Excerpted from the Documentary by Todd White|Arranged by Bralynn Newby
So often, grace is reduced to a permission to “sin and get away with it,” but is that really the life that Christ died to give us? It is such an amazing privilege to represent Jesus, that we can’t afford to misrepresent him in a place of hyper grace that says we can keep sinning.
Introduction: Throughout the documentary, Todd and his team are traveling in Europe living out this pure and holy lifestyle, praying for people, healing them, and welcoming them into the Kingdom. At one point they went into an empty church and were singing and praying when a woman walked in. Todd asked her through a translator app if she had lost a child who was now with Jesus. She said yes, and he prayed for her. It turns out that her whole family was having a lot of problems and earlier that day she had cried out to God for an hour to send a someone to her who could look into her heart. Todd was so moved that this was no coincidence that he went and got money out of his ATM, and went back and gave her €150 (euro) to bless her family. “You can come into people’s lives, and Christ in you can come in and through you everywhere you go. That lady prayed that day, ‘God help me. I need help. Send a man to pray for me. Send a man of God to pray for me for my family and for our needs.’ So she goes into a church and she meets some people from from Texas, and from Canada, from different places, and it’s just crazy. God shows up through normal people. We’re just normal people who serve an extraordinary God.”
When you come to Christ there should be a real difference between your life and the lives of the people around you. It’s dangerous to go into a place to witness that’s totally against God when you don’t truly know who you are and what you’re called to. There are Christians who push that line. And they push a little further, a little further, and a little further, and all of a sudden they sear their conscience and shipwreck their faith. It’s important to stay pure and stay separate from the world. In it, but not of it—to really just remain with holiness inside of us and have a reverence for God.
You can’t afford to incorporate the way that seems right to a man into the way that is right and righteous because we’re listening to the devil. We’re being manipulated by the liar, and God forbid you learn how to heal the sick, and heal them, and then think that it’s okay and sleep with your girlfriend—that’s not okay. False grace slips in because there’s no relationship with God there.
I’m not judging people. I’m telling you that there ought to be a difference between our life and theirs. How can I witness to you if I’m gonna be drunk when I’m doing it? That’s not a witness. When you lower your conscience and numb out your senses, you actually forget what’s real and what’s important. People are important. All the people you hang out with are eternal. They’re either headed to heaven or to hell. You’re walking before them every day. Let that matter. You have the opportunity to represent Jesus.
Is the life you’re living worth the price He paid?
People across Europe will sometimes say to me, “Well, this is our culture. You must have a glass of wine.” And I say you’re asking me to violate my conscience for the sake of your culture, and I don’t believe I’m supposed to sacrifice my conscience on the altar of trying to be relevant to a culture. There’s no need to use profanity to fit in either. When your heart gets changed, when your heart’s in surrender, your language will change. My language shouldn’t be like the language of people around me if I want them to know that Jesus is different.
After I was saved I lived real bad in front of a friend for five and a half months, partying with him, getting drunk with him. Still getting high, talking about Jesus. There was no difference in my life, no change. I went away to a rehab, and three days into this rehab my friend had a brain aneurysm and went into a coma. I had a revelation of who Jesus was, and how Jesus changed my life forever, but now my friend was in the hospital. I went to visit him and told him I was sorry, but he was in the coma, and couldn’t hear me. The next day he died—my best friend that I could have witnessed to, but I lived my life as a hypocrite, confessing one thing but living another way.
We can make a real change in people’s lives by the way we live ours.
Jesus said, “Be not conformed, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” So I believe that as we step into our identity in Christ and who He’s created us to be that our face actually shines. Jesus says that we’re supposed to be the light of the world. I believe that light shines brightest in the darkness, and I believe the darker it is, the brighter we shine. And I believe that if our identity is secure in who God created us to be, then we’ll be able to represent Jesus well everywhere we go. I believe that God wants His bride to be pure and powerful. He wants her to walk in purity and He wants her to walk in power.
Jesus satisfied and paid the price for me so that I could enter into a place by grace as a son—not an orphan—as a son, knowing who I am in Christ. The Bible doesn’t say, “Deny the devil, pick up your cross and follow him.” The devil’s not your problem. You are. It says to know yourself. Know the way you think. There’s a way that seems right to a man…and it’s killing us. The devil is a liar. He’s finished, he’s cut off, and he’s trying to recreate himself in your mind. Know your mind.
I can’t afford to read that Bible with my carnal mind and think that I know it because I can quote it. The only scripture that we really know is the one that we can walk out. God doesn’t want us to be professional quoters. He said, “Be in relationship with me. My word is alive and sharp and active. Sharper than any two-edged sword. It’s able to divide and separate the soul from the spirit.” You read that stuff and say, “God my life isn’t what this says, and I need it to be. Help me father. This is who you say I am. God, make me become this word. God, this is who you say I am. Here I am God, your son. Show me what it means to be a son.”
