Donald E Coleman 0:21

All right. Welcome back to again the Daily Live In for Christ. And we are going to just jump right in. I don't want to kind of beat around on this one. So we're in the last episode on this series. It's kind of the detour series, is what I'm calling it. And it was beloved, the journey of leaving Egypt, entering the wilderness, and awakening as a new creation. And I think it's important for us, and I want to hit some high points before I go through. No, actually, I think I'll go through it and then I'll hit the high points because I want you to get everything out of this. There's a lot that came on this detour, and I want to use an example in the Bible that a lot of us know about. Jesus took a detour, and he took a major detour in one of his destinations, and he went to a place that was outside of the norm. And what happened in that detour was pretty profound. And most people don't really pay attention to it. We talk about some of the verses that pop up, but it was interesting on the detour. And I believe God took us on a detour through these seven episodes that talked about the journey or the wilderness and the desert, like the purpose of it. And what I want you to take from this is that wilderness experience that you may be in or you may go through. We're all going to go through wilderness experiences, is God is with us in the wilderness and he's trying to bring something out of us. And I will highlight tonight what he's trying to bring out of us and a constant way of getting it to flow for us to receive it and accept it and make it a part of our lives. So I'm calling this episode belovedness, because that's what this is all about. Belovedness, the promise that awaits the journey. And this is the key because today we arrive at the hidden, the gift that's hidden in every Egypt, every wilderness, every awakening as new creation. It's hidden underneath the surface, and most of us don't ever get to experience it at its fullness. But what I believe happened to us last year when we started on the invitation to wholeness, and then around March or April, it changed to a journey of wholeness. And then in July of last year, the the revealing, God revealed the hidden river, talking about the five principles of God's agape. And out of agape, we God revealed to us belovedness. So there is three derivatives that flow out of agape. Agape is God, is the God, the love that flows from God. So you cannot separate agape from God. So whenever you hear someone say agape, they are saying God because God is love. And the love that flows from God is agape. And that's why for me, getting that revelation that I shared with you guys earlier, understanding that the first revelation that I got like five years ago was we were created by love to be loved and to love others, which is a beautiful statement. So love brought us forth. And as an act of love bringing us forth, we were all created to be loved. And I want you to grab a hold of what that to be love actually means. We're to be loved from first, God loves us. And then because of what transpired, we're searching for love outside of God. That's the human challenge, that's the human destiny. They're searching for that love because we were created by love. Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you. That's what God revealed to us through Jeremiah. And then it says, we were created by love to be loved and what? To love others. And what we are finding out, and what we're seeing now is we can't love others if we have not received the love that we so desire. And that love can only come from God. And as we are able to receive that love from God, and God fills us up with that love, then that love is able to flow from us to others. Remember, I told you about the Jesus' first miracle and the ceremonial jugs that were waiting there to be filled. I just want you to see yourself as that ceremonial jug waiting for agape to fill us and to fill you so that what? So that that water can be turned to wine or that filling can be turned and flow back out. And then they say you've saved the best for last, so that they can only acknowledge God. So in 2020, the revelation was we were created by love to be loved and to love others. And then after July, the revelation that flowed out of it was we were created by agape to be agape. That word means beloved. So we were created by agape. Let me say it this way: we were created by agape to be beloved and to belove others. So now to be love others moves that agape into an outflow. So belove means we receive it, and to put it out means it's it's the flow. So the Greek words is agape, agape tos, and agape tan. But all three of those words have the root of divine love in it, and what I got out of that expansion of the revelation in July was that divine love is greater than human love. So the love that we were created by is greater, it was greater than human love. So, in spite of whatever transpired in our lives, whatever has gone well or good or bad or indifferent wounds, trauma, all that stuff, we were beloved. And in all situations, God was there. So here's the thing I want to say before I go into my lesson. Whoever is getting this, go ahead and receive this. The difference between wounds and trauma is a thin line. You see, when when we go through situations or circumstances, is when we don't know that God is there with us and God is there to comfort us in those situations, they can become a womb and a trauma. You see, but God is present in all situations. But here's the thing: if we are not consciously acknowledging or aware that God is with us, that thing can actually grab a hold of us and have a lasting effect on us. And this is why receiving our belovedness and living from a place of being beloved