Things, things, things! A better job. A bigger house. New clothes for the kids. Tomorrow’s luncheon date. A better television. Get the picture?
Many of us have learned to believe God to prosper us to such a degree that we have too much to keep up with. We end up spending so much time and energy taking care of the legitimate “things” of life that we unconsciously give the attention and affections of our heart over to this natural world instead of to God.
Quite simply, God says love is keeping His commandments. That brings love out of the indefinite into something explicit. But God has done more than define love for you. He’s given you instructions so that you can know how to love as He loves. By giving you His Word, God has given you His love manual in black and white. All you have to do is follow it and you’ll be walking in love.
I want you to begin to develop an addiction today—an addiction to the Word of God. That may sound odd to you, especially if you don’t have much of an interest in the Word right now. But, believe me, it’s possible. I’ve done it myself and I’ve seen others do it, time and again.
All you have to do is make a decision to give yourself to it. To focus your time and attention on it. The more you give yourself to it, the more your desire for it will grow. Eventually, it will consume your thinking.
Once you start stepping out in faith and walking in the spirit, the devil will see to it that you have ample opportunity to fall flat on your spiritual face. He’ll try to get you into some jams where there appears to be no way out.
But take it from me as one who’s been there, if you’ll look to God and trust His wisdom instead of your own, He’ll always show you a way of escape (1 Corinthians 10:13). Not only that, but He’ll do it in such a way that He’ll get the glory and you’ll have the last laugh on the devil.
What happens when you hesitate to do something God has told you to do? Your adversary takes the first step. The devil gets the jump on you.
If you want to live by faith, hesitation is one of the most hazardous habits you could ever have. It comes from being indecisive. The Bible says a man like that is “unstable and unreliable and uncertain about everything he thinks, feels, decides” (The Amplified Bible).
I can’t tell you how many born-again, Holy Ghost-filled Christians pick their pastor apart on Saturday night and then expect him to pray the prayer of faith for them Sunday morning! They’ll constantly make critical comments about the evangelists and preachers that God has sent to minister to them and then wonder why the rain of the Spirit has all but dried up in their churches.
When your alarm clock goes off tomorrow morning, don’t just wake up to another day. Do what the Word says to do and “awake to righteousness”! Reawaken yourself to the glorious fact that you’ve been made the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus and given right-standing with Almighty God.
I know from personal experience that when people start to criticize you and persecute you because you live by faith, your natural human response is to want to strike back. You want to start dishing out a little criticism of your own. Maybe if they get a taste of their own medicine, they’ll shut their mouths, you think.
But you know what? They won’t. Your words will just add fuel to their fire and they’ll criticize you harder and louder than they did before.
If you’re born again and have the Word of God in your heart, you can live in victory. You may not have all the answers. There may be a great many spiritual things you don’t understand. But it’s not those things that are most likely to destroy you. It’s the things you know to do—but don’t—that usually make you fall.
Years ago, I decided I was going to walk by the Word of God. I told God that, as far as I was concerned, His Word was final and I’d confess it the rest of my life no matter what. That was the most important decision I’ve ever made.
Not too long after that, I decided that no matter what happened, whether I felt like it or not, I’d walk in love. Because the Bible clearly says “faith worketh by love.” It won’t work any other way.
Those two decisions—to operate by faith in the Word of God and to walk in love—are the two most important decisions I’ve ever made in my life.
The more you fellowship with God around His Word, the more you’ll know the “power outflowing from His resurrection.” You’ll develop joy. You’ll develop faith. You’ll start developing God’s own characteristics...just by fellowshiping with Him. You’ll begin to understand who you really are in Jesus.
I remember one day I was reading the story of the woman with the issue of blood who touched the hem of Jesus’ garment and was healed.
How do you give to the Lord?
Do you just drop some money in the plate at church without much thought? Or do you just write a check to God at the first of every month and pay Him like you pay all your other bills?
You need to think about that because how you give is a matter of deep concern to God. He’s particular about how offerings are given. He won’t receive just any old thing however you feel like giving it.
If you want your deeds to be blessed, if you want to see supernatural results in your life, you’ll have to do more than simply read the Word of God. You’ll have to put it into action.
That’s what I did. Years ago when I realized that God was the One who had the answers to all my problems, that He was the One who could supply all my needs, I committed myself to do everything His Word told me to do. I made a quality decision to step out in faith on every command I saw there.
When you’re facing a problem, the very first thing you should ask God for is wisdom. Not money. Not power. Not even healing. But wisdom.
God’s wisdom is the key that will unlock every door in your life. It will turn your every failure into success. So, stop wasting your prayer power begging God for things you think you need and spend some time instead listening to what He has to say about your situation.
If you’ve never tried that before, practically speaking, here’s what you need to do:
God is not full of surprises. He’s not an unpredictable being who likes to keep you guessing. Countless believers, however, have the idea He is.
“You just never know what God is going to do,” they say. They base that idea on 1 Corinthians 2:9 which says, “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.” They interpret that scripture to mean that God is keeping secrets from His people.
But, praise God, He isn’t!
We often praise God for His faithfulness. We’re thankful that we can always count on Him to be there for us. But we rarely consider the fact that He needs us to be faithful too.
It’s true. God needs people He can count on. He needs faithful and wise stewards He can trust over His household. In this final hour, He needs faithful believers to team up with, so He can manifest Himself in the earth more than ever before.
“Oh Gloria, God doesn’t need me!”
When an athlete goes into training, he practices to improve his skills. He works hard, repeating the same motions over and over until they become what we’d call “second nature” to him.
Most of us understand how crucial that kind of training is in the physical realm. We know that you simply can’t be a winner without it. But did you know we can train ourselves that same way where spiritual things are concerned?
Do you ever have seasons in your life when it seems like every time you go to church and every time you spend time in prayer and every time you open the Bible, you receive a revelation from God? I do. Spiritually, everything will be going great. I’ll be higher than a Georgia pine. Then, suddenly, something starts to happen. I start drying up in spiritual things.
It seems like it doesn’t make any difference what I pray or how much I read the Word, I can’t get anywhere spiritually. I’m so dry my spirit’s creaking!
If you’ve been crying and asking God to run the devil out of your life, stop! The Bible says you’re the one who’s supposed to overcome the devil.
How? By resisting him. By rebelling against him when he tells you to do something and doing what God says instead! When Satan tells you some lie, contradict him with the Word of God. Oppose him. This verse says when you do that, he’ll flee from you. He’ll “run as in terror.”
That means everywhere you go, as you walk in faith and oppose the devil, darkness is pushed back.
In this day and time, trouble seems to surround us on every side. If it’s not a failing economy, it’s a failing business, a failing marriage or failing health. Yet, in the midst of seemingly overwhelming problems, God has promised to deliver us.