Possibility Thinking, Part 3

In our last meditation we pointed out that if we really believe the Lord is able to do something to improve a difficult situation we are in, we will demonstrate that faith by asking, seeking, and knocking with importunity, that is, with persistence. We considered the teaching of our Lord on this subject as He taught His disciples to pray in Luke 11:1-13. Today let’s consider this thought further by noting the parable of the unjust judge as given us by our Lord.

Luke 18:1  And he spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint;

2  Saying, There was in a city a judge, which feared not God, neither regarded man:

3  And there was a widow in that city; and she came unto him, saying, Avenge me of mine adversary.

4  And he would not for a while: but afterward he said within himself, Though I fear not God, nor regard man;

5  Yet because this widow troubleth me, I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me.

6  And the Lord said, Hear what the unjust judge saith.

7  And shall not God avenge his own elect, which cry day and night unto him, though he bear long with them?

8  I tell you that he will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?

Now the widow in this parable obviously believed the judge was able to do something to give her relief from her adversary. And she believed that enough to cause her to come to the judge continually. She was persistent. Finally, she received what she asked for and sought. And our Lord used this story to teach “that men ought always to pray, and not to faint.” So if you desire something that is not forbidden in God’s word, and you desire it so that you might serve and honour the Lord with it, then don’t give up. Ask, seek, and knock persistently! At some point, you will get an answer. It may not be exactly what you want, but it will be an answer that will help you and bring you peace.

But never forget what Jesus said when the blind men confessed that they believed He was able to heal them: “According to your faith be it unto you.” If you do not believe the Lord is able to do something to improve your situation, it will likely not happen. Hear what our Lord said:

Mark 9:23  Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth.

When you come to God in prayer, you must come with the faith that “all things are possible” with God. If you don’t have this faith, then you cannot pray a prayer that will please God.

Hebrews 11:6  But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.

God does not receive prayers that are not mixed with faith. This is evident from the following passage:

James 1:5  If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.

6  But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed.

7  For let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord.

If you are asking God for something and yet doubting His power to grant it, then you are wavering. You are acting like you believe God is able to grant what you pray for; after all, that is the reason you are praying. But at the same time you are doubting. Hence, you are wavering. In that case, you can put it down that you will not “receive any thing of the Lord.” When you doubt God’s ability to do what you ask, you are in effect limiting “the Holy One of Israel,” something which both provokes and grieves the Lord.

Psalms 78:40  How oft did they provoke him in the wilderness, and grieve him in the desert!

41  Yea, they turned back and tempted God, and limited the Holy One of Israel.

42  They remembered not his hand, nor the day when he delivered them from the enemy.

So it comes back to this: “Believe ye that I am able to do this?” “According to your faith be it unto you.” And this is where your personal battles will be fought. Do I believe or do I not? Do I trust the Lord or do I not? This is why our Christian warfare is called “the good fight of faith” (1Timothy 6:12). If you doubt that all things are possible with God, you are losing the battle and Satan has gained the advantage over you. Because, you see, Satan is resisted when we are “stedfast in the faith.”

1 Peter 5:8  Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:

9  Whom resist stedfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world.

It is with “the shield of faith” that we are “able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked” (Ephesians 6:16).

And if you are struggling with nagging unbelief, then there is this prayer that a man prayed when the Lord told him that “all things are possible to him that believeth.”

Mark 9:24  And straightway the father of the child cried out, and said with tears, Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief.

You see, God can help your unbelief. That is one of the endless number of things that is possible with God. I suggest you pray this prayer and do so with importunity until you begin to see your faith increasing and your unbelief diminishing. And if you are asking the Lord to increase your faith, you are obviously asking for something that pleases Him. In this case, you will receive what you ask for.

1 John 5:14  And this is the confidence that we have in him, that, if we ask any thing according to his will, he heareth us:

15  And if we know that he hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him.

It is my prayer that this series of meditations will spur my readers to more possibility thinking as it pertains to what the Lord is able to do. Nothing but nothing that you need is impossible for God to provide. God can do anything you ask and much more. When you dare to believe and act on that faith, you may be surprised at what the Lord will do, even beyond what you imagined He might do. To be sure, He may not do just exactly what you asked. He may do something that in the outcome will be far and away better for you and others. In conclusion, let me challenge you to answer the call of this passage:

Jeremiah 33:1  Moreover the word of the LORD came unto Jeremiah the second time, while he was yet shut up in the court of the prison, saying,

2  Thus saith the LORD the maker thereof, the LORD that formed it, to establish it; the LORD is his name;

3  Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not.

Possibility Thinking, Part 2

In our last meditation we considered that the Lord is able to do far and away beyond anything we can verbalize or even imagine. And we saw examples of people in Scripture who believed God could do something about their adverse circumstances, yea, they believed enough to ask God to do something about them. These people practiced what I call possibility thinking. Then we closed challenging you with this question: do you believe the Lord is able to do anything to improve your situation?