You don’t want to just pray for people and not be practical. If you are going to say that you represent Jesus on your job, then you want to do your job better than everybody else. Especially when you’re going to pray for people at the same time. When I got saved, I got a job and I started praying for people everywhere I went. It was just normal to work really hard and to pray for people, to never let my job go bad because of praying. You don’t want to be so heavenly minded that you’re no earthly good. You want to be so heavenly minded that you’re earthly incredible, and your boss wants more people just like you.
Holiness Is the Byproduct of Relationship
We need to let our roots go down deep into the love of God. We are to love God with all of our heart, our soul, our strength and our mind, and love our neighbor as ourselves. The reality of our life in love with Jesus in the public eye is amazing, but it starts with His eye being on you in private. I love my one-on-one time with my Father more than anything. It’s that time right there, just me and Him. Holiness to me is my state of love relationship with my Father. You’ve called me into holiness; a royal priesthood; a holy nation set apart. We are a people that represent the name of Jesus through our lifestyle. Ask God to help to train your senses to discern between both good and evil. I want to live my life in love with you every day and I only want those things in my life that you love and I don’t want those things in my life that you don’t love. So honestly, it’s a secret love relationship with the father that’s on public display; what’s revealed is holiness. It’s supernatural, it’s miraculous, and it’s amazing.
We weren’t just born into sin, we have been cultivated by the very enemy of God. Our minds have been trained by the liar, by deception. Even if you grew up in church, if you haven’t pressed in to relationship on your own, you still have been trained by the world. Like with weed. I used to tell people that God made this, and God thinks it’s good. This is “medicinal.” If God made weed, God also made poppy seeds, therefore he also made heroin. If God made coca, he also made cocaine. God didn’t make that stuff so that we could get drunk and high and be buzzing all the time. You know God created us in His image and in the likeness of God He made man. Jesus restored that which was lost, so that we could walk like Christ walked.
A lot of times people are struggling with pornography or similar things. Many people ask me to pray for them that these thoughts would just go away. We’re in a day where people want something microwaved, something delivered to them without having to deal with it on their own. You can’t simply come to a prayer line and expect these things to go away permanently. All God’s asking you to do is apply yourself to a relationship, and the Holy Spirit will bring massive conviction inside of you. I am talking about growing in your personal relationship with God. And if you’re not willing to do that, you will never be free. There is a necessity for you to surrender. Surrender doesn’t just mean I’m going to try harder, or I’m going to go to church on Sunday. When you desire and seek God with everything you are, with all your heart, all your soul, and with all your strength and mind, it will become available to you. Surrender to the truth of what He says. Get on your knees and open your Bible in a quiet place and ask God to teach you who He says you are.
It’s time to give up compromise.
God says, “Let fornication not even be named among you as is fitting for saints.” And Jesus said if you love me, obey my commandments. One of the commandments is not to commit adultery. Adultery is not just cheating on your wife. Jesus defines adultery as actually committing lustful thoughts in your heart. People say, “I can’t help it because I fall into sin.” I don’t believe it’s a fall, I believe it is a gradual descent…because you haven’t protected your conscience. You haven’t guarded it from things that are not okay. There’s a way that seems right to a man, and in the end it’s destruction. It’s time to give up compromise. You need to ask God to convict you of things that are right to Him because living in that lifestyle, you’re living in the way that seems right to a man. The wisdom of the world is sensual and demonic. It’s self-seeking and empty, and every evil thing is in there. Sexual immorality separates you from an intimate relationship with God.
God loves you regardless of whether or not you sleep with your girlfriend or boyfriend. It’s not stopping God from loving you. But by the fact that you’re doing it, you’re actually telling God, “I don’t love you. I choose to serve myself. I choose to serve how I feel rather than what you say.” If you’re going to sleep with your girlfriend or boyfriend and think that God’s okay with it, you’re going to answer for your life one day when you stand before him. You can call it whatever you want, but it is sin, and it is twisted. I’d rather warn you now than you to be forced to your knees later before God, and answer for your life and all the people that you affected.
We can’t afford as Christians to compromise our faith and get high, or get drunk, or look like the world. We can’t afford to compromise to try to “reach people,” because that’s not reaching people. That’s actually hyper grace. It’s a twisted thing where people think, “I’m under grace I can do this. God will forgive me.” No. Jesus paid a price for you to be free from every addiction. Anything that’s a vice, even if there’s something in your life where you know it’s a stumbling block for other people, there should be none of that in you because you don’t want to cause anybody to stumble. So it’s really important that I be really secure in my identity, but also to walk the way God created me to walk so that I can represent Jesus. To be an imitator of Christ. Walk away from a situation when that’s what Jesus would do. That’s really what should happen in a Christian’s life. Be bold, be courageous, be free, be pure, be holy as He is holy. If every Christian would know what it means to be a son and a daughter they would change every sphere of influence that they’re in. God wants to restore what sin defiled, so the focus is identity in sonship. When you see that you’ve been adopted, it’s so powerful.
