"Overcoming Obstacles to Your Vision!"

Greetings, My Friends.

When your vision gets challenged or tested, your first instinct might be to fix everything fast. 

I am sharing a new response because I’ve been there—and in this conversation, I walk through a counterintuitive path that steadies the heart and clarifies the next step: pause, practice God’s presence, and proclaim His promises before you move. That shift—from reacting to responding—turns obstacles into places of renewal and moves your goals forward with quiet strength.

I am sharing a recent moment when panic knocked, and how stillness opened the door to a better response. From Hebrews 10:36, I gained a clear insight: patience often sits between obedience and fulfillment. 

We also unpack the Three P’s—patience, perseverance, and practice—and show how they work together in real life. Practice means withdrawing to a quiet place, remembering God’s faithfulness, and speaking truth out loud over your goals and vision. Perseverance means steady motion in the strength God provides, especially when fatigue or spiritual resistance pushes back. Patience becomes active expectancy, like a skilled server—attentive, ready, and responsive at the right time.

If you’re facing setbacks or challenges, a seeming delay in your promise from God, you’ll learn simple steps to regain confidence: be still, worship, recall past provision, and declare promises such as Deuteronomy 28:8 over the work of your hands. 

We talk about shifting focus from the problem to God’s presence, understanding the true nature of resistance, and refusing to throw away your confidence because it has a great reward. By the end, you’ll have a practical rhythm for navigating hard days and keeping moving toward a God-given vision with peace, clarity, and resolve.

If this resonates, subscribe, share it with a friend who needs courage today, and leave a review to help more listeners find messages like this. What promise will you proclaim this week?

Let’s stay connected. 

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Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome And The Vision Challenge
• 0:38 A Personal Obstacle And First Reaction
• 1:46 The Three P’s Revealed
• 2:35 Practice The Presence Of God
• 4:15 From Fear To Confidence
• 5:01 Proclaiming God’s Promises
• 6:00 Perseverance And Renewed Strength
• 7:42 Patience As Active Expectancy
• 9:00 Prayer And Final Encouragement

