Welcome to 15 Minutes in the Word with New York Times bestselling author Joyce Meyer. On today's program, Joyce will be teaching from her series, Pressing In and Pressing On. To press is to push beyond opposition. It means leaving the comfort zone and doing whatever it takes to attain what God has for us. We must let go to grow. Now, here's Joyce with today's teaching. All right, well, I'm going to do a series this weekend called Pressing In and Pressing On. You didn't clap, but I didn't expect you to. I started to call it gliding in and gliding on because I think we'd rather glide than press. Sadly, and this is not any accusation against any one person, but people just don't seem to have the tenacity that they used to have. And I think it's because life has just become so automated and in some ways it's harder, but in many ways it's easier. I mean, what we used to have to do to make a phone call is amazing to what you do now. I mean, when I first started studying the word and teaching, I mean, it was quite a job to put together one message to teach because you couldn't just get on the Internet and say, give me all the scriptures on sin. You had to have a concordance and you had to have this and you need to have something else. I mean, I would have books all around me and study sometimes seven hours for one message. And so, yeah, we all like things easy, but when things are too easy, to be honest, then it ends up not being good for us because there's always going to be times in your life when things are not going to be easy and you're either going to give up or you're going to have to do a little bit of pressing. And pressing really just means to press against your pressure. It means the enemy's coming against you and instead of you just letting it defeat you, you say, no way. I know what God's word says and whatever he told me I can have, I will have it in Jesus' name. I will not quit. I will not give up. Now I would imagine that there are people here, I just kind of got this in my heart right before I came out. I think there's some people here and you just feel like it has been so long since God has done anything in your life. You just been waiting and waiting and waiting and you just don't feel like he's changing you. You don't feel like he's changing your circumstances. I just want to tell you that as long as you are believing God is working. Did you hear me? As long as you're believing God is working. And just because you don't see anything or feel anything, that does not mean that God is not doing anything. Amen? And so don't let, just don't get discouraged and throw in the towel. If anybody is at the point of just wanting to give up, maybe you came tonight and you said, God, I got to have a word. You got to speak to me through joy. So I'm just going to give up. Well, I'm telling you that God says, do not give up. Amen? God is working. And you know, when I'm waiting on something and we all have things, how many of you are waiting on something? I mean, we all have things that we're waiting on, whether it's healing or breakthrough or for our ministries to grow or to get married or not to be married or whatever the case might be, to have kids, to get your kids out of the house. You know, kids used to leave as soon as they were 18. They were out and on their own. Now they're still there when they're 40 sometimes. And you got to pray them out of the house. So whatever it is that you're waiting on, if you don't quit, God will either give you what you've asked for or something much better. I want you to get that before I go on. Because I don't want you to leave here. I mean, I've given up a million times, but the thing is, is God really won't let you give up. He'll pick you back up and get you going. So we're going to have to press into things and through things. And it's a principle that we have to understand. A little baby eagle it in the shell has got a little tooth on the end of its beak. They don't have that when they're adults, but they've got this little tooth on the end of their beak. And when it's time for them to be born, they pack, pack, pack. I mean, it seems like they're pecking like forever trying to break this shell. And occasionally somebody will think they need to help them break it open for them. But if you do that, what happens is they become weak and they never become what God intended them to be because that that work, that pecking, that pressing to come into life is what helps them get through life later on. So be careful about making it too easy on your kids, because sometimes they need to go through a few things. So they're ready to go through some of the things I have to go through later on when life really gets hard. Now, wishing does nothing for us. Well, I just wish. Well, that wishing does nothing for us. We have to press wine is made by putting grapes through a press. And wine often represents power in the Bible. For example, new wine cannot be put into old wineskins. Basically means new power cannot be given to someone who is still hanging on to old ways. And then. Hey, you got a great future. You have a great future. Your history is not your destiny. You have a great future, but you will miss it if you keep hanging on to the past. And so we're going to talk some tonight about new beginnings. But first, I just got to do this little introduction to this pressing thing, because if you don't understand that it's not all going to be easy and that sometimes you're going to have to wait and sometimes you're going to need to press through