RELEASING YOUR POTENTIAL.

Releasing Your Potential.

1. Be fruitful! God’s command in Genesis 1:28 is most often understood as referring to procreation, but filling the earth with people is only part of the meaning. The Hebrew word for fruitful means more than just sexual reproduction; it refers to being fruitful in either a literal or a figurative sense. Fruitfulness can be qualitative in nature as well as quantitative. Mankind has never had a problem being procreative—a current global population of over six billion is proof of that—but we do have a problem with being fruitful in the other ways God desires. Essentially, being fruitful means releasing our potential. Fruit is an end product. An apple tree may provide cool shade and be beautiful to look at, but until it produces apples it has not fulfilled its ultimate purpose. Apples contain the seeds of future apple trees and, therefore, future apples. However, apples also have something else to offer: a sweet and nourishing food to satisfy human physical hunger. In this sense, fruit has a greater purpose than simply reproducing; fruit exists to bless the world. Every person is born with a seed of greatness. God never tells us to go find seed; it is already within us. Inside each of us is the seed potential for a full forest—a bumper crop of fruit with which to bless the world. We each were endowed at birth with a unique gift, something we were born to do or become that no one else can achieve the way we can. God’s purpose is that we bear abundant fruit and release the blessings of our gift and potential to the world.

2. Increase! Being fruitful is a good and necessary start, but it should grow into the next phase, increase. Once again, even though the idea here is to multiply or reproduce, sexual procreation is only part of the meaning. The Hebrew word for increase also can mean “abundance,” “to be in authority,” “to enlarge,” and “to excel.” It carries the sense of refining your gift until it is completely unique. It is impossible to reproduce what you have not refined. In this context, then, to increase means not only to multiply or reproduce as in having children, but also to improve and excel, mastering your gift and becoming the very best you can possibly be at what you do. It also means learning how to manage the resources God has given you and developing a strategy for managing the increase that will come through refinement. By refining your gift, you make room for it in the world. The more refined your gift, the more in demand you will be. Proverbs 18:16 (KJV) says, “A man’s gift maketh room for him, and bringeth him before great men.” By refining your gift, you make room for it in the world.

What is your fruit—your gift?

What are you known for?

What do you have that is reproducible?

What quality or ability do you have that causes people to seek you out?

What brings you joy?

What are you passionate about?

What do you have to offer the world, even just your little part of it?

Fruit must be reproducible or else it is not genuine fruit. “Be fruitful” means to produce fruit; “increase” means to reproduce it.

3. Fill! The third phase of dominion is to “fill” or “replenish” the earth. Bearing fruit, refining our gift, and mastering the use of our resources create demand and lead naturally to wider “distribution.” To “fill the earth” means to expand our gift, our influence, our resources, just as a growing business would by continually improving its product, opening new outlets, and hiring more employees. Another way to look at it is to think once again of an apple tree. A single apple seed grows into an apple tree, which then produces apples, each of which contains seeds for producing more trees. Planting those seeds soon turns a single apple tree into a whole orchard. This expansion to “fill the earth” is a joint effort between the Lord and us. Our part is to be faithful with the resources He has given. He is the one who brings the expansion. The more faithful we are with our stewardship, the more resources God will entrust to us. That is a biblical principle.

4. Subdue! Fruitfulness, increase, and filling lead naturally to the end result of subduing. To subdue means “to dominate or control,” not in the negative sense of oppression, but in the positive sense of administration. Using business terminology, to subdue means to dominate the market. As we learn to manage our resources, God expands those resources and enlarges our influence. He increases our “market share,” so to speak. There is no limit to what the Lord can do in and with and through any individual or any married couple who surrender themselves and their resources completely to His will and His way. He wants to cover the world with His “orchards” of human fruitfulness.

"If you refuse to die empty, you've rubbed your generation and humanity at large."

SIX IRREFUTABLE PURPOSE OF MARRIAGE.

6 REASONS WHY MARRIAGE MATTERS.

God gave us marriage and He expects the church to stand for it and to support it. Most people don't know why marriage matters. As we teach from the Scriptures about marriage, there are at least six divine purposes for marriage to communicate.
Whatever state you're in  married, single, divorced, or widowed  the Bible commands everyone to honor marriage. The Bible says in Hebrews 13:4, Marriage should be honored by everyone. Everyone, married or not, should honor earths oldest institution.
Sadly marriage is no longer honored by everyone in our society. Today, marriage is dismissed as irrelevant by many people. Its demeaned by many people. People are delaying marriage more and more  many times for the wrong reasons. And marriage is being redefined. Its being ridiculed. Its being demeaned. Its being denounced. Its being discouraged. Marriage is disrespected.
Part of the problem is that nobody knows the basics of marriage any more.

