Series: Vision

Why talk about vision?

Proverbs 29:18 | TPT  When there is no clear prophetic vision, people quickly wander astray. But when you follow the revelation of the word, heaven’s bliss fills your soul.

Proverbs 29:18 | MSG  If people can’t see what God is doing, they stumble all over themselves; But when they attend to what he reveals, they are most blessed.

Twelve Principles for Fulfilling Vision:

1. Be directed by a clear vision.
2. Know your potential for fulfilling your vision.
3. Develop a concrete plan for your vision.
4. Possess the passion of vision.
5. Develop the faith of vision.
6. Understand the process of vision.
7. Set the priorities of vision.
8. Recognize people’s influence on vision.
9. Employ the Provision of Vision.
10. Use persistence in achieving the vision.

Even though there will be times of stress, disappointment, and pressure, the vision will come to pass!

It is not a matter of whether the vision will be fulfilled; it’s a matter of whether we’re going to be true to it in the midst of trials so that God can bring it to pass.

Faithfulness – this describes the essence of God’s character. He is true to what He decided to accomplish, and nothing can stop Him.

Steadfast – this means to stand fast or stand steady in the face of resistance.

(Opposition should strengthen your resolve and revive your stamina.)

Courage – the ability to stand up in the face of fear.

If you are afraid to step out in your vision because it’s so big, then let your courage come to life as you trust God.

The vision in your heart needs to be larger than any opposition that comes against you so you can persist in your life’s purpose.

Persistence – the desire to withstand every opposition.

Persistent people never take no for an answer when it comes to their visions.

Persistence means that:

• • • You insist on having what you are going after.
    • You stand up against resistance until you wear it down.
    • You make people who are against you so tired of fighting that they either become your friends or leave you alone.
    • You only stop after you’ve finished.

How bad do you want it? How big is your want to?

Many people lose because they quit when life says no the first time, but persistent people win.

When you win, you forget all the pounding you received during the fight!

God has put so much in you that if you are willing to capture it, nothing can stop you!

1 John 4:4 | NKJV  You are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.

11. Be patient in the fulfillment of vision.

It may take a while for your vision to come to fruition, but if you are willing to wait for it, it will come to pass.

Hebrews 10:35-36 | NLT  So do not throw away this confident trust in the Lord. Remember the great reward it brings you!  (36)  Patient endurance is what you need now, so that you will continue to do God’s will. Then you will receive all that he has promised.

You cannot rush a vision. It is given by God and He will carry it out in His own perfect time.

The step by step process of vision is making some adjustments to the plan as the working out of His purpose becomes clearer to us.

Galatians 4:4 | NLT  But when the right time came, God sent his Son, born of a woman, subject to the law.

You do not need to wonder if the vision will come to pass, because it will. You just need to wait for it.

When you are patient in the fulfillment of your vision, you are able to be calm in the midst of uncertainty.

Therefore, when you have a vision, no one can offend you. 

• • • Do your coworkers dislike you?  That’s all right. It’s just temporary.
    • Are they not speaking to you? That’s Okay. It’s just temporary.
    • Are they trying to hold you back? No problem. It’s just temporary.
    • Your job is not your life. It’s merely a classroom to prepare you for your future.

Patience always wins the race.

Hebrews 12:1 | AMPC  THEREFORE THEN, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses [who have borne testimony to the Truth], let us strip off and throw aside every encumbrance (unnecessary weight) and that sin which so readily (deftly and cleverly) clings to and entangles us, and let us run with patient endurance and steady and active persistence the appointed course of the race that is set before us,

12. Stay connected to the Source of vision.

If you are going to be successful in your vision, you must have a daily, dynamic personal prayer life with God.

John 15:5 | NLT  “Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing.

John 15:5 | TPT  “I am the sprouting vine and you’re my branches. As you live in union with me as your source, fruitfulness will stream from within you—but when you live separated from me you are powerless.

If you stay in touch with God, you will always be nourished in both life and vision.

God will bring you through your difficulties and challenges and give you victory through prayer based on His Word.

Prayer encourages us to get back in the fight.

