I have a
hard time believing… that there is good in the world, that God does in fact
love me, that grace is sufficient, that miracles can occur… that God has given
me power and authority to perform miracles in His name.
I mean, why
would He choose me? I doubt. I question.
I stop myself from taking that leap of faith.
Recently
I’ve been reading the gospels. Turns out
I’m not the first to struggle with this lack of faith, this issue of
disbelief.
And you know
what? Not being alone makes me feel a
lot better.
Jesus told
the disciples, to their face, standing
right there, that they were to go out, preach that the kingdom of heaven
was near, and to do the following: heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those
that have leprosy, and drive out demons.
I was told
to do the same. Someone claimed Jesus told
his disciples to do this, and if this was their charge, then it should be
ours. I did not even believe it was in
the Bible. (I was wrong; you can find it
in Matthew 10:7-8.) Much more, I did not
believe that Jesus would ask this of me.
But back to
me not being alone… If you keep reading past this initiative, you see that the
disciples did go out to do these things, but in Matthew 17:14-23, we learn that
the disciples tried to cast out a demon & heal a boy with seizures, and they failed! Why?
Because Jesus was wrong? They
couldn’t do it? Nope. Jesus tells them why…
“Because you have so little faith. I tell you the truth, if you have faith as
small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to
there’ and it will move. Nothing will be
impossible for you.”
Hmmm… I
wonder, is this why I can’t do these things?
Is it my lack of faith?
This week,
we went out to the hospital here in Mwanza to pray for the sick, to bring healing
to their bodies, to bring the hope of Jesus into a place of despair. On Monday, I doubted that I could do
anything, but I prayed anyway. Nothing
extraordinary happened. That night I
read about the call that Jesus gave the disciples. It scared me that it was in the Bible. It scared me that this was asked of me
too. Tuesday, I went in scared of this
authority… I fainted. Fell to the floor,
right after leading a dying man to accept Christ as his savior. Tuesday night, I read about the disciple’s
failure and that they too lacked faith. Like
me, they didn’t get that it wasn’t about what they could accomplish, but about
calling out to God in faith. Wednesday,
I went in with a renewed hope. I could not do anything, but believe
that my faith could change a life, heal a body, cast out a demon…
I prayed
with passion for babies with pneumonia and young women suffering from a lack of
bladder control. For the first time in
my life, I called out to God in the name of Jesus Christ, I sang hymns of
praise, I thanked God for showing up. I
prayed as if they had already been healed.
Babies stopped coughing, mothers cried, demons were cast out of a woman,
and a young girl found grace and hope in the love of Jesus. Yep… all because I finally had the faith to
not only ask but to believe.
I know, yes I get it, and I know that it is
easier to believe I was mistaken, to believe demons aren’t in people, to
believe in the medicine. But I know. I know that these events occurred. I know that God showed up. I know that there is power in belief, in
faith, in the name of Jesus Christ.
that I finally believe.
