How God constructed your faith : the dream

"To him who by the power that works in us can realize infinitely beyond what our prayers may ask or that our imagination dares to hope, be glory to him." Ephesians 3:20

 

Faith is like a muscle : it develops. It may be weak or strong, depending on how you exercise it.
The first thing God does to build your faith is to give you a dream!

How does God build your faith ? It uses a very simple scheme that, if you understand it, allows you to collaborate with it to strengthen your faith. It is like this father who comes to ask Jesus to heal his son and says : "Have mercy on us and help us, if you can !" (Mark 9:22).

Jesus replied : "If you can, you say, but everything is possible for him who believes" (Mark 9:23).

The first thing God does to build your faith is to give you a dream. Whenever God wants to act in your life, it gives you a dream - concerning yourself, what he wants you to do, how he will use your life to touch the world.

Examples are not lacking in the Bible :

- God places in Noah the dream of building an ark.

- He gives Abraham to become the father of a great nation.

- To Joseph, the dream of becoming a leader who would save his people.

Nehemiah, for his part, dreams of rebuilding the wall of Jerusalem.

How do we discern whether a dream comes from God or is it simply the fruit of his own imagination ? The Bible tells us that God, "by the power that works in us, can realize infinitely beyond what our prayers may ask or that our imagination dares to hope for" (Ephesians 3:20).

In other words, if a dream comes from God, it will be so great that you can not do it alone. If that were the case, you would not need faith. And without faith, you are not pleasing to God, because the Bible declares that everything that does not result from faith is sinful (Romans 14:23).

God begins to build your faith by giving you a dream. He will never ask you to do anything that contradicts his truth.

A question for today

Maybe God is speaking to you at this very moment, but you do not recognize his voice ... This dream that is yours - this idea, this project that you would like to realize and that would be a real benefit for others, Others - where do you think he comes from ?

Rick Warren
 
Source (The Thought of the Day)