Joyce Meyer - Freedom From Struggle And Self-Effort

I want to talk to about being free from, free in, and free to. Free from, free in, and free to. Example: we can of course, be free in relationships, free to praise and worship God, free in unpleasant circumstances, free while we are waiting to be free from unpleasant circumstances, free from allowing our emotions to control us, free from jealousy, free from self pity, free from overeating, on and on and on. Here's an example: you can be free to confront and yet free to submit. This half of the room is getting it better. You can be free to confront somebody that you feel like is controlling you but you can also be free to submit to proper authority that God places over you.

So, the thing we can't do is just yell, "Well, I'm free! I do what I want to, I'm free"! Let me be clear, that is not freedom. That is stupidity. Nobody can do everything they want to do and expect to have any friends and a great life. Amen? You can be free to enjoy food and yet at the same time, free from overeating. Now, you know, it's just a little bit silly for somebody that's born again and full of the Holy Spirit to say, "If I eat one cookie, I have to eat the whole bag. If I eat one potato chip, I've got to eat the whole bag". I mean, did you even hear how silly that sounds? I mean if you don't have authority over a cookie or a potato chip, we are in serious trouble. Just saying.

Now you're going to find out tonight that one of our biggest problems is wrong believing. 'Cause see, the truth is Jesus has already set us free from everything. But it's what we believe that determines how we're going to live. And so, as long as you believe that you cannot just say no to cookies or eat one cookie, or that if you eat one... "If I get the taste of chocolate in my mouth I have to eat the whole thing". You know. If that's what you believe, then guess what? Be it unto you even as you believe.

I've been thinking about scripture a lot this week, just thinking about some different circumstances and situations that I'm aware of and I'll tell you the truth, what we believe is just extremely important. And, you know, you can adjust your thinking just a little bit and it can make a major change in your life. Just by adjusting how you think, just a little tiny bit.

See, for years, I believed the lie that I can never get over my past. My dad had abused me sexually and my mom didn't know how to help me. She was afraid of him so she didn't. I married the first guy that came along. He mistreated me even more. It was just one nightmare after another. And so, I mean, I thought I would always, I believed this, I believed that I would always have a second-rate life because of what had happened to me. I believed that I would never be okay. Well, guess what? I believed I'd never get over it, so you know what? I wasn't getting over it. But when I learned to believe the word more than I believed what I felt or what I saw or what other people told me.

When I started saying, "I didn't get a good start, but I'm going to have a good finish". When I started saying, "God can take all that mess and actually work something good out of it and make me a better person then I would have been if it wouldn't have happened". See, then it started happening. But you have to learn to believe. Come on. Believe, believe. What do you believe? What do you believe? You believe people don't like you? They're not going to like you. I'm just goofy, I believe everybody loves me. Free to spend money, yet free from being in bondage to debt. Free to speak boldly and plainly and yet free from being ill mannered and rude.

I'm telling you people, and I was like this for years, I mean I was always saying things to people I shouldn't say and hurting people's feelings. I'd be, "Well, that's just the way I am. It's just my personality. I'm just a straightforward person". Well, you know what? You can be a straightforward person and still do it in love. You see the thing is, is love has to trump everything. I mean, that's like the thing. Everything has gotta come back to love, otherwise there is no such thing as being free, if we're not free to do the thing that will be a blessing to people. We can't just be free to do what we want to do all the time. We have to be free to say, well, I know that I'm free to do that, but I'm going to choose not to do that because I believe doing that would hurt you.

Now, we got a real mess going on in the world today with my rights and my freedoms. I mean, even the freedom of speech is carried to such a ridiculous extreme that it just is unbelievable. First of all, the laws that we have were all written based on the Word of God. Now, they're not being interpreted that way now but they were written based on the Word of God. And so people today want to be free, but what's happening is they're more than happy to take away your freedom to have theirs. And they don't care who they hurt as long as they get what they want. And you can't do that.

Freedom is a privilege but it's also a huge responsibility. The freer you are the greater your responsibility is. I'm free to do anything and say anything I want to in this place because right now, for this moment, I'm in charge. But that doesn't make me feel like a big shot or powerful, it scares me. You know why? Because I answer to God and so I cannot just do anything I want to do. Not if I want to keep my job. Because God is good at firing people. Hey, you think you've got a tough boss? How many of you understand me?

