When you jump on a highway, you have a choice.
You can drive in the slow lane, cruise along in the middle lane, or move over to the fast lane. In life, you have choices, too, regarding which lane you’ll cruise in. You can hang out in the “safe” lane, the waiting-for-everything-to-fall-in-your-lap lane, the guarded lane, the angry and bitter lane. You get the point. Or you can live life in the faith lane. The lane that cruises at an altitude much higher than the others, ignores the “directions” the world gives, and dares to believe for more. The best part? It always arrives at its destination.
If you’ve been stuck in traffic on the way to your dreams, it’s time to change lanes. Here, 5 Secrets To Living Life in the Faith Lane that are guaranteed to get you to your destination—victory!
1. Choose Life
“I have placed before you today life and happiness, and death and adversity…. So choose life.” –Deuteronomy 30:15,19 (NASB)
When you wake up in the morning, you’re going to move into a lane of life. Some people start their day grumbling about how tired they are, how they don’t want to go to work, or expecting things to go just as they always have. Uh oh. They choose incorrectly. That’s life in the slowest lane there is.
Instead, God tells us to “choose life” that we might live life in the faith lane! How do we choose life? Deuteronomy 30 tells us:
- Love God. To love God is to receive His love for you, love others and obey Him.
- Walk in His ways. (Take time to do a study on what it looks like to walk in His ways and live an upright life.)
- Keep His commandments, statutes and judgments. This means all of them! If you attend church and tithe but attack people verbally or become angry easily, you’re not keeping the greatest commandment—to love others. Endeavor to keep all of God’s commands.We are not called to be perfect in the sense that we are without a single flaw (that’s impossible), but we are called to be perfect in the biblical sense, which is to become spiritually mature.
When you choose life, you’re choosing success! That means you wake up with a spirit of expectancy about you. You know it’s going to be a great day because the Lord is with you, and He has great plans for your life!
2. Speak Only Life Words
“But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord.” –James 1:6-7 (ESV)
On a two-lane road, you can go one direction or the other, but you can’t go both ways at the same time. You have to pick a lane!
In life, if you want to stay in the faith lane, it is critical that you speak only life words. Your words are the steering wheel of your life. When you speak God’s Word and God’s will over your life, it propels you farther down the faith lane toward victory in that situation. Conversely, every time you speak negativity, doubt, fear, self-pity or defeat you flip yourself around and start driving the other way—away from everything you want! Backtracking is not fun on a road trip, and it is no better on the way to your dreams.
Stay in the faith lane by making sure everything you say agrees with what God says. Be consistent. Don’t believe and speak faith today, but then tomorrow say, “Well, I’m not sure if it will happen.” As long as you’re flip-flopping, you’re guaranteeing you won’t receive what you’re after (James 1:6-8).
The more you speak only life words, the more your faith will grow. It will keep you from being in the faith lane one day then out of it the next. Spending regular time meditating on God’s Word is key to keeping your words in line and staying in the faith lane.
And resist every temptation to speak wrong words! Those temptations will come—daily even—but unless you want to drive away from victory, you won’t give in. When the devil tempts you to tell it like it is instead of like you want it to be, say, “No, devil! I’m not going to slam on the brakes. I’m staying in the faith lane!”
3. Be Intentional About Being Obedient
“If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” –John 14:15 (ESV)
The reason God has commandments and statutes is to keep us safely within the lines of the faith lane. Whenever we disobey, we move outside the faith lane, where we’re safest and moving toward all the benefits of THE BLESSING.
The plans He has for us work out step by step—obeying Him in the little things that lead us right up to the big things. Now, we may miss a step from time to time, and sometimes the result of missing a step or disobeying may seem insignificant. But Gloria Copeland believes otherwise: “I am convinced there is no insignificant disobedience.” That’s why we must approach every moment in tune with His voice and obedient to His Word.
