Realistic

 Christmas can be a magical time for children. It certainly was for me. I recently wrote of the time my grandmother put me to bed on Christmas Eve, telling me to listen for the sound of Santa's sleigh bells on the roof of our house. I drifted off to sleep, sure that he would come, sure that the sleigh would land above my head. I was a true believer.

Now, from the perspective of my "wise" adulthood, I can see all the ways that such a happening could never take place. Why would Santa land on a roof that had no chimney? How would he get down from a roof that even my father didn't care to walk on? How could a sleigh and eight reindeer fit on the roof of our modest little home anyway? Then there was the question of how one man could cover the entire earth, knowing the location of every child, and all in one night? It was impossible, yet, none of this interfered with my childlike faith. I simply believed.

I once listened to a woman who ministers mainly in Africa, in what are commonly called "third world countries." Here she had seen countless numbers of miraculous healings and countless more lives being transformed by the saving grace of Christ. The people she ministered to simply believed that the Lord and Savior she told them about could do all that He said He could. She said, "All children believe God can do miracles, until some adult tells them He can't" Has this happened in your life. We all come to the knowledge that Santa isn't real, but have we also come to the place where we no longer really believe in the wonders and miracles of God? We may know He once did, but do we believe He still can and will? Have we become too sophisticated, too secularized to believe that He can still make the blind to see, the lame to walk, and the dead to rise? Not just figuratively, but literally?

His Word says, "I am the God who heals you," but in sickness, who is it we first turn to, the Doctor, or Him?

In His Word we read how Jesus fed 5000 with just a few loaves and fishes, but how much sleep have we lost, how much anxiety have we gone through, wondering how we'll get through the month? Some of us, maybe all of us, once believed He'd do such miracles for us, but "other voices" began to whisper into our spirit. They told us we needed to be more "realistic." Yes, God can move in miraculous ways in the Bible, but that was then, this is now. Now He's chosen a more reserved role in this world. We may not actually say this, but it's the way too many of us live and believe. 

Do you still have the faith of a child? If not, where has it gone? Why has it gone? Who was it that first told you such things weren't really possible? Are you ready to once more have the heart and faith of a child? A heart that believes what it's told by a Father whose love for that child knows no limits. Are you ready for Him to show up in your life, moving in the miraculous? Are you ready to once more be a child, His child? All things really are possible.....for the one who believes.

Blessings,
Pastor O