I am very slowly realizing that God is always doing God things, but we don’t always have God-sized faith… and/or obedience.
“Ask and keep on asking and it will be given to you; seek and keep on seeking and you will find; knock and keep on knocking and the door will be opened to you. [Luke 11:9-13] For everyone who keeps on asking receives, and he who keeps on seeking finds, and to him who keeps on knocking, it will be opened.”
Matthew 7:7-8 AMP
Jesus said it. I didn’t.
We don’t really grasp the fullness of that short statement.
Especially because most of us (not all, but the vast majority) hate asking. For anything at all.
It doesn’t matter who we’re asking; we would much rather just be given nothing, or what we feel others know or should know we need. But honestly… most people are really too wrapped up in their own daily survival struggles to notice much of anyone else’s.
God, however, misses nothing, yet more often than not, He does “need” to be both asked and obeyed. (No, not always, but usually.We’re all on very different stages of this relationship)
Sometimes we ask, and because He knows all and we do not, He says no, and so we seek to go about it our own way.
Sometimes He says, “Not yet,” and we seek to go about it on our own time.
Sometimes we are so convinced “we know” that we surrender the battle before we’ve even begun the war because sometimes…
Sometimes we want God to do things in ways that shelter us from pain, the discomfort of rejection, or the perceived humiliation of hearing the word “no.”
Sometimes (almost always) we want the reward without the risk.
Occasionally, we really can only see one way out because we forget that we serve a God who is The Way Maker, who parts the waters, who brings water from the rock, and all that other stuff that we all know He does.
We’ve experienced it, but we forget.
I forget.
I forget what He has done. I forget that He is God.
God is God.
He is Creator. We are creation.
His ways really are not ours. It’s not just something the Bible says; it is Truth.
We do not know Him. We have simply made up our own ideas or interpretations of who He is, what He means, and what He is actually like.
He is a person. Eternal. With His own reasoning. We must seek to know Him.
There is not enough paper in the world to contain all that we don’t know about Him.
The Bible, big as it is, is not the whole of the story, much less the whole of His story, yet it tells a very clear message, and somehow, we miss it.
And we miss it because we don’t know Him.
We read the words on the page, but they don’t mean a thing to us because we don’t know His nature, His character. We don’t know His meaning of the words, just our own interpretation of those words, 2,000 years down the road of history.
Honestly, too many people use words every day that they don’t know the actual meaning of, much less their original meaning.
Once again, we forget… that language has evolved over time, and there’s just so much we don’t know, mostly because we’ve never taken an interest in truth, always too content with what someone else said about it… but I digress.
God is always doing God things.
Always.
Big things. Little things. Things that get ignored or mislabeled as “coincidence” (there is no such thing).
Things that defy worldly logic and reasoning, because they are not of this world, and we get so caught up in what we know, or think we know, or what we see, that we don’t even entertain the possibility that there could be another way. And so here I am telling you that there is always another way.
A way you didn’t think of, a way you dismissed, a wall that God can use to show you how He, and only He, can put a door there for you to walk through.
God’s way.
Most times we say things like, “God’s got this” or “His will, His way,” but if we were being honest with ourselves (and each other), we would have to admit that we say it, but we don’t really believe it.
Because we have religion, and we go through the motions, but we do not know The Person that is God. We don’t trust Him to really do impossible things.
And this week was my reminder that when we ask, and we truly trust and believe with that mustard-seed-sized faith…
A reminder that when we boldly walk in obedience, no matter how crazy it sounds to anyone else (and believe me, my own life experiences are plenty crazy to my own ears, and I am the one living them, but God cannot and will not be denied. By me, anyway) He can do above and beyond the wildest things we could ever hope for or imagine.
I understand none of it, but I am thankful for all of it because I can see it—how the hard road He chose led here.
My circumstances have not changed, not really. Yet everything is different because we serve a God who truly can and will do the impossible, even today.
And because of that, because of who He is and what He has done, and just how faithful He has been through it all…
I am overwhelmed with joy and gratitude, even if it all does still feel so very surreal, to the point where, at times, I wonder if this is “enough joy, enough gratitude” for the mountain He moved for us this week. And honestly, I don’t think so, but also, who can say what is enough?
Not me.
So I go forth with a song of praise and gratitude in my heart and the wholehearted acknowledgment of what an absolutely perfect and faithful God we serve.
Only He gets the glory.
“Now to Him who is able to [carry out His purpose and] do superabundantly more than all that we dare ask or think [infinitely beyond our greatest prayers, hopes, or dreams], according to His power that is at work within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations forever and ever. Amen.”
Ephesians 3:20-21 AMP
“Not to us, O LORD, not to us, but to your name goes all the glory for your unfailing love and faithfulness. Why let the nations say, “Where is their God?” Our God is in the heavens, and he does as he wishes. Their idols are merely things of silver and gold, shaped by human hands. They have mouths but cannot speak, and eyes but cannot see. They have ears but cannot hear, and noses but cannot smell. They have hands but cannot feel, and feet but cannot walk, and throats but cannot make a sound. And those who make idols are just like them, as are all who trust in them. O Israel, trust the LORD! He is your helper and your shield. O priests, descendants of Aaron, trust the LORD! He is your helper and your shield. All you who fear the LORD, trust the LORD! He is your helper and your shield. The LORD remembers us and will bless us. He will bless the people of Israel and bless the priests, the descendants of Aaron. He will bless those who fear the LORD, both great and lowly. May the LORD richly bless both you and your children. May you be blessed by the LORD, who made heaven and earth. The heavens belong to the LORD, but he has given the earth to all humanity. The dead cannot sing praises to the LORD, for they have gone into the silence of the grave. But we can praise the LORD both now and forever! Praise the LORD!”
Psalms 115:1-18 NLT