We are walking in today: The Enemy Comes Against Your Potential! Part 2
Witness throughout the Bible: H341 'oyeb--hating; an adversary:—enemy, foe.
Exodus 15:6 Thy right hand, O LORD, is become glorious in power: thy right hand, O LORD, hath dashed in pieces the enemy. H341
The Torah testifies...............
Deuteronomy 33:27 The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms: and he shall thrust out the enemy H341 from before thee; and shall say, Destroy them.
The prophets proclaim..................
Ezra 8:31 Then we departed from the river of Ahava on the twelfth day of the first month, to go
unto Jerusalem: and the hand of our God was upon us, and he delivered us from the hand of the enemy, H341 and of such as lay in wait by the way.
The writings bear witness...........................
Esther 7:6 And Esther said, The adversary and enemy H341 is this wicked Haman. Then Haman was
afraid before the king and the queen.
Jeremiah 15:11 The LORD said, Verily it shall be well with thy remnant; verily I will cause the enemy H341 to entreat thee well in the time of evil and in the time of affliction.
6. Past Failures
Too often we are unwilling to take risks in the present because we have failed in the past. Perhaps the first story you sent to a magazine wasn’t published, so you never wrote another story. Perhaps your first garden didn’t produce many vegetables, so you never planted another garden. Perhaps your first business proposal didn’t win the bank’s approval, so you never started your own business, and you’re still working for someone else. Failure is never a reason to stop trying. Indeed, failure provides another opportunity to enjoy success. The apostle Paul discovered the truth of this when he met Yeshua and turned from persecuting HaMachiach to preaching the good news of The Most High’s kingdom operating here on earth!!
...I press on to take hold of that for which HaMachiach Yeshua took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which The Most High has called me heavenward in HaMachiach Yeshua. All of us who are mature should take such a view of things.... Only let us live up to what we have already attained (Philippians 3:12-16).
Paul was not unaware of his failures, but he refused to allow them to keep him from doing what he knew he could do. He believed that the The Most High who had called him to serve Him would accomplish within and through him all that He had purposed. He trusted in a power higher than himself.
...I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing HaMachiach Yeshua my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain HaMachiach and be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in HaMachiach—the righteousness that comes from The Most High and is by faith (Philippians 3:8-9).
Paul had messed up, but in HaMachiach he found the reason and the strength to pick himself up and move on. You must do the same or you will never see your full potential. Refuse to be a loser no matter how many times you lose. It is better to try and fail than never to try at all. Remember, you cannot make progress by looking in the rear-view mirror. To maximize your life you must let the past be past and leave it there.
The Torah testifies...............
Deuteronomy 33:27 The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms: and he shall thrust out the enemy H341 from before thee; and shall say, Destroy them.
The prophets proclaim..................
Ezra 8:31 Then we departed from the river of Ahava on the twelfth day of the first month, to go
unto Jerusalem: and the hand of our God was upon us, and he delivered us from the hand of the enemy, H341 and of such as lay in wait by the way.
The writings bear witness...........................
Esther 7:6 And Esther said, The adversary and enemy H341 is this wicked Haman. Then Haman was
afraid before the king and the queen.
Jeremiah 15:11 The LORD said, Verily it shall be well with thy remnant; verily I will cause the enemy H341 to entreat thee well in the time of evil and in the time of affliction.
6. Past Failures
Too often we are unwilling to take risks in the present because we have failed in the past. Perhaps the first story you sent to a magazine wasn’t published, so you never wrote another story. Perhaps your first garden didn’t produce many vegetables, so you never planted another garden. Perhaps your first business proposal didn’t win the bank’s approval, so you never started your own business, and you’re still working for someone else. Failure is never a reason to stop trying. Indeed, failure provides another opportunity to enjoy success. The apostle Paul discovered the truth of this when he met Yeshua and turned from persecuting HaMachiach to preaching the good news of The Most High’s kingdom operating here on earth!!
...I press on to take hold of that for which HaMachiach Yeshua took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which The Most High has called me heavenward in HaMachiach Yeshua. All of us who are mature should take such a view of things.... Only let us live up to what we have already attained (Philippians 3:12-16).
Paul was not unaware of his failures, but he refused to allow them to keep him from doing what he knew he could do. He believed that the The Most High who had called him to serve Him would accomplish within and through him all that He had purposed. He trusted in a power higher than himself.
...I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing HaMachiach Yeshua my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain HaMachiach and be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in HaMachiach—the righteousness that comes from The Most High and is by faith (Philippians 3:8-9).
