To Those Who Ask Him

God is sooooo incredible! In yesterday's blog, Waiting in Expectation, I shared some from my prayer journal. The beginning of the excerpt was a prayer for a friend who was going to have to do something difficult and stressful today. Well, I spoke with her last night and she had found out that the situation that she was stressed about having to be a part of had been resolved and so she was off the hook. Praise God! I thought back to what I had prayed and was humbled. I had prayed that He had the ability to make the tense situation easy for her but He did even more than that. God eliminated the situation altogether! He blew my mind! "If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!" ( Matthew 7:11) Talk about a faith boost. Not only am I excited for her, but I am thankful that God was gracious enough to show His love for me as well.

I'm reading Reaching for the Invisible God by Philip Yancey and it deals a lot with faith and doubt. I realize that in my prayer yesterday I acknowledged that I do sometimes doubt the effectiveness of my prayers. The book talks about how doubt is generally present with faith because faith requires believing despite concrete and irrefutable evidence. This obviously leaves room for questioning and doubt. But doubt has the ability to draw you closer to or away from God. I love that God still answers prayers despite my doubts. I think what He likes is honesty about our doubts, fears, and struggles. Only when we're completely open can He do what is needed because we are acknowledging our lack and admitting our need for Him. And God is so faithful. "O Lord God Almighty, who is like you? You are mighty, O Lord, and your faithfulness surrounds you" Psalm 89:8.