Transcript

Tony: 0:00

Greetings, my friends. Tony Williams here. Welcome to Cell D Summit Evergreen Leader Development Insights. Thank you so much for listening. I'm so excited about the message I want to share with you today. It's called Overcoming Obstacles to Your Vision. Overcoming obstacles to your vision. You know, this year we've been setting goals and establishing a vision that God gives us. And the goals and vision that God gives us, He guarantees that they will come to pass. However, on the way, we can anticipate obstacles. Just yesterday, I faced a significant obstacle to my vision. At first, I was almost overcome by it. But then I decided to respond in the power of God, His Holy Spirit in me. And this gives you the ability, my friends, not to react to a circumstance. When you face an obstacle, and it can come in many shapes, forms, and fashions, it could come from people, it could come from circumstances, many different ways. The most important thing we can do when we encounter an obstacle on our way to God fulfilling the promise of his vision is to pause and be silent. Be still and know that he is God. Don't feel like you have to immediately react or respond to the situation. Yesterday, when I faced a significant challenge, my first reaction was, oh, I'm being attacked. Oh, this is terrible. I need to do something. But God told me, nope, you just sit and wait and be still and know that I'm God. So I went to bed. In the middle of the night, around three o'clock this morning, the Lord awoke me and He gave me this message. You have need of patience, that after you have done the will of God, you will receive the promise. Hebrews the 10th chapter, verse 36. That's ironic because in 2015, when I was coaching early career professionals, one of my first messages was entitled, The Three P's Are Invaluable: Patience, Perseverance, and Practice. So when I awoke this morning at 3 o'clock a.m., I knew what God was saying to me. Tony, you have to have patience. Tony, you have to persevere and you have to practice. Let me unpack that for you. Let me share what those mean to me, and I believe they will help you with you when you encounter obstacles. The first one is practice. First of twofold, practice the presence of God. You see, when you're encountering a challenge, don't feel like you have to react immediately. Instead, withdraw to a quiet place alone with God and practice being in the presence of God. Talk with him, fellowship with him, worship him, sing songs to him. Then as you spend that time alone with God, practicing being still and listening and just thanking him for giving you the vision, thanking you, thanking him for giving you the promises that he's given you as you've taken the time to get alone with him and ask him, Lord, what's your vision for my life? Lord, help me to set goals that are big and grand and spectacular. That once they're accomplished, everyone will know God did it. So when he does that, you can anticipate obstacles. Obstacles come in many forms, but most of the time they have a spiritual dimension to them. And we have to encounter and face spiritual obstacles in a spiritual way. So here's what it looks like. You practice the presence of God. Thank you, Father God, that you love me. Thank you, Father God, that you see me. Thank you, Father God, that you've given me this vision. Thank you, Father God, that you have been so faithful to me. I remember five years ago, ten years ago, you just let the Holy Spirit in you, give you the time frame, and just reflect on the goodness of God, the faithfulness of God, the miracles that God has given you to this point. And what that does, it shifts your focus from the obstacle to the Almighty presence of God. And then you know what happens? Your spirit gets lighter. You start to be more confident that God is in control and you begin to see the true nature of the obstacle. It is a hindrance, a designed tactic of the devil to make you turn back, to make you doubt. So when you face these obstacles, don't give in. Recognize that you're in step with God, that you're moving to where God wants you to be, and Satan wants you to be resisted. He wants to force you to turn around. That's why God told me also, He said, Don't throw away your confidence. It has great reward. In other words, God is saying to me, Tony, you're confident, you're believing me, you're fully persuaded that what I've promised, I'm going to do. Don't throw away your confidence. It will be greatly rewarded. And that's what he's saying to you, my friend, wherever you are in the world. If God has given you a vision, if God has helped you set goals, he's saying, Be confident in me, practice my presence and proclaim my promises. And that's what I did. I have my vision board. I have the goals that God has helped me set. And I just began to look at those goals and thank God and proclaim the blessings and the promises of God. Here's one that God gave me as I was preparing for our message. It's found in Deuteronomy the 28th chapter, verse 8. Write it down, look it up, because God wanted me to share this with you. Because I love you and I pray for you and I know God wants the very best for you. And this is what Deuteronomy 28 promises. The Lord will command a blessing. The Lord will command the blessing upon you, upon your barns. That's your finances and your savings and those instruments, your barns, and everything you put your hand to, and in the land that the Lord your God is giving you. That's your vision. So, my friends, when we face these obstacles, the response should be not to react, but this too. Withdraw, get alone with God, practice the presence, praise Him and thank Him, and then speak aloud the promises of God. Practice the presence of God and proclaim the promises of God. Just like I gave you Deuteronomy 28:8. I proclaim that over myself throughout the day. I proclaim other promises that God has given me for all the goals that He has helped me set and the vision that He's given me. I believe that God wants you to know this. So when you face an obstacle, you may be facing one right now. Step one, withdraw and get alone with God. Practice His presence and proclaim his promises over your vision and the goals that He's helped you set. So that's practice. Then it's perseverance, patience, perseverance, and practice. Perseverance is meaning you keep going, you don't give up, you be still and know that God is God. And perseverance means that you keep going in the strength that God provides. We get tired physically, we get tired emotionally, and we come under spiritual attack occasionally, sometimes more frequently than we realize. So God knows that. So He's told us, come alone and be still with me for a moment. Renew your strength. They that wait upon the Lord will gain new strength. They will mount up with wings like eagles, they will run and not be weary, they will walk and not faint. So when we practice patience, we practice perseverance. God gives us supernatural strength to keep going in the power that He provides. And then the patience. Patience is realizing that God is going to work in your behalf at the perfect time. And so we're patient. We wait patiently for him. When we wait patiently for the Lord, it doesn't mean that we're not doing anything. Waiting in this context means we're alert. It's sort of like a waiter at a five-star restaurant. That waiter is attentive to the needs of the customer, the person who's dining there. They are attentive. This is what waiting means from a spiritual context. We are tuned in, we're focused, and we're expecting, anticipating God to give us guidance and direction. We're attentive. And so that's what waiting for the Lord means. When we're waiting, we're patiently waiting, looking, expecting, anticipating what He will have us do next. And so, my friends, the three P's are invaluable: patience, perseverance, and practice. Father God, I thank you for my brothers and my sisters, your leaders all around the world, when they listen to this message, may your Holy Spirit speak to their hearts, may your Holy Spirit encourage them, empower them, equip them to overcome the obstacles your way and continue to move forward by faith, accomplishing the goals you've helped us set, and realizing the vision that you've placed in our spirits. In Jesus' name. Amen.