My message today is part of a series of talks.

The series is called: Quit Telling Yourself I Can't

We are following through this little, but power-packed book in the Bible, called Philippians.

The time is 2000 years ago. The writer is a philosopher and force of nature named Paul. The recipients are the Christians a city called Phillipi. The setting is the Roman Empire, a toxic stew of civility and brutality, liberty and slavery, morality and perversity.

Today we're going to tackle one of the biggest "I can'ts" of them all. It's the quiet, subtle lie that you can't live a big, bold, beautiful life.

My talk today is called: Quit Playing Small

This is the conviction that you're just a pawn on the chessboard of life, being moved around by circumstances, by your past, by other people's decisions. It's the temptation to just go with the flow, because you feel like you don't have the power to create the flow.

Your inner voice says:
Don't take that risk, you might fail.
Don't speak up, you might get shot down.
Don't get your hopes up, you'll just be disappointed.
You're a nobody.
You're a nothing.
You're too messed up, too broken, too addicted, to evil.

Who are you to reach for the stars?
Who are you to dream bigger?

That voice wants to constrict your life. It wants you to hide. It defines you as a victim. It locks you into average.

The reason that voice has any power at all is because it's tapping into a deep wound in the human soul. Theology calls that wound the Fall—catastrophic failure of human agency which damaged human free and put us in bondage to fear and sin. We are fallen members of a fallen race, and this is why people play small.

But I am here today to declare to you that is not the life God made you for, and it is not the life Jesus saved you for.

God's vision for you is a big, bold, beautiful life.

In 1875 there was a young man named William, who suffered from a really tough medical condition.

At age 16, due to complications from tuberculosis, William had his left leg amputated.

Later, doctors recommended amputating his other leg, but William sought out a pioneering surgeon who managed to save it after multiple surgeries.

During his long recovery, 16 year old William wrote a poem that 's become famous. It's been quoted by everyone from Winston Churchill to politicians to preachers. The poem is a declaration of resilience and inner strength. Of agency that won't quit. And I'm going to share that poem at the end.

So the question is, how do you get to that big bold beautiful life? How do you bridge the gap between the small life you might be living and the big life Jesus invites you into?

Answer: You have to look at the blueprint. You have to see the life of the only person who never once played small.

I want to look at Jesus today. And I want to show you, from his story, four Power Moves for you to be powerful, and for you to step into to your royalty and dominion.

This is the non-negotiable foundation for a life that is no longer small or afraid.

"who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God," (Philippians 2:6)

This isn't just a line in an old book; this is the key that unlocks a life without fear! "Form of God" means He had the very DNA of deity. He was, is, and always will be, fully and completely GOD. This is called His Pre-Incarnate Glory!

Long before there was a planet earth, before there was a solar system or a sun, before God spun the galaxies into existence, before the angels, before the starry cosmos, before any created thing, there was God. Just God. Only God.

And though God was alone, God was never lonely. Because the God we worship is a Trinity—the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

And here, Paul refers to that second person of the Godhead, Jesus Christ, the Son.

Paul reveals He was "equal with God." He wasn't a lesser god, a junior vice-president in the corporation of heaven. He was in the eternal circle of the Trinity—perfect love, perfect power, perfect joy. He had nothing to prove and no ladder left to climb!

He didn't consider His divine status "a thing to be grasped." This wasn't a stretch, this wasn't an ambition, this was an identity.

He KNEW who He was! His value wasn't based on His performance; it was based on His being. He wasn't striving for value; He was value! That is a perfect, unshakable, glorious sense of self!

And then there's you.

Why do you play small? Everything that shrinks your footprint comes from living on the quicksand of an insecure identity. An insecure senes of self lands you on an exhausting, soul-crushing treadmill. You've always got something to prove.

You're grinding for your worth at work.
You're begging for it in your relationships.
You're posting for it online.
You're performing for it—at home, on the job, on the field, in the classroom—even here at church, hoping that you're good enough.

An insecure identity is an emotional prison.

Will they like me? Am I good enough? Will I make it? What will people think? Am I hot or not?

When Jesus dies on the cross, He didn't just pay for your sin; He made a massive trade! He took your broken, striving, insecure identity and traded you His perfect, unshakable, glorious one!

Christian, Your value is no longer a moving target based on your performance; it is a fixed point based on Jesus!

So here is the first power move of a big life, and I want you to hear it like a declaration of independence:

Your identity in Christ is not a project to be completed; it is a fact to be enjoyed!

The invitation of the gospel is a call to FREEDOM! It's time to stop living like a pauper when you are the child of the King! Look at the new-creating birth certificate signed in the blood of Jesus and start thinking like the royalty you are!

What would you do tomorrow if you knew, deep in your bones, that you had nothing to prove? What fear would lose its grip? What chains of approval would finally shatter?

That is the beginning of a big life! It starts with who you are! And in Christ, you are eternally, unshakably, gloriously secure.