Here is a list of six excuses that will keep you from seizing your God-given opportunities. Read these negative statements and make a point of removing them from your vocabulary:

1. "It's impossible."
2. "It can't be done."
3. "I don't have what it takes."
4. "It's too risky."
5. "What if it doesn't work?"
6. "What if I lose everything I have?"

Let me elaborate on that sixth one for a moment—"What if I lose everything I have?" The answer to that one is "You start over."

Back in the early 1990s, Carolyn and I were faced with the most severe financial crisis we had ever faced since we'd been in full-time ministry. This crisis reached the point that we had to make a decision to be willing to lose everything and start over.

For a while it looked as if we would lose our buildings, our equipment, our staff, our money, even our home. But were we going to lose our ministry? No!

I won't lose my ministry just because I lose my buildings, my equipment, my staff, my money or my home. My ministry can't be taken away from me, because my ministry is in me.

I'm not finished in the ministry just because all of my earthly possessions are taken. My ministry is in me. You can't take that from me unless I'm willing to give it up.

So my ministry is not over if I lose my building. "Where will you preach?" On the street.

It's not over if I lose my sound system. "How will they hear you?" I'll preach louder.

"Well, if you lose your car, how will you get there?" Hitchhike. Walk.

"If you have to lay off your staff, how will you get everything done?" Work all night.

We had to get to the point that we were even willing to sell our home—our dream home that we had designed and built ourselves—and put all the money into the ministry if that was what it took to keep us going.

God turned that situation around, and, fortunately, it didn't take that. We didn't have to do that. But we were willing to do it. We were willing to lose everything we had in the natural because we realized that losing all our possessions would not mean we'd lost our ministry.

My ministry is inside me. It doesn't depend on worldly possessions.

Seizing God-given opportunities requires that you get rid of all negative excuses. Stop saying "It's too risky." "It's impossible." "I don't have what it takes—the money, equipment, time, support or whatever."

"What if I lose everything?" You'll never seize an opportunity by hanging onto your security, or what you perceive to be security. The things that you and I tend to think are security, the Bible says are not security at all.

I believe it was General Douglas MacArthur who said, "There is no such thing as security—only opportunity."

Source: Seizing God-Given Opportunities by Jerry Savelle.
Excerpt permission granted by Harrison House Publishers