Steve Lyston | Watch your thoughts - Positive thinking brings positive outcomes

Isaiah 50: 4 says, "The Lord God has given me the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season to him who is weary. He awakens me morning by morning,He awakens my ear to hear as the learned."

We all need encouragement, particularly this season when many want to give up hope due to life's circumstances. It is key to have yourself surrounded with people who think positively and who will speak a word each day to encourage you and give you hope.

Negative thinking fosters negative confessions and responses. Positive thinking perpetuates positive outcomes. Negative people will allow you to lose the battles you are going through. They will blind you with logic, fear, doubt and unbelief, which are enemies of faith. Faith allows you to see beyond the natural occurrence or response. Interestingly, President-Elect Donald Trump seems to have mastered this activity. When everybody else says it cannot be done, he engaged in positive thinking and speaking positively. Regardless of your circumstances - whether you are sick, broke, discouraged, indebted, in despair - positive speaking by faith can change your circumstances.

Not permanent

Remember that going through something means that it is not your permanent position or disposition. Focus on the light at the end of the tunnel. There are many negative words - I call them the negative ds - delay, denial, discouragement, distress, debt, death, depression and even depreciation. It is time for us to confess and believe the positive As - affirmation, access, acceleration, approval, addition, appeal, accumulate, appreciate, acceptance and advance. Think about it and believe it. Remember Dr Martin Luther King Jr's 'I Have A Dream' speech?

Each day we rise up we are given new favour, new grace and new mercy. What we failed to conquer yesterday, we are given the opportunity to conquer it today. So when God is going to change a nation or individual, the first thing He does is to change your mind and then change your speech. For those changes to take place, we have to move from around the negative people that will poison our hopes, dreams and vision, especially regarding the battle we are fighting. One may have a good physical vision, but be blind spiritually and have no insight. For many, their vision is clouded by those who surround them. It could be family, friends or associates. This is why many politicians fail, because they are surrounded with many advisers who are blind, negative, doubtful and unwilling to change. Jesus had to lay His hands twice on one man to give him a new perspective before he could truly receive physical sight. He had to be separated from his people - those negative ones surrounding him - so he could be healed and receive full sight.

Keys to success

Ensure you guard the gates of your eyes, ears and mouth. In other words, what you see, hear and say can demote or defeat you. Most of the problems we encounter comes through these three areas. After a mighty prophet called Elijah was so successful, one negative word from Jezebel (which he believed) almost destroyed his ministry. There are so many negative things that occur on a daily basis - negative news, negative reports - negative, negative, negative! The environment is polluted with negativity. The media must give people hope. They have to be willing to seek out the positives as well. Even doctors should challenge their patients to expect positive outcomes. Have you ever listened to the medical advertisements that list out the multiple side effects of a medicine that is supposed to be a solution for a problem? By the time they're done, you've lost hope again.

There is nothing called, can't, with God. Through God all things are possible. Have faith in God when you are going through a storm. Remember, faith is not blind. Faith does not deny the reality of difficulty, it declares the power of God when we face problems. Faith, confessions and positive thinking will bring victory.

Always confess a victorious outcome when you are in a negative situation. Declare the positive outcome that you want. Your mind and your mouth are powerful, particularly when used in the right way. The giants and the mountains will not move or come down until every word we speak is positive. Remember, words - whether good or bad - bring a harvest! We all need a good harvest.

I declare on every broken family, on those experiencing hopelessness, on the sick, that December will be a month of TURNAROUND!