God Wants to More Than You Can Imagine

Hey, welcome to Self Talk. I'm Dr. Ray Self. Thank you again for tuning in to this episode. Can you believe it? It's episode 209. It has been quite a ride, and I'm just grateful for everyone who listens to this show and, and shares this show with their friends. Today I'll be talking about a very important topic. It's about abundant life, how to experience it, what does it mean, and how you can live it. So stay– stay tuned, I think this is going to be a show that will bless your life. So uh, again, this show is sponsored by the International College of Ministry, now enrolling. God bless you, thank you so much. Again, this is Dr. Ray.

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Well, here we go, episode 209, Abundant Life. Abundance, prosperity. It almost seems like a, a dirty word or a non-Christian word, but let's talk about abundance. And I want to talk about a particular scripture that actually is a key to living in God's abundance. Now listen, there's abundant living that, that we think of in our natural minds is always having um, a lot of material things and a lot of money and that kind of stuff. And I sought after that for so much of my life. I sought the material world, and I sought - some of you know my story. I, I thought owning businesses would, would bring me my satisfaction, and things, especially boats. I love boats. I owned quite a few boats and never had a boat that was large enough for me. But then I found my purpose, I found my call, which was a call to the ministry, and I found abundance. Because see, abundance is not money. Although money's good, I mean, nothing wrong with money. But abundance is when you have peace and fulfillment and, and more. And you see things, and you experience things that are just beyond anything you could imagine. And that's what, that's what can happen with God. 

So I want to share this scripture with you because there's a key to living in God's abundance. Now, the first thing I want you to understand is God's abundance is always more than you can imagine, and this scripture I’m going to read to you points that out very, very clearly. In Ephesians 3:20, Paul is actually um– he's kind of…it's a prayer, it's part of a prayer that he’s praying for the Ephesians in his letter. It's a written prayer. But part of the prayer says, “Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we could ask or think, according to the power that is within us, and to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever…” So, this scripture, and you look at it, and he says, “Now to Him,” and he's talking about God, okay, “who's able to do more–” “far more abundantly beyond all that we could ask or think…” A dear pastor friend of mine years ago was reading this scripture, and he said, “You know, I can ask or think of a lot, but God can do more…and will do more.” And so you know, I think in my own mind of, of what abundance is. And, and I imagine this or, or that, or…I used to think abundance was going to be living in a, a little cottage on the beach with a, with a boat out back. Uh, abundance was um…having my sports car and, and and another boat and abundance was having um, a large, beautiful home. You, you know the story. Abundance. 

But you know, the scripture says in Isaiah that God's ways are not our ways, His thoughts are not our thoughts, right? So He thinks differently. But what I've become to learn over all my years as a Christian - and I've been walking this walk a long time - is that God's plans and what God wants to do for us and what God will do for us is greater than we could imagine. Some of you know more of my story. Uh, but just very briefly, you know, I was pastoring up in the Memphis, Tennessee area, and I had a very growing Church, uh, trem– a church that had a tremendous anointing in it and tremendous move of God. I mean, we would see healings and deliverance and prophetic words that were coming true almost every– every week. And the presence of God was so strong, and people would come from miles around. There were, there was one family that drove for four hours just to come experience what was going on, you know, in my church, and all glory to God. So we had a Sunday morning service, which was my regular church group, then we had a Sunday night service, which ended up having a lot of visitors from other churches– including pastors from other churches would come to our Sunday night service just to experience what God was doing. And it was so beyond me. I remember having services where the Holy Spirit would take over the service, and things would just start to happen. I mean, people would be weeping, and people would be crying, and some people would be full of joy, and uh, some people would be on their face before God. Some people are being healed, some people being delivered, some people were just caught up in the glory of God. And it was like it was just all just happening, and I was an observer. Even though here I was the pastor, I became an observer, and it was just an incredible– and the presence of God was so strong, you just wanted the service to never end. Let it, let it never stop. It was exceedingly and abundantly greater than I could ask or think. 

