Is God Willing?

It's pretty easy to believe God is able to do the impossible. But do you ever struggle with believing that He is willing? I know I have struggled in the past. Why do we struggle with this? One reason is, I think we read about these stories in the Bible and believe that those men and women were somehow spiritual superheroes. Maybe you and I think that God is willing to do it for them because they had so much to offer Him. Or maybe God just favored them more… we don't know why, but we believe that God was willing to do it for them but are not super confident in His willingness to do it for us. 

 

We all can struggle in this area, but we forget that those Bible “superheroes” had incredible failures and were ordinary people just like you and I. They were outcasts, uneducated, sexually immoral, cheaters, murderers, prostitutes and the list goes on and on, yet GOD WAS WILLING to do the impossible in and through them. 

 

One scene we experience in Episode 6, Season 1 of The Chosen based on Matthew 8:1-3, was a man with leprosy who came to Jesus and said, “You have the power to make me clean (to heal me), if you are willing.” Think of the mental and emotional state of this man. Because of this disease, he would have been totally isolated, lonely and poor. Everything would have been taken from Him and nobody would have wanted anything to do with Him because he was labeled as “Unclean.” In the series Mary shrieks in disgust and the disciples try dismiss Him away. Everyone is scared.  Yet He came to Jesus. Risking embarrassment and being turned away. He says to Jesus, “Please don't turn away from me.” Jesus  responds, “I won't.” and then later tells the man… “I AM WILLING.”

 

I don't know about you, but I am so thankful we serve a Savior who doesn't turn away from us and is willing to do the impossible in and for us. 

 

***One bonus note: In the series, after Jesus healed the man, He dresses him in a new tunic.  This symbolically represents newness in Christ. He doesn't just wipe away our past. He doesn't just heal us of our disease. He clothes us in His righteousness and salvation. Isaiah 61:10 NLT

 

So how does this uncertainty in God's willingness to do the impossible play out in our lives. Well, it can lead to us NOT asking big things of God and praying safe prayers. It can lead to us NOT asking to be healed or NOT declaring healing in our loved ones. Why? Because we are afraid that it won't work. That God won't come through. But I want to encourage you today. God is able. God is willing. Sometimes it doesn't work out the way we thought or wanted it to. But your job isn't to heal. It's not to do the miracle. Your job is to ask. To declare. To believe. If we never ask BIG things, we will never see BIG things. And I don't know about you, but I'd rather ask and believe for BIG things and maybe not see them, than to never ask for BIG things and never see them.