Inspiring and Challenging Dreamers

When you increase in wisdom, you increase in finances! Proverbs 8 tells us that riches and honour are tied to wisdom (v. 14) and that if you love wisdom, God will fill your treasures (v. 21).

Let me say this another way: to gain wealth, you need to become good at what you do.

Study! Go to seminars! Read books! Get a mentor! 

These are ways to increase wisdom, and it is increasing wisdom that will increase your net worth. You don’t have to know everything about everything, but you have to know something about something. You have to develop a skill, an ability, a gift – you must find what God has placed inside you and cultivate that.

What you love is a great clue to your dominant gift – if you love computers, that’s a clue your gifting will be in that, if you love children, then that’s a clue your gifting will be there – and if you love something, it is always easier to develop in wisdom in that area.

Please, develop the attitude that you will be a lifelong learner. I have seen people stop learning and then they start dying.

Today, don’t take prisoners, but be ruthless towards apathy and ignorance. Today, find a seminar and get yourself booked in. Today, buy a book about your chosen topic. Today, find a mentor.  Don’t wait around, this is vital to your life success.

The truth that has to be said over and over is that to disobey God’s Word is to bring loss into your life, and to obey God’s Word is to bring prosperity into your life. Now when I share that with people, someone will always bring up the wicked people that are doing quite well for themselves, and they will tell me that they don’t go to church, they don’t read their Bible, but they are doing well… why?

Well, the answer is invariably because they work. A lot of Christians do not understand that God has designed them to work and to work hard. The blessing of God is not on your prayers but on the work of your hands.

The Lord shall give you His good treasure, the heaven to give the rain unto thy land in His season, and to bless all the work of thine hand (Deut. 28.12)

It is not just a good idea that you work, it is actually vital – Paul the apostle said that those who do not work should not even be fed (2 Thess. 3.10) and that they are busybodies (2 Thess. 3.11) because people without business of their own always seem to get their noses caught up in everyone else’s business! My advice to people is to stay away from people who refuse to work and is rebellious to having a job – don’t be their friends! And if you think that is a bit harsh, realize that it not my idea, it is also Paul’s:

And if any man obey not our word by this epistle [in other words, not working as per 2 Thess. 3.10-11], note that man, and have no company with him, that he may be ashamed (2 Thess. 3.14)

Note that man means that you should draw attention to them and let people know about the lazy person and stay away. That’s what the Scripture says – the only question you have is whether to obey it or not. I have lost more people from Tree of Life Church by telling them they need to go and get a job than anything else I have ever said to people. There is a culture of laziness that will always stop prosperity. That is why someone who never goes to church can be prosperous, but some Christians never prosper because they never produce. You have to produce to prosper.

But what if I lost my job? Well, while hunting another one and believing for another one you should still be productive. Joseph was put in jail, but still worked. It wasn’t a job, but it produced, and it highlighted the favour on Joseph’s life. You might not enjoy the job you have right now, but if you don’t learn to obey your boss, be productive, follow instructions you will never prosper in your future ever. God will have you repeat the class over and over until you learn this lesson!

 

 

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Every seed has inside it an invisible instruction manual, and if you could somehow look closely enough you could see it. The apple seed is designed to produce apples, the orange seed oranges, the tomato seed tomatoes.

When you sow a seed, there is absolutely zero doubt that the seed you sow will produce after its own kind. No-one expects – or would even believe – that you can plant an apple seed and get a cucumber. We all know that seeds are utterly, unwaveringly consistent.

God planned the harvest He wanted, then wrote that harvest inside the seed in language so small you cannot see it even with the most powerful of lenses – in fact, scientists have only just in the last five years been able to see DNA with electron microscopes.

When God wanted many sons to come to glory, He sowed a son.  And inside the Son, He wrote an invisible code  – “seek and save that which is lost”. Jesus was the greatest seed ever planted, and you are part of the greatest harvest of all time!

What does this have to do with you and your financial statement?

Well, once there was a starving widow. And, like most ministers today, Elijah received an offering for her. And I am fine with that – everyone should be expected to contribute to offerings and everyone should be a tither no matter how poor they are. But unlike most charismatic ministers today, Elijah wasn’t after her money, he was trying to paint a picture of her future – he was, to use Tree of Life language, inspiring her to dream and challenging her to live the dream.  Elijah said:

For thus saith the Lord God of Israel, the barrel of meal shall not waste, nor shall the cruse of oil fail, until the day that the Lord sendeth rain on the earth (1 Kings 17.14)

Elijah gave her a picture of what the harvest would be when she sowed her seed. He told her that making him a cake of bread was not a tomato seed, not an apple seed, but a miracle seed and Elijah showed her a picture of the harvest. When you sow a seed with a picture of the harvest in your heart, and you speak that image out, then you are writing inside the seed – you are taking a spiritual pen and writing the DNA of your offering, and designing your own future.  Look what happened to the widow:

And she went and did according to the saying of Elijah: and she, and he, and her house, did eat many days (1 Kings 17.15)

If you give to a specific end, and you declare your harvest as you sow, you can write the DNA into your offering and determine your harvest. That is the authority you have as a believer.

