BELIEVE HIM FOR GREATER THINGS

I was talking to a pastor from Ireland recently who told me about his fears for the upcoming year. While he sees some difficulties on the horizon, I love that he quoted Hebrews 11:1. Have you ever read that? It says, “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” And then he said to me, “Gary, you know the fear is that the things you hope for won’t happen. Right? And that the things that are not seen will remain unseen. That’s what fear is. It’s a conviction inside of you. You think that what you hope for is never going to happen. That is fear and that’s a hindrance to what God wants to do in your life.”

I want to ask you today, before this day is over, to ask God to bring you into such a covenant with Him that His perfect love, His work of grace on your behalf, will cast out all fear. Some of you think that when you receive perfect love you won’t be afraid anymore. No! His perfect love—and His is the only perfect love there is—comes into your heart. You are loved, you are accepted, you don’t need any idols to make you feel good about yourself. Once that happens and you lay down your own agenda, all that’s left for you are the promises of God for your life. Hallelujah—that’s good news!

In Genesis 15:7 (ESV) we see that God brought Abram out from the Ur of the Chaldeans and gave him the promise of “this land to possess.” Abram had a long journey ahead of him but he had the promise of God!

When you have a promise of God, it is worth the journey, my friends. When you have the promise of God, He is saying, “Come on, brother. Come on, sister. Come on, daughter. Come on, son. Believe Me! Have faith.”

If you’ve never had faith before, have faith in Him this year. If you’ve had faith, increase your faith this year. If you’ve believed God for great things, believe Him for greater things.