April 24, 2025 • 19 mins
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hey, everyone, it's Daily Hope with Pastor Rick Warren. So
we're continuing with this series called Daring Faith the Key
to Miracles.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
And in this series you're.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Learning how to have a bold, unshakable faith. And so
far this series is giving all of us powerful tools
to share our faith, a faith that gives you courage
to impact the world around you. All right here it
comes Pastor Rick with part two of a message called
Daring to Imagine.
Speaker 3 (00:32):
So my imagination shapes my life, and imagination is essential
to living by faith.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Number three. Third thing I've learned.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
Great lives are built on great dreams. Great lives are
built around great dreams.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
In my lifetime, I've.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Had the opportunity to meet a lot of very great people.
Some of them are famous, some of them are not famous.
Because fame and greatness have nothing to do with each other.
You can be famous and not be great, and you
can be great and not be famous. But in great lives,
they're built around great dreams. What I've discovered is that
nobody is naturally a great person. You don't just pop
(01:09):
out of your mommy being a great person. No, you
become great by attaching your life to a great cause.
A great purpose or a great dream. You need something
bigger than yourself to draw you out of yourself, to
make you grow better than yourself. And that's what makes
you a great person. Until you have a great dream,
you will never be a great woman. Until you have
(01:33):
a great dream for your life, you will never be
a great man if you don't have a great vision.
If you don't have a great dream, it is impossible
for you to be great. Greatness comes from what you
attach yourself to. You need something bigger than yourself that
pulls you out of your self centeredness that makes you great.
Now during during faith, I want to help you unlock
(01:57):
your imagination and I want to help you become a
mo or great person. And I want you to dream
and to visualize them, to think about how God wants
to use your career, how God wants to use your future,
your finances, your family, your giving, your ministry, your career.
And my prayer for you is actually this next verse
on your outlines Pesians chapter one. As your pastor, I'm
(02:21):
praying this, may God enlighten the eyes of your mind
so that you can see the hope that His calling
holds for you. And notice this may God enlighten the
eyes of your mind. What's he talking about there, the
eyes of your mind. He's not talking about your physical eyes.
He's talking about your imagination. He's saying, I pray that
your imagination will come alive and in faith, you will
(02:44):
be able to see God's dream for your life. God's
vision for your life, God's purpose and plan for your life,
God's calling on your life. God has a calling for you.
Most people miss their calling in life. Why because they're
following their dream instead of God's dream. I'm not interested
in you following your dream. I'm interested in you in
(03:06):
following God's dream. I could make up a dream for
my life. I could say, you know, I dream of
being a rock star, and it would be a waste
of my life because God didn't wire me to be
a rock star.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
God said, I want you to give you.
Speaker 3 (03:21):
I want to give you my dream for your life,
and that's your calling. And he says, when you understand
what I've made you for, what I've built you for,
what I have a vision for your life, then you're going.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
To have hope. You will know the hope that is
calling holds for you.
Speaker 3 (03:37):
If you want significance in your life, if you want
satisfaction in your life, if you want fulfillment in your life.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Here's what you gotta do.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
You got to stop following your dream for your life,
and you've got to start following God's dream for your life.
Because God's dream, when you fulfill it, you go, this
is it. This is what I was made to be.
It fits. I know my niche, I know why I'm alive.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
Now.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
If you can't imagine, you're calling. If you can't dream
God's dream, you're not really living. You're just existing and
you're just going through life. And without a dream, you're dying.
The Bible says in Proverbs twenty eight eighteen, where there
is no vision, what does it.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
Say the people perish? Circle that the people perish?
Speaker 3 (04:21):
I tell pastors when a church has no dream, where
there's no vision in a church, that people go to
another perish.
Speaker 2 (04:31):
Now, as I.
Speaker 3 (04:31):
Said, I want you to discover God's dream. And one
of the things that I told you that during daring faith.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
I'm going to push you. I'm going to stretch you.
Speaker 3 (04:39):
I'm going to challenge you to discover God's dream for
your life. And that leads me to number four. The
fourth thing I've learned, and it's this. God's dream for
my life is bigger than my dream. God's dream for
my life is bigger than my dream. It's exponentially bigger.