Grace empowers us to walk out what truth calls us to.
Life is a gift. You’ve got this short opportunity—you get to leave a legacy of what it looks like for someone to be possessed by God. Grace enables me to walk like Christ walked, and Christ never tried to sin and get away with it. He walked free from that, and He did it all for us so that we could step into the same thing. I’m not talking about perfection in my own strength. I’m talking about His perfection. You can live in the fear of man or in the fear of the Lord. The fear of the Lord isn’t the scary thing, it’s the only place to live. If you want to live without fear, then you have to understand the blood of Jesus, because it’s the perfect love of God that casts out all fear. When I got born again, I left habitual sin. I didn’t want to do it anymore. Your conscience gets clean and washed by the blood, and it enables your conscience to be free from wanting to sin. When you get born again, your conscience gets sensitized by the blood of Jesus. He cleanses my conscience from dead works in order to serve God, so my conscience is completely clean; and if I don’t violate it, it stays that way.
Why do we have the helmet of salvation? Why is it on our head? A helmet of salvation is given to encapsulate the reality of a believer’s identity so it cannot be torn away by lies. The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but are mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, taking every thought that rises itself up against the knowledge of God captive. So how do we do that? You don’t just get hands laid on you to get the thoughts to go away. You have to continue in truth. You have to study the word to show yourself approved. You have to not be conformed to the world. The world will try to squeeze you, mold you, shape you, make you look just like it, but God wants to transform you by the renewing of your mind. So that everywhere you go you know what is and what is not the will of God.
What if the Christian life was all about this? What if this was why we’re alive?
Everywhere we go there are people that are asking God for a sign, and you just might be that sign. We have the opportunity to transform people’s lives with each person we encounter. How can we do that if we remain unclean and look exactly like the world? If we all realized how much He loves each and every one of us, we would live our lives holy and pure. Because when people see you live a life that’s not unto the Lord they want nothing to do with the Lord. Hypocrisy is not just damaging to you, it’s damaging to everyone that sees you. Cold or Hot. I wish that you were cold or hot, because cold God can switch you like a light switch to burning. Hot you are burning and nothing can slow you down. When you’re burning, you’re on fire with His love, with His goodness, with His grace, with His mercy, with His purity. God wants us to be pure in heart because you can’t even see God unless you’re pure in heart. And you need to see God when you look in the mirror. You see Christ in you, the hope of glory. You can’t afford to live with junk in your closet.
Where is the Christian that would run full steam, full on with God, and believe the absolute truth of what the blood of Jesus has done? Where is the Christian that believes that you can actually walk and be holy? That doesn’t mean that I’m never going to miss it. But if I slip, I don’t stay in the slip and do it again, and stay in the slip and do it again, and stay in the slip and do it again. If I slip, I confess it to God and He’s faithful and just to wash me clean with blood. Completely faithful. He’ll cleanse me of all unrighteousness.
The least that we can do is fully surrender and live our life in a godly way and be a representation of what Jesus looked like on this earth. The least we can do is surrender everything to Him. That we walk in a way that’s convicting to everyone around us. That’s all God’s asking you to do, to be a living epistle known and read by all men. So that one day when we stand before God you don’t have blood on your hands from people that you’ve lived like a hypocrite in front of.
Get before God right now. Don’t play. Don’t mess around with this thing.
If you’re in a place where you think God doesn’t see your life, you’re wrong. He sees everything. Little children, don’t you be deceived. The one who practices righteousness is righteous. The one who practices sin is of the devil. Righteousness bears its fruit unto holiness. Everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself just as Jesus is pure. Everyone who practices sin also practices lawlessness—and sin is lawlessness. Know that He appeared in order to take away sin, that in Him there is no sin. No one who abides in Him sins. I pray that God would sear you in righteousness, sear you in holiness, and that God would baptize you in fear of the Lord.
Right now you’re saying to Jesus, “I surrender all.” You’re saying, “I am willing to give everything that I’ve always been about, to have You. Lord Jesus, I believe that You died on the cross for my sin to be wiped away. You valued me so much that You came and You died for me. While I was yet a sinner, Christ died for me. Your blood, Lord Jesus, takes away my sin. And everything that I wish I’d never done gets wiped out right now, today.” The blood of Jesus has cleansed you from all sin. He says He’s faithful and just to cleanse you of all unrighteousness if you just ask Him. Pursue holiness. Pursue a relationship with God. Learn your identity. You have become pure and holy.
* Although rearranged and edited, this work is from Todd White.
White, Todd. “Todd White – Pure and Holy”. Todd White – Lifestyle Christianity. Dec 14, 2018.
