Joel Osteen is the senior pastor of Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas. Listed by several sources as America's largest and fastest-growing congregation, Lakewood Church has approximately 45,000 adult attendees every week. Millions more watch Joel's messages as they are broadcast on national and international television networks. Joel is the author of numerous journals, devotionals, and books, including the
Hope for Today Bible and the bestseller,
It's Your Time. His book
Become a Better You has sold over two million copies to date, remaining on the
New York Times bestseller list for five months. Visit Joel's website at www.joelosteen.com
Introduction Are you living better today than you were yesterday? Will you enjoy your life tomorrow more than you are enjoying it today?
You can!
Whether life is going well for us or collapsing right before our eyes, we all want to be better. We want to be more effective in our lives. We want to know God better; we want to be better spouses and parents, better lovers, better encouragers, better community leaders, better employees, and better bosses and managers. None of us gets up in the morning and says, "You know, today I really want to do worse than I did yesterday!" No, God put something deep down inside us that evokes a desire to be more like Him. In our inner being, we hear a voice saying, You were born for better than this; you are meant to live at a higher level than you are currently. Don't be satisfied with less. You can be better.
The question is: "How? What must I do to become a better me?"
Today, many people are developing a greater vision for their futures and are experiencing more of God's blessings and favor. But even if you are living your best life now, it is important that you do not become stagnant. God always wants to increase us, to do more in and through us. He always wants to take us deeper into self-discovery and then raise us to a higher level of living. He didn't create us to be average. He doesn't want us to settle for "good enough." He wants us to keep stretching, to keep pressing forward into the next level.
In Become a Better You, my goal was to help you look inside yourself and discover the priceless seeds of greatness that God has placed within you. I showed you 7 keys that you can use to unlock those seeds of greatness, allowing them to burst forth in an abundantly blessed life. These keys are not complicated or difficult; in fact, their sheer simplicity often causes them to elude many people's notice. Nevertheless, they are 7 key principles that have helped shape me and continue to keep me expecting good things in my personal life, in my relationships, in my family, and in my career.
I know these principles work, because I have experienced them firsthand in my own life.
So I decided to put together a 90-day reading presentation of the encouraging principles in Become a Better You to help you gradually develop a habit of becoming a better you each day.
Let me remind you that these devotionals are not meant to be full treatments of passages of Scripture. I am usually highlighting a specific point from the Bible that will inspire wholehearted love and worship of God. Hopefully the slower pace of these devotional readings will encourage you to immerse yourself in God's Word and see all the practical guidance God has to give you.
These daily readings from Become a Better You have been selected to emphasize the 7 keys that form the structure of the book. But I've added several features that I'm convinced will help you apply and live out the truth that God wants you to know. Each devotional includes:
- Scripture Reading to Become a Better You -- these passages will sometimes relate directly to the key being described, and in other instances the Scripture reading will provide necessary background for accurately understanding the truth you are studying. Please don't neglect these brief selections from God's Word if you want to gain the most benefit from this book. - Key verse -- usually chosen from the Bible reading that expresses the theme of the devotional.
- Devotional Excerpt from Become a Better You -- a couple of pages of lessons and stories that I believe will encourage and uplift you.
- Today's Prayer to Become a Better You -- some suggestions that will help you express your heart's responses and set the stage for you to share your prayer requests, desires, gratitude, and fresh commitments to God. Feel free to adapt these prayers and make them your own; take a few moments to have a personal conversation with your heavenly Father.
- Today's Thought to Become a Better You -- this is not just a sentence for you to read and brush aside; it's a thought for you to think about today. God's Word tells us that our thinking patterns become our acting patterns. The way we talk to ourselves greatly influences the way we act. Today's Thoughts will encourage you to agree with what God thinks of you throughout the day!
As I already mentioned, there are 90 readings in this book. If you take them at the one-a-day pace I'm suggesting, it will take you three months to make your way through these pages. I'm convinced that by the end of the next 90 days, you will have become a noticeably better you. Your life can be transformed and renewed as you allow God's Word to refresh you and reshape your thinking, speaking, and daily activities. May this devotional book be another instrument God uses to help you become a better you!
Joel Osteen
Copyright © 2008 by Joel Osteen
--This text refers to the
Hardcover
edition.