Paul had messed up, but in HaMachiach he found the reason and the strength to pick himself up and move on. You must do the same or you will never see your full potential. Refuse to be a loser no matter how many times you lose. It is better to try and fail than never to try at all. Remember, you cannot make progress by looking in the rear-view mirror. To maximize your life you must let the past be past and leave it there.
7. The Opinions of Others
Most of us have had the experience of sharing a great idea with friends only to have them tell us 50 reasons why it won’t work. Too often such criticism prompts us to abandon our ideas because we wanted those with whom we shared our dreams to approve of our plans. Forsaking dreams because others belittle them or say we are crazy for trying them wastes potential. So does changing our plans to suit the ideas and expectations of our family, friends, and business associates. Hasatan uses those closest to us, whose opinions we value, to get to our potential. He kills our vision by shaking our faith in The Most High and our confidence in ourselves. Hasatan uses those closest to us, whose opinions we value, to get to our potential. Because the destroyer uses those you trust most to keep you from translating your vision into reality, you must accept that no one is for you except The Most High. No human being can be trusted to defend your potential. You alone are responsible. By refusing to allow the disparaging comments of others to discourage you, by removing yourself from their influence when your vision becomes threatened, and by clinging to The Most High’s commandments and directions, you can unleash the totality of The Most High’s power within you.
Yeshua demonstrated the importance of disregarding the opinions of others when He went to Jerusalem one Passover and the crowds believed in Him because of the miracles He performed. But Yeshua would not entrust Himself to them, for He knew all men.
He did not need man’s testimony about man, for He knew what was in a man (John 2:24-25).
He had a good reason to be cautious about accepting the affirmation of the crowd: He knew the fickle nature of people. He didn’t trust their cheers and their pats on the back. Accolades should be appreciated but never required.
The events of the week preceding His death confirm the wisdom of His decision. One day the people in Jerusalem received Him with great joy and hailed Him as the Messiah. Several days later they clamored for His death. Had He relied on their praise and good will, He very well may have lost the opportunity to fulfill His The Most High-given purpose to be the Savior of the world.
You too must beware of allowing the opinions of others to influence your decisions. Do not trust others to work for your good. Too often folks you thought were for you will turn against you and destroy what you have been working to accomplish. Remember, you are required to perform for an audience of one, the Lord Yeshua HaMachiach. When He applauds, then you are successful.
Get your encouragement and promotion from The Most High. Tap into the heavenly realm and receive the confirmation of your plans from Him because His opinion is the only one that counts. The opinions of others can destroy your potential if you permit them to touch your dreams and visions. To maximize your life you must declare independence from the opinions of others.
8. Distractions
This is one of the principal enemies of maximizing potential. All of us have had the experience of walking into another room and saying, “Now, why did I come here?” We had a purpose when we decided to go into the other room, but something between our decision to go and the moment we arrived sidetracked us from our original intention. Or we may allow side interests to distract us from our main goal.
Say, for example, that you set the goal of walking three miles everyday to improve your health. The first day you walk three miles in a little over an hour. The second day your walk takes an hour, but you walk only half a mile because you keep stopping to pick wildflowers. Picking flowers isn’t bad. It’s the result of picking flowers—the distraction from your goal—that is bad.
Hasatan uses distractions to stop our progress toward a goal, or at least to change the speed of that progress. If he cannot convince us that our dream is wrong, he’ll throw other things into our path to slow the development of our vision or he’ll push us and induce us to move ahead of The Most High’s timetable. One of hasatan’s most successful devices is to preoccupy us with “good” things to distract us from the “right” things.
Perhaps The Most High has planted the seed of a dream that He wants you to accomplish 20 years from now. Between then and now He has many other plans for your life. Let that seed incubate, and proceed cautiously. As you stay open to The Most High’s leading in that area, He will reveal when the timing is right. Never sacrifice the right thing for a good thing.
Likewise, if The Most High says, “Now is the time,” be careful to examine your thoughts and actions closely to see if they help or hinder the completion of your goal. If a plan or activity distracts you from accomplishing your vision according to The Most High’s schedule, it is bad for you at that moment. The apostle Paul understood this truth.
“Everything is permissible for me”—but not everything is beneficial. “Everything is permissible for me”—but I will not be mastered by anything (1 Corinthians 6:12).
