THE JANUARY JUMP
A small vision will never influence big people. If you have a small-sized vision, ask God to help you supersize it to His God-sized vision for you. While a God-sized vision might seem impossible, and even improbable, it can become inevitable when we’re willing to see it, seize it, and surrender to it! (Tweet this!)
One of the great Christian visionary leaders was Dr. John Edmund Haggai. One day, I was speaking in a church in Atlanta, and he invited me to meet with him in his office. What an opportunity! I’ll never forget visiting him because it was the first time I had ever been to somebody’s office where they had a sign in the lobby saying, “Our worldwide ministry welcomes John Ed Mathison.” You can’t imagine how I felt when I got there.
It was an amazing time to sit and hear him talk of what his ministry was doing around the world. He had a vision so big that I was overwhelmed in my thinking, but it helped change my life and ministry. John Haggai said, “Attempt something so great for God that it is doomed to fail unless God is in it.”
That was a huge vision. Just after that, I met Dr. Bill Bright who shared the God-Sized Vision of starting five million churches and winning one billion new believers by 2020. I thought I could just sit back and admire that vision, but he invited me to participate in it, and I did. I saw that vision fulfilled in 2020!
Limited vision is the result of being deficient in our courage and boldness to take a risk. A vision requires action. Vision without action is a daydream. Action without vision is a nightmare. When you put vision and action together, you see results that other people have difficulty comprehending!
The African impala can jump over ten feet high and cover a distance greater than thirty feet. Amazingly, these marvelous creatures are kept in an enclosure in any zoo with a three foot wall. How does such a small wall contain them? The animals will not jump unless they can see where their feet will land.
Many people, churches, and organizations live in captivity by a three-foot wall. They have the capacity to jump over ten feet high and more than thirty feet, but they are afraid to jump if they can’t see where they will land. A God-sized vision, coupled with a bold faith, leads to jumping when you can’t see where you’ll land. January 2021 is the best month to start jumping!
A God-sized vision helps erase the horrible memories of the past and serves as a bridge to a new future. Vision is focusing on what can be. It’s declaring with Paul, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” (Philippians 4:13) It’s experiencing with John, “Greater is He who is in me than he who is in the world!” (I John 4:4) It’s affirming with the angel that “Nothing will be impossible with God.” (Luke 2:37) It’s saying with Paul, “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.” (Galatians 6:9)
Vision is about seeing things that other people don’t see. It’s about revealing a future that most folks could not imagine. It’s not just what you see, but it’s what you help others see. It’s not just for you, but it’s for enlisting others to help see the vision come to reality!
Join the January jump!