This brings me now to the passage that I consider the crux of this meditation. It is the story of Jesus’ healing of two blind men. Pay close attention as you read this passage.

Matthew 9:27  And when Jesus departed thence, two blind men followed him, crying, and saying, Thou Son of David, have mercy on us.

28  And when he was come into the house, the blind men came to him: and Jesus saith unto them, Believe ye that I am able to do this? They said unto him, Yea, Lord.

29  Then touched he their eyes, saying, According to your faith be it unto you.

30  And their eyes were opened; and Jesus straitly charged them, saying, See that no man know it.

31  But they, when they were departed, spread abroad his fame in all that country.

Notice that Jesus did not ask these blind men if they believed He would heal them. He simply asked them if they believed He was able to heal them. After affirming their faith in His ability to heal, he said to them: “According to your faith be it unto you.” So if you are involved in some kind of situation that you long to see improved, do you believe the Lord is able to improve it? Do you believe He can heal you? Do you believe He can overpower the person with whom you are having a problem and bring peace in some way or another? Do you believe that your job situation can improve or that God can give you a better job? Do you believe the Lord can make a way for you to move closer to a church? Do you believe God can still open doors and hearts to the gospel of Jesus Christ? Again, I am not asking if you believe God will do these things. I am asking you the same thing the Lord asked those blind men: “Believe ye that I am able to do this?” And do you believe it enough to ask for it? After all, if you don’t ask, you will not receive the desired blessing.

James 4:2  Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not.

3  Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.

As our Lord Jesus said: “Ask, and it shall be given you” (Luke 11:9). Now I am not encouraging you to ask for things simply to satisfy the lusts of your flesh. I am not teaching the modern “name it, claim it” doctrine which affirms you can have pretty much anything you want if you believe God will give it to you for the asking. When our Lord taught us to pray He taught us to put God’s honour and His will in the forefront of our requests.

Luke 11:1  And it came to pass, that, as he was praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples.

2  And he said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth.

3  Give us day by day our daily bread.

4  And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil.

In teaching us to pray Christ taught us to put the hallowing of God's name, the coming of His kingdom, and the doing of His will ahead of asking for our personal needs.  When you ask for something so that you might better serve and honour the Lord, you are seeking to please the Lord rather than yourself. In this case, you are much more likely to receive what you ask for. I once counseled a cancer patient in my congregation on how to bargain with God for his life. I instructed him to tell the Lord that if He would let him live, he would go up to His house to offer the sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving the remainder of his days.

Psalms 116:17  I will offer to thee the sacrifice of thanksgiving, and will call upon the name of the LORD.

18  I will pay my vows unto the LORD now in the presence of all his people,

19  In the courts of the LORD'S house, in the midst of thee, O Jerusalem. Praise ye the LORD.

This bargaining chip carries a lot more weight with the Lord than asking Him to let you to live to pay off the house, or to see more of the world, or to see your grandchildren grow up.

But if we truly believe the Lord is able to do something to improve our situation, then we need to go beyond just asking. Let’s read further what the Lord had to say in teaching His disciples to pray.

Luke 11:5  And he said unto them, Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves;

6  For a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him?

7  And he from within shall answer and say, Trouble me not: the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee.

8  I say unto you, Though he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needeth.

9  And I say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.

10  For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.

11  If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent?

12  Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion?

13  If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?

Notice in the example our Lord gave of a friend asking his friend for three loaves of bread at midnight, that the petitioner would not be put off. He persisted until he his friend gave him the needed bread. Jesus said his friend gave him what he asked for “because of his importunity,” that is, because he was persistent and pressing in his solicitation. So you asked the Lord to do something about your troubling situation. Did you only ask once and then give up when you didn’t get what you asked for? Does that sound like importunity? Does that sound like persistence? Do you believe God is able to help you to the extent that you will keep asking Him?

Notice that our Lord not only taught us to ask of our Father, but He also taught us to seek: “seek, and ye shall find.” To seek for something is to go in search of it; to try to find it; to look for it. You see, prayer demands actions that are in harmony with its desires. Therefore, if you are asking for health with which to serve the Lord, seek those things that promote health. If you are sick, seek the appropriate remedies. If you are having a relationship problem, do what you can to rectify whatever you may have done to hurt the relationship. If you are seeking a better job situation, then look for other employment opportunities if there is nothing more to be done where you are working. If you want to move closer to the church, look for jobs in the area where the church is located. And don’t just look once and give up. That is not importunity! Keep looking. Be persistent.

But you say, “I have asked and searched but I have only met with a closed door.” Then knock on the door if you want it to be opened to you: “knock, and it shall be opened unto you.” The Lord may just be testing you to see how persistent you will be. You see, it all comes down to this: do you believe the Lord is able to improve your situation? And do you believe it enough to ask, seek, and knock with persistence? Remember what Jesus said: “According to your faith be it unto you.” More on this next time.