It's far larger. It's eternally significant. There are a lot
(05:00):
of dreams. You could have big dreams and they wouldn't
be significant. You could dream of being a millionaire by
a certain age. Your dream of being a billionaire.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
For what purpose?
Speaker 3 (05:09):
Just do you think God puts you on this planet
to live for yourself? Of course not, of course not.
God's dream is for your life is bigger than your dream.
Let me show you what the Bible says Ephesians three.
God can do anything, you know, far more than you
could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dream. Notice,
(05:32):
far more than you could ever imagine. God can do
that in your life, or guess or request in your
wildest dream.
Speaker 2 (05:38):
Now let me stop there.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
I don't know about you, but I'm a pretty big dreamer.
I've never been accused of small dreaming. I've never been
accused of being a tiny thinker. I have big visions
in life, and yet God says, rick, think of the
greatest thing I could do in your life. Think of
the greatest way I could bless your life. Dream the
biggest dream, the greatest vision, and I can top that.
(06:03):
You have no idea what God wants to do in
your life. You are living such a small fraction of
what you're capable of. You were doing with your life,
such a small portion of what God wants to do
in your life. God's dream for your life is enormous.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
It's big.
Speaker 3 (06:23):
He says, I can do more than you can imagine
or guests or requestion in your wildest dream. The Bible
says He does it not by pushing us around, but
by working within us his spirit deeply and gently within us.
And by the way, the next verse after that says,
so glory to God in the Church, glory to God
in Jesus, Glory to God in all generations, and glory to.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
God forever and ever. We just sang that. That's this verse.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
We just sang this glory to God forever. Now, I
want you to write this down in your outline.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
God wants me to dream big. Write that down.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
God wants me to dream big. He wants me to
use the imagination that He gave me. Because dreaming big
honors God. It shows faith, It shows trust. Now you
should base your dream not on what you think you
could do, but you should base your dream on what
(07:17):
you think God could do. I remember many years ago
when we bought the Lake Forest property and the word
got out in Orange County that a church was going
to go buy one hundred and twenty acres. Let's put
this a perspective, that's bigger than Disneyland. His property is
bigger than Disneyland. And people said, what kind of church
(07:39):
is this going to go buy one hundred and twenty
acres of Orange County property? Who do those people think
they are? And when I heard that, I said, that's
the wrong question. The question is not who do we
think we are? It's who do we think God is.
(08:00):
That's the real issue. I write this down. Let the
size of my God determine the size of my goal.
I must let the size of my God, not the
size of my gifts, but the size of my God
determine the size of my goal. God's dream for my
life is bigger than my dream. Number five, The fifth
(08:23):
thing I've learned about dreaming and vision and imagination is this,
Doubt is the enemy of imagination. Doubt is the enemy
of imagination. Now, doubt and fear neutralize what God wants
to do in your life.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
You see, it takes courage to imagine. Why.
Speaker 3 (08:44):
You know why most people don't imagine because they're afraid
of failure. When you were a kid, you had a
great imagination. Children have a massive amount of imagination. But
the older you get, the more your imagination grows rusty.
You stop imagining what things could be, and you just
start living the way they are, and you get stuck
(09:06):
in the status quo, which is Latin for the mess
we're in, and you don't imagine what they could be.
You just imagine or you just think about what it is,
and you stop using that imagination muscle in your life.
Doubt is the enemy of imagination, and that's why it
takes courage. And by the way, what is courage. Courage
(09:27):
is doing the thing you fear the most. If you're
not afraid, you don't need courage. You don't need courage.
Courage only happens when you're scared to death. Courage is
when you're scared to death. He said, I'm going to
do it anyway. In the history of Saddleback Church, every
great thing that we did, I was scared to death
to do scared to death?
Speaker 2 (09:46):
Dude, I just said, we're going to do it anyway.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
Why because I'm not going to about to let fear
dominate my life. So I do it, moving ahead, trembling,
moving ahead in fear, and I just do it anyway
and God shows up.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
God will show up in your life.
Speaker 3 (10:01):
Courage is when you do the thing while you're afraid.