Isaiah 40:31 | MSG  But those who wait upon GOD get fresh strength. They spread their wings and soar like eagles, They run and don’t get tired, they walk and don’t lag behind.

Prayer is the essential resource of vision.

There will be times when all you’ll have is prayer. Yet that is all you need! God will see you through!

Renewed Vision of SpringHill Church

June 23, 2020

“Flood this city with the Word of God and God’s healing power. There have been trickles and streams in the past but now is the time for the flood to begin.”

July 15, 2020

“There is a healing move of God that is getting ready to begin the likes of which the world has never seen.”

Ephesians 4:11-12 | NLT  Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers.  (12)  Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ.

Ephesians 4:12 | TPT  And their calling is to nurture and prepare all the holy believers to do their own works of ministry, and as they do this they will enlarge and build up the body of Christ.

Our building is to be used every day of the week teaching, equipping, empowering and discipling people to be used in this great move of God.

“Teach the people, teach the people, teach the people”, He said.

Why talk about vision?

Proverbs 29:18 | TPT  When there is no clear prophetic vision, people quickly wander astray. But when you follow the revelation of the word, heaven’s bliss fills your soul.

Proverbs 29:18 | MSG  If people can’t see what God is doing, they stumble all over themselves; But when they attend to what he reveals, they are most blessed.

Twelve Principles for Fulfilling Vision:

1. Be directed by a clear vision.
2. Know your potential for fulfilling your vision.
3. Develop a concrete plan for your vision.
4. Possess the passion of vision.
5. Develop the faith of vision.
6. Understand the process of vision.

God has a plan for each of our lives, yet He brings those plans to pass in a gradual way.

He gives us purpose and vision but doesn’t explain the full process.

Psalms 37:23 | NKJV  The steps of a good man are ordered by the LORD, And He delights in his way.

God says He will direct our steps. There is no hurried way to get to God’s vision.

At the time we receive our visions, we are not ready for them. We don’t have the ability to handle the big things that we’re dreaming. We don’t have the experience or the character for them.

The route God takes us on prepares us for the destination.

God’s ways of getting us where we need to go are often different from what we expect.

Life’s hardships are part of the preparation for God’s plan for us and our visions. Think about Joseph, Moses, and others in the Bible. God had to work in them while He was taking them where He wanted them to be.

God is working on us, preparing us for our purposes through the process.

God will continually fulfill a little more of your dream until it comes to pass in its fullness.

Live by faith as you move through the process of vision.

Habakkuk 2:4b | AMPC  …the [rigidly] just and the [uncompromisingly] righteous man shall live by his faith and in his faithfulness.

7. Set the priorities of vision.

If you want to be successful, you must set priorities for yourself in relation to your vision.

Priority is the key to effective decision making.

Your life is the sum total of the decision you make every day.

Deuteronomy 30:19 | NLT  (19) “Today I have given you the choice between life and death, between blessings and curses. Now I call on heaven and earth to witness the choice you make. Oh, that you would choose life, so that you and your descendants might live!

You must fix your eyes on the vision and not get caught up in anything that won’t take you there.

1 Corinthians 6:12a | AMPC  (12) Everything is permissible (allowable and lawful) for me; but not all things are helpful (good for me to do, expedient and profitable when considered with other things)…

Not everything will move you towards the vision God has given you.

You will constantly need to evaluate and decide how many of the things you are currently involved in are beneficial to the vision.

Your greatest challenge is not in choosing between good or bad, but between good and best.

Proverbs 4:25-27 | NKJV  (25) Let your eyes look straight ahead, And your eyelids look right before you.  (26)  Ponder the path of your feet, And let all your ways be established.  (27)  Do not turn to the right or the left; Remove your foot from evil.

When you take your eyes off the mark, you end up where you don’t want to be.

Proverbs 29:18 | NIV  (18) Where there is no revelation, people cast off restraint; but blessed is the one who heeds wisdom’s instruction.

Vision provides some boundaries or restraints to govern our lives by.

You will never be disciplined in your life until you have real vision.

8. Recognize people’s influence on vision.

When you begin to act on your vision, it will stir up both those who want to help you and those who want to hinder you.

