And without faith it is impossible to please him. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him. [Hebrews 11:6 (RSV)]
It was a dreary winter day when the entire congregation exited the church into a weed-filled field. Like the Israelites, we were armed with horns, only ours were those silly blowout noisemakers seen at children’s birthday parties. Silently, we marched until we’d circled the muddy patch of ground seven times. Anyone observing us from the highway surely thought us foolish as we raised those noisemakers to our lips, blew hard and then cheered. Unlike the Israelites who marched around Jericho so God would knock down walls, we marched around that field to show our faith that God would erect walls for us!
That was a little more than five years ago in the Colorado mountain town where we spent our winters. Armed only with big prayers and bold faith, that church built a 15,000 square-foot Family Life Center. At its dedication last September, the congregation was again given noisemakers; when the service ended, the horns sounded as they celebrated God’s love, grace, and amazing provision.
Erecting that building wasn’t an easy task—blueprints were drawn and redrawn, delay after delay occurred, the red tape seemed never ending, and everything was more complicated and often more expensive than expected. The church never lost faith in the project nor did they cut back on serving God’s people. They faithfully continued their discipleship, benevolence, education, community outreach and missions work while raising additional funds for their expansion. This ski and ranch town is not a wealthy one and many are employed only seasonally. Nevertheless, they generously stepped out in faith, shared their resources, made sacrifices, and trusted God to provide. The pastor is fond of reminding his flock that God honors audacious prayers because audacious prayers honor God. The Family Life Center is a testament to that statement—when the people dared to dream and pray big, instead of walls falling, they were raised!
Picture the audacity of the bleeding woman who was so sure Jesus could heal her that she pushed her way through the crowd just to touch the hem of His robe. Imagine the audacity of Joshua asking God to stop the sun and moon from moving until the Israelites had defeated their enemies. When Elijah prayed for both drought and rain, he made some audacious predictions to Ahab. Like the bleeding woman and Joshua, he would have looked a fool if God had not answered those prayers. God came through for them all because their big bold prayers honored an even bigger God.
We insult our amazing Father with trivial prayers; they’re like asking famed chef Gordon Ramsey to make only a peanut butter sandwich. Inconsequential prayers imply we’re not sure He really can do anything that great. Courageous faith means bold audacious prayers and stepping out for God’s kingdom. Because they prayed, believed, and acted on their belief, that mountain church saw our awesome God provide in miraculous ways. He can do far more than we can imagine or ask and we must never doubt His power. Perhaps God will say, “No!” but, if we never ask, He can’t say, “Yes!” God honors audacious prayers because audacious prayers honor Him!
But she said, “Don’t call me Naomi; call me Bitter. The Strong One has dealt me a bitter blow. I left here full of life, and God has brought me back with nothing but the clothes on my back. Why would you call me Naomi? God certainly doesn’t. The Strong One ruined me.” [Ruth 1:20-21 (MSG)]
Pray like this: Our Father in heaven…” [Matthew 6:9a (NLT)]
Our recent trip to the Canadian Rockies reminded me of a hiking trip I took there with my daughter more than twenty years ago. With two guides for our group, one acted as lead and tied orange ribbons along the trail to mark the way. Knowing that we are to leave nothing in the forest but footprints, a second guide (the sweep) followed the last hiker and removed the trail markers. That morning’s hike was a trek up to a mountainside teahouse and my daughter and I (both fast walkers) wanted to have time at the top to explore. Confident we couldn’t get lost, we shot ahead of the guide, promising to meet at the teahouse. Apparently, there was a fork in the trail we missed in our haste; we veered left when we should have stayed right. After a while, it occurred to us that we seemed to be going down when the trail should be going up. Nevertheless, expecting an uphill just around the next turn and unwilling to admit we may have erred, we continued down. When we arrived at the same lake from which we’d started, we saw the error of our ways, turned around, and made the hike back uphill. By the time we reached the main trail, the trail markers placed by the lead guide had already been removed by the sweep. Knowing we needed to go further uphill, we continued our trek and eventually rejoined our group at the teahouse. In our case, the first really were the last and we barely had enough time to eat lunch before starting back down the mountain.
Not all of us have the benefit of eighty years’ experience as did Moses when God called on him. Take David, for example, he was just a young shepherd boy when called on to become both warrior and king. Peter and John were fishermen; nothing in their backgrounds prepared them for their roles as Apostles and founders of a church. Mary was just a girl, in the town of Nazareth, engaged to be married to a local carpenter. What preparation did she have to become the mother of God? Gideon was a farmer, hiding from the Midianites in a wine press while threshing wheat, when God called to him. In fact, Gideon protested that, as the most insignificant member of the weakest clan, he couldn’t be the one to rescue Israel.
Devotions of the Heart 