And the barrel of meal wasted neither did the cruse of oil fail according to the word of the Lord spoken by Elijah (1 Kings 17.16)

You can sow for financial freedom, you can sow for victory in a situation, David sowed to stop a plague and his offering stopped a plague (2 Samuel. 24.25). Your giving can get you out of trouble!

Anything you have in your hand that you can give to another to benefit their life and not yours is seed. You can sow information, sow wisdom, sow encouragement, sow money. When you plant, give your seed an assignment so that it produces a great harvest for you.

Now don’t try and give your seed several instructions, it will get confused. Even David said “This one thing I do”. Don’t waver in this, be strong and bold. Give your seed an assignment and bring your focus into the picture too.

So the next time you are at church, and pastor says “We are holding a special offering for a building” – don’t just respond. Don’t just give. That’s great for the church and the building, but we want the offering to be great for you.

Give your seed an assignment. Aim that seed and plant it deliberately because you want a harvest in your life, and write the DNA of the seed with your words. Your testimony will be amazing, so please share it here, I look forward to hearing from you!

You cannot muck around when it comes to character, it’s that simple. A lot of people do not realize that character and prosperity are linked, but they are. I spoke to a multi-millionaire entrepreneur once, a man so good at making money they asked him to be on Dragon’s Den. He told me he had seen more people fail to make their millions because of character flaws, including adultery, than anything else put together.

I have been a pastor for many years now, and watched many ministries come and go, many pastors come and go, many evangelists start off powerful and extraordinary and end up in a heap of ashes as they divorce their wives, steal money from the church, or some other weakness has eaten away their life, like a wild cancer.

Right now you are reading this blog hoping to prosper, hoping for your church to prosper – and maybe there is a weakness in your life. Maybe right now it is still a little cub, but if you do not stop feeding it, it will become a giant bear that will rip you and your ministry limb from limb! Right now it is cute, you play with it, joke about it, but you cannot muck around when it comes to character.

There is a fight going on right now – for you to win you need to deal with your weakness. Not walking in victory is not fun, it’s sad. You get annoyed and you get off focus. It’s time to deal with our weaknesses so we can prosper and be in health!

We have all sinned, but some sins will tie you to the wrong people. Samson’s problem with women tied him to Delilah and defeat, and a little leaven can easily infect the whole lump until your whole life succumbs to your weakness.

You need to confront this thing now while it is still in its’ infant state. Do not let it grow up. Do not let it take over your life. And how do you fight temptation? With the Word of God. You cannot defeat a weakness of the flesh with philosophy or will power. You need the Word of God.

Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his ways? By taking heed according to Thy Word (Psalm 119.9)

Right now your Father knows what you are struggling with, and He is on your side and wants you to walk in freedom. He remembers that you are just flesh (Ps. 78.39), and He is on your side, and will bring people to you to help you walk in freedom.

However, just as God wants you to walk in freedom and sends encouragers and deliverer to you to bring your mind and thoughts into freedom, satan wants your weakness to grow and sends people who agitate you right at the point of weakness, or worse who befriend you because of your weakness. But you can win!

And minister – man of God – listen to me today – when you win, the nation wins. When David beat Goliath, everyone beat Goliath. When you beat your weakness, your church walks in victory, everything moves forward. You have to starve your weakness to death, which never happens quickly.

Right now your weakness doesn’t like being small, it wants to grow and increase and find expression in your life! So don’t tolerate it another day – make it leave. Take authority over yourself, resist the devil, and submit to God. Grow in strength and resist weakness! Watch out for your weakness because when you let it in, it invites its brothers and sisters round for dinner – David’s adultery opened the door for lies and murder.

So resist the devil, and do not give in to the lusts of the flesh. Walk in love, walk in Christ, walk in righteousness. Resist temptation today and live in victory.

It is one of the keys to the harvest.

 

 

I am currently doing a new programme of weightlifting designed by a fantastic top level body builder. One of his catchphrases is “Train With Purpose”. His idea is that you don’t just walk into a gym and do what you feel, but you plan everything with a purpose so that every exercise and every rep helps you fulfill your goals.

