Some say that spirituality and business should never mix. I disagree.

In fact, I don’t think it’s possible to keep the two separate. Everyone is in possession of some form of spirituality-some form of experience or set of beliefs about the things we refer to as “spiritual” things. Even if you are an atheist, your experience of spirituality is clear, if only by its absence.

Whatever your spirituality, it cannot help but inform the way you do business. In fact, it cannot help but inform the way you do life.

So the question is not: does spirituality have a place in business, the question is… are we going to talk about it? Are we going to admit it? Are we going to “own” our beliefs and our spirituality, and do so openly and honestly?

Or, as some suggest, should we make this a case of “don’t ask, don’t tell?”

I welcome your comments.

By faith Sarah herself also received strength to conceive seed, and she bore a child when she was past the age, because she judged Him faithful who had promised.
- Hebrews 11:11

Receiving God’s blessings for your life by having faith sometimes feels like a tricky business.

Sometimes we feel that if we doubt-even for a second-that we will have cheated ourselves out of our blessings.

Nothing could be further from the truth!

When we accept God’s gift of abundant grace, and of righteousness through Jesus Christ, He no longer sees our sins and shortcomings (even our lack of faith).

In fact, God promises that He will “remember our sins no more”.

This isn’t even restricted to the New Covenant-take Sarah for example. The writer of Hebrews says that Sarah received strength to conceive a child, even in her old age, because of her faith. But if you go back and read the story in the Old Testament, you’ll notice something very interesting. Sarah did not instantly have great faith that God would deliver on His promise-she actually laughed when God said she would have a child. Then, when asked why she had laughed, she lied and said she had not!

Yet the Bible clearly says that it was by faith that Sarah conceived. How can this be? It’s because when God forgives, He forgives completely, and He sees the good that He has placed within us.

Don’t worry that you have somehow disqualified yourself from God’s blessings. It’s impossible for you to do that; God is the one who qualified you, and He promised it was done with complete and everlasting perfection.

Have faith, pray that the Lord will grace you with more, and put yourself in a position to receive the blessings God is already sending your way!

Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.
- Hebrews 10:23

God makes many promises to us in the Bible.

He promises health, prosperity, and blessings to those who accept his Son, Jesus Christ.

As we will see in the coming days, these promises are too unequivocal to ignore; too straightforward to dance around with “verbal gymnastics”.

When you deny that God means to keep His promises, you willfully engage in unbelief. This is because you are thinking like a human being. That’s understandable, but no longer acceptable to you and me, as followers of Christ.

Beloved, you are a new creation. God wants you to stop following the pattern of the world (for instance, entertaining unbelief) and He wants you to allow Him to “renew” your mind. He promised that He would.

The next time you seize upon one of the Lord’s promises for your life, and the voice of unbelief begins speaking in the back of your mind, remember what the writer of Hebrews said: “He who promised is faithful.”

You and I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. He has given us the “abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness”. And He has promised us that He knows how to take good care of His children.

Hold fast to that confession. Do not waver. And if you do, pray something like this: “Lord I believe in You. I thank You for Your gift of grace and of righteousness. I accept the blessings that You have for me, and I thank You for washing me in Your Spirit, even when I falter. Keep on reminding me, Lord, that You have made promises to me, and that You are faithful. Thank You for what You’re doing in my life. Give me eyes to see and recognize it as it unfolds. Thank You for being the kind of Daddy that knows how to give good gifts to His children.”

“For if by the one man’s offense death reigned through the one, much more those who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.”
Romans 5:17

What does it mean exactly to “reign in life”?

I would like to propose to you that it means exactly what it sounds like: that Jesus intends for us to enjoy the benefits of every blessing He has given us.

He intends for us to be without anxiety, to be satisfied, to experience joy, and to be saved, healed, delivered.

How are we to receive these benefits? What do we do in order to get them?

That is the best news of all; we don’t have to do a single thing. Jesus paid it all! All we have to do is receive. Read it for yourself in the passage above from Romans. Who is it that reigns in life?