It may seem harmless to slip up and be dishonest or fly off the handle in anger or share some gossip, but those small moments of disobedience take us off track and sometimes cause us to wander around when we didn’t have to.
God has given us His written Word and placed His Spirit within us to provide moment-by-moment direction for our lives. Obedience is worth the effort!
Luke 11:28 tells us that those who hear God’s Word and keep it are blessed—it’s as simple as that. His plan and purpose for your life is not dependent upon what you can or cannot do. It depends on your doing what He tells you to do when He tells you to do it.
It takes being intentional about being obedient to make it happen! Though it becomes easier as we grow and mature in the Lord, there will always be work to do—faith muscles to exercise. How do we grow in spiritual maturity? Practice, practice, practice. You can do this by prioritising more time:
- Meditating on the Word of God and applying it to your own life
- Listening for and responding to correction
- Practicing holding your tongue, being patient, thinking of others
- Forgiving others (even from offences of long ago)
- Praying for God’s help.
So, don’t give in to the temptation to disobey God’s Word in any area—especially walking in love. Be intentional about obeying Him and keep yourself cruising along at full speed in the faith lane!
4. Live by Faith on Purpose
“Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is.” –Ephesians 5:15-17 (ESV)
What does it mean to live by faith on purpose?
When you turn onto a road to start driving, you choose which lane you want to drive on and you do so on purpose. Living life in the faith lane doesn’t happen by accident or on a wish—it is intentional and with purposeful effort. What does that look like? Instead of winging it from one day to the next, you have a plan. It includes making the following decisions for yourself.
Begin today and say “I AM GOING TO…”:
- Speak words of faith, and I am not going to speak words of doubt
- Believe God, no matter what my five senses are telling me
- Obey God, even when my flesh is shouting out and demanding otherwise
- Read, study, memorize and meditate on the Word of God daily
- Receive correction from God and those around me so that I can become more and more pleasing to God and stay qualified for promotion.
Now, are you going to be perfect? Of course not. But it is this intentional effort. Living life in the faith lane on purpose will keep you moving in the direction God has for you straight to your dreams and the plans and purposes He has for you.
5. Overcome Hindrances to Faith
“Without faith it is impossible to please God.” –Hebrews 11:6 (MEV)
But I have faith and I’m still not seeing results!
If that’s where you are, it’s time to take an inventory, and find out where you can make an adjustment to get back on your way to victory!
Kenneth Copeland said at a recent faith event, “When you pull a card from the promise box, make sure you go to the Promise Book and read the verses before and after it because it’s probably conditional.”
Every promise has a note of correction in it, a place you need to adjust or a condition that must be met to receive it. So, if something isn’t working in our lives, we know it isn’t on God’s end. But that’s OK! He always gives us a way to get back in the faith lane and in position to receive everything we desire.
While there are a number of conditions to God’s promises (see The “Ifs” Between You and Your Promise), the greatest hindrance to faith is failing to walk in love. Walking in love isn’t “being nice”. Rather, a state of the heart that yields the fruit of the spirit in every situation toward every person. It’s the driving force behind a person who can remain calm when being insulted, bless someone who cuts them off in traffic, and forgive quickly and completely. It isn’t fake exterior behaviors. But a sincere attitude that flows from a heart that has been fully developed in the love of God.
And no matter how long you’ve been at it—it takes work! You will never stop having to work at walking in love. But it’s worth the effort because it is by far the greatest hindrance to receiving from God. If something is missing in your life, it is almost certainly tied to your love walk.
To get yourself back in the faith lane, overcome any hindrances that may have crept up and driven you into the wrong flow of traffic. It is so much better to acknowledge areas where you’ve missed it and correct them than remain in denial and stay perpetually stuck in the same place in life.
You can live life in the faith lane! When you take these five secrets and apply them one by one to your life, you will see a change. Keep making the slight corrections needed to stay in your faith lane, and you will arrive at your dream destination!
