"I am the LORD, the God of all mankind. Is anything too hard for me?"
Jeremiah 32:27
One of my daughters kept coming to my wife with math problems she considered "too hard" to answer quickly, like this one:
"If a girl checked out 66 books, then 6 more books, then 10 more books, how many books would she have in all?"
When my wife quickly and effortlessly answered, "82," my daughter responded in utter amazement, "How can you do that!?"
To my daughter, math problems like these seemed too hard. And in her eyes, no math problem seemed too hard for her mother.
I told my wife that I'm sure it's like this for God when we bring Him problems in prayer that seem too hard for us.
I believe a key to strong faith is to realize that there are no degrees of difficulty for God in answering our prayers. It is as easy for God to provide $10,000.00 for a major surgery as it is for him to provide $100.00 for expensive prescriptions, if either of these were our need. Better yet, it is as easy for him to heal cancer as it is for him to relieve migraine head aches.
Some may think certain prayer requests require stronger faith on behalf of the one praying. They think that God is limited in his power by the amount of faith we bring to the throne. There is some truth in this thought. Though God's power is unlimited, our faith limits how much of His power we experience. Jesus was unable to perform many miracles in certain places because of a lack of faith. Often times He said that a person's faith healed him/her or brought about a certain miracle, so there is a connection between the amount of faith expressed in God and the amount of God's power we experience.
Yet Jesus also said that faith as small as the smallest seed could move mountains. He said this when his followers asked for Him to increase their faith. So in the Lord's eyes, they didn't need an increase in faith, but to use the faith they had, even if it was very small. Whatever amount of faith they had would be enough to move mountains!
Furthermore, Paul, the ambassador of Christ to the nations beyond Israel, said that faith comes from hearing the word of God. In other words, we "increase" our faith by increasing our intake of God's words. God is the kind of the person that to hear Him is to believe Him. His character, expressed in words, is so compelling that He inspires faith in those who listen to Him.
We've all experienced this. We've experienced listening to someone and deeply believing him or her because of the truth, conviction, and integrity of the speaker. No one is more true, convicting, or honorable than God.
And nothing is too hard for Him!
Yet Jesus also said that faith as small as the smallest seed could move mountains. He said this when his followers asked for Him to increase their faith. So in the Lord's eyes, they didn't need an increase in faith, but to use the faith they had, even if it was very small. Whatever amount of faith they had would be enough to move mountains!
Furthermore, Paul, the ambassador of Christ to the nations beyond Israel, said that faith comes from hearing the word of God. In other words, we "increase" our faith by increasing our intake of God's words. God is the kind of the person that to hear Him is to believe Him. His character, expressed in words, is so compelling that He inspires faith in those who listen to Him.
We've all experienced this. We've experienced listening to someone and deeply believing him or her because of the truth, conviction, and integrity of the speaker. No one is more true, convicting, or honorable than God.
And nothing is too hard for Him!
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