Transcription
This is Bishop Dell Broner. Thank you so much for joining our YouTube channel today. If this is a blessing to you, I want to encourage you to like it and then click the subscribe button and then turn on notification. Hit that little notification bell so that you never, ever miss another one of our videos. And then, if you're in the Metro Atlanta area on a Sunday, check out one of our exhilarating services at 8:30 a.m., 11:00 a.m., or 6:00 p.m.
Well, our foundational text today comes from Habakkuk 2 verses 1-3, a familiar passage of scripture. "And I will stand at my guardpost and station myself on the watchtower, and I will keep watch to see what He will say to me and how I may reply when I am reprimanded." And then, "The Lord answered me and said, 'Write down the vision and inscribe it clearly on tablets so that one who reads it may run. For the vision is yet for the appointed time; it hurries toward the goal and it will not fail. Though it delays, wait for it, for it will certainly come; it will not delay long.'"
I'm speaking today from the subject: Write, Read, and Run. Write, Read, and Run. This is at a time when the Lord uses godless people, the Chaldeans, to punish Judah. And now Habakkuk, the prophet, is wondering, "What in the world do we do in a time like this, in a season like this?" And he's at a place where he needs God. And he's saying that, "God, I I I believe that you will talk to me. That You have something to say about my situation." And so, so he said, "I I'm I'm going to stand on on the watch here and and see what You will say to me."
I believe that God is looking for people who are in a a posture of expectation of God speaking to you. I don't know about you, but I still believe that God speaks to people. I don't think that you're crazy if somebody says that that God spoke to them. I do know that there are some crazy people that say that God spoke to you. But just because you experience a counterfeit doesn't mean that there's not a genuine. So, um, I believe that God speaks to people who are in a posture, who have made themselves available to say, "God, speak to me. Speak to me. Speak to me. I trust that You will speak to me so that You can lead me and guide me." God wants to lead us. He wants to guide us. He wants to give us direction as to what to do. So God speaks to people that are in a a posture of expectation and receptivity.
And remember, if you are expecting God to do something, that's what He said: "Write the vision and make it plain." And, uh, so that you can, uh, read it and run with it. And He says, "Though it t wait for it." You always show what you're waiting on by showing what you're working on. Now, if you really waiting on something, you ought to be working on it. I mean, if I'm waiting on my breakthrough, I ought to be, I ought to be working on my breakthrough, right? I mean, if I'm waiting to be able to get my first car, I ought to make a room to be able to put the car. I ought to clean out the garage. I ought to clean out the carport or to get a car cover, if if that's what is necessary, or the washing materials. If if I pray and ask God and said, "God, please, please, please, Lord, send rain today. I've got seed in the ground. Send rain." And if I believe that God is going to answer by rain, I ought to walk out of the house with my umbrella. I mean, faith without works is is dead. H. Again, you show what you are waiting on by showing what you are working on. If if I if I'm waiting on something, I ought to be working on it. I mean, if if I'm a single woman, if I'm waiting on a husband, I ought to be saying, "Lord, you know, make me the answer to the kind of prayer that my husband is praying for in a wife, so that when he sees me, he will have no problem recognizing me." So you ought to be working on that. You you can't wait. If you know that you need to lose 20 pounds, you can't wait. Now, if he likes a little meat on his bones, that's fine. But the point is is that you need to be working on whatever you are waiting on as an act of your faith, because faith without works is dead. And dead faith doesn't work. So always, if you're waiting on something, if you've got something by vision and you're waiting on God to show it to you, be working on it. Be working on it. You don't have to have it, but be working on it. If if you're trying to get your first place, buy your first piece of property, be saving your down payment. Be working on it.
Now, the reason, for example, I had always confessed that, um, that I was going to marry as soon as I finished college. And and the year that I finished college is the year that I got married. That was not an accident. That was an intention. Now, I didn't just, I didn't, I was not going to marry somebody and bring them and live in my mom and dad's basement. Now, if you have to do that, that's fine for you. But I needed my prophecy. Okay? So I had a job in my teen years and I was saving money because I was working on what I was waiting for. So when I married, uh, you know, as soon as I finished college, I was, I was 21 years old when I finished college. And I, I, I went in with a plan. I, I didn't go in on the six-year plan. I said, "Lord, I'm going in on a four-year plan." I, I was, I went in on on half, half tuition scholarship, but I didn't want to waste my other half of the money. So I, I went in with a plan and I came out with a plan. And I said, "I want to marry as soon as I get out of school." And so I start saving money years leading into that because I had a vision of doing that. And I started working on that, showing what I was waiting on.
So you have to always have a plan of what you are working on while you are waiting on it. You show what you're waiting on by showing what you're working on. And I want you to realize this: if you got a vision, if you got a vision from God, the command that God gave them was to write the vision and not just scribble some general ideas about it, but write it and make it plain. Make it clear. I want you to write the clarity of your vision so that when people read it, it will inspire them to bust a move. That they will read it and run. Write it, read it, run it. Write it, read it, run the vision. Run the vision. Run with your vision. Write it, read it, and run with it.
