Dream Big, Pray Hard, and Think Long

"I was overwhelmed by my circumstances.  Now I am overwhelmed by God's grace"

God calls the unqualified because we can never take the credit for what God is doing.  I read two remarkable books of late that had the same three messages.  Dream Big, Pray Hard, and Think Long.  God is birthing a new beginning and spiritual season as He enlarges my dreams, increases my prayer life, and corrects my finite thinking with his longer thoughts.  God is teaching me how to stay in His Spirit and I can never escape His Love. 

I believe the closer we are to a spiritual breakthrough, it feels like your life is spinning more out of control.  I believe God is calling many people to seek His face through prayer and fasting.  I am taking a series of three days at the beginning of each month (the third through the fifth) and consecrate them to God.  I believe the first-fruits of these intense spiritual times will overflow into the rest of the year.

If there is something God desires for us all is to stay humble and stay hungry.  Everything  depends on God and our focus is how small we are and how great is our God.  I can not get into God's Word enough and my prayers are for God to consume me in His Presence.  When we are fully Alive in Christ then nothing else really matters.  Let me let you on a little spiritual secret.  God wants the best for you but first He wants to kill your flesh.  Until we consecrate our lives, we will not see God do amazing things (Joshua 3:5).

Our problem today is we want to do amazing things for God rather than allowing God to do what only God can do for us.  If you want to see God do amazing things this year, amazing always starts with consecration.  And just as amazing begins with consecration, consecration always ends with amazing. 

I remember when God spoke to me before the ending of 2014 and said, "You are going to be amazed."  I was so excited when I heard those words because I thought amazing must mean everything was going to be better and more wonderful for me.  What I did not know was flying closer to the flame of God meant that I was going to have to be broken, sick, and weak before God could do a deeper work in my life.  What God has taught me is His definition of amazing is something quite different than my definition!

Consecration and desperation go hand in hand and you can't fully have one without the other.  We want God's promises but we don't want the cost that goes with them.  We want divine favor but we don't want personal responsibility.  We crave God's approval and blessing but when push comes to shove, how many of us really want to suffer for righteousness or for Christ?  Do we really trust God to lead us or do we rather want God to follow our lead and bless us along the way?

God is healing me but nothing is the same for me anymore.  My dreams are scaring me.  My prayers come from another world.  My thoughts don't seem to be my thoughts anymore as God continues to shape and reshape me in the fashion He desires rather than the easier road I would settle for as if I really had a choice in the matter and guess what, I don't!  God is sovereign.  God is leading the way and all I can do is follow.  There is no other path or road but the path that God is laying out before me.  Shalom.