Join us as Pastor Rick enlightens us on the significance of clear goals and public declaration of faith in our path to achieving our God-given vision. He illustrates with biblical narratives like that of Bartimaeus, highlighting the power of faith, clarity, and immediate responsiveness. This episode provides practical advice on cultivating quietness to hear God’s voice, the importance of setting faith-based goals, and how living out your calling glorifies God.
Hey everyone, welcome to Pastor Rick’s Daily Hope. We’re so glad you’re here. Today, Rick continues in a series called Preparing for Your Future, where he shares how God’s destiny for your life is good and how you get to choose much of your destiny. Okay, well, I can’t wait to get started, so let’s go. Here’s part two of a message called How to Get Your Vision Back.
SPEAKER 02 :
You know, I’m a fairly well-known person. I just, you know, the other day I was in a grocery store and I had, the guy in front of me was buying some stuff and he just paid for everything. And as he was walking away, he realized, he said to the clerk, oh, I meant to buy two sacks of ice. And the clerk goes, well, it’s just right over there. And he goes, okay, I’ll go get it and I’ll come back and pay. And he looks at me, he says, you won’t mind waiting, will you? And I looked at the guy and go, oh no, I said, I’ll just pay for it. He goes, what? I said, I’ll just pay for your eyes. Just pick it up and head on out. He goes, who are you? And the clerk looks across and says, okay, he’s Saddleback Church. So, you know, I’m a fairly well-known guy. But let me tell you what, nobody’s thinking about me. In that grocery store, there wasn’t a single person. I wonder what kind of bread Rick would choose. And I’m pretty well known. You don’t sit at home at night going, I wonder what channel Rick would watch tonight. No, let me just let, here’s what I’m trying to tell you. You would worry a whole lot less about what people think of you if you realized how little they do. Okay? They’re not. They’re not thinking about you. They’re thinking about themselves. And when they walk into some party, they don’t look over and go, ew, what an ugly dress she’s wearing. They’re going, how do I look to everybody? They’re worried about what everybody thinks of them. They’re not thinking about you. So don’t worry about it. Number three, if you’re gonna get your vision back, you gotta have hope, believe that Jesus can change situations. You gotta resist, you gotta ignore the negative voices like this guy did. And number three, you must listen for God’s call. Listen for God’s call. This is what I call the attention step of getting your vision back. You’ve got to pay attention to God, which means you’re gonna have to settle down, slow down, you’re gonna have to stop being busy, and you’re gonna have to be quiet for God to hear God’s call. Notice this verse. The next verse in the story, verse 49, tells us this. So this guy’s yelling, hey, Lord, hey, Jesus, notice me. And they all tell him, shut up. And he still keeps saying, hey, notice me. And in the verse 49, so Jesus stopped and said, call him. Talking about this blind guy. Call him. So they called to the blind men. Cheer up on your feet. He’s calling you. Circle that. He’s calling you. Throwing his cloak aside, he, Bartimaeus, jumped to his feet and and came to Jesus. He’s calling you. You must listen for God’s call. Would you write this down? Calling and vision go together. Calling and vision go together. What do I mean by that? God’s call on your life is God’s vision for your life. They go together. If you want to know God’s vision for the next 10 years, you’ve got to get God’s call on your life. Now, When people talk about, I was called by God, a lot of people think that’s some kind of scary, spooky thing. And like, I was called to be a missionary. I was called to be a pastor. I was called to go work in darkest Africa or the poorest New York City slum. And I feel called. Listen, everybody’s called. In the whole world, everybody is called by God. We’re all called to know him. We’re all called to love him. We’re all called to serve him. We’re all called to share his love with everybody else. We’re all called to be saved by him. We’re all called to be forgiven by him. We’re all called by him to go to heaven. The only question is, are you gonna pick up the phone? He’s calling. but he’s not gonna pick up the phone for you. Are you going to answer the call? And he’s been calling you his entire life. God has been calling you his entire life. And you