allows God to go in and clean or heal anything that has ever been wrong, that not wrong, but that has gone contrary to agape in our lives. I want you to really grab a hold of that. That's why this is so important for us this year as we step into this year of really diving in on agape or um our belovedness from a point of claiming it and living from a place of our belovedness, or living loved is the way that we can say it. And that word love is living from a place of agape. So when you think about it today, the hidden, the gift that's hidden in every Egypt, Egypt, we've learned, go back to episode one, is kind of the place that we grew up. It's the place that we were formed. It's our house, it's our family, it's the neighborhood, it's the community, it's the nation in which we live in. It's the culture that we lived in. That doesn't define us. You got to understand that. It does not define us because we were living in it, but it may shape us, but it doesn't define us. And the wilderness we see that in the wilderness, from a historical perspective, from a Jewish tradition, and even from a Christian tradition, all the way up from the third century, all the way up to today, there have been Christians that have gone into the desert. Why? Because they've separated themselves from the things of the world. And most people don't even realize why they even went into the desert. Because the thing that if you understood why the desert mothers and fathers went in, it'll help you realize the power of what goes on in the wilderness. They went to the wilderness because Constantine had declared Christianity as the religion of the empire. So the very thing that was persecuting the church now became something that was a part of the church. And then before you knew it, being a Christian was like everyday living, where it was supposed to be something that was great and mighty, it did not work that way. And over time, the church lost its zeal because it became commonplace or cliche. So the monks, the desert mothers and fathers decided, well, wait a minute. If Rome is no longer our enemy, then we have to separate ourselves from there so that we can really tap into God and really understand. Because now politics and all this stuff was running the church. It was about the false self-saboteurs running the church. And when we understand this, we can now offer grace and compassion to others that we see in church that may not be living up to their God belovedness. Because we were once there. And that's what that's what people have a hard time with. They have a difficulty seeing someone that does something that's ungodly and they were supposed to be, you know, a Christian or this or that. But we're human. And in essence, I know why they're doing it, because the church has judged people for so long that it has a zero tolerance when someone in the church does something that every other human does. So they want to ridicule us. But God is calling us back to the wilderness or to desert, not physically. I'm saying he's calling us back inward. He's calling us to a place of communion where there is limited distractions. He's calling us to a time of communion. And this is what I've been saying since July. There's an outpouring of a desire, a longing that's getting bigger inside of people. You can't, there's not enough stuff to fill that longing that's going on. And now what we're seeing is that dissatisfaction. I always called it a divine dissatisfaction. People can't feel it, so now they're starting to act out. They're starting to act in ways that are unbecoming. There is no value for human life anymore. There's no value for people, there's no value for opinions anymore. You either pick a side or get out of the way. But God is not on the on the right or the left, God is always with the and, and God is always on the side of humanity. And we as Christians, true believers, has to be on the side of humanity. Why? Because we were created by agape. Agape brought forth every human that is alive and that has ever been alive. God called us forth. None of us is greater than others. We may think we are, but we're not. We're all the same in God's eyes. So our identity is in the belovedness of God. So my identity is in the beloved of God, and your identity is in the beloved of God. So let me read Matthew 3.17 because I'm just gonna focus on this verse here because I want you to get this because it's important that you read this and you read it in context, because Matthew 3.14, I mean 17, is the first time that publicly people hear that Jesus is the beloved of God. And in the same way that Jesus is hearing the beloved of God, every believer that accepts Christ becomes the beloved of God. And here, let me read it. I'm gonna read at 16. So actually, I will read from 13 and I'll just read down to 17 to keep it in context. And it's the baptism of Jesus. So it says, Then Jesus came to Galilee to the Jordan to be baptized by John. But John tried to deter him, saying, I need to be baptized by you, and you and do you come to me? Jesus replied, Let it be so now it is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness. So Jesus said, John, you need to do this so that we fulfill all righteousness, or that the prophecy that was spoken hundreds of years ago may be fulfilled on this day. Then John consented. So look, 16, it says, As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water, and at that moment heaven was opened, and the spirit, and they and he saw the spirit of God descending like a dove, and a lightning on him. So it was a a light, a great light was on Jesus. And here's verse 17, and it says, And a voice from heaven said, This is my son, and whom I love. That word love there is agapitos, in whom I beloved is what that