Gregory Dickow - How to Respond to Life's Problems with Confidence
"And the Lord opened the servant's eyes and he saw. And behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha". And let me tell you something. The horses and the chariots of fire were always there. They didn't come from prayer. All of a sudden, the horses didn't show up because Elisha prayed. Elisha prayed, and the servant's eyes were opened to see. It's all about seeing it from God's point of view and what is God's point of view? From heaven, He looks. From heaven, He laughs. From heaven, He rejoices. From heaven, He celebrates. In heaven, God is not weeping. In heaven, God is not sad. He's not sorrowful. In heaven, He knows the end from the beginning. From heaven's point of view, everything's going to be all right. From heaven's point of view, you're going to make it to the other side.
I can teach you and I can pray. And I can believe that what I share with you will open your eyes. But God is the one that opens our eyes. And all we got to do is ask. He didn't pray for a week. He didn't pray for a year. He just prayed once, "Lord open his eyes". And his eyes were opened and he saw the way it really was. We've got to realize our problem is not what's going on in our life. Our problem is how we see it. Be careful that you're not deceived, because it's easy to be deceived when you don't keep your eyes fixed on Jesus the Author and the Finisher of our faith. We got our eyes fixed on our problems. We got our eyes fixed on our need. We got our eyes fixed on what other people think about us. We got our eyes fixed on what we've done wrong. We got our eyes fixed on our guilt. We got our eyes fixed on what somebody said about us. Don't fix your eyes on that. The Bible says, "Fix your eyes on Jesus, the Author and the Finisher of our faith". It says in [Genesis 1:31], "and God saw all that He had made. And behold, it was very good".
God had the right perspective when He saw everything the way He created it, it was very good. When you only see it from your point of view, it's going to be bad or at best it'll be good. But when you see the whole picture from God's point of view and when you see your situation from God's point of view, you're the head and not the tail. When you see your struggle from God's point of view, you're going to make it because He's with you. When you see that sickness from God's point of view, your healing is coming. When you see your financial situation from God's point of view, He will supply all your needs according to His riches and glory. Your life is going to be very good. It's perspective. You are not your problem. You have a problem, but you are not your problem. One of the things we have to be careful of is to not associate with our problem as our identity. Your identity is not your problem. Your identity is a son or daughter of God. You have a problem, but it's not who you are.
I'm admitting I have the problem. I'm admitting I've carried the problem. I'm admitting that the problem has been in my mind. It's been in my soul, it's been in my emotions, it's been in my DNA. But I don't associate with it. I have a problem, but I am not my problem. All of life's struggles are rooted in how we are looking at life. The disciples were struggling in the boat. Jesus was sleeping in the boat. They were struggling because from their perspective, this is the end of their life. But from God's perspective, Jesus already made a promise: "We're going to the other side". From God's perspective, miracles can happen. But from the disciples' perspective, they had five or ten thousand people that were hungry for three days, and Jesus told them to feed them. And they're like, Where are we going to get the money that each of these might have a small piece of bread? And He said, What do you already got? What do you already got?
All we got is five loaves and two fish. That's that'll do it. Give them to me. Five loaves and two fish. Thank you. Boom. Multiplication. Thank you. Boom. What you got? Five loaves, Two fish. Thank you, Father. Boom. Multiplies. Perspective. It's how you see it. We are all seeing the same thing, but we're not seeing it the same way. We need God to open our eyes so we see it from His perspective. What is the point of view that we need to see things from? Seated with Christ in heavenly places. What does that mean? It means no more striving, no more struggling to find our seat.
We are seated with Christ and therefore we can see things from His point of view, from the bigger picture. And we can look at the problems in this world and we say, "Our God is bigger". We can look at what's coming against us and say, "Greater is He that is in me than he than is in the world". We can look at our trials and say, "I can count it all joy when I encounter various trials because my faith is building, my faith is growing". And we can look at our financial situation. We could either say, "I don't know what I'm going to do", or we can say, "I don't know how God's going to do it, but I know He's going to do it". You know, two of us here can give in the offering. One of us gives it and says, "I'll never see that again". Another one of us gives it and says, "I won't see that again until the harvest". Perspective.