go, sorry, Lord, I’m busy talking to Snoop Dogg right now. I’ll get back to you. No, no, he’s calling, you’ve gotta pick up the phone. Calling is not something supernatural. It’s God’s plan and purpose for your life. You know, in business, we talk about the word vocation. And we usually say, what is your vocation? Which is your career. Your job is your vocation. It’s what you do. The word vocation comes from the Latin word, voce, which means voice. We get the word vocal, vocalize, voice. Your vocation is your calling. That’s your calling. Some people are called to do real estate development. Some people are called to teach preschoolers. Some people are called to drive a truck, and some people are called to do accounting. Some people are called to raise kids, and some people are called to run for office. Some people are called to study under-seas water animals, and some people are called to make music and art. And we’re all called by God to do different things, and God intentionally called us to do different things so everything in the world gets done. If he called us all to be pastors, there’d be a lot undone. A lot left, nothing done. I’m glad God calls musicians to be musicians, because I happen to like to listen to music. I once thought I was called to be a musician. The problem was I love to sing, nobody liked to hear it. I realized I wasn’t called to be a musician. If you’re called to do it, you’re good at it. And if you do, let me talk to you about the decade of destiny. If you figure out God’s calling for your life, God’s vision for your life for the next 10 years, if you do that, you will succeed in it. If you do anything other than what God’s called you to do, you will fail at it. God does not bless your problems, your vision. He blesses his vision, his calling for your life. And you were not an accident and God made you and created you to fulfill your calling. Now it says here that Jesus called them and they said, come on, get up, get on your feet. He’s calling you. Now here’s the point. Bartimaeus could have missed God’s call if he wasn’t listening. He could have been so busy shouting, hey, hey, I’m over here, hear me. He couldn’t hear Jesus calling him back. The only way you’re gonna hear God’s call is you gotta be quiet. Which means you have to spend some time with God alone, reading the Bible, praying, just being quiet. God has a good plan for your life. He has a plan, he says in Jeremiah, that will give you a hope and a future. And in Decade of Destiny, we’re going to look at God’s plan for your life in detail for the next 10 years. But in order for you to hear it, you’re going to have to be quiet. You can’t hear God’s call. You can’t get God’s vision if you’re distracted by less important things. That’s why the Bible says this up here on the screen. Isaiah chapter 30. In repentance and rest is your salvation. In other words, when I turn to go God’s way and I rest in his grace, then I’m saved, I have salvation. In quietness and trust is your strength. Now notice, you don’t get strength from a pill, you don’t get strength from a bottle, you don’t get strength from TV, you don’t get strength from listening to talk radio, you don’t get strength from your girlfriend, you get strength in quietness and trust. To overcome stress, you have to have periods of quietness where you can hear the call of God in your life. That’s why periodically you just need to get alone and be quiet with God. This last week, Kay and I took the day of Tuesday. And as a husband and wife, we spent the day together quietly in prayer together. Now, when I say the day, that doesn’t mean 24 hours. I’m talking about like from 8 o’clock in the morning till 6 o’clock at night. And it doesn’t even mean you’re talking the whole time. Sometimes you’re quiet. Half a prayer is just listening. And we would listen to music together, Christian music together, and that would cause us to want to pray. And what we pray is the way we pray is conversationally, which I say a little bit and she says a little bit and I say and she and back and forth. And rather than I make a long speech and she makes a long speech, that gets kind of boring. How do you spend a day in prayer? Well, I’ll tell you about that someday, but I’ll tell you one thing is you need to get comfortable. You don’t have to be on your knees the whole time. There’s no spiritual way to pray. Like you have to have your hands folded, knees bowed, and in the most uncomfortable way. No, no, you’re not gonna pray very long if you’re uncomfortable. So to spend a day in prayer, Kay gets comfortable