Remember that this whole series is based on 3 very important principles.
1. God has a plan for your life - Jeremiah 29:11
2. There is a battle engaged for your life - Jesus said in John 10:10 “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.”
3. Too many of God’s people are losing the battle - Marriages, children, finances, life. Matthew 9:36 - “When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.”
The first secret to living this abundant life was answering 4 of life’s most important questions. Who are you? What are you? Where are you? What do you really want?
Today I want to share the next two secrets with you.
1) Secret #2: Own It - If you want to move into the life of abundance that God wants for you, you have to own it.
Own what? Own you.
*Have you noticed that when we experience failure in life it is always someone else’s fault? My pain, my failure, my hardship is all someone else’s fault. If my behavior is bad it’s because you didn’t do enough to make me better.
I told my psychology professor at Liberty that I could pass the class quickly, because everything that’s wrong with me Is my parents fault…
*Owning it means that I’m taking responsibility for my own life. It means waking up and realizing “I am where I am because of the choices I have made.”
*Not don’t misunderstand me. Other people’s sins do affect our lives. The things that other people do can make our journey much more difficult.
I must understand that I am responsible for me. Anything else and you make yourself a victim and give unlimited power to the person who persecutes you.
*You need to know that God is on your side - and with Him all things are possible.
In John chapter 5 - Jesus stands in Jerusalem by the pool of Bethesda and looks down at a man who has been sick for 38 years.
He asks him a simple question “Do you want to get well?” The man quickly starts making excuses. The question that faces each of us this today is this… “Do you want to get well?” Do you want to be what God made you to be? Do you want to live in the abundance God has for you? Then own it.
*The only person who can stop you from becoming what God wants you to be is You.
*The only person who will stand before God and give an account for your life is you!
Once I realize that I am responsible for me I then need to…
2) Secret #3: Embrace Positive Change -Jesus asks the man at the pool “Do you want to get well?” You know something that smokes my salmon… There are actually some who don’t want to find abundant life. I have talked with people about getting out of the rut they’re in and the excuses they make tells you that they like wallowing in their misery.
Change as a concept is interesting but when the rubber meets the road we just aren’t all that interested.
You see, Sometimes it’s easier to be a victim than to be whole –
Being whole takes work…It takes a desire to change… It takes commitment, discipline and energy...
Sometimes being a victim becomes an excuse for not trying – instead of being an encouragement to try.
*Sometimes being a victim gets us attention – people pay attention to us, show us they care and we begin to feed on that sympathy.
When we wallow in the pity of others it tends to keep us from getting to our feet.
In the parable that Jesus tells about the prodigal son in Luke 15. The life of this young man changes when Jesus says in verse 17 “But when he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired men have more than enough bread, but I am dying here with hunger!”
*Someone said “We change when the pain of remaining the same outweighs the pain of change.”
Sometimes it’s easier to stay in the pig pen that we know than to risk change.
When We come to our senses and understand that anything less than God’s best for us is slop, life begins to change.
I don’t know about you but I would rather be a slave in the Fathers house than eating the slop of the world!
The change that we need is positive change because not all change is positive.
The younger son, in this parable, could have decided that it was better to be a thief than to work with the pigs.
That would not have been positive.
*But the change that he made was a positive one -Look at these two verses “18‘I will get up and go to my father, and will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in your sight;
19I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me as one of your hired men.”
This is the point where the blessing begins - God just needed his cooperation - from that point it was a ring and a robe. God’s blessing began to flow.
Are you living in God’s abundance?
Adapted from a sermon by Dan Cale
