Visualization: Put on your Faith shaded glasses

Dr. Adams, my pastor has been preaching a series on faith for the past several weeks.  In one of the sermons he preached about using visualization to help ourselves see by faith what we cannot always see in the natural.

I have been using visualization for years.  The bottom line is it works.  I have used it to picture myself literally laying my problems on the lap of God.  While I know that God does not have a body like man the idea of putting something on his lap or at his feet helps my psyche to release whatever it is I am going through.  Or if I am having trouble sleeping I picture myself going to Abba’s House where I can talk with Jesus or just go to sleep in my room which happens to be all white, calming and very wispy.  The concept of taking my mind someplace else helps.

The same can be applied to our faith if we activate the God kind of faith in our lives. 

A beloved friend of mine who is also a theologian told me that everyone has been given a measure of faith.  He taught me that everyone has the God kind of faith that can make things happen but not everyone activates their faith to do so.  He helped me build my faith tremendously.  As I began to seek God’s truth on the matter my pastor began a teaching on faith confirming everything my friend had told me. 

One day my pastor preached a message on the power of visualization.  I have visualized to help me relieve anxiety but never visualized about something I had faith for.  Visualization about faith matters can help relieve anxiety as well.

Since I have started doing this it has literally rocked my world.  Visualization is putting on faith shaded glasses.  Visualization allows you to see by faith what your human eyes cannot see.

That same visualization will activate your faith so that you began to prepare to receive whatever it is that you are having faith for.

If you have faith that you will be married you began to prepare yourself for marriage tying up any loose ends.  This is true for me.  I wrote down the attributes of the Proverbs 31 wife and evaluated myself in the areas.  Those areas that I am deficient in I prayed for God’s strength and changing power and began to seek to strengthen myself in those areas.  Why?  Because my husband is coming and I plan to be ready when he arrives.  In fact, he is en route as we speak.  I don’t know how long it will take for him to get to me, but he is coming.  When I get a little anxious I just close my eyes and visualize him on a white horse riding hard to find me.  I see his path being made straight.  I see God supernaturally building bridges over water for him so that he can get to me.  It might sound odd but it is working. 

In that faith that he is coming I am preparing myself.  I am putting my works in line with my faith according to James the second chapter.  The version I am using is the Message.

14 Dear friends, do you think you'll get anywhere in this if you learn all the right words but never do anything? Does merely talking about faith indicate that a person really has it? 15 For instance, you come upon an old friend dressed in rags and half-starved 16 and say, "Good morning, friend! Be clothed in Christ! Be filled with the Holy Spirit!" and walk off without providing so much as a coat or a cup of soup--where does that get you? 17 Isn't it obvious that God-talk without God-acts is outrageous nonsense? 18 I can already hear one of you agreeing by saying "Sounds good. You take care of the faith department, I'll handle the works department." Not so fast. You can no more show me your works apart from your faith than I can show you my faith apart from my works. Faith and works, works and faith, fit together hand in glove. 19 Do I hear you professing to believe in the one and only God, but then observe you complacently sitting back as if you had done something wonderful? That's just great. Demons do that, but what good does it do them? 20 Use your heads! Do you suppose for a minute that you can cut faith and works in two and not end up with a corpse on your hands? 21 Wasn't our ancestor Abraham "made right with God by works" when he placed his son Isaac on the sacrificial altar? 22 Isn't it obvious that faith and works are yoked partners, that faith expresses itself in works? That the works are "works of faith"? 23 The full meaning of "believe" in the Scripture sentence, "Abraham believed God and was set right with God," includes his action. It's that mesh of believing and acting that got Abraham named "God's friend." 24 Is it not evident that a person is made right with God not by a barren faith but by faith fruitful in works? 25 The same with Rahab, the Jericho harlot. Wasn't her action in hiding God's spies and helping them escape--that seamless unity of believing and doing--what counted with God? 26 The very moment you separate body and spirit, you end up with a corpse. Separate faith and works and you get the same thing: a corpse.

I also have a hope chest.  My father told me story of the women of old who used to fill a chest with things for their day of matrimony in faith that her day would come.  My hope chest is being filled for my wedding day and things for our new home.  It is also being filled with books about marriage so that we can keep the love protected and safe.

But you can have a hope chest for anything.  If you have faith that God will use you to minister to his people you can have a special storage container for all of your notes, sermons etc.  You can videotape yourself to critique your style and make changes to your presentations that you will have in the future by faith.  It is wise for you to prepare yourself for God’s working.  

My pastor says he has been preparing for our church for 20 years.  While preparing he has been  in leadership over a great church here in our city.  He never lost sight of what God put in his spirit and in that faith he begin to prepare himself.  The doors of Amazing Grace Christian Church opened in 2010.  When the day came Dr. Adams was ready.  He believed what God said and then put works with it.  He visualized it.  He prepared himself for it.  This is faith with works.

If you have faith that you and your spouse will have a child you can start preparing yourself by getting some literature on parenting and child development and common things a child would need such as blankets, onesies and such.

If you have faith in a business God birth in your spirit you can get a chest to fill with your business cards, literature on businesses and any notes that you have been writing for it.

Notice that all of these examples of faith include moving towards that faith goal.  People act on what they really believe.  Who knows they are expecting guests but does not clean their house in preparation?  The same is true for things we believe in faith.  In our expectant state of mind we prepare for God’s provision.

Dr. Adams shared in the message there are four important factors in visualization:

1.       Frequency- The more you visualize what you have faith about the more it gets into your psyche and your belief is strengthened

2.       Duration- You can’t just believe for one day and then give up.  You have to stay in a constant mind frame of belief and expectancy.

3.       Vividness- This describes the depth of which you are able to see what you have faith for.  It is not a passive wish or desire.  You can see some detail.

4.       Intensity- The amount of emotional energy you put into it.

In psychological terms we would say its mind over matter.  It’s not what is going on presently, it is what we believe will come to pass.

My faith shaded glasses are on presently and the faith that I have in God is removing all traces of anxiety.  My visualization will come to actualization.  I know it will.