Have you ever had a season where everything looks fine on the outside, yet something inside quietly holds back?
Your feet move, but your heart hesitates. Your plans advance, but your soul cannot keep pace.
Often, this is what happens when gifted people carry unhealed pain. Trauma that was never named or healed begins to misshape vision, drain confidence, and delay destiny.
You are present in the room, but a part of you is still doubled over in a moment you never left. The traumatic moment lingers…
Scripture shows us this picture in Luke 13. A woman came to the synagogue, bent over and unable to stand upright for eighteen years. People saw her posture. Jesus saw her person.
Where others saw a condition, He saw the image of God within her — still intact, still waiting to stand tall.
I want you to know that He sees where you are. He knows where He is taking you. The question is: do you see Jesus?
THE IMAGE WITHIN: HE SEES WHERE YOU ARE
Life often bends us out of shape, subtly impacting upon our confidence, our discernment, and our self-perception. Yet, there comes a moment when God calls us to see anew, to see clearly and to see correctly.
He invites us to view ourselves and our future through His lens, rather than through the distortions of our experiences and our emotions.
Here’s the enduring truth: nothing around you straightens out until something within you stands upright. Vision precedes provision; clarity precedes change. This divine restoration of sight always paves the way for a renewal of life and hope.
IMAGO DEI: SEEING AS GOD SEES
When you look at your life, what do you really see? Do you see the limits — or do you see the glory that is still waiting to emerge?
Everything changes when vision changes. That's when you start seeing as God sees; that's when you stop reacting to life, and you start shaping it instead.
You’re not defined by what’s visible; instead, you’re strengthened by what is eternal. The same Spirit that hovered over chaos in the beginning at Creation now lives inside of you — still calling light out of darkness, still turning confusion into purpose, still healing what’s been broken.
In Luke chapter 13, Jesus saw a certain woman who had been bent over for eighteen years. Everyone else instead only saw her pain, her poor posture, her terrible past. But Jesus saw her whole, full, well, upright, standing tall, and restored. And when He spoke what He saw, creation aligned and agreed with His word.
That’s what happens when Heaven becomes the lens through which you see your world. Faith starts to rise. Confidence returns. The impossible begins to yield.
I want you to know that God has already forgotten all your sins, but He will never forget His promised purpose in your life. So, you have to forget what He has already forgotten and hold fast to what He still remembers about the goodness of your future that's soon to become.
That is the power of the eternal God’s foresight into the future. That when you see as God sees, everything straightens — your posture, your purpose, together with your forward focus and your life.
THE IMAGO DEI: STRAIGHTEN ME UP
When you know who you are, you stop striving to become what you already are. Last week, we discovered that we are the Imago Dei, the visible image of the invisible God. That’s deep! This week, we delve deeper.
You were never meant to live for identity, but instead to live from the power of your God-ordained identity. You already carry Heaven's authentication and Heaven's validation. You walk in His authority because His Spirit gives you full backing.
The revelation of who you already are is what releases the power to live differently. To see as God sees, to speak as God speaks, and to act with much assurance of one who represents The Almighty God.
When you learn to live with that understanding, alignments begin to happen. Divine structures and architecture with people groups and many opportunities start coming together to facilitate God's plan and purpose for your life.
Stay connected to your source, for He is the vine and we are the branches. Live aware of your divine nature and walk in the authority that already carries Heaven's endorsement.
IMAGO DEI: WALKING IN GOD'S AUTHORITY
What about if the most profound power that you will ever walk in already resides within you, awaiting only your recognition? What if your confidence, your access, and your influence hinge upon the cognitive grasp of a singular verity, which is the essence of your authentic identity?
You are His masterpiece. You are His embodiment upon this Earth; His reflection, His expression, His authority manifest through your very life and existence. Shaped in His likeness, imbued with His nature, you are vested with the wherewithal to fulfil God's will and counsel in the world. You are the Imago Dei.
It is insufficient to bear the title Imago Dei without the consciousness of it. When identity is obscured, the world reflects that uncertainty.