You do the right thing. He said, should I wait
till all the fears gone? It's never gonna go away.
You just do it while you're afraid, and then it
goes away. Doubt is the enemy of imagination. You have
to move against your fears, and sometimes you have to
ignore all the insecures you're feeling.
Speaker 2 (10:21):
You say, I'm gonna do it. I'm just gonna go
for it.
Speaker 3 (10:24):
I'm gonna do it even though I'm scared to death
and I'm insecure and i might fail, and blah blah
blah blah blah. James, Chapter one. If you need wisdom,
you want to know God's dream vision for your life.
If you need wisdom, just ask God for it because
he's generous and he enjoys giving it to everyone. But
when you ask, you must believe and not doubt. For
(10:46):
a doubtful mind is as unsettled as a wave of
the sea that's driven back and forth and tossed about
by the wind. Such doubters cannot decide anything that they do.
So they should not imagine there's that word. They should
not imagine receiving anything from the Lord. You gotta believe,
and you've gotta banish doubt. You know what you need
(11:07):
to do. You need to doubt your doubts and believe
your beliefs. The problem we have today is we do
the exact opposite. We believe our doubts and we doubt
our beliefs. No doubts are meant to be doubted. Beliefs
are meant to be believed. So you believe your beliefs
and you doubt your doubts. Your imagination in your life
is either gonna be governed by fear or it's gonna
(11:29):
be governed by faith.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
And that's your choice. Now.
Speaker 3 (11:32):
If you let your imagination be governed by fear, you're
gonna go around freaked out, stressed out, worried all the time,
and you're gonna worry about what other people think, and
you're gonna worry about are you gonna have enough?
Speaker 2 (11:43):
And you're gonna worry about this and this and that.
Speaker 3 (11:45):
And when you allow fear to control your imagination, you
live a miserable life. And instead, if you say, I'm
not gonna allow fear to dominate me, I'm gonna allow
faith to dominate me, and I'm gonna trust in God.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
All things are possible with God.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
Then your imagination talks about what could happen, the good
things that might happen, and your imagination moves you ahead.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Doubt will destroy you.
Speaker 3 (12:10):
Now, there's a great story in the Bible about a
man who had a son who was sick, and he
comes to Jesus, and we pick up the story in
Mark chapter nine, and the man says to Jesus, please
heal my son if you can. And Jesus replied, what
do you mean if I can? Anything is possible if
(12:33):
a person believes. The father replied, I do believe, but
help me not to doubt. I love this passage because
I love the authenticity. I love the honesty of this guy.
He goes, I believe. I just got some doubts. And
one of the passages in translations, he says, Lord, I
do believe, help me with my unbelief. And you know
(12:57):
what Jesus's response was to this guy when he said,
I mean, if all things are possible if you believe,
and the guy says, well, I do believe, help me
with my doubts.
Speaker 2 (13:07):
You know what Jesus said.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
He does good enough, and he heals the guy right
there on the spot.
Speaker 2 (13:12):
On the spot.
Speaker 3 (13:13):
You know, I wish I had learned a long time
agoing wish somebody told me that I don't have to
have all my doubts resolved and all my questions answered
in order to follow Jesus Christ and enjoy all the
benefits of it. I've been walking with Jesus Christ now
for almost well over fifty years. I still have questions.
(13:34):
I got a list of them. I still have doubts.
When I get to have it, I'm going to be
You can get in line behind me. I've got all
my questions to ask Jesus. Jesus, why did you do this?
Why did you do that? I doubted this. I doubted this.
I didn't think this was a good thing. You did
here and on and on, and I'm just going to
go through my laundry list of questions and doubts.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
Why, because I believe I just have some doubts.
Speaker 3 (13:58):
Now, if I had thought that I had to answer
all my doubts and all my questions, I still wouldn't
even be a Christian. What I learned listen very closely
is I don't have to understand something for me to
benefit from it. I don't have to have it all
figured out for me to benefit from it. For instance,
(14:19):
I don't understand how internal combustion works. It doesn't stop
me from driving a car. I don't understand the chemistry
of digestion. It doesn't stop me from eating steak. I
don't understand how there are literally colored pictures flying through
(14:39):
the air right now and going through my body and
yours that it doesn't stop me from turning on a
TV and watching them.