It is, quite simply, “those who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness”.

Grace is the unmerited favor that Christ offers to everyone who will simply say “yes”. The fact that it is unmerited should be a source of great joy to us; it means not only did we not earn it, but also that we can’t lose it! If we did nothing to gain it to begin with, how could we possibly do anything to lose it?

Even more exciting is the gift of righteousness. Righteousness means “right standing with God”. It means that when God looks at us, and we have accepted the gift of eternal life through Jesus, God sees us as righteous. It means that even when we stumble, we are still “right with God”.

Remember that when Jesus died to pay for your sins, all your sins were future sins! So you’re not just “okay for now” – you are “perfected forever”.

What the law could never do, and what we could never do through trying to adhere to the law, Jesus did for us.

And now, we are told that once we have received this abundance and this gift that we will “reign in life”; not in the mystical hereafter, but in life! In the here and now.

So what does it mean if we are not experiencing this thing called “reigning in life”? What does it mean when we are faced with sickness, or lack, or adversity? Should we be discouraged?

By no means! We should know that these circumstances are the work of the enemy. They are not God’s way of “teaching us a lesson” and they are not His will for us. Believing otherwise is the opposite of “receiving the abundance of grace”.

Now be cautious, because this is the point at which it’s easy to fall into feelings of guilt or self-condemnation. If you are experiencing sickness, pain, or adversity, don’t blame God-and also don’t blame yourself.

Simply step up, and receive that which has been freely given to you by the Son of God: the “abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness”. If you are facing any kind of suffering in your life, you might want to pray something like this:

“Father, thank you for the abundance of grace, and the gift of righteousness that you granted me through your mighty work on the cross. Thank you for taking all authority over death and hell. Thank you for the gift of eternal life, and for the privilege of reigning in life through the one, Jesus Christ.”

Watch what God will do for you when you accept his gifts!

Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed.
- Isaiah 53:4–5

According to the words God spoke through the prophet Isaiah, Jesus – when He was crucified – not only bore the penalty of our sins on His body, He paid for our sickness as well.

The prophet says that “by His stripes we are healed”.

Jesus showed that this was true when He walked the earth as a human being. He healed every person who came to Him; He turned nobody away.

It is important to remember that when Jesus walked the earth He did so as a man; He was filled with the Holy Spirit, and He was led by Holy Spirit, because He was modeling for you and me how we are to live our lives.

In other words, He was teaching us to do what He did.

So ask yourself this question: if we are supposed to do what Jesus did, how are we to respond to those around us who are sick?

If you have been trained by the modern American church, you have probably already made an excuse in your mind about why you are not qualified to heal the sick. You’ve probably heard it explained away, usually with some comment to the effect that we are not Jesus. We are not able to do the same works that He did – that’s what some will say.

While the evidence seems to confirm that idea, and I certainly am still working on raising the dead and walking on water, I also know that the Bible clearly teaches that we are to believe God’s truth, and not the evidence of the world.

Jesus clearly taught that we, His followers, would do “greater works” than He. Not even works that are “equal to” ones He did, but “greater works”!

My proposal is that we have an assignment. And that is to keep on receiving the abundance of grace, and the gift of God’s righteousness, until we begin seeing those “greater works”. It is after all, the mission which He gave to us.

A good place to start might be… to heal the sick.

Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them.
- Mark 11:24

I’m always amused when Bible teachers try to make excuses for God. As if He needs excuses.

Case in point: the above verse from the Gospel of Mark very clearly says that whatever you ask for when you pray, believe that you receive it… and you will have it.

There doesn’t seem to be any “wiggle room” in that promise, does there?

Either the Bible says what it means, and means what it says, or not. There are plenty of other straightforward promises of answered prayer, too, just like this one, in the Scripture.

So how do we explain it when we ask for something in prayer, and do not receive it? Especially if we feel that we really believed for the answer?