Everything that doesn’t help our progress, hinders it. This is true because obeying The Most High too soon or too late is disobedience. Therefore, we must be careful not to get drawn into good activities that distract us from our overall purpose. The Most High requires our prompt response to Him throughout the journey. Obedience part of the way is really disobedience. We must be true, then, to our whole vision over the long haul because true obedience to The Most High is doing what He says, when He says, the way He says, as long as He says, until He says “stop.”
Because distractions take us off course, we cannot maximize our potential if we allow ourselves to be distracted from faithfully obeying Him every step of the way. Even if The Most High, in His love and mercy, permits us to get back on course, we cannot recover the time and effort we wasted being distracted.
The Most High is the only One who knows where you are going and what is the best way to get there. He will not send you by roundabout routes with many delays; neither will He lure you into detours and dead ends. The fulfillment of your potential is His hope and joy. To maximize your life you must stay focused on your purpose and avoid distractions through discipline.
9. Success
Success is another enemy of potential. When we complete a task and quit because we think we’ve arrived, we never become all we are. If, for example, you graduate from college and teach first grade for the rest of your life when The Most High wanted you to be a high school principal, you forfeit much of your potential because you stopped at a preliminary success. Leave your success and go create another. That’s the only way you will release all your potential. I am gonna say that again, leave your success and go create another.
Remember, hasatan is afraid of our potential. He knows that The Most High created us to do something great. Therefore, he will allow us a small success and try to convince us that we have arrived. Then, we will not want to move on to greater successes. We must beware that a small success does not keep us from accomplishing our larger goal or purpose.
In a similar manner, we must be careful to judge our successes by The Most High’s standards, not the world’s. Success in the world’s eyes is not really success because the world does not know what true success is.
True success is being right with The Most High and completing His assignment and purpose for our lives. It’s knowing The Most High and obeying Him.
Thus, we cannot succeed without discovering and doing what The Most High asks of us. Without The Most High, everything we do is nothing. Therefore, do not be intimidated by your lack of achievement in the world’s eyes. The power of The Most High within you is greater than any other power. When you’re hooked up to The Most High and you’re obeying His directives, you will achieve success by His standards. Refuse to allow the world’s measurements of success to encourage or discourage you because The Most High’s standards are the only criteria that matter.
Follow Him as He leads you from success to success. To maximize your life you must never allow temporary achievement to cancel eternal fulfillment.
10. Tradition
Traditions are powerful enemies of potential because they are full of security. We don’t have to think when we do something the way we’ve always done it. Neither do we receive the incentive to grow and be creative because our new ideas may interfere with the conventional way of doing things.
Say, for example, that you are hired to be a receptionist in a manufacturing company. Invoices, orders, replacement parts, personal mail, trade journals—everything comes through your desk before being distributed. Because the company is a large one, you spend much of your day sending out mail or deciding who should receive incoming mail. This prevents you from presenting the company to the public as effectively as you would like and often delays the routing of important contracts and specifications.
Thus, you propose that all outside vendors and salesmen should be notified that their business will receive prompter attention if it is addressed directly to the department to which it pertains. Invoices should be sent to accounts payable, payments to accounts receivable, shipping instructions to the expediting office, parts to the supply room, etc. Your proposal is not implemented, however, because the receptionist has always opened all the mail. Indeed, you are criticized for being lazy and inefficient because you cannot handle both the mail and your other duties as the company’s gatekeeper. Most likely, it will be a long time before you make another suggestion to improve this company.
The tragedy is that the tradition, which probably served its purpose well when it was started, prevents the accomplishment of the purpose for which it was established. When the manufacturing company was small, it made sense to have the receptionist open all the mail and stamp it received because she also served as the secretary for the various departments. Now that the company has grown and each department has secretaries and clerks within it, the continuation of that tradition is self-defeating. Disorganization, rather than efficiency, is the result.
Remember, no matter how good the present system is, there’s always a better way. Don’t be imprisoned by the comfort of the known. Be an explorer, not just a passenger. Don’t allow yourself to become trapped by tradition or you will do and become nothing. Your present level of success will be your highest level of success, and The Most High, who is not trapped within tradition, will find someone else to do what you could have done. Use your imagination. Dream big and find new ways to respond to present situations and responsibilities. Then you will uncover never-ending possibilities that inspire you to reach for continually higher achievements. We are sons of the “Creator,” who created us to be creative. Nowhere in Scripture did The Most High repeat an identical act.
Refrain from accepting or believing, “We’ve never done it that way before.” Now is the time to try something different. The release of your full potential demands that you move beyond the present traditions of your home, family, job, and church—in essence, throughout your life. To maximize your life you must be willing to release ineffective traditions for new methods.