Speaker 2 (14:46):
How the world does that happen? I don't know.
Speaker 3 (14:49):
How can I pick out my phone and talk to
somebody on the other side of the world. I don't
know all of it. I can't explain that to you.
But I don't have to explain it to enjoy it.
Does that make sense? And I don't have to have
all my doubts answered, all my questions resolve in order
to live by faith. Lord, I believe, help me with
my doubts. God says, that's good enough. And so doubt
(15:11):
will destroy you if you let it keep you from
imagining and being all that God wants you to be.
So this guy comes to Jesus and he says, Lord,
I want to believe, help me with my doubts. Have
you ever cried out to God that way? Have you
ever cried out to God and said, Lord.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
I want to believe, help me with my doubts. You
need to do that this morning if you haven't. Now.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
One of the things that happens because of doubt and
because of fear and because of worry is vision begins
to dissipate in your life. You get a dream, but
you leak and your dream dissipates. A lot of people
start off in life with a great dream, a great goal,
a great vision, a great objective, a great cause and
(15:59):
a purpose to live their lives for. But over time
it begins to dissipate and drain out and leak out
of their life. Just much like you buy a balloon
with healing minute, you put it up in your house
and three days later nobody's actually poked it.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
It didn't all leak out at once.
Speaker 3 (16:13):
It just started to leak out a little bit at
a time, and pretty soon it's droopy. And some of
you have a flat tire emotionally, and you got a
flat tire mentally because you don't. You're not dreaming anymore,
You're not believing anymore. And so what you have to
do is you have to re energize the dream periodically.
(16:34):
You have to refuel the dream or you run out
of gas.
Speaker 1 (16:41):
What a great message today from Pastor Rick. There's something
I always can use in my own life after listening
to this show. All right, would you like to step
out of a life of ordinary existence and into a
life of extraordinary faith? Then please order the Daring Faith
DVD study kit by Pastor Rick Warren. Here's Rick to
(17:03):
tell you more.
Speaker 3 (17:04):
How'd you like to have a bold, unshakable faith that
gives you the courage to make the changes you've always
wanted to see in your life, your work, your family,
and in the world. That's not a dream. That's exactly
what God wants to do in your life. He wants
you to learn to live by daring faith. The Bible says,
(17:24):
according to your faith, it will be done under you.
Now to help you develop that kind of faith, I
put together a Daring Faith Study Kit, and it includes
a DVD and it includes a workbook. Now there's six
sessions in the Daring Faith Study Kit, and it'll teach
you these six things. How to build a life of faith,
(17:45):
how to expect the best from God, how to stretch
your imagination in order to see what God wants to
do in your life to expand your vision. How to
have the courage to take the initiative with your faith,
how to face your fears with bold faith, and how
to believe and what to do while you're waiting on God.
You cannot afford to miss this series. It was one
(18:08):
of the most important series I've ever done at Saddleback Church.
And the Bible tells us in Ephesians three twelve, because
of our faith in Him, we dare to have boldness
and courage and confidence in coming to God with freedom
and without fear. I want you to have that boldness,
that courage, and that confidence when you come to God
in prayer. I want you to come to Him without
(18:29):
fear and come to Him in freedom. God will use
this Daring Faith Study Kit just like He used it
in the lives of tens of thousands of other people.
He'll use it in your life if you'll trust him
in all things. So get this kit today.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
You know, today, when you give a gift to help
Daily Hope take the hope of Jesus to a hurting world,
we will send you a copy of the Daring Faith
Study Kit, and it has six video sessions and a workbook.
And that's our way of saying thanks for your gift
at Pastorick dot com. Or you could text the word
hope to eight hundred, six hundred five thousand and four
(19:06):
to get this great study tool. Again, that's Pastorick dot com.
Or text the word hope to eight hundred six hundred
five thousand and four and thank you so much for
your support. We hope you'll join us next time when
we look into God's word for our daily hope. This
program is sponsored by Pastor Rick's Daily Hope and your
(19:28):
generous financial support.