This is what I would say as a goal is not a goal until it is written. A vision is not a vision until it is written. You know, a goal, if it does, if it's not written, it's just a wish. And a vision, if it is not written, is just a fantasy. So your vision needs to be written. Your vision needs to be written. The Lord told Habakkuk to write the vision. Write it, write it, write it. And so a vision must be written. It must be written. Write what you hear. Write what you see. Write what you believe. Write what you imagine. And write what you passionately sense in your heart. So if I feel that God is speaking to me about something, I want to write what I hear. I want to write what I see because vision is a living entity. I want to write what I believe. I want to write what I have imagined in my heart. I want to write it. I want to write what I passionately sense that God is is saying and and putting in my heart to do. You write it, and it shows that you mean business.
There's something about it. If people just talk a good game, you know, about what all they're going to do, you really can't see what all they're saying. Or you can get caught up in the emotion of how they say it and all of the passion and all of that. You emotion. But if you put it on writing and see exactly the details of what they've said, we we call that a a memorandum of understanding, an MOU. And you need to always have a memorandum of understanding after you discuss something. There needs to be in writing, a clarity, a summary that is written, that this is the understanding that you're going to do this, and we're going to supply that. That this, we're going to do this, and this is the price that we're going to pay you. There needs to be a memorandum of understanding. Write it so that you clearly understand it. You can't go to, uh, to court saying, "He said, she said." You need a a memorandum of understanding. It must be written.
I want a clear vision before we start on the project. That must be a a definition of the scope of work that we're going to provide and the payment that's going to be expected. That needs to be clear. What's what's, uh, what's going to be included? What is the type and quality of the material that is going to be used? There, there are a lot of details. And when people are just talking about stuff, they get you all excited about it. But if you don't understand the details, that this is what you ordered. Because sometimes you get stuff, and I don't know about you, but I've ordered some stuff from China and I couldn't even fit it when it got in the mail. I mean, and I got an extra large and double X, and and it, it looks like it was built for a child. And I, I, I couldn't even wear it. I'm like, "That was not in the understanding." You, you don't look like your picture. I call that deceptive advertising. And we need to have some clear USA sizes, cuz we eat differently here.
But in a report at Harvard Business School, MBA study on goal setting, as I said, in the same way that as a goal is not a goal until it's written, a vision is not a vision until it's written. But in their Harvard MBA program, there the graduating class was asked a very simple question concerning their goals in life. And this was the question: "Have you set written goals and created a plan for their attainment?" Have you written? Have you established written goals and set a plan for their attainment? And then upon graduation, they discovered that 84% of the class had no written goal or plan for attainment. 13% of the class had written goals but no plan, written plan for the attainment of those goals. And 3% of the class had written goals and a plan for the attainment of those goals. Fast forward 10 years. 10 years down the road, the 13% of the class that had written goals but no plan for the attainment were making twice as much as the 84% of the class that had no written goals or plan for attaining. They were making twice as much. And the 3% of the class that had written goals and a plan for the attainment of those goals were making 10 times as much as the 97% of the class that had, that did not have the goals and a plan for their attainment. It was a good case that proves the power of writing things down of what your goals are and your process or plan for the attaining of of those particular goals and aspirations that you have.
So write it down. Tell somebody. Write it down. Write it down. Write it down. Here's, here's the way that I would say it: If you think it, ink it. Put it in writing. If you think it, ink it. A short pencil is worth more than a long memory. So put it in writing. Write it down. Write it down.
There are certain things that if I really wanted to get it in me, I, I don't like to just get it verbally. But there are certain things if I want to to remember them, I write, write it down. Every week I write down things. Every, every week. In fact, every day I journal. Now, it's not a diary. It's a journal where I'm distilling truth based on the reflection of my day, of things that I've seen, that I've experienced, things that I have read that have spoken to me. I want to write it down. When you write it down, it adheres to your your memory bank. I mean, you, if you just say it, I mean, you know, it just goes out. I mean, but if I write a telephone number down, I can remember it better. And You'd be surprised, whatever you write down, you can remember it better. And and I don't know why, but psychologists tell us, don't just write it down, but if you write it in blue ink, your mind can remember it better than if it's in black ink. So guess what color My Ink pens are? They're blue. And it gives me incredible recall as I write things down. As I write things down. You see, just because I speak without notes doesn't mean that I don't have something written down. And so if you write it down, if you write it down, you can adhere it.
So I think that God was accomplishing more things than what we might imagine when He says, "Write the vision." Uh, remember, sight is a function of the eyes. Vision is a function of the heart. Sight is a function of the eyes. Vision is a function of the of the heart. So God gives vision to your heart. Have you ever heard older people? They would say, "The Lord laid on my heart." It was really a vision of something that God put in their heart for them to do. Vision is a function of the heart. Is this in your heart? Vision doesn't come out of your head. It's a heart function. It is a heart function.
It is interesting. Now, let me share with you about the three components of vision. The three components of vision. The first one is hindsight. Sight. Hindsight. Hindsight is what you learn from reflecting on the past. You know, life can only be lived forward, but it can only be understood backwards. So that's why you need hindsight, because hindsight, uh, is is allows you to get an understanding that comes out of things through reflecting on the past. Hindsight. There are certain things that you learn in hindsight. You've heard the saying that hindsight is 20/20. It's very clear to you that I look back and now I see that I made a bad decision. I look back and I discovered now that that was an emotional decision, and I wish that I had waited and done this and paid that all first. And hindsight is very, very clear. But at the time, you couldn't see it. Hindsight. Hindsight will teach you things. The hindsight are the things that older people looking back over their youth realize that, "Hey, listen, I shouldn't have spent my time doing this." Now they're able to teach you wisdom based on their hindsight. So that helps with the understanding of your vision is to be able to value hindsight. Hindsight.