word is, and it says, With him I am well pleased. So I want you to grab this and understand before Jesus does anything in ministry, God declares that he's beloved, and and listen now, and he's well pleased, and before we do anything in ministry for God, technically, we don't do things for God, we do things with God, but with God, God is saying to us, you are beloved, you do not earn belovedness, you don't strive for belovedness, you don't achieve belovedness, our belovedness is a gift from God, and no one is greater or lesser in the kingdom, and no one has greater or lesser belovedness, it's not human love. So when you read this, it's important to always remember that in everything you do, you're beloved, and what God is going to do, and God is doing in us this year in 2026. I remember I talked about 10 and I talked about the number. What God is doing is it is a duh a year of double portion of grace, it is a year that's going to allow us to step in to our belovedness and not only just know it in thought, but to live it in bodily action. So every destiny or every destination, the destination of every journey is this learning that we're beloved. Every destination, every journey, every endpoint within the journey, every situation, a circumstance that we go through, the good, the not so good, is for God to reveal to us that we're beloved. Yes, he allows life situations to teach us that we're beloved. But the first thing that happens is we become aware of our belovedness in God, and through these lessons, I'm gonna tie this all in now so that you can understand this. So the destination of every journey is belovedness, right? Abraham receives a new identity, right? He went from Abram to Abraham, Israel receives a covenant identity, went from Jacob to Israel. Jesus receives a public identity as the beloved son of. Of God. And here's what happens to us. Believers receive their spiritual identity. I want you to just grab that. And I was thinking about this this week, and this is a perfect time to really kind of put this in. What if we shifted our mindset? What if we started to think that we are spiritual beings on an earthly adventure to get back home? Versus we are humans on a spiritual journey. What if we acknowledged our belovedness in God as being we're spiritual beings? Amago Day. We were created in the image of God, and we're on an earthly journey to get back home to what? To agape, to God. And it doesn't matter how long we live on this earth, our journey is to get back to God the Father, is to be back in the presence and in the fullness of being present. And we can experience that presence with God as we are on earth, as we become more consciously aware. So first it's inside aware that God is in us, Emmanuel, and God is with us. In and with us, in all things, God is there. So the key here is that believers, we receive our spiritual identity, but it's through the walk of life, the shift moves from human first to spiritual. See, we came out and we we thought we were like, hey, we're humans. So we started to think in what? What's the first thing that humans think that we're separated from God? That's one of the greatest challenges of the spiritual life is that we're separated from God, that God is out there and we're here. That we're we're alone, we're away from God. But belovedness says that God is with us. And belovedness doesn't leave us. I want you to grab that. And belovedness doesn't actually dissipate. There is no less of agape. Once you receive agape, God's belovedness, you get it all. And it's it's our ability to allow it to flow like the hidden river. The hidden river is always flowing. The key here is have we acknowledged that that river has been flowing in us and underneath us and through us? So let me say this again: Abraham receives a new identity, Israel receives a covenant identity, and Jesus receives a public identity, and believers receive their spiritual identity. All of these can be summed up in one word. Beloved. Just listen to that. Beloved there's just so much power in saying that. Say it to yourself right now. I am beloved. Go ahead and say it again. I am beloved. You see, there is a power in being able to say that I am beloved. And it's greater than it. I don't know about you, but for me, when I say I'm loved, I got that. But when it says I'm beloved, man, it just changes everything for me. It reaches to the depths of my being. And I've made it a point to declare that I'm beloved every day, multiple times a day. I'm saying now that I'm beloved. Because I'm I'm I'm reshaping my way of thinking. Because for a long time I thought that God's love was like human love. Conditional, inconsistent, and distant. But I was wrong. It had to do with my view, it had to do with how I saw God. God was right there with me all along, but because I was not spiritually aware or allowing myself to be conscious of God's presence, I equated human love to agape. And everything in 2025 shifted for me. And I have been a believer for 29 years. And everything shifted when I got the true understanding of agape. Like every time we breathe in, we are breathing in God, which means we're breathing in agape. We're breathing in the love of God with every breath. I mean, can you just catch that? With every breath, we're breathing in the love of God. So from the time that we came out of the womb to where we are today, we've breathed in the love of God that has kept given us life on earth. And here's the thing. And if we breathe our last breath on earth, where will we end up? Right back into the Father's house. We'll be present with God to spend eternity with God who beloved us before we were created. I don't know about you guys, but that that to me is just beautiful. And before I move on, I