The second most important encounter that I ever had with the Lord – as far as affecting my life and ministry – happened on January 31, 2002. It took a couple of months to build up to this, but the Lord finally spoke to me through Psalm 78:41. Where it says, “In their heart, they turned back and limited the Holy One of Israel.” That was talking about the jews when they came out of the land of Egypt. God had plans for them of good things. He wanted to bring them into this Promised Land that had an abundance of all things, flowing with milk and honey. And yet, because of their disobedience and their unbelief, they rebelled at God and spent 40 years in the wilderness, until all of that older generation died away.
That was not God’s will. God’s will does not automatically come to pass. They limited God through their unbelief. God spoke to me that I was limiting what He could do in my life through unbelief. You know, it is hard to quantify all of this, but one of the ways I measure things. At the time God spoke to me, did you know our physical assets, and again it is not all about things, but this is just one way of measuring things. Our physical assets have increased over 500 times in the last 16 years. That is phenomenal. The number of television stations we are on, the number of people we are reaching, the number of lives being changed, the number of people being healed. All of these things have increased exponentially because I took some limits off of God.
A lot of people don’t even understand that God is limited to working through us. Ephesians 3:20 says, “Now unto Him who is able to do exceedingly, abundantly above all we ask or think, according to the power that works in us.” A lot of people just leave that last phrase off. They just say, “Jesus is able to do exceedingly, abundantly above all we ask or think.” That really isn’t true, it is dependent on the power that works in you. It is His power, but you have to release it. You have to stir yourself up and believe.
I have a teaching out entitled, “Don’t limit God”, as I said at the beginning, it is one of the most important things God ever showed me. I am convinced all of us limit God. That was 16 years ago that God showed that to me. He is still speaking this to me. I have made decisions in the past few months that were dependent on me not limiting God. I don’t think I will ever get to a place where I have arrived, but I have left, I am moving in that direction. I want to encourage you that God has more for you.