Then there's the second one. Form of vision is insight. Insight is a power to see and to understand what is not evident to the average mind. It's, it's a power to see and to understand what is not evident to the average mind. That's insight. My me and all of my brothers were over in, uh, in, um, Puerto Rico. And we were there at one of those, it's, I think it's only about three places or something in the world where there's a bioluminescent, uh, organisms that's in the water. And this is where you can go in in the water at nighttime and you splash around and you'll see the stuff like a yellow-green. It's like it's, you know, like a lightning bug where these are organisms that are in the water and you can see them, uh, when you when you move the water. You get in at night time, but it has to be pitch black at night. And you get out in these canoes and go out and do that. And so here we all out there, me and all of my brothers. We were in in different boats. There were two of us in in each boat. So we had about three boats. And, and I got lost. I got turned around. I didn't have any insight as to how to get out of this. We got in the boat, it was dark when we got in, it was dark when we got out. And we got in some swampy areas, you know, there were trees and stuff, you know. And we got all flustered and flabbergasted. Me and my youngest brother went in the boat together. And, and, and then, uh, we we look up, a certain move, he's going one way and I'm going another, and our boat capsizes. And both of us are in the water. And now here I'm in the water with bioluminescent organisms. And as I'm moving my feet, I'm seeing this yellow-green kind of stuff. I'm like, "What in the name of Jesus? What, what is this?" I couldn't see how there's black jar out there. But my oldest brother, who's a chemist, he's, he's in a boat. His boat didn't capsize. And he figures the way to get get through this thicket in the darkness. He was looking up at the stars and the moon, and it showed him a path to be able to get out. Now, I didn't have the insight to do that. Now, though there were five of us, he was the only one that had insight. But I had enough sense to follow the one with the insight, and I was let out because I followed my oldest brother who had the insight. All of us were in the darkness. All of us had the same experience and the same opportunity. But he saw something that the average mind couldn't see because his mind is not average. I mean, I might have an average mind, but consistency turns average into [Laughter] mastery. Touch your neighbor, said, "There's hope for you." There is hope for [Laughter] you. If you just be consistent. And, and, and like I said, you don't have to have all the sense in the world, but have enough sense to follow somebody who's got sense. And that just blessed my life. That blessed me. So we got out and we got through because we followed somebody that had an insight as to what to do in a dark situation in life. And you get in some dark situations in life, and you might not know what to do. But at least have sense enough to follow somebody that has insight as to what to do when they're in the same darkness that you are. Because God is going to give somebody some in, some insight as to how to get out of this or how to get through this. And if you follow them, you can get out too.
So there's hindsight. There's insight. And then the third form of vision is foresight. Foresight is the ability to predict what will happen or what will be needed for the future. So you need foresight. That's why you should always love older, older people that have some experience. Now, please, I understand they are old fools just like they're young fools. So you don't, don't please don't just follow them because they have gray hair. Please. But you need to be able to realize, if I'm, if I'm trying to climb a mountain, if I'm climing to climb the ladder of success, the maybe the best person to ask about this is the person who's already been there and is on their way down. Maybe they have foresight because they've already gone before you. They've seen before you. They've already been there. So we're talking about these three components of vision: that's hindsight, insight, and foresight. God's got you covered on every degree. That there are things that you learn from your past, from your present, and from the future. So you get a wisdom of where you've been and the mistakes that you have made. Uh, the greatest value of of of of the past is as a teacher. And that's why those who do not know their history are doomed to repeat it. So have the hindsight. There ought to be a historian in every family. There ought to be a historian, somebody that re, reminds the culture of who you are. There have tribes in Africa that if, if a child gets caught in criminal behavior, they will take people from the tribe who know this young man and know his family, and they will spend the next 24 hours speaking words to him, reminding him or her who they are. And they do not allow them to become defined by the mistake that they made, but they remind them of the history and the heritage that they are there. So there's a power in hindsight. There's a power in insight. And there's a power in foresight.
There's a tremendous power. In fact, the word provision, provision, actually comes from a Latin word that actually means foresight. Provision means foresight. It means preparation. And it also means look, looking ahead. God always sends provision for vision. If you got a vision, that's provision. Where God guides, there He provides. He's Jehovah Jireh, the Lord our provider. I said, "God is the Lord our provider." God will provide. He put that in His name so that when we pray, that we will remember that God will provide. There's always a doubt. "God, I'm in trouble. I need this. I need, uh, that and, uh, the other." God is my provider. God, He's Jehovah Jireh, the Lord my provider. God will provide. God will provide.
When Abraham was going up that mountain, the first time that he was called by that name was when Abraham was ascending the Mount Moriah. And when he got up there with his son Isaac, and his his son was asking him, "Daddy, Daddy, where, where's the sacrifice?" He didn't want to say, "Son, you, it, you, it." So he said, in faith, he said, "God will provide the sacrifice himself." Daddy had the knife, a, a, and the rope, and, and, and the boy was carrying the wood. He had everything but the sacrifice. He says, "He's Jehovah Jireh. He's the Lord will provide the Lord will provide the sacrifice." He says, "We're going, but the Lord will provide." We don't have it yet, but He will provide. I don't have all the pieces yet. I don't have all the resources yet. But all that I know is that He will provide. I don't know how I'm going to put these children through school. I don't know how we're going to pay the all of the the rent and the mortgage and, and, and the, the car note and the utilities. But God will provide. When you trust Him, that God will provide. God will provide. God will provide. He saw the need before you had the need. The moment that you have the vision, that you are pregnant with child, and that you're going to have a child, you don't wait until your water breaks to start preparing for that child. When you know that you're pregnant, you begin to then start start planting the baby's room and the furniture that will going in that room, and the diapers and the wipes and, and some clothes and blankets and washcloths and all of these things because you've got the vision that a child is coming. So now you begin to get the provision in advance before you need it. You see the need before you need it. That's foresight. So when you're working on vision, that's about foresight. It was about foresight. It was about foresight.
