Power to Succeed Pt.3

As believers, it is our job to follow instructions. If you cannot follow instructions, the enemy will take you out. The enemy’s whole goal is to take you out, but he can’t just do it, you have to open the door. If you deviate, the enemy will ultimately get you. You need to find some direction to follow every single day. If you choose convenience over following instructions, the enemy will own you. That’s why God’s Word says that we walk by faith and not by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7 NKJV). If you do what you want to do and do not follow instructions, everything won’t work together for your good.

We need to pay acute attention to God, the Word of God, the Spirit of God and whatever is going on around us. God will make it work out for your good. You have to stop struggling. Struggling is anti-God. You should be content with such things as you have. You have salvation, you are born-again, you are filled with the Spirit and you have a loaded and ready mouth. God is on your side. He said that He will never leave you or forsake you. God can’t play on your team if you are struggling. Let God do whatever He wants to do. There is no hope or power in struggling.

God wants more than abundantly to show you that you will not be ashamed (Hebrews 6:19-20). Jesus is our hope. You have this hope as an anchor to your soul, so how can you not be excited and have a zest for life? You have to activate the power that has been given to you.

Hope changes the way that you see (Romans 8:28). Hope drives faith. This power to succeed in hard times changes the way you see. Hope is power. Without the hope, there is no faith. Hope changes the way a person goes about making choices and decisions because they are not looking with their natural eyes in order to make these choices and decisions. Your senses are not there to tell you how to live. We walk by faith and not by sight.

We ought to be eager about the things of God (Romans 8:24-25). Only by putting God first will you ever see the things that you desire manifest in your life. Get eager about God! All you have to do is be expectant. You have to imagine and meditate on God’s Word for hope to be conceived. If you can see the hope, it is not real, Bible hope. For you to have the hope that drives faith, you can’t see it. Hoping for what you can see is a lower level of hope. Hoping for what you cannot see brings out excitement and perseverance.

Hope will make you hear the Word differently, obey the Word differently, pray differently, and praise differently because you will have excitement and endurance to do whatever is necessary. It kills the whining and the complaining because you get real hope – the power to succeed no matter what.

Hope is the power to open up your eyes. Abraham hoped in God against the hope that his eyes could give him (Romans 4:18-19). This is the hope that is the power God has given us to succeed in hard times.














































.

Power to Succeed Pt.2

The pressure that is attempting to mount upon you can have the effect of causing other weaknesses to appear. We established last week that every challenge in life is an opportunity! Even with all that’s going on around you, you alone will determine which it will be. Challenge or opportunity. Light always destroys darkness. The bigger the challenge; the bigger the opportunity. With God on your side, how can you lose?

Our foundation Scripture: Romans 8:28 – gives us the source of hope. We know that all things work together for our good. This power we’re talking about is hope. The enemy is crafty and knows faith is driven by hope; so if hope is eliminated, faith is nullified. You can’t hope too big for God. Your greatest expectation won’t exhaust God! Impossibilities are possibilities waiting to be shown.
Romans 5:5 – this hope doesn’t disappoint, nor will you come up short or be embarrassed. God provokes us to have hope by all His promises and result in those lives around us. How do you know God is on your side? God has deliberately chosen His loyalties.
Romans 8:31, 32 – God is on our side, not the other way around. Religion tells us we have to try to get on God’s side, but how can we who are finite approach an infinite God? He chose us. If you stay on His side, failure is not an option. When you don’t see a way out, ask yourself: am I born again? You receive Christ up front, at the very beginning.

Anticipate how God will deliver you. Your sight is critical. God is our helper, we have nothing to fear. We’re to cease from our own labor to enter into God’s rest (Hebrews 3, 4). God chose to do this for us. He gave Himself to us. If God is our help, then we’d better declare it!
Hebrews 6:13; Galatians 3:16, 17, 29 – God’s Word is to us because the promise was made to Abraham and his seed (Christ), and to us as His heirs! This guarantees it! God’s will is more abundant than your desperation. We are the righteousness of God through Christ Jesus. Realize that you didn’t add anything to this game. We have a strong, warm, comforting confidence through our Covenant with God. He’s on your side. Knowing this, you now have to change the way you think.

Power to Succeed Pt.1

The Bible says that all those who live Godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution. There is no victory without overcoming. Today, we will discuss how the power to succeed in hard times is yours. You cannot overcome unless something comes at you. You are who God called you to be. You can do everything He says you can do – whether or not you believe it.

We are facing challenging times. The economic pressure is forcing all of the weaknesses in the foundation of people’s lives to be exposed. Nevertheless, we should be excited because this is a time for truth, power and majesty. We have the power to succeed in hard times. We are talking about the power to dominate in hard times. God said that the wealth of the wicked is laid up for the just.

Every challenge in life is an opportunity. Anything in your way – any obstacle – is an opportunity. People who don’t view challenges as opportunities are already defeated. You can’t view a challenge as a problem. Challenges are meant to be met and overcome. The bigger they are, the harder they fall. When you face whatever you face, you must keep the word of God in mind. The way that you do this is you store the Word of God in your heart, so that you can always keep it in mind.