Hey, everyone, it's Daily Hope with Pastor Rick Warren. So
we're continuing with this series called Daring Faith the Key
to Miracles.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
And in this series you're.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Learning how to have a bold, unshakable faith. And so
far this series is giving all of us powerful tools
to share our faith, a faith that gives you courage
to impact the world around you. All right here it
comes Pastor Rick with part two of a message called
Daring to Imagine.
Speaker 3 (00:32):
So my imagination shapes my life, and imagination is essential
to living by faith.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Number three. Third thing I've learned.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
Great lives are built on great dreams. Great lives are
built around great dreams.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
In my lifetime, I've.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Had the opportunity to meet a lot of very great people.
Some of them are famous, some of them are not famous.
Because fame and greatness have nothing to do with each other.
You can be famous and not be great, and you
can be great and not be famous. But in great lives,
they're built around great dreams. What I've discovered is that
nobody is naturally a great person. You don't just pop
(01:09):
out of your mommy being a great person. No, you
become great by attaching your life to a great cause.
A great purpose or a great dream. You need something
bigger than yourself to draw you out of yourself, to
make you grow better than yourself. And that's what makes
you a great person. Until you have a great dream,
you will never be a great woman. Until you have
(01:33):
a great dream for your life, you will never be
a great man if you don't have a great vision.
If you don't have a great dream, it is impossible
for you to be great. Greatness comes from what you
attach yourself to. You need something bigger than yourself that
pulls you out of your self centeredness that makes you great.
Now during during faith, I want to help you unlock
(01:57):
your imagination and I want to help you become a
mo or great person. And I want you to dream
and to visualize them, to think about how God wants
to use your career, how God wants to use your future,
your finances, your family, your giving, your ministry, your career.
And my prayer for you is actually this next verse
on your outlines Pesians chapter one. As your pastor, I'm
(02:21):
praying this, may God enlighten the eyes of your mind
so that you can see the hope that His calling
holds for you. And notice this may God enlighten the
eyes of your mind. What's he talking about there, the
eyes of your mind. He's not talking about your physical eyes.
He's talking about your imagination. He's saying, I pray that
your imagination will come alive and in faith, you will
(02:44):
be able to see God's dream for your life. God's
vision for your life, God's purpose and plan for your life,
God's calling on your life. God has a calling for you.
Most people miss their calling in life. Why because they're
following their dream instead of God's dream. I'm not interested
in you following your dream. I'm interested in you in
(03:06):
following God's dream. I could make up a dream for
my life. I could say, you know, I dream of
being a rock star, and it would be a waste
of my life because God didn't wire me to be
a rock star.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
God said, I want you to give you.
Speaker 3 (03:21):
I want to give you my dream for your life,
and that's your calling. And he says, when you understand
what I've made you for, what I've built you for,
what I have a vision for your life, then you're going.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
To have hope. You will know the hope that is
calling holds for you.
Speaker 3 (03:37):
If you want significance in your life, if you want
satisfaction in your life, if you want fulfillment in your life.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Here's what you gotta do.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
You got to stop following your dream for your life,
and you've got to start following God's dream for your life.
Because God's dream, when you fulfill it, you go, this
is it. This is what I was made to be.
It fits. I know my niche, I know why I'm alive.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
Now.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
If you can't imagine, you're calling. If you can't dream
God's dream, you're not really living. You're just existing and
you're just going through life. And without a dream, you're dying.
The Bible says in Proverbs twenty eight eighteen, where there
is no vision, what does it.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
Say the people perish? Circle that the people perish?
Speaker 3 (04:21):
I tell pastors when a church has no dream, where
there's no vision in a church, that people go to
another perish.
Speaker 2 (04:31):
Now, as I.
Speaker 3 (04:31):
Said, I want you to discover God's dream. And one
of the things that I told you that during daring faith.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
I'm going to push you. I'm going to stretch you.
Speaker 3 (04:39):
I'm going to challenge you to discover God's dream for
your life. And that leads me to number four. The
fourth thing I've learned, and it's this. God's dream for
my life is bigger than my dream. God's dream for
my life is bigger than my dream. It's exponentially bigger.
