GOD-SIZE ANSWERS TO PRAYER
1 John 5:13-15
I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.14 This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. 15 And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him.
A few years ago I was blessed to arrange for my friends Ben to come and bear hunt with me in Michigan. Ben had dreamed of bear hunting since he was a boy in Southern Michigan. Now, a resident of Texas, he finally drew a tag for bear.
I found the perfect location for him to hunt, it was on the edge of a large corn field where a heavily used bear trail entered the field. My grandson, Micah, sat with Ben to film and keep him company. Ben carried his crossbow to use on the hunt, so we set up a ground blind just 20 yards from the bait.
The first night of the hunt, the bear never arrived in the daylight, but within minutes of Ben and Micah leaving he arrived for a snack. The second night he arrived right at dark and Ben made the shot. It was a little too dark to get good video, so we decided to wait until morning to track, not knowing the location of the hit.
The following morning 5 of us headed to the stand to recover the bear. We looked for sign and only found one minuscule drop of blood. We spread out and searched the entire swamp for about an hour. We were all praying for the Lord to help us recover Ben's bear. At one point I stood and prayed hard, allowing God to know that we were beyond our own ability to find this bear
Before I finished praying I heard my wife, Linda yell, "DEAN". When I answered she yelled back, "I found him"! What an amazing answer to our earnest prayers. Linda, like me and the others, had walked all over the area looking hard and praying for God's help. After walking and crawling through the area of swamp and evergreen forest, it was obvious that God answered our mutual prayer.
All too often we pray for God to move for us... then we move on and do what we humanly can do... often doubting that God is going to do it anyhow. We think in man-sized reality, when God works on God-sized answers, on God-sized miracles. If we pray and believe and we plan to follow through with giving Him all the glory... He will answer with God-size answers.
This is an awesome example of answered prayers, when the sole reason for the prayer is for God's glory. It reminded me of the life of Elijah in the Old Days. Elijah lived out an amazing life. He was fed by ravens. He saw the supply of oil and flour, of the widow, that miraculously never ran out. With God's help he raised her son back to life. And he faced down the prophets of Baal at Mount Carmel. What was it about Elijah that made his prayers, his life, so powerful and effective? What can we learn from the life of Elijah to help our own prayer lives?
Elijah learned to be completely dependent on God. Elijah prayed boldly for God-sized miracles. Elijah's prayers pointed the world back to God. He never gave up, Elijah prayed fervently until he saw the answer.
Our prayers need to be like Elijah's.... GOD SIZED.
1 Kings 18:37
O Lord, answer me! Answer me so these people will know that you, O Lord, are God and that you have brought them back to yourself."
When our prayers align with God's will, when they glorify Him, when they point others to God and when we pray continually, fully expecting God to answer... it's then that God can and will do amazing things.
Mark 11:24
Therefore, I say to you, all things for which you pray and ask, believe that you have received them, and they will be granted to you.
Help achieve the mission - GIVE today
Click the button to sign up for Dean’s Daily Devotional. FREE and delivered daily.