Love has to be the main goal in everything. We're free to dream great dreams for our futures but we're also free to be patient while we're waiting. We're free to be all we can be. We're free to enjoy ourselves while we're changing. We're free to be ourselves and yet realizing that we constantly still need to be changing. "Well, this is just the way I am". Well, compare it to what's in here and if it's not what's in here, then while you're enjoying being yourself where you're at, keep asking God to change you. We're free from guilt and condemnation but we're also free to still be very sensitive to letting the Holy Spirit touch us when we do anything wrong.

See, I know people that have gotten so good if there's no condemnation that they don't even seem to notice it anymore when they sin. And that's a problem. I mean, we need to know it right away in the pit of our gut when we do something that displeases God and we need to repent and receive forgiveness. And then there's no condemnation to those who are in Christ. We don't have to live under condemnation but we do need to be sensitive to bad behavior otherwise we will not walk in love because we'll go around hurting people all the time. Now here we're going to dive off the deep end and see what you guys can take.

Romans 6:6 and 7, "We know that our old (unrenewed) self was nailed to the cross with him in order that our body which is the instrument of sin might be made ineffective and inactive for evil, and that we might not no longer be the slaves of sin". Now, it doesn't say you'll never sin. It says that you will no longer be a slave to sin. In other words, we should be at a point in our life where we can say, or at least we need to be heading toward this point, "There is nothing in my life that controls me. There is nothing in my life that controls me except the Holy Spirit". Amen?

You say, "Well, I sure wish I was free from sin". Well, you know what? You're never going to be until you first start believing that you are. That's okay, we'll go slow. I get it. "Well, if I'm not, how can I be? It says I am, but are you sure I am"? Yes, you have it legally. Jesus died to set you free from sin but experientially now, after you believe that you have it, experientially as you walk with God you'll manifest it little by little by little as you grow in him. You'll change, there will be some things in your life that will change from being here in this next 3 days, or 2 days, or 1, tonight, or however often you get to come.

There will be things that will change, but it won't be the last thing that will change. There will be other things that will need to change. We're always growing in him. But still, you have been set free and I have been set free. Every born again person on the planet has been legally, by the blood of Christ, set free from bondage to sin.

Now, we're going to look at something that I think is interesting. Romans 7:15. We're going to look at Paul's very confusing discourse here about the thing I want to do, I can't do the thing I want to do, muttering I read that and think, "Yeah, Paul, what is wrong with you"? But it kind of makes me feel good when I read it because somebody else feels like me.

Now, I'll make a statement first. If you said to me, "Joyce, tell me how I can live the Christian life"? How many of you would like it if I could just put it into one thing for you and say, "I'm gonna tell you how you can live the Christian life". Would you like that? Let me see. You'd like that? She's like, "Me, me, me"! She's talking to me too. How about over, anybody over her? You'd like that? Okay, alright where here's my great theological answer: you cannot live the Christian life. "What kind of stupid teaching is this"? Yeah, you can't live the Christian life. Just, now... I'm just going to let you sit there a while and wonder what I'm doing and then I'll show you.

Romans 7:15, "I don't understand my own actions. I am baffled, bewildered", I'm going to read this whole thing, so just, "I don't practice or accomplish what I wish but I do the very thing that I loathe which my moral instinct condemns. Now if I do habitually what is contrary to my desire that means that I acknowledge and agree the law is good, (morally excellent) and that I take sides with it. However it's no longer I who does the deed, but the sin principle which is at home in me and has possession of me. For I know that nothing good dwells within me that is in my flesh. I can will what is right but I cannot perform it. I have the intention and the urge to do what is right but no power to carry it out. For I fail to practice the good deeds I desire to do but the evil deeds that I do, not desire to do or what I'm ever doing", is anybody relating to Paul here?

Now, come on. "Now if I do what I don't want to do then it's no longer me doing it". I used to think well, then who is it? I mean, he would lose me here. "So, it's not myself that acts, but the sin principle which dwells within me fixed and operating in my soul. So I find that to be a law a (rule of action of my being) that when I want to do what is right and good, evil is ever present with me, making me subject to its insistent demands. For I endorse and delight in God, in the law of God in my inmost self with my new nature".

We're getting there. "But I discern my bodily members in the sensitive appetites and wills of the flesh a different law or (rule of action) that war against the law in my mind, my reason making me a prisoner to the law of sin that dwells in my bodily organs in the sensitive appetites and wills of the flesh". 24, "Oh unhappy and pitiable and wretched man that I am, who will release and deliver me from the shackles of this body of death"?

