Unleashed

I spent the past week in Abilene, TX preaching to a group of students in the eleventh grade. Our time together was very intense and I think very profitable. The theme for the camp was “Unleashed”. This theme has really resonated in my heart. Even though I am home now, I know this theme holds something beyond camp for me personally.
What would happen if you and I could really be unleashed in the power of the Spirit? I think most of us are on the complete opposite end of things. We are leashed, constrained, restrained, and held back by our own doubts, religion, the opinions of men, and our own fears.
When I read about the apostles and other disciples in the book of Acts, I see them as unleashed, let loosed, and set free. They experienced more of God and witnessed more of the power of God through them in a few months than many of us will experience in a lifetime as we remain leashed to those things that hold us back.
If we continue to live leashed year after year, we will continue to see the same mediocre commitments and the same half hearted passion for God. We will continue to see the tragedy of 88% of our teenage graduates forsaking the church after high school. We will continue to see baptisms statistics going down as they are currently.
What is keeping you leashed and held back from being all you can be for God and more importantly all He has intended and designed you to be. [Eph 2:10] “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.”
Ponder this for a season. We were created, formed and fashioned for God’s good works. God created us to be unleashed for good works. It was His plan from the beginning of time. Somewhere along the way, we became too tamed and domesticated. Maybe it was because we heard people along the way tell us we could not really make a difference. Maybe it was because did not see anyone really being unleashed around us.
I will never forget a conversation I had like that as a brand new believer. I was talking with some ministers and listening to them talking about our sin plagued town. In my youthful exuberance I stated that we needed to stand and change our town. They laughed and told me I was young and that I would learn one day I couldn’t really change my town much less the world.
That conversation took place twenty one years ago and the pain of their words still hurt my heart. But I have rejected those words. I still believe that God working through me can change one heart and one life at a time. That is why I continue to pray, to preach, and to write. That is why No Compromise Ministries has been reborn and unleashed. We fully expect to change the world and expand God’s Kingdom one heart and one life at a time.
God chose and prepared the good works that you and I have been appointed to do. Not just to sit around and dream about but to actually walk in them and to do them. God is unleashing bold witnesses to see the lost saved. God is unleashing titans in prayer to believe Him for the impossible. God is unleashing men to be warriors in their homes who reject passivity, accept responsibility, lead courageously and trust the Lord for the reward.
The Lord has been planting huge dreams in my heart for this ministry these past few months. I am humbled as I am watching Him unleash us to do all of them. I believe the Lord in unleashing this ministry in ways we have never been unleashed before.
You were born in Christ to be unleashed from mediocre meandering in your walk with the Lord. You are being unleashed to commune with Christ at the deepest levels of your being. You are being unleashed to impact those around you in your family and community. You are being unleashed to live courageously as the Lord calls you to run toward risk. You are being unleashed to possess dreams He has planted in your heart that you thought were long dead. You are being unleashed from the prison of dead, stale, dry religion to walk, live, and minister in freedom. You are being unleashed from the impossible as you walk in the possible.
If your eyes are scanning the words of this message you have not been forgotten. God has something to unleash each of us to do. Preach. Write. Teach. Raise children. Lead your family. Sing. Worship. Lead. Learn. Trust. Work. Travel. Move. You are being unleashed from living in the religious rut and falling into mindless repetition and routine week after week.
God created you for so much more. The muzzle has been taken off, the chains no longer hold us back. We have been unleashed to be everything and to do everything God intended for us. Who will believe this by faith and possess your God ordained destiny? Who will refuse to live beneath God’s best for your life? It will take courage to step out of the safety of the leash and the confines of the yards we have been restrained in. God has a whole world of ministry opportunities and possibilities. Will you listen for His voice of guidance and pursue those dreams with intensified discipline? Will you refuse to live another day leashed by what others think, leashed to the wineskins of religion, and leashed to your own fears that hold you back. Even if none go with you, will you not follow in the footsteps of apostles and walk unleashed in the power of God. Will you be one who bears much fruit in your life and therefore also brings much glory to God? [Jn 15:8] That is what you were divinely designed for. This is your God ordained destiny. All that is left is for you to believe and to follow God into those works chosen for you before the foundations of the world.