Have you ever wondered why two people can face the same difficult circumstances and yet have completely different results? Why can one person look at what is happening around him and become fearful and discouraged, while another looks at the very same situation and remains full of faith, expectation, and confidence in God? It has a lot to do with what is happening on the inside of a person. 

In Genesis 26, Isaac found himself living in the middle of a famine. The economy of his day was in trouble. The rain had dried up, crops were disappearing, and naturally speaking, it looked like the sensible decision was to leave the country.

His father Abraham had gone down into Egypt during a famine, so Isaac was preparing to do the same. But God spoke to him and told him not to go. He told Isaac to stay where he was and gave him this promise, “I will be with thee, and I will bless thee.” God did not tell Isaac there was no famine, nor did He deny the circumstances existed. Instead, He gave Isaac a word that was greater than the circumstances.

Genesis 26:12 tells us, “Then Isaac sowed in that land, and received in the same year an hundredfold: and the Lord blessed him.” It didn’t stop there. The Bible says that he continued to increase until he became very great. Though there was a famine in the land, there was no famine in the man.

Trouble may be around you, but you do not have to let it get into you. Fear may be in the world, but it does not have to steer your heart. Lack may surround you, but you do not have to develop an image of lack in your heart. Bad reports may be all around you, but they do not have to become your report. Instead of focusing on what is going around you, ask yourself, “What am I allowing to happen in me?”

You have to guard what you allow to get inside you because eventually what gets inside you will affect how you think, how you talk, what you expect, and ultimately how you respond. If you continually take in fear, eventually you will begin thinking fear. If you continually focus on lack, eventually lack will become the picture you see for your own life. If you continually rehearse disappointment and betrayal, those experiences can begin defining how you see your future. What is around you does not have to become what is in you.

God gave Joshua a key to victory in Joshua 1:8 when He said, “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success.” 

Notice the progression. Keep God’s Word in your mouth. Meditate on it. See yourself doing it. Then act on it. The more you meditate, the more you see. The more you see, the more you can do. And the more you do what God has said, the more you put yourself in position to experience the promises He has made you.

Romans 12:2 tells us to “be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind.” God’s Word changes the picture on the inside. As you meditate on what He has said, His Word begins to shape how you see yourself, how you see your circumstances, and how you see your future. Keep the words of the covenant in your mouth until they paint an image on the inside of you.

That is exactly what we see in the life of another one of Abraham’s descendants: Joseph.

Joseph went from being the favored son of a wealthy family to being betrayed by his own brothers, sold into slavery, falsely accused, and eventually put into prison. If anybody had a reason to develop a defeated image of himself, Joseph did. Yet Genesis 39 makes an astounding statement. While Joseph was still a slave, the Bible says, “The Lord was with Joseph, and he was a prosperous man.”

Think about that. His condition said slave, but God said prosperous. Everybody else may have looked at Joseph and seen a slave, but God saw something different. Joseph did not allow slavery to become his identity. He did not let betrayal get inside of him. He did not allow injustice to determine what he believed about his future. The circumstances in Joseph’s life kept changing, but the presence and promise of God remained with him.

Isaac faced famine. Joseph faced betrayal and injustice. Their circumstances were different, but neither man allowed what was happening around him to determine what was happening inside him. God had something to work with because His Word, His promise, and His presence still had a place in their lives.

The enemy would love nothing more than to take something happening around you and get it inside you. He wants the bad report to become fear. He wants the financial pressure to become an expectation of lack. He wants the disappointment to become bitterness. He wants the delay to become discouragement. But you get to decide what you allow to take root in your heart.

Let God paint His picture on the inside of you until His Word becomes more real to you than what you see happening around you. Then look in the mirror and see what God sees. See a covenant person. See somebody in partnership with God. See somebody God has raised up to make a difference. See yourself blessed, increasing, prospering, and fulfilling everything He has called you to do.

Always remember, there may be a famine in the land, but there does not have to be a famine in you.