So I knew when I married that I was going to move into my own place and I wanted to have a down payment. So I had the foresight to start saving years before it was time to do that. Years. But I knew that it was coming. I believed that it was coming. And I showed what I was waiting for by showing what I was working on. I hope that it's making sense to you that when you've got this thing, a vision, by faith, faith without works is dead. And dead faith doesn't work. But God is a provider. God is a provider. And He wanted His people to know that He's a provider. That is the only reason that God allowed the children of Israel to walk around for 40 years in the wilderness. He was waiting. He was waiting on them to be able to trust Him. It's crazy that as many miracles as He did. I mean, if God, if He had done that many miracles to bring me out of something, I'm like, "You know, God, I know You didn't split the Red Sea. You didn't, you didn't do all of this stuff that You have done, that the with the plague of flies and frogs and lice and all of this, You didn't, in the three days of thick darkness, You didn't send all of this to bring me to a place to let me die here. You've already provided for me. You have provided for me." But God said, "I, I want you to trust Me." He let them go around for 40 years just to learn to trust Him. He says, "I'm going to carry you around for 40 years so you can learn to trust Me to be to provide your daily bread." I'm not going to give you. He said, "I could give you enough for the month. I could dump down enough for the whole year." But where are you going to put it? And you only move. Why should I give all to the? Now is some something else for you to have to drag around? God says, "I'll give it to you when when you need it." I, I, I. That was a God had a plan. He was working on something. And it's like, "You got to trust Me." It spent 40 years to get him to trust Him. Some of them would never trust Him, so they died in the wilderness. But the ones that He could teach, these were the ones that were 20 years old and and younger, the teachable ones. And you can be taught in your spirit, even though that your birth certificate says something differently. But as long as you stay teachable, you'll be in that crowd that God said, "Come on in here. Come on in here." And listen, listen, if, if you will trust God, trust, trust, trust Him in the wilderness, then He, He will entrust you in the promised land with all kinds of blessings, with abundance. That's where your harvest is. That's, that's where your ship is coming in. If, if you trust Him, where you got to believe for the manna and the quail to come every day, and water to come out of a rock. It wasn't enough to store it up. God never wanted us to ever get beyond. Don't you ever grow beyond trusting God. That's why Jesus taught us to pray, "Give us this day our daily bread." Every day, He said, "I want you to depend on Me for a daily need in your life." Never become so self-sufficient that you don't have a need for God. I don't mean that you need God to pay you to come up with the rent money at the end of every day or every week. But, uh, it might be a different thing if you got your rent money. You got an issue that you working out with a relationship. It may be your marriage. It may be your girlfriend, your boyfriend. It may be your son or your daughter, your brother, your sister. It may be a coworker. It could be a cantankerous neighbor. But you have a need that is beyond your pay grade. And even if money is not the thing that you need God to provide on a daily basis, it may be an issue that's happening in your body that, "Well, Lord, I feel something. And today I need You to give me the strength that I need today." Because some days you wake up and you don't even have the energy to go into that job. Anybody know what I'm talking about? And you got to trust Him. Jesus, just a little walk with You, just enough to take the next step. Just give me the grace. God, give me the strength. God, give me the ability to walk in this thing today. Today, today. Give me strength. God, I don't have the strength to go into this office today and to deal with these trifling human beings. Jesus, today I'm trusting You to hold me, to help me, to strengthen me, to give me grace. Jesus, I'm trusting You to help me to forgive and to walk in love today. Lord, I need You. I need You. Anybody understand what I'm talking about? And if you'll prove your trust in the wilderness, God will bring you into a promised land where you'll be entrusted with more than you could ever imagine. I'm telling you, God's God's out to bless you. He is. He is. But you need hindsight. You need insight. You need foresight.
I want you to notice what Proverbs chapter 27 and verse 12 says in the Living Bible: "A sensible man, a sensible woman, watches for problems ahead and prepares to meet them." When you got a goal, if you got a business, if you got a plan, anticipate problems. Have a plan B in your mind. Suppose so and so doesn't show up. Suppose they have a wreck on the way to work. Have a, a sensible person watches for problems ahead and prepares to meet them. The simpleton, you know what a simpleton is? Never looks and suffers the consequences. He's saying, "Think about it. Plan ahead." That's not against your faith. That is the wisdom of faith. And please understand this: faith is never a substitute for wisdom. Faith is not a substitute for wisdom. So a sensible person watches for problems ahead and prepares to meet them. But the simpleton never looks and suffers the consequences.
