Fire with wet wood

Oftentimes, I have thought to myself— “has my faith in God become weaker over the years?” “Do I still trust God with the impossible things?” “Have I become complacent?”

The first time I prayed actively for healing was when I was nine-years-old. My friend had a huge boil filled with pus on her arm. It was hurting her to the point that she began crying during the first hour in school. I couldn’t watch others cry but I wasn’t sure what to do. So, I decided to do what my Sunday school teacher taught me—PRAY. Although, I knew that my friend did not believe in Jesus, I told her that day, my exact verbatim—“Jesus heals and I going to ask Him to give you healing!”

I stretched my hand, prayed a short prayer for her and firmly believed that my Jesus would heal her boil in a bit. We were in our third hour in school and my friend excused herself from the class to go to the washroom. She came back with a smile and told me that her boil burst and all the pus got expelled out. It doesn’t stop there, she also went on to say that she did not have pain anymore—“Your Jesus heard your prayers. Thank you!” This was a boost in my faith and I boldly prayed for people and miracles without any hesitation. I began reading books on men and women of God who interacted with angels, heard the distinct voice of God and operated actively in the Holy Spirit. I desired for that. I wanted to see God and His angels real-time. Not just sketch an image in my mind but see them standing beside me when I get dressed in the morning for school, watching over me as I sleep and helping me with my studies. I wanted to live in the supernatural.

People often said that small babies could see angels and I had often seen my younger sister smile randomly, looking at corners of the house. I was certain that she saw Jesus and the angels. So, whenever I caught her smiling at a wall, I used to run there just to see if I experienced anything different in that space. I didn’t and that got me disappointed. My biggest prayer point in the list was the healing for my sister. I wanted to see her delivered from her state of paralysis; I wanted to see her lift her mattress and walk around, have fun with the other children and play dress-up with me. I had this whole blueprint of how my life would be with her—from sharing clothes and going shopping to sharing secrets and what not. For five years, I prayed without an ounce of doubt for her healing. I expected the healing. But, she died when she was five-years and three-days old.

I did not shed a tear, probably because I did not understand loss at that point. I still continued to pray because I had faith that God would raise her from the dead. My heart sank when the first fistful of soil was thrown onto her coffin in the burial pit. That was the first time, I felt the pain of loss—although my faith was strong, deep down I knew that I won’t get to see her anymore. The choir sang, “we will meet on that glorious shore!”— “will we?” I thought, “and even if we meet, will I recognise her?”. The funeral got over and I continued praying for I had heard stories of how people rose from the dead even after they were kept in a morgue for days together. A week passed by and I was done praying. I was so angry at God and people at the time. God, because I felt like He did not hear my prayers. People, because they made so many horrible comments on the day and post the funeral. Some said, “look at the bright side, Olvin did not have to suffer anymore and, you can get all the attention of your parents now!” “You are so lucky; you’re a single child now!” “You don’t have to share anything with anyone anymore!” How could people be so insensitive, I thought. We even heard in the grapevine that our family was apparently praying for her to be taken to heaven because of the difficulty in giving her care—Gosh! People. That too, Christian folks.

I would say that sort of marked the downfall of my confidence in God. I was hesitant to pray boldly for things. I would run away from the scene if I remotely smelled impossibility. Yes, I went to church. Yes, I prayed for people. But, passively. I did not expect God to do anything. This went on for about 10 years. My passive faith took a toll on my spiritual life. My spirit was malnourished by the time I was 15. My head was full—intellectual apologetics, deep doctrines and a lot of Biblical knowledge. But I was like the Pharisees, “always learning, never understanding.”

Somewhere around this time, I began seeing random dreams or rather what I thought were random and dreams! I would see people—friends, relatives and neighbours—some of whom I rarely associate with, in my dreams. It was unusual for someone who slept like a log, and dreamt of climbing up stairs or falling off a building. Some of these dreams were specific and some, just abstract images. And one of the nights at the time, I felt a tap on my hand in the middle of the night. I slightly opened my eyes, and I saw a strong beam of light and an outline of wings. I got too scared and closed my eyes immediately. But the next day, I woke up curious—“Did I just witness an angel?” I knew at the time that these random dreams were actually visions. I asked God if I should actually tell people about these dreams. Obviously, I was waiting for a distinct voice to tell me what to do and what not to! But I did not hear anything. So, I told my mother about these dreams. She did the deed of informing people—she never told it seriously though, it was apparently taken as a joke.

One of the significant dreams was about a girl in my neighbourhood. She was in her grade 12 at the time. In my dream, I saw her being congratulated by many including me for her marriage. I also heard my voice in the dream asking her “will you be writing the board exams?”. This was in the beginning of the year and when my mother informed her mother about it, they laughed. About three months before the board exams, we get a wedding invite. It was this girl’s wedding, right before the board exams. My mother was in shock and this girl’s mother told the entire neighbourhood that I saw this dream way before it happened. It was impossible—getting a school girl married right when the clock struck 12 on her 18^th birthday. For the first time, I felt like God gave me intricate details and not just an ambiguous, open-to-interpretation sort of dream. However, my faith was still on a low as I stopped expecting God to do things.

