Speaker 1: If you don't really see things clearly, correctly, truthfully. You
Speaker 1: may think you're living in the light, but you're not.
Speaker 1: You're really living in the darkness, and you're missing all
Speaker 1: the wonderful things that God has in store for you
Speaker 1: for your future because you just can't see it. Proverbs
Speaker 1: twenty nine, verse eighteen says this, where there is no vision,
Speaker 1: the people perish.
Speaker 2: Now what does that mean?
Speaker 1: Well, there are at least three results of not having
Speaker 1: a vision for your life. I want you to write
Speaker 1: these down. An unclear vision leads to three things. It
Speaker 1: leads to indecision, it leads to division, and it leads
Speaker 1: to a collision. First, an unclear vision leads to indecision.
Speaker 1: Do you remember this verse from our study of James
Speaker 1: James Chapter one, verse eight. Double minded people can't make
Speaker 1: up their minds that waver back and forth and everything
Speaker 1: they do. Without a vision for your future, you're just drifting.
Speaker 1: You wander, you ramble through life. You're not really living,
Speaker 1: You're just existing. You don't have any goal or purpose
Speaker 1: or plan or meaning. You just kind of let life
Speaker 1: happen to you. When you don't have a vision, you
Speaker 1: waste time and you missed opportunities, you don't make the
Speaker 1: most of what you've been given. And without a vision,
Speaker 1: you're a poor steward of life, end up just coasting
Speaker 1: and you all and you know when you're coasting, you're
Speaker 1: always headed downhill. So it causes this indecision. Second, an
Speaker 1: unclear vision leads to division. Division. It causes people to
Speaker 1: go different directions, in different ways, to be divided on things.
Speaker 1: If you aren't sure where you're headed, don't expect anybody
Speaker 1: else to go with you, or to marry you, or
Speaker 1: to agree with you, or to partner with you, because
Speaker 1: everybody's just going to head off in a different direction
Speaker 1: because no one has a clear path. You know, this
Speaker 1: lack of clear vision is one of the causes of
Speaker 1: all the division in America right now. Here's an interesting
Speaker 1: verse from Proverbs twenty eight, verse two. In the Message,
Speaker 1: it says this, when a country is in chaos, everybody
Speaker 1: has a plan to fix it. Okay, they're all going
Speaker 1: in different ways, different directions, division, But it takes a
Speaker 1: leader of real understanding to straighten things out.
Speaker 2: Vision is the answer to division.
Speaker 1: The third thing that happens when you don't have a
Speaker 1: clear vision for life is a collision. In other words,
Speaker 1: without a clear direction of your life, it is inevitable
Speaker 1: that at some point in your life you're going to
Speaker 1: crash into some kind of dead end. You know, for
Speaker 1: many people, when you think about it, I've met a
Speaker 1: lot of people. Life's just a series of collisions, relational collisions, confrontations,
Speaker 1: of financial crashes, personal crisis, just one after another. They
Speaker 1: go from one dead end relationship to the next, or
Speaker 1: from one dead end job to the next. Life's kind
Speaker 1: of like a bumper car ride. Just keep bumping into
Speaker 1: everybody else and you get hit from all sides. Now,
Speaker 1: the Bible warns us of the damage of not following
Speaker 1: God's vision for our lives. One Timothy one nineteen says this,
Speaker 1: and God's word translation. Some people have refused to let
Speaker 1: their faith guide their conscience, and their faith has been
Speaker 1: destroyed like a wrecked ship.
Speaker 2: That's a collision.
Speaker 1: On the other hand, having a vision for your future
Speaker 1: requires hard work. That's why a lot of people don't
Speaker 1: have one. It requires faith, it requires thinking, It requires
Speaker 1: prayer and seeking God, all the things we're going to
Speaker 1: talk about in this series. If you just make up
Speaker 1: a vision for your life, well that's no better than coasting.
Speaker 1: What you want is God's vision for your life, and
Speaker 1: that is the result of seeing things clearly, seeing with
Speaker 1: eyes of faith rather than eyes of fear. We're going
Speaker 1: to look at that today in just this introduction message.
