You’re Waiting on God… But God Is Waiting on YOU | ACT LIKE GOD

What if I told you that one of the reasons you are not seeing change in your life is because you keep asking God to do something He's already told you to do? You're waiting on God, and God may be waiting on you. Now, that might sound controversial, but stay with me, because the Bible actually tells us to imitate God. Ephesians 5 tells us to be imitators of God as beloved children. So just think about that for a minute. What do children do? They imitate their parents. They copy the way they talk, and they copy what they do. So if you're supposed to imitate God, then we need to learn to talk like Him, believe like Him, act like Him. Hello, that's why my podcast today is called Act Like God. That is my title. So welcome, everybody. Glad you're joining us to Cindy Hope Podcast. I know there's like 60% of you have not yet subscribed. We don't want you to miss when a podcast comes out. So please go ahead, click that subscribe button, click the little bell and comment. Let us know where you're watching from. I always like to know where our watchers are. But I thought this was an important message today because it's something that we just don't hear enough about, and that's act like God. And now listen, hear me, don't get crazy and be like, this woman's crazy. I'm not saying that you are God. I'm saying that you were created in His image, filled with His spirit, given His word, and instructed to imitate Him. And when you begin to understand how God operates, you start noticing something throughout scripture. What is that? God speaks. Think about it. How did the world get created? When God wanted light, He didn't describe the darkness. He didn't complain about the darkness. He didn't have a conversation about how dark it had become. He said, what? Let there be light. He spoke into existence and He called forth what He wanted to see. And some of us have spent far too much time describing our darkness instead of speaking God's word into it. Am I speaking to anybody else out there? Yeah, we describe the marriage. We describe finances, the diagnosis, what our kids are going through, how tired we are. We describe everything that's wrong in great detail, great emotion a lot of the time. And then we wonder why nothing's changing. Guys, there's a realm of God's kingdom that is activated by words. Jesus commanded the wind and the sea. He spoke to the fig tree. He commanded demons. He even spoke to the dead people. And guess what? They obeyed Him, which is what can I get to say for a lot of living people today. But listen, let me ask you a question. What have you been saying? What have you been speaking? Because you may be praying for one thing while prophesying something completely different with your mouth. And it's like, this is a conversation that, you know, it can get quite controversial with some people. They're like, I don't believe you can have any power. You're saying what my words have, like I can affect my life by my words. I'm like, dude, do some research. This isn't even just Bible anymore. I mean, the Bible said it first, as I always say, hashtag Bible said it first. But now scientists, neuroscientists, I see it even on social media. There's neuroscientists everywhere, like young people that have gotten their degrees and doctors and whatever. And they're all saying the same thing, how our minds are affected. Yes, you just randomly saying anything doesn't change your world, doesn't affect you because it is tied to your identity and your belief and all of that. But that's what I'm saying. This is not a new concept, but it is an important one. Years ago, I needed a new office chair. So like most people, I went to Staples to look for one because that's what you do. And I'm in the back there and I'm trying out all the chairs and I'm spinning around and I'm rocking back and forth because that's important when you're looking for an office chair because that's honestly what I do most of the day, spin around and rock. But anyway, I'm moving it up and down. I'm getting on. Finally, I find like the perfect chair and I start wheeling it up to the front and the guy stops me. He's like, what are you doing? I go, I'm, I'm buying this chair. He goes, no, that's the display. I'm like the display. He goes, yeah, it's like he goes, I'll go get you your chair. So he goes to the back. He takes the chair to the back and he comes out with this skinny box. And I was like, where's the chair? He says, it's in the box. I'm thinking you broke down that huge chair and managed to fit it inside this tiny box. He looked at me, he was like, yep. And then he says two words that you never want to hear as a woman, assembly required. I was like, how many pieces are in there? Like, okay, this is years ago. This is before I met my amazing husband. Who's an engineer who can literally build anything and put anything together. Nothing is beyond his capabilities. Okay. And I'm pretty sure that's why God sent him to me because moments like this, the Lord is like, she's going to need help. I don't even own a screwdriver thingy. Okay. And the guy's like, assemble the chair. I'm like, you want me to assemble something and more importantly, trust it, that it's going to hold me up. This sounds like a chiropractic appointment waiting to happen. It's like, no, we're not doing that. Turns out Staples has a procedure