When you prophesy against the circumstances that are the evidence of futility, you are effective to some extent; but the real place where futility is conquered is in your spirit. The victory over futility starts with the sons of God and goes forth from them.
God has always spoken a word which is deceptive in its simplicity. We do not realize how deep it is. God is not concerned about what we do, so much as He is concerned about what we are becoming. That is a truth beyond exhaustion.
What we are becoming, not what we are doing, is important. We can do many good works, but first something must be worked in us. Paul said, “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not love, I have become a sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal. I could have all faith to move mountains, but if I have not love, it profiteth me nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1, 2). What counts is what we become.
You cannot have a walk with God unless you accept that you can walk with God. Sometimes you are held back because you are still not accepting yourself in God. Oh, that God would give you a revelation of yourself! You may think you have had a revelation of yourself—that you are a mess. That is the flesh side of the picture; you are not looking at what God has wrought in you.
When I look at a person, it is with the revelation of what God has for them. I am moved by that and relate to them on that basis. It has nothing to do with kindness; I accept a person as God sees them. We should be kind and tenderhearted to one another, but that should not need to be our conscious effort. The conscious effort is to see the Christ in our brother and sister and to focus on what God is bringing forth in them.
If you are to see the Christ in your brother, how much more should you see yourself in that light. This is the key to overcoming futility.
The futility comes when you are in utter frustration over the fact that God is doing something in you and you are not accepting it; instead, you are beating yourself down.
I know there is a coexistence of spirit and flesh for a while; but if you do not want defeat, if you are a good repenter and are down on your knees when you do something wrong, do not think that God has given up on you. He loves you. He has brought you this far, and prophecies came over you at a time when you were in a worse state than you are now. If God said those things over you then, how much more is He going to work them out now?
Have you had promises from the Lord when you were a mess and you knew you were a mess? If God could say those things about you then, and confirm them, how much more should you accept those words now, when you see how He has moved step by step to bring that all to pass. Instead of frustration, there ought to be release in your spirit to lay hold upon it.
Instead of prophesying against your circumstances, rise up in the Spirit and take a position of faith. Rise up to the throne with Christ, be seated with Him, and speak as a son. Prophesy as a son. It is the sons of God who will loose creation from futility (Romans 8:19–21); and until you are aware of your sonship, you will not be able to overcome futility. You do not assume more than you should, but you look for God to reveal what is really taking place in your life. Then you reach in and start prophesying as a child of God.
This awareness of your position is not an arrogant attitude; there is no room for pride. It is the kind of humility God honors. There is a false humility that whines, “I am nothing I cannot do anything.” That attitude is not humility; it is unbelief.
Paul understood true humility. “Not that we are sufficient of ourselves, to think anything as of ourselves. I know that in me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing” (Romans 7:18). But he also said, I can do all things through Him who strengthens me. Philippians 4:13. “Our sufficiency is of God, who makes us able ministers of the new covenant.” Notice: “able ministers” (2 Corinthians 3:5, 6). True humility trusts God. Humility cannot be divorced from faith. The attitude, “I am nothing,” is often unbelief parading as humility.
Real humility is a positioning of yourself as a child of God, knowing that you can do anything in Christ, but knowing also that there is no sufficiency in the flesh. The sons of God must have that kind of humility. When the Lord says, “You are seated with me in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 2:6), the sons assume that place and answer, “Yes Sir, we are seated there.”
God says, “I have given you authority to bind and to loose.”
“Yes Sir; we bind and we loose.”
“Yes Sir; we can loose creation.”
Whatever God says, you do it! Walk in obedience, filled with humility, filled with submission. Do not draw back from anything by looking at what you are in the flesh. You are complete in Him who is the Head (Colossians 2:10). You are complete in Him!
You prophesy according to the proportion of faith (Romans 12:6), and instead of trying to prophesy yourself up into a position, take your place and prophesy. Then you will find that release from futility that is yours. Then you will be able to handle and loose all the adverse circumstances.
The New Testament has much hidden revelation in it. It records that Jesus did many mighty works, but the principle was that in His submission to the Father all authority was His. He was completely submissive; He was not seeking to glorify Himself. He was the bond-servant of the Father. He had come to do the will of the Father. His humility was in no way unbelief.
He believed He could do anything. He had all power; and all authority in heaven and earth was at His disposal (Matthew 28:18) because He was submissive, because He was humble.
We tend to take a human viewpoint about humility and think that since we cannot be proud, we must feel inadequate. Do we have to feel inadequate?
