The finished works of Christ impact every area that touches our lives, in the natural as well as the spiritual. The last words Jesus spoke before dying on the cross apply just as much now as they did then. “So when Jesus had received the sour wine, He said, ‘It is finished!’ And bowing His head, He gave up His spirit” (John 19:30, NKJV). This declaration means that our healing, deliverance, prosperity, victory, joy, peace, and everything else we need in life is already finished and ready for us to claim.

Just when Satan thought he had beaten Jesus, Jesus rose up in victory and proved otherwise. The kind of eternal life Jesus has is now available to us; this isn’t any ordinary, dreary existence to which most people are accustomed, but a joyful, celebratory life. The enemy doesn’t want us to have this, but when he tries to step into our path and block God’s blessings, we now have the authority over him. “And the seventy returned again with joy, saying, Lord, even the devils are subject unto us through thy name. And he said unto them, I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven. Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you” (Luke 10:17-19). Remembering this keeps the devil powerless to cause trouble for us.

Jesus made sure that we have everything we need to succeed in life. “By his divine power, God has given us everything we need for living a godly life. We have received all of this by coming to know him, the one who called us to himself by means of his marvelous glory and excellence. And because of his glory and excellence, he has given us great and precious promises. These are the promises that enable you to share his divine nature and escape the world’s corruption caused by human desires” (2 Peter 1:3, 4, NLT). It’s significant that this is written in the past tense, in that we don’t have to work to earn the right to stand in God’s presence the way the people had to in the Old Testament. Jesus makes us holy and righteous, and gives us the same nature that He has. We receive this, and all of God’s other promises, by faith.

Forgiveness for sins was also given at the cross, which means we’re free from the burden of guilt or shame for something that happened in the past. “Then said Jesus, Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do…” (Luke 23:34). There’s no need to be tied down by condemnation when Jesus died to take it from us. We’re now living with all of the blessings and none of the curses. The knowledge of this radically transforms us and empowers us to live up to our highest potential.

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LION’S ATTITUDE
“When a lion saw an elephant, he saw a lunch, not a threat. “ – Dr. Myles Munroe

– Lions see themselves as Kings, as Conquerors. You are small because that is how you think you are. See yourself how God sees you. The Bible says in Psalms 23:7 that “For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he”. Everything comes from how you see yourself. You should know and secured on your identity in Christ Jesus. The more you know Christ, the more you know who you are and what you are capable of.

“For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he..” (Psalms 23:7)

Jesus knows who He is when He came in this world. He knows His assignment, and He knows His significance. You have a GREAT POTENTIAL. But if you don’t have the BELIEF, your potential will become a victim of your present belief.

LION’S BOLDNESS
“When a lion roar, everyone is paying attention.”

Boldness does not mean you are always aggressive. But it means that everything you do or say should be remarkable, powerful that captures everyone attention. Lions make themselves heard throughout the kingdom. Start your leadership by knowing yourself and enjoy it. Be expressive. If your talent is writing, express yourself through it. If it is singing, express yourself through it. Lion is not shy. Be bold! Be bold on your gift. Be bold on your passion! Use it for His glory!

“Whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” (1 Corinthians 10:31)

LIONS DON’T WALK WITH DOGS
“Lions gather together with their own kind.”

Unlike other cats, lions are very social animals. They live in groups, called prides. and they don’t walk with other creatures – they just walk with their own kind. You can’t be successful if you surround yourself with negative people. Seek the company of lions. Choose your company very carefully. Keep a company with the same heartbeat, same fierceness, same blood, same passion!

“Do not be misled: “Bad company corrupts good character.”” (1 Corinthians 15:33)

LIONS DO NOT EAT DEAD MEAT.
“They eat their prey alive. Warmblooded. “

Be wise in your feeding. Choose wisely.

What are you watching during your free time? Choose wisely because we will become what we eat.

Choose what you watch. Choose what you hear. Choose what you eat. Don’t eat dead meat. They are not healthy. Have a healthy diet. Eat the Word of God daily with fresh revelations from it – and you will have a healthy life.

“Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.” (Proverbs 4:23)

LIONS MENTOR THE NEXT GENERATION KINGS
“Lionesses bring their cubs and let them watch how the lions strategically catch and eat their prey.”

Lions prepares the next generation of the kingdom. Leaders love mentoring. They prepare the next generation leaders. They are generational. As Dr. Myles Munroe quoted “Great leaders do not seek power, but they seek to empower”. We are responsible for the next generation’s success. How we prepare them is how we prepare our future.

Things to remember:

The first act of true leadership is to identify, train and develop a replacement.
True leaders do not retire. They just go to the next phase.
Mentoring’s goal is not to have a “copy paste” of you. The goal is to develop people who will become greater than you.
You are bigger than your current position. Do not let your current position trap and limit your exposure. Train people to take your place so God can expand your territory.

“The things which you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, entrust these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also.” (2 Timothy 2:2)

LIONS FIND TIME TO REST
“Lions can spend 20 hours in sleeping.”

Lions find time to rest. The world right now is full of junk and situation that can pressure our lifestyle. Find time to rest your soul. If you want to have an enjoyable life, learn to not let activity dominate your life. Find time to relax. Take time for reflection.

