Vision – Part 1 Pastors Lawson and Aaron Perdue

Vision Part 1 with Pastors Aaron and Lawson Perdue! In this session we’ll talk about how a vision that comes from God will revolutionize your life and take you into the place where God wants you to go.

Vision Part 1 Transcript

Welcome friends to the broadcast. I’m so glad that you’ve tuned in. We’re gonna be beginning a brand new series today, talking about vision and you don’t wanna miss it. I believe that if you get a vision that comes from God, it will revolutionize your life and it will take you into the place where God wants you to go. So, open your heart and receive the good work of God today. I believe this is gonna help you move into your divine destiny. Welcome, friends to the broadcast. I’m so glad that you’ve tuned into today. We’re beginning a brand new series on vision and we need a vision that comes from God.

Amen.

It’ll change our life and, you know, we’re actually talking some about the vision of our ministry and the vision of our church and, you know, part of that, you know, is living with purpose. And when you get a vision that comes from God, it leads you into purpose and there’s a lot of people today in life that really don’t understand they have a purpose and I think a lot of it’s because, plainly, they don’t have a vision. So, we need to have a vision that comes from God.

And, also, going along with having a vision, you need to have direction from the Holy Spirit on the steps to go in the direction of accomplishing that vision. You know, some people might have a big idea, a big vision, but they don’t have any like practical direction that’s coming from God on how to accomplish that, so.

[Lawson] Right.

So, just having a vision with no plan can be very frustrating. I think sometimes people get frustrated by that. They might have a big dream, a big vision, but they just don’t know how to go about accomplishing that. Or, you know, God uses a lot of other people and he brings people into your life sometimes to help you get to where he wants you to go.

[Lawson] Right.

It might be another minister, a teacher, you know, different relationships, friendships, business connections. God often uses relationships to help you fulfill what he’s called you to do.

Yeah, and that’s part of what we’ll teach on when we teach on vision. Where does it come from? It comes from God, it comes from the word. But it also comes from the Holy Spirit and people, a vision. And I like what you said that a lot of people, even though they may have a big vision, they don’t have a plan that goes with it. And when I was in Bible school, we actually had a very accomplished instructor. He had a doctorate degree. He had started out, Pat Robertson’s phone center, in Virginia Beach, Virginia. He said this, he said, he had us have this thing, it said purpose, vision, plan, volition. And a vision without a plan is just a pipe dream. It’s not gonna go anywhere. It’s not gonna accomplish anything. And, you know, sometimes people are somewhat visionary people, they have a lot of visions, so on and so forth, but if they don’t have a practical plan that goes with it, and I know people like this. They get vision, they get dreams, they get things that come from God, but they don’t have a practical way to work it out, so they end up going almost nowhere at all because they don’t have a practical aspect of how do we work this out and so we have to have a practical aspect of how do we get from A to B. And I believe that God will give us that. A good example of that really in the scripture is Joseph. And the Pharaoh had a dream and it was doubled to him. He saw, first of all, he saw seven fat cows coming out of the river and then he saw seven skinny cows come out of the river, then he saw seven fat ears come out of the river and then seven skinny ears of corn and he was troubled because no one could give him the interpretation to that dream. And then his butler, who had been in prison with Joseph, said, “Hey, there is a Hebrew young man in the prison by the name of Joseph and I remember in my evil, I was supposed to tell you and get him out of there when I got restored to this position, but he interpreted my dream and it came to pass.” He interpreted the baker’s dream and it came to pass, just like he said. And so the Pharaoh got Joseph and Joseph interpreted the dream. And Joseph said, “Pharaoh, this thing, by God it’s given to you because you’re the leader of this empire and there’s a lot of people that are in your power, but we’re gonna have seven years of tremendous plenty and then we’re gonna have seven years of tremendous lack.” And he said, “You need to find a man who is full of the Spirit of God and you need to put him in charge of this and in the seven good years, take up 20%.” Save 20%. And for that one-fifth or that 20%, then, you know, in the seven lean years you’ll feed all these different people and help all these different people. And so Pharaoh said, “Is there anybody like Joseph?” And they put Joseph in charge. And Joseph, it says, gathered corn as the sand of the sea. But he actually made Pharaoh, you know, in the Egyptian empire, he made Pharaoh the wealthiest person on earth, but when Israel left Egypt, they took the wealth of Egypt with them and Abraham actually had a dream and had a vision about that, that his children would go into slavery for 400 years, but then they would multiply greatly and come out with great wealth and so a number of visions were fulfilled in this. But if you have a vision that comes from God, like Joseph, you need to plan to go with it.

