God’s miracles in our time

Habakkuk3_2

This is somewhat of a different type of lesson for me to write. It’s about what I would like to see happening today. The question is, can it happen?

Let’s start this lesson with Habakkuk 3:2. “Lord, I have heard of your fame; I stand in awe of your deeds, Lord. Repeat them in our day, in our time make them known….”

For me, this scripture just makes me want to shout out “Yes Lord please let us really see you, hear from you and make yourself known to us.” I can’t tell you how many times I have wanted to see, in our time, God working in our lives like I have read about his deeds in the Bible. Where God would talk with people or angels would give messages from God. Where men of God spoke prophecies, or stopped it from raining for days or split open the sea. Or how Jesus and his disciples went out to preach and people were saved, people were healed and sometimes, the dead were brought back to life. I keep thinking that it would be awesome to see the mighty work of God, in our time. I can honestly say, that it is practically part of my prayers every single day. I know for sure I think about it every day. What a revival we would have!

But, we don’t see those type of miracles. Yes, we see miracles every day. Once you have the appreciation that God created this world you will see more miracles daily. However, I would like to see the miracles we read about in the Bible. As Habakkuk said, “Lord, repeat them in our day, in our time make them known.”

I often get friction from people when I say it was easier to have faith during Jesus’s time than it is right now. I have to believe that being there and seeing the miracles would have a great effect on one’s faith in Jesus.

Let me list the miracles Jesus performed during his 33 years.

Changed water into wine
Healed of the royal official’s son
Healed the Capernaum demoniac
Healed Peter’s mother-in-law
Healed the sick
Caught a large number of fish
Healed a leper
Healed a centurion’s servant
Healed a paralyzed man
Healed a withered hand
Raised a widow’s son from the dead
Calmed the storm of the sea
Healed the man possessed by demons
Healed a woman with internal bleeding
Raised Jairus’ daughter from the dead
Healed two blind men
Healed a mute demon-possessed man
Healed a 38 year invalid
Fed 5000 men and their families
Walked on water
Healed a girl possessed by a demon
Healed a deaf man with a speech impediment
Healed a blind man
Healed a man born blind
Healed a demon-possessed boy
Caught a fish with a coin in its mouth
Healed a blind and mute man who was demon-possessed
Healed a woman with an 18-year infirmity
Healed a man with dropsy
Healed 10 lepers
Raised Lazarus from the dead
Healed Bartimaeus of blindness
Restored a severed ear
Jesus rose from the dead
And ascended into heaven

That is quite a lot of miracles for people to witness and it had to have instilled such faith in the people of that time. It is one of these miracles that is very pertinent to this lesson of how we can see those same miracles today.

It is the healing of a centurion’s servant. We can read about it in Luke 7:1-10. “When Jesus had finished saying all this to the people who were listening, he entered Capernaum. There a centurion’s servant, whom his master valued highly, was sick and about to die. The centurion heard of Jesus and sent some elders of the Jews to him, asking him to come and heal his servant. When they came to Jesus, they pleaded earnestly with him, “This man deserves to have you do this, because he loves our nation and has built our synagogue.” So Jesus went with them.

He was not far from the house when the centurion sent friends to say to him: “Lord, don’t trouble yourself, for I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. That is why I did not even consider myself worthy to come to you. But say the word, and my servant will be healed. For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and that one, ‘Come,’ and he comes. I say to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.”

When Jesus heard this, he was amazed at him and turning to the crowd following him, he said, “I tell you, I have not found such great faith even in Israel.” Then the men who had been sent returned to the house and found the servant well.”

That blows me away every time I read it. This centurion had so much faith and confidence in Jesus. Read the centurion’s words again. “Lord, don’t trouble yourself, for I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. That is why I did not even consider myself worthy to come to you. But say the word, and my servant will be healed.”

His “great faith,” as Jesus stated it, even amazed Jesus, something, which I believe, was pretty hard to do. And this passage from God’s Word is the main point of this lesson. The centurion did not need Jesus to come to him and in fact, he felt he was not even worthy for Jesus to come, YET he believed in what he heard of Jesus’ fame and he was in awe of the deeds. It is this that belief that gave him THE FATIH in Jesus to heal his servant without Jesus having to come and pray directly over the servant.

Is that not what we need to do to see miracles like this happen today? To see the sick healed, the blind see, the deaf hear and the crippled walk and yes the dead brought back to life. Do we not just have to say, “Lord just say the word, and it will be done.” We do not have to have Jesus appear to perform the miracle. AND we do not have to even be worthy.