in place for people like me. It's called $50. They do the assembly required. And what do I get? I get the finished product. I like a finished product. Do you like a finished product? Yes. I think most of us like the finished product. Put it in the comments if you like the finished product. Okay. Yes. Just go ahead. Write it in there. But the problem is, this is how we can be with God sometimes. We want the finished product right away. We want the happy marriage, successful business. I want that book written, you know, the child serving God, the dream fulfilled. I want the vision that God gave me fully manifested. I want the end result. I want the finished product and I want it now. But you know, when we look in front of us, sometimes all we see are pieces or worse, dry dead bones. And I'm talking about in Ezekiel chapter 37 when God takes the prophet Ezekiel into the valley filled with bones, if you know this Bible story, and they weren't just dry bones, they were very dry and dead bones. The situation looked completely finished, hopeless. And what does God ask Ezekiel? He says, son of man, can these bones live? That's the question I'm asking you. Can your marriage live again? Can that dream live? Can your finances live again? Can your child come back to God? Can the thing that looks absolutely dead in front of you, can it live? Ezekiel answers and says, oh, sovereign Lord, you alone know. And I love that because God has your answer. See, what appears hopeless and dead to you and me can still be a field full of possibilities to God. Nothing is too hard for him. But here's what I want you to see. God did not simply tell Ezekiel, stand back and watch me. He gave Ezekiel something to do. Ezekiel 37 verse 4, he said, speak a prophetic message to these bones and say, dry bones, listen to the word of the Lord. Come on, somebody. I feel like that means a fire emoji. Come on, put a fire emoji. Hear the word of the Lord. God told him, say something. Notice what Ezekiel was supposed to say. It's not whatever Ezekiel felt like saying. He wasn't saying like, oh, say some motivational statement. No, not your own opinion. He was commanding him to what? Speak the word of the Lord. That's important because I'm not talking about just saying whatever you want and expecting the universe to give it to you. I'm not talking about just positive thinking. Our culture understands positive thinking and being positive is definitely important, but it's not the only thing. I can give you an example because Goliath, you know, David and Goliath, that man was filled with positive speaking. He was super confident. He was like, oh, David, you're going down. He was super confident. Didn't help him any though, did it? So I'm not talking about just saying anything. I'm talking about speaking what God has said because God's word, not your word, has the power to bring life to dead places. So what have you been saying of your dry bones? What are you saying of your spouse? Sorry, I thought that was funny because I was thinking my husband, he's like, no, we're not going to go there. We're staying stick, stick with the story, Cindy. No, but you know, I'm not talking about joking around. It's like, what are you saying over your children? What are you saying over these problem areas, right in your life? We have to be, we have to be careful what we're saying. What are we saying over our future? You know, there's a lot of issues on the horizon. Are you just saying, I'm going to be the next person to get laid off or I'm never going to afford that or, you know, my body's just getting older every day. I'll probably always struggle with this. We don't even realize how often we prophesy defeat over our own lives. Ezekiel didn't describe the bones. What did he do? He prophesied life to them. So if your child is running around, chasing everything except God, don't spend all day agreeing with what you see. Speak God's word over that child and say, as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. If you're exhausted and worn out, say, thank you, Lord, that you renew my strength like the eagle, that I will run and not grow weary. Come on, somebody, will you run and not grow weary? If you're struggling financially, you can say, Father, I trust you that you are my provider. You supply all my needs according to your riches and glory. Find out what God has said and put his word in your mouth because words are powerful, because your body will hear it and they will start responding. Your mind will start responding to what you are saying. That's why Mark chapter 11 is one of those passages where we can read so quickly that we actually miss what Jesus is saying. Jesus says, have faith in God or have the faith of God. And then he says this, whoever says to this mountain, listen to this, you can pull it up in your Bible. Whoever says to this mountain, be removed and cast into the sea and does not doubt in his heart, but believes those things he says will be done. He will have whatever he says. What I love about that paragraph is if you go look at it, you notice how many times Jesus says the word says. Why? Because it doesn't help you if you're only thinking about it. I'm thinking about it. No, at some point, faith has to come out of your mouth. There are mountains. Jesus didn't tell you to analyze people or my analytical people out there. No, there are mountains. He didn't tell