Vision wakes up opposition.

Nehemiah 4:1 | NIV  (1) When Sanballat heard that we were rebuilding the wall, he became angry and was greatly incensed. He ridiculed the Jews,

As long as you are not doing anything about your vision, no one will bother you. If you start to move toward your vision, however, opposition arises.

When you step outside what others expect you to be, they begin to see you as a problem.

World changers declare their independence from other people’s expectations.

Your passion has to be more powerful than the opposition of those around you.

Nehemiah faced this too.

Nehemiah 4:2 | NIV  (2) and in the presence of his associates and the army of Samaria, he said, “What are those feeble Jews doing? Will they restore their wall? Will they offer sacrifices? Will they finish in a day? Can they bring the stones back to life from those heaps of rubble—burned as they are?”

Don’t sacrifice your vision and dream because of a fear of criticism, conflict or disagreement.

Three things that will protect your vision are dissociation, limited association and expanded association.

• • • Disassociation is not mean and necessarily confrontational.
    • Limited associations are those you don’t need to disassociate from but limit your engagement with.
    • Expanded associations are those who have strong vision and you want to know and emulate them.

9. Employ the Provision of Vision.

God designed every purpose with its own prosperity.

Your purpose has built-in provision for it. 

People often stop dreaming about what they really want to do in life because they know that they have few resources with which to do it. They believe they have to pay for their visions with their present incomes when they can barely make ends meet as it is.

If we believe we have to use our own resources to accomplish God-given visions, then we are small dreamers.

Whenever a person receives a vision from God, it usually seems impossible. God knows that our provisions are never equal to our visions the moment we receive them.

It is our job to understand, believe, and write down our visions while it is His responsibility to explain how He’s going to accomplish them in His own time.

When people ask you how you are going to accomplish your dream, you simply tell them  you are trusting God for provision each step of the way.

God often gives us visions that confound us at first because He wants to make sure we don’t attempt to fulfill them apart from Him.

He wants us to be obedient by putting the vision on paper and then looking to Him to generate the funds and other resources that are needed to support His work.

God will never give you a vision without provision. 

Your provision, however, is usually hidden until you act on your vision. When we take action, then God manifests the provision.

God never requires from you what He does not already have in reserve for you.

Ephesians 1:3 | NKJV  Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ,

God has already prepared everything you would need before He created you so that you could do what you were born to do.

Matthew 6:25 | NKJV  “Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing?

Matthew 6:31-33 | NKJV  “Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’  (32)  For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.  (33)  But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.

Do people worry about something they already have? No. Worry isn’t related to our present supply. It is related to a perceived or potential lack in the future.

Jesus was asking His disciples, in effect, “Why do you want something that you don’t need right now? You are focusing on the wrong thing. Seek first God’s kingdom and His righteousness and these things will come with the job. Don’t pursue them; they will follow you.”

Biblical prosperity doesn’t mean tomorrow’s need is met today, but that today’s needs are met today!

True prosperity means to be free of worry and fear and reflects a state of contentment that everything necessary is being taken care of.

Whatever God calls for, He provides for!

Why talk about vision?

Proverbs 29:18 | TPT  When there is no clear prophetic vision, people quickly wander astray. But when you follow the revelation of the word, heaven’s bliss fills your soul.

Proverbs 29:18 | MSG  If people can’t see what God is doing, they stumble all over themselves; But when they attend to what he reveals, they are most blessed.

Twelve Principles for Fulfilling Vision:

1. Be directed by a clear vision.

Even Jesus identified a specific life work that was His own and motivated everything He did.

John 18:37 | BBE  (37) Then Pilate said to him, Are you then a king? Jesus made answer, You say that I am a king. For this purpose was I given birth, and for this purpose I came into the world, that I might give witness to what is true. Every lover of what is true gives ear to my voice.

• • A clear guiding purpose will keep you from being distracted by lesser or non-essential things.

2. Know your potential for fulfilling your vision.

Your potential is determined by the assignment God has given you.

• • Whatever you were born to do, you are equipped to do.

