The King Wore the Crown, Daniel Carried It Inside: Ready for Promotion

Sermon outline

The invisible creates the visible: promotion comes to believers who build a consciousness of God's blessing on the inside through His Word and who are faithful now with what God has already put in their hands.

1. A king fell on his face before Daniel

   King Nebuchadnezzar fell prostrate before Daniel and commanded that an offering and incense be presented to him. Everyone bowed to the king, never the other way round. If God could make a king bow to a child of God, no circumstance is so overwhelming that you need to bow to it.

   “There's no circumstance that is so overwhelming that you need to bow to it.”

   • Daniel 2:46

2. Poverty, sickness and smallness are a mentality

   Preachers repeat certain truths not because they have run out of material, but to permeate your consciousness, because a mentality cannot be changed by one sermon. As the Word enters, it brings light, and one day when someone says you will be poor all your life, your spirit rises up and says 'not me'. God's Word is like a hammer that breaks rock, so even the most fortified wrong thinking will break.

   Illustration: You may be living in one room with little furniture and not much grocery; that does not matter as much as what is happening in your spirit.

   “Poverty is a mentality. Sickness is a mentality. Thinking small is a mentality.”

   • Psalm 119:130
   • Jeremiah 23:29

3. Wealth and healing gravitate to a consciousness

   Do not try to get wealthy by copying someone, such as going into debt for the kind of car they drive, without changing on the inside. A miracle can be received and lost if you keep speaking wrong because you think wrong, since out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. He tells his pastors to preach from the overflow of their spirit, not to pump out what is not there.

   “Wealth and good things in life gravitates to a consciousness.”

   • Matthew 12:34

4. They that be with us are more than they that be with them

   When Elisha's servant saw the Syrian army surrounding them, Elisha prayed that his eyes would be opened, and he saw horses and chariots of fire. Can you look at your bank balance and the people around you and say that what is on the inside is more? Feed your spirit with the Word, books and teaching, and young people especially should develop their spirits now, or their qualifications will be run from an impoverished spirit. God is so big that He does not give birth to small things.

   “If you don't develop your spirit now, you'll be an impoverished adult.”

   • 2 Kings 6:15-17
   • Proverbs 23:7

5. The king wore the crown; Daniel had the crown in his heart

   The king had the crown and the robe on the outside; Daniel had them on the inside, and the invisible always creates the visible. So the king confessed Daniel's God as God of gods, promoted him, gave him many great gifts and made him ruler over the province of Babylon. If promotion and gifts are not coming, it is not that God is against you; you have not yet given enough time to meditating on His Word in that area.

   “So the invisible always creates the visible.”

   • Daniel 2:47-48

6. You are already blessed: the heavenly places are in Christ, and Christ is in you

   Promotion will not come simply because you pray. God 'has blessed' us, past tense, with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places in Christ, so saying 'I'm rich' or 'I'm healthy' is not bragging but declaring what God has said. If Christ is in you, your blessings, health and promotion are on the inside of you, to the measure of revelation of the Word you have received. Three believers can all love God and be loved by Him, and the difference between them is that measure.

   Illustration: Some people pray, 'I prayed one hour in tongues yesterday, today one hour fifteen minutes, God you've got to hear me', as if God were a miser, when He wants to clap His hands and say, 'Look at my child, he's doing well.'

   “Every blessing you would ever need in this life is on the inside of you.”

   • Ephesians 1:3-4
   • Romans 8:34

7. Out of Egypt, but still with a wilderness mentality

   When you are born again, you are translated in one transaction from Egypt into the promised land of God's grace and favour, but many believers still carry a wilderness mentality. Develop a new consciousness by studying, meditating, confessing and prophesying the Word every day, so that when sickness or lack comes, your spirit immediately rejects it.

   Illustration: Every morning he confesses, 'I have no lack in my life, I have a debt cancellation anointing functioning in me, I'm wealthy', and 'I'm the healed of the Lord'. He speaks to himself in the car and the shower, and does not wonder about his church but declares it 'crammed, jammed and grown'.

   “You may not be physically in the wilderness, but you are wilderness in the mentality.”

8. Are you ready? What are you doing now with what you have?

   The test for promotion is what you are doing now with what God has given you. 'Lord' means boss, so if He has told you to be an usher, a deacon, a cell group leader or involved in ministry, obey, even if it costs your private time. Not everyone can handle prosperity, and many people are too busy for God once they are promoted. Love and serve Him at your present level and you are ready for promotion, and favour will not only follow you but overtake you.

   Illustration: You want the dessert, the ice cream, but God says starter first. He never wanted to be a pastor and ran from the call 'like Jonah' for years, until one day, driving home from work, the Lord told him that if he did not answer the call he would die. He began serving his pastor and running crusades, which became his training ground.

   “Maybe you are preventing your own promotion.”