Now, don't go to verse 25 on the screen. Alright. Now, I just saw something, well I mean, I've known this in different ways but I was reading that a week or so ago and I've done some theological checking with my professor friend who knows more the theology than me to make sure I'm not crazy but in ten verses Paul uses the word, "I", 25 times. And he's very right. I cannot do it. And neither can you.

Now people have wondered what is Paul talking about there? And there's actually been a lot of theological debates over the centuries about what is he talking about. Is he talking about himself before he was born again? Is he talking about himself after he was born again, but when he was still struggling with some of the things that we struggle with? Or was Paul already completely free but he was just doing this whole thing to kind of help other people that were going through things?

And I'll be honest, I don't know that, that matters that much to me because I think the principle is clear. Paul is coming to the point where he's saying, I mean, if I went through... I went through and I circled every place where he said, "I", now, I've got an amplified Bible so there's even more in that one than there is in the other ones. 25 times in 10 verses, "I try to do this and I try to do that and I can't, and I fail and I want to and I, I, I, I". Now, verse 25, "Who will deliver me from this body of death? Oh, thank God, he will! Oh, thank God he will, through Jesus Christ our Lord so then I of myself with mind and heart serve the law of God but with my flesh I will serve the law of sin". So he's saying, "If I could learn to walk in the spirit, with God's help, the power of the Holy Spirit, I can't do it myself".

I cannot do it by myself. You cannot live the Christian life. I cannot live the Christian life. But he will live it through us if we trust him all the time to do through us what we cannot do on our own. Amen? So, see, if we're not careful you'll hear my series on freedom and go home and try to be free. Yeah. Well, now I'm going to try to be free. You know we skip the important parts. For years I went to church and heard messages and every message I heard I needed it. Every message. And then I would go home and try to do it. I would try to keep my mouth shut. I would try.

And, you know, it was weird because when I got quiet for very long, I got depressed. I did, I started feeling really down. And I didn't understand. It's like, I'm trying to be good. I'm trying to be quiet like the Bible says and like they said in church on Sunday so if I'm doing the right thing why do I feel so down and you know what, God had to show me, I'm so glad I got this stuff from God, he said, "Well, you've shut your mouth but nothing's changed on the inside". And so, yeah, I was getting depressed because now it was like a pressure cooker. I wasn't letting of it out, it was all in there just eating away at me.

See, that's why we need him all the time, because there has to be an inward work before there will be outward fruit. You say, "Well, then, what am I supposed to do?"! Alright, I'll give you an example and I still do this. The other day somebody said something to me that hurt my feelings and I could feel offense. And it's somebody that's done it more than once, so you know, you get a little bit more touchy when you have to keep forgiving the same person over, and over and over. It's like, "really God, could we just change this person a little more quickly here please"?

But see, I know better. I know better, I cannot be in strife. I cannot be in unforgiveness. I cannot stay angry. I cannot, I will not, but I still felt that way so I know what to do and I'm going to tell you what to do. You go to the word, and you look up scriptures that you know about anger, about strife, about peace, and you prayerfully read them. What I mean by that is you read, you talk to God about it. I mean, I'll just say to the Lord, "Lord, we need to have a conversation about this. We gotta talk about this because now my feelings are hurt and I can't stay mad so you've got to help me get over this".

You know, you might get more help from God if you would quit trying to be so spooky religious every time you go to him. I mean, people change their voice tone, they change their... They go to Elizabethan English. "Oh thou most holiest, most wonderfulest". I just said, "Lord, I am mad and we need to have a conversation. Cause I can't stay mad. I gotta have peace". And you know what, it wasn't very long at all, I mean, maybe it took me 2 hours to work through the whole thing and I would feel better and then maybe I'd start to think about it again a litte, you know how it is, you'll start to think about it and then it will all come back again? You know?

And so, what we learn, you learn things, you just, go get your mind on something else. Do something else. I'm not wasting my day on something that has already happened and I can't do anything about it. See, if you'll put your little holy foot down and say, "Devil, you are not going to do this to me". But you can't do it without God. I don't care if I have to say that nine million times tonight, you cannot do it without God. You can't do it. So, I'm just telling you, you cannot live the Christian life. So if you're trying to live the Christian life, you might as well just figure out it's gotta be Christ in you, Christ through you, he has to get the credit, he has to get the glory.

