“And Moses said unto the people, Fear not, stand still, and see the salvation of the LORD, which he will show to you today:” Exodus 14:13

We’ve been talking lately about “seeing,” but not so much with your natural eyes, though they may aid in the process. I am talking about seeing in a higher dimension. We already know there are sound frequencies at a higher and at a lower frequency than humans can hear but animals can hear quite clearly. Just because you can’t hear them, doesn’t mean they don’t exist.  Animals can sense tornadoes and earthquakes enough in advance to save lives, if we are paying attention.

On occasion I have seen into that higher dimension and on all occasions it has made a significant difference in the outcome of the circumstance in which it occurred. As a young copier salesman in Tennessee, my boss accompanied me on a call to close a sale at the courthouse. Our equipment had been on trial for some time and had performed unbelievably poorly. The decision maker was not leaning in our direction and there was a competitor in the lobby begging for the opportunity to compete.

We had superior equipment and his bad experience was an anomaly but he didn’t know that and was resisting (understandably) our attempts to close the sale. We were giving many assurances but he wasn’t hearing us. Unexpectedly, my eyes were opened to see in the spirit realm. I wasn’t looking for that. I had never experienced it before and would have been suspect of others making such a claim. Nevertheless, I saw perched on this man’s shoulder a black “cat / monkey-like” figure, only far more hideous, chattering constantly into his ear. Surprised by the vision before me, especially as it occurred in a business meeting at the courthouse, I left the room without explanation.

I began taking authority over that demonic presence and praying fervently, whereupon my boss came running into the room I had ducked into to tell me the man suddenly changed his mind and I was needed to go over the numbers to wrap up the sale. Seeing into the spiritual dimension revealed the true problem and the solution became instantly clear. When you are faced with a challenge, ask God to reveal any other forces that may be at work to hinder your progress, then act accordingly.

“And there appeared a great sign in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun… and the dragon stood before the woman who was ready to be delivered, to devour her child as soon as it was born.” Revelation 12:1, 4

This past weekend I received an unexpected phone call, the implications of which are far reaching and personally painful. I spent much of the weekend with my wife processing it. While having our Saturday morning coffee I looked out over our lanai into the backyard and noticed a raven swoop down to check out a turtle trying to birth some eggs and bury them in the shallow earth. My wife pointed out that the time to give birth had come and in the turtle’s most vulnerable time, the destroyer had come to devour her offspring and the turtle had no choice but to give birth anyway and she could not change the outcome. The scene was riveting.

As soon as the eggs were buried, she turned and walked away and the birds of prey began to feast on her offspring. One by one the eggs were uncovered and eaten like delicacies until they were all devoured. I realize this is normal in nature but as you know I have been asking God to speak to me and cause me to “see” and “hear” what He was saying to me. I was surprised by how emotionally upset I became as each egg was consumed. I wanted to look away but couldn’t. I wanted to blow the birds away with a shotgun, but my neighbors would surely object.  It seemed so wrong and yet it was so natural. The mother turtle just slowly walked away, never looking back and the birds picked the site clean in a matter of moments.  Then everything returned to normal as if nothing had happened at all and there was peace. It all seemed rather surreal.

But there was a speaking of the Lord to me. It wasn’t easy to hear, nor pleasant to see but God was showing me something very personal. It cut to my deepest core but at after it was over, it was as if I had just had surgery and been stitched up. The healing could begin. My wound had been open for a very long time, but on Saturday, surgery was done and the recovery process began. I came to terms with reality.

I tell you this sketchy version of a very personal story because I want you to begin to pay attention to what God brings across your path. Begin to recognize the “super” in the midst of the “natural.” I have looked out that window thousands of times and never witnessed something like that. When you see something that grabs your attention, it may well be the Lord is speaking to you, but you will miss it unless you wait on the Lord and ask Him to reveal it. Learn to hear Him in unexpected ways. It might just be a much-needed surgery.

Have a blessed week my dear brothers and sisters.

