You Don't Know Who You Are: For the Church Musician & Singer

By Bert Cross

God is holy, and He is listening for a certain holy sound.

This book, You Don't Know Who You Are, is a call to return to holiness for the church musician and singer so that their musical offering can be accepted by God.

This book is a spiritual road map for worshipping God in Spirit and in truth. The reader will u

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trilogy Christian Publishing
• Release date: Mar 7, 2022
• ISBN: 9781637699515

Bert Cross

DR. BERT CROSS II is a musical prophet sounding the trumpet to all that hear. Dr. Cross has four music degrees, but more importantly, he studies the Word of God. The author is in full-time ministry, and his motto is "Leading people in becoming true worshippers and ministering to the glory and honor of God." Dr. Cross resides in Houston, Texas, with his wife, Lenora.

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YOU

DON’T

KNOW

WHO

YOU

ARE

For the Church

Musician & Singer

Ministry Series by

Dr. Bert Cross, II

You Don’t Know Who You Are

Trilogy Christian Publishers

A Wholly Owned Subsidiary of Trinity Broadcasting Network

2442 Michelle Drive, Tustin, CA 92780

Copyright© 2021 by Dr. Bert Cross, II

All Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, King James Version of the Bible. Public domain.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without written permission from the author. All rights reserved. Printed in the USA. Rights Department, 2442 Michelle Drive, Tustin, CA 92780.

Trilogy Christian Publishing/TBN and colophon are trademarks of Trinity Broadcasting Network.

For information about special discounts for bulk purchases, please contact Trilogy Christian Publishing.

Trilogy Disclaimer: The views and content expressed in this book are those of the author and may not necessarily reflect the views and doctrine of Trilogy Christian Publishing or the Trinity Broadcasting Network.

Manufactured in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.

ISBN 978-1-63769-950-8

E-ISBN: 978-1-63769-951-5

Dedication

To My Wife, Children, and Family:

You Mean the World to Me.

Acknowledgments

I first want to thank God for His grace, for the gift, and for the love for the music that He has given me. I am forever grateful.

To my wife and prayer partner, Lenora, who caused me to be in the ministry in the first place. She exposed me to ministries that changed my life. She is one of my gifts from God. Honey, I love you!

To my mother, Patsy Clifton, who brought my sister, my brothers, and me up in church and prayed the prayer of faith and protection over our family all of her life. May God tremendously bless her with the things of heaven that money cannot buy.

To Dr. S. E. Mitchell, who was the first ministry influence in my life; to Melvin L. Smith and his brother, Bishop Robert E. Smith, Sr. To my partners in ministry who helped me in the writing of this book: Kevin Battles, Donald Burton, Forrest Lamb, and Asia Smith. I also want to acknowledge the musicians Samuel Murrell, Renard Webb, Hubert (Hubbie) Powell, Charles Covington, Cyrus Chestnut, and all of my past and present music professors and friends for musical revelation, influence, and inspiration.

To all the people who encouraged me and who covered my ministry in prayer. Only God knows how you supported this ministry, and only God can reward you for your faithfulness. May God’s riches be yours!

Table of Contents

Dedication

Acknowledgments

Foreword

Preface

Who Is God?

The Holy Three: God, Jesus, and the Holy Ghost

The Enemy of God

Who Are You?

You and the Anointing

Go Into All the World and Do What?

Your Unique Position

Choose to be Clean

The Worship Direction

Minister from a Place of Power

Foreword

by Donald W. Burton

It’s been my honor to have known Dr. Bert Cross for over twenty-five years. No matter how long it’s been since last we spoke, it’s always been as though we spoke the day before. I’ve always known him to put God first in every endeavor he’s undertaken. He has always been a man of compassion, conviction, dedication, and loyalty to the Father, the Creator of the Universe.

I watched him be hurt by the church while faithfully serving the church and inspire the church with his preaching and music ministry. His consistent love for the Father and the Father’s people has often been challenged, but he never wavered. He is a talented and gifted man, born and chosen by our Father to bring true unadulterated praise and worship back to the body of Christ in these last days.

If you had the choice between listening to your favorite preacher or pastor speak about the Father for thirty minutes or one word from the Father, which would you choose? I’ve asked that question to thousands of people from all walks of life, races, cultures, ethnicities, and religious backgrounds, and the answer has always been the same: one word from God. Why is this so important to humanity? This was the question presented to me thirty-six years ago when the Father began speaking to me concerning what His expectations were when it came to the praise and worship of Him.