Yet, when we awaken to our divine nature, as said in 2 Peter 1:3–4, creation resonates in kind. Opportunities beckon. World systems align. Your original purpose recognises you and shifts to embrace all that you carry as God's agency on Earth.
IMAGO DEI: LIVING IN YOUR TRUE IDENTITY AS THE IMAGE OF GOD
LIVING AS HEAVEN'S LEGAL TENDER. THE GREAT EXCHANGE
Have you ever wondered what happens when Heaven establishes her economy on Earth through your life? When God doesn’t just bless you, but works through you to shape systems, to create value, and to transform the world around you?
You are Heaven’s currency, stamped with divine authority, carrying God’s image, and backed by His authority. What you carry was never meant to sit idle; it was designed to circulate, to be part of establishing His order and His purpose, and counsel here on Earth.
When God invests His image in you, He expects a return through your creativity, by your productivity, and because of your contributions to effecting His plan here on the Earth. Your life was designed to manifest wisdom, to make impact in a world that is desperate for both.
when Jesus held up a Roman coin and asked a simple yet seismic question: Whose image is on this coin?
Caesar’s image on the coin granted the coin authority, access, backing, the power of legal tender, and of course, the recognition across the entire great space of the Roman Empire.
But what happens when you realize that you carry a far greater imprint than Caesar’s Roman coin? That you are stamped with the very image of God The Almighty? Because when you know this, you stop living beneath your calling and your spiritual credit limit.
YOU become God’s legal tender, Heaven’s currency in the earth authorized to transact His will and to bring about His purpose.
BEYOND COINS & COUNTENANCE: THE TRUE CURRENCY OF OUR IDENTITY
YOUR NEXT POWER MOVE
Nation building is one of the highest callings known to mankind. It is the sacred duty of a people to frame society around values that embrace righteousness, protect human dignity and build enduring prosperity for posterity.
Our story as a nation is still being written. However, history warns us of paths which destroy. Instead, she points us toward the patterns that build. History does not repeat itself. It is repeated only by men who refuse to learn.
Nigeria, and indeed Africa stand in need of their own reformation, the kind which transformed Europe and North America in the 16th century and beyond. That reformation laid the foundations of productivity, responsibility and nationhood. So must we also embrace ours in this time under God.
The All-Wise God has always depended on His human family to forge nations. And in every generation, He calls His people to engage in this sacred task.
Like Nehemiah summoned, we too must arise together and build. It is our time to dream again. It is our time to build with courage, with conviction and with creativity. It is our time to build with human dignity under the hand of The Almighty God.
For the sake of our children, their posterity and for the future of our land, this moment demands that we rise as one and build that which will endure.
WHAT IS YOUR NEXT MOVE? THE SEQUEL
When God lifts you, His purpose is never dependency; His plan, ultimately, always is stewardship. To be raised UP by God is intentional release, to move you from mere survival into real significance; to grow you from meagre subsistence into good success. His purpose is to shift you from mediocrity into a deep sense of responsibility.
Why so?
This is in order to free you from slavery and bring you into ownership; to advance you from consumerism and bring you into value creation and productivity.
It is never only about you; it is always about nations. Nations are not built by shortcuts, nor by miracles. Nations rise when you, and all of us together, renew our minds, skill our hands, and set our hearts intentionally towards purpose. My friends, great nations are shaped when people embrace proven values and weave them into the very fabric of their culture.
Some seasons bruise you and bless you at the same time. Yet God knows how to lift you, set you UP on high, and breathe hope into your tired places. When He does this, the next question to you should not be, ‘will you move again?’ but instead: ‘what is your next move?’
This Sunday, we lean into grace for your next steps. We will talk about momentum after mercy, preparation after perseverance, and opportunity that answers only to those who are prepared and ready. This message will interrogate the action for which the release of the power of God is already present and waiting on you to make your next move. I’ve always said that power is on the other side of obedience.
Breaking through is not your destination; it is the gateway to an incredible journey of endless fulfilment.