God’s Word says in Romans 8:28 (NKJV): “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.” We have to start to “know” some things. We must know that “all things work together for good.” This verse is referring to bad things, i.e. challenges, working together for our good. “Knowing” means we have confidence. Confidence brings peace.

When you are at your end that is when good stuff starts to happen – and good can become great. When you are at your end, you are being challenged, but it is an opportunity. The bigger the challenge is, the harder it falls. God is not afraid of anything – not even death (1 Thessalonians 4:13). The Word says that we should not grieve when people die, even as people who have no hope. We have hope, even in death.

When you come to the end of yourself, you need to evaluate whether you take note of it or whether you try to explain it away, i.e. bury your head in the sand. Most people try to convince themselves they have an answer. They don’t accept the truth that it is over. The battle might be over, but not the war. A war is made up of many battles. You ought to win the battles so that you can win the war.

God works all things together for our good – that includes ugly things. You can’t bury your head in the sand. You have to focus on the things that God has worked together for your good over and over again. You should not have regrets. God will turn it for your good.

God is not a sentimental God. He is a fair God. You can never use your experience to invalidate the Word of God. Romans 8:28 does not say that God works everything out for everybody. He rewards those who pay the cost. This verse applies to a specific category of people: “to those who love God”. Who loves God? Everyone who loves God is known. There is an acid test to determine those who love God. Jesus states in John 14:15: “If you love Me, keep My commandments.” You have to learn God’s commands, put them in your heart and be able to recall them, so that you can do them. Simply stated, you obey God’s Word. This is the acid test.

If we fail the test, God’s Word tells us that if we confess ours sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us of all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). The Word also says that God will not remember our sins. This does not give us license to sin. But, if we do go back to sin, there is still hope because Jesus is our advocate. You prove that you love God by keeping His Word. You can’t bury your head in the sand. You must address it. We have to obey God’s Word to live with Him. When you don’t obey His Word, you have to get right back and obey. Confess your sins to God – that’s when you start being in a love relationship with God.

There is another category of people in Romans 8:28: “to those who are called according to His purpose”. The call of God is stated in John 3:16: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” You have to put yourself in the category – if you believe in Him, you will have everlasting life. Everyone is called, but only a few people answer. We determine whether we are in this group or not. Another translation of “to those who are called according to His plan” is “to those who God deliberately chose for His plan”. In other words, God deliberately chose you for His plan, so He called.

We obey God because He deliberately chose us for His plan. He calls us because He needs us for His plan, and if we come He will work everything together for our good. What Satan means to kill you, God will redeem for His glory. God knows our heart’s desire. He will cause our heart’s desire to come to pass (Romans 12:1). In hard times, you have to remember that God is working everything together for your good as long as you obey Him.

Don’t let it be too late for you. God is calling you right now. Pick it up. God is deliberately calling you right now because He has plans for you. Hope is the power to succeed in hard times. Hope drives your faith. Without hope, nothing happens. Hope does not disappoint (Romans 5:5). You will not be embarrassed. Your business is to love God and He will work everything together for your good.





























































.

Hoping Pt 5

Hoping When it Seems Hopeless
Part 5



You have been given a supernatural hope by God through Christ to use when everything around you looks hopeless, so that God can bring it to pass. Dig into the Word of God and make the decision to live out the fullness of your salvation. God wants to do something never seen before through you (1 Corinthians 2:9, 10). You have to believe that He who promised is able to perform. Starting this very day, we will learn how to expand hope and God in your life.

Being filled to your level of hunger and thirst is a spiritual principle. There are "hunger stimulants" to increase your hope:
 Exposure – just like smelling bread in a bakery – exposure will increase your appetite for the Word.
 Focus – whatever you concentrate on will develop an acquired taste.
 Reflection/memory – remember how God brought you out of a previous situation.

Get your hopes up! It’s an act of your own will to hope greater. You cannot separate hope from belief. How can you believe for something without an expectation for it to come to pass? Without hope there is no faith. Mark 9:23 lets us know that the size of hope is determined only by ourselves. Your hope causes your faith to birth what you can’t see. But you first have to get over yourself. Hope can mean faith because they are so closely associated (Hebrews 10:23). Hold fast to your hope because it’s going to be some kind of bumpy ride! Why hold on? Because God is faithful.

1. You might have to modify your requirements for hope. God hears you! But God doesn’t move for sincerity; He moves for faith.
John 20:24-29 – Thank you, Thomas! We are blessed because of Thomas’ sensory criteria for hope in Jesus’ resurrection. No longer in the Kingdom of God can we only rely on our senses. You can believe without physical evidence.
Romans 8:24, 25 – The new criteria for hope – you will have follow brother Abraham and learn to hope beyond the obvious. If you can figure it out, you aren’t in hope. If you can see the light at the end of the tunnel, get off the tracks! You’re about to get run over!

2. People’s expectations are shaped by:
 the authority to which they submit. The Spirit of God revealed: people’s fears are crystal clear. It is their hopes that are fuzzy. Your hope needs to be crystal clear. Define where, when, how.
 what they are exposed to repeatedly – using your imagination is how to elevate your hope. Don’t spend time with ungodly people. Get away from toxic environments.
 their environment – be separate! Don’t stay on the ground with turkeys – they can’t fly!
 their experiences – the most powerful thing that will shape your expectation.