1. God gave marriage for the connection of men and women.
First Corinthians 11:11 says, In Gods plan men and women need each other.
1Corinthians 11:11-12. Amp.  Nevertheless, in [the plan of] the Lord and from His point of view woman is not apart from and independent of man, nor is man aloof from and independent of woman;  For as woman was made from man, even so man is also born of woman; and all [whether male or female go forth] from God [as their Author].
God wired it this way. God thought up gender. God thought up sex. What a God! And God thought up marriage. The Bible says this in Genesis 2:18 It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a companion who is right for him. You need companions in all different areas. But there is nothing like the companionship of a marriage.
Mark 10 says, Gods plan has been seen from the beginning of creation, when he made us male and female. [God made males, God made females. And God chose what he wanted you to be.] This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united as one body. Now since they are no longer two but one, [God sees a married couple as one] no one should separate them, for GOD has joined them together. That passage says three things.
i. Marriage is Gods plan. Its not a tradition we can just throw out. God invented marriage when he invented you, when he invented me, when he invented humanity. Marriage is Gods plan.
ii. Marriage is between a man and a woman. There are a lot of other relationships but those aren't marriage.
iii. Marriage is to be permanent. What God joins together  God joins a couple in marriage  no one, no one else, should separate. Its meant to be permanent. Its meant to be for life.
2. God created marriage for the multiplication of the human race.
God chose to populate the human planet through marriage. For thousands of years billions of people have come into existence because men and women got married. God chose for everybody who's going to be in heaven to come into existence through marriage and sex.

Malachi 2:15 in the Message paraphrase says, God, NOT YOU, made marriage! His Spirit inhabits even the smallest details of marriage. And what does he want from marriage? Godly children from your union. So guard the spirit of marriage within you.
If you're married and you cant have kids, God is not disappointed in you. That's not what this verse is saying. What it is saying is that were all alive because some couple got together. For thousands of years God has used marriage to populate heaven. And if men and women weren't getting together, marrying and having sex then there would be nobody in heaven.
3. God created marriage for the protection of children.
God invented marriage for the protection of children. We all know that kids grow better, healthier, stronger when they grow up in a stable family with a mom and a dad.God knew that human children needed a safe environment. And you were going to need somebody to feed you and dress you and nurture you. You were going to need somebody to protect you, to guide you, to train you, to care for you and all these things.
Proverbs 14:26 says, Those who obey and respect the Lord have a secure fortress; their children have a place of refuge and security. Kids need to be able to grow up in a home that is a refuge.
4. God created marriage for the perfection of our character.
God created marriage for the perfection of our character. It is in relationships that we learn to be unselfish and to be loving. And no relationship has a greater impact on your life than marriage, if you get married. Maturity and the purpose of life is to grow up and realize its not all about you. Life is a laboratory of learning how to love. Why is love the most important thing in life? Because God is love. And God wants you to become like him. He wants you to learn how to love. We learn to love and learn to be unselfish.

The Bible says this in Proverbs 18:1 Its selfish and stupid to think only of yourself. Marriage is a lifelong course in learning to be unselfish because once I get married, I can no longer think about me. I've got to think about we. 
The number one tool that God uses in your life to build Christ-like character if you are married is your spouse. Oh no! Yep! Because every day you get hundreds of opportunities to not think about you. You get opportunities to think of the other person, to care about them. The number one purpose of marriage is to make me holy, not happy. That is counter-cultural, but it is the truth.
5. God created marriage for the construction of society.
Marriage is the fundamental building block of every community, church, state, nation, society and culture. If you know anything about history you know that where marriages are strong, cultures and nations are strong. You know that wherever marriages and families are weak, cultures and nations are in decline.

6. God created marriage for the reflection of our union with Christ.
Marriage is a metaphor. It is a symbol. Its a walking, living, object lesson of how much God loves us and how we are to be in relationship with him. Marriage is a model of a profound spiritual truth.
Ephesians 5 says, Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her He died so that he could give the church to himself as a Bride in all her beauty  In the same way, husbands should love their wives as they love their own bodies No one ever hates his own body, but feeds and takes care of it. And that is what Christ does for his church, his body. The Scripture says, a man is united with his wife, and the two become one body. This is a profound mystery  but I am talking about Christ and the church! So each husband must love his wife as he loves himself, and each wife must respect her husband.

No other relationship on planet earth, including the parent-child relationship, can adequately illustrate our union with Christ the way a marriage between a man and a woman does. This is the strongest reason why marriage cannot be redefined. This is the strongest reason why it must be protected at all cost. Because we are the body of Christ. We are the bride of Christ in union with Christ. And marriage is that metaphor.
It really doesn't matter what other people think about marriage. It doesn't matter what public opinion says. It doesn't matter what the opinion polls say. It doesn't matter what's politically correct or incorrect. What really matters is what God says. He's the One who invented marriage.
Ecclesiastes 4:9-12. Amp.  Two are better than one, because they have a good [more satisfying] reward for their labor;  For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!  Again, if two lie down together, then they have warmth; but how can one be warm alone?  And though a man might prevail against him who is alone, two will withstand him. A threefold cord is not quickly broken.
Jesus must be honour in your marriage.