“God is up for a challenge!”—this was the sermon the next Sunday. I was in shock for this was exactly the area where I was struggling. I underestimated God many times. “Naah, cancer is too hard for God; I will just pray for some temporary relief for the person!” “Not this issue; a breakthrough is impossible!” “Ah, let us just go with the flow and go through it; I am sure God wouldn’t do anything to change it!”—I may not have said all this, but I thought it for sure. That Sunday afternoon, the 20-year-old, headstrong me delved into the sermon passage from 1 Kings 18: 21-39. It was about how Elijah challenged the followers of Baal. I urge you to go read this passage from the Bible. Although, I won’t be quoting all the verses here, I am going to take up few that were my highlights:

 vs22-24: Then Elijah said, “I’m the only prophet of God left in Israel; and there are 450 prophets of Baal. Let the Baal prophets bring up two oxen; let them pick one, butcher it, and lay it out on an altar on firewood—but don’t ignite it. I’ll take the other ox, cut it up, and lay it on the wood. But neither will I light the fire. Then you pray to your gods and I’ll pray to God. The god who answers with fire will prove to be, in fact, God.” All the people agreed: “A good plan—do it!” 

Phew! the confidence he exuberated—1:450, that was the ratio. The interesting bit in this is that Elijah had a plan and he did not just throw the ball on to their court. Sometimes, we step out without a plan and that be dangerous not only for our spiritual growth but also for the ones around us.

vs26: So they took the ox he had given them, prepared it for the altar, then prayed to Baal. They prayed all morning long, “O Baal, answer us!” But nothing happened—not so much as a whisper of breeze. Desperate, they jumped and stomped on the altar they had made. 

vs27-28By noon, Elijah had started making fun of them, taunting, “Call a little louder—he is a god, after all. Maybe he’s off meditating somewhere or other, or maybe he’s gotten involved in a project, or maybe he’s on vacation. You don’t suppose he’s overslept, do you, and needs to be waked up?” They prayed louder and louder, cutting themselves with swords and knives—a ritual common to them—until they were covered with blood.  29This went on until well past noon. They used every religious trick and strategy they knew to make something happen on the altar, but nothing happened—not so much as a whisper, not a flicker of response. 

Maybe the taunts were a little too much but I just love how Elijah knew for sure that God will set a fire when he calls out to Him. His mocks provoked the priests to pray louder and somehow, I feel they were under a lot of pressure.

30-35Then Elijah told the people, “Enough of that—it’s my turn. Gather around.” And they gathered. He then put the altar back together for by now it was in ruins. Elijah took twelve stones, one for each of the tribes of Jacob, the same Jacob to whom God had said, “From now on your name is Israel.” He built the stones into the altar in honor of God. Then Elijah dug a fairly wide trench around the altar. He laid firewood on the altar, cut up the ox, put it on the wood, and said, “Fill four buckets with water and drench both the ox and the firewood.” Then he said, “Do it again,” and they did it. Then he said, “Do it a third time,” and they did it a third time. The altar was drenched and the trench was filled with water.  36-37When it was time for the sacrifice to be offered, Elijah the prophet came up and prayed, “O God, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, make it known right now that you are God in Israel, that I am your servant, and that I’m doing what I’m doing under your orders. Answer me, God; O answer me and reveal to this people that you are God, the true God, and that you are giving these people another chance at repentance.” 38Immediately the fire of God fell and burned up the offering, the wood, the stones, the dirt, and even the water in the trench. 39All the people saw it happen and fell on their faces in awed worship, exclaiming, “God is the true God! God is the true God!”

I suggest you read this bit again. Elijah went beyond just calling out to God for a fire—he called out to God to light up wood drenched in water. Elijah saw beyond the impossibilities and he knew that NOTHING is impossible with God. Even if there was no wood, there would have been fire. Such faith, such expectation in God to make the impossible possible. This hit me—over time, I had lost the blind, child-like faith I once had in God. I stopped expecting things from God or Him to do anything. My faith became passive and it was high time that I hit the active button.

Are you in a trench, drenched in the waters of impossibilities? Know that God is going to set a fire in you. He is going to work through your impossibilities. EXPECT HIM TO DO SO! Your confidence in God is directly proportional to your faith. Grow in confidence, grow in faith. Don’t aim at being the next Elijah though. Envision being “the child of God”. A child who has complete trust and confidence in the Father to do everything that is good for you.

I am on this journey of training my body, mind and spirit to believe that God works on things that, I and the people of the world, have tagged as impossible.

PRAY WITH EXPECTATION—you’ll see God’s fire on your drenched wood. Let this fire burn all your unbelief and doubts, and shed light on the TRUTH.