It's Personal

Recently, I had a dream about being sucked up in a tornado. At first, I was terrified of not being able to breathe because I’ve heard that the air pressure in a tornado sucks out your breath. (Although it would seem that there would be bigger problems if you were flying around in a twister.) After a minute, though, I discovered that I could still breathe, although I could not see and had no idea what was happening. I felt a sense of peace in my dream because I just knew that God was there.

I know that’s a wacky dream, but I think that following Jesus is kind of like that: flying around in a tornado, unharmed and able to breathe.

I’ve long believed that life isn’t worth living unless you’re doing something that scares you a little bit. I’m not talking about being an aimless, thrill-seeking adrenaline addict; I’m talking about living into your full potential in Christ. Life with Him is just plain exciting….that is, if you trust Him.

The Bible speaks about Abraham, the ultimate faith warrior, in this way:

He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead (since he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah’s womb. No distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. That is why his faith was “counted to him as righteousness.”—Romans 4:19-22

It’s a common misconception that “faith” means manufacturing a feeling in yourself to produce some kind of result. “Believe for your healing!” people say. “Have faith for your miracle!” For one thing, that mentality makes it seem like faith is all you. But my Bible says that faith is a fruit of the Spirit—which means it comes from Holy Spirit, not from you.  

But more important, thinking of faith in this context leads us into the mindset that faith is only belief in what God can do.  However, the true definition of faith can be found in the above description of Abraham: “No distrust made him waver.” Faith is not about objectively believing in God’s sovereignty or power. It’s wholeheartedly, sincerely trusting in WHO HE IS—even to the point of giving up all else to seek His heart. It’s being in a tornado: completely unable to see the path clearly, but holding on to who He is.

Now that’s personal.

A lot of people talk big about being a Christian, but in their hearts, they feel constantly afraid. You can agree with the Word of God and all His promises as much as you want to, but if you don’t really know Him, you’re not going to believe that He is who He says He is.  The result is that the tornado is coming for you—and you’re terrified of suffocating.

I’m not saying this to be condemning, because I think most people in America are used to drive-thru church, a vending machine relationship with God. In fact, riding on the highway just now, I saw a sign that advertised “free wi-fi and mini-fridge” at a nearby hotel…you know, so you don’t have to actually talk to or interact with anybody. I think many Christians are simply afraid to get personal with the Lord (or anybody else, for that matter).

Belief is objective. Trust is personal.

The opposite of faith is not scoffing unbelief. It’s more sneaky than that. The opposite of faith is fear that comes from deep-rooted distrust of God.

Distrust can come from a variety of sources. The enemy is endlessly creative in his ability to inspire suspicion, resentment, and bitterness toward God. It may be consistent failure in your life. It may be that people you trusted deeply let you down. It may be bad things that happened to you, which can turn into an opportunity for the devil to whisper in your ear, “God doesn’t really love you. He’s not going to be there for you.” Distrust of God is often disguised as lack of confidence in yourself, but that is only distrust of who God says you are because you don’t trust who HE is. Real faith is simply believing that God is not a liar.

Satan’s very first lie was a planned attack against Eve’s trust in what God had told her (Genesis 3). She replaced God’s word with Satan’s, and the result was disastrous. 

The devil doesn’t often get Christians to believe lies based on logic (although he does disguise them that way). He gets personal. He goes straight to the heart and attacks your relationship with God. He doesn’t care how religious you are, how many rituals you keep, how many works you do, if he can only keep you shrinking away from the presence of God, because that’s where real change happens and where we reach our true tornado-riding potential in the Spirit.

Surely, signs and wonders inspire and build faith. But real faith is responding to your life in the way of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego: “O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter. If this be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king. But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up” (Daniel 3:16-18).  

That’s personal. They refused to serve other gods. I hate to tell you, but fear is an idol. These three young men knew God well enough that their conviction was more powerful than the idol of fear. They knew that God’s plan was best, because they knew that God was good. They trusted Him.

Turn around and tell the devil, “We have no need to answer you in this matter.” THAT is FAITH.

Trust is something I’ve been learning a lot about over the past few months. I’ve been coming to believe Him when He says, “Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you” (Matthew 6:33).  

For my whole life up to this point, my prayer routine has consisted primarily of me telling God everything I needed for Him to do. I’d go through every minute of the upcoming day, asking Him to do this or that for me. I believed big enough that He heard my prayers and that He would do it; but I did not believe enough to trust that He was good and could do it on His own, even if it didn’t look like what I wanted.

This prayer list looked like great trust because I was “submitting” every detail to Him. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing in general. Passionate intercession has its place. But there’s a fine line between intercession and control in your personal prayer life. I felt like I had to tell God what I needed or wanted in every situation because I thought that He would forget about me if I didn’t. I thought that my expectations and vision were correct; therefore, I needed to tell God exactly what to do, rather than walking blindly into what He already had planned. If I trusted Him, He might do something I didn’t want.

But when you know His heart, you honestly, genuinely want what He wants, because you know how much He loves you and how irreversible and unconditional His love is.

A week or two ago, I woke up and felt like I heard Him say, “Today is the day. “ I thought, “The day for what?” In my prayer time, I felt nudged to just stop praying for every detail and just say, “Whatever you want, Lord, I will accept.” I was able to say that because, for the first time in my life, I believed so much in God’s love for me that I knew that whatever He had planned was for my good.

It’s a basic concept, but it’s so hard to grasp.

That very day, I received a phone call from the school where I’ve wanted to work for two years, offering me an interview. I got the job and will sign the paperwork today. Yes, ask for what you want from God—and then stop asking. Trust that He has it taken care of, or that He has something even better for you.

It takes tremendous faith to pray big. It takes bigger faith to set aside time just for looking into His face and asking Him nothing. The greatest faith is believing that He is all you need, and that His heart toward you is good.

Trust means throwing away everything to go after God’s own heart. The adventure is just a side effect.