It’s a simple idea but a powerful one. I think it is something every Christian needs to take notice of. Because I see a lot of activity in the church today that has no purpose. It isn’t making us stronger, it isn’t extending the kingdom, it isn’t building up Christians or the body of Christ. It’s just activity without fruit.

Pastors – how many meetings do you have each week? Ask yourself what is the purpose for those meetings. Are they extending the kingdom? Are they building people – are they helping people’s hearts? At Tree of Life we have two meetings a week, one big and one small for people to attend. Because both have a purpose for helping and feeding people’s souls. I’ve seen churches with meetings every night – how can someone live a life of love and wisdom if they are never at home? That’s missing the purpose.

I’ve seen people who want to go and plant a church go to Bible Colleges where not one of the staff has ever planted a church. They leave the Tree of Life family which has planted six churches and is about to plant more and has loads of experience in planting new churches and go somewhere that has no church planting experience because it is called a college. These people have failed to understand purpose. If you want to go into ministry stop and think about what kind of ministry then find a place to train on purpose, there is no one size fits all solution.

I’ve been to churches where they have a particular order of service that to me doesn’t serve the people. I will ask the pastor why things are done in that order, and no one knows. It is a tradition, not on purpose. Things need to be thought through.

Often things that were originally initiated because of a strong sense of purpose have lost their purpose. They are now being done because of tradition and they are done mindlessly. Stop and think about why you do things, it will make you a more effective leader.

Mentorship is the single most powerful force in moving your entire life forward. That is a simple fact and is inviolable. George Hill says “The fastest way to get anywhere is to follow a man who has been there”. I say “What you hear from someone you respect, you will inevitably believe”.

So when you have found someone who has been where you want to go then you have to treat every moment with them as a moment to treasure. When I started Tree of Life Church, I asked God for three mentors: one to show me how to operate in authority and command things to happen, one to show me how to pray and meditate, and one to show me how to pastor. God brought all three of these men to me, and I have treasured the moments I have spent with all of them.

Let me give you some powerful wisdom most people don’t realize and very few ever live by: what you fail to honour and respect will eventually leave your life. It might be a miracle. It might be a pet dog. It might be money. You see life has a flow – things flow, and if you honour things they flow to you, if you dishonour them they flow away from you.

There was a man who disrespected divine healing. He wrote articles of hate against any Christian who prayed for the sick and who wanted the sick to be well. He mocked Christians who believed that God still answers prayer for healing and that God still heals today. He said Jesus did not want people well. He got cancer, and someone asked me to go pray for him. I refused as someone who has spent their life dishonoring healing cannot suddenly change. What I am talking about today is the fundamental principles that bind the universe today, this is vital for your success and well being.

When it is time for you to move forward, a mentor appears. When Israel was ready to enter the land of promises, Moses appeared. When they were ready to reject paganism and immorality, Elijah appeared. When the woman needed a financial miracle, Elijah turned up at her doorstep!

If you respect the people who bring financial freedom to others, they will move towards you. People often ask how Tree of Life gets so many good speakers – I believe that a massive part of the story is that we genuinely honour our speakers. When you honour those who come your way to bring you freedom financially, you will explode with prosperity.

Many people who have experienced horrific financial devastation, if you listen to their story, a mentor appeared but they failed to honour their mentor! You have to honour your mentor, you have to pursue your mentor. Some people have failed to be lifted by me because they cannot come and visit me. You visit your mentor! I visit Robert Maasbach, he does not come and visit me!

So believe that you will encounter a mentor who will give you wisdom to make better financial decisions. If you have made actions that lost you money, you can make actions that bring money in!

So chase wise counsel! Maybe your pastor, maybe it is your boss at work, maybe it is a financial planner. But whatever else you do today, take the time to listen to good advice. And let the advice come from whom it will. Don’t make snap judgments based on what they look like. The wisest man in Israel was John the Baptist, but he wore funny clothes and had a funny diet. Never let the package distract from the content.

 

Let me finish with this: the most successful people in life have the best mentors.

I’d love to hear your mentorship stories, please tell us as a comment about them!

One of the things that stops many people enjoying the abundance of life that Jesus Christ wants us to have is looking to the wrong source.  What many people fail to realize is that: your harvest comes through people, not from people.

Now it is easy for me to say “You need to depend on God, not men”, and it is equally easy for me to say teach your people to depend on God, not men, but how can you actually know if you are relying on men instead of God?

I will tell you right now how to know who you are depending on: by what makes you angry.  If you are furious at your boss for not giving you the promotion or raise, you are relying on him not God for increase. If you are angry at the bank for turning you down for the loan, you are depending on the bank not God. If you are annoyed at a loved one for not helping you more with money, then you are relying on them and not God.

