A story is told of a man who once prayed to God. He fell to his knees, shut his eyes, opened his heart and with his hands in the air, he prayed to God every single day for 50 years. Each time, he says the same prayer: “Please God, let me win the lottery”. Lo and behold, an angel goes to God one day and laments, saying, “My Lord, this man has prayed to you for the past 50 years, why don’t you let him win the lottery?” Can you guess what God said?
The lord answered, I would love to, but he has never even bought a lottery ticket.
Have you ever felt frustrated because you’ve prayed about something over and over again and God just doesn’t seem to answer it? You are begging him, “God, please throw me a bone!” and he doesn’t seem to care. Maybe you are asking God to do something for you that he wants to do through you or with you.
When I became a Christian, I returned to my hometown for Christmas. I spent time with my family who were not disciples of Jesus. I went to the local church which was lifeless. I thought, my family needs a fired-up church here to reach out to them. I spent the next 18 years praying for my family. Finally, I realized that maybe God wanted to plant that church with me and through me. I resigned from my ministry position and moved my family of five to my hometown to plant a fired up church. I had been praying to God to do for me what he wanted to do with me and through me.
Look what the Bible says in Judges 6:12:
6 Midian so impoverished the Israelites that they cried out to the Lord for help… 12 When the angel of the Lord appeared to Gideon, he said, “The Lord is with you, mighty warrior.” 13 “Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but if the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all his wonders that our ancestors told us about when they said, ‘Did not the Lord bring us up out of Egypt?’ But now the Lord has abandoned us and given us into the hand of Midian.” 14 The Lord turned to him and said, “Go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian’s hand. Am I not sending you?”
The Israelites prayed for help, for relief from the Midianites. God answered them by calling a man to go in the strength he had. Gideon complained about the lack of miracles. God simply challenged him to go and then he’d see the miracles. That’s when Gideon started to really backpedal.
So often in our lives we want the miracles to happen. We complain that our lives, our churches, our ministries, our small groups, our jobs, our marriages or families, our finances aren’t what they used to be. They aren’t what we want them to be. They aren’t what others seem to have. We pray that God will do for us what we want. But we don’t realize that many times God won’t do for you what he wants to do with you and through you.
Did you really try? Maybe you’ve only completed step one: pray to God. Maybe you are shying away from step two: act on faith to accomplish your faith goal. That’s what leaders do, especially spiritual leaders.
Recently, I was praying through a list of things that I’ve prayed about for years. There are about 8 things that I consider life goals that I pray about every day. They have to do with my church, planting new churches, raising up new leaders, my family, saving souls, my finances, and my health and fitness. As I prayed through my list that quote came into my mind, “Don’t ask God to do for you what he wants to do with you and through you.” I realized that I had taken a very passive approach to some of my goals. Yes, they were goals. Yes, I wanted them to come true. Yes, I prayed about them. But what was I doing on a daily basis to move toward those goals? Very little other than prayer. I repented right there and then.
One long-term obvious goal was to get down to my long-term healthy weight. My weight had gradually climbed over 200 to peak at 212 last Christmas. I prayed about it, lost a little weight. Then I thought, God isn’t going to do this for you, you need to do it with him. I fasted seven days and lost 13 pounds.
If you’ve prayed about it and nothing has happened, maybe you’re not the only one waiting. Maybe God is waiting on you to take the next step, the step of faith and action that defines Biblical faith:
20 You foolish person, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless[d]? 21 Was not our father Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? 22 You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did. 23 And the scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,”[e] and he was called God’s friend. 24 You see that a person is considered righteous by what they do and not by faith alone…26 As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead. James 2
mattis.
Valentines Day, 2024
Kelli Peterson (Not her real name) dumped me at the Nevada County Fair in August of 1983. No amount of begging, pleading, promising to change would change her mind. She was done with me. She replaced me with a guy by the name of Paul Eagle. Paul was cool, kind, had his own car and he had the coolest name in our high school. They sat together the rest of our senior year in high school in civics class. I would spy them making out by his locker and looking incredibly happy. I was miserable. I went through several rebound relationships but couldn’t recover from that humiliation for a couple of years. It made me think, what does it take to win the person you really want.
Luckily, I landed the woman of my dreams five years later, when Pam Wilkinson flew into town from Cairo, Egypt. Pretty, sophisticated, funny and spiritual, she was immediately on the top ten list for every single brother in the church I was interning for in San Francisco. Whenever church ended, she was surrounded by smiling admirers in their mid-twenties. Some of my closest friends were crazy for her. How was I going to win her over? I had learned a few things from my relational beat-downs. Over the next year we got to know each other, started dating and got married. Now we’ve been married for thirty-three happy years. We’ve lived overseas together for ten years, planted churches, gone through highs and lows and we are still incredibly happy together.
I’d like to share with you today how to attract, win and build a lasting relationship with the woman of your dreams. You may not feel like a Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt or even a Casanova, but luckily relational skills are learnable and you can become incredibly attractive to the right person for you.
Here’s how:
Take this post it note pad and write one thing you appreciate about your wife or girlfriend on it every day and post it where she will see it. Do it for at least a week or even a month.
Kelli Peterson (Not her real name) dumped me at the Nevada County Fair in August of 1983. No amount of begging, pleading, promising to change would change her mind. She was done with me. She replaced me with a guy by the name of Paul Eagle. Paul was cool, kind, had his own car and he had the coolest name in our high school. They sat together the rest of our senior year in high school in civics class. I would spy them making out by his locker and looking incredibly happy. I was miserable. I went through several rebound relationships but couldn’t recover from that humiliation for a couple of years. It made me think, what does it take to win the person you really want.
Luckily, I landed the woman of my dreams five years later, when Pam Wilkinson flew into town from Cairo, Egypt. Pretty, sophisticated, funny and spiritual, she was immediately on the top ten list for every single brother in the church I was interning for in San Francisco. Whenever church ended, she was surrounded by smiling admirers in their mid-twenties. Some of my closest friends were crazy for her. How was I going to win her over? I had learned a few things from my relational beat-downs. Over the next year we got to know each other, started dating and got married. Now we’ve been married for thirty-three happy years. We’ve lived overseas together for ten years, planted churches, gone through highs and lows and we are still incredibly happy together.
Take this post it note pad and write one thing you appreciate about your wife or girlfriend on it every day and post it where she will see it. Do it for at least a week or even a month.