on a couch. I lay down on the living room floor. flat on my back, looking up with my eyes wide open, because if you have ADD, you don’t want to close your eyes when you pray. Because your mind is going to go a million directions, and in a few minutes, you’re going to go, you know. So, and then you need to understand, it’s not how long you pray, and it’s not how eloquent you pray that matters. It’s what’s in your heart, and it’s your faith. My wife has a good way with words. Sometimes she’ll pray and go, wow, I wish I’d said that. That was good. I want to write that one down. Throw that in on a Sunday morning. That sounds spiritual. She’s just got a good way with words. Most of us who are guys, if you’re a man, now I’m a pretty talkative guy, but as general, men don’t talk as much as women do. The average man speaks 25,000 words a day. The average woman 35,000 words a day. That means when you both get home from work at night, she’s still got a 10,000 word surplus. Okay, and she needs to unload those and you’re there hubby. So just be aware of that. But you know, if you’re a guy, I don’t typically have a 30 minute conversation with anybody. You know, I certainly wouldn’t talk on the phone for 30 minutes to anybody. And so it’d be nuts to think that now I’m gonna have a 30 minute conversation with God and I can’t even see him and I’m supposed to have my eyes closed. That’s a guaranteed recipe for sleep for a man. So it’s not really how long you pray, it’s being open, but it’s being quiet. And that’s why if you’re gonna get God’s vision for your future, the next 10 years, and as your pastor, my job is to make you a success the next 10 years, because that brings glory to God, to succeed in what God made you to be. And that’s why I’ve been planning all year for Decade of Destiny, to help you in the different areas of your life and get God’s vision for those areas. Now, it’s interesting here that in listening for the God’s call, Jesus stopped and said, call him. So they called the blind man and the crowd says, cheer up on your feet. He’s calling you. Notice how the crowd’s thoughts have changed. I mean, earlier they’re saying, shut up. Now they’re saying, cheer up. Oh, how fickle the crowd is. One minute you’re a hero. The next minute you’re a zero hero. How quickly public opinion changes. They’re so fickle. And so that’s what I want to tell you. If Jesus calls you, it doesn’t matter what the crowd says. You better do it. It doesn’t matter if your mommy doesn’t like it. It doesn’t matter if your boss doesn’t like it. It doesn’t matter what the crowd says. If God has called you to do it, you better do it. because it’s gonna be the right thing. It’s gonna be the vision for you. Now notice, it says on that verse, bottom of the first page, throwing his cloak aside, he, that’s Bartimaeus, jumped to his feet and came to Jesus. Circle the word jumped. Notice he said, I’m not gonna procrastinate. I’m not gonna delay. I’m not gonna waffle. I’m not gonna wait. I’m not gonna keep putting it off. When God calls me, bam, I’m there, man. I’m there. He thought, I’m never gonna get this chance again. I’m gonna make the most of it. I’m gonna take advantage. It’s now or never. God has been calling some of you for weeks, months, and some of you for years, he’s been calling you. And you’ve been putting it off. That’s dumb. That’s really dumb. You need to do it now. If he’s calling you now, you do it now. You’re not gonna get the chance again. I remember hearing some pastor sometime, we talk about, I surrendered to God’s call for ministry. Like it was some big battle or something. I didn’t surrender to ministry. In the first place, there’s two things wrong with it. Number one, we’re all called to ministry. Everybody’s called to serve God. That’s what ministry means. And number two, I didn’t surrender. I didn’t struggle with it. I jumped at the chance. It’s like Bartimaeus. I’m going, hmm, you know, I got this idea. If I do what God wants me to do with my life, I’ll probably succeed at it. If I do what I want to do with my life, I’ll probably fail at it. So it wasn’t really a hard decision for me when I got God’s vision for my life, God’s call, I think I’m gonna do that because if I do what he’s called me to do, what his vision for my life is, I’m gonna succeed. The same is true with you. My guess is that you already know some things to do in your life that you ought to be doing and you probably even know what benefit they bring, but you’re just thinking, I’ll do it someday. I’ll get around to it. You’re delaying the call of