Speaker 1: You know, in the Bible, Jesus has a lot to
Speaker 1: say about your vision, about how you see things, and
Speaker 1: about blindness. In fact, in the Bible, blindness is always
Speaker 1: a metaphor for having a closed mind. When he talks
Speaker 1: about people who are blind, he's talking about their minds
Speaker 1: are closed. They're not open to new ideas. They're not
Speaker 1: open to what God wants to say. Matthew, Chapter six,
Speaker 1: verse twenty two and twenty three is the verse we'll
Speaker 1: come back to in this series on vision, because Jesus
Speaker 1: said this, Listen closely look at this verse. Your eyes
Speaker 1: are the lamp of your body. And if your eyes
Speaker 1: are open and good, your whole body will be full
Speaker 1: of life light. But if your vision is bad, I
Speaker 1: just got new glasses. I've got good vision again. If
Speaker 1: your vision is bad, your whole life will be full
Speaker 1: of darkness. And he says, and he says, if the
Speaker 1: light that you think you have is really darkness, is
Speaker 1: the worst kind of darkness you can have. Now, Jesus
Speaker 1: is saying that if you don't really see things clearly, correctly, truthfully,
Speaker 1: you may think you're living in the light, but you're not.
Speaker 1: You're really living in the darkness, and you're missing all
Speaker 1: the wonderful things that God has in store for you
Speaker 1: for your future because you just can't see it. Now,
Speaker 1: we've all heard the expression what you see is what
Speaker 1: you get, and in many ways that's actually a biblical statement.
Speaker 1: We're going to look at the implications of that idea
Speaker 1: through many scripture verses during this series on vision. But
Speaker 1: what I want to do today is just introduce a
Speaker 1: series on God's vision for your future. And I want
Speaker 1: us to go back to a story in the Old
Speaker 1: Testament that involves Moses and the Jewish slaves who had
Speaker 1: been freed by God from four hundred years of slavery
Speaker 1: in Egypt. Now here's the background of the story. We're
Speaker 1: going to look at numbers thirteen and numbers fourteen. Here's
Speaker 1: the background in the Book of Numbers. God had promised
Speaker 1: these freed slaves a homeland of their own, and he
Speaker 1: calls it the promised land. I'm going to set you
Speaker 1: free from Egypt, and I'm going to take you to
Speaker 1: the Promised Land. It represented their future, It represented their
Speaker 1: inheritance that God wanted them to enjoy.
Speaker 2: It would become the land of Israel.
Speaker 1: Now, after crossing the desert, they've gone through the Red Sea,
Speaker 1: crossing the desert, all these freed slaves that come to
Speaker 1: the edge of the promised Land, and Moses chooses twelve representatives,
Speaker 1: one from each of the twelve tribes, to go ahead
Speaker 1: of everybody else and spy out the land. And he says,
Speaker 1: I won't you go in, check it all out, and
Speaker 1: return with the vision report. This is a fact finding mission.
Speaker 1: In other words, it's a vision trip. And Moses says,
Speaker 1: go into the new land that represents our future and
Speaker 1: find out everything you can. Find out what it's like,
Speaker 1: see everything you can see. Then come back and report
Speaker 1: to us on everything you have seen. This is a
Speaker 1: vision trip. Numbers thirteen, seventeen to twenty says this. Moses
Speaker 1: gave them men these instructions as he sent them out
Speaker 1: to explore the new land. Go northward through the Negev
Speaker 1: into the hill country and see what that land is like,
Speaker 1: and find out whether the people living there are strong
Speaker 1: or weak, few or many? What kind of land do
Speaker 1: they live in? Is it good or bad? Do the
Speaker 1: towns have walls? Are they unprotected? How's the soil? Is
Speaker 1: it fertile or poor? Are there many trees? Enter the
Speaker 1: land boldly and bring back samples of the crops you see.
Speaker 1: If you're taking notes, circle that phrase you see now,
Speaker 1: why did Moses do this?
Speaker 2: Because Moses was a great leader.
Speaker 1: Why did he send these spies on a vision trip
Speaker 1: and ask for a report? Here's the reason. Listen to
Speaker 1: this if you're a leader, this is really important. Before
Speaker 1: people can succeed with the goal, they have to see
Speaker 1: the goal.
Speaker 2: If you're a leader, you need.
Speaker 1: To understand that we can only accomplish the impossible if
Speaker 1: we first see it in our minds. Everything that's ever
Speaker 1: been accomplished in history started as an idea in somebody's mind.
Speaker 2: First, you have to imagine it. You have to see it.
