Ken and I had been married only four months when we found the opportunity of a lifetime. We decided to go into business with some people and strike it rich! We believed this would help us live "the good life." I eagerly quit my job as a secretary to go to work for this company, and Ken quit his job to do the same.

We were so excited about this great business venture that we left our little apartment and leased a house in the nice part of town. We had great plans to buy this house we were leasing and fill it with beautiful furniture. I was only 19 at the time, and everything was looking up. And then...two weeks later, the company went broke. We never even got a paycheck! Well, there we were - both without jobs and money. Suddenly, everything looked bleak.

At nineteen, my world had crumbled around me. I was newly married, away from what was familiar, and found myself in the most desperate place I'd ever been. I didn't know what I was going to do - or what Ken was going to do. I was in serious trouble and needed help.

Now, I didn't know anything about the Lord, but I picked up a Bible Ken's mother had given him. In the front she had written, "Ken, precious, seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these other things will be added unto you" (Matt. 6:33).

Well, I obviously needed a few things added to me. Actually, I needed a lot added to me, so I turned to Matthew, chapter 6, and what I read just stunned me: "Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow and reap and store in barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. You are worth more than the birds!" (Verse 26).

For the first time in my life, I found that God loved me. If He cared for the birds, He had to care for me! When I realized that God loved me, I just naturally responded to Him. I said something like, "Lord, I'm just giving You my life. Take my life and do something with it."

That day, I was born again. I got to start my life over. For the first time in my life, I really did have the possibility of living "the good life." The good life is not reaching out for things, it's reaching out for God and allowing Him to add to us all that He intended. The good life is living every day in God's victory, receiving His abundance for our every need. It's walking in His unconditional love for us and in His blessings. It is a life beyond what we can ask or think (Eph. 3:20).

Everyone loves to be on the winning side. Most people, when their favorite football team wins, get so thrilled. They just come alive. They're so happy. If that team goes on to win the Super Bowl, why, they just throw a party! It's a tremendous time of celebration.

As exciting as that kind of victory is, it pales in comparison to the victory Jesus has given us. Being excited over the victory of a football game only lasts a few days, or a couple of weeks. But winning in life - everyday having the abundance of God's overcoming love, faith, answers to your problems and everything else that He has - now that's something to celebrate.

It never fades, grows old or gets forgotten. Victory in God is a constant supply, a winning season one year after the next.

But to have victory in God requires using your faith, a key element God places inside you when you are born again. Faith is the key to victory! It has the power to change any problem, any circumstance. It can change your marriage, get you a better job, restore your children, and set you free from addictions and destructive habits.

The new birth is the great equalizer. That means it doesn't matter what your background is, where you came from, how smart you are, how rich you are, or how poor you are. When you make Jesus the Lord of your life, you get born again. You literally start over!

That's why our lives turned around after we were born again. We got to start over. All the disadvantages we had at the time of our new birth were taken away. We were enabled by the Spirit of God to succeed at anything He called us to do. Our backgrounds didn't matter. Our mistakes didn't matter.

That's why ALL believers can have victory. That's why believers can rebuke sickness and disease off their children, rebuke lack in their lives and rebuke foul habits that try to take over their lives. Believers have the supernatural power of God inside of them. They have been reborn by the Spirit of God.

If someone is born again, there's nothing in the world that can overcome them - they just have to learn how to use the God kind of faith that now resides on the inside of them.

You are no longer the same person. You are a new spirit in Christ Jesus. Old things have passed away and all things inside you are made new. "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new" (2 Cor. 5:17). Your future is bright. You have just stepped over into the beginning of the best years of your life. You have begun a life of victory.

You can start today learning about your new life in Jesus. You can get into the Word of God and find out who He has called you to be, and what He has called you to do. For example, 1 John 5:2-3 says, "When we love God, we keep His commandments." These verses contain a very valuable key to understanding your new life.

Jesus taught this Himself, that if you love God, you'll keep His Word (John 14:23). Keeping God's Word is obeying it, doing what it says to do. It's walking in all the light that you have, but always looking for more understanding from God's Word.

Our believing God, our faith, is what causes us to be able to walk through darkness and still be light. Faith affects every area of our lives. It is what enables us to be surrounded by sickness and disease and still be healed. It is what enables us to walk through danger, storms, and threatening situations unharmed.

You have to feed on the Word of God to keep your faith strong, to keep overcoming. You have to spend time in the Word, speaking it out of your mouth and listening to the Word, because "faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God" (Rom. 10:17). Faith comes by hearing and hearing and hearing and hearing and hearing....

It takes hearing it over and over because it takes time to uproot the unbelief and error you've had placed into your thinking throughout the years of your life. If you obey God's Word by spending time in His Word and doing what it says, God will see to it that you have victory over the world and all darkness.

The Word gets into the midst of your heart through your eyes and your ears. Then it comes to life! "My son, attend to my words; incline thine ear unto my sayings. Let them not depart from thine eyes; keep them in the midst of thine heart. For they are life to those that find them, and health to all their flesh. Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life" (Prov. 4:20-23).

As for my life, I have chosen God's way. My decision to follow God, more than 32 years ago, was the best one I ever made. I've never stopped wanting to know all that God has to say about my walking free from sickness and disease, walking in full prosperity, living full of peace and joy. I've never stopped wanting the victory!

Praise God for the great equalizer...the way for all of us to start over and be made new. When you made Jesus the Lord of your life, that's when you became an overcomer. That's when you made the choice to live by faith. That's when you stepped into a life of victory!