How To Keep What God Gives..pt.1

I am just coming off an AMAZING weekend! PURE2011 Conference blows my mind every year. It amazes me how every year God shows up and moves in the lives of the young people. This year we had guest speakers Poncho Lowder http://youtu.be/0d-00mYV2Js, prophet Ruckins McKinley http://youtu.be/gGBDHJQQugI, my senior pastor Glen Johnson, my beautiful wife Kate Trenda and myself. After hearing so many great messages and being in the life changing atmosphere of the power of God, I started to think about how many times growing up in the church... going to youth camps, conferences, youth services, and mission trips and how many times God gave me a word, a dream, even a vision for life that was so powerful at the time but years later seem to have forgotten, misplaced or even doubted. Having God dreams so vivid, yet over time faded into someday wishes... Were they really from God? Were they form the nacho bar? Where they just my imagination?

Looking back I would have to be honest with myself and say that they were form God. I was just not putting into practice or maybe was not equipped with the tools to use, to KEEP those dreams that that God had given me. So over the next few blogs I think I am going to lay out a few things we can do to KEEP what God gives us. I mean, if I come up to you and give you a million $$ for your future or to pay for your medical school, it is safe to say that you would protect that million $$ because your future could rely on it, right? Whats more valuable than a word, dream, or life vision given from God!? What God has for us  carries way more value that any amount of money but yet we protect a few bucks with more intensity than the very thing God has for our lives. So the here are a few things we can do to KEEP what God has given us, whether it was yesterday, today or tomorrow.

1. Keep Your Mouth Shut!

               If you are like me the first thing you want to do when God shows you something, is to tell ANYONE! lol. I think a lot of the time we run out and share with people who we trust, like a parent, B.F.F., etc and since they might not understand fully the dream or vision they shoot it down with a "thats stupid" or "haha, how are you going to do that" or maybe "That has never been done before"or God forbid "That would never happen in this church", the sayings could go on and on.. That person that you so trusted to share something so big, not realizing it, has begun  to help you loose what God just gave you! We can learn this lesson from our friend Joseph. Remember, he had a God dream... Then he went and shared it with his own brothers! His blood. The guys he had grown up with.. and they SOLD HIM INTO SLAVERY just so that his dream would not come to pass. Read it for yourself in    Gen 37:3-10  - "Now Israel loved Joseph more than all his children, because he was the son of his old age. Also he made him a tunic of many colors. 4 But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peaceably to him. 
5 Now Joseph had a dream, and he told it to his brothers; and they hated him even more. 6 So he said to them, “Please hear this dream which I have dreamed: 7 There we were, binding sheaves (bundles of wheat) in the field. Then behold, my sheaf arose and also stood upright; and indeed your sheaves stood all around and bowed down to my sheaf.” 
8 And his brothers said to him, “Shall you indeed reign over us? Or shall you indeed have dominion over us?” So they hated him even more for his dreams and for his words. 
9 Then he dreamed still another dream and told it to his brothers, and said, “Look, I have dreamed another dream. And this time, the sun, the moon, and the eleven stars bowed down to me.” 
10 So he told it to his father and his brothers; and his father rebuked him and said to him, “What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall your mother and I and your brothers indeed come to bow down to the earth before you?”

We need to be carful of who and when we speak the words or dreams that God give us.

There are many places when Jesus Himself would do a miracle for someone and then tell them not to tell anyone... I wonder why? I think this is interesting in Matthew 16:15-20  - He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” 
16 Simon Peter answered and said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” 
17 Jesus answered and said to him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. 18 And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it. 19 And I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” 
20 Then He commanded His disciples that they should tell no one that He was Jesus the Christ."

Now why would Jesus COMAND his disciples to not tell anyone who He was?? I believe that because the doubt from others would have birthed doubt in them! If you live with or hang around negative people… YOU WILL FALL SHORT!  I don’t care how “Good” your heart is or how “Well” you can hear God. Doubt will get you hearing wrong! Here is a cute lil story to back up that thought in 

Luke 8:49-56  - "While He was still speaking, someone came from the ruler of the synagogue’s house, saying to him, “Your daughter is dead. Do not trouble the Teacher.”
50 But when Jesus heard it, He answered him, saying, “Do not be afraid; only believe, and she will be made well.” 51 When He came into the house, He permitted no one to go in except Peter, James, and John, and the father and mother of the girl. 52 Now all wept and mourned for her; but He said, “Do not weep; she is not dead, but sleeping.” 53 And they ridiculed Him, knowing that she was dead. 
54 But He put them all outside, took her by the hand and called, saying, “Little girl, arise.” 55 Then her spirit returned, and she arose immediately. And He commanded that she be given something to eat. 56 And her parents were astonished, but He charged them to tell no one what had happened."

WOW! Jesus knew that they needed to shut their mouth! So He put them outside. I love how it doesn't say "He asked them to please leave the room". Lol. Jesus was "the man" and took authority her and it says "He PUT THEM OUTSIDE". I love it. Come on, He just told them she was not dead but sleeping! But their mouth of negative words was going to kill His words of life!

It dose not matter “HOW IMPOSSIBLE” Gods word sounds to you!!

The only thing that will stop it from happening is your mouth!