We can tune into His omnipotence and His omniscience, still recognizing that in ourselves we are nothing, but we are the instruments of the Almighty. We are His sons, and we will come forth in the very image of Jesus Christ because that is the Father’s plan (Romans 8:29).
Our coming forth as sons does not depend on what we work in ourselves. For of His fulness we have all received, and grace upon grace. John 1:16. God is constantly exposing us to His dealings, to His workings, to His grace; and this is the way we break from everything that is human and reach in to become the sons of God.
Our acceptance of our place in God looks like an ego trip, but it is not. It looks like self-confidence, but it is not; it is confidence in God. It almost looks like arrogance, but it is the submissive, humble obedience that God has wrought within us, just as it was wrought in Christ, who in all ways humbled Himself as a servant and became obedient even unto death (Philippians 2:7, 8). When we accept our place, we are not far from shaking the bands of futility.
Because we are seeking to overcome futility, the devil is raging. Let him rage; we are not going to be bluffed, nor will we be moved to try to do something in ourselves. It is important that we do not get excited and try to do something on our own. Just when we begin to sense our position in Christ to take dominion over futility, we must not fall into a trap of Satan and instead of relying on the spiritual authority, which is the key, decide that we have to slug someone and take it in our own hands.
Do not fall into the trap of “What’s-his-name.” If he cannot succeed in discouraging you until you are completely overcome with futility, then he will try to push you to the opposite extreme and get you to go into battle with both fists clenched. Do not do it in yourself! Just stand fast in the Spirit of the Lord. You will lose your battle if you do it in the flesh.
Creation is to be loosed from futility by the sons of God, and the futility has to be released from them by their walking into their authority as sons.
It is in the authority that is given to you, not in your actions, that futility is overcome. Nor is futility measured by your circumstances. Your actions will not overcome it; you overcome by believing in the authority of Jesus Christ, the fact that He is absolute Lord over all, and by moving into that authority.
When that reigns within your own spirit, then you can bind and you can loose. Then you can deal with everything else. Until you have that, you become a victim of the frustration, the futility, the distractions, the deception—everything that comes against you.
When you move into Christ’s authority, you know who you are; you know who He is; you know His authority; you know your commission; you know your place; and you are humble in it. You will not draw away from it for you realize that you are what He says you are and you can do what He says you can do. You can bind; you can loose. You have His authority. When you know all this and it fills your heart, then you have the first evidence of sonship to come forth in two millenniums. In two thousand years man has not seen evidences of sonship except in the first pattern Son, Christ. He is the only one who ever made it in that perfect pattern.
Did the early apostles attain sonship? I do not think they made it on the highest plane. Something special is available now that is related to the Kingdom. Does that sound arrogant? It is not. God is going to fulfill what He has purposed to do in this age. We do not strive to come up to the spiritual level of the past. The old-time religion is not good enough for us. Nothing is good enough, except what God says is to be in this age.
You may think you are not of the same caliber as the saints of the past. Eulogizing the saints and praying to them is dangerous. They were ordinary people just like you.
Because a few incidents in the early Church are highlighted, you may think that all the early saints endured great persecution. That is not the true picture. If you want to know the actual truth, many of them, in their lifetimes and even in facing death, were not subjected to as much pressure as many Christians are today. The pressure that has been put upon people in this generation is subtle.
Today there is no threat of lions eating us; in fact, only a small percentage of the early Christians faced that type of persecution. An equal number of us could die on the freeway from devil-possessed drivers ramming into us. We have “lions” coming against us all the time, if we only realized it. We are continually in a position of needing to be delivered.
Now, as a handful of people come up in God’s remnant, Satan is after them ferociously. There is a great concentration of devil power on a psychic level coming forth right now. Do not bemoan the fact that all the saints are dead. Do not pray to the saints. That is heresy. God will produce, in this generation, more prophets, more saints, more miracle workers, more gifts of the Spirit, more ministries, than were ever produced in a dozen centuries of the past. He is doing it.
We must not go on an ego trip, but neither can we back away from this destiny as sons of God. We are not only going to cast out a few devils; we are going to loose all creation.
We will see areas, perhaps a hundred miles square, suddenly cleared of devil power as dominion is taken over the powers and the principalities that governed that area. People may talk about old-time religion revivals, but the world has never seen anything like this. This will not be a passing experience; this is the beginning of the Kingdom.
Do not draw back because you have had many problems and you wonder whether God will ever use you. Get rid of that thinking as fast as you can. It is not what you have been, but what you are becoming in God that really counts.