you to become comfortable living beside. I'm just going to pitch a tent here because I'm thinking I'm going to camp out for a while. He told you to speak to the mountain. Jesus spoke to, he spoke to the wind. He spoke to the waves. He spoke to trees. He spoke to diseases. Guys, like if you, you cannot think this is weird. If the person we're imitating, as the Ephesian calls us to do is speaking all the time. This is how God operates. He doesn't just think he speaks. So if he tells you to speak his word, he would not ask us to do something. Either we're incapable of doing or wasn't important. So this is where I want to go a little deeper. You need to decree the word of God. How do we do this? Find a scripture that the Holy Spirit is highlighting to you. So when you're reading something, if you want to read all the scriptures on finances, if you need wisdom for finances, read all of them until one jumps off the page at you and you're just like, whoa. It's almost as if God spoke it fresh to you. It's called a rhema word. It means it's alive. It's fresh. It's happening right there. And it's God, what he does on a rhema word is as if he's speaking to you. And when that happens, it puts faith in your heart. And now you have the faith for it. So then what you want to do is stop and begin to meditate on that word. Begin to imagine it in your mind. What does that look like? How does that play out in my life? I begin to feel it. I begin to think it, feel it. And then all day long, I mutter it. I think about that word over and over and over because it becomes part of me. And then I begin to declare that word. Once it's part of me, I begin to speak it out because it's not just words off the top of my head. It's coming from a deep place of faith. It's coming from a deep place of belief. Listen, speaking is important. If you look at the history, it's like who made decrees? Who spoke things out like that? Kings made decrees. And what does Revelation 5.10 say? It says, and have made us kings and priests unto our God, and we shall reign on the earth. It's saying in Ecclesiastes 8 verse 4 says, wherever the word of a king is, there is power. So we can tell that God has made us kings and priests in the spirit realm on the earth. So therefore, when you approach his word, if you approach it like I have the authority to make this decree because I am making it on the behalf of somebody else, it's not your word. It's not what you say. It's God's word has already been spoken. So you need to learn to make prophetic decrees over your life. The Lord is my light and my salvation. Whom shall I fear? I'm blessed going in and I'm blessed going out. How about we just start saying that? Hey, how are you doing at work today? Oh, I'm blessed going in, blessed going out. They're gonna be like, what? They don't know you just quoted scripture. Something starts happening. You know, no weapon formed against me will prosper. You know, I don't know, but I always see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. People will be like, what? Something happens, I shall not die, but live and declare the works of the Lord. You can throw it in your sentences all the time. You don't have to wait for somebody else to come and speak something over you. You need to know what God says about you and you are the prophet in your own life first. You need to know his word in your heart and you need to open your mouth and speak it over your life. Speak it over your destiny. Stop allowing fear to have that, the loudest prophetic voice in your life. Stop allowing your circumstances tell you what your future is going to look like. Stop allowing yesterday to prophesy over your tomorrow. Speak the word of the Lord. You know, angels in Psalms, it talks about that he's angels who excel in strength. Heed the voice of his word. It's saying that angels respond to the word of God. So why would I fill my atmosphere with fear, anxiety, defeat, and hopelessness when I can fill my mouth with what God says? God says, I set before you life and death, blessing and cursing, choose life. So what will you choose? What will you agree with? What will you declare over your life? Because when you begin speaking, it reinforces your thoughts and your thoughts are powerful. They affect your emotions. They affect your mood. They can even affect your physical body. You know, when it was coming up around Father's Day, after my dad passed away, I remember I was having a really rough week. I was really missing my dad. I was crying a lot, a lot of emotion. And by Sunday, that morning, I woke up. I said to my husband, I said, I'm not feeling great. I said, I kind of feel sick, but I have no real symptoms, but I feel sick. Like my body feels off. And as I sat there, because I was trying to pray and just be ready for Sunday, I realized, oh my gosh, my body is responding to everything I had been carrying emotionally. Like all of that emotion, eventually my body started to say, yes, we need to feel this heaviness. We need to feel this. The only way it can join me and carry what I'm carrying emotionally is to get sick. And when I realized it, as I sat there, I was like, oh, this has to stop right now. This has to stop. And I made a decision. I said, that's it. I'm not crying anymore. Tomorrow when I wake up, I will not spend the day crying. I will have joy. I will have strength to continue. This is the day that the