Great and Mighty Works

Good Thursday morning! Praise God for the rain of last night. Dare we as humble creatures of the dust expect great and mighty works from our God? Where did that expectation come from? God told me to look at the beginning and ending of His word. The Bible begins with a subtle reference to a great and mighty work: "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." I just love the understatement of God's word. Look out the windows, see the earth. Look up to the sky and see the heaven. Now imagine that none of that exists and God has assigned you to create this thing. No idea where to begin? Me neither. The Bible states in its calm way that God just up and did it. Let's go to the ending of the word. Just before John's sign off, we have this in Revelation 22:16, "I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David. The bright and morning star." Again, ho hum, just another day of sending angels to testify. Have you tried to send an angel somewhere this morning? Will angels testify to what you or I am about to do? How does one go about becoming both the ancestor, the root, and the child, the offspring, of someone who lived thousands of years ago? Of course, the bright and morning star is the one we look for to herald the coming of the day when night is darkest just before the dawn.

Great and mighty works of God abound in the Bible. How do we go about asking for these works? Last night we studied the story of Elijah and the contest with the prophets of Baal. Did Elijah command the fire to appear? No, the word tells us that Elijah came near and said. No dancing, no waving of the arms, no words of command, and no self-glorification. The words were not some secret word of power that only Elijah knew, but words of prayer to a great and mighty God who loves to work. Ah, so Elijah was more deserving than I am, that must be it. No, the Bible says nothing about Elijah's special qualifications. In fact, if you continue on from this passage you will soon read of Elijah's flight from an evil queen. All that power demonstrated at his prayer, and he flees. And what a flight it is! 40 days and 40 nights from Mount Carmel to Mount Sinai to put some serious distance between his body and the queen. Along the way he is fed by an angel. Oh, he just happened to collapse right where an angel waited with food and drink. No big deal for our God. In case we miss it, the angel fed him a second time because the journey was too great for Elijah.

Yesterday, I wrote about the situations that are too great for us. Sometimes like Elijah, we don't stop to ask God, we just take off running, putting legs to our fear. Suddenly, it seems, we are in one of those situations where we starve or the angel feeds us. Which it will be is up to God. I cannot command the angels to provide for me, but I can pray to the One in charge of the angels. I cannot command the earth or heaven to appear from nothing, but I have a direct prayer channel to the God who did those great and mighty works. As I read that God performed great and mighty works throughout the Bible, I have it on good authority that those works have not stopped. I do not believe that God is taking a breath to reload His miracle batteries. If God has not changed, then miracles are still for the asking. We have but to humble ourselves and repent, as a person or as a nation, and great and mighty works God will do on our behalf. Does God want anything in return for these great works? He may want our testimony. Very much like the testimony Jesus commanded for the great and mighty work He did on the cross for you and for me.

Have a blessed day!
Bucky