Choosing the “Glory Road” to the “Utmost Life” – part 1

Note 11 – Part 1

To Dream the “Impossible” Dream

A few days before we watched SALT (either 2/27 or 2/28), The Lord gave me a series of words/confirmations: “BE FEARLESS” (Oh my word, Again! I hear you, Lord!), “Break the Mold. Be EXTRAORDINARY” (Extraordinary had become another recurring theme), “Dare to Dream and Go for it” (confirmation of RISK theme from past years, and this began a “go for it” theme that emerged immediately. The first confirmation came in the SALT extras – see note 9), and finally, “What would you attempt to do if you KNEW you would not fail?” This last one especially struck me. Since we’d been praying to understand what we needed to do to trust and take the leap of faith and “have the guts to get in the car,” (after the series of Heb 11:1 words and the first Transformer movie – see notes 6 and 10) it really made me stop and think. “Lord, is this really you, and if so – WHAT IN THE WORLD are You trying to lead us to do through all these words?” A couple of days later, I was catching up on some Ed Traut devos I’d missed. When I opened this one, I was AMAZED:

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“For I can do EVERYTHING through Christ, who gives me strength.” Philippians 4:13 NLT

“There are NO LIMITS – I can do EVERYTHING.” (More confirmation of NO LIMITS / LIMITLESS theme. To clarify – we can do anything/everything that GOD calls us/tells us to do). He talked about how we do this through Christ’s STRENGTH, depending on Him no matter what we’re facing. This reminded me of our previous themes of operating in His Supernatural, Superhuman, Bionic Strength because He Himself is IN US and IS OUR STRENGTH (see note 2). He ended with a prayer ~ “Lord I praise you that no matter how hard or difficult it seems going forward, I know that you will give me strength. I have every hope that I will succeed because of that. Amen.” ~ Ed Traut
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But what left me in utter awe was the picture in the center which said “WHAT GREAT THING WOULD YOU ATTEMPT IF YOU KNEW YOU COULD NOT FAIL?” !!! Not only was this a precise confirmation from what I felt He’d said to me a few days earlier, but when I looked at the date this devo was sent, it was the very same day I felt the Lord had asked me the same question. With this undeniable confirmation, we began to give this question more serious thought and prayer (and invite you to prayerfully ponder this as well). He also gave us a word describing 3 groups of people – Those who make things happen; Those who sit on the sidelines and watch things happen; and Those who wonder what happened (lol) 🙂 – stating that He wanted us to be among those who “MAKE THINGS HAPPEN” (not meaning that we should try to bring things to pass in the arm of the flesh – but to be compelled to “TAKE ACTION NOW” (another recurring theme) on what He’s telling us to do). He brought a confirmation of this word immediately, and then gave several more confirmations in the next few weeks.

Counterfeit Clarity ~ Dividing Soul from Spirit

Entertaining such a question calls for caution. We immediately realized this was not a “blank check” to launch into whatever we wanted to do, expecting God to cause it to succeed. In fact, when I initially considered this question, the very first thing that came to mind that I would attempt to do if I KNEW I wouldn’t fail was something we’d already sought Him about for months last year. So we already knew His answer was “NO” to our idea of how to complete that assignment (and He’d given us His strategy instead). Therefore, He was clearly not telling us we were free to just do anything we desired, promising that He’d make it work. Yet at the same time we knew that through this line of questioning He was trying to bring something to our attention that HE DID want us to do – Something that all the bits and pieces of the puzzle previously received had revealed would involve laying all on the altar of sacrifice, being totally committed, fully surrendered and yielded to Him, divesting ourselves of comfort and convenience, would require seeing BEYOND what we can see / seeing the invisible to the point of being sure and certain (fully persuaded), so that when His request became clear, we would say “YES,” trust and take the leap of faith, and “have the GUTS to get in the car.”

As we continued to pray about what specific dream He was trying to provoke action toward, a second idea came to mind. When we began to ask Him if THIS is what He meant, He immediately began to confirm.

Bringing us to the place of total surrender in this process allows the Lord to give us divine instructions that stretch us BEYOND what we would naturally be open to hearing or willing to do without a direct word from Him. But if we want divine results we have to be able to hear and follow His divine instructions, even if they defy human logic and reasoning. Our surrender allows Him to show us what desires and dreams are born of our flesh and soul (mind, will, and emotions) versus those that are truly born of His Spirit. For example, if we were to tell Jesse that the Lord was giving him a blank check to attempt ANYTHING and he was guaranteed to succeed, he would be a composer and musician one day, a minister the next, a pilot the third, a farmer the fourth, a professional golfer the fifth, a dive master the sixth, and we’re just getting started. He would own a castle (I suppose adjoined to the farm) and commute wherever he needed to go via helicopter (apparently to the golf course, ocean, and his ministry and music venues). And I could go on, but you get the picture. Clearly there are some “dreams” we have in life that are our own which need to be distinguished from the God-given dreams that are part of the purpose for which we were created. So allowing the Lord to help us sift and separate, dividing soul and spirit by the power of His Word and Spirit (Logos and Rhema) is essential.

Even when we pass this test and truly surrender all, saying “not my will, but Yours alone be done” in every area of life, we must still be alert and aware of the enemy’s schemes to deceive us. This place of total surrender God must bring us to can leave us in a vulnerable position ~ so open to whatever God wants that the enemy can seize the opportunity to introduce counterfeit versions of God’s vision. During this process, we wrestled with the question of whether God was asking us to do something extremely foreign and frightening. We came to the place of total surrender, willing to do even that if it’s what God wanted. But as we continued surrendering all and wholeheartedly seeking, He showed us this idea was NOT from Him. He showed us that when He’s bringing us to the point of surrender to prepare us to receive and obey the often outrageous and challenging, if not “impossible,” instructions He needs to give us for the leap of faith He wants us to take, the enemy will simultaneously try to implant ideas for a counterfeit leap of faith into our minds. He reminded us that, “Jump and God’s angels will catch you and keep you from harm” (paraphrase) was one of the very temptations the enemy tried on Jesus (even using Scripture to support his counterfeit instruction). So we shouldn’t be surprised if he tries to deceive us in the same way. But if we are cautious and continue to wholeheartedly surrender and seek the Lord each step of the way, He will expose every counterfeit leap of faith and confirm beyond the shadow of all doubt which leap of faith is truly His will.