Now if you would go back and read that in the context, which I'm not going to take the time to go through the whole thing again, but we can clearly see he's saying, "I tried to do this, and I can't do that and I, and I, and I, and I, and I, and I, and I". He throws in one "Me" in there but I think it's like the same thing and then he says, "Oh what a mess I'm in. Who is going to help me? Who will deliver me? Oh!", exclamation mark in the Bible, "Thank God, he will, through Jesus Christ"! Then the next verse says, "And there is therefore now while he's changing me, there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ for the law of the spirit of death, the law of the legal code is dead and the law of the spirit that's now in me has set me free from that law of sin and death".

But I'll tell you what, I suffered with guilt and condemnation for so many years of my life. I mean, I say this and everybody laughs, but it's true. I didn't feel right if I didn't feel wrong. I mean, I was just so used to feeling bad about myself, and wrong about myself, and like God was probably a little bit, halfway mad at me all the time that I just... When I started finally, feeling a little bit good, I thought, "Well, this has gotta be sin. You gotta feel bad. I mean, good Christians feel bad. The poor wretched man that I am"...

So, let me read you 1 John 2:1, "My little children, I write you these things so that you may not violate God's law and sin". So, John is saying, "Look, I'm writing all this to you so you don't sin". That's the point of the whole book. "But if anybody does sin, we have an advocate (one who will intercede for us) with the father... And it is Jesus Christ the all righteous upright, just, who conforms to the father's will in every purpose, thought, and action". So, I can't conform, but I'm in somebody who already has, and that somebody is also in me. Amen? I know it takes a while. You're like...

See, and really the people clapping, you kind of already know this and you're just excited 'cause now you're hearing it again. But people that are going... I'll tell you the absolute truth. And I know exactly what you're feeling like, I was petrified to believe this. I was petrified to believe that if I did something wrong that I could just ask God to forgive me and just go on, that I didn't have to persecute myself, feeling guilty for two days, or three days, or whatever. And I'll tell you what, that is one thing that I do not waste my time with anymore. Because I can tell you it does absolutely nothing but keep you trapped in sin. Amen?

Now, I might be sorry for a long time, but I don't feel guilty. There's a difference. I don't ever wanna disappoint God. I wanna do what he wants me to do all the time. And you know, a lot of times people are afraid to preach this kind of freedom to people because they think, "Well, you're just giving people a license to sin".

Well, you know what? I highly doubt that if you were just looking for a way to sin and get by with it, I really doubt you would have come to this conference, tonight, cause I think you already know that's not what you're getting out of me. Amen? And nobody would take off work and travel and, I mean, some of you have paid money, you traveled, you stayed in hotels and you didn't do it because you're looking for an excuse to sin. You want to be the person that God wants you to be. And I'm here to tell you that God sees your hearts. And this is my feeling. I think that God would rather have somebody with a really good heart, who makes a mistake once in a while, then somebody who's got their act perfected, but they have a lousy heart. Amen?

1 John 1:9, "If we freely admit that we've sinned and if we confess our sins, he's faithful and just, (true to his own nature) and will forgive our sins, dismiss our lawlessness", and I like this in the amplified, "And continuously cleanse us from all unrighteousness". Well, I guess if he's continuously cleansing me then I must continuously need it. And the Bible says that, "Jesus sits at the right hand of the father continuously interceding for us". So, I guess I continually need him to pray for me. Alright. Freedom's a wonderful thing but at the same time, it is a huge responsibility.

How many of you agree with that? Freedom not only says I can do whatever I desire but it says I must take responsibility for my actions. And that's the big thing that's missing in our society today. We have so many people that think they're entitled to stuff. I mean people want to come to work for you now and start where it used to take people 30 years to get to. And I'm not saying everybody's like this but there's a lot of people in the world today, they don't want to earn anything. They want to be given everything.

And can I tell you a secret? I do not believe if stuff is just handed to you that you can ever really appreciate what you have. I don't think you can. I just I don't know that you can really appreciate what God does for you if you've never had to ever have to want something or wait awhile to get it or do your part to get it. It's just not God's way. Man, if you knew how long I preached and taught people and had such deep financial needs and never got any money for it and now you can't hardly get anybody to volunteer for anything. You should see what we have to go through to get volunteers for our conferences.

I mean sometimes we'll have to contact 5,000 people to get 100 to show up. It's like, you know, we need to realize that we don't have to be paid for every move that we make. We need to learn how to serve and give and be a blessing and do it unto the Lord. And I do appreciate all the people that do volunteer in our meetings because you can't really have a good meeting without people to keep things in order. So freedom not only says I can do whatever I want to do but it also says I'm willing to take responsibility for my actions.