It's amazing. But your vision, your vision should be compelling. It ought to be a compelling vision in the sense that it ought to want to make me move. It ought to move me. It should move me. It should make me want to run on the inside. It should make me want to run. It should move a person to act. If the vision doesn't move a person to act, if I begin to share you, uh, with you a vision of something, and if it doesn't move me to act, I've had young people come to to my house and they, they rang the doorbell and they were selling something. And I said, "What, what is this?" And they began to tell me about the vision of the organization. And then I become, I became so moved by it. I mean, one dude told, I mean, he was just straight up with me. He said, "You know, I'm I'm out here selling this to keep me from breaking into your car." I'm like, "You know what? I'm sold right there." How, how many? I mean, I can see his vision real clear. But one of the reason that you ought to have a vision is because when you see more, you can be more. And the more that you can be, the more you can do. It's not to be greedy. It's so you can do more. It's so you can do more. Max Depree said this: "We cannot become what we want by remaining what we are." We cannot become what we want by remaining what we are.
Write your vision. Write your vision. Write the vision. Make it plain. Make it clear. Spell it out. Spell the details out. A clear vision provides these elements: A clear vision provides purpose. You ought to know why you're doing it. People buy more your "why" than they buy the "what." I bought that boy's product because of the "why," not the "what." It was a clear purpose. Secondly, for direction. It, it ought to have clear direction. You ought to understand what, what this, what this is, which way it's going. Uh, it ought to provide inspiration or motivation. It should provide clarity. It should provide alignment with your values. And it should provide resilience. Your vision, a clear vision should provide resilience so that I don't give up on it because it says it takes time. Write it. It is for an appointed time. It needs resilience. You know, resilience is when you experience pushback or setback. And I promise you, if you got a God vision, you will have some setbacks and pushbacks. But don't give up. There's going to be some things that will happen in your life that would make it look like your vision will never, ever come to pass. But you got to be able to have resilience to say, "You know what? I may not be able to do it this way, but I'm going to find another way." Maybe you're not the one. Uh, when you get a "no," "no" is simply the next opportunity. I, I mean, you got to, you have to have a resilience on the inside of you to say, "You know what? Maybe it's not that anything is wrong with me. Maybe I'm trying to sell it to the wrong audience." Have you, have you, has it ever dawned on you that there might be another audience of people in another part of the world that would absolutely love who you are and what you have to offer without your changing a thing? Don't change the message. Change the audience. I'm not everybody's flavor. So I don't, I don't sweat that because some people like for folks to, you know, to really tune it up. And that's not who I am. I never have been that way. I mean, I could have gone there, but I didn't want to. That was, I want to be authentic to who I am. I mean, you could have come here and, and I could have taken you down that road that he shook off a dying shroud. And, yeah, Lord, yeah, Lord. I just have to be authentic to who I am. That doesn't change your gift. Find the audience that has an appreciation for your [Applause] gift. You'll be surprised. There's somebody that will love what you have to offer. Some people are not cultured to understand and appreciate the taste of what you're cooking. But you have to have a resilience in you. A resilience. A resilience.
And here's what I want you to realize is that when God gives you a vision in your heart, the devil will use your eyes as the enemy. Because remember, sight shows you what you can be. Vision shows you what is. So when God begins to say to us that, "With His stripes, ye are healed," then your your eyes will said, "Look in the mirror, where you don't look healed to me." Well, why is it still swollen? Why is it still hurting? And it's, and it's showing you all of the stuff by sight, which is an enemy to your faith with what you believe in your heart. You see, sight is the enemy to your vision because you can't see it right now. Sight becomes the enemy to your vision. But 2 Corinthians chapter 5 and verse 7, here's what it says: "We walk by faith and not by sight." Because when you got a God vision, you got to do that by faith. Because faith is a function of your heart, the same as vision. But sight is the enemy to your vision because it's dealing with all of the senses that's saying, "It doesn't look this way to me. It doesn't feel this way to me." And you don't have the money in your pocket right now. But we walk by faith and not by sight.
But you need a vision for yourself. You need a vision for your marriage. You need a vision for your family. You need a vision for your business, for your career, for your organization, for your team. You need a vision for your ministry. You need a vision for your community. For every aspect of life, wherever you are, you need a vision for it. You need a vision. If you going to be in a family, what's our vision? Before you get married to somebody, you need to sit out and talk about a vision. Make sure that you're on the same page. That you, you know, that we are fighting for this. You see, when, when you have a common vision, here's what the common vision does. The common vision, and this is why the Bible says, "And the two shall become one." It means that you have singularity of vision. There's nothing that will produce unity faster in you than having a common vision. When you have a common vision, it puts you in the same boat. The only reason that we are here gathered together in a place of faith and worship is because we have a common book with common values. We are Christians here. That we are not Muslims, uh, we're not Jews. I mean, we're not Buddhists. We're not Harry Christmas-ians. It, we, we, we're drawn together by faith in a common, a common book with a common law that builds us and helps us to be who we are. That's what makes us a community, a family. So you have to have a, a vision. Write that vision. Make that vision plain. So for what every organization needs a vision that binds you together. Every family, you need a vision. You know why? So that when you have trouble in your mind, marriage, that even though I'm having an issue with you right now, and, and, and you're looking at me with with an attitude, and so you're upset with me, but, but we still believe that we need to hang together because we want to put the best for our children, and we want to, we, we still want to be able to be people that will serve God and be faithful in our tithes, and we want to do this and that. And so you use the things that you both agree on in the commonality of your vision, even though when you have disagreements among yourselves, that this trumps that and still allows you that even when the boat is rocking, you realize we're in the same boat. That's the common vision. We're in the same boat. And if your end goes down, it's not going to be long before mine goes down. And so I've got to fight with you, even though I couldn't knock your brains out right now, but I've got to fight with you right now because if you go down, I go down. We got to do this for us, for our children, for our grandchildren, for our nieces and our nephews, even though we got tension in the boat right now. This is our salvation. Even though it's stinking right now, but if we hang in there, my, my [Applause] my. That's why people didn't jump ship out of the ark. Can you imagine the stench of animals in there? But when you realize that, "We get out of here, we're going to drown."
