Breaking Family Limitation (part 1) by Pastor Philip Olubakin: MP3 Download & Sermon Notes

The Battlefield of the Mind

2 Corinthians 10:4-5 declares that the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds — casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.

There is a warfare. You cannot win a battle you are not aware of. The Bible calls thoughts a stronghold — mindsets, thought patterns. We are looking at breaking family limitations, and I want you to understand: do not undermine this. Thought patterns, paradigms, mental restrictions passed from generation to generation lead to behavioral patterns. Even if Satan is not directly involved, a mindset formed through what you repeatedly saw growing up can lead to destruction. The Bible calls it a warfare.

We have a tendency to become what we constantly behold. We have a tendency not to attempt what we have never seen attempted.

Mental Limitation — What You Behold Becomes Your Stronghold

Most of us are already a picture of the picture we kept looking at. The things that you saw done — or saw that could not be done — form layers of belief in your mindset.

I was preparing for a healing meeting on campus, having declared that there is no sick God will not heal. But as I prayed, Satan supernaturally reminded me of my elder brother — my model of what a Christian should be — and how he had once prayed for a crippled person who was not healed. That memory came packaged with a statement: if your brother couldn't do it, what makes you think you can? That picture was crippling. If your father died in penury, what makes you think you can do better? If your parents didn't have a beautiful marriage, what makes you think you can?

But the Holy Ghost intervened immediately. He said, Philip, that brother is not the only brother you have. He reminded me of Peter in Acts 3 — who looked at a man lame from birth and said, "Rise up and walk." That's your brother too. And Paul in Lystra — where a man born lame received strength in his feet and leaped. That's your brother too. There is more inspiration available to you than the one failure you keep replaying.

You need to change what you are looking at. I had no example in my family of anyone pastoring a large church. There was a deeply embedded belief that small is holier. So I got pictures of large crusade crowds, printed them, and pasted them on my wall. God was changing what Abraham was seeing when He said, "Come, look at the stars." Some of us need new models — new pictures on our walls.

A stronghold is what you behold until you come to be. Even addiction is a stronghold — a response system. Depressed? Drink. Excited? Drink. Lonely? Drink. It answers everything. The Bible says bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.

Physical Limitation — Disadvantages from Your Family of Origin

Physical limitations are those that come simply by virtue of the family you were born into. Some people are already ten steps ahead of their contemporaries just by bearing a particular surname. Some of us have to work hard just to match up.

1 Samuel 2:8 says He raises up the poor out of the dust and lifts the beggar from the dunghill and sets them among princes. There is a God who can break the limitations of where you came from.

In John 1:45-46, Philip found Nathanael and said, "We have found the Messiah — Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph." Nathanael answered: "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" In John 7:52, the same attitude surfaces: "Search and look, for no prophet has ever come out of Galilee." There are people whose families have been categorized that way — blanket statements that nothing good will ever come from that side.

But look at what Saul came from. 1 Samuel 9:21 — "Am not I a Benjamite, of the smallest of the tribes of Israel, and my family the least of all the families of the tribe of Benjamin?" Yet Samuel told him that he and his father's house were the hope of all Israel. When God begins to speak to you, He does not look at your family. He looks at His plan for you.

Gideon said in Judges 6:15: "My family is the poorest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father's house." Yet the angel addressed him as a mighty man of valor and commanded: "Go in this thy might. Have not I sent thee?"

Mephibosheth lived in Lo-debar — literally "below." He was crippled, from a forgotten house. Yet when David asked, "Is there yet any left of the house of Saul?" the king's table became his inheritance. There is nothing in your past that looks like your future.

The Courage to Attempt What No One Before You Attempted

God did not tell David to fight Goliath. David volunteered. It takes courage to put your foot where nobody in your family has ever put their foot. Joshua had to cross the Jordan with people who had never seen it crossed — 40 years their fathers had wandered without entering. God kept saying: only be strong, only be courageous. He was going to attempt something his forefathers could not do.

That dream in your heart — there is no way it could have crossed your mind if God did not put it there. The very fact that a thought crosses your mind that nobody in your family has ever entertained is evidence that God planted it. You are not supposed to be small. You are the limit breaker. You are the trailblazer. You are setting a new standard.

• Mental limitation: Identify the thought patterns and belief systems that moved from your family to you. Consciously detach from them. Change what you look at — change your models.
• Physical limitation: God can lift a beggar from the dunghill. Supernatural divine favor can bypass every natural disadvantage of background and origin.
• Transgenerational patterns: Faith can run in families — so can limitation. But the patterns can be broken. You are not destined to repeat what those before you could not overcome.