“Delight yourself in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart.” (Psalms 37:4)

Conclusion:

In His first coming, Jesus came as a lamb who took away the sin of the world. But in His second coming, He will come as a LION – as King of kings and Lord of lords. As Kings and Priest here on earth, we should practice our dominion that God has given to us. And as we observed the life of lions –we should see ourselves as rulers and the ones who are in charge here on earth. You are authorized!

by Steve Backlund

This daily habit will change your life – responding to the negative circumstances you face with godly beliefs, actively building your spiritual belief muscles. If we actively choose to disarm the enemy’s lies and respond to the negative, “oh no!” situations we encounter each day with God’s truth and His perspective, not only will negative circumstances begin to affect us less emotionally, spiritually, and even physically, but we will also learn to extract the spiritual benefits hidden within each daily challenge, and build up our belief muscles in the process. I’ve found that building your spiritual belief muscles daily is the key to strengthening yourself to impenetrable faith long-term.

We all face various negative circumstances on a daily basis and when these these occurrences happen, we’re presented with a powerful choice (and opportunity). We can either:

Grow weaker by agreeing with the negative and increasing its weightiness through…

Rehearsing lies we’re believing about ourselves, God, other people, or the hopelessness of the circumstances.

Exacerbating the potential negative results, OR,

Grow stronger by agreeing with God and counteracting the weight of negative circumstances with…

Biblical, healthy beliefs about ourselves, God, the circumstances we’re facing, and other people in our lives.

Asking God what He is doing and declaring His Truth instead of declaring and rehearsing the negative.

The power available to us is in the daily choice.

We can see this concept at work in Nehemiah 6, when Nehemiah is rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem. Three harassing spirits are bothering Nehemiah and ask him to come down to the valley of Ono. Nehemiah responds, “I am doing a great work and I cannot come down. Why should the work stop while I leave it and come down to you?” (Nehemiah 6:30).

Many of us go through daily life just trying to avoid challenges or “oh no’s”, but I am trying to develop a different habit in my life. What if my current life situation is just training for my bigger purpose? If so, then each day is a simply a training workout in which each “oh no” I encounter is intended to strengthen me to fulfill my calling.

So, rather than attempting to avoid “oh no’s”, what if we intentionally focused in on these challenges in our daily lives the same way an athlete focuses in on building specific muscle groups in weight-lifting? If I allow myself to become aware of each “oh no,” I’ll begin to understand which belief muscle God trying to build in me based on the “oh no.” Instead of passively allowing these negative circumstances to happen, I recognize when they happen each day and extract the benefits God was making available to me through that challenge.

Then, I can reflect upon what caused me to descend from my place of faith, hope, and love throughout the day and ask myself and the Lord questions to build that muscle further, like: What were circumstances that caused me to become hopeless? How did my emotions, energy levels, and thought patterns respond to those circumstances? Are there any lies that I am repeating to myself when those circumstances happen? What benefits is God making available to me in these “oh no’s” that I can extract to build my belief muscles?

Often, when we’re heading down into the valley of “oh no,” the enemy likes to play negative self-talk tapes in our heads on repeat with phrases like:

“You’re never going to get it.”
“You should be afraid.”
“There is something uniquely wrong with you.”
These lying tapes of failure, condemnation, and hopelessness have to go. As we put our trust in God and His word, new tapes of what He is saying over us, in us, and through us will replace the repetitive lies of the enemy.

For example, when I watch the news and see something happening politically that I don’t like, I notice my joy begins to decline and a spirit of heaviness descends upon me. In that place, and over many years, I’ve learned to ask, “God, what are you building in me that is more important than this actual situation?” He’s told me things like:

Belief that my prayers for my nation are actually working.
Belief that no matter what happens, I will thrive and can do all things through Christ.
Belief that it is my mission to love my “enemies” and pray for those I would wish to criticize (thus building the muscle of love).
Each day, I’m learning that my response to something is almost always more important than the something that occurs. I’m learning how to prosper in my soul beyond what is happening to me. I’m learning to take biblical truths and make them daily thought patterns and to build belief muscles by pressing in toward what is resisting my joy each day.

As you begin to intentionally build your beliefs muscles and see from God’s perspective more and more each day, you’ll find you begin facing each “oh no” not with hopelessness and resistance, but with joy and as a purposeful opportunity to strengthen your faith. You become the great spiritual maximizer who finds strength in all things, particularly your obstacles

1. Know the faith walk is first to believe, and then to see – I used to only believe that something was true after I had experienced it through circumstances. For instance, I would not believe I was an influencer of nations until I actually saw that I was influencing nations. God told me, “That is not how this all works. You must believe to see, not see to believe.” Faith is believing something is true even before we see it in our experience.

2. Know things don’t immediately change when you set a new temperature on your thermostat – It would be foolish to say, “This is not working!” only thirty seconds after you set a new temperature on the thermostat. It takes time for the environment to catch up to the new setting. Likewise, our experiences will catch up to our beliefs and the waiting time is called “faith.”

3. Know we cannot get our beliefs from our feelings or our past experiences – These are the two main ingredients of “thermostatic living”: 1) We don’t deny the past, but we cannot get our beliefs from it, and 2) we acknowledge the facts of what is happening, but we believe in truths that Holy Spirit guides us into about what He is doing in the situation. These truths are actually higher than the facts of our experiences.

4. Know that what we renew our minds with today radically influences what we will experience tomorrow – Romans 12:2 says to “be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” How we renew our minds now creates future experiences. If we only renew our minds with what has happened, we will repeat what has happened. Thermostatic people intentionally meditate on and believe the promises of God even when their experiences are saying something totally different.

5. Know “life is in the power of the tongue” – Those who don’t upgrade their language will have more difficulty being thermostatic. Our words are containers of life or death (Proverbs 18:21) and they become a directing force in our lives (James 3:2-5).