Part 5 of 12 Graham Cooke Voice of the Prophets 2009

"We are not necessarily doubting that God
will do the best for us;
we are wondering how painful
the best will turn out to be."

(Clive Staples) C. S. Lewis


Graham Cooke
Voice of the Prophets
4-16-09 Christ Community Church Camp Hill

Notes fkj

When you talk to Graham Cooke, you can sense he’s been hanging out with God. He’s at the same time down-to-earth and full of spiritual wisdom on everything from prayer to spiritual warfare to prophecy to intimacy with God. Cooke is well known for his prophetic training programs and has a passion to build prototype churches that can reach our postmodern society. God also uses him to help transition churches into higher levels of vision and ministry.
The following are my notes from a sermon by Graham Cook which was presented at Christ Community Church’s ‘Voice of the Prophets convention’ on April 16, 2009. I believe Graham is a very humorous man of God with a poignant message for the church today.


“I need this word in your blood stream and in your thinking… I need you to learn to live in the secret place.”

Part 5 of 12

“I need you to understand about a refuge and a fortress… I need you to interact with angels, because where I am taking you, you’re going to need that level of protection. I want you to go into those places unafraid, because of who I Am for you. This is too important, son stop messing about!” O.K.
What doe He want? He wants me to have encounters and experiences. I’m still having encounters out of that Psalm… still having experiences out of that Psalm. It’s a part of my life, it is written on my heart.
Here you have Jesus, you have the Father the Holy Spirit… all of them having their persona’s revealed, this is who they are. It was said of Jesus He is the image, He is the persona, of the invisible God and the firstborn of creation. We are being conformed to the image, the persona of His Son, so that Jesus will be the firstborn of many brethren. Jesus said, “He who has seen me has seen the Father”… if you’ve seen My persona you’ve seen His. [Edit: John 14:19]
Jesus is the radiance of the Father’s glory, and the exact representation of His nature.
You know when Zechariahs had a visitation from Gabriel, Gabriel came to prophesy over John the Baptist, while he was still in the womb and to declare to his father, this is going to be the persona of your son… you need to understand it because he… when he is born, he’s going to hit the ground running.
And he says this,
“He will be great in the sight of God he’ll drink no wine of liquor, he’ll be filled with the Holy Spirit while in his mother’s womb, he’ll turn many of the son’s of Israel back to the Lord, he’ll go as a forerunner before him in the Spirit and the power of Elijah. He’ll turn the hearts of the fathers back to the children, and the disobedient to the attitudes of the righteous, he will make a people ready for the Lord.” [Edit: Luke 1:13-17] Phhhh! That’s a persona! That’s one that John professed. “I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness ‘Make ready the way of the Lord, make his path straight’” [Edit: john 1:23]
Your persona is this, it a part of our redemption; it’s to have a persona in Christ.
Literally your persona gives you on earth an elevated status. It’s an expression of God’s image in us. It’s the place of our acceptance, it’s the place where we are beloved, it’s the place where we are favored. You step into your own identity and you know who you are in Christ, and who He is for you. You live there and operate from that place. It doesn’t matter what the enemy is doing, when you know who you are – everything the enemy does can only reinforce who you really are. But you have to know who you really are. Your persona is how you are perceived perpetually in God. It becomes your adopted role, you know you have to practice it. Your persona is going to be a little strange to you at first, because you understand there are so many things I have to get rid of in my life in order to take that persona on-board. When your persona is made known to you then you understand the process that comes along with it. ‘Cause how may of us understand there is no breakthrough without follow through. For every impartation there is always a process. All prophesy leads to process. A process is a series of steps that takes us from where we are right now to what God has promised us we can be. So as soon as you receive a prophetic word tomorrow you’ll be in process. Because the Lord is not messing around, He is redeeming time right now. That means He is speeding thing up around us. So as soon as you have a prophet word and you come back in here [Edit fkj: the conference]
He has locked you into process. That means that all the next series of circumstances in your life are going to establish that prophetic word. When God shows you your persona, you have to step into it.
When Samuel prophesied over David, he happened to step into it. So when he went to deliver some cheese sandwiches to his brothers, and saw the most enormous guy he had ever seen challenging Israel – ‘Come out and fight me and whoever wins will take over the country, If you win you take over our country, if we win we will take over your country.’ He’s [Edit fkj: David] just had a prophetic word that he’s going to be king over Israel, and now this huge guy is offering up a challenge and nobody is stepping up. He’s got a prophesy about being king, and he steps into the identity… before he’s become king. You don’t wait to become king to act like a king, you start acting like a king when the prophesy is come.
You start acting like it, you start living in a way that is commensurate with the word you have received… because then you can pull it closer to you.
What I think about this whole thing of, ‘Only God has abundance, the enemy has a budget.’ Why do you think the enemy uses intimidation? Because he’s cheap!
It’s a cheap budget item in hell. And you see the effect of it, one guy is holding a nation hostage and the king is hiding out in his tent with the baggage. Intimidation is cheap, the enemy will use a word, he’ll send something, he’ll use something, or say something and if he can get hundreds of people to back off with just one word… that’s a quick victory, that’s an easy win. He uses intimidation because it is cheap and it works on sheep. It doesn’t work on lions though.
Intimidation works until it comes up against a person who knows… who can’t be intimidated because they are too busy being fascinated by who God really is.
Intimidation doesn’t work on intimacy. It doesn’t work on worshippers, that’s why God is looking for worshippers! Hey listen, if you haven’t done anything about your personal worship for the last couple of years, you’re in a poor place.
You need to step up. The most intimidating thing about you should be your intimacy with the Lord. Isn’t that a great thought. Intimacy intimidates the enemy. Why is God looking for worshippers? Because, worshippers are people who get overwhelmed by majesty. They get baptized in sovereignty and supremacy… and they’re hard to beat… because they have a mindset that Jesus is King.
And so, here’s Goliath issuing this challenge…eventually David gets out to meet him. And he goes into mark two of intimidation which is contempt… to tell you that you can’t do anything. You can’t beat me, I’m too big… I’m too strong. You know when you look at a giant you’re always going to get mixed messages. The enemy is always going to tell you he’s too big, too strong, you can’t overwhelm him, and really, face it dude, you’re a grasshopper! You know that worked on ten of the spies… but it didn’t work on the two guys who were intimate, who knew about intimacy.
The other message you’re going to get is from the Holy Spirit. He’s saying to you, ‘Take a look at that giant. By the time we are finished on this level, you’re going to be his size and he is going to be your size. You guys are going to swap places. He is the doorway into your blessing and your favor. By the time we are finished with him, he is going to bow the knee to you on this level. Then you’re going to stand on him and use him as a footstool to go on to the next level.’ Every new level you meet a new devil. But, you have to beat the devil at the level you are on.
How it works is you come into a new level, and the enemy against you has to be bigger than you and stronger than you…it’s important… and you learn firstly how to stand in that place… you learn who God is for you in that placed. You learn how to stand, how to be unworried and unfazed. Then the Holy Spirit gets you moving forward… and you learn how to contend, and you learn how to press in… and you learn how to keep moving… and as you keep moving forward, so you get bigger and the enemy gets smaller. Eventually he bows the knee to you, and you stand on him and you get into the next level and where the whole wonderful process begins again.

End Part 5