Speaker 1: Sometimes you have to taste it, but you definitely have
Speaker 1: to visualize it. And that's why I'm going to teach
Speaker 1: you as the beginning of this year, a new series
Speaker 1: on getting God's vision for your life Now numbers Chapter thirteen,
Speaker 1: verse twenty one, twenty three says this, so they sent
Speaker 1: spies in.
Speaker 2: They spied out.
Speaker 1: The land all the way from the wilderness up to Hebron,
Speaker 1: and there they saw circle that word. They saw the
Speaker 1: Amanites and the she Shites, and all the Tumites, all
Speaker 1: the families descended from Anek. Now, by the way, don't
Speaker 1: confuse these tribes with the termites and the parasites and
Speaker 1: the satellites and the stalactites. Those are different tribes completely.
Speaker 1: But it says what they came to Eskol. They cut
Speaker 1: down a cluster of grapes so large that it took
Speaker 1: two of them to carry it back on a pole.
Speaker 1: Can you imagine that, a cluster of grapes. They also
Speaker 1: took samples of pomegranates and figs. This promised land was
Speaker 1: so fruitful and so incredibly prosperous. They're bringing back giant fruit.
Speaker 1: You know, I grew up in northern California, in the
Speaker 1: redwoods and in the wine country, and as a kid,
Speaker 1: every season I cut grapes and vineyards at harvest. But
Speaker 1: I never saw a cluster grace so large that it
Speaker 1: took two men to carry it. This is supernatural, This
Speaker 1: is miracle grows. Crop numbers thirteen twenty five twenty six
Speaker 1: is this after seeing? There's the word seeing. This is
Speaker 1: a vision trip. After seeing the land for forty days,
Speaker 1: the men returned to Moses, an Aaron and the people
Speaker 1: of Israel waiting at Katesh in the wilderness of Parenne.
Speaker 1: They reported of the whole community what they had seen,
Speaker 1: and they showed them.
Speaker 2: The fruit they had taken from the land.
Speaker 1: Now, all this sounds really promising, but there's a problem,
Speaker 1: and it has to do with their vision. That's why
Speaker 1: we're sharing this story. Two of the spies that were
Speaker 1: twelve spies. Two of the spies, Joshua and Caleb, looked
Speaker 1: at their future with eyes of faith.
Speaker 2: But the other ten of the.
Speaker 1: Twelve spies looked at their future with the eyes of fear. Okay,
Speaker 1: so let's get into this now. You know the story
Speaker 1: looking at the future with fear, which ten of the
Speaker 1: twelve spies did, causes all kinds of problems. In fact,
Speaker 1: this story illustrates oh five or so of the traps
Speaker 1: maybe six that we fall into. Why don't you write
Speaker 1: these down? Here's what happens when you look at the
Speaker 1: new year, you look at the future with fear instead
Speaker 1: of faith. Number one we learned from this story. I
Speaker 1: overemphasize the negative when I look at the future in fear.
Speaker 1: I overemphasized the negative. In Life Verses twenty seven twenty eight,
Speaker 1: it says this was their report to Moses. We arrived
Speaker 1: in the land you sent us to to see, and
Speaker 1: it is indeed a magnificent country, the land flowing with
Speaker 1: milk and honey.
Speaker 2: Here's some of the fruit as proof.
Speaker 1: But I'll circle the word butt, because now that you
Speaker 1: get to butt, you're going to see with eyes of fear.
Speaker 2: Here's the conflicting information.
Speaker 1: But the people living there are powerful, and their cities
Speaker 1: and towns are fortified, and they're very large. And we
Speaker 1: also saw the Anakin, the descendants of Anik who lived
Speaker 1: in the desert. Now, the Anakin were of the tribe
Speaker 1: of Skywalker, and the forest was strong with them. If
Speaker 1: you believe that, I've got some land to sell you to.
Speaker 1: When you over emphasize the negative, it creates a lot
Speaker 1: more stress in your life.
Speaker 2: When you're looking at everything with fear.
Speaker 1: Look, you worry that the glass is always half empty,
Speaker 1: instead of being happy and grateful that the glass is
Speaker 1: still half full. Look at what you have left, not
Speaker 1: what you've lost now. Of course, life is filled with negatives.