“And Moses said unto the people, Fear not, stand still, and see the salvation of the LORD, which he will show to you today:  for the Egyptians whom you have seen today, you shall see them again no more forever.” Ex 14:13

As I have laid out previously, one must escape the paralysis of fear and learn to be still so you can see the salvation or deliverance God has. Nothing calms fears quite like being in right relationship with God. When we sin, it is not God who turns away from us, but rather it is we who turn away from Him. We feel shame, unworthiness, etc. because our heart condemns us (and so do many of our brothers and sisters), but John says, “If our heart condemns us, God is greater than our hearts. If our heart does not condemn us, then we have confidence towards God.” When you sin, run toward God. That in itself is an act of repentance, and He will not condemn you. Rather, He will restore you. When you are “still” in His presence, it is the same as “waiting on the Lord,” and it is in that process, you experience the restorative process and find strength again. (Psalm 27:14)

Now to my point. Seeing. Do you believe there is a spiritual dimension, a heavenly realm that is a higher dimension than our earthly existence? I do. When I say “higher,” I am not referring to altitude. I am speaking of higher “authority,” greater excellency, superior strength, the eternal vs. temporal. Remember how Elisha answered his servant who was terrified by the armies surrounding the city?  2 Kings 6:16 records his response, “Fear not: for they that be with us are more than they that be with them.”  How did he know that? Is it possible he had trained his eye to see? Is it possible that his walk with God had attuned him to see in that realm? And more to the point, is it possible that we might also learn to see like that?

Elisha prayed for his servant who had never seen in that dimension, “LORD, I pray you, open his eyes, that he may see.” And the Lord opened his eyes and the servant saw the mountain full of horses and chariots of fire. If God would answer that prayer for Elisha, do you think God might open our eyes to see? I am going to suggest that we can learn to see in ways we may never have seen before, whether with the eyes of our understanding (Eph 1:18), our spiritual senses (Heb 5:14) or through spiritual giftings (1 Cor 12). And I am going to suggest that seeing in that realm is as much of an advantage as natural eyesight is an advantage in life over those who cannot see. Even though we see through a glass darkly, “in the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king.”

In many ways we are sight deprived and we don’t care because everyone we know is also similarly afflicted. But when a man or woman with spiritual vision comes along, we discover there is a higher way of life. In the next several weeks, we are going to explore what it means to see in that realm and I will be calling upon you to share your experiences of receiving sight and seeing the salvation of the Lord!

None of us got to where we are without the help of others. One of the people who has contributed to the success we had at Selling Among Wolves in 2007 was David G. Johnson of Epiphany Marketing. His specific area of influence had to do with the growth of our business using the internet. Because his input was valuable to me, I thought his input might be valuable to you as well. With that in mind, I have asked him to contribute the content for the blogs this week. He is limited to just a few blogs this week, so I suggest you don’t miss a one of them.

In my work with clients over the years, one thing I’ve observed is that most marketing mistakes made by businesses both small and large come from a fundamentally poor understanding of the real identity of the business. If you don’t know who you are, how can you properly introduce yourself to your future customers? In truth, how can you have any real clear idea about who your future customers are if you aren’t crystal clear on who you are? It’s an extension of a personal identity crisis that gets carried over into the business world, and it’s much more common than I ever would have imagined had I not observed it first-hand again and again.

To illustrate this phenomenon, I’ll let you in on one of the processes that I take nearly every client through to help them better understand who they are. It’s actually a very simple process, but is typically overlooked. It begins by asking the very simple question: what is your true product or service?

Before you respond with the most obvious answer, let me ask it a different way. What business are you really in?

Most companies (and this is particularly true of small businesses) define themselves too specifically and do not think about the answer behind their answer.

To illustrate this, let’s use a well-known company as an example. Starbucks roasts coffee beans purchased from growers all over the world and sells them primarily by making drinks out of them in their local retail stores. What business is Starbucks in?

a. Coffee

b. Beverages

c. Legal Addictive Stimulants

d. Entertainment

Be sure to watch your inbox for details of an important marketing meeting David and I will be holding very soon!

“Thus says the LORD to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have held, to subdue nations before him; and I will loose the armor of kings, to open before him the two-leaved gates; and the gates shall not be shut; I will go before you, and make the crooked places straight: I will break in pieces the gates of bronze, and cut asunder the bars of iron: And I will give you the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places, that you may know that I, the LORD, who call you by your name, am the God of Israel.” (Isa 45:1-3)

Did you know that God has riches hidden in secret places? And these are riches He is eager for you to possess. Am I saying that God wants you rich? I don’t know what God wants for you with respect to tangible riches. I don’t know your character, your calling or your capabilities. What I do know is that there are great riches hidden in secret places and the kind of riches I am speaking of cannot be seen with the eye.

Take for example the rainforest. People with limited vision see only with their natural eye and cut it down to obtain temporal, tangible riches. They sell the timber and create pasture land for cows. But people with great vision who have spent time in the secret place of God know that God made the systems that make the rainforest the most productive and fruitful system on the planet producing tremendous abundance out of relative scarcity.

