And I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed (descendants) after thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed (descendants) after thee – Genesis 17:7.

 Covenant – An agreement; to promise by a covenant.

We make covenants with people throughout our lives. As teenagers and young adults, we make an agreement with our parents as long as we’re living in their home, we will abide by their rules. As students, we agree to follow the rules and regulations of the school. As an employee, we agree to the guidelines or mission statement of the company. When we marry we make an agreement to keep our wedding vows; and so many times we break our agreement as students, with parents even to our wedding vows.

Aren’t you happy, God is not like humans? When God makes a promise, you can believe the report of the Lord and not what you see, feel or hear. God established a covenant with Abram at the age of ninety years old; when God established the covenant with Abram, God also changed his name to Abraham meaning Father of a Multitude.  Although the covenant was made, the promise was given, Abraham didn’t receive it immediately. The promise was not denied but delayed until the time God wanted it to be manifested.

If God has promised you something, it doesn’t matter when He promised it or how long ago the promise was made, believe God and you shall see the promise being manifested in your life. Sometimes before God can give the promise; He has to wait on us to be committed to Him in order that the promise will not influence us to forget who gave the blessing;  so that we will not praise the blessing rather than the Blesser. Many have made promises to God and when they receive their prayer request they forget who gave them the blessing. They get selected amnesia, they forget the promised they made to God if He would answer their prayer. Every time we make a promise, we’re making an agreement, a covenant and God is expecting us to keep our promise, whether it’s to Him or someone. God looks at promises we’ve made to others just as He looks at the promise we made to Him.

Before we make a promise, we need to think about what we’re promising before making the promise because God is holding us responsible for what we promised. When we say we’re Christians we need to keep our promise just as our Father does. A promise is a vow, and the Bible instructs us it’s better not to make a vow than make a vow and not keep it.  (When thou vowest a vow unto God, defer {delay} not to pay it; for he hath no pleasure in fools: pay that which thou hast vowed. Better is it that thou shouldest not vow, than that thou shouldest vow and not pay – Ecclesiastes 5:4-5).

 There are times we may make a promise and cannot fulfill it,  this is when we should be honest and say we cannot fulfill our promise. God knows when we desire to do it, but can’t. When God made a promise to Abraham, He could swear by no other greater than Himself so He swore by His Word. God’s Word is true and we can always depend on His Word. Don’t let Satan influence you, that God is not going to fulfill His promise, don’t allow him to steal your faith.  Focusing on the problem doesn’t change the problem, but it weakens your faith. You don’t deny the problem; you don’t let the problem be your focus. Exalt God above your problem, whatever we keep our focus on will become our god. Know that the God you serve is greater than anything or anyone that would try to hinder you from reaching your destiny. God spoke into your life while you were still in your mother’s womb. He planned your destiny. We can hinder ourselves from reaching our destiny sooner and we can also cancel God’s plan for our life when we reject the plan He has for us.  God knew before you were born whether or not you were going to accept His Salvation. He knew the pit falls and the stumbling blocks that would be placed before you. He knew the different tribulations you would be going through, but He left His Word to encourage you to go on (Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with the patience {perseverance} the race that is set before us – Hebrews 12:1).

 For some reason, people think when they become a Christian, everything will be smooth and easy, but it’s just the opposite. When we surrender our lives to the Lord, Satan is angry, he has lost another one of his followers, and he will try everything he can to get you back along with the trials you will go through to build your faith. God has given us His Grace to go through whatever we have to go through when we place our trust in Him. Suffering comes with Christianity Forasmuch then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind; for he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin – 1^st Peter 4:1).

 Suffering doesn’t mean you will be sick although sometimes sickness will come to our physical bodies, not because God placed it there to teach us a lesson or because we disobeyed God. Sickness comes because we haven’t taken care of ourselves or because Satan has attacked the individual with sickness. God has a plan for your life and Satan will try to do everything he can to keep you from receiving what God has for you. Know that God is with you no matter what you may be facing. God has promised no weapon formed against you shall prosper, He didn’t say it wasn’t going to be formed, He said, it wouldn’t prosper. He promised the angels of God have encamped around about those that love the Lord. He promised, the Lord God was our sun and our shield, no good thing would He withhold from them that walk uprightly before Him. The promise is a covenant with God as well as the covenant is if we will be His people then He would be our God. God has made us promises and it’s our decision to receive what He has promised. It doesn’t mean we will not have to fight to receive what He has given us. Just as God gave the children of Israel a land flowing with milk and honey, they had to fight for what God had given them. This is why the Apostle Paul admonishes us to put on the whole armor of God in order to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked ones.

Look up, and know that God is on your side, don’t have a party with pity. Keep the faith; surround yourself with people of faith. Read the Word of God and see what He is saying to you.