Whatever you look like in the spirit is how the demonic spirit world sees you. Whatever you carry of the kingdom is what you represent when you are in the realm of the spirt.
Some of the vibrant things we need to carry as believers are the crowns that God has given us. Crowns are very important because a crown speaks of a realm of authority. Whenever a king would wear his crown, he would have that dominion over his realm. He usually wore his crown when he was out amongst the people or when he was sitting on his throne. The reason he wore that crown is because it represented the land he had authority over.
As believers we have crowns, and the Bible is very clear about these crowns. I want to teach about this because, for many of us, some of our crowns are in the trophy room at the Satan and we are going to get them back!
You may say where is that in the Bible, that Satan has a trophy room? I do not know. But those of us who have learned how to ascend and descend in the realm of the spirit, Satan’s trophy room is in the lower realm or depths of the earth. But don’t get sidetracked, that is not the point of my message.
Crowns are important to us as believers, particularly when we come before the throne. Revelation tells us that:
The 24 elders bow down before the one who sits on the throne, and they worship him who lives forever and ever. They put their crowns down (cast/lay their crowns) before the throne – Revelation 4:10
I do not want to turn up in heaven and have no crown to throw before him as an offering. The crown is the very thing he has given you to wear to display him, so when you lose a crown it is important to go back and pick up your crown.
So, what is the objective of carrying a crown? It is the provision of the relevant anointing or mandate that the crown represents. A crown mandates us to do a job and enables us to have rulership over the circumstances that are arrayed against us. These crowns are a means of identifying who you are in the spirit. This identification releases the government of God around your life and the power of God around you into the atmosphere. It is a recognition – the spirit world knows what you look like.
In Jerusalem when the seven sons of Sceva tried to cast demons out of a man, seven demons with one man, they said:
We expel you by the Jesus whom Paul preaches. An evil spirit answered and said, Jesus I know, and Paul I know; but who are you? Then the man in whom the evil spirit was leaped on them, overpowered them, and prevailed against them, so that they fled out of the house naked and wounded – Acts 19:13, 15 – 16.
That is about where the church is at when confronting the enemy: Jesus I know, Paul I know but who are you? You do not go into the glory, who are you? Some of the church is running away from demons naked.
Being able to see in the spirit is neat because you can see what people are caring on their lives. Many of us have only two or three crowns. O Jesus, I want more of the realm of heaven then I have today!
A crown is symbolic of the representative of a realm of government. Without a crown there is no symbol of that recognition. You can be going down the street and see a police car with a flashing light at the side of the road. Usually most of us gasp to ourselves quietly and take our foot off the Accelerator! It is because of who they are and what they carry that we do this.
If you feel guilty about something, or you have done something wrong, when you go past the policeman you will feel it. They do not even have to look at you, they may not even know that you are there, but what they carry on their body effect something in the atmosphere.
You and I are no different in the realm of the spirit, we carry the government of heaven and whenever we arrive, the devil gasps! But the devil has made the church think that we are the kitten and he is the lion. Then God tells us to roar! But we go meow! The devil has made us think that he is the lion, but the Bible says the lion is a lion of the tribe of Judah, who is Jesus. I belong to that tribe of the lion of Judah, so that means I am a lion to! The devil has made us believe that we are the animals in the field, and he is the lion who goes around hunting us. He hunts those who are lonely, isolated, weak or injured because they are easy prey. That is why we need to have fellowship with one another. That is why we need to be knitted into a body of people and that is why we need to exercise the realm of dominion so that we stay strong and healthy.
In Africa, when a lion comes into view all the other animals are happy if they can see it. The moment a lion disappears somebody is in trouble! The animals will always keep an eye on the lion and the moment the lion disappears the other animals get jittery because something is going to happen. When a lion is hunting it does not put its mouth into the air to roar, (it does that in the Night watch and in the cool of the day.) When it is hunting and on the prowl for meat, it puts its mouth to the ground, and it roars into the ground. Then the ground erupts all around the animals, so they do not know where the point of attack is coming from.
