I was lying on my bed really exhausted, staring at a circumstance, trying to make a good decision wishing there was a prayer for understanding God’s will when my preschooler starts telling me the Christmas story.
“And the angel came to Mary but then he went back to the sky, to God, to heaven.”
“Uh, huh,” I murmured, eyes shut, breast feeding the baby, big and buffy.
“But he scared all the sheep too, cause he had a message from the Lord,” she continued and I opened my eyes and saw a roll of toilet paper cascading down from above me.
“But what’s toilet paper got to do with the Christmas story?” I cut right across her, because we’d had many conversations recently about not using a whole roll of toilet paper per visit to the loo.
“Mum, it’s a message from the Lord! Like in the Jonah movie, coming down from the sky.”
“It’s called a scroll” I grunted and rolled over. It is suffice to say that I was in bed by 6:30pm that night.
Sometimes I think I would love a message that clear from God, a scroll coming down from heaven telling me what’s next and where I’m going, but I think deep inside of us, somehow we know what God’s will is, it’s what we all fight for instinctively, to be well, to be fed, to safe, to make a difference, and if we start really studying God’s nature, we discover that really is His will.
Sometimes the details can get a bit blurry, like when and how and why, but just as there are laws in the natural, eg gravity, thermodynamics, there are laws in the spirit realm. You can’t tell me that a God who so delicately designed our bodies and that of millions of creatures, and put our earth at exactly the right distance from the sun, would leave the laws of the spirit to randomness and chance.
There are times you’ve prayed so hard, so much and every single prayer leads you to this strange place you don’t understand. All the directions from the hand of God and still you’re like Moses backed into the sea, and ready for the miracle to rip the sea right open.
We are all desperately wanting to hear from God, to know that we are in His plan and timing, some times more than others. We make mistakes. There are things we wait on, jobs, relationships, and if you push too hard it’s like pushing a baby out and things tear and it’s physically and spiritually a big ouch. I’ve done it.
But then there are other things in Christ, that are ours now. Salvation, healing, deliverance. The Bible says the by His stripes we were healed. 1 Peter 2:24 and while there may be layers to that, we need to know that as our foundation.
Another foundational Scripture is John 10:10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
Our prayer is for understanding God’s will and that is wonderful, and theoretically we know that the Bible is our handbook to life, but the more we study it the more we will see in our life what simply doesn’t line up and then we are empowered to do something about. We are going to explore four areas where we can reinforce God’s will with our prayers and a huge part of that is understanding God’s nature.
I love how the worship songs in this era have so much truth, Scripture and good theology in them. This is a portion of one by Kari Jobe called Your Nature
You bring life to the barren places
Light to the darkest spaces
God, it’s Your nature
You bring joy to the broken hearted
Hope to the ones who’ve lost it
God, it’s Your nature
I’m supposed to give you three steps to figure out your mess; that’s what us bloggers are told to do with our titles, and goodness knows I’ve done it plenty of times, sometimes there aren’t 3 steps, but it comes down to knowing and trusting His character. We sing Good, Good Father but until it’s put to the test we don’t know.
This place where theology is tested and testimony created.
But what is our theology?
If His Name is Healer, why would He ever cause you to or allow you to be sick? We actually fight very hard to get well when we we are sick, taking supplements, going to the doctor and searching out treatments that would allow us to get well.
I think we instinctively know this, it’s why we have prayer requests. A young lady on Instagram recently shared her father had Covid was on full oxygen in ICU and it was a very serious situation. She asked all her followers to pray and within 3 days he was eating, talking and home.
I wanted to go to a meeting last night but was having an asthma attack. I asked for prayer from a few people because I knew that according to God’s Word, I was healed and I just needed that added oomph to shift those symptoms.
I sent a friend a leaflet for a church meeting and she said she wanted to go but she was always too tired by Friday afternoons and often had migraines. I told her to call me next Friday and we would all pray that she would be well enough to go if she so desired because it certainly wasn’t God’s will for her to be struggling with migraines every week. Read here for a story of a lady healed of migraines after she started declaring this Scripture.
When we know what God’s will is our prayers begin to reinforce His will.
God’s Word is full of Scriptures promising healing, and each one of us have a different journey walking towards that.
(Lyrics from the song Generous Portion)
A fantastic book dealing with Scriptures surrounding God’s will for pregnancy and childbirth is called Supernatural Childbirth, and in this post I share my morning sickness free and pain free pregnancies and births.
I said before that our health journeys are all different, and I heard another story of a lady who was struggling with hormonal imbalances and the corresponding emotions that can bring and so she went on antidepressants, while at the same time thanking God that Jesus had paid for her healing at the cross and everything began to balance out and one day God told her to just throw the meds out. Often times God will have us combine the spiritual with the physical.
Another name of God is Father.
A few weeks ago I had a sore throat. I meant to ask Stephen to pray for it before I went to bed but I fell asleep while he was having a shower. I woke up around 11pm and it was getting worse, despite my best efforts of taking Vit C, drinking a whole lemon and a capful of apple cider vinegar before bed.
I had been listening to a preacher sharing how in the early days of their ministry they weren’t making any money and they had nothing in the fridge except a case of coke cans. He was praying, begging God for food but then God brought the Scripture to him from Luke 12:32 “Do not fear, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”
And as he started meditating on how God loves us and is our provider, people actually started turning up at his place with food.
I’ve been praying for a revelation of the Scripture faith works by loves and so I began to thank God that Jesus paid for my healing on the cross, that it is something that is already done, just like our salvation, and we just have to use that truth as a weapon against sickness and disease when it tries to attack us.
My sore throat left. The next morning it tried to come back, but I kept thanking God that it is His good pleasure to give me the kingdom. I went on to have a chocolate milkshake that morning which normally if I have some sort of bug attacking my body I steer clear of sugar, and I did not come down with anything.
A father gives His children good gifts, He wants His children safe, and a fantastic book to really understand this aspect of His character is Psalm 91 by Peggy Joyce Ruth.
So we’ve covered 4 areas or ways your prayers can reinforce God’s will; protection, provision, health, & childbirth, and we enforce these by speaking out loud. Speaking something out actually rewires our brains. There are so many Scriptures about the power of the tongue in the Bible and how our tongue dictates the direction our lives move in. It’s really important that we learn to speak God’s Word while being honest about our circumstance. I had a bad day today BUT God says a fruit of the spirit is Joy and I have the Holy Spirit so I can expect that as I begin to praise God for Who He is, my emotions can shift, they don’t have to stay the same.
As my husband says, its very important where you put your Buts.
Hebrews 4:12 For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it pierces even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It judges the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
It’s our job to renew our minds and speak God’s Word over our lives but the Bible also says we are to bear each others burdens in the big and the small, in the celebration and the journey. We were never made to do it alone, we go much further together. So next time someone is on your mind, pray for them, message them and let’s see more of God’s promises manifest.
God has given us so much that as we read His Word and meditate on it, begins to manifest in our lives. Often the prayers in the Bible are asking God, not necessarily for more, but for revelation of what He has already made available to us, like this one that I’ve shared below.
