The Importance of Having Vison

1. By revelation at the place of prayer

Vision comes at the place of prayer when you begin to ask God, “What is your
purpose for my life? Why do I exist? What do you want me to do with my life?”
As you keep praying, when the atmosphere is ripe, God will reveal it to you, in a
night dream, in an open vision, in a trance, or by any other means.
For a very long time, many years back, I saw myself ministering to a huge crowd
for about nine years. It was not time for Ministry then, but it kept on happening.
Other persons kept seeing me too. When the appointed time came, the vision spoke.

In essence, God can show to you by revelation at the place of prayer, the vision
for your life. That is why, every man of prayer is a man of vision. Show me a
person who has value for prayer and I will show you a person of revelation.
Jeremiah 33:3 says, “Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew thee great
and mighty things, which thou knowest not.” So, a vision can come at the place
of prayer.

2. By inspiration from Scriptures

A vision can be received by inspiration from Scriptures. The most important
thing you should know is that the Scripture is calculated to give you a picture of
your future.
Every time God says something, people are meant to see something.
The Scripture gives you a picture of your future. It shows you how not to be
poor. It shows you how not to be sick. It shows you how to be the head and not
the tail.
There was a young man whose name was Josiah. Before he was born, there was
a prophecy that God would use him to kill all the prophets of Baal and to destroy
all the evil altars. That prophecy came about four hundred years before his birth.
Josiah became king of Israel at the age of eight. Imagine! He was just a little
baby.
Josiah just kept going about his young life until, one day, they opened the Bible
and he saw his name there and the prophecy concerning his life. He must have
exclaimed, “What! Do you mean this is what I am to become?” His eyes opened;
his life changed. He stepped into the realm of vision, because of what he saw in
the Scriptures(1Kings 13:1-2; 2Kings 22 and 23).
That is the way it is. While you are studying your Bible, you begin to see
yourself in Paul the Apostle. You begin to see yourself in Queen Esther. You
begin to see yourself in Moses. Vision can come by inspiration from the
Scriptures.

3. By insight into personal potential

God can open your eyes to see the graces and unction He equipped you with.
Then you can begin to understand the direction your life is going to take. When
your eyes are open to it, certain gifts, endowment, and graces inside of you begin
to open you up to what your life is all about.

4. By hindsight

Hindsight implies what you passed through. What this means is that what you
passed through can sometimes become the foundation for what will pass through
you.
Your misery of the past can sponsor your Ministry in the future. The mess
around you can bring forth a message from within you. What the devil used
against you, God can use against the devil.
Moses passed through the wilderness and God gave him the Ministry of passing
others through the wilderness. Where you have passed through in life, at times,
can be a clue to what God wants to use you to take others through.
I was a very sickly child, with very terrible pains. My mother could hardly sell in
the market. She would have to run home many times because her child
convulsed. The black spot of my eyes would turn up, leaving only the white,
with jerking and all manner of unbearable afflictions and pains, including
internal undiagnozable swellings. I had, at birth, an organ condition in the body.
But it has long been restored by the power of God.
Now, see how mesmerized the devil has been. The same fire of healing anointing
by which the sickness he tried to use against my destiny was healed, God is
using me to deliver people from all manner of cancers and afflictions. Your mess
can become the foundation for your message. Your misery can become the
foundation for your Ministry.
Some people reading this book now may have suffered unusual poverty as
children or young adults. If you are one of them, get ready, because God is about
to use you to empower people into prosperity.
Show me a purposeful person and I will show you a wise person. To be without
vision, is to be without wisdom.
Vision can come by hindsight. If you can remember where you are coming from,
God can use that as a tool for deliverance. But this is also to be confirmed by
revelation from the Lord.

5. By passion

Vision can be revealed by a passion to solve a particular problem. Imagine that
every time you see orphans, something happens to you. Every time you see
prostitutes on the road, you want to do something about it. Every time you see
hungry people or you receive news about people that are hungry, you are
sleepless at night. You lose your peace. You want to do something about it. It is a
clue to your vision. That was the secret of Nehemiah. When he heard that the
walls of Jerusalem had broken down, he lost his peace. He could do nothing else
except to go and rebuild those walls. The passion brought the vision.

Every man of prayer is a man of vision.
Those are five ways by which vision comes.

VISION BOOSTERS

Now, what are the boosters of vision? What are the things that help a vision to
come to pass?

1. Prayer and fasting

When you have received a vision, you can nurture it in prayers. You can pray it
into manifestation. That is to say, you can pray it into happening. You do not just
get a vision and go to sleep. When you have received a vision, then it is the time
for praying and fasting.
It took Joseph about thirteen years of incubation for his vision to come to pass.
Jesus was born King of Kings and Lord of Lords. He came as the Saviour of the
world, to save the lost, heal the sick and cast out devils; but it could not come to
pass until after those forty days of prayer and fasting. Then the Holy Ghost came
upon Him and He moved into the realm of that manifestation. Vision can be
nurtured by prayer and fasting.

2. It is nurtured by continuous review

On a continuous bases, perhaps weekly, if not daily, you should look at why you
exist: Why am I alive? What does God want me to do with my life and how can
it come to pass? Have a continuous review. Write down your vision; make it
plain. You need to write it somewhere and keep reading it. Look at it
continuously. Tell yourself, “This is why I am alive. This is what I must achieve
before I die. This is where my life is heading.” Do not just write and drop it
somewhere. Look at it continuously.

3. Vision requires the right association and environment

You need the right friends – people who, themselves, are visionaries; people who
are optimistic, enthusiastic, and positivistic. Those are the people you surround
yourself with.
Understand that there are many dream and vision killers. They will tell you, it is
not possible. They will ask you, “Who do you know that has ever achieved that
kind of a thing?” They will tell you, “That man is not going to be a good
husband.”
There are all manner of people. And you know, many people reading this book
now, would have been far better than they are today, if not that someone
discouraged them. Someone said something contrary to what they believed.
If you want your vision to be alive, you have to surround yourself with the right
association. That is why it is an asset to marry the right husband and to marry the
right wife. Some men have run out of Ministry because of their wives. Some
women became shadows of themselves because of whom they married.
To keep your vision alive, you need the right association and the right
environment.

4. Vision is nurtured by persistent pursuit

Persistent pursuit nurtures vision. Do something about your vision daily.
Whatever is the plan of God for your life, do something about it daily. Whether
you are taking a course, or improving your life, on a daily basis, itemize where
God wants you to go and find out what you need to do to get there. Pursue it
persistently. If your eye is single, your pursuing this thing persistently will make
your body full of light.

5. Vision is nurtured by role model influence

Someone ahead of you has already achieved what you are planning to achieve.
That person can act like a coach or a mentor. He may be a pastor, or someone
who has reached where you are going. He can assist you to find your way. He is
the one that can encourage you that it can be done. He will motivate you and
challenge you to get to where he is like Jesus challenged Peter to step out of the
boat and walk on the water.
Your mentor is someone that will challenge you to take risks. He is someone that
will give you the permission to fail. He says to you, “Even if you fail, stand up
and try again.” He is someone that will not kill you because you failed. That is
role model influence.
When you put these factors together, you must necessarily fulfill your vision.
And I want every person reading this book, who is still battling with aimless
existence, to know that by the grace and the anointing of the Holy Ghost, that
battle is over forever. God is going to show you something that is going to
change your life, and give you a positive direction, in the Name of Jesus.