If I were to put a bunch of apple seeds into your hand you would probably get a picture of what could be produced from them. The same is true if I filled your hands with turtle eggs.
If I were to put the seed of a human into your hand, try and think of the possibility!
We look at the Japanese bonsai tree with its artistic, dwarfed size and shape and admire it. Most of humanity has gone through an unseen process like the bonsai tree. Humans have been restricted, confined and twisted to a shape of another’s liking. It could be religion, family criticism, personal inferiority and fears, or the example of others that has made you feel dwarfed and twisted, but Jesus came to set the captives free! Each of us has an ability to dream of the possibilities in our future. It is a risk to go beyond the parameters, but no one will ever know how high you can grow until you allow yourself to reach! God has put a future in you that reaches into eternity. Stretch for it today!
For nearly a year, Magda Herzberger struggled to survive the daily terrors and psychological torture in three of Adolph Hitler’s concentration camps. According to the Grand Canyon University interview, though forced to “gather corpses,” she resisted the draw of suicide and instead relied on God for the hope to outlive the Nazi death machine.
Growing up in the home of a respected international businessman, Magda was exposed to music, sports and languages, learning German, French, and Latin. She was cultivating her dream to go to medical school when the Nazis swept across Romania.
She vividly recalls the day the Hungarian Secret Police knocked at the door and began collecting families at gunpoint. As her family was being trucked away, her father arrived home and willingly joined them. She remembers her father’s warm tears falling on her head, as they were being transported to Auschwitz-Birkenau. She can still hear the dreadful cries and hopeless whispers of strangers packed into train cars without food or even a toilet for the terrifying journey.
Magda said, “Regardless of what I experienced in those camps, and all those terrible things, I’m still a loving and forgiving person.” I would ask, how can it be possible to remain a loving and forgiving person after being kidnapped, tormented, imprisoned and forced to watch mass murder? As she prayed in her silent moments in the camp, Magda knew in her heart that God could help her make it out alive. She said, “I think my great trust in God was my source of survival.”
What is hope? Hope is the picture of the future or the thing desired. The dictionary says, “it is a wish or desire accompanied by confident expectation of its fulfillment.” Robert H. Schuller, said, “Let your hopes, not your hurts, shape your future.”
For Magda, her hope in God—her confidence that He would help her stay strong through the storm—gave her strength for her journey. I want to encourage someone today, do not allow anyone or anything to steal your hope! Magda Herzberger went on to fulfill her dream of becoming a doctor, and today at age 89 she is still sharing her story of hope in the midst of tragedy. You can experience that same hope today!
It doesn’t matter where you are in life today, you can move forward because life itself declares that potential always exists. God always loves you and believes in you, so love yourself! Believe in yourself and get started!
Jesus was born in a manger, but He did not stay there. You might have been born in a poor family in a poor neighborhood, with poor neighbors and a poor education, but you do not have to stay there! There is no one limiting you. You are not a prisoner of your past, your neighborhood, your status or lack of education.
When Christ comes to live in you there is a new power in operation. You no longer live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud: A new power is in operation!
“For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death.”
Even though you might be starting off in an obscure place, there is a place in the sun waiting for you! They said of Jesus, “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?” The answer is, Yes, the Savior of the world! A good thing is coming out of your city – YOU – because you and Jesus are a dynamic duo that can’t be defeated!
Scripture: Romans 8:2 (NKJV)
Scripture tells us that King David was not even considered by his family to be a prospect for anything other than being a shepherd. Yet the prophet Samuel chose him as the one whose destiny was to be King of Israel!
What did he do when he received this great announcement and anointing? He just went back to shepherding. The difference was that he now began to dream of himself as a king. The idea was birthed in his heart.
It was neither the prophet nor the dream that made David a king. It was the victory gained through the challenge of Goliath that put him on the path to kingship. Confronting this giant was a decision he had to make alone, but something within him rose up to move him to face Israel’s enemy. Again, where others only saw a young boy tending sheep, the Lord saw a mighty man leading Israel to greatness in the future!
Your challenges are your own, but God prepares you for them! What challenges are you facing today that you do not realize God has already equipped you to conquer? Search your heart, seize the moment, and be bold because of the Great One Who is within you!
How do you perceive adversity? The great sayings of leaders such as Martin Luther King, “I have a dream,” Ronald Reagan, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall,” or Nelson Mandela, “Quitting is leading too,” were not born in a time of comfort and tranquility but were shaped in adversity!
Perhaps you are like the famed baseball player Jim Abbott. Though born with only one hand, he became a Michigan Hall-of-Famer, an Olympic athlete, and one of the rare major league baseball pitchers to record a no-hitter.
