It’s
funny how God is always challenging us and pushing us to a deeper level of
trust and obedience with Him. This past
week, God took me a big step forward in trusting Him. Unfortunately for us, learning to trust and
obey God can sometimes be a rather painful process. It can also be humiliating if we are
concerned about what other people think about us. That’s usually where I struggle the
most. I get so worried about other
people’s opinions of me that it hinders me from acting in obedience to what God
is calling me. Thankfully, though, God
is taking me past that.
Last
Wednesday my team was at a healing service at our partner church for the
month. The pastor gave an invitation for
anyone desiring healing to come forward and receive prayer. I noticed a man in a wheelchair sitting at
the end of my row of chairs. He did not
come forward for prayer. Suddenly, I
felt God stirring my heart towards this man.
I felt that God wanted me to go speak to the man. I believed that God wanted to heal that man
right there in the service; and He wanted to use me to do it! That’s when the fear and doubt came crashing
down on me.
For
fifteen minutes I sat in my seat arguing with God. His words kept piercing my heart in wave
after wave. I had specifically told God
time and again that I believed He could heal anything He chose. I also believed that He often chooses to work
through His children to accomplish His work on the earth. He kept asking me, if I believed these
things, then why did I not have the guts to get up and tell the man in the
wheelchair to be healed in Jesus’ name?
Would I have the courage to obey God and take a step of faith?
I
wanted so badly to obey God and believe that He would heal this man, but my
biggest fear was the fear of failure.
What would happen if I went to the man, told him to be healed in Jesus
name, pulled him up out of his wheelchair…and nothing happened? God, don’t you care if I look like a complete
fool? What will everyone else think
about me? What about my teammates? What about the pastor? What about the man in the wheelchair?
These
fears and doubts circled around in my mind, battling against the words of the
Holy Spirit in my heart. God finally
gave me the grace to realize that, ultimately, it doesn’t matter what others think
about me. It doesn’t really matter if I
fall flat on my face. As long as I act
in obedience to God, He will take care of me.
It’s like learning to ride a bicycle.
We fall down and fail many times before we learn to ride correctly. It’s the same way with spiritual
matters. We should not let the fear of
failure keep us from taking a leap of faith.
If we do, we are telling God that we don’t trust Him enough to look
after us and to catch us when we fall.
God
finally convinced me to go and speak to the man in the wheelchair. So I obeyed.
I went to the man, whose name was George, and asked him if he believed
that Jesus could heal him. He said
yes. I then told him I believed that
Jesus wanted to heal him today. I told
him to be healed in the name of Jesus.
Then two other people and I helped pull George out of his wheelchair
into a standing position. The only
problem was that his feet were still crippled and he still had no strength in
his legs. Nothing seemed to be
happening! My mind spiraled into a
panic. God, where are you?! Don’t leave me hanging here! Many of my teammates gathered around us and
we all started praying for George, believing that God was going to heal
him. After a few minutes of intense
prayer, there was still no change in George’s condition.
God
didn’t heal George that day. I think He
was teaching me a valuable lesson. I
faced one of my greatest fears – the fear of failure – and put myself
completely in God’s hands. I know that I
was acting in obedience to God. He is
helping me get over my fears and learn to trust Him completely. The amazing part is this: when I place my
full trust in God, I am pleasing my Heavenly Daddy. And that is what matters most. Who cares what anyone else thinks?