It's far larger. It's eternally significant. There are a lot
(05:00):
of dreams. You could have big dreams and they wouldn't
be significant. You could dream of being a millionaire by
a certain age. Your dream of being a billionaire.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
For what purpose?
Speaker 3 (05:09):
Just do you think God puts you on this planet
to live for yourself? Of course not, of course not.
God's dream is for your life is bigger than your dream.
Let me show you what the Bible says Ephesians three.
God can do anything, you know, far more than you
could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dream. Notice,
(05:32):
far more than you could ever imagine. God can do
that in your life, or guess or request in your
wildest dream.
Speaker 2 (05:38):
Now let me stop there.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
I don't know about you, but I'm a pretty big dreamer.
I've never been accused of small dreaming. I've never been
accused of being a tiny thinker. I have big visions
in life, and yet God says, rick, think of the
greatest thing I could do in your life. Think of
the greatest way I could bless your life. Dream the
biggest dream, the greatest vision, and I can top that.
(06:03):
You have no idea what God wants to do in
your life. You are living such a small fraction of
what you're capable of. You were doing with your life,
such a small portion of what God wants to do
in your life. God's dream for your life is enormous.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
It's big.
Speaker 3 (06:23):
He says, I can do more than you can imagine
or guests or requestion in your wildest dream. The Bible
says He does it not by pushing us around, but
by working within us his spirit deeply and gently within us.
And by the way, the next verse after that says,
so glory to God in the Church, glory to God
in Jesus, Glory to God in all generations, and glory to.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
God forever and ever. We just sang that. That's this verse.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
We just sang this glory to God forever. Now, I
want you to write this down in your outline.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
God wants me to dream big. Write that down.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
God wants me to dream big. He wants me to
use the imagination that He gave me. Because dreaming big
honors God. It shows faith, It shows trust. Now you
should base your dream not on what you think you
could do, but you should base your dream on what
(07:17):
you think God could do. I remember many years ago
when we bought the Lake Forest property and the word
got out in Orange County that a church was going
to go buy one hundred and twenty acres. Let's put
this a perspective, that's bigger than Disneyland. His property is
bigger than Disneyland. And people said, what kind of church
(07:39):
is this going to go buy one hundred and twenty
acres of Orange County property? Who do those people think
they are? And when I heard that, I said, that's
the wrong question. The question is not who do we
think we are? It's who do we think God is.
(08:00):
That's the real issue. I write this down. Let the
size of my God determine the size of my goal.
I must let the size of my God, not the
size of my gifts, but the size of my God
determine the size of my goal. God's dream for my
life is bigger than my dream. Number five, The fifth
(08:23):
thing I've learned about dreaming and vision and imagination is this,
Doubt is the enemy of imagination. Doubt is the enemy
of imagination. Now, doubt and fear neutralize what God wants
to do in your life.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
You see, it takes courage to imagine. Why.
Speaker 3 (08:44):
You know why most people don't imagine because they're afraid
of failure. When you were a kid, you had a
great imagination. Children have a massive amount of imagination. But
the older you get, the more your imagination grows rusty.
You stop imagining what things could be, and you just
start living the way they are, and you get stuck
(09:06):
in the status quo, which is Latin for the mess
we're in, and you don't imagine what they could be.
You just imagine or you just think about what it is,
and you stop using that imagination muscle in your life.
Doubt is the enemy of imagination, and that's why it
takes courage. And by the way, what is courage. Courage
(09:27):
is doing the thing you fear the most. If you're
not afraid, you don't need courage. You don't need courage.
Courage only happens when you're scared to death. Courage is
when you're scared to death. He said, I'm going to
do it anyway. In the history of Saddleback Church, every
great thing that we did, I was scared to death
to do scared to death?
Speaker 2 (09:46):
Dude, I just said, we're going to do it anyway.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
Why because I'm not going to about to let fear
dominate my life. So I do it, moving ahead, trembling,
moving ahead in fear, and I just do it anyway
and God shows up.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
God will show up in your life.
Speaker 3 (10:01):
Courage is when you do the thing while you're afraid.
