Living in the Abundance of God
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Authors: John Osteen
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OREWORD BY
J
OEL
O
STEEN
M
Y DAD WAS RAISED
in an extremely poor family, losing everything they owned during the Great Depression. As was true of most people of that generation, he grew up with a “poverty mentality” that shaped his formative years and, as you’ll read in this book, had a big influence on his Christian life as well as his ministry. When God tried to bless and increase my dad, he couldn’t receive the abundance of God at first. In fact, for many years he thought he was doing God a favor by staying poor. Later, Daddy learned that as God’s children, we are able to live an abundant life; that we should even expect to be blessed. Indeed, it is as important to learn how to receive a blessing as it is to be willing to give one.
When God led the Hebrew people out of slavery in Egypt, the eleven-day journey to the Promised Land took forty years. God wanted them to move forward, but they wandered in the desert, going around the same mountain, time after time. They were trapped in a poor, defeated mentality, focusing on their problems and always complaining about the obstacles.
Because of their disobedience and lack of faith, the Israelites spent forty years wandering around in the wilderness. How sad! God had prepared a place of tremendous abundance, a place of great freedom for His people. But their oppressors had beaten them down for so long—mistreated and taken advantage of them—now, even though God wanted a better life for each of them, they couldn’t conceive it.
Do you feel as though you’re spinning your wheels in life? Rather than moving forward with an attitude of faith, expecting good things, are you allowing obstacles to stand between you and your destiny?
If you listen closely, I believe you’ll hear God saying what He said to the Israelites, “You have dwelt long enough on this mountain…. Behold, I have set the land before you; go in and take possession of the land which the Lord swore to your fathers… to give to them and to their descendants after them” (Deuteronomy 1:6, 8
AMP
). No matter what you’ve gone through in the past, no matter how many setbacks you’ve suffered or who or what has tried to thwart your progress, today is a new day, and God wants to do a new thing in your life. Don’t let your past determine your future.
My dad said that from the moment he gave his heart to Christ at the age of seventeen, “I made a quality decision that my children and family would never have to experience the lack that I was raised in.” He searched the Scriptures to see what God said about him and started seeing himself not as a farmer’s child with no future but as a child of the Most High God. He rose up and broke the curse of poverty in our family and eventually discovered what it means to live in the abundance of God—spiritually, mentally, and physically.
Are you allowing obstacles to stand between you and your destiny?
In Jeremiah 29:11, the Lord declares, “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you,… thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.” It’s time to let go of past hurts, pains, or failures. It is time to stretch your faith and pursue the excellence that God has placed in your heart. It is time to break out of the “barely get by” mentality, to become the best you can be, not merely average or ordinary, for the rest of your life. Refuse to be counted among the doubters.
Friend, I trust that this book will help lead you to break through the barriers of your past and enter into the abundant life God has for you today. We serve the Most High God, and His dream for your life is so much bigger and better than you can even imagine. Never settle for a small view of God. Start thinking as God thinks. Think big. Think increase. Think abundance. Think more than enough!
I think you’ll see from the commentary I have added at the end of every chapter that I can’t agree more with my father’s belief that you can start to enjoy a new life filled with abundance as you are transformed and renewed by God’s Word. No matter where you are or what challenges you face, if you dare to believe God and just act on His Word, the possibilities are endless!
“F
OR
I
KNOW THE THOUGHTS
THAT
I
THINK TOWARD YOU
,
… THOUGHTS OF PEACE
AND NOT OF EVIL
,
TO GIVE YOU A FUTURE AND A HOPE
.”
JEREMIAH 29:1
NTRODUCTION
I
love people and desire to help everyone find the best for their life. The Lord God desires to pour out the abundance of His love and mercy and power upon us, but far too often we fail to recognize His presence and guidance when it comes. The Lord is so near, and every one of the promises He has made in His Word for us are true, yet we do not recognize it. If we will only believe that all things are possible to those who believe what He has said and done and provides, it will change our lives.
The Bible states that Jesus is the King of kings and the Lord of lords. Have you ever wondered who the other kings and lords are? Well, you may not feel like one, but you became one of them the moment you received Jesus Christ as your Savior. God’s intention is that every believer would reign as a king in this life through Jesus Christ.
REATED TO
B
E
K
INGS
Consider this bedrock truth that God created us to be kings and priests: “From Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler over the kings of the earth. To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and has made us kings and priests to His God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen” (Revelation 1:5–6).
Why is it that we readily accept the truth that Jesus is the King of kings and Lord of lords, but we hesitate when it comes to the truth of who we are? God says that because He loved us and washed away our sins in His blood, we are to live in His abundance as kings and priests. That is marvelous Good News, yet this is what I hear so many believers say: “Let’s just hold out to the end. We may barely make it through this life. We may get to heaven dressed in rags, but in the next life we will reign.”
That is certainly not what the apostle Paul tells us in Romans 5:17: “For if by the one man’s offense death reigned through the one, much more those who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.” Yes, death reigned in life through the sin of Adam, but we who have received the abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness are to reign in life through Jesus Christ!
In the midst of trials,
in the midst of tribulations,
in the midst of the uncertainties of life,
in the midst of raising a family,
in the midst of all the problems that are hurled at us,
we are to live independent of circumstances
in the abundance of God and reign as kings!
You may say:
“I don’t see it!”
You will.
“I can’t do it!”
You will.
“I don’t understand it!”
You will soon.
“I feel like a slave!”
You will feel differently.