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GOG - 19 - 263 - 2019: Making Your Life Count Through Selective Perception
MAKING YOUR LIFE COUNT through
SELECTIVE
PERCEPTION PASTOR CHARLES OMOFOMAH
14 And the Lord said to Abram, after Lot had separated from him: “Lift your eyes now and look from the place where you are— northward, southward, eastward, and westward; 15 for all the land which you see I give to you and your descendants forever. Genesis 13:14-15
Making one’s life count means making one’s life to be important; to have signi5icance; to come properly into a reckoning. Everyone wants to come properly into reckoning in whatever they do. They want to be seen as the best; to make a difference; to stand out – that is what it means for your life to count. Selective gives the impression of something that is more than one; that is chosen from amongst many; while perception is simply from the root word, perceive and it means to become aware through the senses, for example, by hearing or seeing; to become aware by understanding. Another word for perceive is to discern. In this article, I will show you the importance and power of your ability to see or perceive rightly as a believer.
You Become What You Perceive The Mirst thing you need to understand is that you become what you perceive, see or focus on. From our text, God introduced Abraham to a very important and valuable principle. Abraham did not, initially, do exactly what God had asked him to do. He was to leave his country, family and father’s house, but he left his country not only with
his family, he took his nephew, Lot, along. Lot and Abraham parted ways at some point. It was at this point that God began to talk to Abraham about what He had in store for him. However, God started by asking Abraham, to “see” because God would not give to Abraham beyond what he can see. That is how important “seeing” or “perceiving” is. God wanted Abraham to know the role that sight or perception was going to play later in his life. This same principle applies to every believer.
you see, whatever interpretation you give to that thing is the image that it is going to have in your heart. If it is a right interpretation, you will have a right image. If it is a wrong interpretation, you will have a wrong image. When you relate it to yourself, your interpretation will give you a right self-esteem, or a low self-esteem. That is also what everyone else will see about you because you will manifest it. Let me show you the perspectives of certain people in the Bible and how it shaped their lives.
In Matthew 14:22-29, Peter heard a rhema; a speciMic word from Jesus, and that word was “come”. Peter came down from the ship and walked on water towards Jesus, but when he saw the boisterous wind, he began to sink. What you see can make or mar you. God said to Abraham in Genesis 13:14-15 that as far as he could see, He would give to him and Jesus told Peter in Matthew 14:22-29 to come, and he began to walk on water. However, Peter changed his focus from Jesus to the boisterous wind, and he began to sink. What you see is important.
Jacob’s Perception
2 Corinthians 3:18 says, “But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord”. You are transformed into the same image by “beholding” or “seeing”. You can’t be changed into an image except you see it or behold it. Sight plays an important role in your life. What you see is what you will be transformed into. When you look at something and you begin to interpret what
In Genesis 30:25-43, Jacob had an encounter with God and God told him that He will prosper him. Jacob served Laban, but Laban cheated him many times. After a while, Jacob decided to leave. Laban said, “No, don’t go. I can see from experience that God has blessed me because of you”. He told Jacob to name his wages instead. Jacob decided to practice a principle that God had taught him as a means of raising his own wages. He took the clean animals and began to practice the principle of selective perception. He got some rods, cut them and made them speckled and spotted. He put those rods where the animals mated, so that as they mated, they will be looking at the rods. He put them before the animals because it is what they see that they will produce. You can only conceive what you see, and you can only bring forth what you conceive. Note that Jacob was careful to put only what he wanted the animals to see before them. So, he selected what he wanted them to see and
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GOG - 19 - 263 - 2019: Making Your Life Count Through Selective Perception
the selection was the rod. While they were mating, they were looking at it and they conceived and produced spotted and speckled animals, but it all began with what they saw. Ecclesiastes 11:3 says, “If the clouds are full of rain, they empty themselves upon the earth; and if a tree falls to the south or the north, in the place where the tree falls, there it shall lie”. It is what you conceive that you will bring forth, and the process of conception starts by you seeing something. What do you look at when you want to make your life count? Do you sit in front of the television and listen to all the bad news? Remember perception is what you become aware of through the senses especially of hearing and of seeing. If you sit in front of your television and you say, “I am so conversant with what is happening all over the world”, while you are busy getting conversant with all the bad news, you will be full of it and what you will bring forth when your life needs to count is bad news because you can only bring forth what you are full of. If you Mill your heart with healing Scriptures, it will bring out healing. If you Mill your heart with prosperity Scriptures, it will produce prosperity for you. If you Mill your heart with deliverance Scriptures, it will bring out deliverance for you in the time of adversity. Your heart has to be Milled Mirst.
