We give God the praise for the opportunity given to us to see the last Sunday in the month of November, and today we are bringing our series to an end. By His grace, we started with “Praise Over Worry,” “Come Out of the Box,” “The Mixed Multitude,” “Pressing Towards the Higher Calling,” and today, “Reaching Beyond.”

As we might have all known, to reach beyond is to go beyond limits. To reach beyond is to achieve much more than expected. It means a tough decision not to be restricted by whatsoever comes your way so as to fulfill your mandate, so as to achieve your goal.

And we have heard about a lot of people putting in the work for them to reach beyond in life. People who had circumstances that ought to have hindered them from finishing their school but said no to their circumstances. People who reached beyond their disabilities to become who God has called them to be.

Such was the case of Pastor Nick Vujicic, who was born in 1982 without arms and legs, went through tough times of bullying, depression, and at one time contemplated suicide, but reached beyond all that could have become a limitation to him and is now blessing lives with his life.

Also, we have those who would not allow the goodies of life, the best they believe the world is giving to people such as money, materialism, fame, enjoyment, immoralities, and luxuries of life, to hinder them from reaching beyond all these vanities and fulfill their purpose in life.

Such was the case of Apostle Paul, a man who had all it takes to become who he had been dreaming of but ended up having an encounter with the Lord and reached beyond what would have become a limitation to achieve his heavenly goal.

We have someone like Peter who ought to be a fisherman but through the help of Jesus, reached beyond his earthly dream and became a fisher of men. We have someone like Abraham who reached beyond the comfort of his family to embark on a journey to an unknown destination.

All these folks mentioned so far are exemplary figures that should encourage us to also reach beyond every form of limitation that life, Satan may set before us in order not to attain that which God has placed ahead of us both spiritually and physically.

Because the comfort of the environment we find ourselves in can make us not reach beyond and become an achiever, that is why we talked about “coming out of the box.” The worries we allow to become a burden to us could end up as an obstacle for us not to reach beyond. That is why we talked about praise over worries.

The people we allow in our lives, who ought not to be part of our journey but we allow them without knowing or for other reasons could also become a hindrance to us from reaching beyond, and that is why we talked about the mixed multitude in this series.

That said, every believer must know that nothing must stop us from reaching beyond if we want to attain our goals in life and most importantly in Christ.

Hence the reason we are using Apostle Paul as a case study this morning as he talked more about forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead.

In other words, many things that ought to be behind us must be behind us, such as worries, vanities, laziness, procrastination, pride of life, lust of the flesh, genuine but disingenuous excuses and the like, as these are some of the reasons many people could not reach beyond their limitation.

And this same Apostle Paul now calls the attention of every believer to the fact that we can also reach beyond and attain those things which are ahead of us, the ones God set before us.

Because you will be amazed that many things that we count as gain today ought to be loss for Christ, but we are still holding on to them, and that is why we are not seeing the fullness of God’s presence in our lives. 

All the things that ought to be counted as loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ are what we are holding onto today. Hence the reason for the limitation of attaining the fullness of His power, of His grace, and more like it.

So, in other words, what we are counting as gain today is not gain if it is not for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ. What we have achieved, which are our values in this world, is not enough if it is not yielding any value to Christ, and they can become our limitations if we do not pay attention.

Apostle Paul counted all things to him a loss just to gain Christ, just to be found in Him, just to know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death so as to reach beyond and attain to the resurrection from the dead.

Beloved, we can also let go of that which has become a limitation to us. We can also count it all loss, that which is not making us fulfill God’s purpose. We can also forget the things behind us and reach forward to those things which are ahead. We can press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

Sometimes, it may be hard to let go in our memory, as Apostle Paul could not also obliterate the past from his memory, but he refused to let his past obstruct his progress towards his goal. He reached beyond it.

Let us also reach beyond everything we have set before ourselves and the ones which the devil is setting before the world today, which are interpreted as distractions, hindrances, and stagnation, because if we do not, it would be hard for us to attain our goal in Christ Jesus at the end of the race.

So let us reach beyond by setting our eyes on the things above and not beneath

 

Prayer:

We reached beyond every limitation that the world may set before us, that we may set before ourselves, that the devil may set before us in Jesus name. Amen!