Here's what I want to say to you: When you feel like God has given you a vision in your heart, never ask a spiritually blind person to proofread your vision. Sometimes, you know, God will be speaking to you about something, and you, you've got something in your heart, you, you believe it with all of your heart, and you talk to somebody who has no vision, somebody who is, you know, they call them, say, "Yeah, I'm going to keep it real." You're operating by faith, and now they're operating by sight, and they're trying to keep it real and trying to destroy your faith and mess it up. Don't ask people who are spiritually blind to proofread a divine vision. They're the wrong audience.
This is why when I was first in Israel in 1980, and I stood there at the well of Annunciation where the angel of the Lord Gabriel appeared to Mary, the Virgin Mary, the mother of Jesus, and told her His plan for her life. Though she didn't have proof, she had enough faith in her heart to say, "Lord, be it unto me according to Your word. I don't know how You're going to do this, but I believe it. I believe it." And it was accounted to her in faith and righteousness. She just accepted the word of the Lord. But before the angel terminated that conversation, he knew some doubt was going to start creeping in her. So the angel of the Lord told her, "Go see your cousin Elizabeth." You know, when you're in the country, you know, you just call him Elizabeth. He said, "Go see Elizabeth because Elizabeth was her cousin, but she was six months ahead of her in her pregnancy, and Elizabeth was an old woman." I mean, can you imagine being 78 and you discover that you're pregnant? Your cycle had already cut off, and all you notice is you're just getting big, and it's like, "What is this?" And God told her, "You're going to have a child." So He now speaks to a young Mary. Mary was only 12 or 13 years old. She's a virgin. And it said, "The Holy Ghost is going to come on you. You'll never know a man. You've not known a man, and you're going to have a baby without ever knowing a man because the Holy Ghost is going to come on you, and you're going to have this thing growing inside of you." Nobody had ever heard of that. She had no scripture for that. So He said, "I'm going to hook you up with your cousin Elizabeth, because she's an old woman that's carrying a miracle in her belly." Don't talk to somebody who doesn't have something in their own spirit. They have no vision. They're not believing God for something miraculous and supernatural, something that you can't do in your own strength. He said, "I need you to be hooked up with somebody that's already six months ahead of you." They don't have to have already birthed it, but they got to be carrying it. And when you are carrying a word from God, when you're carrying something that is prophetic and divine, you're carrying something that has been born of Him. When you're carrying something that's been ordained by Him, there's a strength in you. There's a resolve in you to say, "Baby, if God said it, He'll do it." Look at me. Look at me. And here was Elizabeth saying, "Hey, hey, I'm I'm 78. My husband is 81, and we're getting ready to be parents. Here's my baby bed that's already ready. Baby, believe Him, because if He said it, bam, here is the proof." God will hook you up with somebody that is carrying this thing. Say, "I hadn't delivered it yet, but I'm well on my way." He's able to do exceedingly abundantly and above all that you can ask or think. That God is up to something. He's working on something in your life. I declare to you, watch what He will do. Watch Him. Watch Him. Watch Him. God's getting ready to blow your [Music] mind.
But when I'm trying to give birth, I don't need to be hooked up with somebody who is barren and had five miscarriages. I need somebody that is carrying it by faith that said, "This, this Lord, this what You're doing in me. Now He's able to do in you." Take your seat. Let's go deeper. [Music] Some of you are carrying a miracle. You're carrying something divine. The Lord has asked some of you to do some stuff. You don't have all the money. You don't have the manpower, the resources. But God is still God. And I'm just hearing Him say, "If you'll trust Me, if you'll trust Me, while you're walking in a place that is barren." Yeah, if we going to prophesy, we may as well go in. And He said, "I will cause water to flow. Water to flow in the desert." God says, "I'm going to make something happen in a place where it shouldn't happen. I'll make it happen in a section of town where it shouldn't happen, where they don't have the traffic flow, the demographics." God says, "I'm, I'm God. I am the Lord. I'm God." He says, "If you put your eyes on Me, watch what I'll do. I'll make water come up in a desert place. It shouldn't be able to come. It ought to be dry. But God says, 'I'm going to do something supernatural in a place where it shouldn't happen.'" I'll do it at a time in your life when it shouldn't happen. You'll think that you're too old for this. But God says, "Trust Me. I am the Ancient of Days. I'm the Ancient of Days. I'm able to cause a root to come up out of a stump. A root up out of the trunk, out of the trunk of David. I, I am, I Am The Great I Am. I'll do something that will blow your mind. I'll set you in a place and begin to bring renewal. I'll bring back and peel back and add years onto your life, as He did with Hezekiah. He said, 'I'll give you 15 more years.' I'll pull back your clock, the time clock. I'll give you a resurgence of energy. There's a new energy that's getting ready to fill you. You've been feeling devoid."
of energy, but new energy. He will renew, renew, renew, renew, renew, renew your youth like the eagle.