So, in this scripture, in your life, God wants to do more than you could ever imagine. Now, let me come back to my story. So I gave up this church, and I moved to Central Florida. It's a long story, I met a beautiful woman in Central Florida, God said move to Central Florida, and I'm thinking, you know, “God, I mean, I, I just don't know.” But I know He, He called me to do something, to move to Central Florida. And then, when I get down to Central Florida, to make a long story short, things began to happen in my life and in the ministry God had given me that were just greater and more incredible than I could ever imagine. End up meeting a, a man named Steve who builds me a 2,000 page website, took him five years to build it, with a, with an online school with hundreds of students from all over the world. I could never imagine that. And I end up ministering. All of a sudden, I'm getting invitations to speak in New Orleans and New York and uh, uh, North Carolina, in Alabama, in uh, Louisiana, in Michigan, in Ohio, and different places. Indiana. All over the United States, which I could never imagine speaking, and preaching, and ministering. I end up publishing uh, my first book and then a second book and now a, a third book. Greater than I could ever imagine. I end up ministering in the mountains of Guatemala to Mayan Indians and to a– prophesying to an Indian witch doctor in a village in a mountain in, in– 7,000 ft up in a mountain in the jungles of Guatemala, prophesying and ministering to a witch doctor. Who could imagine that? And uh, in Spain…In a Muslim town in southern Spain, a young man comes in off the street– a young Muslim man come– came in off the street. I gave a prophetic word, and he, he accepted Christ and began glorifying God. Turned from, from being a Muslim to being a Christian right in front of my eyes. In other words, I– just things you can't imagine. In another church in Guatemala, I saw a young man come in. His leg was broken. And, and his friend said, “Could you pray for our– my friend?” Now, we're in a very remote town, and doctors were hours and hours away. This young man came in with a broken leg - not in a cast, just broken. And he's just kind of leaned way back in a chair, his legs sticking straight out; he's in horrible pain. His friends asked me to pray for him. I prayed for him, declared the healing of Jesus over, over him, and he got up and walked! On a broken leg. With no pain. This is exceedingly and abundantly more than you could ever think or ask for. 

And so, what God is saying is in Ephesians 3:20 that He is able to do more than we could ever think or ask for. And the key to this verse is, I want you to hear this today, if you don't get anything out of this podcast, get this: God will do exceedingly and abundantly more than you could ever think or ask for according to the power that is within us. What is that power within us? It's the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit within you. You are the temple of God; you have the Holy Spirit within you. And so, what God within you, the power within you, is able to do greater than you could ever imagine. And I've experienced that. And I can tell you story after story after story when the power within me, the Holy Spirit told me to move from Memphis, Tennessee, to Orlando, Florida, which I could never imagine. But the power within me had things that were far beyond anything I could think or imagine, and to me, that's abundance. That is abundance. And the power within you, the Holy Spirit within you, wants to give you and let you manifest and experience and live in a life that's far beyond anything you could ever imagine. That's the abundance that God has for us. And the key to it is to tune into, be led by, and obey the leading of the Holy Spirit, the directions of the Holy Spirit that is living within you. 

