My focus for 2012 is to live intentionally, making choices and decisions that will further my personal discipleship and my purposes in the Kingdom. We need to be a generation that CHOOSES to walk with purpose, that makes plans and strategies on how to develop our characters and design and create the steps needed to achieve our God sized dreams!
God has given us a mission, He has also given us all the skills and gifts we need to achieve that mission, but if we don’t live intentionally we run the risk of leaving those skills and gifts in their boxes, untouched, unused. There is so much potential inside of you, don’t leave it in its ‘potential’ stage – Be intentional – Start cultivating the gifts that are within you!
Paul discipled Timothy to ‘Fan into flames the spiritual gift that God has placed within you’ 2 Tim 1v6. God leaves the intentional living to us – it’s our decision whether we become all God has created us to be.
So how can we cultivate an attitude of INTENTIONAL living?
- Get a good strong grasp on who you are in God – Know what the Bible says about you!
- Has God given you a vision/dream/mission that he wants you to plant and flourish in? If he has, take time out of your week (every week) to get that dream IN FRONT of you. Write it down! Habakkuk 2v2 says to ‘Write it in big block letters so that it can be read on the run’ If you can’t articulate what it is or where you’re going, you will find it difficult to intentionally put down the foundations to plant it. If God hasn’t given you a specific dream or vision, ASK FOR IT! He is a BIG God with a BIG plan, and He wants to use you to make it happen.
- Pray circles around your life – I am reading an AMAZING book called ‘The Circle Maker’ by Mark Batterson, I highly recommend this book to inspire you to have the faith to dream a big dream and how to support that dream in prayer. ‘God honours bold prayers because bold prayers honour God!’ Every area of your life needs to be fuelled and saturated in prayer – if you need a prayer boost – Get this book!!
- Get inspired – This is one of my favourite ways of keeping Kingdom goals in mind throughout the general day to day traffic of a normal week. Subscribe to great authors’ blogs, it’s really easy to do! Find people that you admire and look up to, people in the same ministry or mission field that you’re being drawn to – follow them on Twitter, check out their ministry website, these are invaluable, free resources that will support and inspire you to keep moving forward with your vision. Why take a long time trying out different ways of building when you can learn from someone who has been there and done it? That’s why God tells us to share our stories, so we build up those around us – remember the phrase on the edge of a two pound coin – ‘Standing on the shoulders of giants’ Find a giant and stand on his shoulders!
- Keep talking about it! When you are passionate about something, everyone around you knows! You can’t keep these things in because as you intentionally disciple yourself you allow God to pour in, and we know that the best way to keep that passion fresh is to pour it right back out – so you become a stream of living water not a stagnant pond! So when you’re having a coffee with your friend, chat about where you’re going, and what your plans are. And remember to turn the focus right back round and encourage them to talk about their passions and dreams. Putting a voice to your passion is powerful!
Where are you in relation to where you want to be? Are you going after your purposes with intentionality? What seeds are you sowing now that will influence the structure of your God designed future?
Proverbs 29v18 states that ‘Without vision, people perish’
Clearly God wants us to be focussed, to have something to aim towards and develop. Intend to find out what that is, if you already know, then choose to start living intentionally towards it – you will be amazed at the results of a life lived with purpose!
Sammi
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