This is why many, many Christians will never walk in abundant life – they are waiting for their blessing from men, when it comes from God.

I know it hurts when people fail to recognize your character, your hard work, your efforts, your everything goes by unacknowledged by people, but you have to get inside your heart and mind right now: promotion comes from the Lord (Psalm 75.6-7).

You must realize this to experience great overflow: God wants to be the source of your divine increase and God wants you to trust Him for increase. He doesn’t want you to trust Potiphar, He wants you to trust Him!

I was speaking to a travelling minister the other week and the church he went to took a love offering for him. The offering was larger than the church expected so the pastor decided to keep some back for the church’s use. The minister said that he didn’t want a penny from the church, and wouldn’t get into a fight with them over money.

What was going on there? The pastor didn’t see God as the source, but the travelling minister did. Let us always be the people who see God as our source, then we will not be in strife with people. I have over-given to people before because God is my source and I will not get into a dispute about finances.

You have one Jehovah-Jireh in your life and it isn’t your rich auntie, or your boss, or your church, or your friends. Harvest comes through people, but from God.

Ultimately harvest depends on your seed, sown in faith and joy. What you can give, you have mastered.

Quit looking for men to be your source, look only to Jesus. When you depend on God, you will see the greatest flow of harvests you have ever seen.

Last week I started a series on lies that steal the harvest, part 1 is found here.

You are a leader.  Your job as a leader has a number of different facets, but all good leaders must help the people who follow them to dream big dreams.  One of the areas in which we must give people the words that enable them to dream big dreams is in the area of finances, by the way we act, the way we talk and the way we lead.

For example, a few years ago I started talking to people in our church that many of the Israelites as they entered the promised land were multiple home owners.  They had houses.  I started telling people that it was fine to own multiple homes, fine to have a property portfolio.  At that time, no one in our church owned their own house.  Now several people have more than one house.

So many people (in churches especially) consider surviving success!  If they just make it through the month they have done great. They have no long term plans, they don’t dream for themselves or for anyone else. The idea of building an orphanage is not in their brain. The idea of buying a car for someone else will never enter their mind. The idea of houses will not be there. Our job is to put these ideas into people by speaking about them – our words paint pictures. Many people couldn’t even imagine saving to have a college fund for their children!

Life should not be “one day at a time, sweet Jesus”, it should be planned for. To live the special life, you have to dream special dreams.

You need to knock the apathy out of your people, you need to paint a picture of hungry people needing feed, of millions of believers in China who need Bible schools and churches, of the vision you have for the church. Give people dreams. Dreaming and prosperity are tied because indifference leads to mediocrity.

Oral Roberts said that the most dangerous days of your life are the days you don’t have a need. Self-sufficiency will stop dreaming and choke your prosperity. It will stop you pushing to use your faith to change the world.

A lack of dream always causes a lack of resources. A big dream always brings in the necessary resources. Please encourage your people to dream big, to see big, to see themselves as the head and not the tail and to dream accordingly.

And if the dream isn’t so big, it needs God – it’s not a God-given dream!

God wants you to grow and all the people around you to grow. Let’s not be the guy who buries his talent in the ground and fail to multiply.

Help your people dream so big, every ounce of faith inside them is woken up and needed to bring that dream to pass.

For the next few weeks, I want to talk to you candidly as leaders, especially those of you who are spiritual leaders. The truth is that God wants the church wealthy, and most of you reading this will believe that and preach that. But you all know people who are giving generously and radically but that are not receiving their harvests. It just isn’t working for them. They are sincere, faithful and generous people.

The problem is that there are mindsets and ideas that prevent seedtime and harvest time working. I want to share these with you because that will help you not just individually and with your ministry, but will help the precious people in your church who are giving generously and kindly and faithfully to prosper.

The truth is that poverty has never done any good to anyone. Right now people are starving to death on our planet. And the truth is that poverty is unnecessary because God is good and God works miracles still. God has promised to provide.

Prosperity is probably still the single most controversial subject to discuss and talk about in the body of Christ because there is still so much wide spread ignorance on the topic. People still have many strange ideas about prosperity and about the prosperity of the saints.  In the next few weeks, probably months, we will deal with some of these ideas.

You can prosper. Your ministry can prosper. Your people can prosper.

The first lie that stops harvest is the lie that God does not really care about your finances. I believe no one is more misunderstood than God. Some think He is just a force, others a supreme being who is distant from us. But the truth of the Word is that God is touched with the feeling of our infirmities (Hebrews 4.15), and that God said to approach Him with boldness in every need we have (Hebrews 4.16).