In spending time with the Father, they learn the systems. They discover the ways of God. They obtain great wealth of wisdom as they inherit His heart for the created order and in the process they can be trusted with the power that wisdom gives them. It is the unseen riches that produce the visible riches. Most folks chase the visible, corruptible, temporal riches. Wise ones chase the unseen eternal riches and in apprehending them, have everything else they need.

I don’t know about you, but I have gotten very serious about “son training.” It’s the process of growing in Christ from little children unto sonship. That place where the Father trusts you with the keys to the car… OK, not the car, but the keys to the kingdom so to speak. One of the things that has helped thousands of business leaders mature, take on greater responsibility and handle wealth wisely has been a conference I hosted three years ago this month. Today, I am going to give every one of you an invitation to receive either the DVDs or CDs from that all day event FREE if you order the download version.

We gathered 11 of the most successful Christian business leaders to convene in Ft. Lauderdale and pass on the inheritance of their heart. It was simply riveting. I asked them to speak to us all as if we were their only heir and this was their last time to pass on business wisdom in a Biblical context. What they shared amounted to nothing less than “son training” for the marketplace. I know from some of the blog comments this week, that there are folks who don’t believe “sons” are called to the marketplace, but for the rest of us, this will put you well on the path to being a “son” in the marketplace, regardless of your gender!

People all the time ask us to give our materials away for free… Well this is as close as it gets, but it’s LIMITED TO THE FIRST 200. I suggest you check this out now and get your Free DVD or CD series while the offer stands. Don’t know if we will do this again.

I have been discussing the seven strategies God built into the rainforest to deal with “pests” and how they relate so effectively to work. So far, we have discussed the following: (1) Eliminate the unnecessary (2) Automate the mundane (3) Delegate the routine (4) Designate your work and last week was number (5) Procrastinate the undefined.

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I am wrapping up my four part series on personal productivity as modeled by the rainforest. In the previous three sessions, we discussed the importance of Eliminating the Unnecessary, Automating the Mundane and Delegating the Tactical. Now I want to get to your core competency as the CEO of your life. What are you the very best at? What gives you remarkable fulfillment? This is what you really want to do, free from the time wasters and time consumers that have plagued your life. It’s where you soar at the stratospheric level like an eagle overseeing the fields and forests, planning the next move from a place of strategic advantage.

In the rainforest, plants have certain designated responsibilities that only they can fulfill. They are wired or created to fulfill those roles and everything about their DNA beckons them to fulfill their primary purpose. The fourth law, therefore, is to Designate. By that I mean, designate your time, your resources, your heart, your mind, your strength to that thing you have burning in your heart, but as much as possible, do it at a strategic level.

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The Tabernacle of Moses reveals three distinct levels of Christian living and those three levels are easily relatable to business. Cooperating with them and knowing how to flow with each level will dramatically impact your business.

The Outer Court is Level 1 and is about practices. It is the place where character and competence are formed. It is the place of preparation. It’s about functioning based on what you see, what you observe, what you can grasp based on your own acquired skills. I call it the place of the 30-fold increase. We have spoken a lot lately about outer court concepts. They include processes, systems, common sense practices and they are essential. Most people never progress past this level.

The Inner Court is Level 2 and is about principles. It is the place of strategy, where God opens His Word and by His Spirit reveals His Way of doing things. These are not natural strategies deduced with natural wisdom, but rather God inspired strategies derived from Godly wisdom. (See James 3:17 for details). Think 60-fold increase.

The Holy of Holies is the third level. It is about the POWER of God working on your behalf to accomplish what you could never do on your own, with any amount of wisdom. Accessing this power is possible, but it is not a game, nor is it something to be taken lightly. Think 100-fold increase. We need to operate on all three levels. Stay tuned as we develop this a little further during the week.

By the way, in case you missed it, we have offered the CDs of our seven-hour teaching with PowerPoint on this subject for FREE to the first 500 folks who download the series called, The RainCatcher’s Secret: 7 Ancient Paths to Wealth, Wisdom and the Wonder of God. Beat the rush. On Friday that offer goes out to hundreds of thousands of folks. Click here for details.

 Last week, we pointed out that rainforests have a job. They are the lungs of the planet, exchanging Oxygen for Carbon Dioxide and sustaining life on this planet. We can’t afford for the rainforest to be inefficient, to fall down on the job or to be ineffective. Fortunately, we do not have to worry about the rainforest defaulting (as long as we don’t cut it all down), because it operates by a series of laws or processes that make it very efficient.

When we understand what makes the rainforest efficient, we can apply those same principles to our lives and garner similar results. Last week, we talked about the first law of productivity… Eliminate the Unnecessary. Today, I want to talk about the second law… Automate the Mundane. In short, systemize those things that must be done routinely and in a precise way.

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