want, I want, let me read this because I want you to catch this. I'm going to go over to John, but the key here is the beloved identity is the foundation. It's our foundation. And we've for too long in Christianity, we have not focused on our beloved identity in Christ. You see, we've talked about, you know, our life in Christ, but it's our beloved identity in Christ. So belovedness is our true name. Belovedness is our eternal identity. And belovedness is our spiritual or true inheritance. And belovedness is our anchor in the wilderness or the desert. In any dry situation, any setback, any challenge, opportunity, belovedness is our anchor. And belovedness is our freedom from the protective self and the false self saboteurs. From the judge, from hyper-achiever, from the stickular, from controller to hyperrational, hyper-vigilant. Belovedness is what gives us the strength to loosen the grip of our ego self or our false self, whatever you want to call it. But I want you to really grab a hold of this journey that we've taken. And here's the key: the last point before I move on. Our participation in agape. So belovedness is our participation in what? Agape or in God. In God's love. Everything begins here. Everything begins with agape. And everything returns to agape. I just want you to think how beautiful that is. So our participation in agape, belovedness is us actively participating in agape, not just knowing about it, but allowing ourselves to be filled that agape may flow out of us. Because if we're filled by agape, the fruits of the spirit will start to flow out of us. Love, joy, peace, patience, long-suffering, perseverance, kindness. But I want you to see what a journey, on a journey that Jesus went. And this is why I don't want you to discredit journeys. I mean detours. I'm sorry, I said journeys, but detours. I don't want you to ever discredit a detour. When God, when you go into a desert experience or you go into a dry season or a wilderness experience, I don't ever want you to discredit that because if you're if God is allowing you to go in it, God wants to reveal something to you. And he wants you to get quiet enough so that he can reveal to you what is actually going forward or what needs to go forward. So I'm in John chapter four. And I'm going to read here because I just want you to get a little bit about what's going on. And in John chapter four, this is after Jesus was preaching, right? He had done lots of preaching. And it says here, it says, now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was gaining, and he was gaining, right? Heard that he was gaining popularity and baptizing more disciples than John. And it says, although in fact this was not Jesus who was baptizing, but his disciples. So Jesus left Judea and he went to Galilee. But now watch this. And he says he and he went back once more to Galilee. Let me get that right. It says, now he had to go through Samaria. I want you to understand that. That was not by choice. That is a detour. Because Jews did not go through Samaria because they were enemies of each other. That's why the Good Samaritan parable brings more clarity to this detour. I want you to read it. Go back and read. And read it in each one of the gospels, and you'll understand this detour that happens. But look what happens on this detour. So it says, so he came to the town in Samaria called Sakar, near a plot of ground, Jacob. Who's Jacob? Israel. Right? The ground Jacob was given to his son Joseph. Jacob's well was there, and Jesus tried, as he was from, he was tired from his journey, sat down by the well, and it was about noontime. I want to preface this. Nobody goes to get water at noontime. They go early in the morning before the sun gets hot. But look what happens here on the detour. Now, when the Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, Will you give me a drink? His disciples had gone into town to buy food. So now it's just Jesus and the woman in the middle of the desert getting water in the noonday. This is a picture of a wilderness experience. And we're gonna see more that she is in a pretty messed up situation. So she is one-on-one with God in the wilderness in search of water. I don't know if you ever noticed it that way, but here's what it is. But look what comes out of this conversation in verse 9. The Samaritan woman said to him, You are a Jew, and I am a Samaritan woman, not just a Samaritan, a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a jerk a drink? For Jews do not associate with Samaritans. Now you understand the point of the detour. Jesus answered her and says, Well, if you knew the gift of God and who it is that asked you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water. You're starting to see this now. Look what the now Jesus got her attention on the detour. She is one-on-one with God. So I'm looking at this now from a I'm looking back into this. I'm seeing this through eyes of the spirit. She's one-on-one with God in the wilderness, and now God has her attention. And look what the woman says next in verse 11. I want you to please grab a hold of this, sir. The woman said, You have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? Keep going now. Watch this. Are you greater than our father Jacob? Wait a minute. She's a Samaritan and they're enemies, but Jacob is their father. Israel is the same. They're all part of the same thing. They had a schism. I want you to see this. And it says, Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us this well, and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and livestock? And look what Jesus says, right? Look what God is about to say to her. I'm going to say Jesus, but I'm seeing God now because I'm I'm going, I'm reading from the