God on your life. You’re postponing his vision for your life. And every day you postpone God’s vision for your life, you’re wasting that day. Now here’s the fourth thing to get your vision back. The fourth step is to tell God exactly what you want. Tell God exactly what you want. This is what Bartimaeus did. Jesus calls him, he goes up and notice what it says. Luke 18 verse 40, when he came near, that’s Bartimaeus, Jesus asked him, what do you want me to do for you? Lord, I wanna see, he replied. I love this. I love this because it’s so simple, nobody can say it’s too hard to understand. It’s not complicated to get your vision back, it’s just you gotta tell God exactly what you want. I love the fact here that Jesus comes, calls Bartimaeus, the blind guy walks up to him and Jesus says, what do you want me to do for you? And Bartimaeus doesn’t go into this long speech, He doesn’t go into why he went blind or anything. He just says, I’d like to see, Lord. Jesus goes, well, then here’s your sight. God bless you. Next. It’s pretty simple. I mean, that took all of three seconds. I’d like to see. Well, receive your sight. Go, you know, your faith has healed you. That was it. Bam. It was just like that. You know, he’s asking for a miracle as if he’s asking for the time of day. I’d like to see, Lord. And Jesus’ answer is just as simple. Well, go. Your faith has made you well. You’re healed. It’s really simple. Now, when he got there, Bartimaeus didn’t have to think about the answer to the question, what do you want me to do for you? He knew. He had it clear in his mind. This is the way you get your vision back. I suggest that you go home and you sit down and you spend some time and you think out, where do I want to be in 10 years? Where do I want to be 10 years today? Where do I want to be financially? Where do I want to be in terms of my health? Where do I want to be in terms of my ministry and service through my church family? Where do I want to be in my relationships? Where do I wanna be in my spiritual growth? Where do I wanna be in my career? Some of you, where do I wanna be in my education? Do I wanna be married by the end of that decade? Do I wanna have kids by the end of that decade? Do I wanna have grandkids by the end of that decade? That one’s a hard one for you to do. I’ll just tell you that one. But you set your goals And people think, well, should I set goals? Goals are statements of faith. And the Bible says God loves when we trust him. He loves faith. Without faith, it is impossible to please God. And so when I set a goal and I say, Lord, I believe by the end of this decade, here’s where you want me to be in this. You’re trusting God. That is a statement of faith. You’re telling God what you want out of life. You’re announcing your goal. I highly recommend that you don’t just think this through, but you write down your prayer requests as statements or as goals. So that writing down your vision makes it more specific. It makes it more clear. It makes it more clarified. Now, obviously, Bartimaeus didn’t write it down because he’s blind. But he’s been thinking about the one thing he’s wanted his entire life. And Jesus comes up and says, what do you want me to do for you? Now, here’s the question. Why in the world did Jesus ask that? Isn’t Jesus the son of God? Yes. So doesn’t he know everything already? Yes. Didn’t he create blind Bartimaeus? Yes. Hasn’t he seen every day of his life? Yes. Hasn’t he known that Bartimaeus wanted to be healed? Yes. Can he not read Bartimaeus’s mind? Yes, he can read it. Does he not already know the answer in advance? Yes. So why in the world, when Jesus calls a blind man up, says, what do you want me to do for you? Now, I’ve told you this before. Every time God asks you a question, it’s never for his benefit. He already knows the answer. When God asks you a question, it’s because he wants you to know the answer. He wants you to have it clarified in your mind. Jesus knew what Bartimaeus wanted. The question is for his benefit. What is he doing? He’s giving Bartimaeus the opportunity to publicly announce his faith goal. Now listen very, very carefully. If you want to be any different in the next 10 years, you’re going to have to do the same thing. This is the next step. You tell God what you want in advance and you announce it publicly. You see, it took a lot of courage for Bartimaeus, this blind guy, to answer that. He’s a blind, poor man. And now he’s standing in front of thousands of people and Jesus says, tell me what you really want. What can I do for you? It took a