Sometimes we get stuck in life because we look at things from the wrong perspective. We need the word of God to change the way we see things. When our perspective changes through the word of God, we can get a breakthrough and move forward.
Hagar
When Hagar was kicked out of her house with her son, she was wandering in the wilderness. She had no more water and no more food. The heat was unbearable. Hagar was sure that her son was going to die. She put the boy under a bush and went away to cry.
Then God spoke to Hagar. He opened her eyes and showed her a spring of water. He told her that her son had a future.
The word of God gave Hagar a new perspective. It enabled to see something that she couldn’t see before.
The spring was always there. But Hagar was too desperate to see it. She was too overcome with sorrow. The tears had clouded her eyes. Sometimes our desperate emotions block us from seeing the provision that is already there. Our fears get in the way. But in every situation there is provision to get through because God will never leave us or forsake us.
Water symbolizes the Holy Spirit. We have the Holy Spirit in every situation. We need to see him and draw on this divine supply in order to overcome challenges.
God was going to make Hagar’s son a great nation. Inside Abraham’s home, her son could not become a great nation because of conflict. Hagar had to take her son into the wilderness for this prophetic word to come to pass. The wilderness was actually the doorway to the fulfillment of God’s word. God is able to bring good out of apparently bad situations for those whom he loves (Rom. 8:28).
Sometimes we are like Hagar. The provision from God might be right in front of us, but we can’t see it because we are overwhelmed. We need a new perspective from God to see this provision.
Gideon
Growing up, Gideon thought he was weak and the least in his father’s house. He had a low impression of himself and a high impression of his enemies. He grew up with idols and probably thought they were fine.
Then God spoke to Gideon and gave him a new perspective. God said that he was with Gideon. He called Gideon a mighty man of valor.
Sometimes we need to change the way we view ourselves. We are more than conquerors through Christ. We are children of God. We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us. This is our identity. We need the word of God to define us, not the world. The world will put us down, and Satan will try to destroy us. But God will lift us up. We need to renew our minds through the word of God.
God called Gideon to destroy the idol in his father’s house. The things that were accepted in the past now had to be rejected. Sometimes we put up with things that we shouldn’t put up with. We are afraid that if we tear down an idol, that people will hate us or we will face bad consequences. But if we see that God hates that idol, and that he is calling us to get it out of our lives, then we will be strengthened to get rid of it knowing that God will protect us.
Gideon saw the idol with a new perspective, and then he hated it. He tore it down.
Gideon also saw himself with a new perspective. As he began to understand who he was in God and trust in God’s power, he gathered an army. He defeated the Midianites.
Moses
Moses was another person who got a new perspective. He had been in the wilderness for forty years looking after sheep. At the end of this time he thought he couldn’t even talk.
God spoke to Moses from a burning bush. He asked Moses what he had in his hand. He had a shepherd’s rod. God said that rod was all he needed to break the power of Egypt. Moses was shocked. He looked at the shepherd’s rod as a mark of shame, for he was just a shepherd. That occupation seemed unimportant. But God doesn’t look the way man looks. God said that he was going to use this humble tool to break the power of the mightiest nation in the world.
God takes the weak things of the world to confound the strong (1 Cor. 1:27-29).
God had been using the wilderness to train Moses. Moses probably was sick of the wilderness, but it had been important training ground to purify him and help him hear from God. A new perspective will make sense of the wilderness in our lives too.
Conclusion
In each of these situations, the word of God came to someone who was in a difficult situation and changed that person’s perspective. The word of God brings light (Ps. 119:130). Light shines in the darkness. It shows us things that we could not see before. The word of God lifted these people up from a human perspective to God’s perspective.
In our own lives, we may have been viewing things wrongly. We may have looked at things a certain way for a long time, and wondered how we could get the victory in that situation. But God may have a different way of seeing it. Maybe we were viewing ourselves in a certain way that is not according to the word of God. We need to allow God to define us.
We need to ask God to speak to us. His word will bring light. When he gives us a new perspective, we will see things differently, and that may bring a breakthrough.
Lincoln House Churches 