• • • When you discover your dream, you will also discover your ability.
    • Potential is hidden capacity, untapped power, unreleased energy. It is all you could be but haven’t yet become.
    • Potential is who you are, in accordance with your vision, even if you don’t know it yet. Potential is the person inside you who is waiting to get out.

Ephesians 3:20 | NIV  (20) Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us,

God put His vision AND His Spirit within us and that is more than enough potential for our needs.

This means that what you are able to accomplish has nothing to do with your upbringing, your environment, your past, etc. It has to do with the power at work in you.

Your imagination is not big enough for all God wants to do in you, for you, and through you!

You must understand that God will never call you to do something that He hasn’t already given you the ability to do or that He won’t give you the ability to do when the time comes.

Your potential isn’t dependent on what you perceive as your limitations. You are perfect for your purpose.

3. Develop a concrete plan for your vision.

As we delight ourselves in the Lord, He places those desires in us that are part of His plan and vision for our lives. We begin to make plans to head towards that vision.

God will direct your steps once you make a plan to move towards that desire He put inside you.

Proverbs 16:9 | TPT  Within your heart you can make plans for your future, but the Lord chooses the steps you take to get there.

When ideas are cultivated, they become imagination. Imaginations, if it is watered and developed, becomes a plan. Finally, if a plan is followed, it becomes a reality.

• • When you lack a plan, you miss opportunities!

Let’s say you have a vision to start a business. If you have not developed a plan and begun to prepare for the business, If God brought an investor across your path, you would not be ready and prepared for the opportunity.

Like blueprints to a contractor, the plans keep you on track.

• • A vision becomes a plan when it is captured, fleshed out, and written down.
  • Making a plan is a description of the way you will end up in life, not the beginning.

A plan gives you substance to your prayers. If you have a plan, there will never be enough time for prayer. You can’t pray over it enough!

4. Possess the passion of vision.

You will never be successful without passion. Passionate people are people that have discovered something more important than life itself.

How badly do you want what you are going after? Passion is stamina that says, “I’m going to go after this, no matter what happens or how long it takes.”

• • You must have a purpose that produces passion.
  • You must put your whole heart into your vision.

Nehemiah 4:6 | AMPC  (6) So we built the wall, and all [of it] was joined together to half its height, for the people had a heart and mind to work.

Nehemiah 4:6 | NIV  (6) So we rebuilt the wall till all of it reached half its height, for the people worked with all their heart.

Remember, your vision should cause you to be dissatisfied and unsettled.

• • The majority of people in the earth have no passion for life because there is no vision in their hearts.

You are passionate and you are real if you stay steady under pressure. The Apostle Paul proved this in all the hardships he endured.

It’s easy to get excited about a vision, but it is much harder to be faithful to it.

• • • Purpose feeds passion and passion feeds persistence and persistence is what will keep you moving forward.
    • Passion is a desire to win that is bigger than a desire to quit.

5. Develop the faith of vision.

• • Sight is a function of the eyes, vision is a function of the heart.

A reporter once asked Helen Keller, “Miss Keller, is there anything worse than being blind?” She paused for a moment and, in her unique way of talking, said, “What’s worse than being blind is having sight without vision.”

Physical sight sees things as they are. Vision is the capacity to see things as they could be through the eyes of faith.

• • Never let what your eyes see determine what your heart believes.

Hebrews 11:1 | TPT  (1) Now faith brings our hopes into reality and becomes the foundation needed to acquire the things we long for. It is all the evidence required to prove what is still unseen.

• • God gave us vision so we would not have to live by what we see.
  • The vision of our heart is greater than our environments.

As a believer, if you try and function in any other way than faith, you will malfunction.

How does God operate? God created everything by speaking His thoughts into being.

• • Thoughts are the most important but words are the most powerful. Why? Because thoughts design a future, words create that future.
  • You can undermine your vision through negative thoughts and words.
  • You don’t need to be big to think great thoughts, but you need to think great thoughts to become big.

Your success or failure is determined by how you see.

Why talk about vision?

Proverbs 29:18 | TPT  When there is no clear prophetic vision, people quickly wander astray. But when you follow the revelation of the word, heaven’s bliss fills your soul.

