor, that’s the one I’m going to give honor to.” That’s the Bible. God said, “I will use that part more than I will use the one that’s already got the honor. If that part submits to Me, I’m going to pour out more grace on that feeble part. I will pour out more grace on the part that men think I shouldn’t be using.”

Read your Bible. That’s what Paul said. He said… “because if I don’t, the Body won’t be tempered. It will be one-sided. It is not common for God to use females and Gentiles. It’s just common for Him to use Jews. So I’m going to pour out more grace on the Gentile. Does not the Gentile church have more grace than the Jewish church? Aren’t there more Gentiles than Jews? Aren’t they doing a greater work in the Body of Christ? That was the part that was most uncomely. Now is the time for God to pour out that grace on the female, for that’s another part that’s without honor in the Body. Guess what brothers? There is nothing you can do to stop it. You know what you are going to do? Go with the flow. If you have negative mindsets about the things I preached tonight, come running down to the front as a sign of faith toward God. Come down and repent for the way you feel tonight. God is trying to raise your conscience. Just say, “I repent for the way I’ve been thinking. I want you to change me.”