Now, 1 Peter 2:16, "Live as free people, yet without employing your freedom as an excuse for sin". Don't you love that? Now, Peter's saying, "Look, you're free. We teach you that you're free. Jesus came to set you free. Now go out and live as free people but don't use your freedom as an excuse to sin and mistreat other people". Love trumps everything.

Now, I want to take the rest of the time we have and I want to talk to you about freedom in one area, freedom from struggling. If I would have walked around this room tonight with a microphone before I got started and said, "Tell me what you're struggling with", most of you could have come up with something just like that. Struggling with my husband, struggling with my wife, struggling with one of my kids, struggling financially, struggling with my weight, you know, struggling with my job, you know, struggle, struggle, struggle. And we're not supposed to do that. Jesus didn't die so we could be tied up in knots and struggle all the time and always be wrestling with something.

The only thing, the only antidote for struggle is believing. Believing. Because believing is what causes us to enter the rest of God. And the rest of God is that place we're talking about tonight where you're free and you are not constrained and you're not worried, you're enjoying your life, you care about other people. The thing that causes us to struggle is trying to do something ourselves without believing or instead of believing God. Don't try to do anything that you don't ask God to help you with. The most frequent prayer that we should all pray is, "God help me". And we probably need to just, I mean, I don't know, we probably shouldn't be able to count how many times a day our heart goes up to God asking him to help us.

I hope you don't think I ever come out here without asking God to help me because I certainly do not. And if I ever did I would hope he would kick me right off the platform. And I have preached enough times that you would probably think that I could certainly be able to come out and do it and pull it off but I tell you what I'm not interested in pulling anything off. I want God's anointing on what I say and you don't get that if you don't get God involved. Struggle just makes you miserable. When you're struggling you're trying to make something happen that's just not happening.

How many years did I try to change myself, and try to change Dave, try to change my kids. I hated all the sports that Dave loves and in January we'll be married 50 years and he still loves them and he's added some. I mean now, you know, he, now he sits and watches tennis all the time. He's never played tennis in his life. So he just keeps adding them. Literally, if it rolls or bounces, Dave likes it. And I'm good with it. It's like, I don't care. You do what you want, I'll do what I want. See you for dinner. See you in the morning, whatever, you know. You know why? Can I tell you... Now listen to me. A life is not worth living if you're going to be in knots and upset and struggling with something all the time.

Now, when I lean over the pulpit, this is my motherly look... This is my very best, you know how you're mom used to look at you, it's like... Please don't just accept the life of just struggling and frustration and always trying to fix something that only God can fix. There's nothing worse than trying to do something only God can do. Amen. And the bottom line is if God doesn't do it, you sure can't. Now, if God gives you something to do, do it. But the whole thing is if God does assign you something to do he will give you the power of the Holy Spirit to do it and so even then it won't have to be a struggle. I work hard at what I do but I do not struggle doing it. Not now, I used to years ago. If I wouldn't have gotten over the stress I felt I would have been dead long time ago. You need to enjoy your life.

How many of you have been struggling with some other person? How many of you have kids that just drive you crazy? You know what, I had four kids that I thought, I mean, three of the four I thought would kill me. And I was sure they would never be able to leave the house. That they could not take care of themselves, that they couldn't find anything that belonged to them. My youngest son, who's now 36, I thought for sure I'd be taking care of him the rest of his life. I mean, it was so hard to get that kid through school. And now he's the CEO of our ministry. It is just so funny. And the one daughter that couldn't keep up with anything she owned now, I pay her myself personally, to help me keep my life in order.

Let me tell you something, you're worrying about stuff that you can't do anything about and if you pray instead of worrying, you will be amazed at how God will take care of that stuff. Just listen to me. There's one thing about getting older folks, you know more. And we all say, "Oh, if I could just be young again and know what I know now". Well, don't happen that way, but one of things you can do is maybe share what you've learned with somebody else and they maybe won't listen, I don't know, but you can try anyway.

Hebrews 4:10 and 11, "He who has once entered God's rest has ceased from the weariness and pain of human labors", wow. "Just as God rested from those labors peculiarly his own. Let us, therefore, be zealous and exert ourselves and strive diligently to enter the rest of God". He's like, "Okay, if you're going to struggle with anything, do your very best to learn how to rest in God". "And experience it for yourself so that no one may fall or perish by the same kind of unbelief and disobedience that they had in the wilderness". So, believing leads you into the rest of God. Believing means to be persuaded or to have confidence.

