Bethel Deliverance International Church

Guest (Male): Bethel Deliverance International Church is calling for all teens ages 13 and up to join them for the 2026 ReGeneration Youth Conference. This conference is happening on Friday, July 24th and Saturday, July 25th. We're kicking off Friday night with Christian Arts and Entertainment and a short play called Burgers, Fries, and Faith. Doors open at 5:30 PM and the night begins at 6:30 PM.

On Saturday, we'll be having workshops, peer-to-peer discussions, fellowship, raffles with grand prizes, and a concert with Philly's own Daniel Houston and national gospel recording artist Todd Dulaney. Doors open at 7:30 AM with the first activity beginning at 8:45 AM.

Tickets are only $13 for this power-packed weekend. The first 100 teens registered will receive VIP access to priority seating for the play and concert. All activities will take place at Bethel Deliverance International Church located at 2929 West Cheltenham Avenue in Wyncote, PA. For more information, visit betheldeliverance.org or call 215-885-2585. It's the 2026 ReGeneration Youth Conference, July 24th and July 25th. Teens, come hang with us, have fun, and encounter God. We can't wait to see you there.

Guest (Male): Today on Climbing Higher: It is very difficult for us to even contemplate, to think it through, to even come to grips with the fact that God just wanted us for Himself. It’s a very difficult concept because our view of God is that He wants us to do something. It is hard for us to realize He just loves us. Welcome to Climbing Higher with Bishop Eric A. Lambert, Jr.

Bishop Eric A. Lambert, Jr.: Well, praise the Lord, everyone, and welcome to the Climbing Higher broadcast. We love Jesus here at Bethel. I tell you, we just think He is the greatest person to have ever breathed oxygen. That's right. And we live to worship Him and to serve Him, and we want to invite you to do the same thing.

Now, in today's message, we're going to talk about knowing your place, coming to you out of the letter to the Ephesians where Paul says that we have been predestined by God to become the children of God. Not only has God saved us, but according to Paul in the letter to the Ephesians, He has sealed us with the Holy Spirit so that we will know that Jesus is coming back to get us.

And so throughout those first three chapters of the letter to the Ephesians, Paul talks about us being in our place, and ultimately He says we are seated in heavenly places in Christ, with Christ. Oh, that ought to send goosebumps up and down your spine, that we are seated in heavenly places. And so we've titled this series of messages Know Your Place.

And so you and I must know that we are seated in heavenly places because the enemy has no more power and authority over us. Now, he likes to make us think he does. He affects our minds, he affects our thought life, he affects our emotions. And if we give in to him, then we will forget who we are.

So let's stay in our place. Let's listen to the word of God today and gain a better knowledge of where Christ has placed us. When you know where you are, the devil can't pull you down to where you should not be. Now, as you listen, grab your Bible, read through, and find these truths for yourself. I'll be back at the close of the broadcast to encourage you to continue to sit in heavenly places.

Bishop Eric A. Lambert, Jr.: To sort of put some gift wrapping, if you will, on the present of God's salvation, I don't think that we really understand what it means to be born again. I think that we are so preoccupied and enamored with the fact that we're not going to hell that we really don't know what it means to be born again. And so there are levels of education in your salvation that you must begin to adhere to.

The salvational aspect is very, very simple. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. Can't get any simpler than that. You hear the gospel. How can they hear without a preacher? How can the preacher preach unless they are sent by God? It’s simple.

Now, what happens after that? We become so caught up in the reality that, oh, praise God, I'm saved. And if you really sit and talk to people and say, "What are you saved from?" immediately you will hear, "Hell. I'm not going to hell." And that's a beautiful, blessed thing. I would not try to minimize that. But I might shock some of you if I said that's not why God saved you. God didn't save you to keep you from hell.

According to Paul's writing in this same letter to the Ephesians in Chapter One, he says in verse four, "He has chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, wherein He has made us accepted in the beloved."

You take those two verses together and try to find a word to identify it, it would be relationship. It is very difficult for us to even contemplate, to think it through, to even come to grips with the fact that God just wanted us for Himself. It’s a very difficult concept because our view of God is that He wants us to do something. It is hard for us to realize He just loves us.