Lord has made, not Satan. And you have to make that decision to choose. This is the day that the Lord has made, guys. Even Satan has to wait to see what the day is going to look like because he didn't make it. The joy of the Lord is my strength. That means there's strength in God and nothing is going to steal my joy because I, and it doesn't mean to be fake happy in the circumstances. I can just be like, God, you know what? My dad, my mom is in heaven. They're so happy. You're with me. You've never left me. You've never forsaken me. I can trust you. I'm going to see them again. I can find joy in the moment. And so what happens is it becomes a decision and a decree. And sometimes you just have to decide how long am I going to allow my current circumstances to determine what's happening inside of me? How long are you going to let yourself continue in the misery of what you're currently looking at? I'm not saying deny reality. Ezekiel wasn't pretending there weren't bones in the belly. Faith doesn't mean pretending the bones aren't there. Faith means the bones don't get the final word. God does. And some people are waiting on God while God is waiting on them. God operates within the systems he created. And he created us in his image. And he said, speak to the mountain and make it move. There are moments when you have to stop whining about the mountain and speak to it. You have to do glare. You have to agree with heaven. You have to act like God. Not God, but like him. His angels don't respond to your whining. They respond to his word. And when you decree, don't declare from a place of fear or worry. Don't stand there saying scripture because you're terrified it isn't going to happen. No, you have to declare from a place of kingship, a place of authority, of confidence, of absolute trust in God that he is the one doing it. Troublemakers are far from my destiny. God is bringing the right people into my life. His mercies are new every morning. I will walk in everything he's got for me. I will fulfill the purpose he has in my life. Doors are opening for me that he is destined me to walk through. They're opening for me right now. No sickness can live in my body because Jesus paid the price and I have divine health. My body is divinely healthy. Every disease and virus dies when it touches my body. I receive the mercy and the grace that is for today. I declare that every door the Lord has for me this week opens that I may walk through it. This is what I'm talking about, guys. It's God words that brings life and change into the situation. So find that scripture, memorize it, meditate on it. And then when faith rises in your spirit, you declare it, you speak it out. And parents, listen, Psalm 112 says this, blessed is the man who fears the Lord, who delights greatly in his commandments. His descendants will be mighty on the earth. The generation of the upright will be blessed. So when you're looking at your child and everything you're seeing in the natural is telling you something different, you say, my child will be mighty on this earth. The generation of the upright will be blessed. My child is blessed. Every spirit trying to come against my child, I look beyond what I'm seeing right now. I look beyond the stubbornness. I look beyond the rebellion. I look beyond this season and I see a giant rising. They will fulfill the purpose of God for their lives. They will be blessed. They will serve the Lord. Why? Because I'm not gonna let what I see become greater than what God said. And that's exactly what Ezekiel did. The Bible says he prophesied. And then suddenly there was a noise. There was a rattling. And slowly the bones began to come together. The muscles and the flesh began to form. The skin began to cover. There was, then there was the breath. So God told Ezekiel, he said, speak again, Ezekiel. Prophesied the breath. He said, prophesied the breath. The breath rose and brought their bodies back to life. See, sometimes we speak and we, there's a rattling. There's a little rattling in the distance. And sometimes it's, you know, we're like, is that it? Is that enough? And we back off and we think, oh, that's it. It's done. And, but God is saying, speak again, prophesy again to it. Speak it again. Don't give up until you see the breath in it. And then they stood to their feet. And what happened is the valley was filled with now a great army. That's the finished product. But see, Ezekiel didn't start with the finished product. He started with dry bones, but he started with an encounter with God, a word from God and the willingness to say what God told him to say. And that might be where some of you are at today. God is saying, don't call something dead that God is still building. Don't prophesy defeat over something God intends to breathe into. Believe what he says and open your mouth and speak his word. You were created in his image. You carry his spirit. You have his word. Act like God. And don't give up until you hear the rattling, until you see the army rise with all the breath in them. Amen. Well, come on, somebody. I hope you share this podcast. Share it with somebody that will encourage them. Let's get it out there. Help us with the algorithm. Let's share it as many people as we can. Please comment. Let us know if you enjoyed it. What do we need? What do you need prayer for? We're wanting to know. And we'll see you on the next one.