Today was an amazing day for me! On the way to church the Lord began to stir some old dreams of mine. Before I had arrived he had outlined three or four scenarios of ways some of these things could be realized.
Once at church I quickly connected with a brother in the choir and unloaded what I felt the lord had impressed upon me to pursue. Having a creative bent himself he immediately gave confidence pursue a few of these new directions.
Moving right along the Pastor ended his message with his famous conclusion of what two things kept the Israelites out of the Promise Land. 1. Unbelief (lack of faith) and 2. Complaining. Ouch that hurt!
If the Lord had used a two by four and whopped it against my head I don’t think he could have made it any clearer. ITS TIME TO STOP COMPLAINING AND BELIEVE!
Knowing that I had gotten His message I ducked into my regular Sunday School class on 1 Peter. As Marcia flowed in her wonderful gift of heavily anointed teacher, she emphasized that as long as Jesus is alive there is hope. (AND He ain’t going anywhere!) She reminded us that we are tempted to think that faith is a small thing. Jesus tells us that our faith is a precious thing to Him. He is not going to do anything to diminish it. Our faith can be extremely fragile and fickle.
Remember that before Peter denied Jesus we are told that Jesus had prayed for Peter. We get confused. We think our faith has to be strong. It doesn’t. It has to be genuine. We have to pray for a faith that will endure a test of time. That’s why we have to choose our battles carefully. We can’t let the stupid little offenses by other Christians tear at our faith.
Marcia took us take you back thinking about the Old Testament Prophets. They had to record exactly what God was giving them but they had no idea what they were writing about. They had no frame of reference. We just take it for granted that we can go look things up because we have THE WORD and books and records to check all this out. They had nothing because the Bible wasn’t written yet. They had to trust that what they were recording was from God.
Remember Peter walked with Jesus for three years and knew him better than anybody. But bear in mind what Jesus told doubting Thomas? Blessed are those who believe even when they haven’t seen and believe. Verse 8 (Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your soul. Verse 13: Therefore, prepare your minds for action!!!; Believe again! Moving in the anointing now there were few dry eyes in the room. She asked in a way that touched the depths of your heart, “What thing have you laid down and given up on?” Maybe you have been bringing the same thing to God for the last 20 years and are afraid to pick it up again. We are afraid to believe again. Believe again, she challenged.
Moving on Marcia talked about the Silent Years when God says nothing more about the subject although we bring it up to him continuously. When God has been silent for so many years the only reason he remains quiet is …because what we are asking for is too simple! He wants us to trust Him to do the impossible. If we will pick it up and believe again he wants to give us more than we can believe for! When God is silent… need to believe again! For he is able to do exceedingly and abundantly more than we can ask think or imagine.~ He must love the word impossible!
