The recent article, “How To Maintain Your Vision” has received a tremendous response. It seems that this is an area in which many of God’s children have great difficulty maintaining. Why is this? First, any vision from God will be fiercely contested by our enemy the devil. Indeed the fulfillment of the vision will result in great devastation to his kingdom. Second, any true vision from God cannot be accomplished by natural gifts or means. That means our carnal man will have to die, and he never does so without a great deal of painful whining and crying. Third, the world does not understand your vision, and it will ridicule and mock what the Lord has called you to accomplish.
When I first began to write, I never dreamed this journey would be so full, rich, exciting, or fruitful. Neither did I know the level of commitment it was going to take, the years it would involve, or the number of people the Lord would raise up to help accomplish this task. Thankfully the Lord has brought the right people at exactly the correct time so that I would keep going when I began to grow weary. Thank you so much, if you are one of those blessed helpers who hold up the hands when they grow weary. As Aaron and Hur did when the victory depended on Moses keeping his hands held high.
Sometimes we think the vision the Lord has given us is just too hard to accomplish and has too many difficulties associated with it. One of the reasons the Lord allows this is to remind us that we cannot do His work on our own. Again spiritual work requires us to do the things God has initiated by spiritual means—mainly by depending and obeying Him. Sadly far too many of God’s children are trying to accomplish spiritual things in carnal ways. How true this was of Jacob as he tried to connive and deceive his way to the very position the Lord ordained for him. I wonder how much we do to accomplish things for the Lord that are done with a motive that centers around gaining honor and glory for ourselves rather than giving the glory to the Lord?
Yet any vision the Lord gives will result in a life of fulfillment greater than anything one could ever imagine. Indeed the vision will be perfectly matched to the nature and spiritual giftings the Lord has placed within you. Your vision and that which makes you passionate, productive, and peaceful are the same thing. You were purposely and intricately designed by God to accomplish the task He has given you.
At the beginning of 2016 I heard the Lord say, “You have come full circle.” As I pondered the meaning of this phrase, I began to hear, “In the year 2016 you will be going back to the beginning of your journey with me. This time you will experience the same truths, teachings, visions, and dreams, but you will gain far more from them than you did the first time. This will be so because you have grown and learned so much. This time you will win when in the past you lost. You will conquer where you were defeated, and you will succeed where you failed.”
Indeed since hearing this word from the Lord, I have truly felt like I have been born again. Excitement and faith that I have not known since my earliest days with the Lord have returned and grown. The following verse seems to fit what I have been experiencing.
Isa 40:31
But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.
Dear one, it is time to renew the vision the Lord has given you. You are not too late or too old. Your time has not past. The failures you have experienced are but stepping stones and the defeats are lessons learned to apply in the next battle.
One of the most profound things I have learned about this word from the Lord is that I am much more focused on the “glory of the Lord” this time around. When I first started in ministry in 1970 I loved the Lord with all my heart. What I did not know, however, was just how much I needed to succeed for myself. How much I looked at the approval of others as a measurement of how well I was doing. I did not know just how much of the carnal man was involved in my service to the King.
Yet something very wonderful is taking place as I have come full circle. I can indeed focus on the “glory of the Lord” with much greater purpose. His glory and honor occupies my thoughts and actions to a degree I have never known. I hope the same will be true for you as you walk through this year and bring greater glory to God than ever before.
As you and I renew our vision in 2016 I would like to give you four practical steps we can take to accomplish this:
Review
Remind
Renew
Rewrite
As I have begun to review the dreams and visions of the past, I have found treasures that I did not know were there, when the Lord first gave them to me. Let me give you an example. In 1970 my wife and I were attending Bible College at what is now Lee University. Our home was right next door to the college, and I could easily come home for lunch. One afternoon as I came to eat lunch with my wife, the Lord spoke to me very gently and said, “Go pray and do it now.” I got up from the table and went to my little spot where I prayed and before my knees touched the floor I began to have this vision:
I was approaching a door and an angel was positioned on each side of the door. They looked at me and while opening the door, they swept their arms down in such a way as to welcome and direct me through the door. As I entered, I noticed I was in a long hallway about twelve feet wide and ten feet high. I also noticed there was a faint sound of rushing water. The further I traveled down the hallway the sound increased. Louder and louder the sound of rushing water filled my ears. Eventually it became so loud I had to place my hands over my ears. I soon came to a great rotunda like room perhaps 500 feet across. The room had a round dome at the top, very high and when I looked down I saw there was no floor. It looked like a deep, deep well. All around the edge of this great room was a ledge about ten feet wide. The sound was now deafening. I began to walk to my left on the ledge and about a quarter of the way around the room there was a door, and I turned left and went through it. I was surprised to find that I was in heaven. The grass was so beautiful and green. The trees and flowers took my breath away. There was a path before me that led over a number of hills and small valleys. As I began to walk down the path, I saw what looked like a shimmering lake on my right. It was so calm it looked like glass. I topped a hill and looked down into what looked like a natural amphitheater. People were seated all around on the grass and were listening to someone teaching. As I looked up to see who was teaching, I found that it was Jesus himself. I walked down to where everyone was sitting and the Lord motioned for me to sit down. As I sat down the Lord looked right at me and said, “Do you understand what you saw?” I said, “No Lord.” He said, “That great room you saw is where all the prayers my people have ever prayed are stored. I keep them all and they are all alive and active in that room. While you sleep on the other side of the earth people are fervently praying and while they sleep others take up the prayers. That room is never silent and those prayers are ever before me.” He then asked, “Do you know what the lake was that you passed”? I said, “No, Lord.” He went on to say, “Every tear that my children have ever shed is in that lake, and when the lake is full, I will return for my children and take them home to glory. And, son, that lake is almost full.” He then said, “Everywhere you go throughout your ministry, I want you to tell my people about this vision.”
As I thought on this dream and remembered the Lord had said, “Revisit the dreams and visions of the past because there is much that you missed the first time,” I then said,“Lord there must be more to this dream – there must be a second part.”
Then through quite a supernatural way, I was told this second vision. I was in heaven and saw a great warehouse. The warehouse stretched out as far as the eye could see. I entered the doors and saw boxes and file cabinets. They literally filled the warehouse from top to bottom from front to back. I saw an angel and asked, “What are all of these files doing here?” He took down a box that had the name Shirley on it and then said, “This is where the answered prayers of the children of God are and never claimed. This vision was the second part of what the Lord spoke to my heart in 1970. It carries such implications, it will take me all of this year to grasp the significance of why answered prayers were never claimed.
Dear one, it is of vital importance that you and I begin to review the vision the Lord gave us at the beginning because He has so much more to reveal concerning our vision than we ever imagined. Hopefully we have outgrown the need for self-promoting and selfish ambition and are ready to focus on His glory and His glory alone. As you and I do so, who knows the depth of revelation that awaits us. I encourage you right now to sit down and Review you vision with the maturity and growth you presently have and receive the second half of His word to you.
In the writings that follow we will cover the other three steps to Maintaining our Vision and carrying it forward. Review, Remind, Renew, and Rewrite.
Habakkuk 2:1-3 (KJV)
1 I will stand upon my watch, and set me upon the tower, and will watch to see what he will say unto me, and what I shall answer when I am reproved.
2 And the LORD answered me, and said, Write the vision, and make it plain upon tables, that he may run that readeth it.
3 For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry.
MORE TO FOLLOW
Apostle Robert D. Rogers
Onemillionvoices's Blog 