Principle 5

The fifth principle is the fulfillment of God’s promises does not depend upon our circumstances but upon our meeting God’s conditions. That’s very important. When God gives a promise it is not limited to a particular set of circumstances. It doesn’t have to be easy for God to do what he promises to do. And one of the big snares is when we’re confronted with a promise of God we say, “Yes, I see that but in this particular situation it would be too much.” So our faith wavers. The truth of the matter is God’s promises do not depend upon the circumstances in which we find ourselves. They make no difference. You can be 100 years old, your wife can be 90 years old but if God says you’re going to have a son, you’re going to have a son. It doesn’t not depend on anything around about you or in you, it’s nothing physical, nothing temporal, nothing in this space-time world can change the eternal promises of God. That’s the lesson, that’s why God so often allowed the men of faith to get into totally impossible situations. He wanted to make it absolutely clear that in no case were his promises dependent upon a favorable set of circumstances. So, usually he’d let the circumstances get just about as unfavorable as they could be.

Like, you know, Elijah wants the fire to come down so he douses the sacrifice in water three times and lets the water run around and be in the ditch and says, “Now let’s see what God can do.” And when the fire came it burned up the water, it burned up the dust, it burned up the wood, it burned up the sacrifice. God’s fire has got no more problem with a ditch full of water than a dry ditch, it doesn’t make any difference.

Perhaps the most remarkable example of this fact is the provision of God for Israel in the wilderness. For 40 years he fed, clothed, provided for, guided something like three million people: men, women, old people, infants, cattle, everything in a totally barren desert where there wasn’t water, there wasn’t food, there was just nothing. God went out of his way to say, “Make it difficult and let me show you what I can do.” In fact, he made it difficult. He was the one who arranged the situation. It’s most important to understand that you must not let your focus move from the promise to the situation because that’s when you begin to sink.

I’m going to read through those five principles just to fix them in your mind and then we’re going to go on. The five principles are,

1. first, God’s provision is in his promises.
2. Second, the promises are our inheritance.
3. Third, God’s promises are the expression of his will.
4. Fourth, all God’s promises are now available to us through Christ.
5. And fifth, the fulfillment of God’s promises does not depend upon our circumstances but upon our meeting God’s conditions.