There's a renewal that's coming. There's a renewal. There's a renewal. There's a renewal. My God, God is looking for people that can trust Him in this season. He's looking for somebody that can trust Him to say, "God, if You can do anything in me, do it in me, do it in me, do it in me, do it in me, do it in me." You said it yourself, "I'm too old." Who told you that?
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"I'm too young." Who told you that? You started in a place and you said, "My location is not ideal." I hear the Lord says, "Is there anything too hard for the Lord?" Is there anything? Can you trust Me? Can you trust Me today? I'll give you something further to trust Me with tomorrow, but can you trust Me right now, this day, this day, this day?
What is it that you put on the back burner and said, "I've gotten too old to do this now"? And God will say, "That's the very thing I'm calling you to do." You've got unfinished business. The Lord says, "Go back to what I told you to do. Go back to what I put into your spirit. Go back to what you never brought to fruition." It's, it's birthing time. It's a birthing floor. It's a threshing floor. It's a time now to reap. My God, I'm telling you, thank it. It looks like your age bracket, they're calling for folks much younger than you, but God says, "I'm getting ready to do something different." He says, "You watch what I will do with the time." And I'll take something that looks old and let that be your uniqueness. In that, I will do a new and a young thing through an older vessel. Yes, He will.
And I'll put a wisdom beyond the years in a younger person and do something beyond the years and amaze them that this is coming out of a young person. And it'll be like an old soul, and it'll capture the attention. You'll be surprised when you trust God and to walk. And I'm going to tell you this by the spirit of the Lord, as His hand is upon me and revelation is opening in my spirit.
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I heard the Lord said that before Solomon ever asked for wisdom, he first asked the Lord for the sense to be able to know when to come in and to go out. He says, "I am but a child, and I don't know when to go in or to come out." And much of your success is going to be the timing of the Lord. It is the timing of the Lord. And some of you think that you're running late, but God says, "I know the timing concerning you. I know the timing." Solomon said, "I'm like a child. I don't know when to come in and when to go out. I don't know when to get in the market and when to get out of the market. I don't know when to start and when to stop." "Lord, I don't know." His first request was for a discernment in knowing God's timing. All that I can tell you is that you're not too late and you're not too early. Shab. You watch Him. You watch Him. You watch Him. God's got you. God's got you. God's got you.
If you'll trust Him in this day, if you'll trust Him. Some of you are in a precarious position because you can't do this. You don't have enough to do it. But God said, "If you'll trust Me in this day, it's a daily bread, and I'll give it to you today." And I know about you. You've been worrying, worrying. You worried yesterday about yesterday, and today is a new day. And you've got a stress and a pressure on yourself. You're prematurely aging yourself because of the anxiety. And I heard Him say, "Take no thought. Take no thought. Take no thought for that. Trust Me. Just look to Me. Trust Me. Trust Me. Trust Me." He's Jehovah Jireh. He's the Lord our Provider. God will provide. God will provide. God will provide. God will provide for the vision.
Vision. Provision comes for the vision. Provision comes for the vision. Provision comes for the vision. Before you had the, before you had the need, God saw the need and He prepared for the need. And everything that you need will be there when it's the time. When I began the work of the Lord here, I didn't have all of the resources to be able to finish the work. God says, "You don't need enough to finish it. You just need enough faith to start."
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You need faith to start, and then you need faith to follow. And if you have faith to follow, then you'll have faith for God's feeding, because God's will is God's bill. God's will is God's bill. God's will is God's bill. Where He guides, there He provides. Where He leads, there He feeds. God is your Provider.
It's been difficult, and you've lost sleep, but there's a rest that's coming over your soul. Rest. You've carried something that your back was not designed to carry. Cast, cast, throw it off from you. Get it off. Project it away. And say, "Lord, I trust You with this. I trust You with this. I trust You. I trust You, Lord. I'll walk with You, but I trust You in this moment. I trust You. I trust You."
I pray that God will give you ears to be able to hear His voice, what He's speaking to you, because some of you, the responsibility and the provisions for which you're responsible have overwhelmed you. And God has said, "It is not up to you. He says, 'Look to Me. I'm Your Source.'" You're a resource. The job is a resource. The contract is a resource. Don't be concerned about the business that you've lost. When you look to Me, says the Lord, I'll open new doors. I'll lead you into greener pastures. And this next season, this next season, as you trust Me, will become a season of blessing and power.
