Understanding Your Priesthood by Pastor Poju Oyemade: MP3 Download & Sermon Notes

The Priesthood Is the Root, the Kingship Is the Fruit

The priesthood is invisible, the kingship is visible. What is done in secret is the priesthood; what is rewarded openly is the kingly anointing. The very foundation of operating as a king in the marketplace is fulfilling ministry as a priest first. A priest is called to minister directly to God, entering the courts of God, and then carrying certain graces outward into the marketplace. If this priesthood is not understood, a believer entering the marketplace will be subjected to the corruption that is already there.

1 Peter 2:5 As holy priests, believers are to offer up spiritual sacrifices well pleasing to God. These sacrifices are hidden and described throughout scripture, and once a believer consciously offers them, the effect becomes visible in their life. This is what could be called the doctrine of exemption: what may happen to others cannot happen to that person in the same way. A believer will still go through tribulation, but the promise is not exemption from trouble, it is the guarantee of overcoming.

What an Altar Is

An altar is a platform or gateway through which a deity legally accesses the physical realm, a place of exchange where weakness is removed and strength is given. Through the blood of Jesus Christ, an altar has been established where God has legal entry into human affairs. Many believers are not consciously operating in this priesthood, and if they were, they would see its effect.

Luke 1:9 When Zechariah entered to burn incense, an angel appeared standing at the altar, because incense was understood to carry prayers before God.

Revelation 8:3-4 An angel added incense to the prayers of the saints before they ascended before God. The prayers alone were not enough; something had to be added to them. Many believers are praying today without understanding that there are spiritual sacrifices meant to be added to those prayers, sacrifices Judaism clearly understood.

Six Spiritual Sacrifices That Are Well Pleasing to God

1. The Sacrifice of Praise

   Psalm 40:1-3, Hebrews 13:15, Psalm 50:5

   There is no sacrifice in praising God when everything is convenient. The sacrifice of praise is offered when a person is going through contradiction, and still says, regardless of what is seen on the outside, God is good and His mercy endures forever. This was the sacrifice Jonah offered from the belly of the fish, and it was David's pattern through affliction. Blessings on the outside are not proof of God's presence; His presence is constant, and offering praise in the difficult place is what releases the sacrifice that moves Him.

2. Doing Good and Sharing With Others

   Galatians 6:2,5

   Helping people in genuine need is one of the highest forms of social intelligence in Christianity, because charity done without wisdom can create dependency instead of relieving a burden. Scripture distinguishes between an excess burden, a load beyond a person's own capacity, which others should help carry, and personal responsibility, which every person must carry themselves. Those who are capable of work but unwilling to work should not be sustained indefinitely; genuine intervention is for those facing something beyond their own strength, not for those unwilling to be responsible for themselves.

3. Honoring Parents and Elderly Family

   1 Timothy 5:4

   Before benevolence is extended publicly to a widow, the responsibility belongs first to her own children, or where there are none, to nephews and nieces, because the family is the first institution, older than the church itself. Many problems attributed to the church are actually failures of family structure. Children owe their parents a debt for the investment already made in them, and honoring that debt is what scripture ties to living long and it being well on the earth. Taking up responsibility for family carries a particular blessing, likened to the inheritance carried by a firstborn such as Joseph, who provided for the very brothers who had wronged him.

4. Walking in Forgiveness

   Forgiveness is not the end point. Forgiveness means relinquishing the right to do a person harm because of what they have done, but the wound can remain even after forgiveness is extended. Closure comes from bringing the matter before God and asking Him to judge it, not asking Him to destroy the offender, but trusting Him to repay and to settle the one who was wronged, the way He settled Joseph and settled Jesus. Bitterness and vindictiveness forfeit the very positions God intends a person to walk into.

5. Giving Into Spiritual Nourishment

   Philippians 4:18

   Giving toward those who minister spiritual nourishment was called by Paul a sweet-smelling sacrifice, an offering God responds to by supplying every need according to His riches in glory. An unusual supply follows that kind of sacrifice.

6. Patient Endurance Under Unjust Treatment

   1 Peter 2:19-23

   Taking mistreatment patiently, without running in emotion or repaying evil, is itself an acceptable sacrifice. It means praying for those who mistreat, blessing rather than cursing, and leaving judgment to God rather than pursuing personal vindication.

The Altar Speaks in the Marketplace

Hebrews 11:4 Of Abel it is said that though he is dead, his sacrifice still speaks, because it obtained the witness that he was righteous. What is offered up at the altar in secret becomes the thing that speaks into a person's family and their affairs in the marketplace. It is not of him that runs, nor of him that wills, but of God who shows mercy. Others may go through the same things a believer goes through, but by reason of these sacrifices offered at the altar, the outcome cannot be the same. That is the doctrine of exemption.