When we roar, we put our face against the realm of the spirit. We roar into the ground of the realm of the spirit and the enemy does not know where the attack is coming from. That is why God can send an ambush against him – a surprise attack, because the enemy gets so confused! When a lion roars like that the animals suddenly scatter and this is also what happens in the spirit.
Crowns are very symbolic, particularly of the tribe that you belong to. They represent who you are and the spirit world sees them. When you are in the spirit world you have them on your head. The devil knows how much authority you have by which crowns you are wearing. It is very clear.
Unless you hold what God is giving you to prayer, worship and encounters with God, the crowns will be removed from your life by the hand of man through circumstances in the natural as well is in the spirit.
A crown can be removed by the hand of man, so who do you think is going to knock our crowns off our heads? Man. Why do you think Jesus used some very strong words against the Pharisees and the religious leaders of his day? What was he doing? He was addressing the crowns that they were wearing. He spoke to them very clearly:
While you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!… Whitewashed tombs… Full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness… Brood of vipers! – Matthew 23:27, 33.
Jesus spoke about the crown of death that they carry – religious pride. I hate it! There are times when I find I am being religious too. It is okay, you just need to repent and pick your crown up again because it has been lost. If the devil can orchestrate circumstances around your life where the hand of man can remove your crown, then he will. You need to hold onto your crown:
Holdfast which you have, so that no one may rob you and deprive you of your crown – Revelation 3:11.
It is the carnal and natural man in lives of others that will try and remove that crown through natural circumstances around you, to shut down your spirit life. It could come through accusation, through guilt, through shame, through the sin of another against your life, through trespass or our own sin or iniquity that we carry – anything that can give the devil a handle for somebody to come beside you and knock one of your crowns off. When a crown falls off your head, the devil picks it up and takes it down into the trophy room and shows all the other devils his victory. I do not know about you, but that makes me angry!
There are two ways crowns can be removed. One is by sin and the other is by the hand of man. Both result in a loss of rulership. With the loss of the crown comes the loss of that relevant flow of the anointing of the life of the kingdom. Sin is your own choices, your own desires, your own issues and the things that you have not responded to in God.
The hand of Man is the choices of others and behavior of others against you, often against your will and against your choices. Both are subject to circumstances and often the right responses are the remedies that will prevent your crown being stolen. If someone rejects you; you can lose a crown if you choose to receive the rejection. If somebody speaks destructive words to you, you can lose a crown if you choose to receive their words. You are receiving their words which are rejection if your soul is broken. If your soul is broken then you will not want to wear the crown anyway, so you are going to hide it from the spirit world.
So, how do I recognize where I have lost a crown or that it has been removed from my life? It is quite simple really. You cannot do something you used to do. You can spent hours praying in tongues, focused on the kingdom. It is great to be like that for a season. But one day it was like a switch was turned off and it was so hard just to pray for 20 minutes a day in the spirit. You wonder what is going on! You have lost a crown.
You deal with a crown being knocked off your life by going back to last place you experienced that element of the kingdom, or the last time that experience was happening to you – and when it stopped. Often through abuse that kind of experience happens, often many of these crowns are knocked off your head at the same time. And something will happen, you will feel like you do not want to go on living anymore. The reason that happens is because the crowns have been removed from your life and there is no more covering and displaying of that manifestation, because it is the manifestation that keeps you going.
When we are working with these crowns like this it is very important to see that they can be removed from our lives. This can happen by natural circumstances or by the spirit world.
Sometimes the devil has assignments against us. You become aware of something happening in the realm of the spirit around your life. God has given us dominion over these assignments. It is a crown of righteousness to gives us dominion because corruption cannot touch righteousness.
THE CROWN OF RIGHTEOUSNESS
2 Timothy 4:8 – finally, there is continually appointed right now me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord; the righteous judge, will give to me on that day (glorified body), and not to me only but also to those who loved his appearing.
This crown is received at salvation and is the base of all other crowns because without righteousness nothing can sit firmly on your life.