Now I like to, like speaking about Joseph and his, you know, his ability to have vision, but also interpret other people’s dreams and, you know, he was a very consistent person. You know, sometimes people think if I just have a vision, it’s just gonna happen like that.

[Lawson] Right.

But, really, if there’s a vision that comes from God, a big purpose that comes from God for your life, it’s gonna take years, probably decades to really bring it to pass if it’s from God. It’s gonna be so big, it’s gonna be bigger than you on your own and it’s not just gonna happen overnight.

I know a lot of people look at Andrew Wommack and really when he began on TV in about the year 2000, people called him an overnight success. But he had already been going for over 20 years and he had been working, he had been laboring, he had already been on radio for a long time. He had developed systems with that and so he had a foundation, really, to take the television ministry forward, but then God brought him some good people around him that knew how to really show what he had to offer and he brought him some good managers that knew how to manage staff, that knew how to manage finances and resources that really led to the growth of Andrew Wommack Ministries and so Andrew is one of my mentors, but in the year 2000, their total income was around $2 million and today, per year, they have about 100 million a year income. But like you say, sometimes this takes years to bring to pass and I see some people and they go out and they just do things. They don’t use a lot of wisdom. They don’t have a practical plan and their vision, you know, is really not going a lot of places.

Yeah, and like I said, sometimes it takes years, decades, relationships, you know, that’s one thing we’ll share on throughout this series is just the important of relationships and God can bring about divine connections at the right time.

Right.

You know, he can ordain it so that you’re at the right time at the right place to make those connections where God’s gonna help you accomplish what he wants to accomplish in your life.

Right. I’ve heard this that every person is within four relationships of anybody that they need to be in contact with to accomplish what God’s called him to accomplish.

Yeah, and I know our ministry has kind of a four-part vision to know Jesus, to experience grace, to build relationships and to live with purpose, so we’ll be sharing, you know, on all four of those aspects, but I love just the importance of relationships and, you know, one thing I’ve observed just in your life and in your ministry is you really honor relationships. You don’t burn bridges.

It’s terrible.

And you can just see, you know, how you treat other people, how you treat relationships, it’s really important. Even if someone maybe isn’t gonna help you accomplish what you want, it’s important to treat them well and to respect and honor people.

[Lawson] Right.

You know, I’ve been in ministry now for seven years, but before that I was pursuing a career in classical music, so actually received a doctorate from Rice University in music and my flute professor there, I play the flute, I studied with her for a master’s degree and for a doctorate degree and she really invested a lot in me and right as I was wrapping up my doctorate, I told her I was gonna have a change in career and I felt like I was supposed to go into ministry and she was very positive, very supportive, but I know that she invested thousands of hours in helping me, you know, as a musician, as, you know, working on my dissertation to get my doctorate and, you know, she’s gonna be retiring soon and having a big party and, you know, like I’m flying to Houston to go there and honor her. It’s not, you know, it doesn’t, it’s not really related to my career now, but I just wanna honor that relationship and-

