You can have your cake and eat it too!
Dave Gilpin challenges some of the world's most famous paradigms in his up and coming book, "If you think - you can!" In a sneek peak - here's the first chapter that will challenge you to look once more at what you thought was the norm!
They say, “you can’t have your cake and eat it too”. I say it’s time to make a bigger cake! You can then both have it and eat it if you enlarge it. So often we’re held back by the resources available to us and, instead of breaking into the realm of the supernatural, we remain earthbound. Some have found ways of being prudent with the cake that they’ve been given and try to cut it up into smaller pieces to make it last as long as possible. I remember winning a competition in my late teens by cutting a chocolate wrapper into one continuous strand. I made a strand that was a metre long and shrugged off the competition. I made the most of what I had, and won! Our Christianity, however, is designed to take us out of the limitations of what we have, into the realm of what we don’t have. It crosses the line that divides the natural from the supernatural.
Living on the edge
In the gospel of John there is a story about a disabled man who had lived by a pool for 38 years, unable to get better (John 5:1–9). It tells us that, at a certain time, when the water was supernaturally stirred, the first one into the water was the one who got healed. Jesus asked the man a question: “Do you want to be made well?” It was an excellent question. The man had obviously got used to his poolside surroundings. He had probably grown quite popular amongst the other people waiting for healing. He might have found unexpected status amongst the poor. He might have got a respectable income from begging or been comfortably supported by an uncle or a brother. He would have had a suntan to die for! Did he really want to be made well, was the pertinent question to ask. Some people love to complain about their circumstances but do nothing about them. They are full of excuses as to why something cannot be done. The disabled man had two excuses. Firstly, he said no one was around to help him into the pool when the waters were stirred. Secondly, someone always beat him to the water. Why was he not living on the edge, ready to fall in at the slightest sign of rippled waters? He was not bedridden, he was excuse-ridden! On February 11th 2001, Ellen Macarthur became the youngest person to sail single-handedly around the world. She was just 24 years of age. Despite her longest sleep being two hours and 48 minutes over a 94-day marathon, and striking a semi submerged container, she made history. She beat off everyexcuse as to why she could not win, and won.
Around 70 years ago, Glen Cunningham had a dream of breaking the world record for the mile run. One day Glen and his brother went down to a one-room Kansas schoolhouse to start the morning fire. They poured kerosene on and an explosion caused their clothes to catch fire. His brother died and the doctor said that Glen would not live long. At the age of 18, he could not walk, yet he would have his father hitch up the horses to the walking plough, carry him out there and tie his hands to the handle because he could not hang on all day. He would lean against the crossbar as he was dragged around the wheat fields in an attempt to remobilise his legs. At the age of 22, Glen Cunningham still could not walk but he had learnt to move with both a crutch and a cane. At the age of 25, he broke the world record for the mile run. He would not be contained by his circumstances.
In 1660, John Bunyan was arrested for preaching without a licence. He was jailed for twelve years. Instead of sinking into an excuse-ridden world, he wrote one of the world’s greatest stories, Pilgrim’s Progress.
Containment or advancement
One of Satan’s greatest aims is not to send you backwards. His aim is to prevent you from going forwards. Containment is his aim. He wants to keep you living by the pond, not swimming in the ocean. Did you know that things grow according to the size of the environment they live in? The size of both a shark and a goldfish is determined by the size of the pond in which they live. A shark can triple in size by being released from its container.
An adult elephant that was restrained as an infant by a three-metre chain will continue to live within a radius of three metres, even after the chain is removed. It is essential that we plant ourselves in an environment that expands our horizons and encourages growth.
I once met a minister called Phil Baker from Perth in Australia. I asked him what new things he was doing in his church and he said that he had hired the Western Australian Symphony Orchestra. “I didn’t think you could do that,” I replied in amazement, and enquired whether they played Beethoven’s Ninth or the 1812 Overture. He told me they played Hillsong Music! He used them for an outreach and had paid a company to write the score. The results were that many got saved and were added to the church. He had made a bigger cake!
Visitation or inhabitation?
