Press – to act on with steady force, push steadily against, to squeeze
1. Find purpose:
If I were to ask everyone in this room today “What is your purpose in life?” I would probably get several different answers. Those answers would be good, but they are all secondary purposes. The question is what is your primary purpose in life? In other words, what is your reason for living? Everything in creation has a primary purpose, or a reason for existing. For anyone or anything to be successful, it must fulfill that purpose.
Every individual that God has created has a primary purpose. Our lives will be without meaning - we’ll be failures - unless we find out what is our purpose is.
The seeds of potential that God has planted inside of you are just waiting to blossom into your divine destiny and purpose. But often times something is stunting the growth. Something is cutting off the supply of nutrients needed and is hindering that seed from growing into the full size. It could be our own insecurities, lack of confidence, past hurts or the opinions of someone else. Whatever the obstacle we need to deal with it and began to encourage ourselves so that the seed of goodness can grow. The transformation and the ability to overcome depression, sin, rebellion, pride, whatever is hindering us begins when we recognize and understand not who we are but whose we are, which develop who we really are. Our circumstances are hindrances to seeing God’s abilities in us.
2. Forget the past:
You cannot enter your tomorrow as long as you hold on to your past. You must let go. Many times people say they will forgive but they will not forget. But the fact of the matter is you must forget. If you don’t once something similar occurs you will just bring that issue back up. We tend to hold onto those things that we are familiar with whether they are good or bad. It’s time to leave the safe and familiar behind. If you want to make the most of your life, you must be willing to plunge ahead into unchartered territory. Only then will you be challenged and stretched. Challenge brings growth, which in turn can bring success.
You can’t look backwards and forward at the same time (Luke 9:62) Paul, just like all of us had a past to forget. He had tortured and murdered many innocent people. He had caused a lot of pain and had done much damage to the cause of Christ.
But, now he was faced with a choice. He could either dwell on his mistakes or let them ruin his life and his chance for effective ministry, or he could forget all about them and move on get to his destiny.
Just like Paul had to make a choice, so do we. Maybe you’ve had a bad experience just lately or maybe you did something long ago that you regret. Maybe the memories keep coming back to haunt you from living a full life today.
A person who is pressing forward has to resist all feelings of fear including the fear of the unknown. God told Abram to leave is country in Genesis 12 and He would show him a land. There are some things about your future that God will not reveal to you unless you are will to leave your past behind and go higher in your relationship with Him. See there is a part that we must play. We as Christians give the wrong impression that when you come to Christ everything will go away no. There is a walking out and working out that is our responsibility. (Ephesians 4:21-24) You have to forget the past.
Well guess what? Many people have, but we must forget the past!!! Get a revelation. It’s over. It’s done. It’s gone. It can’t hurt you anymore. There’s nothing you can do to change it. The only thing you can do is change your mindset and move on.
3. Change your thinking to line up with God’s thinking
We have to choose to think differently. (Philippians 4:8, 9) Your thought become your words, your words become your actions, your actions become your habits, and your habits become your character. We have to begin to watch the seeds that we allow to be planted in our minds and cause us to think against God’s word (Give Personal example)
4. Get over People
There is a freedom when you turn from pleasing people to focusing on God. The greatest fulfillment in like is praising the lord the more you praise God the more your perception will change. I was in the MVA reading the manual and one thing it said was that you look with your eyes but you see with your mind. Now the scripture says that we ought to look to the hills from that’s where our help comes from. So if I get my focus off of man and things and begin to set my eyes on Jesus, then my mind will line up and be transformed into what God is saying. Many times we seek the approval of folk who really don’t care about and find ourselves in a rut trying to move at their every whim. We have to realize that God is the only one that can make us whole so He is the only one we should be pleasing.
5. Recognize who you are in God
The only way to overcome your condition is to know your position. Get in Gods word and begin to say and call yourself who God calls you. The enemy recognizes the greatness on the inside of you but do you. That’s why he sends distractions to get you to doubt and question God. We must continue to press. We must come to the understanding that the pain of yesterday will be turned into power for tomorrow. This is why the scripture says in James 1:2 to count it all joy. The enemy comes for your weakness, so know your weakness and guard yourself while you operate in the strengths. God didn’t say that he would pull you out of your situation but rather he would give you new vision and perception in those situations (Paul thorn)
6. Play to Win
Preserving is a defensive hold on the past. Progressing is an offensive hope for the future. I imagine that many of you have seen some sport in your past. You’ll see a player who is pretty good. Whenever they feel they have a comfortable lead on my opponent they would stop playing to win and start playing not to lose.
There’s a big difference between these two ways of playing. When you’re playing to win your more aggressive and willing to take more risks. You’re playing with more heart and determination. But when you’re playing not to lose you are playing more cautiously and less intensely. Those of you who know anything about sports know that when you start playing not to lose, you usually start losing. Your opponent often starts to close the gap and as they do they build momentum and confidence, which sometimes results in them overtaking you and actually beating you.
Again, the same is true spiritually. Whenever we let up and start trying to preserve what we have we actually start losing ground. We can’t afford to let that happen so we have to keep taking spiritual risks with God and for God, and not allow ourselves to be content or complacent in our spiritual comfort zones.
7. Have Cheerleaders
Proverbs 13:20
Attach yourself or get around those who will push you towards your destiny not away from it. Choose to associate with people who see your potential as being unlimited. Your limitations are the limits you place on yourself (Mark 10:27) Jonathan and David.
8. Encourage yourself
E – Endurance – that ability to last, continue, remain
N – Non negotiating (Don’t settle)
C – Courage – that attitude of facing anything recognized as painful or difficult
O- Out do yourself
U – Understand
R- Recognize, Respond and recover
A – Act on what you believe
G – Grow – develop in maturity
E – Exalt God.