And because most of our relationships are predicated upon what you do for me, what have you done for me lately? Pay my bills, buy me this, buy me that. Everything about us in the capitalistic society is what have you done for me? So when you go to God and you say, "What have you done for me?" He said, "Well, I sent my son to die for you, to wash away your sin." Now, God, why did you want to wash away my sin? So that you could be in my presence without guilt or shame.

We cannot grasp this. And I think that's why we work so hard in church. And I'm not opposed to working. I think we should; we are saved unto good works. But it’s not the whole package. My salvation is not strengthened by what I do. It's strengthened by how much time I spend with the one who saved me.

This is why Jesus, when He talks to this same church in Revelation Chapter Two, He says to them, He said, "You're doing a tremendous amount of works, but you don't love me anymore." My brothers and sisters, if a relationship is not built upon the solid foundation of love, it will dry up and you will drift away from it.

I was preaching at a church last week and at Pastor Prichett's for their anniversary service, and sometimes I'm surprised by the things I say. And I turned to him and I said, "You have a marriage ministry." And he said yes, him and his wife now run that marriage ministry. And I said what I'm about to say is going to make the participants of your marriage ministry reach out to you like never before.

And Pastor Prichett is one of those guys that says, "Come on with it." Never tell me, "Come on with it." Save it for the sophisticated people because I'm at a place in my life and ministry where I'm going to say it. And I said no matter how saved you are, no matter how long you've been married, there is a place, a point in your marriage where you begin to drift apart. It is a normal drifting unless the two of you spend 24 hours a day, seven days a week together.

Because you begin to have separate desires and separate goals and separate dreams, and if those dreams and desires and goals are not somehow intertwined, those personal goals will begin to pull you apart. Now just go with me. Let's say, for example, your spouse decides to pursue a business or pursue a particular educational goal. They will join with people who are also going down that road. That means they have more in common with that person than they do with you.

So who do you think they will connect with? It happens very innocently. They're sharing text messages, they're sharing phone calls, they're sharing times together. They go to conferences and meetings together. And human beings do not possess the ability to stay disconnected emotionally. If that were true, then God wouldn't put such a strict application on separating yourself from that.

Now, these people will begin to take a spot that your spouse used to have because you now have someone to talk to about the things that you enjoy. This person is now sharing with you on the level that you feel comfortable with. If you try to share it with your spouse, they may become offended. Oh, now you think you're better than me? Oh, oh, okay. And the relationship begins to teeter-totter.

Then you want counseling because you've identified the demon that's trying to destroy your marriage, and there is no demon. It is the normal evolution of humanity. You seek something that your spouse does not seek, and you become more drawn to it than you do to your spouse. Now, what we normally do is we will then say we need to have personal time together, the obligatory weekend at Ocean City, the trip to Vegas, the cruise, the wherever you go to spend quality time together to reconnect.

But if you notice that if you're so caught up in that pursuit, that even when you go on that quality time together, you will still be texting and calling and doing, sending a message to your spouse that you ain't as important as you think. Now the emotion begins to change and you work hard at it because you're a Christian. And no Christian wants to have the stigma of a broken or failed marriage over their life, but they would rather be hypocrites and share a dwelling with someone that you don't know, don't like, and don't really want to be around.

But you will lie and you will give the impression that you're extremely close because you're a Christian and no Christian wants to have that over their heads. Now, my brothers and sisters, those of you whom I love that come to the 7:30 service on Sunday and allow me to exegete scriptures in a little bit more of a mental way than an emotional way, I'm crazy about you.

If you look in the word of God, you will find that there are times when God wants to get a spiritual truth over to His children, He uses a human application. The human application is so connected to the spiritual truth that if you really sit down and observe what He's saying, you will realize He's trying to give it to you in a way that you can fully understand it.

He knows that if He tries to teach us how important it is to be close to God and that it is possible not to lose one's salvation but to replace God with your pursuits, He says, "Let me teach them this through the application of husbands and wives." So in Ephesians Five, He says, "Now, you wives and husbands, you have a certain relationship. Wives, you are to submit to the leadership of your husband," slash, "you Christians are to submit to the leadership of God."

