Victoria Osteen - Live Together in Unity
Psalm 1:33, 1 and 3, "It is good and it is pleasant when God's people live together in unity". How many of you want to live in a good and pleasant place? I do. It is good and pleasant when God's people live in unity. That's what I want to talk about just for a second today is unity, getting ourselves in a place of unity because that scripture goes on to say that there is an anointing that flows when we're in unity, a power that flows in our life. It goes down through us and through everything that we touch when we're in unity. At the end of that verse, at the end of that chapter says this, "For where there is unity, there is a commanded blessing".
Do you see the promise? There is a promise when you have unity in your life. There is a commanded blessing where you have unity. There is an anointing and I really feel like today, that in a world where we feel like we're anything but united, that we need to realize we can be in unity and the best efforts to put our unity is in our families. Listen, when you start with your family, that blessing not only flows down through you, through your children, through your family, but it flows and follows you everywhere you go. That commanded blessing will follow you to your workplace. That commanded blessing will follow you into any difficult situation because God says where there is unity, there is a commanded blessing, and when God commands a blessing, there is nothing that can stop it.
It may look impossible, it may be difficult, but you've got to remind yourself, "When I am in unity and at peace, then I walk in the commanded blessing". You know, the enemy wants to separate us. The enemy of our soul wants to bring division in our life. He doesn't want to bring us together. He wants to bring us apart. He wants to put a wedge of strife, a wedge of discontentment so that wedge can grow bigger and bigger until we have no unity. But God is saying, "When you're united, you're strong". You ever heard that saying, "United, you're strong. Divided, you fall", and there is so much truth in that saying that when we are united, we are strong. God has commanded a blessing where there is unity.
Joel and I have been married 29 years. Yeah. We've been together 29 years. We've raised two children together. Now, they're in college. We built two houses together. We've built a business together over this past 29 years and, now, we're leading one of the greatest churches in the nation together, together, and when I look back, I can see that it's not because we're so smart. It's not because we're so privileged. It's because we've stayed in unity. Now, does that mean we agree on everything? I personally don't think it's possible in our human nature to agree with everyone all the time. So I'm not saying that's where the unity came. Where the unity comes is through a bond of peace.
Listen to what it says in Ephesians 4. It says, "Make every effort to keep the unity of the spirit through the bond of peace". Do you want the commanded blessing? Keep the unity through the spirit. How do you do that? Through the bond of peace. Peace doesn't hold grudges. Peace is willing to be wrong. Peace doesn't have to be right all the time. Peace isn't bitter. Peace doesn't have to have its way. Peace is a place of power. The Bible talks about God's presence reigning in peace. If you want the power of God and the commanded blessing of God, stay in unity through the bond of peace.
Listen. You may not see eye to eye with everyone in your life. Does it make it person right and one person wrong? That's what we must understand. It makes us different. It makes us different people with different opinions. But that doesn't have to fragment us. That does not have to cause us to be bitter towards one another. We can keep the bond of peace. That's what the common, that's where we find the common ground. Can I tell you that peace is a beautiful thing? That's what the scripture says, that it's pleasing and it's pleasant and good when you dwell together in unity. I just believe that our families will go completely different levels and be so effective on this earth with we decide we're going to have peace in our homes. We're going to come together under the common bond of unity. Who gives us that peace? The Holy Spirit.
You see, you've got to be in relationship with God before you can ever be in relationship at peace with anyone else. Peace trusts. Peace believes the best. Peace knows that there is a better way. Do you know God can do more in us and through us when we're at peace than we're at odds? See, too often, we fight against each other when we should be fighting for each other. How do we fight for each other? We fight for peace in our home. We understand that we can do more together than we can apart. Is it so important to have our own way all the time? See, there is a blessing attached to unity. And can I suggest this? When we're tempted to say what we shouldn't say, when we're tempted to be right all the time, can we think about this?
If we say it and if we do it, we may very well miss out on a blessing. We may very well forfeit our blessing because we want to feed our flesh, because we want to get some temporary gratification. We want to show each other who is right. You know, I believe when we begin to put things into perspective and we begin to realize, "Hey, listen. We are the solution. We are not the problem because we serve a great, big God", that's when we can walk in peace and unity in our homes. God's kingdom is built on joy, peace, and righteousness. Let's build our homes on peace. Let's let God establish our homes. We don't want to build vain homes. We want to build strong foundations. We want to be people who are quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to get angry. That's what the scripture says. God is quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to get angry with us. We need to have those attributes in our life.
You know, people can teach us something. Sometimes, it doesn't feel like it, but they really can. I think about my children. You know, I love to listen to my children. I love to listen to their ideas. I have been on this earth longer than they have. I don't always agree with every idea that they have. But you know what's important to me? A willingness to learn from them, a willingness to show my respect, a willingness to grow with them and to keep peace. I don't want to fix them all the time. I don't want to reprimand them all the time. I want to learn the way to keep peace, to keep unity, to keep strife out of our home.
You know, Joel and I don't see eye to eye all the time. The truth is we agree on more than we disagree on. But it's those small foxes, you know, those small things that can make big things if you're not careful and ruin everything. It's the small foxes who spoil the vine. So we don't always see eye to eye and when we don't, I listen to his perspective. He is a very smart man. I want to hear what he has to say. I want to know what he is thinking and if I still can't get to that place in my own mind, guess what I do. I keep my mouth shut. I zip it up for peace. We need to learn to zip it up for the sake of peace. I know it's only a matter of time before he comes to my side. There is a bond in the spirit of peace.
Listen, we can stay bonded in the spirit by keeping peace. Let's learn to listen to one another. Let's learn to grow with one another. Let's learn to communicate. When we have good communications with our family, we know what they're thinking. We know what they're doing. We all know what's expected of each other. That's how we grow in this place of peace. Learn to laugh together, not only work together, but laugh together. Laughter is like a medicine. Unity is worth fighting for. Hold your peace. Don't give it up. Pursue it. Chase it down because that's where the commanded blessing is. Amen? Amen.