Introducing The Promises

Last year, my wife and I participated in this really cool thing that the National Community Church and their pastor Mark Batterson put on dubbed the “7:14 Experilent”.  Every day at 7:14 during Lent, people around the world dropped to their knees and humbled themselves before God.  The inspiration came from 2 Chronicles 7:14.  Overall the experience was very cool and my wife and I experienced some awesome breakthroughs as we joined other Christians around the world, humbling ourselves before our Lord.

Part of this process was that we would receive text messages every day at 7:14 to give us different things to pray about and reflect on.  One of these text messages was burned into my mind and I haven’t been able to shake it since.  It read, “The world has yet to see what God can do through a person FULLY CONSECRATED to Him.  Why not you?  Why not now?”  It’s a beautiful, yet convicting message.  I looked this quote up before I started writing this and found that it was first said by Henry Varley, a friend of the great evangelist D.L. Moody.  These were supposedly the words that inspired Moody to begin pursuing becoming an evangelist.  Varley’s exact words were: "The world has yet to see what God can do with and for and through and in a man who is fully and wholly consecrated to Him."

For the longest time, I didn’t do anything of importance with these words.  Out of nowhere though, they came back to me a few days ago.  Believe what you will about spontaneous memory of past events, but I don’t believe in chance.  If you believe in the Christian God of the Bible, then you shouldn’t either.  He is the Grand Weaver, the Architect of everyday, there is no chance or coincidence or happenstance with my God.  I believe that He brought this text message back to me on New Years Eve of 2012 to rock my world in 2013.  I want to document it too, so that your world can be equally rocked.  Why should I have all the fun?

Last year, just after the new year started (January 10^th to be exact), I decided to step up my prayer game.  I experienced some huge breakthroughs from it too.  I was baptized in the Holy Spirit for the first time and spoke in tongues.  I was baptized in water for the first time since I was an infant.  I was so close to God.  He was talking to me and I was talking to Him.  It was such a sweet time in my life.  Then about six months ago the communication line started to go bad.  I could still feel God with me…He just wasn’t talking to me anymore.  I think that time is over now though.  I think that might have been my little vacation.  My time of rest before it was time to get knee deep in the Lord’s work.  Up to my elbows in it.  And believe me, after being so on fire and then having six months off…I am ready to get to work!

As I stated, I believe that this whole plan came from the Lord.  I have been thinking about trying to write a book for awhile and actually started writing a few chapters of a book that was going to be about the promises that God has made to us in the Bible.  Then this text message came back to me.  “Why not you?  Why not now?”  Why not me?  What if I started taking God at His Word?  What if I started living by God’s promises to me?  Through all of history and for the rest of eternity, God has never and will never break one of the promises He has made.  So why am I not living according those promises?

There is an old hymn that most of you are probably familiar with, “Standing on the Promises”:

Standing on the promises of Christ my King,
Through eternal ages let His praises ring,
Glory in the highest, I will shout and sing,
Standing on the promises of God.

Standing, standing,
Standing on the promises of God my Savior;
Standing, standing,
I’m standing on the promises of God.

Standing on the promises that cannot fail,
When the howling storms of doubt and fear assail,
By the living Word of God I shall prevail,
Standing on the promises of God.

Standing on the promises I now can see
Perfect, present cleansing in the blood for me;
Standing in the liberty where Christ makes free,
Standing on the promises of God.

Standing on the promises of Christ the Lord,
Bound to Him eternally by love’s strong cord,
Overcoming daily with the Spirit’s sword,
Standing on the promises of God.

Standing on the promises I shall not fall,
List’ning every moment to the Spirit’s call.
Resting in my Savior as my All in all,
Standing on the promises of God.
(Source: http://www.hymnal.net/hymn.php/h/340#ixzz2GqNxmmgI)

I absolutely love this song.  Those lyrics are so rich and just dripping with God’s truth and goodness.  Just thought I’d get that out of the way so no one thinks I am saying anything against this hymn.  The problem in my life with “Standing on the Promises” is that I am tired of standing on them.  I want to MOVE on them.  The world needs more movers and fewer talkers.  The book of James is big on this topic.  James 1:22 says, “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves.  Do what it says.”  James 2:18 continues, “But someone will say, ‘You have faith; I have deeds.’  Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.” and in verse 20, “You foolish man, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless?”  Perhaps the most well known verse from James is 2:26, “As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.”

I think James was going through the same thing I am: just fed up with all the talk.  Jesus said the same thing to His disciples.  Don’t just listen.  Do it!  Jesus compared it to a person building their house on a firm foundation (the one who does what Jesus teaches) versus one who builds on a foundation of sand (the one who listens but does not do).

So I am done standing on the promises of God.  I am ready to start doing the promises of God.  That’s my New Year’s resolution.  Every week, my friend Jake, his fiance Liz, my wife and I are going to search out a promise God gives us in the Bible and we are going to LIVE by that promise.  We are going to document it each week too.  The successes and failures.  The good, the bad and the ugly.  Hopefully it will inspire some of you to join us.  If this little experiment works the way I think it will, it will be something that will change us forever.  By the end of this experiment, the world WILL know what God can do “with and for and through and in a man who is fully and wholly consecrated to Him”.

 

If you would like to join us in this "experiment" please let Jake, Liz, Jana or I know.  We would be thrilled to have you along for the ride and just KNOW that God is going to do some insanely wonderful things through this small act of faithfulness.  Even if you just leave a comment on this blog that you would like to be a part, we will let you know what promise we are focusing on for the week and you can join in on the MOVING!  Ball is in your court...

 

MOVE!