You Reproduce Who You Are – Walking In Power with Nate Ortiz

Everyone, this is Nate Ortiz and you are listening to Walking and Power.

You might have heard the old leadership saying that says, you teach what you know but you

reproduce who you are.

I think that could really be implied to our faith.

And when we talk about who we are, I want to focus on that moment before we even talk

about reproducing who we are.

You have to understand who you are in this life and not just what we do.

We talk about it often where we can focus and say, well, this is what I do, but who are

you really?

Right?

And you know, in your private life, when you are not around other people, you are not

presenting or performing when you just say, well, I am by myself, but I am just sitting

down in a room and I don't have anything pulling on me.

I am not on my phone and I am not answering emails or text messages.

Who am I really?

So wherever you are listening to this out, you might be at the gym, you might be at home,

sitting on your couch.

Where you might be in the car, ask yourself, right?

Who am I really?

And sometimes people think they know but they really don't.

I feel like one of the great ways to understand who you are is to really peel back the layers

of things that people perceive, thoughts of you, but really find yourself and who God's

created you to be.

To understand that in this relationship with God, there are things that will come in time.

There are things that will be immediate.

But when you walk with God, I think there are things that you discover about yourself through

his word, through being around other people who have been walking with God for a long time.

And I think understanding who you are will ultimately help you impact other people's lives.

If you're unsure of who you are, unsure of what God's called you be or just your identity

in him, you're always going to feel like you're struggling or you might take on the identity

of other things that you're not meant to take the identity of on.

So here's the thing.

Who you are will be discovered when you are saying, God, I submit my life to your word, I

submit my life to your plan.

Because when you do that, you begin to peel off everything that isn't meant for you.

There's a story of David in the Bible where he goes to battle and King Saul tells him,

hey, you'll wear my armor and David puts it on.

He's like, this is me.

It takes off and the story he goes out and takes a slingshot and takes down Goliath, the

giant.

And David in that moment where he could have tried to wear Saul's armor and be something

that he wasn't, what he chose to do, what he was gifted in, how God's wired him.

The same is true for you.

Don't try to be like someone that you would, you know, somebody deemed really high esteem

when it comes to their faith, but be a God's call to be.

And that only happens when you walk with him daily.

When you, like I said, step back from what you do to find out really who you are.

And when you reproduce yourself, you know, Jesus, he was the best at reproducing himself.

Jesus didn't come to establish his leadership, but Jesus came to empower people to walk this

life.

I'm not, you know, not that we know worries or stress or things, you know, obstacles in

your way, but gave the empowerment to say, listen, there's going to be battles and fights in

your life, but you're not going to fight them in the ways that you maybe did in the past

before the Lord, but you're going to fight them in a new way and fight them in prayer.

You're going to fight them with just, you know, not always just feel like you have to be

the aggressor in situations where you say, God, I'm trusting you, helping me be strong,

helping me bold, helping to stand my ground, but also helping me not to step in the place

where you want to fight my battles for me.

So when you reproduce who you are, you have to learn that it's in partnership with God,

but you are going to impact people's lives around you.

You are going to be someone.

You know, you might look at, well, let me say, if you might look at your life and say,

there's people important to me, there's people who helped me grow my faith reading the word,

understanding God in a greater, richer way.

There might be people in your life who are doing that for you now, but then who are you

doing that for around you?

Jesus, like I said, was great this.

He took 12 disciples and he poured everything he was into them and not all of them got what

he was, he was putting down, but they, but they were taught by him.

And I, their impact went on and on and on because there were, you know, Jesus disciples,

his disciples, and they disciples, someone else, and went further and further and further.

Sometimes we want to reach the crowds, the masses, but really there's this idea that we

are the people that you're pouring into, right?

You can sometimes identify mentors easily in your life, then you can't people that you're

mentoring.

Because sometimes we're like, well, I don't want to do this or do that, but it takes a lot

effort and time and it does mentoring someone or discipling someone, but it's always worth

it because God is not doing things in your life that you can keep to yourself, but God

is doing things in your life that you can empower other people around you.

So be that type of person, right?

You teach what you know, and that's great, but you reproduce who you are.

So look around you.

Are there people that you say, yeah, I feel like I see someone like my leadership, some

of my, you know, my faith journey, like the things I've learned from God and these are the

people, these spiritual disciplines.

Can you see those things in someone's life?

If not, I think you're basically on a big part of the fullness of what God has for you

in your walk with them.

When you feel that man had that joy when he sees someone walking with God because the

time they spent with you and they used to be on thriving and they're marriage-selfying,

their families healthy, businesses thriving because they were dedicated to things that were

taught to them.

Well, the sad I want to encourage you, wherever you are today, whether you feel like you're

doing great, whether you feel like you're feeling low, whether you feel like you have a lot

of people around you that you're helping or none at all.

Listen, today's the day to start where you are.

Today's the day and now is the time for you to get serious about your faith and say, God,

what do you have for me?

So even as this video ends or you know, as you're listening to it, take a moment to pray,

wherever you are.

Be genuine, be authentic.

Just talk to God.

I say, God, I want to grow.

I want to know who I am and I want to reproduce the great things about me that you've put

inside of me.

And so when we think about our life, let's dig into the context of, right, good, good,

pour it into us and how can we give that away to other people?

I pray that you're blessed.

I pray that you have an amazing week and I hope that in this you continue to get closer

to God.

We'll catch you next time.