What follows is a partial transcript of Mark Hancock’s keynote address entitled “Lies About You.” The speech was delivered on Sunday, July 21st at the Trail Life USA Summer Adventure and Family Convention. To hear the message in its entirety, click the video link below.
The most powerful words that define and direct you may never have been spoken out loud. They are the words you say about and to yourself. And believe it or not, no matter how young you are, you’ve already got a set of words that you say to yourself – things that you believe about yourself that can either weaken or strengthen your resolve. They can free you to achieve, or they can freeze you in place.
What lies have you accepted about you? What limits have you self-imposed? What mistakes have branded your mind with unquestioned conclusions? What God-inspired possibilities have you already dismissed? What restrictions – self-imposed or spoken by others – have you put on yourself that hold you in place? Maybe you made a wrong decision, lost your temper, did something you regret. So you banish yourself like Moses to something like the backside of a mountain, hiding there from your destiny. Your words may be, “I can never go back and fix what I did; it’s too late. … Others may be brave and able to rise to a great challenge, but that’s not me.”
God may be calling you to reject some lies and embrace some truths. He may be calling you to engage where your resume doesn’t qualify you, where your lineage doesn’t qualify you, where your experience doesn’t qualify you.
What preconceived notion stands between you and your wholeness in Him? What is your response to that question when He stands before you and says, “Are you ready to get over this? Have you had quite enough of this?”
If what you are doing can be accomplished in your own strength, you have to ask yourself if it’s worth doing anyway.
He’s not after what you can do for Him. He’s asking what you will let Him do through you and in spite of you.
It’s time to…pursue the things you feel called to but have convinced yourself that you can’t. And by the will and power of Christ, beyond what you are able to accomplish yourself or even believe about yourself, you can believe the truth. He is the ultimate source of what is true about you. Believe that.