In my times of study and reading lately, I’ve been seeing a lot on hope–the absolute necessity of it and the power it wields in the life of a believer. And just today, I was once again reminded of its power, along with a special word that God gave to me a few years ago. I was so encouraged by it that I went on to share it in a letter to my ministry friends and partners. And now, I want to share it with you.
The Word of God is eternal and never becomes outdated. So it is just as relevant and powerful today as it was the day the Lord ministered it to me over four years ago. Receive this powerful word from the Lord for your life and circumstances–and expect something good to happen to you!
Partner Letter, January 2007:
Dear Ministry Friend:
Welcome to 2007! I pray that as you are settling into this New Year, that you have already begun to release your faith and expectancy for the great things that God would do in your life. He has spoken and promised that this year will be The Year of the Open Door, a year of heavenly manifestations, and a year of increase and blessing like never before! So it’s a time to rejoice, stir yourself up in the Word and prayer, and prepare to see God’s best to come to pass in your life.
God recently revealed a major key to me concerning our ability to lay hold of and experience these awesome promises, and that key is hope. Not hope in the traditional, watered-down, uncertain sense that it’s commonly known for, but the powerful, bible-based hope that causes your faith to take on substance and produce the desired results (see Hebrews 11:1).
So what exactly is true bible hope? In its simplest form, it is an intense, confident expectancy that something good is going to happen to you. For instance, when you’re expecting a package to arrive that you’re longing to receive and you know the delivery is scheduled for that day, you will have an outstretched neck, looking for and expecting that package to be delivered. It’s an active force that’s keeping you centered on the end result—your delivery. So can you see that it’s not the dormant and lifeless thing that some would make it out to be? Your hope is a gift given to you by God to under gird your faith and bring in the promises every time!
During a recent time of prayer, the Lord spoke the following to my heart: “Hope is in. Hope is in.” Why would the Lord emphasize such a thing at this time? Because for many, there is a need to regain our lost expectations. Perhaps you have withstood some disappointments and delays in receiving what God has promised you or spoken to you about in the past. But understand this—God still expects and plans for you to receive and accomplish all that He has ordained for your life (see Jeremiah 29:11). So now is the time to reset your hope and reclaim those things of which you have let go. It’s also time to set your hope anew on the great promises and declarations that have been given concerning 2007.
But let us, who are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love; and for an helmet, the hope of salvation (I Thessalonians 5:8). Hope is a part of our divine weaponry and God expects us to use it. The hope of our salvation is the expectation of God’s promises—His covenant provision—coming to pass in our lives. We must expect to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. We must expect that God’s Word will prevail in our lives and hold fast until the promise is manifested.
As you go forward in this New Year, follow the instructions given in I Corinthians 9:10: …For our sakes, no doubt, this is written: that he that ploweth should plow in hope; and that he that thresheth in hope should be partaker of his hope. Whatever you do, do it in the spirit of hope—in the spirit of intense expectancy of something good happening in your life. Sling off past failures and disappointments, reclaim any lost or forgotten dreams and visions, and begin to rejoice like never before because hope is in!