Well, the Bible actually says this. The Bible says your own friend and your father’s friend do not forsake and so my own father died when I was just 17 years old. But my father had friends and as much as I could, I honored my father’s friends because I knew what the Bible said in that area. And I have friends and some of those have not served God like the should or went different ways, but I still honor the relationship as much as I can and show them respect because I’m, even though, you know, they may be going a different direction, I still value, you know, the investment that they made in my life at that time and I’ve had other people, you know, we pastored in Kit Carson for 13 years. And from 1988 to 2001 and I still value relationships with people that I have there. Even though, you know, some of them may not be giving me anything, so on and so forth as far as financially, I honor those relationships and so many people they just leave somewhere and they just burn bridges like you’re talking about and that’s very unhealthy. And so we need good and positive relationships, but I wanna go ahead and, you know, look at the scripture today where we’re starting with vision and talk about this. In Proverbs 29, verse 18, the scripture actually says “Where there is no vision, the people perish, but he that keepeth the law, happy is he.” So, when you begin to look at that where there is no vision, the word for vision in the Hebrew is the word chazowe and it means vision, oracle, prophecy, a divine vision, sight, a dream, revelation. So, he’s talking about prophetic insight and, you know, direction that you get from that. So, we need direction. We need enlightenment that comes from God that comes from the scriptures, that comes from godly relationships. All these different things, but he goes on and says where there is no vision, where there is no insight or direction, divine insight or revelation the people are perishing. And the Hebrew word here for perish is para and it means to refuse, to uncover, to be naked, to avoid, to go back. You know if you’re not going forward, you’re going backwards. It means a lack of restraint, to be unbridled. You know, you wouldn’t want to be riding a horse that was unbridled. To be lawless, to reject counsel. And so there’s some people that they have rejected counsel and, you know, one thing that I have, like in hearing the voice of God is not only do I have the word of God, the Spirit of God, peace in your spirit, but I have Godly counsel. I value of Godly counsel and then the gifts of the Spirit. And then I actually told the person one time, I said listen, you’re trying to be the voice of God for everyone but, you know, I’m trying to teach people how to hear the voice of God. And no person is the voice of God every time for everyone. That’s just crazy to think that. And there’s different ways that we hear God’s voice, but number one, the word. Number two, the Spirit of God inside us. Number three, the peace of God. You know, we need the peace of God. Number four, you know, the counsel, Godly counsel, and I thank God for Godly counsel. I thank God for people who have spoken into my life, like you’ve talked about how I’ve had relationships, but I listen to the people that God has placed in my life and, you know, I’m always trying to pull, you know, on these relationships and listen to people around me. Some people think they don’t have anyone, that’s a very dangerous place to be in. And I believe that we all need to have people who are speaking into my life and finally then the gifts of the Spirit. And even with the gifts of the Spirit, I weigh those things out with the gifts of the Spirit with these other voices, the voice of the word, the voice of the Holy Spirit, the voice of peace and the voice of Godly counsel to see if this really the direction that I feel that God has taken me. So, we’re going to come back right after our break, we’re gonna have a short break and we’re gonna be talking about how we get vision, where vision comes from and so stay tuned. We’ll be right back after a short break. Thank you so much for staying with us, blessings. Friends, I wanna tell you about our product that we have available with this teaching and we have a special offer. First of all, we have the “Vision” series and I have five messages that I taught on vision. You can get them on CD or digital download on our website. You can get them immediately and then my “Uncommon Favor” book. This is my life story from just a few years back. It’s a lot of different stories. A lot of people tell me when they read my “Uncommon Favor” book, it encouraged me because it gave me hope that if God did this for you, he would do it for me and he would help me and there’s so many ways that God has blessed me and helped me, but it’s not unattainable. You see, God is no respecter of persons. He is a respecter of faith. So, when you get a hold of the word of God and begin to believe God, you can move into the vision and the plan that God has for your life through the favor and grace of God on your life. Thanks and blessings. Friends, I’m so glad that you’re still with us. We were sharing on vision and where there is no vision, the people are perishing, the people are going unbridled. There’s a lack of restraint. But he that keeps the law, he that keeps the word, happy is he. So, we want to go forward from that and talk about different places the vision comes from and I want to go to Genesis chapter 13 and read in Genesis chapter 13, verse 14 to verse 18. Actually, years ago I was at a conference. I was just attending, I wasn’t slated to speak, but it was a conference put on by Dr. Lester Sumrall and they were having workshops and they came to me like the day before, afternoon before we were gonna have these workshops and they said Lawson, will you share at at workshop today and the title is “Vision, Key to Your Future.” And what happened was somebody else dropped out and so they called on me last minute and God actually gave me this in Genesis chapter 13, verse 14 to verse 18. And Aaron, if you want to read there beginning in Genesis 13, read verse 14 to verse 18.

“And so it says and the Lord said to Abram, after Lot had separated from him, lift your eyes now and look from the place where you are northwards, southward, eastward and westward for all the lane which you see I give to you and your descendants forever. And I will make your descendants as the dust of the earth so that if a man can number the dust of the earth, then your descendants also could be numbered. Arise, walk in the land through it’s length and it’s width for I give it to you. Then Abram moved his tent and went and dwelt by the terebinth trees of Mamre, which are in Hebron and built an altar there to the Lord.”