Speaker 1: Everything is broken by sin on this earth. Not all
Speaker 1: news is positive. But you do have a choice in
Speaker 1: choosing what you're going to focus on, what you're going
Speaker 1: to emphasize, and that is going to directly affect your
Speaker 1: happiness in this new year. So the spies brought back
Speaker 1: conflicting news to the spies had eyes of faith and
Speaker 1: they gave positive news, okay, but ten of the spies
Speaker 1: had eyes of fear and they delivered negative news. By
Speaker 1: the way, I think that ratio in news is probably
Speaker 1: still true today. For every one positive news, you're going
Speaker 1: to hear five negative news stories. And experts tells that
Speaker 1: negative news s spreads about ten times faster on social
Speaker 1: media and positive news. So I focus on the negative
Speaker 1: when I'm looking with eyes of fear. Number two second trap,
Speaker 1: I pay too much attention to what other people are doing.
Speaker 1: I pay too much attention to what others are doing.
Speaker 1: Numbers thirteen twenty nine says this. They're focusing not on
Speaker 1: the beauty and the value of the land. They say
Speaker 1: the Malakites live in the negative, and the hit Dites
Speaker 1: and Jebysites and Amorites live in the hill country, and
Speaker 1: the Canaanites live near the sea and along the Jordan,
Speaker 1: the Jordan River. What are they say in here? What's
Speaker 1: the point? It's a scarcity mentality. What they're saying is
Speaker 1: there won't be enough for us this year. All the
Speaker 1: good land is already taken by other tribes. There's really
Speaker 1: no room for us in this promised land. There aren't
Speaker 1: enough resources for everybody. Now, if you look at this
Speaker 1: new year with eyes of fear, you too are going
Speaker 1: to develop a scarcity mentality, which is going to create
Speaker 1: stress in your life, like there's not enough.
Speaker 2: And you say.
Speaker 1: All the good experiences are gone, all the good jobs
Speaker 1: are already taken, all the good houses already bought, all
Speaker 1: the good husbands are married. You're going to look around
Speaker 1: as a scarcity mentality. Now, you got to look with
Speaker 1: the eyes of faith. Number three. Third trap that we
Speaker 1: see from this story when we look at the future
Speaker 1: with fear instead of faith. I understand, excuse me, I
Speaker 1: underestimate the abilities that God has given me. I underestimate
Speaker 1: the abilities God has given me when I look at
Speaker 1: the future with fear, Because seeing life with eyes of
Speaker 1: fear causes you to bury your talents. You know that
Speaker 1: story that Jesus told Numbers thirteen thirty one. The men
Speaker 1: who had gone with Caleb said, we can't circle that.
Speaker 1: We can't. We can't attack those people. They are stronger
Speaker 1: than we are. They're underestimating their own ability. Did you
Speaker 1: know that people who always say I can't and the
Speaker 1: people who always say I can are both right?
Speaker 2: Why?
Speaker 1: Because fear creates self fulfilling prophecies. You got a vision
Speaker 1: based on fear rather than faith. It's gonna limit you
Speaker 1: for your entire life. You're gonna miss opportunities, You're gonna
Speaker 1: waste talent that God has put inside you, and you're
Speaker 1: gonna set yourself up with self fulfilling and self defeating predictions.
Speaker 1: You know this happened? Job says in Job three twenty five.
Speaker 1: He said, what I have always feared has happened to me,
Speaker 1: and what I have dreaded has now come to be.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you a very personal question. What are
Speaker 1: you setting yourself up for in this new year? What
Speaker 1: are you setting yourself up or in just with your attitude,
Speaker 1: how are you seeing yourself? Are you looking at your
Speaker 1: own abilities as I'm inadequate, I'm incapable are you looking
Speaker 1: at your life in faith or in fear? The spies
Speaker 1: with fear based vision saw themselves as inadequate Verse thirty
Speaker 1: two and thirty three. They said, the land we explored
Speaker 1: devours those living in it.
Speaker 2: What a what a hyperbole?
Speaker 1: The land we explored devours those living in it, he says.
Speaker 1: All of the people we saw there are of great size.
Speaker 1: He says, we saw giants there. The Hebrew word is
Speaker 1: nephelim for a giant. By the way, the Hebrew are
Speaker 1: for fans, handsomest, pastor rick in Hebrew, we seemed like
Speaker 1: grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same
Speaker 1: to them. You see what they're saying. We see ourselves
Speaker 1: as insects waiting to be devoured. That word devouring Hebrew
Speaker 1: actually means to eat up. They said, these people are
Speaker 1: going to eat our lunch, and they're they're nephelin, they're giants,
Speaker 1: they're bullies, they're tyrants, they're NFL linebackers.