You do the right thing. He said, should I wait
till all the fears gone? It's never gonna go away.
You just do it while you're afraid, and then it
goes away. Doubt is the enemy of imagination. You have
to move against your fears, and sometimes you have to
ignore all the insecures you're feeling.
Speaker 2 (10:21):
You say, I'm gonna do it. I'm just gonna go
for it.
Speaker 3 (10:24):
I'm gonna do it even though I'm scared to death
and I'm insecure and i might fail, and blah blah
blah blah blah. James, Chapter one. If you need wisdom,
you want to know God's dream vision for your life.
If you need wisdom, just ask God for it because
he's generous and he enjoys giving it to everyone. But
when you ask, you must believe and not doubt. For
(10:46):
a doubtful mind is as unsettled as a wave of
the sea that's driven back and forth and tossed about
by the wind. Such doubters cannot decide anything that they do.
So they should not imagine there's that word. They should
not imagine receiving anything from the Lord. You gotta believe,
and you've gotta banish doubt. You know what you need
(11:07):
to do. You need to doubt your doubts and believe
your beliefs. The problem we have today is we do
the exact opposite. We believe our doubts and we doubt
our beliefs. No doubts are meant to be doubted. Beliefs
are meant to be believed. So you believe your beliefs
and you doubt your doubts. Your imagination in your life
is either gonna be governed by fear or it's gonna
(11:29):
be governed by faith.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
And that's your choice. Now.
Speaker 3 (11:32):
If you let your imagination be governed by fear, you're
gonna go around freaked out, stressed out, worried all the time,
and you're gonna worry about what other people think, and
you're gonna worry about are you gonna have enough?
Speaker 2 (11:43):
And you're gonna worry about this and this and that.
Speaker 3 (11:45):
And when you allow fear to control your imagination, you
live a miserable life. And instead, if you say, I'm
not gonna allow fear to dominate me, I'm gonna allow
faith to dominate me, and I'm gonna trust in God.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
All things are possible with God.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
Then your imagination talks about what could happen, the good
things that might happen, and your imagination moves you ahead.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Doubt will destroy you.
Speaker 3 (12:10):
Now, there's a great story in the Bible about a
man who had a son who was sick, and he
comes to Jesus, and we pick up the story in
Mark chapter nine, and the man says to Jesus, please
heal my son if you can. And Jesus replied, what
do you mean if I can? Anything is possible if
(12:33):
a person believes. The father replied, I do believe, but
help me not to doubt. I love this passage because
I love the authenticity. I love the honesty of this guy.
He goes, I believe. I just got some doubts. And
one of the passages in translations, he says, Lord, I
do believe, help me with my unbelief. And you know
(12:57):
what Jesus's response was to this guy when he said,
I mean, if all things are possible if you believe,
and the guy says, well, I do believe, help me
with my doubts.
Speaker 2 (13:07):
You know what Jesus said.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
He does good enough, and he heals the guy right
there on the spot.
Speaker 2 (13:12):
On the spot.
Speaker 3 (13:13):
You know, I wish I had learned a long time
agoing wish somebody told me that I don't have to
have all my doubts resolved and all my questions answered
in order to follow Jesus Christ and enjoy all the
benefits of it. I've been walking with Jesus Christ now
for almost well over fifty years. I still have questions.
(13:34):
I got a list of them. I still have doubts.
When I get to have it, I'm going to be
You can get in line behind me. I've got all
my questions to ask Jesus. Jesus, why did you do this?
Why did you do that? I doubted this. I doubted this.
I didn't think this was a good thing. You did
here and on and on, and I'm just going to
go through my laundry list of questions and doubts.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
Why, because I believe I just have some doubts.
Speaker 3 (13:58):
Now, if I had thought that I had to answer
all my doubts and all my questions, I still wouldn't
even be a Christian. What I learned listen very closely
is I don't have to understand something for me to
benefit from it. I don't have to have it all
figured out for me to benefit from it. For instance,
(14:19):
I don't understand how internal combustion works. It doesn't stop
me from driving a car. I don't understand the chemistry
of digestion. It doesn't stop me from eating steak. I
don't understand how there are literally colored pictures flying through
(14:39):
the air right now and going through my body and
yours that it doesn't stop me from turning on a
TV and watching them.
