Begin 2010 with vision

As the new year fast approaches, it is important for one to perceive, conceive and believe what God has for one for the coming year and beyond.

If a person can see the invisible, then one can see the impossible; and I personally choose to see the impossible in 2010.

I believe that this is the year of breakthrough and the year of increase; this is the year when I go to another level. Next year at this time, believe that you will be at another level in your life, that you will overcome and will be blessed.

Proverbs 29:18 says that where there is no vision, people perish. Meaning, without vision, one is just living life. And when you’re living life without purpose and fulfillment, there will be decay. It’s so easy to see — marriages are dying around us, families are struggling to stay together, boredom and a lifeless house is commonplace. So your vision is your future. Without a vision you don’t have a maximized future.

This can change when someone grabs ahold of a vision for 2010 and runs with it, because vision is the bridge that takes us from our present into our future.

Helen Keller was once asked, “What could be worse than being blind?” Her answer was, “To have sight but have no vision!”

Once we see a vision or a mission statement for our life, we then need to decree, or speak, the vision into existence. The Bible says in Proverbs 18:21, “There is life and death in the power of the tongue.” By decreeing the vision one has for 2010, one would literally be speaking life into it.

After seeing the vision and speaking it into existence, one then needs to write it out. A goal or a vision not written out is only a wish. Writing out the vision and goals is an extremely important step toward seeing them come to fruition.

When writing out one’s goals and vision, one must develop a statement of purpose. Ask yourself some difficult questions: What do I exist for? Why am I here? Why was I born into this world?

A person needs to come to the realization that he or she is not here just to occupy space and time; but God released you out of eternity for a purpose here on Earth. You were not created by a man and woman. Some might think they are accidents — because their parents didn’t plan them. Nothing could be further from the truth, because you were designed with a plan and a purpose even before you were in your mother’s womb (Jeremiah 1:5). God has a plan specifically for you.

Here is a motto that I have been living by for almost a decade now, and I encourage you to adopt it as well: See it, decree it, write it, and then execute it.

I encourage you to not walk into 2010, but run into it.

• Pastor Gilbert Ybarra is minister of The River of Life Christian Fellowship. Sermon Notes is a column by ministers of the Patterson Ministerial Association.