Now, most of us are really good at ignoring the Holy Spirit because our mind is so logical, our mind is so practical, our mind is so full of uh, our own vision, our own plans, our own budget, our own ideas, that we drown out the voice of God. The voice of God is a still, quiet voice. But when you're able to tune in to that leading in your, in your spirit, the voice of God deep down within your heart, and when you're able to be– learn and teach yourself and train yourself how to hear the voice of God, which is coming from within you because God's living in you, then you will be able to experience what Jesus is talking about here: far more abundantly beyond all that we can ask or think according to the power that works within us. The power within you wants to do far more abundantly than you could think or ask. It's within you. The power of God is within you. If you're a born-again Christian and filled with the Holy Spirit, the power of God is within you, and the power of God within you will do more than you can imagine. As a matter of fact, I'll never forget this quote, I've quoted it many times. My– the president of the seminary I went to, I'll never forget this. One time, we had a graduation, and the seminary I went to had just exploded and become extremely popular. And we had a graduation one time, and there were 800 people graduating at this graduation. The seminary had just become a nationwide seminary. The president of the seminary got up, and he looked at the crowd - he kind of had an old country twang - and he looked at the crowd of people before him, and he said, “You know, you can tell when it's God because it's bigger and greater than you.” And, and I never forgot that because that's how you know it's God, because it's more than you. It's more than you could imagine, it's more than you could think of, it's greater than you can dream of. That's how you know it's God. And to experience that, we have to live and o– live according to the power that works within us. Paul said in Romans 8, “Those that are led by the Spirit are the sons of God,” amen. So the Holy Spirit wants to do more than you can imagine, but our job is to know where He is, know who He is, and learn how to obey Him. Now, that takes a little practice because there's a lot of voices out there talking. I often tell people this: there's three voices talking to you right now. There's you talking. Your thinking, your thoughts, your ways. There's the Holy Spirit, that's still, quiet voice within your heart, and sometimes, unfortunately, there are demons that want to put these thoughts in your mind like you're worthless, you can't make it, you're, you're shameful, you're condemned, you'll never measure up, blah, blah, blah. But when we teach ourselves and we train ourselves to listen to the Holy Spirit and discipline ourselves to obey what the Holy Spirit is asking us to do, say what He wants us to say, go where He wants us to go, believe what He wants us to believe, you will - hear me, folks - you will experience life far more abundantly than anything you could think or ask for. Because God has plans for you. And it's bigger than you know. As a matter of fact, sometimes He doesn't tell you the whole plan because if he told you the whole plan, you would freak out. You know, you would, you, you, you would just freak out. He– sometimes He gives you a little, little piece at a time. 

So I hope this is making sense to you because this is critical for you. Acc– according– He'll do exceedingly, abundantly more than you could ever think or ask according to the power that is within us, and that is the power of the Holy Spirit. You want to have abundant life and more than you could imagine? Live and follow the leading of the Holy Spirit, train yourself on how to hear His voice, and recognize His voice. As a matter of fact, I've written a lot about that my book, uh, Hear His Voice, be His Voice. Talks about that a lot. It's on amazon.com, Hear His Voice, be His Voice. We've got some courses on the Holy Spirit at icmcollege.org. You can audit those courses, you know, email me, Dr. Ray Self, drrayself@gmail.com, if you want to audit one of those courses. But I hope this has been a blessing to you. I thank you for being a part of the show. I'm going to pray for you. Heavenly Father, I thank you, Lord, for your promise that you're able to do exceedingly and abundantly more than we could ever think or ask for according to the power that is within us. Lord, I thank you first of all that you've given us your son to die for us that we might become the temple of God and that our body might be the place where the Holy Spirit resides. So Father, I thank you for that. We praise you for that. I ask right now, Father, that you'll make the leading of the Holy Spirit crystal clear to everyone listening to this podcast. And Father, those of us that need to repent, Lord, we repent for not listening to your voice and not listening to your guidance. And we trust you now, Father, because we know you have something great for us. And Lord, we trust you, Father. We trust you, and we purpose in our heart to tune in to you, to listen to you, to follow you, Father. From this day forward, Father. I speak blessings for everyone listening to this podcast. In the name of Jesus Christ, I pray. Amen and amen.

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Hey, thanks for listening to episode 209. Hope this show was a blessing to you. If you want more information on being led by the Holy Spirit, I was thinking about it at the end of the show. I did a course about a year ago called Discerning the Holy Spirit. It's a six-lesson course called Discerning the Holy Spirit. It's for our online college, but you can audit this course for $35. If you're interested in doing that, just email me, and I'll tell you how to do it. Just email me at drrayself@gmail.com. d r r a y s e l f @gmail.com. Uh, you can make a $35 donation, uh, to the ministry, and I'll send you a login to the course, Discerning the Holy Spirit. Another good resource is my book, Hear His Voice, be His Voice, and we talk a lot about the Holy Spirit and how to hear the voice of God in the book Hear His Voice, be His– Hear His Voice, be His Voice by Dr. Ray Self. That's available on Amazon. Thank you for being a part of the show, sponsored by the International College of Ministry, now enrolling. icmcollege.org. God bless you, thank you, thank you, thank you. Amen.