Most of us have had the experience of sharing a great idea with friends only to have them tell us 50 reasons why it won’t work. Too often such criticism prompts us to abandon our ideas because we wanted those with whom we shared our dreams to approve of our plans. Forsaking dreams because others belittle them or say we are crazy for trying them wastes potential. So does changing our plans to suit the ideas and expectations of our family, friends, and business associates. Hasatan uses those closest to us, whose opinions we value, to get to our potential. He kills our vision by shaking our faith in The Most High and our confidence in ourselves. Hasatan uses those closest to us, whose opinions we value, to get to our potential. Because the destroyer uses those you trust most to keep you from translating your vision into reality, you must accept that no one is for you except The Most High. No human being can be trusted to defend your potential. You alone are responsible. By refusing to allow the disparaging comments of others to discourage you, by removing yourself from their influence when your vision becomes threatened, and by clinging to The Most High’s commandments and directions, you can unleash the totality of The Most High’s power within you.
Yeshua demonstrated the importance of disregarding the opinions of others when He went to Jerusalem one Passover and the crowds believed in Him because of the miracles He performed. But Yeshua would not entrust Himself to them, for He knew all men.
He did not need man’s testimony about man, for He knew what was in a man (John 2:24-25).
He had a good reason to be cautious about accepting the affirmation of the crowd: He knew the fickle nature of people. He didn’t trust their cheers and their pats on the back. Accolades should be appreciated but never required.
The events of the week preceding His death confirm the wisdom of His decision. One day the people in Jerusalem received Him with great joy and hailed Him as the Messiah. Several days later they clamored for His death. Had He relied on their praise and good will, He very well may have lost the opportunity to fulfill His The Most High-given purpose to be the Savior of the world.
You too must beware of allowing the opinions of others to influence your decisions. Do not trust others to work for your good. Too often folks you thought were for you will turn against you and destroy what you have been working to accomplish. Remember, you are required to perform for an audience of one, the Lord Yeshua HaMachiach. When He applauds, then you are successful.
Get your encouragement and promotion from The Most High. Tap into the heavenly realm and receive the confirmation of your plans from Him because His opinion is the only one that counts. The opinions of others can destroy your potential if you permit them to touch your dreams and visions. To maximize your life you must declare independence from the opinions of others.
8. Distractions
This is one of the principal enemies of maximizing potential. All of us have had the experience of walking into another room and saying, “Now, why did I come here?” We had a purpose when we decided to go into the other room, but something between our decision to go and the moment we arrived sidetracked us from our original intention. Or we may allow side interests to distract us from our main goal.
Say, for example, that you set the goal of walking three miles everyday to improve your health. The first day you walk three miles in a little over an hour. The second day your walk takes an hour, but you walk only half a mile because you keep stopping to pick wildflowers. Picking flowers isn’t bad. It’s the result of picking flowers—the distraction from your goal—that is bad.
Hasatan uses distractions to stop our progress toward a goal, or at least to change the speed of that progress. If he cannot convince us that our dream is wrong, he’ll throw other things into our path to slow the development of our vision or he’ll push us and induce us to move ahead of The Most High’s timetable. One of hasatan’s most successful devices is to preoccupy us with “good” things to distract us from the “right” things.
Perhaps The Most High has planted the seed of a dream that He wants you to accomplish 20 years from now. Between then and now He has many other plans for your life. Let that seed incubate, and proceed cautiously. As you stay open to The Most High’s leading in that area, He will reveal when the timing is right. Never sacrifice the right thing for a good thing.
Likewise, if The Most High says, “Now is the time,” be careful to examine your thoughts and actions closely to see if they help or hinder the completion of your goal. If a plan or activity distracts you from accomplishing your vision according to The Most High’s schedule, it is bad for you at that moment. The apostle Paul understood this truth.
“Everything is permissible for me”—but not everything is beneficial. “Everything is permissible for me”—but I will not be mastered by anything (1 Corinthians 6:12).
Everything that doesn’t help our progress, hinders it. This is true because obeying The Most High too soon or too late is disobedience. Therefore, we must be careful not to get drawn into good activities that distract us from our overall purpose. The Most High requires our prompt response to Him throughout the journey. Obedience part of the way is really disobedience. We must be true, then, to our whole vision over the long haul because true obedience to The Most High is doing what He says, when He says, the way He says, as long as He says, until He says “stop.”