Speaker 2: It's a great size.
Speaker 1: And they say, we saw ourselves as grasshoppers in our
Speaker 1: own eyes. That's a pretty pathetic self image. We're insects,
Speaker 1: we're bugs that they're gonna squash us. We're gonna go
Speaker 1: smash against the windshield. They and then they says, we
Speaker 1: saw ourselves. Notice that sentence, We saw ourselves as grasshoppers,
Speaker 1: and we look the same to them. What are they doing?
Speaker 1: They are projecting their fears on others. That's one of
Speaker 1: the problems of a fear based vision is you project
Speaker 1: your fears on everybody else. If you think you look
Speaker 1: a certain way, you think everybody else thinks you look
Speaker 1: that way.
Speaker 2: That's a problem. It's a trap. Number four.
Speaker 1: The fourth trap of vision with fear instead of faith
Speaker 1: is I infect others with my negativity. I infect others
Speaker 1: with my negativity. Did you know that fear is contagious?
Speaker 1: Did you know parents can pass on fear to kids
Speaker 1: and it can actually to be passed from generation to generation.
Speaker 1: Verse thirty two. It says they spread a bad report
Speaker 1: about the land they had explored. They didn't just keep
Speaker 1: it to themselves. This is what happens when you become afraid.
Speaker 1: You start talking trash, you start talking negative, you start complaining,
Speaker 1: you start griping the Bible. This is why, by the way,
Speaker 1: the Bible tells you to not hang out with negative people.
Speaker 1: Did you know that in the problems, says many times,
Speaker 1: don't hang out with scoffers and cynics, don't hang out
Speaker 1: with negative people, critics and complainers. You know, one of
Speaker 1: the things I noticed in twenty twenty you probably noticed
Speaker 1: that too. How many conspiracy theories popped up during the pandemic.
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness, we had more conspiracies in one year
Speaker 1: than we had had in a decade or decades. And
Speaker 1: the problem was many Christians were falling for those theories too,
Speaker 1: and they were actually passing them on. Why, because they
Speaker 1: were hanging out with the wrong people. They were listening
Speaker 1: to negative reports, They were listening to negative news sources.
Speaker 1: You know what, if you start hearing some conspiracies this year,
Speaker 1: let me give you a verse to go back to.
Speaker 1: It's Isaiah chapter eight, verse twelve. Here's what it says,
Speaker 1: Isaiah eight twelve. Don't say that everything people call a
Speaker 1: conspiracy is a conspiracy. And don't fear what they fear.
Speaker 1: Don't let it terrify you. That's what God wants you
Speaker 1: to do. Don't thank every conspiracy and conspiracy, don't fear
Speaker 1: what they fear.
Speaker 2: Don't let it terrify you.
Speaker 1: Number five a fifth trap If you don't have eyes
Speaker 1: of faith? Is I make myself miserable when I look
Speaker 1: at my life and I looked at the future with
Speaker 1: eyes of fear, I just make myself miserable. Here's what
Speaker 1: happened after they came back with this fear based report
Speaker 1: numbers fourteen one and two. Then all the people began
Speaker 1: weeping aloud. Okay, they're crying, and they cried all night,
Speaker 1: and they grumbled, and they complained in a great chorus
Speaker 1: against their leaders Moses guy had let him out of them,
Speaker 1: let them out of slavery, against their leaders, Moses and Aaron.
Speaker 1: And they said, we wish we'd died in Egypt or
Speaker 1: even here in the wilderness. Are you kidding me? They wailed.
Speaker 1: They're having a full bone pity party. We would have
Speaker 1: rather stayed slaves. Have to face what we're going to
Speaker 1: face in the future. You would or rather died in
Speaker 1: the desert than have to face the future because we're
Speaker 1: so afraid. Now, that's a very important verse because you
Speaker 1: can know that you're looking at life with eyes of
Speaker 1: fear when the four warning lights that are in that
Speaker 1: verse show up in your life.
Speaker 2: When these four things show.
Speaker 1: Up in your life, you know I'm not looking at
Speaker 1: the future with faith. I'm looking at the future with fear.
