"Don't Throw Away Your Confidance"

Heb 10:35-36
35 Therefore do not cast away your confidence, which has great reward. 36 For you have need of endurance, so that after you have done the will of God, you may receive the promise.

If you are going to have a Christlike ministry then you will be misunderstood…and you will be criticized by religious people. The lost people LOVED Jesus…the religious people could not stand Him!!!

Mark 15:10 - this is why they killed Jesus! Most attacks in ministry come against you because of jealousy!

* When you are little, they ignore you. When you are growing, they criticize you. When you are large, they resent you. SO IGNORE THEM! Just remember…it’s NOT ABOUT YOU!!!

* When people say negative things to you like you think that you are cool by wearing that outfit. (They are using words to steal your confidance) Why? They have no confidance of their own.

* Little people (insecure) will always try to say something to make you feel small, so that they can feel bigger. (satan did this when he said, "I can do what God does" and he tried to ascend by bringing God down.

* People who try to steal your confidance see something in you they want. Confidance is not arrogance or pride, it is knowing who lives in you and what is in you.

* The only way they can steal your confidance is if you agree with them. Choose to disagree, they are not you friends.

* If you hold onto your confidance, it will cause you to persevere and recieve your reward.

* A lack of condfidance is discouragement, which means to lose courage.

Here is the last thing I want to leave you with. There are two facts about satan and God.

1) God is truth and He can't lie. It is impossible for God to lie. Even if He did, what he lied about would become what He said. God can speak at anytime to anything and it will become what he said. You have that ability to (Mark 11:20-24)

2) satan is the father of lies, there is no truth in him, meaning he is incapable of telling the truth. His whole ploy was to get Eve to agree with him. Whatever satan is telling you (mostly through people), the opposite is true.

For example, if someone tells you that your are always going to suffer from paycheck to paycheck and you will never have enough money. It is because satan heard God whisper that your finaces are about to shift. Anytime a seed is sown (word) the thief comes immediately to steal that word while it is in seed form. As soon as God says something, as soon as you recieve a word from God, the enemy will create scenerios and circumstances that oppose what God said. Why? To get you to belive that what God said was a lie. No! Let God be true and every man a liar.

Last example, when satan was roaming through the earth looking for someone to harass, he couldn't find anyone, so he approached God. God said, have you considered my servant Job, there is none like him in the earth, a blameless and upright man... It wasn't till God said something about Job that the enemy began to create opposition (opposites) to what God said.

If Job had agreed with satan or his friends (really enemies) he would have never recieved what God said. But because he refused to throw away his confidance, He recieved double for his trouble.

Friend, God has made great boast about you! It is after He says something concerning your potential, that the enemy comes. If you are being tested it is because:

1) God had announced something over your life in heaven.

2) God is allowing the test to validate what He knows is true but is waiting for you to know it.

3) By the enemy opposing what God has said, God sends reinforcments (Grace and Mercy) to release even greater blessings than what He said. This means that your enemies are really your friends, they are accelerating God's blessing and multiplying them into your life.

Don't throw away your confidance!

Craig