Romans 4:6 – the blessedness of the man to whom God puts on their account righteousness.
God is looking for a release of the glory in our lives, but first we must have a crown of righteousness. Righteousness can be destroyed by willful choice to sin. When we struggle with an area of sin in our lives, we do not have a crown of righteousness on our head.
This is why we need to go into the courtroom in heaven, because that is where God puts a new garment on us and a new crown (or Mitre) on her head – Zechariah 3:5.
THE CROWN OF LIFE
James 1:12 – Blessed is the man who endures temptation; for when he has been approved (pass the test), he will receive the crown of life which Lord’s promise to those who love him
This crown is received through the trials of life in our dealings with temptations, coming to a place of absolute surrender to his Lord ship and abandonment in love of Jesus Christ as we experience the victory over our sin. When we experience victory over the struggles in life, we begin to maintain our joy.
If there is no joy, there is no strength because the joy the Lord is your strength – Nehemiah 8:10. That is why there is so little power in the church, because there is not much joy.
Drawing on the government of the crown of life releases inside of us the life of God. Then we can release the life of God into the realm of the spirit around us.
You must exercise the crowns. Just wearing a crown is great, but when you exercise it, the crown becomes a weapon of war in your hand and establishes a realm of government around you.
THE CROWN OF GLORY
1 Peter 5:4 – when the chief Shepherd is rendered apparent, you will receive the crown of glory that does not fade away.
We can receive all these crowns now; they are in the spirit realm, but we have to appropriate them. If we appropriate them, then when we die and go to heaven or are translated into heaven if we attain the kind of walk Enoch had, we will see Jesus face to face in our resurrected body Jesus gives them to us as rewards.
When the Christ in you begins to manifest around you, and you manifest God in the world around you as a king, then the crown of glory is manifested and revealed to the spirit world.
Every time we manifest God to the world around us this crown is displayed for the spirit world to see.
If you do not carry the crown of glory you will not manifest the supernatural world of God. We must carry these crowns in our lives.
THE INCORRUPTABLE CROWN
1 Corinthians 9:25 And everyone who competes for the prize is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a perishable crown, but we for an imperishable crown.
This crown is represented by our personal walk with God where we keep our body under subjection to our spirit.
When you go into his presence to get clean. It is only areas that are unclean that can become corrupt. When something is clean and pure then it cannot be corrupted. When something is unrighteous it can be corrupted. When it is holy and righteous it cannot be corrupted. That is why you go into his presence to become righteous. You do not stand here in the natural and try to earn brownie points to make yourself feel righteous; you go into his presence and become righteous, because righteousness is given to you in that realm. Then you manifested here in the natural.
THE CROWN OF THE ANOINTING OIL
Leviticus 21:12 – neither shall he go out of the sanctuary, nor profane the sanctuary of his God; for the crown of the anointing oil of his God is upon him: I am the Lord.
This crown is given in the places that we encounter the presence of God in a deeply relational way, and it is maintained by our daily connection with God.
THE CROWN OF REJOICING
1 Thessalonians 2: 19 – for what is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? Is it not even you before our Lord Jesus Christ in His presence.
Rejoicing means to have an overflow of joy with the ability to express it. The implication behind it includes shouts and expressions of joy.
This crown is the people we have discipled in the Lord.
BAD CROWNS
There are some bad crowns. The first one is found in 1 Corinthians 9:25. Is called the corruptible crown. This is known as the crown of your own efforts. Another one is found in Isaiah 28:1, the crown of pride. Another one is found in John 19:2 which is the crown of thorns which Jesus wore to carry every single corruptible, broken piece of crown. That is why Jesus had a crown of thorns put on his head – to give us the power to pick up our crowns again.
You need to see this is why Jesus died. That is why he had the thorns put on his head willingly. He had that crown stuck on his head and they mocked him, King of Kings and Lord of lords. Jesus had to identify with us, not only to be mocked by the Romans for the kingly realm that he walks in, but also to be identified with the destructive crown of sin that we have carry in our lives.