Now, let me share something that I think is just beautiful. The word, "Believe" is such an important word in the Bible. And it's similar to faith, but they have a little, couple little different actions. You know, faith is something that God gives us. God gives to every man the measure of faith and so we have faith. We have to choose to use it but believing is something that we choose and it involves a lot of our thinking. How we decide that we're going to look at things and what am I going to believe about that situation. Just like believing the best of every person.

When I was trying to get over that offense last week, one of the things I did was, I said, "God, I will choose to believe the best". Well, that was not something God downloaded into me, I chose to believe the best because his word says that's what we're supposed to do. And I know that if I believe the worst of people and I'm suspicious, I'm going to be tormented but if I believe the best even if their intention was wrong, if I believe the best, I'm going to be happy. So you can do yourself a big favor tonight if you'll just decide that you're gonna just tweak your believing just a little bit. I just want to give your believing a little adjustment tonight. Amen?

Can anybody think of somewhere where your believing could just use a little... Just a little bit of an adjustment. Okay, now listen, the word "Believe" is used most frequently in the Gospels. And most frequently in the Gospel of John. Matthew uses the verb, "Believe", ten times. Mark uses it ten times. Luke uses it nine times and the apostle John uses the word "Believe" 99 times. 99 times. Now, interestingly enough, he's the one who was always fellowshipping with Jesus, hanging out with Jesus, had his head on Jesus' chest, called himself... Said this in the book he wrote about himself, "I am the disciple whom Jesus loves".

Now, you talk about some bold confidence. Could you imagine if I put out a book like that? I mean, David had confidence too. He referred to himself all the time as the Lord's anointed. What would happen if I came out tonight, said, "I am the Lord's anointed, the disciple whom Jesus loves"? I mean you would have all been ready to stone me and go home. But they had confidence and you know where you get that kind of confidence? Fellowshipping with God. Hanging out with God. Not trying to keep all the rules and regulations, but trusting him to do something good through you. "But, Joyce I have to try". I'm not telling you that there's not effort that we put out but there's a difference in a fleshly effort and an effort made in the Holy Spirit.

And see when you start to struggle or to feel frustrated you might as well know right now, you're into works of the flesh. You left grace and you're into works of the flesh. Now you're trying to do it yourself, your back into the I, I, I, I, i. 99 times, they couldn't even kill him. They tried to boil him in oil and they couldn't kill him and that's a historical fact. They could not kill him. Now, interestingly enough, usually in life we hear more about the doers than we do the believers. Peter, and I'm not saying he wasn't a believer, he certainly was, but Peter was more of a doer. He's gonna do it. And this is just my own opinion, don't have a scripture for it but I think that John probably annoyed the daylights out of Peter. I mean he's probably like, "Will you just do something"?

You know, I was always a doer and Dave was more of a believer. And interestingly enough, you've probably heard a lot more about me than Dave but I was the one that was struggling and Dave was at rest and peace. "Well, bless God, I take care of everything in this family". I was always running around trying to fix everything and Dave is just believing God. Peter had the most dominant personality, I wrote this down, this is good, Peter had the most dominant personality but John had the most intimate relationship.

You gotta be careful of those quiet ones, I'm telling you. Just because you're loud and got something to say all the time don't mean you've got something the little quiet guy doesn't have. He may have something going on between him and Jesus that you couldn't even possible imagine. And I love this, joy and peace are found in believing. Romans 15:13, "May the God of your hope so fill you with all joy and peace in believing through the experience of your faith that the power of the Holy Spirit that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound and be overflowing with hope".

Well, let me close with just a few statements. What should you believe? What would I suggest to you that you believe. One, believe that God is good. All the time. God is good all the time. No matter what kind of lousy thing is going on in your life right now, God is good. And believe that it will ultimately work out. It will work out. Your kids will grow up, more than likely they're going to be okay. I can't say that nobody ever continues to have problems in their life but all of mine have turned out really good and I tell you what I would have just... I was sure wondering. Amen?

Believe that God is greater than your problems and that with him nothing is impossible. Believe that your breakthrough is going to manifest at any moment. Believe that you hear from God. Don't ever say again, "I wish I could hear from God". Do not ever say that. You say, "I hear from God. I am led by the Holy Spirit".

Remember you're going to get what you believe. Believe that God has heard your prayers and be expecting his answer. Just a few more. Believe that God's healing power is working in your body and that every day you're going to feel better and better in every way. Believe God gives you favor everywhere that you go. And that you don't have to work at being accepted by people, let God give you favor. Believe that God is working in your life, in you, in your loved ones, and you are changing all the time and getting better and better and better. And the last thing I want to say is believe, believe, believe. Amen.