The second thing that held back the man by the pool at Bethesda was that he was looking for an angelic visitation. He was looking for a special moment, even while Jesus stood beside him. Many people spend their whole lives looking for a visitation from God. I remember watching a reporter interview Maurice Green, the Olympic gold medal holder and for a season the fastest man to run the one hundred metres. It was just before his one hundred- metre race at a European track event where it was slightly wet and the wind conditions were not perfect. The reporter asked Maurice if that day would be a world-record day. He immediately retorted, “Every day is a world-record day.” Every day was an opportunity for greatness. He was not boxed in by circumstance or waiting for a special moment. Roger Bannister was told that it was scientifically impossible for a man to run a mile in less than four minutes. In 1954 he became the first man to do so. In the following year, 37 other men followed him and, within two years, over 300 had broken the four-minute mile.2 In 1999 the record stood at three minutes 43.13 seconds – around fifteen seconds faster than Bannister’s own time. How’s that for stepping out of containment? Solomon tells us in his book of Ecclesiastes that “whoever watches the wind will not plant; whoever looks at the clouds will not reap” (Eccles. 11:4). He goes on to say, “As you do not know the path of the wind or how the body is formed in a mother’s womb, so you cannot understand the work of God, the Maker of all things. Sow your seed in the morning, and at evening let not your hands be idle, for you do not know which will succeed, whether this or that, or whether both will do equally well” (Ecclesiastes 11:5–6). You need to stop waiting for the right time and start to sow into a bigger future. Right time, right now.
There are many Christians who are waiting for a special visitation that is not coming. The foundation of New Testament Christianity is that the Holy Sprit has come to inhabit, not just to visit. The greatest strength a saint has is the knowledge that God will not be visiting them. Why? Because he never left! He lives with us. When we wake up in the morning, no matter how we feel, the same power that raised Christ from the dead dwells within us. The same power that is moving across Africa through the ministry of Reinhardt Bonnke dwells within us. The same power that lived and worked through Paul lives within us. We do not wake up to a distant God, we wake up to a God who has made His home in us. You did not find God. He found you. You do not have to chase Him to be blessed. He pursues you. He wants to give you a hope and a future. Every day is filled with divine opportunity, regardless of whether you feel it or not. God’s word declares that we are blessed in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. It has already been accomplished. It has already been done. See beyond your limitations!
Open your eyes to the possibilities all around you. Zaccheus’ are in the trees, and it is time for us to look up and take notice. Even though we all want more of God’s presence, the truth is that it was with us all along – we were simply unaware of it. Jacob was so caught up with the hatred of his brother and the uncertainty of his future that he thought the place he slept in was far from God. After a God-given dream and a God-given promise, he awoke and said, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I was not aware of it” (Gen. 28:16). Rise in confidence, for God is with you. Look for God-given opportunities in your life, starting with today. Don’t look for pie in the sky; make a cake that is big enough both to eat and to have at the same time.
Pay it forward
The disabled man was preoccupied with waiting to be set free. Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up your bed, and walk” (John 5:8). Each of these three actions is forward-facing. In fact, the whole of the Bible is forward-facing. It is not focused on deliverance as much as it is on inheritance. The cross is not the destination for us, but a place at which we must die, receive forgiveness and move through to the resurrection.
The children of Israel were in bondage in Egypt, but they were then set free. God promised them a land flowing with milk and honey. Their destiny was not to be one mile outside Egypt but right in the heart of Canaan. Many have made the Bible repentance-centered and not destiny-centered. Repentance leads us only to the doorway of our God-given future. We then need to step through it. The cross gave us the entry permit into our God given future. Faith takes the permit and applies the promises. Deliverance is only a means to an inheritance.
When Jesus said “Get up”, he was declaring “Don’t just lie there!” It is time to believe again. When he said “Pick up your bed”, he was saying “You’ll never be returning to this place again”. When he said “Walk” it was both a walk away from the life the man had been living and a walk into a brand-new life. A lot of people hang around the place of failure after being healed by God. They may be whole, but they remain weak, and inactive.
Most healing comes not from the prayer line, but from the pursuit of destiny. Many times I have felt the release of God when I’ve been on the way to future destiny. It is time to walk in the light, and take the sunshine-rays of revelation and apply them to our lives today (I John 1:5–7). It is time to walk in the Spirit, put on the regenerate man and leave our weak, sin-bound self at the cross (Galatians 5:6). It is time to walk in newness of life and take hold of the largeness of our destiny in Christ (Romans 6:4).
Someone once said that “we all live under the same sky, but we don’t all have the same horizon”.3 The time has come to expand your horizons. You can both have your cake and eat it too. Either bake a bigger cake, or bake two for good measure.
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