So, when you see this, it says the Lord spoke to Abram. And God told him, you know, lift up your eyes and look from the place where you are. If you’re gonna move where God wants you to move, move into the territory that God wants you to take. You’ve got to pick up your eyes and look from the place where you are. Some people are not very visionary. For instance, you know, we’ve bought a number of houses that are just complete fixer uppers. And we’ve went in and just changed them and people will come in just a little bit and they’ll say wow, this is amazing. They say about 90% of people can’t see the potential in that, so I actually tell people when you’re buying a house, the worse the carpet and paint looks, the better off you are. Because that’s relatively cheap, you know, to change when you figure the cost of a whole house, different things and so you remember our Constellation house, when we bought it here in Colorado Springs how it just, it was oil stained black, the sun had eaten off one layer of the outside of it, the house and in certain areas, I mean, it was just gold and red and blue, dark blue shag with cat and dog hair.

Yeah, I’ve learned just growing up being around you that you actually look for problems, you know, like houses that have problems where you can fix it up. You know, I think that’s part of an optimist, kind of a visionary’s type of outlook, they actually look for problems because I know where there’s problems, there’s actually opportunity there.

[Lawson] Right.

A lot of people run away from problems, run away from difficulties. But, you know, Jesus could see the potential in people. You know, he would be looking for that lost sheep. You know, the problem sheep. The problem people. He was really seeking them because he knew that’s where people needed help, that’s where there’s great opportunity for the kingdom, so he chose a lot of unusual people, you know, to be part of his early crew, you know, his first disciples and his first followers. He picked kind of unusual people.

[Lawson] Right.

But I think he saw those great opportunity for the kingdom to grow within them and through them, as well. So, I think God is still looking for people who might have issues because he knows that he can, there’s potential there, he can turn their life around.

Well, we totally renovated that house. And, you know, we started with just painting carpet and we put about 27 gallon of paint on the inside and Kilz. We put about 25 gallons of paint on the outside of the house or oils paint, actually, ’cause it was an old oil stain that was on it and we had to cover it. I mean, and we put new windows and doors and, you know, all new flooring in the house eventually. We replaced the kitchen, replaced the roof, replaced the deck. I mean, we did a lot of work. We renovated it, but some people just, I remember one person came over and they were actually helping us start the church and they went home and told their husband, they said, “Lawson, I can’t believe what he’s done to Barbara and then they came two weeks later,” and they couldn’t believe the change in two weeks just painting flooring made and then we did a lot to the house and, you know, but God blessed us. We bought a $200,000 house on a $300,000, 300 to 400,000 street. And we owned that house for 20 years and sold it for 520 and somebody else did some more work to it and sold it for 675 in a very short time. So they made a lot more money but, you know, it was good to us. God was good to us. We were thankful for what he did for us and how he helped us get started here. But, you know, when you look at this it says the Lord said to Abram, so God is the author of vision. He’s the one that gives vision and he said, you know, and notice this. After Lot was separated from him. You know, God had spoke to Abram in Genesis 12 and actually prior to that, if you read Acts chapter 7, but God said to Abram, you know, I want you to leave your father’s house and go a land that I showed you. So, ultimately, he didn’t quite do that. He brought along his nephew, Lot, but once, you know, he totally obeyed God, then the Lord spoke to him and said I want you to go to a land that I show you and he says lift up our eyes and look from the place where you are. So, you have to begin to see, this is the problem with a lot of people. They think that they’re just stuck in their situation and there’s no way that they can get out of it and they’re a victim, but when you really begin to understand who God is and who God made you to be, you’ll realize that you’re not stuck, that God is the one ultimately who’s in charge of your destiny.

Well, it’s interesting you’re talking about Abram and how God showed you to look at Abram’s life concerning vision because God wanted him to look up from where he was at, look for, Lot was separating from us so that’s probably actually a difficult situation for Abram.

[Lawson] It was.

And, you know, he was close. That was his next of kin, his closest family. Lot was separating himself from Abram, but God told Abram keeping looking for it, keeping looking up and you see Lot later on in scripture, his wife looked back and she was turned into a pillar of salt. So you see one person, Abram, who got his, showing him how to look for, look up, look ahead, look at what I’m doing, what I’m going to do in and through you, but, you know, another character, Lot’s wife, God was trying to move her out of Sodom, out of Gomorrah, protect them, save them.

[Lawson] Right.

But she just couldn’t look ahead. She wanted to look back.

Right.