Proverbs 29:18 | MSG  If people can’t see what God is doing, they stumble all over themselves; But when they attend to what he reveals, they are most blessed.

• When you have no vision, you will simply relive the past with its disappointments and failures.

What is Vision?

• Vision is the ability to see farther than your physical eyes can look – to see not just what is, but also what can be and to make it a reality.

• Vision is seeing the future before it comes into being. 

• Vision is the blueprint for your life.

Hebrews 11:1 | TPT  Now faith brings our hopes into reality and becomes the foundation needed to acquire the things we long for. It is all the evidence required to prove what is still unseen.

• Vision determines your destiny. 

It doesn’t matter what you currently have or don’t have, as long as you can see what you could have.

• God has given you a unique vision.

Every human being was born to accomplish something specific that no one else can accomplish.

Vision Comes from Purpose

Do you know why you exist?

Psalms 33:11 | NIV  But the plans of the LORD stand firm forever, the purposes of his heart through all generations.

1. 1. God planned in advance all that you were born to be and accomplish.
   2. You were born at the right time.
   3. You were given a sense of purpose.
   4. God has placed His eternal purpose in your heart.

• Not only has your purpose been given to you to manifest, but it has also already been completed in eternity.

Isaiah 46:9-10 | NIV  (9) Remember the former things, those of long ago; I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me.  (10)  I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come. I say, ‘My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please.’

Isaiah 46:10 | NIrV (10)  Before something even happens, I announce how it will end. In fact, from times long ago I announced what was still to come. I say, ‘My plan will succeed. I will do anything I want to do.’

These verses say that God does two things:

1. 1. 1. He finishes things first in the spiritual realm, and then He goes back and starts them up in the physical realm.
      2. He reveals the end result of something when it is just beginning.

God establishes the principle that purpose is established before production. He institutes a purpose, then He creates someone or something to fulfill that purpose.

Think about creation. Everything was already completed in God’s mind before He laid the foundation of the world. After He imagined and planned how He wanted it to be, then He initiated the beginning by creating the heavens, the earth and then humankind.

Even we operate this way when we are creating something. We plan it out, see it completed, then build it.

The fact that you were “started” is proof that you are already completed in God because He always finishes before He starts and accomplishes His purposes.

Philippians 1:6 | MSG  (6) There has never been the slightest doubt in my mind that the God who started this great work in you would keep at it and bring it to a flourishing finish on the very day Christ Jesus appears.

You were born to manifest something that is already finished in the heart and mind of God. This is why you must live by faith, looking forward with expectation for what God has already completed; otherwise, you will believe only what you see with your physical eyes rather than the vision you see in your heart.

Let’s clarify and establish the difference between purpose and vision:

• Purpose is when you know and understand what you were born to accomplish
• Vision is when you can see it in your mind by faith and begin to imagine it.

When you are able to see your purpose, your vision comes to life.

Vision is a glimpse of the future God has purposed.

Suppose that you have the money you need to fulfill your vision. God says to you, in effect, “I’ve already been where you are going, and you will have everything you need.”

God doesn’t create something and then decide what to use it for.

He knows what He wants first, and then He assigns someone or something to accomplish it for Him.

How do I begin to receive the vision God has for my life?

• Vision is as close as your deepest desires.

Psalms 37:4 | NKJV (4)  Delight yourself also in the LORD, And He shall give you the desires of your heart.

This verse does not say God will grant the desires of your heart (although He will as those desires conform to His will). It says He will GIVE you the desires of your heart. The word GIVE in the Hebrew means “to add or place”.

When you are Born Again, God begins to shape the desires of your heart to line up with  the purpose for which you were created. The closer you draw to Him, the more those desires will prevail.

All the thoughts, ideas, plans, and dreams that remain constant within you were placed there by God. No matter how much you forget them, they always come back to you. 

Vision is the idea that never leaves you, the dream that won’t go away, that passion that won’t subside, and that irritating desire that will not let you sit still.

• Vision is what you keep seeing, even when you close your eyes.

• Vision from God is never going to be selfish, about you. It will always be for the greater plan of God’s Kingdom and will build others up and help humanity.

