Living The Above Life Part 2 : Bishop Tony Samuels

And the Lord shall make thee the head, and not the tail; and thou shalt be above only, and thou shalt not be beneath; if that thou hearken unto the commandments of the Lord thy God, which I command thee this day, to observe and to do them…  - Deuteronomy 28:13 (KJV)

From the beginning, we were created to live the Above Life. Genesis 1:26 says, And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. Notice, from the beginning the Lord wanted man to have dominion over creation.  Psalms 8:6 says, You have delegated to them rulership over all you have made, with everything under their authority, placing earth itself under the feet of your image-bearers. Adam lost this position, but through Jesus we have been restored to this place of dominion and authority. The enemy wants us to be ignorant of this truth!

 There is a realm in God that is available for us to walk in, an above realm…but to walk in it, we will have to fight for it, because there is an enemy that does not want to see us walking in this above realm. Psalms 62:4 says, They consult only to throw him down from his high position [to dishonor him]; They delight in lies. They bless with [the words of] their mouths, but inwardly they curse. Look at the same verse in the Passion Translation: Liars, hypocrites, with nothing good to say— all their energies are spent on moving me from this exalted place. You see, the enemy is upset, because what we have is the place that he wanted; but the Lord cast him down and gave us the place that is above.

Now, to live this Above Life, we are going to have to live a life of obedience to the Lord. Look at Deuteronomy 28:1:  And it shall come to pass, if thou shalt hearken diligently unto the voice of the Lord thy God, to observe and to do all his commandments which I command thee this day, that the Lord thy God will set thee on high above all nations of the earth. When I talk about obedience, I am not talking about law; I am talking about the condition of your heart; having a heart that wants to obey God; a heart that wants to do God’s will, not its own will. It’s not about perfection; it’s about attitude.

 Once we enter into obedience, we have to understand process. The process is relationship, restoration, preparation, and then promotion. It’s important that we discern what season we are in, because the enemy has done a good job at breaking the process of God in our lives. But it’s this process which will determine whether or not we live the Above Life. As we walk with God, we will experience the goodness of God, and our life will be on a continual trajectory of going up. The world calls it trending up. That’s why, no matter what, we can’t let life get us down or take us down, because our flow is up and never down!

 So, my brothers and sisters, be excited about your future, because things are looking up for you and yours. The Lord is taking you to a high place in Him!!!! Ephesians 3: 20: Now to Him Who, by (in consequence of) the [action of His] power that is at work within us, is able to [carry out His purpose and] do superabundantly, far over and above all that we [dare] ask or think [infinitely beyond our highest prayers, desires, thoughts, hopes, or dreams!!!!

Be Blessed In The Above Life,