Caleb and Joshua’s Perception Moses sent out twelve spies to spy the land of Canaan (Numbers 13 and 14). Ten of them perceived negatively because they saw the giants, and they said that they can’t face them but those same people who saw giants also saw good grapes. They recounted that the grapes were so big that one man could not carry them. By the law of selective perception, they chose to focus on the giants instead of the grapes, but Caleb and Joshua decided by the same law of selective perception to focus on the grapes. What you decide to focus on matters. Would it be the giants (opposition) or the grapes (victory)?
The spies also reported that they were like grasshoppers in the sight of the giants (Numbers 13:33). This could not have been so because as spies, they were not supposed to be seen. They were selective in their perception. They chose what they wanted to see and because it was negative, it ruined them. Joshua and Caleb, on the other hand, saw differently. By choosing to see differently, they made their lives count. Out of all the people that left Egypt, Joshua and Caleb were the only people from the older generation that entered the Promised Land with the new generation. They made their lives count by the principle of selective perception. What you see and hear matter. When you begin to see right and move by the law of selective perception with the
mirror of God’s Word, beholding the glory of God, you will be changed into the same image. Jesus never lacked while He walked on the earth, neither was He sick nor diseased. When you get the revelation to be like Jesus: whole and wealthy, and apply it to your life, it becomes the principle of selective perception in the right direction and you will make your life count.
David’s Perception When the children of Israel were in battle against the Philistines, they saw the size of Goliath and they said, “He is so big, we cannot withstand him; he strikes terror in our camp”. Goliath means one who denudes you; one that makes you naked and makes a public show of you, one who humiliates by stripping you naked. When David came, he decided to see Goliath differently. David looked at Goliath and when he took up his sling, he said, “He is so big that I can’t miss
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him”. David and the children of Israel both saw Goliath differently. David knew his covenant rights and that was what Milled his heart, and inMluenced the way he saw oppositions which was what Goliath stood for. The same David later in life, the Bible talks about certain kinds of people that came to join themselves to David. Before they came, they were described as distressed, in debt and discontented (1 Samuel 22:2). Later on in 1 Kings 1:8, they were described as mighty men who belong to David. Their association with David changed their perception. They turned from debtors, discontented and distressed men into mighty men by looking at David. This tells me that what and who you associate with matters. “But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord” (2 Corinthians 3: 18). If you want to become a mighty man, then begin to associate with the mighty Man of wealth, Jesus Christ. You may say, “Pastor, when I felt that pain in my waist, I said, ‘In the name of Jesus…’ but it did not go”. It cannot go because for a long time, you were not associating with that Name, Jesus. It does not happen overnight, it happens over a period of time. When you associate with this mighty Man of wealth, Jesus; over time, you will begin to change into the same image of glory. I don’t know a better person to associate with than the mighty Man of wealth – Jesus Christ of Nazareth. You must get dissatisMied with your life of indebtedness and discontent and begin to associate yourself with Jesus, just the way those men did with David. When you associate with Jesus; the express image of God’s glory, the mighty Man of wealth that He is will be evident in your life, people who might have known you as a debtor, will be amazed when your life begins to change to the image of glory of the mighty Man of wealth – Jesus Christ.
The Carpenter’s Ministry: All rights reserved. No portion of this document may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means - electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording or any other, without the prior permission of the above.