Greetings,
In this month’s blogs I am going to address the need for a 100-year plan in the church. I am not talking about our ability to live for 100 years, but rather our ability to transition inheritance to the generations beyond our lives. God is a multi-generational God. He is the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Israel. He is the God of Paul, Timothy, faithful men, and others also (2Tim. 2:1,2). As leaders we must lead in a way that the God’s given vision and the God given letter entrusted to us becomes a spiritual reality in increasing measures beyond our lives. Our leadership must not be for our lifetime, but for the generations of our lifetime. The generations of our lifetime will lead to the generations of the lifetimes to come. I believe that there should be three and four generations revealing the glory of God at all times.
So much of the church is longing for the day of Jesus’ return, but I believe that our aim in life must be for His continual return. Jesus’ is revealing Himself as the one who stands in the midst of His Church at all times (Rev. 1). His prophetic testimony is a testimony of life that continues to mature and advance in the generations of men. We are the bride of Christ and the Holy Spirit lives within us. The cry of the bride and the cry of the Holy Spirit are for Jesus to come (Rev. 22:17). This is not just an event in the coming future, but a continual reality of Christ’s manifest presence in the advancing generations of men. We are living in administration that is suitable for the summing up of all things in Christ and there is a continual increase of glory to the fullness of the summing up of all things in Him (Eph. 1:10).
There is a difference between being a successful person and a significant one. One can be successful in life and only accomplish things that can be measured in his or her life, but true significance is to make an impact upon others. When we equip others we find that the testimony of all that God has given to us becomes a testimony in the generations of tomorrow. I believe that the heart of leadership in the church must be the heart of a father. Fathers live to raise up sons (men and women) that can carry the vision of today as a dream for tomorrow. A father seeks to put responsibility in the hands of the next generation. A father takes the secrets that he has received from God and gives them as an inheritance to his children and his children’s children.
Deuteronomy 29:29 “The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.”
Abraham is known as the father of faith. God’s promise to Abraham was a multi-generational promise. When we read the covenant promise given to Abraham we find that it is a multi-generational plan. I call this a 100-year plan. God made a covenant promise to the human race through the SEED of Abraham. That covenant promise was one of blessing, multiplying, possessing, and influence in the world.
Genesis 22:17, 18 “…blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply your descendants as the stars of the heaven and as the sand which is on the seashore; and your descendants shall possess the gate of their enemies. In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed My voice.”
God’s words to Abraham had four levels of ingredients. Those levels are generational in there nature. They are the ingredients of a 100-year plan:
1) In blessing I will bless you
2) In multiplying I will multiply
3) Your descendants shall possess the gate of their enemies
4) In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed
Some translations read that God would “greatly bless” Abraham. The Hebrew word for blessing here is a double use of the same word. It implies that in blessing God would bless him. It implies blessing beyond him own life. God was empowering Abraham to be a blessing and to live for the sake of blessing others beyond his life. This is the anointing of a father’s grace. It is an anointing to bring inherited favor to the generations beyond one’s own existence.
The same significance exists with the word “multiply”. Some translations read that God was going to “greatly multiply” Abraham. The Hebrew word for multiply is also a double use of the same word. God was not only empowering Abraham to multiply, but to release an anointing and action of multiplication to those beyond himself. Abraham would be empowered to do actions of faith that would propagate actions of increase in the generations beyond his life. These are the actions of a father for the sake of all that is to come.
God told Abraham that his descendants would “possess the gate of their enemies”. This is not a measure that would be seen directly in Abraham’s life, but in the lives of his children and his children’s children. This was an anointing of imagination. It was a grace that would carry beyond the vision of Abraham’s life into the generations beyond. It meant Abraham had to live with more than a vision for his life. He had to live with a dream that would extend beyond his life. Gates are places of influence. The gates of the enemy are the influences of the enemy in our lives. God was revealing to Abraham that they present conditions of his world would be changed through his generations tomorrow. It was part of an increasing inheritance and the power of a multi-generational plan.
God also told Abraham that “in his Seed all of the nations of the earth” would be blessed. This is the ultimate testimony of influence. God was prophetically declaring the Seed of Christ that would be shadowed in the nation of Israel, but fully revealed through supernatural Seed of Jesus Christ and the conception of the Body of Christ.
I will be addressing these things and what it means to have a 100-year plan in my blogs for this month. What secrets are you called to release as an inheritance in the earth? What secrets have and are you receiving from the generations of the past? The revealed secrets of God are the blessings to men. The blessings of God are supposed to be expanded in the generations of men. All that God gives is meant to change the world to become a testimony of the increasing inheritance of God.
Food For Thought,
Ted J. Hanson
Hi Ted,
Great article. I really liked; There is a difference between being a successful person and a significant one. One can be successful in life and only accomplish things that can be measured in his or her life, but true significance is to make an impact upon others. When we equip others we find that the testimony of all that God has given to us becomes a testimony in the generations of tomorrow. I believe that the heart of leadership in the church must be the heart of a father. Fathers live to raise up sons (men an women) that can carry the vision of today as a dream for tomorrow. A father seeks to put responsibility in the hands of the next generation. A father takes the secrets that he has received from God and gives them as an inheritance to his children and his children’s children.
I also liked the idea of a double use of the same word; blessings, multiplying. Wonderful stuff.