Because distractions take us off course, we cannot maximize our potential if we allow ourselves to be distracted from faithfully obeying Him every step of the way. Even if The Most High, in His love and mercy, permits us to get back on course, we cannot recover the time and effort we wasted being distracted.
The Most High is the only One who knows where you are going and what is the best way to get there. He will not send you by roundabout routes with many delays; neither will He lure you into detours and dead ends. The fulfillment of your potential is His hope and joy. To maximize your life you must stay focused on your purpose and avoid distractions through discipline.
9. Success
Success is another enemy of potential. When we complete a task and quit because we think we’ve arrived, we never become all we are. If, for example, you graduate from college and teach first grade for the rest of your life when The Most High wanted you to be a high school principal, you forfeit much of your potential because you stopped at a preliminary success. Leave your success and go create another. That’s the only way you will release all your potential. I am gonna say that again, leave your success and go create another.
Remember, hasatan is afraid of our potential. He knows that The Most High created us to do something great. Therefore, he will allow us a small success and try to convince us that we have arrived. Then, we will not want to move on to greater successes. We must beware that a small success does not keep us from accomplishing our larger goal or purpose.
In a similar manner, we must be careful to judge our successes by The Most High’s standards, not the world’s. Success in the world’s eyes is not really success because the world does not know what true success is.
True success is being right with The Most High and completing His assignment and purpose for our lives. It’s knowing The Most High and obeying Him.
Thus, we cannot succeed without discovering and doing what The Most High asks of us. Without The Most High, everything we do is nothing. Therefore, do not be intimidated by your lack of achievement in the world’s eyes. The power of The Most High within you is greater than any other power. When you’re hooked up to The Most High and you’re obeying His directives, you will achieve success by His standards. Refuse to allow the world’s measurements of success to encourage or discourage you because The Most High’s standards are the only criteria that matter.
Follow Him as He leads you from success to success. To maximize your life you must never allow temporary achievement to cancel eternal fulfillment.
10. Tradition
Traditions are powerful enemies of potential because they are full of security. We don’t have to think when we do something the way we’ve always done it. Neither do we receive the incentive to grow and be creative because our new ideas may interfere with the conventional way of doing things.
Say, for example, that you are hired to be a receptionist in a manufacturing company. Invoices, orders, replacement parts, personal mail, trade journals—everything comes through your desk before being distributed. Because the company is a large one, you spend much of your day sending out mail or deciding who should receive incoming mail. This prevents you from presenting the company to the public as effectively as you would like and often delays the routing of important contracts and specifications.
Thus, you propose that all outside vendors and salesmen should be notified that their business will receive prompter attention if it is addressed directly to the department to which it pertains. Invoices should be sent to accounts payable, payments to accounts receivable, shipping instructions to the expediting office, parts to the supply room, etc. Your proposal is not implemented, however, because the receptionist has always opened all the mail. Indeed, you are criticized for being lazy and inefficient because you cannot handle both the mail and your other duties as the company’s gatekeeper. Most likely, it will be a long time before you make another suggestion to improve this company.
The tragedy is that the tradition, which probably served its purpose well when it was started, prevents the accomplishment of the purpose for which it was established. When the manufacturing company was small, it made sense to have the receptionist open all the mail and stamp it received because she also served as the secretary for the various departments. Now that the company has grown and each department has secretaries and clerks within it, the continuation of that tradition is self-defeating. Disorganization, rather than efficiency, is the result.
Remember, no matter how good the present system is, there’s always a better way. Don’t be imprisoned by the comfort of the known. Be an explorer, not just a passenger. Don’t allow yourself to become trapped by tradition or you will do and become nothing. Your present level of success will be your highest level of success, and The Most High, who is not trapped within tradition, will find someone else to do what you could have done. Use your imagination. Dream big and find new ways to respond to present situations and responsibilities. Then you will uncover never-ending possibilities that inspire you to reach for continually higher achievements. We are sons of the “Creator,” who created us to be creative. Nowhere in Scripture did The Most High repeat an identical act.
Refrain from accepting or believing, “We’ve never done it that way before.” Now is the time to try something different. The release of your full potential demands that you move beyond the present traditions of your home, family, job, and church—in essence, throughout your life. To maximize your life you must be willing to release ineffective traditions for new methods.
Shema Selah we must not allow past successes to stifle future completion of our next assigned task from the Most High!! https://www.facebook.com/fiveam.prayer/videos/2063841730360599/?l=227950208344851918
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