Fresh Outlook!

By Jamie Tennant

We have loving, compassionate Pastors, who seek God’s face everyday for their sheep. We have a leadership team who desire for the people of God to grow in who they are in Christ. We have a worship team using their God-given gifts to usher us into His Presence every single service. We have home groups with the sole purpose of connecting the body of Christ together in more personal ways. We have servants in the house of God with a gift to make our church experience more enjoyable and easier. We have a prayer ministry team who loves the chance to pray over whatever need or situation we have in our lives. We are blessed. Immensely.

Yet, most of us have become too familiar with the people we’re doing life with to receive the full benefit of what the Father has put inside of them. One of the definitions of familiar is: unduly intimate (unduly means ‘in an improper manner’); too personal; taking liberties; presuming.

We’ve become too familiar with the person beside us or across the aisle from us. We won’t allow certain people to minister to us because we don’t think they have anything to offer us. We don’t honor them the way we should because we ‘know’ them now: their quirks, their faults, their mess ups. We’ve seen them in their good times and their ugly times. We’ve taken our intimate knowledge of them and used it improperly and we miss the gifts that God has put inside of them for us. Or, maybe we’ve only ‘heard’ things about them. We’ve taken what we’ve heard and presumed things about them.

Presume: to assume as true in the absence of proof to the contrary.

At this point we’ve put a harness on their ability to minister to us. We’ve taken liberties (unwarranted freedom in action or speech) on who we think they are, or what we think they’re capable of offering us. Everything we need for life is in God, and God uses the tribe He’s placed us in to provide for us. If we have an area in our life that seems lacking, then it’s time to take a look at the limits we’ve placed on the people in our tribe.

I am praying, personally, for fresh eyes to see the people of God that He’s placed around me. Instead of seeing Pastor Dave on stage preaching ‘just another message’, I pray for eyes to see a man of God with an impartation from God for ME and my life. Instead of seeing the prayer team at the end of service standing there ready to pray for my cold or some calamity in my life, I pray for eyes to see the people God has placed there to speak a blessing into my life. Instead of dropping my kids off with ‘the babysitters’ in the nursery, I pray for fresh eyes to see the servants God has gifted to pour Kingdom into my children.

I heard a pastor say recently that “God is going to invade the earth through breaking off familiarity.” We can even become too familiar with what God is doing in our lives. We become too intimate, in an improper manner, with the Hand of God in our lives that we don’t even recognize or give him honor for it. It’s amazing when God supernaturally provides for us financially, but when He does it 4 or 5 or 9 times, its become familiar and we don’t honor or acknowledge Him for it anymore. We’ve just made our intimacy with God improper. When we can’t point to God for what He’s doing in our lives, He can’t be glorified. If He can’t be glorified in your life then who or what is your life actually pointing to?

We break off familiarity by acknowledging what God is doing in our life and pointing Him out to others.When we share what He’s doing in our lives others begin to look for Him in their lives, and then they begin to point Him out to others, and then those people begin to look for Him, and then, and then, and then…

Let’s start by repenting for allowing ourselves to make God’s goodness ordinary in our lives. Let’s pray for fresh eyes to see Him all around us. Let’s brag on Him every chance we get and watch Him show up time and time again, like a domino effect. Let’s begin to gather together with a fresh outlook. Let’s pray for God to allow us to see people the way He sees them. Let’s look for ways to honor our leaders, our fellow believers and increase honor, which will increase faith to expect great things! Father! Give us fresh eyes to see what You want us to see! AMEN!