Why? Because the husband is the head of the wife, and Christ is the head of the man. And every Christian must swear an allegiance to the headship or the lordship of Jesus Christ. You know if you have a rebellious wife who does not submit to your leadership, your home is hell. If you do not submit to the leadership of the Lord, your life is hell.

Then He says, "You men, you're supposed to protect your wives and to treat her as Christ does the church." And you women know that when your husband does not treat you along those lines, there is an emptiness inside of you. And if you're not careful, Satan will send someone in to fix that wound. There's no demon to bind because what happens is that person comes in and touches that part of your life that you are seeking to have touched by your spouse, but you don't know how to communicate that to them. And by the time you get the courage to sit them down and say, "Here's what's happening inside of me," you're disconnected.

And I say that because this is what's going on in the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ as we speak. When Pastor Tim interviewed me on our podcast about the new book that the Lord has blessed me to write, one of the things I said in that interview, he asked me, "What provoked you to write this?" I said, "I got tired of committing adultery with my church. I got tired of processing my Christian life through my church ministry."

And so three years ago, I decided to reduce, greatly reduce my preaching engagements and set my mind solely on the development of Bethelites, up to and including divorcing myself from the bishop responsibility of the fellowship of churches, pushing myself away from any and everything that would come between me and my Heavenly Father, realizing that the greatest work was submitting myself to Him and giving Him all the glory, honor, praise, and time. Ministry became extremely dull, but relationship with Christ began to shine.

For the first time in my Christian experience, I realized God wanted me. Not the preacher, not the teacher, not the theological part of me. He wanted me—broken me, bruised me, battered me, hate me, me that has no patience, me that has no sense of their own destiny and purpose. With all my faults and with all of my neurosis, He wanted me.

It was at that time that I began to think about chasing the heart of God. I dug through scripture to find some people who were along that same path, and I found what was happening. Elijah, the Bible calls him a Tishbite, and he just explodes on the scene. And he comes to Ahab, one of the most wicked kings Israel ever had. He walks into the king's house, stands boldly and says, "There won't be any rain until I say so."

And what's so interesting about that is his proclamation for a drought was really a declaration of war to Baal. Because Baal was the god of rain, and so that's why they would sacrifice their children and they would do all types of spiritual things so that Baal would bless them with rain, and God shut it off. And He used this man to do it.

Now I'm excited, I'm feeling good that Elijah is doing something. And you know the story of how his life progresses. And his greatest accomplishment was turning the children of Israel back to God. He asks a question that echoes through our time today: "How long will you get tied up between two opinions? If God is God, serve Him. If He's not, go serve your other god."

I love that proclamation. And when I read that, I say, "God, we're in the same place. We're torn between two opinions. We really don't know if God is God. We're ignorant of how He wants to move, and we don't spend quality time with Him." He's just—you're my people—He's just your savior, but He's not your Lord. You don't acknowledge Him in all of your ways.

I say this at the Wednesday night Bible study. We're teaching on prayer and been doing so for about four or five months. And I said, "You know, we go to God and say, 'Give me traveling mercy.' It’s such a recited phrase." And so I challenged the students. I said, "Why? Why do you go to God and say, 'Give me traveling mercies'?" Because you made a determination as to where you're going and how you're going to get there. You have not acknowledged Him, so you want Him to bless your efforts rather than seek His counsel.

Why? Because we are the masters of our fate. We do what we want to do and we want to bring God along. We insist that He blesses us rather than find out where He wants us to be. So I instructed a young minister who was there that Wednesday. I said, "You're going to dismiss prayer," I said, "and do not say, 'Give us traveling mercies'." I walked back to my office and got myself ready to leave, walked out the office and I'll be John Brown if he didn't say, "Give us traveling mercies."

And I didn't hold it against him because we just slide into it because it really has no meaning to us. What we're really saying to God is, "I run you; you don't run me. Now, this is where I'm going, and you give us travel." Now, the ones that are really bold, they say, "Now assign your angel to go with me," like they don't have anything else better to do.

