{Originally Published May 2013}
Several months ago, a sweet friend of mine shared with me that she and her sister were fasting and praying on the first of each month. The prayer request that drove them to fasting and praying on this regular basis was so earnest that I determined to join them. Recently, during the appointed fasting day, I realized that the requests that I was praying were downright impossible ones. Nothing about the requests were humanly do-able. I can’t change a person’s heart. I can’t heal an incurable disease. I can’t make a person stop loving his sin. I can’t peel off scales of deception. I can’t fix a mental illness. Have you ever prayed such impossible prayers?
Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever! Amen. Ephesians 3: 20-21
What a relief to know that the God that we serve, the God Who is hearing these impossible prayers, is the One True God. There is no one else like Him. And, Jesus tells us that “with men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” Jesus was telling His disciples how it was possible for anyone to be saved; only through God. His answer applies to many other prayer requests we lift, though, too. In fact, the answer to all of our prayer requests is: “With God all things are possible.” Who knows how God is going to work in our lives? It is not up to me to try to figure out God’s ways (see Isaiah 55: 8-9), but I can turn over every single concern and trust that He is a good God whose thoughts towards His children are thoughts of peace, not of evil, and His plans are to give us a future and a hope. Certainly this is bound to look different than our plans and I pray that we can all determine to believe that God is indeed working all things together for good to those who love Him.
Are you praying impossible prayers? Or are you giving up before believing that with God all things are possible? The Ephesians passage reminds me that God can do so much that I cannot even measure His works, not by anything physical like a measuring stick nor by anything in my mind, like a really vivid imagination.
Let’s access His power that is at work in us and ask those impossible prayers. May God be glorified in us and in the Church forever and ever!
Love, Wendy
