Many of us know people who have embraced mediocrity despite deserving greater things. We all have friends and family members who chose companions who don’t were less than ideal – we call that “settling.” Some compromise in both their professional and personal spheres, adopting the belief that contentment stems from embracing whatever life hands them.
Truthfully, it’s easy to settle for less in many areas of life. We are tempted to exchange “free indeed,” which Jesus offers, for “freer than you used to be.” Instead of God’s best, we settle for “just better.” I don’t want a better marriage. I want the best marriage. I don’t want to be freer than I used to be. I want to be completely free. I don’t want to just feel a little bit better in my body. I want complete and total healing in my body.
Genesis 11:31 (ESV)
Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai, the wife of his son Abram, and together they set out from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to Canaan. But when they came to Harran, they settled there.
Abram’s father, Terah, originally set out to lead his large family from Ur to Canaan. However, when they reached about halfway to Canaan, Terah decided to settle in Haran instead of pressing on. Consequently, Haran came to symbolize the land of comfort.
But there’s a pivotal message here: sometimes we exchange Haran for Canaan. Canaan, in this context, represents the land of promise. The underlying message is clear – we should not exchange comfort for the promise. These are distinct choices, and many find themselves at a point in their Christian journey where they celebrate progress but may unknowingly be settling for less.
It’s crucial to recognize that getting older and feeling tired isn’t synonymous with sanctification. The temptation to justify changes in lifestyle by claiming maturity needs to be scrutinized. God’s call is to press on to Canaan, not settle for comfort. Maybe you say, “Well, I don’t club like I used to club.” Well maybe it’s because you’re older and tired, not because you’re sanctified!
What you do incrementally, your children will do exponentially. If you drink a little bit, your children will drink more. If you party a little bit, your children will party exponentially more. We are called to set a standard of the next generation! Don’t settle for comfort when the promise awaits in Canaan.
You may have been delivered from a demonic enemy, but have you dealt with the “enemy of me?” What do you do when you get delivered from demons and now you’re the problem? What happens when you can’t blame a demon anymore? Terah opted for the comfort of this new, like, Mesopotamian home. But why would he stop halfway? When I read Abraham’s testimony from Joshua’s standpoint, it gives another perspective.
Joshua 24:2 (ESV)
And Joshua said to all the people, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘Long ago, your fathers lived beyond the Euphrates, Terah, the father of Abraham and of Nahor; and they served other gods.
Terah worshiped other gods. We’re all made and designed to worship. What is worship? It’s the direction of your affections. We never stop worshiping, we just change the direction of our worship. So, what are you worshiping? Terah’s decision to worship other gods was going to affect his legacy.
Abraham’s Legacy
Hebrews 11:8 (ESV)
By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going.
By faith, Abraham did something his dad never did. His dad started the journey and led everyone toward Canaan. But he stopped halfway because it was comfortable. He worshiped other Gods. God designed Terah to go all the way, but he compromised and moved to the next generation. Maybe the generation before you was destined for greatness, and now God is speaking this message to you. God wants you to go all the way. When Abraham was called, he obeyed. And he went out to a place to receive an inheritance.
Understanding Inheritance
There are two kinds of inheritances: biological and supernatural. You may have inherited your eye color or height from your parents. This is biological inheritance. This is not what the Bible is speaking about when it says that Abraham went to a place that he did not know to receive an inheritance. He was after a godly inheritance.
Some of you received generational curses of alcoholism, divorce, or premature death. But the Bible says he said he went to another land and he obeyed so he could receive another inheritance. Premature death runs in both sides of my family. Men went to prison on both sides of my family, and there’s divorce in my family as well. I had to make a decision when it came to me. My parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents may have been subject to the generational curses of the past. But I was going to go into another land that I knew not. And I was going to obey. I wasn’t I wasn’t going to worship the gods of Playboy Magazine. I wasn’t going to worship the god of Michelob and Miller Lite. I wasn’t going to bow down to those gods, but I was going to go into another land that I did not know.
The Bible says, “He went out not knowing where he was going.” You have to be willing to do something that you’ve never seen someone else do and to be something you’ve never seen someone else be.
