Leaping not Looking

In the last post, I started to wander off the original topic…again. Sometimes I just get so excited about the thoughts that are popping into my head; I follow the trail and wind up somewhere completely different than where I originally anticipated. (Authors secret, this happens a lot! Especially in fiction.)

Since I rerouted myself back to the original topic, I thought I’d go back to the thought trail about faith. In my previous post, I had said

Faith sounds so easy until your toes are over hanging the edge, and it’s time to jump. But if we refuse to jump, then by definition, we haven’t acted in faith. We’ve simply gone as far as we could on our own and in our own abilities, strength, and power.

So true!! First of all, there’s nothing wrong with using our strengths to serve God, I mean, God gave them to us. There’s nothing wrong with using our talents to honor Him, they’re gifts from God we’ve most likely spent time developing and cultivating. I can absolutely have an impact using these. But if I’m only using my strengths, skills, and talents, ultimately, my impact will be limited. Why? Because I’m leaning into and relying on myself. Therefore, I will only have the impact that I can create on my own strength, power, and abilities.

I can (and should) impact those around me; it’s just part of being a human being on this planet with other human beings. But what if I want to really impact someone else? What if I want to be able to reach someone so profoundly or do something so incredible, it’s transformative, maybe even miraculous? I can’t rely on myself, that’s for sure! If I want to push into that realm, taking that next step…er…leap, that’s where faith comes in. Because the only One who can do that is God.

Let me explain. I used to only pray for people after they shared their requests with me. I prayed into the request with whatever was appropriate—healing, deliverance, wisdom, and blessings. God moved! There were healings and visible touches from God. Then one day, God began to push my faith further.

An individual I had never met before came up for prayer ministry. They said nothing, and I began to pray. All of a sudden words and images began to flash across my mind. Do I say this stuff? This is pretty personal and specific. God? The flashing didn’t go away. I began to feel like I was standing on the proverbial precipice, wondering if I was only going to look, or if I was going to muster up the courage to leap this time. I went for it.

As I shared the words and images that had been flashing through my mind, the precious sister I was praying for began to shake and tears flowed freely down her face. Her head kept nodding up and down as I prayed into each one. I’m not sure how long this continued, but I’m quite certain it was longer than 15 minutes. When the prayer ended, the question was then posed, “Is there anything I can pray for for you?” Ironic, I know.

Wiping her tears away, she shook her head and said, “No, you got it all and more.” THAT’S God! It takes guts to live a life of faith. Sometimes we read our Bibles or biographies or autobiographies and read the stories of those who have gone before us and think Easy for them. No, it wasn’t! It was hard! It’s hard because when living a life of faith, if God doesn’t show up and do something it all falls apart! But they made the choice and didn’t retreat. They held onto faith with a vice grip all the way to the other side of whatever chasm they had to leap over. In doing so, they saw God do the miraculous, and we can too.