Speaker 1: Notice the four things. Your sadness increases. It says, they
Speaker 1: cried all night, they were depressed, and sometimes fear is
Speaker 1: caused our depression is caused by fear. Depression can be
Speaker 1: caused by a lot of different things, but once sometimes
Speaker 1: it could be caused by fear. Your sadness increases. Number two,
Speaker 1: your complaining increases. Has your spouse noticed you complaining more lately?
Speaker 1: It says they grumbled and they complained. Why because they
Speaker 1: were afraid. They were afraid? Okay. Third, you start second
Speaker 1: guessing your leaders. It says they grumbled and complained in
Speaker 1: a great chorus against their leaders, Moses and Aaron. He said,
Speaker 1: we wish you hadn't led us here. You're doing a
Speaker 1: lousy job of leading us. And Fourth, you want to
Speaker 1: go back backwards. You want to go back to a
Speaker 1: prior time. They said, it would have been better for
Speaker 1: us to have died in Egypt.
Speaker 2: You you don't want any of.
Speaker 1: Those things, But those are signs that you're living based
Speaker 1: on a vision of fear than a vision of faith.
Speaker 1: So what's the antidote, Well, that's what we're going to
Speaker 1: look at in the days ahead. This is just an introduction,
Speaker 1: but the antidote in a sentence is you need to
Speaker 1: develop a life vision of faith. You need to develop
Speaker 1: a life vision of it. You need to see with
Speaker 1: eyes of faith, not eyes of fear. And I'm going
Speaker 1: to teach you how to do that during this series.
Speaker 1: As I said this just intro. Now, there were two
Speaker 1: guys who were the minority report, and they were Caleb
Speaker 1: and Joshua. They were the only two guys eventually got
Speaker 1: to go into the Promised Land. The rest of them
Speaker 1: died in the desert. God let them die out there.
Speaker 1: Numbers thirteen thirty. Here's what Caleb said in faith. Then
Speaker 1: Caleb silenced the people before Moses, and he said, we
Speaker 1: should go at once. We should take possession of the
Speaker 1: land right now. We can certainly do this. He said, well,
Speaker 1: let's do it right now. Stop defeating yourself with the
Speaker 1: paralysis of analysis. Do it now. You defeat fear not
Speaker 1: by arguing againster feres.
Speaker 2: You defeat fear.
Speaker 1: With movement, not by discussing it, not by focusing on it,
Speaker 1: but by doing, opposing it, doing the thing you fear
Speaker 1: the most. That's what Caleb said. Then in verse six
Speaker 1: to nine of numbers fourteen, here's what Joshua said. He
Speaker 1: is the other guy who had eyes of faith. He said,
Speaker 1: we saw the land ourselves, and it's very good. He says,
Speaker 1: the future looked great. If we obey the Lord, he
Speaker 1: will surely give us that land rich with milk and honey.
Speaker 1: In other words, we're depending on the promise of God.
Speaker 1: So he says, don't rebel. He said, don't rebel. We
Speaker 1: have no reason to be afraid of the people who
Speaker 1: live there. The Lord is on our side, and they
Speaker 1: won't stand a chance against us. One plus God is
Speaker 1: a majority God plus you you know, if God is
Speaker 1: for us, who can be against us? Now here's the problem. Sadly,
Speaker 1: they chose to believe the majority report of fear, not
Speaker 1: the minority report of faith, and they all died in
Speaker 1: the desert over the next forty years until a new
Speaker 1: generation grew up and they would.
Speaker 2: Be allowed to go into the promised land.
Speaker 1: One of the saddest verses in the Bible is Hebrews
Speaker 1: three nineteen that says this, So we see that they
Speaker 1: the people who were the slaves that had been freed.
Speaker 1: They were not able to enter the Promised Land because
Speaker 1: of their unbelief. That's one of the saddest verses in
Speaker 1: the Bible, and it makes me wonder when I read it,
Speaker 1: what blessing of God am I missing out on? Me
Speaker 1: personally because of my unbelief? What blessing of God am
Speaker 1: I missing out on because of my own unbelief? To me,
Speaker 1: hell would be if God were to show me what
Speaker 1: He could have done in my life if I had
Speaker 1: believed him just a little bit more. And I want
Speaker 1: to ask you this question as we start a brand
Speaker 1: new year, what blessing of God are you missing right
Speaker 1: now simply because you don't believe? You don't believe it
Speaker 1: your unbelief, you're looking at the future with eyes of fear,
Speaker 1: not the eyes of faith. Now, the starting point we're
Speaker 1: gonna get into all the details in this series, but
Speaker 1: the starting point for getting God's vision for your life, obviously,
Speaker 1: is the first put your trust.
