In my last post I looked at Mary and Zechariah in Luke 1 and their differing responses to the word of God. You know I have to be honest and say I could relate much more to Zechariah than to Mary. Long years of waiting and disappointment had left me feeling a bit ‘bruised’ within myself and much more likely to question the promises of God than to receive them with rejoicing. But recently God has been stirring my soul with his promises and inviting me to believe… That’s why I’ve been writing about faith in my last few posts because it’s been my current personal journey with God!

God used Luke 1 to show me what my unbelief, fear and doubts looked like, and invited me instead to become like Mary, humbly believing God at his word, fully trusting that nothing is too difficult for him. But its rarely just a simply ‘switch’, I actually had to walk this out with God in real life situations and it was and still is, a journey! I often found I could really believe and trust God for a few days but then I would become worn down and my fears and doubts would mount up again, as not much in the situation seemed to change. 

One thing that really helped was meditating on the promise of God or the truth God was speaking to me for that situation, throughout the day (as well as regularly declaring it). Also I found that often, what God had said to me included an ‘instruction’, as in it wasn’t about just passively waiting. If I wanted to see the promise of God come to pass and see the change happen, I had to play my part and do what God was telling me to do. 

I’m going to share one of the words/promises God has spoken to me, my meditations upon it and how I am walking it out in my life by faith. 

“Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us.” Ephesians 3:20 NIV

This is a promise that God spoke into my heart specifically in response to an area of my life that I was praying for and have a desire to see God’s victory and provision in.

As I meditated on this verse, firstly I was drawn to the words ‘to him’. I realise I actually have to look ‘to him’ and know who he is. My father, my beloved, my friend. When I fully comprehend who he is, I will know I can completely trust him. I can trust the relationship because he loves me and is for me. I have to stop looking to myself for the solution, stop trying to figure it out in my flesh and my own strength and instead look to him, the almighty God, who is my father and best friend who loves me most! 

So I look to him, who is able. He is able to do anything and everything. He is the God without limit, he is the God who can do far more than I can ask for or imagine. Have faith in God! Have faith in his creative ability and limitless power. Yet I realised I actually found this rather hard.

I desired for things to be different in my life but struggled to believe God would really ‘do’ it. There is no question he is more than able, but after years of waiting, I found myself unsure about whether things would really truly change in my life. But God was challenging me with this verse to actually have faith in him because he wants to do something amazing!

Wanting God to change things and believing God will change things are really not the same thing. You can want things to be different whilst still remaining hopeless. You want things to change but you don’t actually expect them to. I had to choose to hope again and believe he really would do all he has said he will do because he is more than able. 

Ephesians 3:16 more specifically says God is able to do more than we ask or imagine… Yet how much time do we give to asking and imagining with God? We have a part to play here. You may ask for things but how often do you spend time imagining the victory of God coming to pass in your life? He desires us to dare to ask him for and imagine the most extraordinary dreams and victories coming to pass in our lives.

Never doubt God’s mighty power to work in you and accomplish all this. He will achieve infinitely more than your greatest request, your most unbelievable dream, and exceed your wildest imagination! Ephesians 3:20 TPT

I love the Passion translation version of this verse… God really wants to reveal himself by fulfilling our extraordinary requests and wildest dreams in a way only the one true God can. So we need to stop asking and imagining so small! If you are able to do what you are asking God for by yourself, think again! Ask for and imagine things beyond your capabilities and limitations, things only God can do.

Furthermore, do not skip the imagining part! Don’t only ‘ask’, it is very important to also ‘imagine’. One of the Hebrew words for the mind/imagination is the same as the Hebrew word for ‘womb’. The imagination is a place of conception, where our dreams and desires get implanted in us and begin to grow and develop. As we imagine and dream with God, we begin to see all God desires to do so clearly and are filled with positive expectation (faith) for it all. Like a baby, dreams with God must be grown ‘in the womb’ before they are ‘birthed’ into physical reality.

So if you are struggling with unbelief/doubts, just spend a few moments (regularly) asking the Holy Spirit to show you the picture of the victory or the dream or promise or whatever it is you are asking God for. Go deep and keep asking for more details, use all five senses in your imagination to get a really strong picture of what God wants to do and trust him to do it.

The verse ends by pointing us back to the truth that God will do all this, not up in heaven or somewhere beyond our reach but “according his power that is at work in us”. It’s not God working separately from us, God desires to work in us and through us by the power we already received when we were born again. That’s why it is imperative that when we receive promises with actions attached to them, we have to follow through and play our part (and you will always have a part to play!)

We can’t just leave it all to God and then get disappointed when the promise appears unfulfilled. He wants to work in us and through us to achieve all this and much more! But we have to partner with him to put his power ‘to work’ by believing him at his word, obeying his instructions and guidance but also by speaking out in agreement with him whilst keeping our doubts silenced. 

Have I received the fulfilment of this promise yet? No. I still wait upon the Lord. But I am learning to enjoy waiting with faith, instead of dreading the future. Hopelessness is a dark and heavy-burdened place to live from, a cage you can choose to stay in, but there is another way to live… Faith is refreshing light and pure oxygen, leaving you free in a wide open space – you just let go and trust God to do it, enjoying his companionship as you wait. There are good things to come!