From his earliest years, he wanted to be an athlete. For hours he labored, perfecting a process of clasping his mitt under one arm, throwing a baseball against a wall, instantly grasping his mitt again with his one good hand to catch the return, quickly switching the mitt, retrieving the ball and repeating the process. He practiced for hours moving closer and closer to the wall, becoming so proficient that within a few feet of the wall, he could switch the glove and the ball almost simultaneously. With an indomitable spirit, Jim handled the naysayers with eloquence and overcame his disability with simple well-practiced solutions, inspiring thousands of young people with disabilities to pursue their dreams.
In Jim Stovall’s famous book The Ultimate Gift, we read the story of a man striving to make his billions, who at the end of his life, leaves a broken, miserable family that has become accustomed to living on his wealth. His only son who possessed a work-hard-help-others attitude, died in a tragic accident. The Ultimate Gift was left to that son’s son, who was wasting away on his grandfather’s monthly stipend.
What could this ultimate gift be? All of the family expected it to be money, and lots of it! But the grandson was given an opportunity for a journey where he would discover hard work, purpose, friendship, giving, and even stewardship!
Receipt of his inheritance would be based upon his ability to rise above the challenge his grandfather had set for him in a series of tests. This young man discovered the ultimate gift was not in having but in giving life, working diligently, using his talents and rising to the challenge at hand! Research shows that individuals who know and exercise their character strengths live happier, more successful lives—they have stronger relationships, more engagement at work, and greater life balance.
Who is your neighbor? Who are you required to help in this world? Should you be involved in the business of rescuing others, or is it just better to sit by and watch people suffer?
A religious leader asked Jesus, “Who is my neighbor?” Jesus replied with a story about a man who was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes and beat him, leaving him almost dead.
A priest saw the injured man and quickly passed on the opposite side of the road. So did a second priest! Then a Samaritan man, considered lowlier than a dog but evidently having some wealth, took pity on the stranger, bandaged his wounds, put him in an inn and cared for him.
Jesus then posed this question, “Which of these three men was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hand of the robbers?” The religious leader responded, “The one who had mercy on him.”
In every human soul, there is a void—an emptiness, waiting to be filled. What will you pursue to fill that void? Success? Family? Prosperity? Education? Or are you willing to step out and set a different standard for your life? A standard that can make a difference?
Today we look at the last of our three Power-Phrases that will help you overcome the obstacles and hindrances you will encounter on the way to realizing your dream.
Power-Phrase #3: The difference between great and small people is that while all may fall, small people just fall, but great people get up again.
You see, positive thinking is the power to look at your situation and find just one positive aspect, one positive thought that you can hold on to in order to transform your negative situation into an opportunity!
Regardless of what you may face today remember this, never give up! You may be at the end of your rope but remember—one positive thought has the power to loosen the grip of impossibility and propel you forward into possibility!
Today we continue with the next power phrase to help you develop the positive kind of thinking necessary to turn your negative situations into opportunities:
Power-Phrase #2: “Great people are ordinary people with extraordinary determination.”
Standing before a large audience of farmers, Dr. Schuller recalled another family tragedy. During the great depression and several years before the tornado disaster mentioned in the previous blog post, a drought destroyed the family crops, forcing his father to mortgage everything to survive. Dr. Schuller recalled entering the bank and seeing a sign on the wall that stated “Great people are ordinary people with extraordinary determination.”
Five years after the destructive tornado, Schuller’s father had completely rebuilt the farm, paid off the mortgage taken after the Great Depression drought, and retired a successful man!
What does your eye see? The scripture says, The person that has a bountiful eye shall be blessed; for this person gives of his [or her] bread to the poor.
There is a story of a Russian woman on a very small pension. One morning she looked into her refrigerator and realized she had only one frozen chicken—and nothing else. In her village dozens were hungry and without any food, so that day she made the decision to take that chicken and make a pot of soup.
You would think that she would savor every drop of that soup, but instead she took it to the streets and began feeding the hungry. So impressed were her neighbors with her act of kindness that others began supplying bread, and even vegetables from their gardens. Even more astounding was the day the mayor walked by and noticed the impact this woman was having in her village. He called his office and told the city clerk to find a facility for her to open a kitchen, and to supply her with whatever she needed!
In the midst of her poverty, this woman found a principle of true wealth. Her eye was full of abundance, and her thoughts were pointed in that direction. With one chicken she became the solution for the needy of her community!
Scripture: Proverbs 22:9 (paraphrased) http://bit.ly/1GM2cPj
