Some many years ago our daughter, Hannah, came home from school and said to my wife and me “Xi asked me whether I would go to China with her in the summer, she is visiting her grandmother, but I said no!”
Hannah’s comment prompted some discussion between the three of us which included me asking her “Why did you say no?” She said, “
thought you would say no!” We were shocked by her answer and
The conversation proceeded and we discovered that Hannah would like to go to China and the trip did happened that summer, but that is another story.
The reason I mention this incident is because it illustrates ‘expectation’. Hannah’s expectation of our response was different to the reality, and as I write I am asking myself “what do I expect God to do or say? How does my expectation of my Heavenly Father align with what I know of His character and what Jesus says?
The father of an epileptic boy came to Jesus and said “’…if you can do anything, take pity on us and help us!’ And Jesus said to him ‘If you can! All things are possible to him who believes. Immediately the boy’s father exclaimed, ‘I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!’ ‘”1 The response from the boy’s desperate father was both a confession of faith and a prayer for help to overcome unbelief.
When the same incident is recounted in Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus goes on to talk to his disciples about faith that can move mountains. The challenge to them was about faith, prayer and expectation.
Later on in Jesus’ ministry he comes back to faith that can move mountains when the disciples ask “how did that happen?” The disciples’ question was prompted by seeing a fig tree that Jesus had cursed, the previous day, withered from the roots up!2 Again, the challenge is about faith and Jesus again, uses ‘mountains’ to tell his disciples that God will do ‘the impossible’ for them.
The final bible account that is on my mind this morning is one from the Old Testament. Again, it is about praying and asking God to intervene. It contains one of the best demonstrations of confidence in God that I know. Elijah had been involved in a confrontation with the prophets of Baal and once that ‘showdown’ is over, he starts to pray for the end of a drought in Israel that had lasted over three years.
1Kings 18:41-44 says “Elijah climbed to the top of Carmel, bent down to the ground and put his face between his knees.‘Go and look toward the sea,’ he told his servant. And he went up and looked. ‘There is nothing there,’ he said. Seven times Elijah said, ‘Go back.’
The seventh time the servant reported, ‘A cloud as small as a man’s hand is rising from the sea.’”
Elijah trusted that he understood the character and purposes of God and did not give up. We also need to challenge ourselves with the thought that he (Elijah) was a human being us like us. The Apostle James says “Elijah was a human being, even as we are. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. Again he prayed, and the heavens gave rain, and the earth produced its crops.”3
Whatever it is that you asking God to do in your life. Don’t give up but be confident in His character.
1Mark 9:17-27
2Mark 11:20-24
3James 5:17-18
I read this about the ‘moving mountains’ quotes:
‘The phrase about removing mountains was a quite common Jewish phrase. It was a regular, vivid phrase for removing difficulties. It was specially used of wise teachers. A good teacher who could remove the difficulties which the minds of his scholars encountered was called a mountain-remover’
So for any difficulty we face, we need to bring it to our Father, expect Him to answer in a way that is in accordance with his character and purposes (no matter how apparently impossible), and be willing to listen and obey when His response challenges us to do so. Sounds simple doesn’t it!!