So, then he said, you know, I want you to look north, south, east and west. Not only look up, but look around. God said I have more for you. Some people like, they’re just very focused where they’re at, but they don’t look around. They can’t see beyond where they’re at. So, he goes on and says this. “For all the land that you see, I will give it to you and your seed forever.” You know, what you see, you know, one of the hardest moves that your mother and I ever made was the move when we moved to Colorado Springs. I mean, I talked about buying that house on Constellation Drive, but we had to go to six bankers before we found a banker that would loan us the money with 50% down because they didn’t believe in what we were doing. But, ultimately, we found another banker and he said, “Listen, I’ll prove your income another way. I’ll get you the best loan that money can get” and we bought that house and God ultimately blessed us with that. But he said, “The land that you see, to you I will give it to you and to your seed forever.” I remember going to this one bank and this lady banker looked across the desk at me and your mom and said you can’t even afford to buy a lot here, let alone a house. And, man, I spoke up. I said if I couldn’t do it, I wouldn’t be here. And we got up and walked out. But the challenge was God, number one had spoken to me and then I talked earlier in the broadcast about people, you know, having counselors and Cecil and Lisa Paxton, who are ministers. They travel around the world, but they attend our church now. But Cecil and Lisa had given us a word before we had told anybody. And said, “What God has put in your heart is good for you, it’s good for your children, it’s good for the church, it’s good for the kingdom of God and this is what you need to do.” And so the world was saying we couldn’t, but God was saying we could, so when this person was just quoting what she saw when she looked at my 1040s, I didn’t believe her because God had spoken different to me.

It’s really awesome what God is doing in this ministry and through this ministry. You know, we planted this church here in 2001 and at the time, you know, you were coming from Kit Carson. Kit Carson, you had a great church there. I grew up there until I was 14 when we moved here, but Kit Carson, the entire population is 300 people.

[Lawson] Right.

And you look at the ministry here, the church now here, you know, we reach a lot of people through television, but just our weekly attendance here in person, you know, we reach a lot of people, obviously, you know, online and through television, but weekly attendance is 1,000 people. It’s three times the size of where you came from and that’s just really incredible to think about.

And we have about 2,000 that call the church home, so they don’t all attend at once but, yeah, we have over 1,000 a week when you consider kids and youth in our three services that we have, our three regular services. But God has blessed us and helped us but, you know, we had to break out, kind of, of a hard place and we had to begin to look and we couldn’t just accept a word from the world, right? If you accept the world, right, you’re gonna perish. But where there’s no vision, the people perish, but if you accept what the word says, we had to accept the word from God, so we can move into what God had for us.

And I think some of that’s really helped you and helped this ministry is that you’ve, you’ve partnered with people who are visionaries, like people like Andrew Wommack. You know, you were mentored also by Lester Sumrall, who was a great visionary, a great-

Leader.

Kingdom builder and, you know, if you want God to help you with your destiny, you know, partner with other people who are doing a lot in the kingdom. You could partner with this ministry. You know, we have a great vision, we’re reaching a lot of people. If you want to become a partner, you can call us and just partner for any amount you’d like to.

Thanks so much for tuning in. If you need prayer or product or wanna become a partner, just give us a call today. Blessings.

[Announcer] Too many people live their lives without ever connecting to their God-given purpose. Learn the importance of having a vision and some practical steps for walking it out. God has a tremendous plan for your life. Start now and see it come to pass. Get the “Vision” package, which includes the book “Uncommon Favor,” and the “Vision” CD series for $24 or digital download for $15 when you call 719-418-4000 or visit CharisChristianCenter.com.

Hi, friends, I’m Pastor Lawson Perdue from Charis Christian Center in Colorado Springs. We wanna invite you to Family Camp Meeting. We’re gonna have special speakers Mark and Trina Hankins, Congresswoman Lauren Boebert, full of the Holy Ghost and fire, Phillip Rinner with special music, special teaching, Max Cornell, Ashley Terradez, myself, Aaron Perdue. We’re gonna have a great time. If you can’t come in person, check us out online at CharisChristianCenter.com.

[Announcer] Thanks for Watching “Grace for Today.” This broadcast has been made possible by our faithful partners. If you would like to become a partner, need prayer or have a question, please call us at 719-418-4000. Or to partner online, go to CharisChristianCenter.com/give. You can write us at P.O. Box 63733, Colorado Springs, Colorado 80962. See you next time on “Grace for Today.”