text, but I'm also reading from our now understanding, knowing that Jesus was God there to save us. And look what happens. Jesus answered, and he says, Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again. But whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of living water welling up to eternal life. Remember, agape keeps flowing, agape never stops. So Jesus is revealing that the love of God, agape of God, is like water that flows in us and keeps flowing up out of us. And we we know the story here. And I want you to understand, we know the story. So I don't need to read all of the story. Now Jesus is saying, hey, before you can get this water, let's get life in order. That's what verse 15 is talking about. Her husbands or whatever it is in the situations. And then Jesus in verse 17, he drops down and he says, Listen, you're right when you say that you have no husband. In fact, you've had five husbands, and the man that you are now have is not your husband. You got it? What you have just said is quite true. So she's telling the truth. So now Jesus, God gets her attention again. Sir, the woman said, I can see that you are a prophet. Look what's happening now. She's now starting to recognize God in the situation. She's starting to recognize her true identity in this situation. This is such a beautiful story here, guys. I mean, a beautiful situation that God's unreal. Verse 20 says, Our ancestors worship on this mountain. But you Jews, notice, you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem. So they tried to, there was a schism, like here or there, whatever it was. Let's keep going. Verse 21. The woman, woman, Jesus replied, believe me. A time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know. We worship what we do know, for salvation is from, is from the Jews. I want you to get this now. But yet a time is coming and now has come when true, the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. For they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship him in spirit and in truth. I want you to just see that. That little detour that Jesus took revealed to her a lot of things, and she became an evangelist. Out of her new identity, she became an evangelist and she brought the whole town out. And Jesus stayed longer in Samaritan. And what happened? People got healed. And people got restored. And when Jesus left, they were still evangelizing what had happened. And this is why it's important for us to understand this. When we accept our belovedness, so from identity, from our identity of belovedness, it flows out flow, it flows outward. So from identity to overflow. So remember the ceremonies. It was empty. I want you to look at those jugs, and those jugs represent us. We were empty. They were ceremonial jugs, right? So they were used for special occasions. But until they got filled, they were just sitting there. But as when they got filled, and when God said, Go fill them with water, Jesus says, Go fill them with water and show them to the other people. That is us being filled and being displayed before others, allowing agape to flow out of us. So from identity to overflow, I want you to grab this. From our beloved Identity goes into overflow. So when you awakened as the beloved agapitan, something begins to flow outward, agapitos. Well, let me say it this way. I don't even want to say something. It says, when you awaken to the beloved, agapitan, agapitos begins to flow outward. And what does that look like? Compassion. Presence. You start to seek God's presence in all things. Wisdom starts to flow out of you. Courage starts to flow out of you. Blessing starts to flow out of you. And love that is greater than human love starts to flow out of you. You become a conduit of the same agape that called Abraham, that led Israel, and sustained Jesus, and now forms us. So I want you to think about these questions and I want you to whisper this slowly to yourself again. I am beloved of God. I am beloved of God. One more time. I am beloved of God. And as that sits with you, I want to throw this question. Where do you feel resistance when you say that I am beloved? What part of you is not willing to allow that to flow? Just stay with it. Or where do you feel an invitation to step greater into belovedness? And where do you feel awakening? Because that's what belovedness is about. It is about us becoming awakened to our belovedness in God and receiving that we're beloved, that belovedness can flow out of us. So I want to thank you for just being with me on this detour, because it's important for us to understand that this detour was to reveal about the desert. The desert experiences are designed to reveal more of our belovedness in God. So as you wake up every morning from this day forward, declare, good morning, Father, I am beloved. Right? And keep reminding yourself throughout the day. When you have a moment where there's just a void of time, a second of time, I want you to think about and just say it. I am beloved of God. You see, I want you to keep doing this because eventually what's going to happen is it's no longer just going to be words you say. You're going to become what you say. I am beloved. And as you become beloved and you live in that beloved, belovedness, it can now flow to others. So I want to thank you for hanging out with me on this one. And in the next episode, we're going to go right back to our belovedness. We're going to see Jesus in action and we're going to talk more about belovedness. That's where we were before we took a detour into the desert to explain why our desert experiences and wilderness experiences are so important. So I want you to be blessed. Until next time, stay strong and stay the course and keep living daily for Christ.