Change

I don't know why people get surprised when they see God work, and I mainly say this to myself right now. We pray and pray and pray and when God actually answers, we lift our eyebrows in surprise; shocked to the core that God responded. It is as though we would have been more satisfied to pray for years in repetition than to actually see anything happen. We expect to pray and keep praying - we don't actually expect anything tangible to happen afterwards.

Why is this?

If we don't think God can work through our prayers, why do we pray at all?

Today, I was gifted with one of the most rare, shocking opportunities that can only be explained by God actively working in both his Word, and in my prayer life. As I have been reading and pursuing God, he reveals to me the importance of following him on my own accord - the fact that it is a personal decision I have to make day by day. I have to take my place in the body of Christ as a functioning part - I do not have the luxury of sitting around and doing nothing. God has called me to action! As God shows me where I am lacking and where I am needing to improve to better serve him, I respond to his call and pray that he give me opportunities to exercise and live out what he has chosen to reveal to me.

A part of what God is communicating to me is the need to be an encouragement to people that have fallen and need someone willing to point them in the right direction. God uses his people to point his children back to him, and in most cases, I am the one people have to pick off the ground and say, "Come on Karissa, we can do this together" and so on. One of the first things I prayed to God was that he allow me the opportunity to step up and show fellow believers that I DO care, and that I want to be a part of their life in Christ.

God was very quick to bring me people that need that encouragement and accountability - so many in fact that I am constantly coming back to him for that strength and energy to keep going. It is work to point people to Christ, more so than I would have ever imagined. I cannot tell you how tempting it is to tell these very same people that look to me for direction to say, 'Look. Stop floundering! Either stand or fall, I could care less!'

This is clearly not the message God wants me to give his people. He wants to show them his grace and kindness. He wants to show them his love and perfection, yet at the same time, his unbending holiness. As much as I would love to be a mouth piece for God, I cannot do this day after day like I wish I could. I get tired. I get cranky. I don't like seeing people struggle - I am not God! It takes my going back to God day by day to get a renewed patience and care for the people he has placed in my life. I cannot do it without him! How ironic is it that the very God that sent those people to me, knew very well that I would NEED his strength to keep me going and serving him?

As much as I have been blessed through this process, God continues to push me even further, past what I had ever expected. Today one of my sisters started talking to me about some options in her life. This particular sister is not one that I ever give advice to, never talk to God about, never try to be overly serious with, because she is the one that often leads me to stray from God. In further detail, I have been given the advice from others to run from her because of her ability to influence me.

God seems to enjoy showing me just how powerful and real he is. Out of all the people I would have wanted to give a serious pep talk, pick up the pieces of your life and just do it sort of conversation, she would by far be at the bottom of the list. It's not that I don't love her - she's my sister, of course I care - but there's just so much in the past between us that makes me feel inadequate. I am not able to be a help to her. She has gone through so much, and I am nothing more than her little sister. What could I possibly have to offer her?

Yet what did I talk to her about today - her marriage.

HER MARRIAGE.

As a reminder, I am not married. I am not even in a serious relationship. If there is one area that I really don't have any input in, it is for the area of marriage. As much as I wanted to stop and say, "Hey I don't feel qualified to help you" that's not what happened. I knew that it was God telling me to step in her life because though I don't have personal knowledge of what it takes to patch together a broken marriage, I know someone first hand who created marriage, and knows exactly what it takes to make a broken marriage come together and be a blessing to both people once again. What better knowledge could I have possibly given her?

It is great to give people first hand advice, but at the end of the day, people need to hear the Truth. (Note the capital t. Truth is not an idea, Truth is a person! God IS truth!) The bible says his Word will not return void - we don't have the same guarantee for the advice we give people based off what we have seen in the world, just his Word.

God is so real and so personal. The longer I read his Word the more I see it. We serve a living God. What a blessing!