Grace not only equips us to be all that we can be, but to do all that we are called to do. Christians often live a listless lifestyle because they either don’t know or else don’t believe that the actual power of Jesus Christ dwells within them. “You shall receive power” was the promise of Christ to His disciples just before He ascended back to heaven. (See Acts 1:8) Our lives are to be a witness to who He is as He lives His life through us in the person of His Spirit.
Your potential is unlimited because you have Unlimited Power living inside you. He has given you the abilities you possess. He is the One who will animate those abilities so that you will accomplish more than you ever could otherwise.
You are destined for more than to loiter around on planet earth for seventy or eighty years, then go to heaven. This world isn’t a waiting room. It is the stage upon which the life of Christ is lived out by us in a way that is nothing short of supernatural. Every Christian’s life is a unique expression of His infinite life and love.
Your life is a part of eternity’s divine drama. It is the love story of Jesus Christ and you. Let the world cower in the wings. As a child of God, you sense the pull to move out onto the stage. At a spiritual level, you know that you are meant to fulfill the wonderful part He has written for you. His grace empowers you to assume your role with confidence and live out your scene in a way that will send ripples across the kingdom of God.
You can live boldly because He has already accomplished in eternity the good things you will experience in time. Isaiah said, “Lord, You will establish peace for us, since you have also performed for us all our works” (Isaiah 26:12). Can you see that it’s a done deal?
The Apostle Paul zeros in on this aspect of the Christian’s life mission in Ephesians 2:10. I love the way the verse is translated in The New Living Translation. “For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so that we can do the good things He planned for us long ago.”
Nobody ever lived out a God-designed plan with effectiveness that equals the life of Jesus Christ. He repeatedly said that the only way He did it was by depending on God the Father to express His life through the Son. Every aspect of His actions was an expression of the life of God within Him.
Paul the Apostle is remembered for his tremendous contribution to the church. Some say he may be the most effective Christian who ever lived. If a man ever fulfilled a God-sized dream, it was Paul.
In speaking about the fulfillment of his own life goals, here’s how he described his success: “For this purpose also I labor, striving according to His power, which mightily works within me” (Colossians 1:29). In another place, he wrote: “But by the grace of God, I am what I am, and His grace toward me did not prove vain; but I labored even more than all of them, yet not I, but the grace of God with me” (1 Corinthians 15:10).
Do you see Paul’s secret to the effectiveness of his abilities? He said, “I work. Yes, I work hard, but it isn’t by my power. It is His power which is at work in me. It is grace that causes me to be effective.”
Be bold in pursuing your dreams. Divine Life indwells you, calls unto you, and empowers you to do all that God has planned for you to do. God’s plan for your life is nothing less than miraculous. Don’t settle for mediocrity.
This devotional is an excerpt from Steve McVey’s new five session conference entitled “Live Your Dreams.” Call our office at 1-800-472-2311 for information on this teaching.
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