Not every goal that you can set is a good goal. Not every goal is a goal that God’s going to
bless. So, you want to set goals in
these seven areas over the next seven weeks, you want to set these in your
life, but you want to set the kind of goal that God is going to bless, God’s
going to give you the power to do.
So how do I know the kind of goal that God will bless? Let me give you three questions. When you get ready to set a goal you want to
ask these three questions:
1. WILL it HONOR GOD?
That’s the first question you ask. Will this goal honor God? What kind of goal would honor God? What kind of goal brings glory to God? Any goal that causes you to trust him more,
to depend on him more, to love him more, to love other people more, to serve
God, to serve others, to be more unselfish.
Those are going to be good goals.
The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 6:20 “God paid a great price for
you. [Look at the cross] So use your body to honor God.”
Are
you using your body to honor God? Or are
you using your body for pleasure, for selfish reasons? Use your body to honor God. Circle that.
1
Corinthians 10:31 “When you eat or drink or do anything, always do it to
honor God.” Everything can be done
to honor God. You can take out the
garbage to honor God. You can wash
dishes to honor God. You can clean out
your car to honor God. Or your
closet. You can study for a test to
honor God. How? By doing it with the right motive – out of
gratitude. And for the right motivation
– I want my life to bring honor to God so I’m going to be the best I can be for
God’s sake.
Will
this goal honor God? The Bible says this
“We make it our goal to please him.” 2 Corinthians 5:9.
2. IS IT MOTIVATED BY LOVE?
That’s the second question you ask when you set a
goal for your finances, your health, your relationships. Is this goal motivated by loved?
God is not going to bless a goal motivated by greed
– I want to make a lot of money. God is
not going to bless a goal motivated by competition – I want to be better than
that company. God is not going to bless
a goal motivated by envy. God is not
going to bless a goal motivated by greed or grief or guilt or grudges. He’s not going to honor a goal that’s built
on worry or fear or anxiety. God is not
going to bless a goal that’s motivated by materialism or by ego or by pride.
But when you set a goal out of love – God, I want to
do this because I love you and I want to love other people – God’s going to
honor that because it’s all about love.
Life is all about learning how to love.
1 Corinthians
16:14 “Everything you do must be done
with love.” Everything. 1 Corinthians 14:1 “Love must be your highest goal.”
That should be the number one goal in your life – I want to learn to
really love. I want to learn to love
unlovely people. I want to learn to love
the loveless and the unloved. I want to
learn to love people who are hard to love.
That’s being like God.
Why is it important for you to have goals that are
based on love? Because if you set
loveless goals, you’re going to treat people as projects. You’re going to run all over them to get to
your goal. You’re going to run over your
marriage, you’re going to run over your friends, you’re going to run over other
people climbing up the ladder of success.
God says, No. You’ve got it all
wrong. It’s not about accomplishments. It’s about relationships. It’s about learning how to love.
3. WILL IT REQUIRE DEPENDING ON GOD?
Will this goal require depending on God? Remember I said earlier, Hebrews 11:6 “Without faith it’s impossible to please
God.” If you don’t have a goal that
requires faith then it’s not a pleasing-to-God goal. Romans 14:23 “Everything that doesn’t come from faith is sin.” If you have a goal that’s so small it doesn’t
require any faith to do it, it’s a sin.
Whatever is not of faith the Bible says, it is sin.
Look at this verse, Proverbs 16:9 “We plan the way we want to live but only
God makes us able to live it.” I
love that in The Message paraphrase.
That’s what we’re going to do during Fifty Days of Transformation. You get to plan the way you want to
live. This series is to help you make
the rest of your life the best of your life.
We get to plan the way we want to live.
But, it says, only God gives us the power, gives us the energy, gives us
the ability to actually do it. To make
the transformation. Why? Because God provides the three things you
must have to reach your goal.
Three things you must have to reach your goal, three
things you must have to change your life.
·
I NEED GOD’S SPIRIT TO EMPOWER ME
Zechariah 4:6 says “You will not succeed by your own strength or your own power but by my
Spirit says the Lord.” I need God’s
Spirit to empower me to make changes I can’t make on my own.
·
I NEED GOD’S WORD TO GUIDE ME
I need God’s Spirit to empower me; I need God’s
Word to guide me. This book, the Bible,
is the owner’s manual for life. The more
you get this book into your mind, your heart, your life. The more you read it, study it, memorize it,
meditate on it, the more successful, the more fulfilled, the stronger you’re
going to be in life.
When Joshua
was given the great dream of taking over the Promised Land and it was a goal
that was going to take him the rest of his life, God had these words to say to
Joshua. Joshua 1:8 “Keep this
Book [That’s the Bible] of the Law on your lips. [In other words, talk about it all the
time.] Recite it by day and by night, [That means memorize it so you can
quote it] that you may carefully follow all that is written in it;
[That’s the premise; here’s the promise] THEN you will successfully attain
your goal.”
If you ever intend to be
in business for yourself you ought to memorize that verse. In fact, it’s a good
verse for everybody to memorize. Keep
this book of the law in your heart. Read
it, memorize it, live it, practice it, study it. That you’re careful to follow
it, obey it.] Then you will be
successful. You will attain your
goal.
That is one of the
greatest promises of success in the Bible.
That promise didn’t come from Tony Robbins or some self-help guru. That promise comes from God. You will successfully attain your goal. How?
If you become a man of the Word or you become a woman of the Word, all
you need to know about life is in this book right here. I need God’s Spirit to empower me and I need
God’s Word to guide me.
The third thing I need is
·
I NEED
GOD’S PEOPLE TO SUPPORT ME
You will not be able to reach your goals on your
own. I haven’t been able to reach my
goals on my own. It takes a team to
fulfill a dream. You need other people
in your life. This is why we suggest
that everybody in our church family be in a small group. You’re never going to feel like a part of our
church until you’re in a small group.
A crowd can’t support you. But a small group can. Three, four, five, six other people. They can know when you’re sick. They can know when you’re having a tough
time, when you’ve had a bad day. A crowd
can’t support you but a community – a small group can.
Ecclesiastes 4:12 says this “By yourself you’re unprotected. [That means like in a
football game. You’re unprotected. You’re out there running down the field by
yourself. You don’t have anybody to block
and tackle for you. There’s nobody out
there to protect you. If you’re not in a
small group you don’t have any block and tacklers. You don’t have anybody that’s going to speak
up for you, stand up for you. By
yourself you’re unprotected…] But with a friend you can face the worst. [Boy!
Did I learn that this last year!] And a group of three is even better
because a rope braided with three strands is not easily snapped!”
What
do you call three people meeting together?
A small group. That’s what it
is. Jesus said “Where two or three
are gathered in my name I’ll be in the midst of them.”
From Rick Warren's Transformed Campaign
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