"...If you diligently heed the voice of the Lord your God and do what is right in His sight, give ear to His commandments and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have brought on the Egyptians. For I am the Lord who heals you."
In His earthly ministry, Jesus specialized in doing what human understanding would have deemed to be impossible. When we are encountering seemingly impossible situations in our lives, we can evaluate to whom we turn. We can try to reason as best we can or attempt to do it ourselves, or humble ourselves before God, pray first, and look to Him to work according to His will. He has a great capacity to do beyond what we can even ask or think, the Bible says. We can look to Him in faith and anticipate that He will be faithful to respond to His people for His glory.
In James 5, we find the call to fervent prayer - James writes about prayer for physical healing, and then we read this passage:
16 Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.
17 Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain; and it did not rain on the land for three years and six months.
18 And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth produced its fruit.
Even the Fox10 television station in Mobile called it a "miracle." As the story was reported, a 13-year-old boy named Trenton McKinley was...
After Trenton had been on life support for several days, his parents signed off on having his organs donated. Then, according to the story:
A CBN story related that:
But, the Bible does teach that He is limited by our own unbelief. There is a measure of faith involved in seeing Him work; and always, according to His plan. We have to expand our capacity to believe - remember, faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. When we are struggling and lacking hope, we can come to Him and encounter His mighty hand.
Finally, I'm reminded that we should regard prayer as being our first activity, rather than a last resort. Rather than follow the human tendency to do it ourselves, we can relinquish control to Him, call on His name, and continue to pray fervently; if He is calling on us to do something, then we can walk according to His direction.
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In James 5, we find the call to fervent prayer - James writes about prayer for physical healing, and then we read this passage:
16 Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.
17 Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain; and it did not rain on the land for three years and six months.
18 And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth produced its fruit.
Even the Fox10 television station in Mobile called it a "miracle." As the story was reported, a 13-year-old boy named Trenton McKinley was...
...playing at a friend’s house two months ago. He was riding in a small utility trailer being pulled by a dune buggy for kids. Trenton says his friend pressed on the brakes suddenly, causing the trailer to flip. He says he quickly threw his friend’s 4-year-old niece off into the grass, but in the process, got caught in the trailer as it flipped.
“I hit the concrete and the trailer landed on top of my head. After that, I don't remember anything," said Trenton.He was initially taken to the hospital at the University of South Alabama, then to UAB. His mother related, "He was dead a total of 15 minutes,” and she added, “When he came back, they said he would never be normal again. They told me the oxidation {oxygen depravation} problems would be so bad to his brain, that he would be a vegetable if he even made it.”
After Trenton had been on life support for several days, his parents signed off on having his organs donated. Then, according to the story:
A day before doctors were set to pull the plug, Trenton started showing small signs of cognition. He believes he was in heaven while he was gone.
"I was in an open field walking straight,” said Trenton. "There's no other explanation but God. There's no other way. Even doctors said it."Trenton is on the slow road back - as of last week, he "deals with nerve pain and seizures daily." He's had three brain surgeries already, and, "Trenton currently only has half of his skull. The missing piece is frozen at the hospital. He will have surgery soon to reconnect it."
A CBN story related that:
Franklin Graham got wind of the story and took to Facebook asking his followers, "Do you believe in miracles? I do."
He went on to say Trenton "nailed it" when he said, "there's no other way to explain it but God." Graham then quoting Jeremiah 32:27 which reads: “I am the Lord, the God of all mankind. Is anything too hard for me?”This story can certainly be a faith builder for many people. God has certainly been good to Trenton, and as he said, the only explanation is God - even the doctors said that. When we encounter the miraculous, we have to make sure that we don't try to explain things away; rather just accept that God has worked. And, we can give Him the honor and the glory, with gratitude! God specializes in the abundant and the inexplicable - in human terms, that is. He is beyond comprehension, and He certainly does not fit in the box of human understanding.
But, the Bible does teach that He is limited by our own unbelief. There is a measure of faith involved in seeing Him work; and always, according to His plan. We have to expand our capacity to believe - remember, faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. When we are struggling and lacking hope, we can come to Him and encounter His mighty hand.
Finally, I'm reminded that we should regard prayer as being our first activity, rather than a last resort. Rather than follow the human tendency to do it ourselves, we can relinquish control to Him, call on His name, and continue to pray fervently; if He is calling on us to do something, then we can walk according to His direction.
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