Speaker 2: In Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: If you haven't done that, you need to ask Him
Speaker 1: to put his spirit into your life. It's the only
Speaker 1: way you'll ever be able to see with eyes of faith,
Speaker 1: and it's the only way you'll ever be able to
Speaker 1: get God's vision John, Chapter three, Verse three, Jesus said this,
Speaker 1: unless you were born again, you cannot see the Kingdom
Speaker 1: of God. You can't see it. You can't see God's
Speaker 1: vision unless you're born again.
Speaker 2: So you need this. You see, when you're born again.
Speaker 1: When you're born physically, you get five censes here, taste, touch, smell, okay, see,
Speaker 1: when you're spiritually reborn, born again, you get a new
Speaker 1: set of eyes. You can see things you didn't see before.
Speaker 1: You can hear things you couldn't hear before. You sense
Speaker 1: things you didn't sense before. Unless you're born again, you
Speaker 1: can never see all that God has in store for
Speaker 1: your life. So here's the first step that I want
Speaker 1: to start just this week. Stop listening to your feelings
Speaker 1: and stop looking in fear and start living in faith.
Speaker 1: Believe that God's going to help you in this New years. Believe,
Speaker 1: believe God will help you, and you will see God
Speaker 1: help you.
Speaker 2: I'll end with this story.
Speaker 1: You know, Jesus had some friends, Mary, Martha, and Lazarus.
Speaker 1: They have two sisters and a brother, and Lazarus died
Speaker 1: and Jesus raised him back to life. And when he did,
Speaker 1: he reminded Mary and Martha. In John eleven forty, He said,
Speaker 1: didn't I tell you that you will see God's glory
Speaker 1: if you believe? You will see God's glory if you believe. So,
Speaker 1: here's my question, how badly do you want to see
Speaker 1: God's glory in your life? You've got to stop nursing
Speaker 1: your worries, they just get bigger. You got to make
Speaker 1: some commitments of faith. You got to step out and
Speaker 1: move against your fears. I want to pray a prayer,
Speaker 1: and I want to pray for two different groups. First,
Speaker 1: if you have never given your life to Christ, it's
Speaker 1: time to be born again. Then you can start seeing
Speaker 1: with spiritual eyes. And if you are already a Christian,
Speaker 1: would you stop listening to the negative reports? Would you
Speaker 1: go rego over these five things we just talked about
Speaker 1: and say, God, I don't want that in my life.
Speaker 1: I don't want that in my life. In this new year,
Speaker 1: let's vow for prayer. Father, I thank you that you
Speaker 1: have a great new future for us. You said, I
Speaker 1: know the plans I have for you, plans for good,
Speaker 1: not to harm you, but to prosper you. And so
Speaker 1: I pray that today, as we start a new year together,
Speaker 1: that we would lay aside the eyes of fear and
Speaker 1: we begin to see with eyes of faith, and that
Speaker 1: we would get your vision for our lives. We don't
Speaker 1: want division in our lives. We don't want a collision
Speaker 1: in our lives. We don't want the negativity of indecision
Speaker 1: in our lives.
Speaker 2: What we want is you.
Speaker 1: If you've never invited Christ in your life, why don't
Speaker 1: you say this, Jesus Christ, I want to be born again.
Speaker 1: I ask you to put your spirit in my life.
Speaker 1: I realize I need you forgive all my sins and
Speaker 1: help me to follow you. I want to learn to
Speaker 1: trust you and love you, and I want to see
Speaker 1: your vision and your purpose and plan for my life
Speaker 1: in this new year. Please accept me into your family.
Speaker 1: For those of you who have already prayed that prayer,
Speaker 1: pray this Father today. I want to switch from eyes
Speaker 1: of fear to eyes of faith. And I don't want
Speaker 1: to fall for any of these traps that we just
Speaker 1: looked at in today's text. Instead, I want to trust
Speaker 1: you and expect great things from you and attempt great
Speaker 1: things for you. I want to be a man of vision.
Speaker 1: I want to be a woman of vision, and I
Speaker 1: ask you to give me your vision in Jesus' name, Amen,