lot of courage to say, Lord, I’d like to be healed. It meant first, he had to believe that Jesus could heal him, and second, that Jesus loved him enough to want to heal him. That is a statement of faith. So Bartimaeus says in front of everybody, Lord, I just want to see. I want to get my vision back. If Jesus Christ walked in here today, Or if I just stood here today and I asked you, stand up and tell me what you want God to do in your life in the next 10 years. It’d scare most of you to death to announce it in front of thousands and thousands of people. I’m not doing that. What if what I say is the wrong thing? What if it sounds self-centered? What if it’s too personal? What if it’s too big a request? And what will other people think if I stood and said, because this is exactly what Jesus is asking you right now. He’s asking you this question. What do you want me to do for you? Just like he asked 2,000 years ago, he’s asking you this question. God is saying, what do you want me to do for you? Tell me your vision. Tell me your dream. Tell me your goal. Without a goal, without a vision, the people perish. Without a dream, you’re not going to make it. So what’s your goal? Jesus said, what do you want me to do for you? And if you’re worried about what’ll other people think, you’re not going anywhere in the next 10 years. Bartimaeus is not hesitant. He states his goal in faith. He states his goal aloud. He states his goal in public. And he says, I wanna see, which means I believe you can make me see and I believe you love me enough to make me see. Would you write this down? Secret faith is shallow faith. You gotta announce it publicly. Secret faith is shallow faith. You gotta take a stand. The Bible says, let the redeemed of the Lord say so. And the more people you tell about your dream for the next 10 years, the more support you’re gonna get. When you announce your intentions, you’re speaking in faith and that pleases God. Now, the first way, the first public announcement of your faith, do you know what that should be? Baptism. Baptism is saying, I’m not ashamed of the world to say I’m a follower of Jesus Christ. That’s the first way you affirm your faith. If you have not been baptized, you ought to be. Last week after the service, I baptized 35 people. A couple of them just jumped into the water with all their clothes. They didn’t wait to change into the clothes we had to change into. They said, I’m in. I call that the Nike baptism. Just do it. Okay? Just do it. All right? And I’m not waiting to change in clothes. We had plenty of towels and stuff. 35 people were baptized. They’re all wearing these name tags. I noticed when they get in the water, some of them float off in the water. And I thought, isn’t that a metaphor that when we’re baptized and we’re coming to God’s family, we get a new identity. And all the old’s passed away. And all that stuff I felt guilty about, that’s not me anymore. It’s a new me.
SPEAKER 01 :
Hey, did you know that experts have discovered that gratitude is the healthiest human emotion? Yeah. It makes you more resistant to stress and increases your overall happiness and satisfaction. And in fact, studies show that the more grateful a person is, the happier they are. That’s the power of gratitude. You know, the Bible tells us to rejoice always, pray continually, and give thanks in all circumstances. So it’s really very clear that God wants us to develop an attitude of gratitude. But we all know that it’s not always easy to feel grateful. So Pastor Rick developed a Bible study called The Power of Gratitude. This innovative study is filled with scripture, teaching, exercises, quotes, prayers, and journal pages. And as you go through this study, you’ll discover the many and often unique things that you have to be grateful for every day. You’ll develop the lifelong habit of expressing gratitude to God, a habit that leads to true happiness and satisfaction. And we’ll send you Pastor Rick’s Power of Gratitude Bible Study to say thanks when you give a gift to help Daily Hope take the Word of God to people around the world. Just go to PastorRick.com to get your copy of this great resource. That’s PastorRick.com. Or you can just text the word HOPE to 70309. And again, that’s the word HOPE to 70309. And we thank you so much for your support. Your gift to Daily Hope helps us share the hope of Christ with people all around the world. Please join us next time as we look into God’s Word for our Daily Hope. This program is sponsored by Pastor Rick’s Daily Hope and your generous financial support.