There is no valid limitation or restriction on the human level, or by human opinion. This is the first time God has ever set before a people absolute power and authority to move in Him. All restrictions are removed now. We no longer know one another after the flesh; we know one another after the Spirit according to what God has called each one to be (2 Corinthians 5:16).
You must prophesy and get the victory over that spirit of futility that grips you, because Satan will rush in to throw everything he can at you in order to get you to doubt God’s word. Walk in faith, and take dominion over the futility in your own spirit. Stand, facing death if need be, and say as Paul, “None of these things move me; neither count I my life dear unto myself, that I might finish my ministry with joy” (Acts 20:24). Keep that joy in view, lest a heaviness come to overwhelm you.
You are going to walk in a release from futility, and it begins in your spirit. Prophesy, but not against situations and circumstances. Take your position in God and prophesy against futility. Voice it. You overcome Satan by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of your testimony (Revelation 12:11). That word of your testimony will be a prophetic declaration over futility.
We need to learn how to have victory, instead of futility, in our spirits. Many times when we become aware that we have a problem, we do what is human: we assault it until we are weary, then we withdraw, bleed a while, rest a while, and then come back and go at it again. This is not the right tactic to win the victory over it.
When I counsel a couple who have some deep problems in their marriage, who have reached a place where the marriage could break up, do I give them a lot of advice on sex? No, for that is not really the problem. The problem is the frustration that is in their spirits. What is the answer? Walking in a consistent kindness. I do not tell them to love each other, because when it comes to marriage, love is the most ambiguous and undefined term there is. Each person has his own definition; and for a couple to love each other, even according to the Word of God, could mean many things to them. But everyone understands what it means to be kind. Consistent kindness can bring down walls that form between people.
Even the walls of Jericho, which were made out of stone, did not come down the first day the Israelites walked around them, nor the second, nor the third, nor the fourth, nor the fifth, nor the sixth. When the Israelites walked around them on the seventh day, they did not come down the first time, nor the second, nor the third, nor the fourth, nor the fifth, nor the sixth; but the seventh time they did come down (Joshua 6)! Those were only walls of stone. The walls that people build—whether they are responses to other people, responses within themselves or responses to the Lord—do not always come down as easily as physical walls. But many times the walls between a husband and wife will come down just by consistent kindness.
I tell couples to stop trying so hard, for that often causes the problem. They need to relax and be kind, consistently kind. They do not need to plan anything; they just need to learn how to be close to each other and take the walls down. Eventually a beautiful reconciliation occurs.
The most precious moments in a marriage are not the times that are scheduled and planned, but the times that are initiated in moments of kindness. This principle applies to every relationship that has been tense and strained—relationships between parents and children, husbands and wives, brothers and sisters. If those involved will simply relax and practice consistent kindness, day after day, the problems will evaporate; they will simply go away.
How does this principle apply spiritually? When you are warring against this spirit of futility, you can become so stirred up that you rise and come forcefully against it; but that is actually not the answer. Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee.… Isaiah 26:3. Be anxious for nothing (that is a consistent state of mind, not stirred up about anything), but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, shall guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Philippians 4:6, 7.
This peace of God, this perfect peace, is God’s answer for the spirit of futility. It comes down to something very simple: a consistency that focuses on the Lord. If you continue to focus on the Lord and worship Him, it makes no difference what happens or how futile the circumstances seem. If you refuse to be moved from that place of perfect peace, if you continue staying your mind on Him and He gives you the perfect peace, then you will be one of the first partakers as a son of God to overcome futility—first to partake within your own spirit, and then first to minister the victory to all creation.
When we rebuke futility, we are only focusing on the negative side. The positive side involves being focused on the Lord, being kept in perfect peace because our minds are stayed upon Him, and being consistent and undistracted in our worship of the Lord. The worshipers are in line for all the blessings. The heart of a walk with God is the Lordship of Jesus Christ and our worship of Him, worshiping in the Spirit.
The deeper you worship, the less futility there will be in your life. You have problems that you do not know how to solve. Everyone has problems; and if you knew how to solve them, they would not be problems. You have needs. Who does not? Keep your mind stayed on the Lord. Every defeat comes through the wrong focus. When you focus on your problems and on your circumstances, then your own spirit, disturbed with futility, responds to them. Focus on the Lord, on His promises, and on your completeness in Him; and no matter how difficult the circumstances seem to be, you will come through all right.