I think that God is doing something in the midst of His people, and He's preparing us. And before I just go any further, I just want to read this prophetic word that the Lord gave to my daughter, Pastor Kirsty, during our week of prayer, when we got up at 5:00 AM every morning the first week of this year. And here's what the prophetic word of the Lord says:
"My people, this is the season of manifestation, harvest, multiplication, and prosperity. As you advance My kingdom, I will advance the things that concern you. You reap what you sow. What you sow in My house, I will multiply into your houses. Advance My kingdom through obedience of what I've called you specifically to do. Invest in the assignments I have given you. Use the tools I've put in your hands. Use the gifts I've given you, and sharpen the gifts. The more you pour out, the more I will bestow upon you. As you advance My kingdom, your houses will mirror the glory in My house. You are to be imitators of God, and your homes will reflect the prosperity of My house. I give power to the faint and give the wealth of the wicked to the just. Advance My kingdom and watch the transfer of influence and wealth from the wicked to the just in all of your spheres of influence. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father which is in heaven. You are the salt and light of the earth. You are a city that should be set upon a hill, not hidden under a bushel. Stand up, my people. Rise up, my people. Open your mouths, my people. Let God arise, and His enemies be scattered. May my people stand as my enemies are scattered. Stand in the gap and fill the emptiness with My Spirit, My light, and My love. And when my enemies are scattered and judgment falls on the wicked, stand in holy boldness among them and show them who I am wherever you go in all of your spheres of influence. Reclaim that territory for Me and My kingdom. Pray, plead the blood, fast when I tell you, and show up for the Kingdom purpose. Seek Kingdom purpose, thinking and praying outside of yourself and your own life, and then I, the Great I Am, will restore your life, health, family, finances, and all that concerns you. Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and then all these things will be added unto you. Build My kingdom, and I will build yours. Build Mine first. Trust Me. Extend your faith and watch what I will do. I'm the one who gives and the one who takes away. I will remove power, influence, and money from the wicked and lay it in your lap for My glory only when you send the glory back to Me first. It is My good pleasure to bless you and your household. I love the righteous, and I love to bless the righteous, says the Lord."
And each of you are going to receive this today. Before you leave, you're going to receive it on your way out. And I just want you to be able to meditate on it and allow the prophetic word of God to just become true in your life. Because some of you have been waiting, and you've, you've said, "Lord, the day is late." But God says, "I am time, yet I am not subject to it."
This is a season for the supernatural power of God. And may those who have been walking in darkness, as Proverbs 28 declares, that where there is no vision, the people perish. They cast off restraints. They go wild because there is no vision. When you see that, if you will just trust God to say, "God, open my eyes." The eye that is in my heart, "I have not seen, neither hath ear heard" (singular, because He's talking about the eye of your heart and the ear of your heart). "Neither have ear heard, neither have entered into the heart the things that God has planned for those that love Him."
I'm telling you, God has great plans. He said, "I know the thoughts that I think toward you, their thoughts of peace and not of harm, is to give you a future and a hope." There's so much that God wants to do in you and through you, and it is for His glory, and it is for our good. And I want to encourage you today that you'll ask God, "Lord, speak to me."
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In visions, and the things that you see. When I see revelation, it's not what you hear. Revelation is what you see. Revelation, reveal, it means the unveiling, the apocalypse. It's an unveiling. It's what you see. You don't hear revelation, you see it. And the moment that you see revelation, bam, faith is released in you for the fulfillment of that thing. May God open your eyes to infuse you with the faith to be able to see with the eyes of Jesus Christ, how God sees. And something is going to be released in your life, over your family, and over everything in which you have stewardship. That God will show you every day. He doesn't give it to you all at once, but He'll give you the ideas today of what you need to do today to make this thing a blessing down the road. God will do it by the day. Your faithfulness and consistency in the daily trusting will cause you to be fed over a protracted period of time, and He will do things that will blow your mind. You watch what God will do in this season because we trust Him.
And I'm telling you, as God trusts you in a wilderness situation where things are dry, if He can trust you in the dry season, He will entrust you in the promised land with blessings galore, more than what you have the ability to be able to bring in in the harvest. And that's because God is giving you something that is bigger than just you. This is bigger than just you. Vision is always bigger than just you. And if your vision does not include other people, it didn't come from God. True vision will always involve others. God never operates His power in a silo. It is for community. It is for community. It is for the brethren. It's to change the city, to change the state, to change the nation, to impact the world.
I pray that God will make you conduits of His power, and that He will give you vision, vision, vision. Father, in the name of Jesus, may the spirit of wisdom and revelation, the spirit of seeing and knowing, now begin to fall into the lives of Your people. Many of them, Lord, as they lie upon their beds to go to sleep, open their spirits, show them things in their dreams. Expand us, stretch us on the left hand and on the right hand. Enlarge us, O God, in what we see on the inside, and capacitate us to be able to believe it, so that the manifestation, Father, ultimately brings glory to Your name. Thank You that You will trust us with more so that we can do more, not merely just have more. But I thank You for what You're entrusting into us today. Thank You for the trust that You build in our hearts for the daily bread. Lord, we declare with our mouths today that we trust You. We trust You. We trust You. You are our very present help in the time of trouble. We trust You. Open our eyes, Lord, to see that those who are with us are greater than those who are against us, even when we are feeling like we are all alone and we have nobody to help us, and we're the only one who sees it and only one who gets it. Lord, open our eyes to see that there's a host of angels waiting for the right words to come out of our mouths so that we put those angels to work on our behalf of causing the vision that You have placed on the inside of our hearts to come to pass. Lord, unleash the visions. May You make us a seeing people, a prophetic people to be able to see. Lord, may You do things in seasons that defy the seasons. That those who felt that they're too old for this, that You will birth through the old. And those who feel that they're too young to be received and respected, that You will give them a wisdom beyond their years. Lord, do things in seasons that are opposites in a way that it brings glory to You and it highlights the fact that surely this is not the work of a human being, but this is the divine finger of God. Lord, we give ourselves to You today to say, "Use us. Have Your way." We decree, Lord, "Be it unto us even according to Your word." Thank You, Lord, that we will see the vision, write the vision, read the vision, and run with the vision for Your glory and for our good. In Jesus name, amen. Hallelujah.
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