In 2004, Jeff and I left our two children with my parents for a week and went to Colorado to attend the wedding of a dear friend. While we were there, we found a pair of cowboy boots which we bought for Isaiah, who was almost three. I told him about them over the phone several days before we came home. They were brown and black. My mom told me he went around for days telling anyone who would listen, "I have new cowboy boots! They're brown and black." He had never seen them. But he had them. He knew he had them, because his Mom said they were his. I wrote a prayer in my journal:
Lord, give me that kind of faith. The kind that believes what You tell me, and walks around triumphant over the things that I 'have', but have not yet seen or possessed. Faith like a child -- like Hebrews 11.
Personally, I consider myself a realist. (I know that some of you unrealistic optimists have now mentally labeled me a pessimist.) If I have a trip to Disneyland planned, I try not to expect it, to avoid the disappointment of failing to achieve it -- in the event the whole thing falls through. The plane might not make it, you know. Storms could cause me to spend my entire vacation in an airport. Maybe I'll die before the date arrives. I just don't know. I do enjoy Disneyland if I'm there, I'm just not one of those people who gets all their enjoyment out of anticipation. I wait till things pan out before I celebrate them. But I would have been so insulted if my son had said, "Yeah, right. I'll believe that when I see it." And with God alone, the things that He says are all 'Yes' and 'Amen' in Christ. No 'what ifs' about it with Him. He speaks worlds into existence, and whatever He speaks IS. I can walk in those cowboy boots now.
Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
(Hebrews 11:1)
Grace and peace be multiplied to you
through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord,
According as his divine power hath given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness,
through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:
Whereby are given to us exceeding great and precious promises;
that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature,
having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.
(2 Peter 1:2-4)
Lord, give me that kind of faith. The kind that believes what You tell me, and walks around triumphant over the things that I 'have', but have not yet seen or possessed. Faith like a child -- like Hebrews 11.
Personally, I consider myself a realist. (I know that some of you unrealistic optimists have now mentally labeled me a pessimist.) If I have a trip to Disneyland planned, I try not to expect it, to avoid the disappointment of failing to achieve it -- in the event the whole thing falls through. The plane might not make it, you know. Storms could cause me to spend my entire vacation in an airport. Maybe I'll die before the date arrives. I just don't know. I do enjoy Disneyland if I'm there, I'm just not one of those people who gets all their enjoyment out of anticipation. I wait till things pan out before I celebrate them. But I would have been so insulted if my son had said, "Yeah, right. I'll believe that when I see it." And with God alone, the things that He says are all 'Yes' and 'Amen' in Christ. No 'what ifs' about it with Him. He speaks worlds into existence, and whatever He speaks IS. I can walk in those cowboy boots now.
Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
(Hebrews 11:1)
Grace and peace be multiplied to you
through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord,
According as his divine power hath given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness,
through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:
Whereby are given to us exceeding great and precious promises;
that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature,
having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.
(2 Peter 1:2-4)
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