In the 1940’s, only 4% of all children were born to single mothers. In 2023, 40% of all births are to single mothers in this nation. Fatherlessness is an epidemic. Every problem we have is rooted in the absence of fathers. Maybe you never saw your dad pray for your mom. It’s time to be something different. A non-anxious presence of a man in a home is a healing force from God. When a man begins to pray for his wife and lay hands on her, that flows oil through the whole family.
When I first got married to my wife, Julie, I had no idea how to be a husband. I’d never seen it before. I was angry all the time. The injustices of the world, how hard it is to make money. In my dad’s generation, you could get a job at McDonald’s and go buy a house and a car. Your wife could be a stay-at-home mom and you could pay in full for college after each semester. The economy of my father’s time was very different. Nowadays you have to have three side hustles, four businesses, you work full time, and you still don’t have medical benefits. And so you live under that pressure and you’re angry and frustrated all the time.
It may feel like things are getting harder for you. The pressure is on. But let me remind you, the same boiling water that softens a potato hardens an egg. So when you are under pressure, if you have the DNA of the kingdom on the inside of you, it will harden some resolve inside of you.
Abraham was under the same pressure. His dad was an idolator, but Abraham said, “I’m not going to worship those false gods. I’m going to worship the God of Israel. I’m going to make a decision. I will be the one that obeys.”
When we talk about spiritual inheritance, we’re talking about dominion. You’re not inheriting biologically, you’re inheriting supernaturally. Fear tells you “Why even try, because it won’t work!” Fear tells you, “Why even go into this area, it won’t work?”
Faith says, “No, I can, I will, I shall.” Faith says, “I will go in, I will do it.” Faith says, “I’m not backing down. I’m going to continue to move in this direction.”
Terah traveled over 600 miles and he only had 450 miles to go. Some of you are right at the edge of your breakthrough. You’ve already been 600 miles. Some of you have been through so much, and you’re right at that point of breakthrough, but you’re getting ready to settle. You’re getting ready to be offended over something stupid. You’re getting ready to get captivated by the thoughts of all the gossip around you, and what other people have said.
You did not get this far just to get this far. You did not get this free, not to get completely free. You didn’t survive all the hell that you went through just to live this kind of life.
The Lord is calling you to this next level.
Overcoming Scarcity Mindset
Terah settled at a place called Haran, which means “caravan route” in Hebrew. It was never supposed to be a destination. Haran was located on the Euphrates River and it was just a caravan route, but he made a route his home. Some of you are about to make a route your home. And God does not want you to stay there. He has more for you. He wants to break the scarcity mindset.
My mother was a single mother on welfare with five kids. My mother and I received the ministry of deliverance and prophecy at the same time. We hadn’t been taught it in our local church; rather, it was through books we were reading, such as those by the Apostle John Eckhart, who was located on the south side of Chicago.
Our church had a lot of people who had recently moved from Puerto Rico who had practiced witchcraft. We started seeing demons manifest when we prayed for people, and we didn’t know what to do. We started learning deliverance and prophecy, and the first person I ever prophesied over was my mom, and vice versa. My mom and I started learning the power of decreeing. In the oldest book of the Bible, Job, he says, “I will decree a thing and it will be established unto me.” The power of life and death is in your tongue. So we started decreeing and declaring.
Dream Bigger
I remember one day I was in my bedroom at the other end of our house and I could hear pounding and muffled yelling. As I walked down the hallway it got louder and louder As I got to the kitchen I saw my mother at the table, praying in the spirit. She was pounding her fist on the table and every time she hit the table, she said, “Dream bigger. Dream bigger.”
At this time, she had five kids, no husband, living in poverty in a home infested by mice.
“Dream bigger. Dream bigger,” she says again.
Finally, she finished, and I said, “Mom, are you ok? What was that?”
She replied, “The Holy Spirit was trying to get me to dream bigger. I was repeating what He was telling me to repeat. He kept saying, ‘Sandra, keep saying it, dream bigger.’ So I would dream about what would be possible with my five kids and he would say again, ‘No, dream bigger!’”
Every time she slammed her fist on the table and said, “Dream bigger,” she was increasing the borders of her belief.
She and I shared this story in my movie, The Domino Revival. And in the movie, she looks into the camera and says, “If you are a single mother and you’re watching this movie, dream bigger.”
