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:
- Be directed by a clear vision.
- Know your potential for fulfilling your vision.
- Develop a concrete plan for your vision.
- Possess the passion of vision.
- Develop the faith of vision.
- 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.
- 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.
- 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.
- 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!