Faith Archives - Page 4 of 14

3 Ways You Can Succeed Like God Wants You To

Does God want us to succeed in life?

There are times in life where it can feel like God doesn’t want us to succeed or that He doesn’t care what we do or the decisions we make. That is not true. God cares deeply about what we do and in the manner in which we do it.

Jeremiah 29:11(AMP)
For I know the plans and thoughts that I have for you, says the Lord, plans for peace and well-being and not for disaster to give you a future and a hope.

We can see that God does care because He has plans for us. He wants us to succeed in life. God’s version of success is not the same as ours. With God, the focus is not about the material possessions. Those things may come, but God’s version of success has to do with pursuing Him. Here are three ways to succeed God’s way.

1. Say What God Says

We are bombarded with messages all day. There are so many things telling us negative messages, that we need to combat those messages. Some people like to call it positive affirmations or something to that affect. I like to give credit where credit is due. Saying what God says gives us the words to combat all of the negative messages that we receive.

Saying what God says gives us the words to combat all of the negative messages that we receive. Click To Tweet

2. See What God Sees

While saying what God says is the first step, we also have to engage our imaginations and see what God says happening in our lives.

As we grow into adulthood, we lose the imaginations that were so active when we were children. God wants us to use those imaginations to see our future. See our future as He sees it.

For us to use our imaginations to see God’s word come to pass in our lives is a part of applying God’s word to our lives.

3. Act on what God is saying

Saying what God says and imagining it happening in our lives will only take us so far. They will just be thoughts and words if we don’t have the actions to support them. The first two steps help us to fight the things that go on in our head. Our actions will follow the thoughts we have.

What is God telling you? You can succeed as God intended for you. It can be done, however it will not just fall in our lap. It also will not just magically appear, we have our part to play.

Our part shows that we value God. That we trust Him and what He says. It is time to succeed the way that God wants us to.

3 Things Keeping You from God

God’s Plan

Are we on the path that God has for us? He is giving us direction, but are we listening? Are we confident in that still small voice that speaks to us? Everyday, people question themselves and wonder if God is truly directing their lives. I know for myself, I have gone through times where I wonder if God has heard my prayers. I wonder if I’m on that straight and narrow path that leads to Him.

There are many things around us that can keep us from fulfilling the vision that God has for us. Here are three things that can keep from doing what God as called us to do and how we can overcome them.

1. Distractions.

We live in a world full of distractions. Our world is full of them. They are ready and willing to take your attention. Everything from Facebook to work to family can offer a distraction to what God has called us to do. We seem to have a microwave type of attention span and God doesn’t work that way.

Matthew 6:33 But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.

This is how we overcome distractions. We have to fight to focus on God. From the moment we wake up in the morning until we go to bed at night. That may seem extreme, but think about it. What is the first thing you do in the morning? For most people they look for their cell phone and get on social media. We’ve gotten to the point that we do this without thinking about it. So we have to fight to focus from the beginning of the day. We only fight for those things that are a priority. God has to be a priority.

We fight for the things that are a priority Click To Tweet

2. Emotions.

A lot of times our emotions drive us. They drive us sometimes when we are not thinking about it. Our emotions can steer us away from God if we are not careful. A lot of times we think that because people go to church they will act differently than people who don’t. We elevate them to such a high standard that they can’t maintain that standard even if they tried. We let things like anger and pride creep in because someone at the church did something to us and that steers us away from God.

3. Out of Balance Priorities.

When our life seems out of control, most times it can be traced to our priorities being out of line. We’ve moved something or someone higher on our list than they need to be.

Exodus 20:3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me.

The best way to overcome an out of balanced priority lifestyle is to have an inner circle that can speak into your life. People that have the green light to tell you when they see something that may be out of balance. People that you will listen to and not get defensive with.

While there are many things that will try to pull us away from God, if we can fight to focus on Him, there will be great things that He will do through us.

Quality Time with God

One of the five love languages is Quality Time. This is the love language that speaks the most to me. I believe it’s great to have quality time with the one you love. It’s essential to building a strong foundation to your relationship and then the longer that you are together it becomes more important. As a relationship matures spending quality time together keeps you connected. Just like we need quality time with our spouse, we need quality time with God. Here are two reasons why quality time with God is important.

1. A solid foundation.

Like a natural relationship, quality time is essential to the start of your relationship. When we are first dating, we spend every moment of time together. We look and make time to spend with that person. When we first come to know God and accept Him into our lives, it’s like seeing the world with the new relationship goggles on. We see God in every ray of sunshine, we see Him in the clouds, we see Him in the smell of fresh grass in the morning.

[ctt template=”8″ link=”mcx19″ via=”yes” ]Quality time is essential to our relationship with God[/ctt]

Having a new relationship with God makes it so that we can have our Bible just fall open and He will speak to us. We feel His presence in every worship song. Every message we hear seems to speak to our hearts and the situation that we’re in. It is in this newness of the relationship that we set our foundation in Him.

2. Keeps you together over time.

There are so many couples today that get divorced when the kids move out of the house. They realize that over the past 18 years, their lives have revolved around the kids so much that they feel like they don’t know each other anymore.

Over time our relationship with God can become “stale.” It can feel like we are doing the same things over and over. Go to church every week, read my Bible, try to pray everyday, this can be the routine that we fall into. This becomes the routine of our walk with God and we neglect the relationship with God. Having quality time with your spouse over the long term can keep your relationship fresh. As couples grow together they learn different skills and hobbies. Having quality time together allows us to share those new skills and hobbies.

We have to be proactive about our relationship with God too. God should be given the highest priority in our lives. Spending quality time with God keeps the things we do everyday from getting stale.

How do you keep your relationship with God fresh?