My mom was prophesying at that kitchen table so many decades ago. I now pastor the fastest-growing church in America for the last five years in a row. She serves on the pastoral staff there. She’s in a major motion picture. My mom was just like Abraham. She said, “I’m going into a place that I do not know, and I will not compromise. I’m not accepting just good when God has greatness inside of me.”
It isn’t your power. It’s God’s power. It’s not your anointing, it’s God’s anointing. It’s not your provision, it’s His provision. You’re not dreaming with your resources. You’re dreaming with His. You can’t get it done with your bank account, but His bank account can get it done. You can’t get it done with your relationships, but He’s got the relationships to connect you to bigger things.
Acts 7:2-4
Brothers and fathers, hear me. The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran, and said to him, ‘Go out from your land and from your kindred and go into the land that I will show you.’ Then he went out from the land of the Chaldeans and lived in Haran. And after his father died, God removed him from there into this land in which you are now living.
The Bible says the glory of the Lord appeared to Abraham. If you want God to appear in your life, I dare you to go a direction no one else has gone. I dare you to step all the way in. I dare you to dream bigger because it provokes God for visitations. You get a visitation when there’s a big assignment.
Provoking the Supernatural
When I first moved to New York City trying to plant our church, I got arrested on the George Washington Bridge. I was driving our box truck and was pulled over for a minor traffic infraction. When the police ran my license, they found that there was an unpaid ticket on my record from New Jersey five years before for not having my headlights on during dusk.
So they arrested me and then when they found out what it was for, they laughed and I paid $90 and they let me out. However, as a result of this, my box truck got impounded. I had to go through a bureaucratic process to get it out with all kinds of red tape to get through, and it was looking hopeless. We were getting ready to have our first church service, and our entire church’s stuff was in this box truck, but, in addition to that, all of my family’s items were in it because I had sold my home.
I had given away a third of everything I owned to launch this church in New York City. And so here I am like, “Lord, what did I do? I left normalcy. I’ve given I cashed out my retirement. I did everything I could to get to this one moment. And I have hundreds of people that are coming for this first service in New York City, one of the most godless places in the nation.”
I finally got all the paperwork in order and showed up to pick up the box truck the day before our church launch, and I arrived after hours because of traffic. The man says, “Listen, we’re supposed to be closed but I happen to be here doing other stuff. I’ll let you go in to get the box truck out.”
In New York, it is required to have license plates on the front and back of your vehicle, so I showed up with my screw gun and the plates. I went to screw the plate into the bumper and realized I forgot the screws. This was the straw that broke the camel’s back. My thinking immediately spiraled. “Now we can’t have church tomorrow. I’m so frustrated. I got arrested on the way here, I finally got all the issues squared away, and now I forgot the screws. I gave you my life to start this church. I moved all the way to New York to do what you called me to do.” I was so frustrated.
Suddenly I heard a voice behind me say, “Hey, is this what you need?” I turned around and this man had his hand open with two self-tapping screws in his palm. It was exactly what I needed!
I turned to screw in the license plate and thought, “Wait, that was rude of me. I’m going to thank him.” I turned around, and he was gone. Then I was scared. I was in New York City, alone, in a huge gated parking lot. I went to the front desk and said, “Hey, where’s the guy who gave me these screws?” The person at the desk said, “Bro, are you out of your mind? No one else is here.” It was then I realized that God sent an angel on assignment to give me the screws that I needed.
When you go to great lengths to do something for God, you will begin to provoke the supernatural, angelic visitation, and the glory of God. And so I screwed that plate in, and I drove away. That same weekend, I started V1 Church. And as a result, Muslims, Hindus, atheists, agnostics, and Jews have accepted Christ as Messiah.
Overcoming Generational Curses
Exodus 20:5
You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me.
Romans 5:18
Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men.
Just by your one decision right now, how many people in your bloodline could be changed? If you would stop being lukewarm and say, God, I want to be on fire for you, your family and friends would begin to get free from drugs, opiates, pornography, lust, and a poverty mindset.
Prayer
If you want to be like Abraham and Sarah, you want to dream bigger and be one of those people who goes all the way, pray this prayer:
Heavenly Father. I commit to your will and your ways. I will go where you tell me to go. I will do what you tell me to do. I break all false idols now: every bit of vanity, every last bit of sin. I confess and repent. I break every band of wickedness, every remaining chain, and every generational curse. It stops with me, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
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