God wants you to have the money necessary to look after your loved ones (1 Tim. 5.8). God wants you to have the money to give great, generous, uncommon gifts to your pastors (1 Tim. 5.17-18). God wants you to have the money to send preachers all over the nations preaching the gospel (Romans 10.15).  God wants you to have enough money to pay your taxes and your bills (Matthew 22.21).  God wants you to have enough money to tithe (Lev. 27.30). God wants you to have enough money to give gifts to your children (Matt. 7.11). God wants you to have enough money to help the poor (Pro. 19.17). God wants you to have enough money to face any problems that comes your way (Ecc. 10.19).

Elijah faced a financial crisis in a drought that affected an entire nation.  God firstly told Elijah exactly where to go to get provision (1 Kings 17.3-9). God will tell you where to go and what to do to bring finances into your life.

Everything God made was made to multiply.  Every tree, every animal, every fish, every bird was designed to multiply and increase. You are no exception.

Today settle in your heart that God’s will is for your financial increase. The more settled you are, the easier you will preach it, the easier you will impart that confidence and faith to people, and the better leader you will be. God gave people cities for looking after a few coins well – He is generous! You matter to Him! He delights in your prosperity (Ps. 35.27).

Now prosperity is so much more than gold and cash and diamonds and fancy things!  Prosperity is having the supply to fulfill your destiny. God wants you to be able to do what He has called you to do, He wants you to have the wisdom, the strength, the energy, the health and the provision. God is not poor and He doesn’t want you to be poor.

So now your finances are going to turn around. No one can do that for you. You need to get those things in your brain. You need to meditate on the Scriptures I have listed today and get them in your heart. You are not serving a God who doesn’t care, you are serving a God who does care. He wants to discuss your mortgage with you. He wants to discuss everything on your finances with you. He is a good God! He has plans to show you and reveal to you, and everyone you are leading.

Next week: the Dream-Prosperity Connection

 

What a week it has been in British politics.  The nation has voted in a referendum to exit the European Union.  The Prime Minister has resigned.  The leader of the opposition has lost his Shadow Cabinet and faces a vote of no confidence.  Never has a week been so packed with political news and changes.

There has been a lot of anger from a lot of people about a lot of things.  Some people are calling for a second referendum, presumably calling for a third or fourth if things do not go their way.  Some people are name calling, feeling sick, feeling scared, and so on and so forth.  It has genuinely shocked me the vitriol on both sides in the last few days.  It amazes me that many people do not seem to be able to disagree without being disagreeable.

Now I am no politician, I am a pastor.  My job isn’t to sort out the financial systems and the democratic systems of this nation or any nation.  My job is to help people get born again, filled with the Spirit and renew their minds.  My job is to build a community that is full of the Word, full of the Spirit, full of the nations and filled with love.

And although politics is important, and I believe Christians should be involved in politics both at the local level and national level.  I believe that good government can make it much easier to preach the gospel and build healthy churches.

But that is just a means to an end.  Let’s look at the referendum through the eyes of faith and the eyes of grace:

• No one got born again or filled with the Spirit based on the moment of referendum.  It didn’t increase the numbers of people in heaven or decrease the numbers of people in hell.  It hasn’t done anything for the kingdom of God one way or another.  So in terms of eternity, it is simply not that important.
• Our joy is not found in a political vote.  Not now and not ever.  Our joy is found in the presence of the Lord (Psalm 16.11).  This referendum is nothing to lose your joy over. No one voted Jesus off the throne, no one voted a single verse out of your Bible, no one voted some power away from God.  No one voted any insecurity into your future.
• The only thing that can stop you from enjoying your health and wealth that is provided through the redemptive work of Christ, from enjoying your success and destiny is this: broken focus.  Do not take your eyes of the cross.  Don’t stop praising God and rejoicing in God – don’t stop realizing God is your source.
• Realize the media is dishonest.  Every time I have been in the media, the media have lied.  I spoke to a police officer who has just retired, he told me in 30+ years of service, the media never got one story right about a case.  Never.  Not once.  So when you read that British people were googling “what is the EU” or that the pound is going to be worth the same as Zimbabwean dollars, you do not have to believe it.  In fact, this is a good time to stop reading the papers to be honest!

This is our year of great overflow.  Nothing the politicians have said or done can change that.  Jesus Christ is building His church.  Nothing that the nations are doing can change that.

Now for leaders, you need to let your people know this.  Don’t be partisan here – there are people in your churches who voted in for good reasons and people who voted out for good reasons.  Your ministry must embrace and make both feel welcome and secure.