And so we're born again. God bless you. Tell your neighbor, "God bless you." You're born again. Come on, say it with me: "I'm saved." Now, the salvation aspect has two dynamic questions: saved to be what and saved to do what? We don't normally focus on the being because we're Pentecostal. We focus on the doing.

We want people to know God has sanctioned us, that He has called us, that He has collaborated with us and brought out great ministry. So we lay hands upon the sick so that we can have a healing ministry. We cast out devils so we can have a deliverance ministry. We teach the word so we can have a teaching ministry.

How many of you husbands have a wife ministry? You have a license. How many of you wives have a husband ministry? "Why is he so much on marriage?" Because God uses it as an example as to how we are supposed to get along with Him. Listen, you wives that don't want to cook anymore, you're not going to hell for it, but you don't realize what it’s doing to your man.

You process emotion; he processes position. In his mind, he ain't good enough to have you cook for him. Now the clean-up woman will cook seven days a week. She will not only wash his boxer shorts, she'll iron those bad boys and put creases down the front, back, and sides. She will wash them and put them back where they belong. You, child of God, tongue-talking, Bible-quoting wife, you will wash them and toss them someplace where he can pick them up because God did not make you a maid.

Now understand, I am again, I'm not talking about problems in marriage, I'm talking about problems in perception. And this is the reason why we go to God with such a disconnected attitude because we don't understand what it means to serve a Lord. So God said, "Start out by serving each other."

Bishop Eric A. Lambert, Jr.: All I can say is wow, wow, wow, wow. The word of God is just awesome. I'm telling you, I am so thankful that God not only saved us, but He left us a written record on His plan, His promise, and His provision for our life. As you listen today, I'm sure that you have become aware of the fact that God has sought you out.

Amen. You know the Bible says there is none that seeketh after Him. We did not have the ability to seek after God because of our sins. Our sins separated us from God. But His love sought us out. So even when we were incapable of coming to Him, He came to us. And not only did He save us, but He seated us in heavenly places.

So you and I, while we're here on this earth in these physical bodies, in the spirit realm, we are seated in heavenly places, and I love the way Paul phrases it: with Christ, in Christ. So we are in the most prosperous, the most successful, the most superlative place that God could have placed us: with Christ, in Christ. And when you know your place, there is absolutely no way you can lose.

So come on, get up from that position of self-pity and stop feeling sorry for yourself and stop going around talking about woe is me. You are seated in heavenly places and God sent Jesus to make sure that you and I would walk in victory. So when you know your place, you can walk in that victory, and the joy of the Lord will forever be your strength.

Thanks for joining us today, and again, we invite you to come and worship with us at Bethel Deliverance International Church. Our service times are there on the screen, and you will be able to sit in a place where the word of God is taught, the Spirit of God flows freely, but the power of God will destroy the works of the devil. We look forward to seeing you and we pray that the Spirit of God would ever be your guide, your strength, and your comfort. God bless you.

Guest (Male): Bishop Eric A. Lambert, Jr. is committed to influencing our culture with Christ. In his book, The Christian and the Culture, Bishop Lambert explores practical ways to avoid becoming ensnared by the trends of today's culture. Order your copy of The Christian and the Culture and achieve daily victorious living. Visit ericlambertministries.org to purchase the book and discover more resources that will enrich your Christian walk.

Thank you for joining us for Climbing Higher with Bishop Eric A. Lambert, Jr. We pray today's message encouraged your heart, strengthened your faith, and inspired you to grow deeper in your walk with God. We invite you to experience the presence of God with us at Bethel Deliverance International Church, where lives are being transformed through worship, prayer, and the power of God's word. Join us in person or online. Visit betheldeliverance.org for service times and streaming information. Strengthen your faith through books, teachings, and faith-centered resources from Bishop Lambert by visiting ericlambertministries.org. To partner with our media ministry in sharing the message of Jesus Christ, visit betheldeliverance.org/give. Thanks for watching today. Bishop Lambert encourages you to pursue the Lord's presence, grow in His word, and continue chasing the heart of God.