Did you hear that? It is key to this lesson. The centurion said, “I did not even consider myself worthy to come to you.” I believe that is one of the two main reasons we do not see the miracles happening today. We don’t feel worthy. I have said it before and I will continue to say it. You are not worthy. You never were worthy to be saved and you are not worthy to be healed or see mighty miracles. It is all for us by grace from our Lord Jesus Christ.

Isaiah 53:5 explains it perfectly. “But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.” So the next time you are looking for a miracle of healing for you or someone else. Do not ask if either is worthy. Look at Jesus’s wounds and KNOW you are healed.

The second reason we do not see the miracles happen today is you have to have faith. The centurion’s faith amazed Jesus. In Jesus’s own words He said, “I tell you, I have not found such great faith even in Israel.”

Here is a little nugget of truth. When the Jews, who were friends of the centurion, went to see if Jesus would come, they told Jesus “This man deserves to have you do this, because he loves our nation and has built our synagogue.” They were figuring that the centurion earned it. That he was worthy for Jesus to come and perform the healing. But I believe, that is not what impressed Jesus or cause him to heal the servant. Why do I believe this? Because if it were the reason then Jesus would have mentioned it, instead he mentioned being amazed by the great faith of the centurion. Jesus healed the servant because of the faith of the centurion not his worthiness.

So, it is faith we need. Great faith! How do we get faith? First we need to define it. We need to fully understand what faith is and not have any misconceptions or misunderstandings of what faith is. So let’s go to the definitive source. God’s Word. In Hebrews 11:1 it says “Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.”

Our faith gives us confidence and assurance for what we do not see. Let’s go deeper by looking at the definition of assurance and even some similar words.

Assurance – a positive declaration intended to give confidence; a promise. Some synonyms would be promise, pledge, vow, oath, bond, and guarantee.

Using Hebrews 11:1 this would mean that faith is the confidence in what we hope for and the promise, the pledge, the vow, the oath, the bond, and the guarantee that we will have those things we hoped. Praise God! His mercy endures forever!

How do we get that faith? Again, the Bible gives us the answer.

Romans 10:17 – “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of God.”

For years, I wanted to see the miracles of God. I constantly prayed for healings for my friends and family. I have always longed for this. I often asked people if you could have only one gift from God, what would it be. And after they told me their one gift they desired, they would ask me what mine would be. I would always say “the gift of healing.” It has always been my one truly desired gift from God. So trust me when I say Habukkuk 3:2 is important to me. Not just for me but for all of his children to be able to work miracles in the name of Jesus Christ.

Now back to faith. Faith may come by hearing the Word of God and reading the Word of God. But it is always how you hear and read it. You need to let it sink into your mind and soul and let it grow in fertile soil. Planting it in your mind along with the TV, music, news of the day, what your friends are talking about on Facebook or Instagram isn’t going to allow the Word to grow in you.

Luke 8:4 -15 explains what I mean. “While a large crowd was gathering and people were coming to Jesus from town after town, he told this parable: “A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path; it was trampled on, and the birds ate it up. Some fell on rocky ground, and when it came up, the plants withered because they had no moisture. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up with it and choked the plants. Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up and yielded a crop, a hundred times more than was sown.”

When Jesus said this, He called out, “Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear.” His disciples asked him what this parable meant. Jesus said, “The knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of God has been given to you, but to others I speak in parables, so that,“ ‘though seeing, they may not see; though hearing, they may not understand.’ “This is the meaning of the parable: The seed is the Word of God. Those along the path are the ones who hear, and then the devil comes and takes away the Word from their hearts, so that they may not believe and be saved. Those on the rocky ground are the ones who receive the word with joy when they hear it, but they have no roots. They believe for a while, but in the time of testing they fall away. The seed that fell among thorns stands for those who hear, but as they go on their way they are choked by life’s worries, riches and pleasures, and they do not mature. But the seed on good soil stands for those with a noble and good heart, who hear the Word, retain it, and by persevering produce a crop.”

Did you hear that? Hearing, retaining and persevering in the Word of God produces a crop.

At the beginning, I asked the question can it miracles happen in our time, the really big miracles? Will the Lord, repeat in our day, in our time, the miracles and deeds we read about in the Bible?

Yes, it can, if we just forget about being worthy and just have faith. And to have such faith we need to read the Word of God and let it grow in fertile soil within our heart, mind and soul. And not let the world and every thing about it trample, choke or lead us away. And in return, that seed of faith in the good soil will produce a crop of faith, of people being saved, of nations being saved and of healings and mighty works happening in this day as they did in the Bible.

Is that a little overwhelming? Are you thinking that it better be a very big seed for a crop of everything I just mentioned? I close with Jesus telling his disciples how to increase their faith.

“Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”

Here is a picture of a mustard seed:

mustardseed

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