Today’s Thought : Don’t get your hopes up

With Bishop Ronald K. Powell

I hope you’re starting to see a pattern of positive, Biblical thinking replacing negative unbiblical thinking!

That’s what this fast is designed to do-replace long-believed lies with the truth.

Thought patterns shape our expectations, and our actions. Like a magnet, our thought life “attracts” the things that our mind is full of.

Today we’re fasting from the thought that says: “Don’t get your hopes up”.

This mindset has subtly found its way into our heads. We have been trained by doubt and unbelief to lower our expectations–to brace ourselves for mediocrity and status quo.

To hope is to look up-to have expectation! To hope is to live. Hope is like oxygen. It’s like light-in a dark and negative world.

Proverbs 13:12 says: “hope deferred makes the heart sick.” There are many great truths from this scripture.

When hope is “put off to the side”, your heart becomes sick. When your hopes are “dashed to the ground”, your heart becomes sick. Most importantly, your heart becomes sick when you STOP hoping. Hope HEALS!

Let’s fast from this thought and replace it with these:

1. GET YOUR HOPES UP. No matter what. Ps. 78:7 “That they might set their hope in God.”

2. KEEP THEM UP. I John 3:3 FIX your hope on Him, and it will purify you.

3. When you don’t see something happening, hope even more. The fact that you don’t see it, gives hope a reason to remain alive in your heart. Once you have something and see it, you don’t need to hope for it anymore. It’s when you don’t see it, that your hope has a reason to exist.

4. Get Faith. Faith is not like hope. Faith cannot be deferred. Faith is a tangible force. It is substance. If you are exercising faith, no one will be able to tell you that God’s promise will not come to pass. All fear and doubt pass away and you will be thoroughly convinced of God’s promise in your life. There are no ups and downs, just a knowing and a sense of his presence. Faith will overcome all opposition. Faith is the fulfillment of your hope; it is the tree of life. Romans 15:4 “Hope comes from the encouragement of Scripture.” And Romans 10:17, “faith comes from hearing the Word”.

5. Meditate on the love of God. Hope that IS NOT DEFERRED (delayed, or disappointed) comes from Love. Romans 5:5 “…and hope does not disappoint (or leave you with shame), because the love of God has been shed abroad in your heart.”

6. Free yourself from people who think they’re doing you a favor by “managing” your expectations, or “protecting” you from disappointment. Get around hopers and dreamers and people who are filled with expectation!

7. THINK IT & SAY IT:

My hopes are up! I eliminate the notion of lowering my expectations.

I refuse to accept people’s advice to “not get my hopes up”.

I get my hopes up NOW and I keep them up.

I expect God’s promises to come to pass in my life today!

I expect good to come to my life today-In my family, in my home, in my church, in my job, in my relationships, in my body and in my finances.

I expect ideas, favor, and wisdom.

I look up, expecting to receive the best of what God has for me today.

I have unlimited and unhindered hope and expectation.