God said, The praise and worship that I require is not what my children are giving me. God went on to say, They give me what they think I want based on what they’ve seen others do without seeking me to find out what it is I require of them. They continue to not give me what I’m asking for. The continued effort of God’s people to worship Him with what they think He wants and not what He requires has led to empty and spiritually anemic people.

Our Heavenly Father has chosen and called men of God, like my dear friend Dr. Cross, to awaken the church and to see just how far we’ve strayed away from the praise and worship that the Father requires of His people and what it’s going to take to get back.

This book will upset many, challenge others to question what they are doing, and cause others to reevaluate everything they’ve done regarding praise and worship to date.

In his book, You Don’t Know Who You Are, Dr. Bert Cross has given us not only a way to get back to worship, grounded in Spirit and truth, but has provided a road map in getting back to the beauty of worshipping the Almighty. Dr. Cross has written a straightforward and honest assessment of what has historically happened over the past several decades that have brought us to this great departure from true worship. He has eloquently provided the biblical basis for which he speaks to ensure that, as you read this book, you will be enlightened, encouraged, invigorated, and compelled to find out who you are, and then return to praise and worship that glorifies and honors the Father, the Creator of the Universe.

He has been provided an extraordinary degree of honesty, transparency, and sincerity, combined with over forty years of experience in being on the frontline and often in the heat of many battles, both inwardly and outwardly. This is what Dr. Cross brings to the pages of this book entitled You Don’t Know Who You Are. For those who may doubt this man of God’s wisdom, expertise, insight, experience as a preacher of the gospel of Christ, student of the Most High, university professor, musician, composer, singer/songwriter, author, husband, father, and so much more, you may be tempted to still ask, Is Dr. Bert Cross qualified to write such a document? The answer is… absolutely! Therefore, it is my extreme pleasure and privilege to introduce to you Dr. Bert Cross and this book.

Preface

Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.

— 2 Timothy 4:2–4

I strongly believe that these are those times mentioned here in 2 Timothy 4. I have been alive for over fifty years, and I see a change in the religious community, whereby the supposedly moral segment of the church population is now offering alternative facts as an option. To those people, I have an important news flash: God has not changed, and neither has His word changed! God had this to say about Himself:

For I am the LORD, I change not.

—Malachi 3:6

God spoke the sun into existence during creation, and the sun is still listening to God every day by doing what it was designed to do. If you go to the Book of Revelation, you will find worship that was, is, and will continue forever.

And the four beasts had each of them six wings about him; and they were full of eyes within: and they rest not day and night, saying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come.

­— Revelation 4:8

The four living creatures in heaven do not rest, and the only thing they declare daily to God is, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come. The Almighty God and His works are perfect. God is holy. God desires us as the people of God to be holy. The antonym to the word holy is the word unholy.

Music is a holy and heavenly gift from God. This holy gift was first given to Lucifer and the angels. Music, being a part of worship, found its way to earth in the creation of man. The Holy God breathed into man the (holy) breath of life, and man became a living soul. This living breath of life also activates the vocal folds to produce what is known as singing. This holy breath also is necessary for the blowing, as to produce the sound on wind instruments. One must be alive to make music.

The God factor is important in music, and music is important to God. The holy musician and singers are not only anointed for the present but also for the future, to play and sing to God for all of eternity. Therefore, music, and its active part in praise and worship, is the only present gift that will remain in the new heaven and earth.

The music ministry has suffered because contemporary teaching and preaching ministries do not embrace sound doctrine and truth. Not only the church musicians and singers, but pastors and church leaders have moved into a gray area and are causing millions upon millions of would-be worshippers to accept unholy influences for the sake of unholy tolerance and compromise. We have come to a point in time where neither church musicians and singers, nor pastors, will endure sound doctrine. At present, you can hardly tell the difference between the sacred and the secular, on the performance stage or in the pulpit. The reason for this phenomenon is that church musicians and singers, in general, don’t know who they are. An enemy has done this.

When a church musician friend of mine, who happens to have a seminary degree (which I will henceforth call a cemetery degree), became aware of this project on the church musician and singer, he immediately thought it necessary to make me aware of traditional non-sacred music, which is offered as just a human activity. He said that he understood my premise on the book, but he thought that my approach oversimplifies the nature of music.

He went on to say that music is used in several applications, such as the use of music to teach educational songs to children and other non-religious activities. He stated that music is a tool, much like a hammer. I understood what he meant; however, according to the dictionary, the meaning for the word tool is a device, especially one held in the hand, used to carry out a particular function.

Just because something is used and accepted in one manner by the population, such as in the case of the baseball cap, doesn’t mean that that thing was designed for that purpose. Just because we,