God’s vision for your life will only be realized as we grow in our relationship with God through the Holy Spirit.

Twelve Principles for Fulfilling Personal Vision:

1. Be directed by a clear vision.

To fulfill your vision, you must have a clear, guiding purpose for your life. Moses, Joshua, David, and Nehemiah each had vision that drove them and motivated their actions.

The vision must be clear to you or you will not have anything to aim at, and you will achieve nothing.

• • • When you can see your purpose in your mind by faith and begin to imagine it, that is vision.

Even Jesus identified a specific life work that was His own and motivated everything He did.

Luke 2:49 | NKJV  (49) And He said to them, “Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?”

• • • A clear guiding purpose will keep you from being distracted by lesser or non-essential things.

Let’s ask some difficult but necessary questions:

• • Have you changed jobs several times in the last few years?
  • Do you keep changing your major in college?
  • Do you do one thing for a time and then go on to something else because you are bored or dissatisfied?

If so, you may lack vision.

You were not created to be bored and dissatisfied.

• • You must choose where you want to go in life and then be decisive and faithful in carrying it out.

Don’t put off the decision or be afraid of it. Moreover, when you’re deciding, make sure not to sell yourself short. Shooting for the clouds is too low. Instead make the clouds your cushion in case you fall.

Pastor John Osteen used to say, “Aim high and hit it sometimes versus aiming too low and hitting it every time.

We are not talking about goals such as buying a house or acquiring financial independence or debt freedom. Having a purpose and a vision has to do with your life’s existence. It enables you to answer the question, “Why was I born?”

While you may not know all the details of your life, you should have a good idea of the purpose He has given you to accomplish on earth. Without it, all you’re doing is existing.

• • Your vision will bother you until you take action on it.

Nehemiah 2:1 | NKJV  (1) And it came to pass in the month of Nisan, in the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes, when wine was before him, that I took the wine and gave it to the king. Now I had never been sad in his presence before.

If God tells you to build, start, invest, create, or manufacture something, then it will bother you deep inside until you do it.

Your vision is a clear conception of something that is not yet reality, but which can exist. It is a strong image of a preferable future.

A vision demands change by its very nature.

When you keep company with God, you have to keep moving forward.

A clear vision gives us passion that keeps us continually moving forward in life.

In this series, we are going to talk about:

• What is vision?
• Where does vision come from?
• How do we maintain vision?
• How do I accomplish my vision?

What brought me to this place in life and ministry?

If you allow them to, past failures, mistakes, frustrations, fatigue, negative circumstances, and more can cause you to lose your vision and get what is called tunnel vision.

What is tunnel-vision? It is defective sight in which objects cannot be properly seen if not close to the center of the field of view.

Proverbs 29:18 | TPT  When there is no clear prophetic vision, people quickly wander astray. But when you follow the revelation of the word, heaven’s bliss fills your soul.

Proverbs 29:18 | MSG  If people can’t see what God is doing, they stumble all over themselves; But when they attend to what he reveals, they are most blessed.

• When you have no vision, you will simply relive the past with its disappointments and failures.

I have had to go back to square one of my calling and what our church is called to accomplish and let God re-establish vision for my life personally, as a pastor and minister of the Gospel, and leader of our church.

What is Vision?

• The greatest gift ever given to mankind is not the gift of sight, but the gift of vision.

• Sight is a function of the eyes; vision is a function of the heart.

• Vision is the ability to see farther than your physical eyes can look – to see not just what is, but also what can be and to make it a reality.

• Vision is seeing the future before it comes into being. God gave humanity the gift of vision so we would not have to live only by what we see.

Vision sets you free from the limitations of what the eyes can see and allows you to enter the liberty of what the heart can feel.

It is vision that makes the unseen visible and the unknown possible.

Vision generates hope in the midst of despair and provides endurance in tribulation.

What we can see is not necessarily what really is. 

Many of us are living as clay vessels when, in reality, we are pure gold inside.

• Vision is the source of hope and life.

Without vision you have no hope. Vision is the blueprint for your life. 