things. And that doesn't mean that God doesn't give us grace, but grace doesn't mean that God does everything for us while we sit around and do nothing. Amen. By grace, through faith, are you saved? Well, God's grace is there for everyone, but not everyone is saved because not everyone will believe. Be it unto you, even as you believe. God always gives us a part. We're partners with God. Just imagine really, just imagine how boring life would be if you could just sit back and just do nothing but say a prayer and God just did everything for you and you never really had to do anything. God wants us to partner with him in seeing the things come to pass that he's provided for us. The past is like a magnet. It keeps trying to draw us back. Do you ever feel like you're the enemy is trying to draw you back into old habits? Amen. Not only do you have to press out of bad things, you got to press into good things. We'll take peace as an example. I grew up in an atmosphere where there was no peace to be honest, and I'm not exaggerating. I didn't even know what peace was until I married Dave. Everybody in my family was dysfunctional. We didn't know that word back then, but they were dysfunctional. Very dysfunctional. Of course, my father was abusing me. My mother knew it was too frightened to do anything about it. My brother went in the Marines when he was 17 and he came out addicted to drugs and ultimately ended up ending his own life because he just was so miserable and couldn't seem to get free. And he was a guy that wouldn't press. He wouldn't press through things. He wanted everybody to do everything for him. And we took him into our home for, he lived with us, I think about four years one time. And as long as you said, get up and go to work, he'd get up and go to work. But if you didn't wake him up, he'd lay there and not go to work. And you can't, you got to do stuff for yourself. Don't even always be calling everybody, asking them where a certain scripture is. Look it up. Do the work. If you do the work, then you'll remember where things are. So we, you're never going to have the future that God wants you to have. If you think that all you got to do is just pray for it and it's just going to fall in your lap. Some of you have got some amazing things out in front of you, but I can tell you the greater that God wants to use you, the more you'll be able to do it. The greater that God wants to use you, the more the enemy will come against you. I have a little thing that I say, new level, new devil. See, some of you are asking God for more of something. Well, when you ask for more blessing, you probably got to get more opposition. I felt like God spoke to me the other morning and said, I want you to be extra careful about your words because I'm going to open a wide door of opportunity and with it will come many adversaries. See, you don't just get opportunity. You also get adversaries. And so when God wants to bring us up higher, our flesh has to go down lower. I feel like I'm already pretty careful with my words, but obviously not careful enough. And you see, the greater God is using you, the more he blesses you, the more accountable we need to be. I don't suppose any of you could use any help with your mouth. Matthew 7, 13 and 14 are a couple of really great scriptures that says enter through the narrow gate for wide is the gate and spacious and broad is the way that leads away to destruction. And many of those who are entering through it. I want us to take enough time to understand this. He says, I want you to go through the narrow gate and you're going to see in the next verse, it says, but the narrow gate is contracted by pressure. That's the amplified translation and the way is straightened and compressed. That leads away to life and few there are who find it. So it's easy to stay on the broad path. God told me once on the broad path, there's room for all your fleshly baggage. You can just take it all with you. You can just be carnal and walk on the broad path. A lot of times people still get into heaven. You get into heaven because you believe not because you do everything perfect and we will never do everything perfect. But I do believe that when a Christian remains carnal all of their life, even though they may end up in heaven, they will never take anybody with them. Maybe you know what I mean by that. Their witness won't be strong enough to take anybody with them and they're not going to enjoy life here because you know what? We can't enjoy life and walk in the flesh. Thanks for listening. Pressing into and through things is a very important life principle. Because God is always calling us up. He requires us to leave where we are and press toward the next level. Matthew 7, 13 and 14 are some great scriptures that say enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and spacious and broad is the way that leads away to destruction. And many are those who are entering through it. This means it's easy to stay on the broad path. But if we want to be on that narrow path, we are going to have to do some pressing. Get your daily dose of encouragement with the Joyce Meyer Ministries app. Catch up on seven days of enjoying everyday life episodes. Grow deeper in God's Word with the Daily Devotional and Question of the Day. And enjoy all your favorite teachings from Joyce in your digital library. Find all this and more with the Joyce Meyer Ministries app. Search Joyce Meyer in your app store and download it today. Thank you for listening to 15 Minutes in the Word with Joyce.