Speaker 2 (14:46):
How the world does that happen? I don't know.
Speaker 3 (14:49):
How can I pick out my phone and talk to
somebody on the other side of the world. I don't
know all of it. I can't explain that to you.
But I don't have to explain it to enjoy it.
Does that make sense? And I don't have to have
all my doubts answered, all my questions resolve in order
to live by faith. Lord, I believe, help me with
my doubts. God says, that's good enough. And so doubt
(15:11):
will destroy you if you let it keep you from
imagining and being all that God wants you to be.
So this guy comes to Jesus and he says, Lord,
I want to believe, help me with my doubts. Have
you ever cried out to God that way? Have you
ever cried out to God and said, Lord.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
I want to believe, help me with my doubts. You
need to do that this morning if you haven't. Now.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
One of the things that happens because of doubt and
because of fear and because of worry is vision begins
to dissipate in your life. You get a dream, but
you leak and your dream dissipates. A lot of people
start off in life with a great dream, a great goal,
a great vision, a great objective, a great cause and
(15:59):
a purpose to live their lives for. But over time
it begins to dissipate and drain out and leak out
of their life. Just much like you buy a balloon
with healing minute, you put it up in your house
and three days later nobody's actually poked it.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
It didn't all leak out at once.
Speaker 3 (16:13):
It just started to leak out a little bit at
a time, and pretty soon it's droopy. And some of
you have a flat tire emotionally, and you got a
flat tire mentally because you don't. You're not dreaming anymore,
You're not believing anymore. And so what you have to
do is you have to re energize the dream periodically.
(16:34):
You have to refuel the dream or you run out
of gas.
Speaker 1 (16:41):
What a great message today from Pastor Rick. There's something
I always can use in my own life after listening
to this show. All right, would you like to step
out of a life of ordinary existence and into a
life of extraordinary faith? Then please order the Daring Faith
DVD study kit by Pastor Rick Warren. Here's Rick to
(17:03):
tell you more.
Speaker 3 (17:04):
How'd you like to have a bold, unshakable faith that
gives you the courage to make the changes you've always
wanted to see in your life, your work, your family,
and in the world. That's not a dream. That's exactly
what God wants to do in your life. He wants
you to learn to live by daring faith. The Bible says,
(17:24):
according to your faith, it will be done under you.
Now to help you develop that kind of faith, I
put together a Daring Faith Study Kit, and it includes
a DVD and it includes a workbook. Now there's six
sessions in the Daring Faith Study Kit, and it'll teach
you these six things. How to build a life of faith,
(17:45):
how to expect the best from God, how to stretch
your imagination in order to see what God wants to
do in your life to expand your vision. How to
have the courage to take the initiative with your faith,
how to face your fears with bold faith, and how
to believe and what to do while you're waiting on God.
You cannot afford to miss this series. It was one
(18:08):
of the most important series I've ever done at Saddleback Church.
And the Bible tells us in Ephesians three twelve, because
of our faith in Him, we dare to have boldness
and courage and confidence in coming to God with freedom
and without fear. I want you to have that boldness,
that courage, and that confidence when you come to God
in prayer. I want you to come to Him without
(18:29):
fear and come to Him in freedom. God will use
this Daring Faith Study Kit just like He used it
in the lives of tens of thousands of other people.
He'll use it in your life if you'll trust him
in all things. So get this kit today.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
You know, today, when you give a gift to help
Daily Hope take the hope of Jesus to a hurting world,
we will send you a copy of the Daring Faith
Study Kit, and it has six video sessions and a workbook.
And that's our way of saying thanks for your gift
at Pastorick dot com. Or you could text the word
hope to eight hundred, six hundred five thousand and four
(19:06):
to get this great study tool. Again, that's Pastorick dot com.
Or text the word hope to eight hundred six hundred
five thousand and four and thank you so much for
your support. We hope you'll join us next time when
we look into God's word for our daily hope. This
program is sponsored by Pastor Rick's Daily Hope and your
(19:28):
generous financial support.
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