While it’s not always possible to know why this happens, it is possible to know this: the shortcoming is not on God’s part.

He does not lie about His promises.

It’s also possible to know that it is His will that we be healed, saved, and delivered. We know because He tells us so in His word.

When we are disappointed in the results of our prayer, it is important to remember that we don’t know all the truth.

Now let me be clear: I never condone the position of saying that it’s the fault of the sick person, or the lack of their faith, or some sort of judgment from God that resulted in the sickness. I don’t believe any of that garbage for a minute.

I also want to be clear that I do not believe God makes us sick, or causes us to suffer, so that we can learn some sort of lesson, or so that we can “build character”.

I do know that God’s delays do not equal God’s denials.

I know that He who has promised is faithful.

I know in Whom I have believed, and I know that He is able.

You know these things too: and they are enough.

If you are ever discouraged because you feel that God has not heard your prayer, know that you are not alone. King David often felt the same way, and he shared those feelings in the Psalms that we have as part of our Bible today. King David also came to the conclusion that God is faithful, and in the end we will understand the perfectness of how God does answer our prayers.

The foundation upon which we build our faith is this: God is good, all the time.

Declare that truth in your life, and be looking for the manifestation of His goodness.

We operate daily as if we know what’s possible – with ideas about what the boundaries and limitations are on our relationships, on our businesses, on our health, and on our lives.

But what if we don’t really know the limits of any of that?

At one time the average life expectancy of a human being was around 40 years. Now it’s approaching double that amount.

More people are living to be 100 than ever before.

More millionaires walk the earth than any time in history before.

We have eliminated many diseases entirely.

We have the capability (yet to be realized, but definitely available) to eliminate poverty and hunger from the face of the earth.

What if there is more available to us?

More life, more health, more prosperity, more adventure?

I know, I know… seems crazy.

But what if?

What would that look like?

And what would you do if you knew it was true?

But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.
- Romans 8:11

Sometimes we forget exactly what it means to be a Christian.

Being a Christian is not about becoming a nicer person.

It is not about going to church a certain number of times per week, or having a special “quiet time” every morning, or even about being able to quote certain Bible verses.

No, being a Christian is not any of those things.

It is having a relationship with Christ; and when we do have that relationship with Him, it means that Holy Spirit is living inside of us.

The Bible tells us that this is the same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead. It is no different!

Now pause for a moment and carefully think about this next question: if Holy Spirit can raise Jesus from the dead, what can He do in your life?

If that thought opens up new possibilities for you, congratulations! You probably just experienced a little bit of hope, perhaps even a little bit of joy.

Cultivate that hope, and that joy, and guard it carefully from the skeptics and naysayers in your life. That hope within us is a sign of the Presence of the same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead.

He is still in the business of doing miracles today.

He is ready, willing, and able to do them for you!

Now in the fourth watch of the night Jesus went to them, walking on the sea. And when the disciples saw Him walking on the sea, they were troubled, saying, “It is a ghost!” And they cried out for fear.

But immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying, “Be of good cheer! It is I; do not be afraid.”

And Peter answered Him and said, “Lord, if it is You, command me to come to You on the water.”

So He said, “Come.” And when Peter had come down out of the boat, he walked on the water to go to Jesus. But when he saw that the wind was boisterous,he was afraid; and beginning to sink he cried out, saying, “Lord, save me!”

And immediately Jesus stretched out His hand and caught him, and said to him, “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?”

If we keep our eyes on Jesus, our faith will be focused on the source of our safety – the Son of God.

When our eyes are focused on the right person, his power is released into our life.

The Bible says Peter actually succeeded in walking on the water! It was only when he looked away from Jesus that Peter “saw that the wind was boisterous” – and as soon as he was looking at his circumstance instead of at his Lord, “he was afraid”, and began to sink!

When the “winds” in your life are “boisterous” (loud and scary), keep your eyes (and your thoughts, and the words that come out of your mouth) centered on Jesus. He will empower you to walk on the stormy sea of life!