Hebrews 11:1 | NKJV  Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

Hebrews 11:1 | TPT  Now faith brings our hopes into reality and becomes the foundation needed to acquire the things we long for. It is all the evidence required to prove what is still unseen.

To paraphrase, faith is the substance of things you hope to accomplish, the evidence of things you can see even when others cannot.

Where there is a dream, there’s hope, and where there’s hope, there’s faith – and faith is the substance, or fulfillment of what you are hoping for

• Vision determines your destiny. 

When you can see what is possible and believe that it can come to pass, it makes you capable of doing the impossible.

Most people have no vision beyond their current circumstances. Without a vision for the future, life loses its meaning. An absence of meaning then leads to lack of hope. It makes one feel as if they are wasting their lives.

It doesn’t matter what you currently have or don’t have, as long as you can see what you could have.

The most frustrated person in the world is someone who has a dream but doesn’t know how to bring it to pass.

• You were born to be distinct and unique. 

• You are one of a kind – irreplaceable, and original.

Ephesians 2:10 | NLT  For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.

Things that are originals are high in value because of their uniqueness. The value of natural things is determined by how rare it is. (diamonds, pearls, gold, etc.)

God wanted you to be perpetually valuable so he made you permanently rare. He created you as one of a kind.

• God has given you a unique vision.

Every human being was born to accomplish something specific that no one else can accomplish.

God loves dreamers. He gives big visions and He is attracted to people who love to dream big.

As long as a person can hold on to his vision, then there is always a chance for him to move out of his present circumstances and toward the fulfillment of his purpose.

Vision Comes from Purpose

Do you know why you exist?

Psalms 33:11 | NIV  But the plans of the LORD stand firm forever, the purposes of his heart through all generations.

Isaiah 14:24 | AMPC  The Lord of hosts has sworn, saying, Surely, as I have thought and planned, so shall it come to pass, and as I have purposed, so shall it stand–

1. God planned in advance all that you were born to be and accomplish.

Ephesians 1:3-5 | TPT  Every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realm has already been lavished upon us as a love gift from our wonderful heavenly Father, the Father of our Lord Jesus—all because he sees us wrapped into Christ. This is why we celebrate him with all our hearts!  (4)  And he chose us to be his very own, joining us to himself even before he laid the foundation of the universe! Because of his great love, he ordained us, so that we would be seen as holy in his eyes with an unstained innocence.  (5)  (5-6) For it was always in his perfect plan to adopt us as his delightful children, through our union with Jesus, the Anointed One, so that his tremendous love that cascades over us would glorify his grace—for the same love he has for his Beloved One, Jesus, he has for us. And this unfolding plan brings him great pleasure!

2. You were born at the right time.

Ecclesiastes 3:1 | NKJV  To everything there is a season, A time for every purpose under heaven:

Your purpose can be fulfilled only during the time you are given on earth to accomplish it.

You were born at the right time to accomplish your vision during your generation.

3. You were given a sense of purpose.

Ecclesiastes 3:10 | NKJV  I have seen the God-given task with which the sons of men are to be occupied.

“God-given task” in the Hebrew could be translated as a “responsible urge”.

There is something already in you that God has placed in you because of His purpose.

4. God has placed His eternal purpose in your heart.

Ecclesiastes 3:11 | AMPC  He has made everything beautiful in its time. He also has planted eternity in men’s hearts and minds [a divinely implanted sense of a purpose working through the ages which nothing under the sun but God alone can satisfy], yet so that men cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.

Although you and I are limited by time and space, our eternal God Who is not limited by time and space has put something into our hearts that calls the unseen into the seen.

What God has placed into your heart is also what is in His own heart.

He lives in eternity, yet He has specifically placed you in time so that others on the earth will be able to see a piece of eternity in Him though you.

Ephesians 2:10 | TPT  We have become his poetry, a re-created people that will fulfill the destiny he has given each of us, for we are joined to Jesus, the Anointed One. Even before we were born, God planned in advance our destiny and the good works we would do to fulfill it!

It is that piece of eternity that makes you uncomfortable or dissatisfied with your present life because you are not yet manifesting your purpose.