Big Things Come Through Preparation

I am praying that 2017 will be a year of great miracles. God has promised us that he will enable us to perform many amazing works, even greater than Jesus performed while here on earth. In John 14:12, Jesus says, “I tell you the truth, anyone who believes in me will do the same works I have done, and even greater works, because I am going to be with the Father.”

Anticipating, as we pray, to be used in healing and revival facilitates the power of God to work through us.  Anticipation and expectation is essential in allowing God to use us. Praying for miracles is not a question of whether or not it is his will, but a question of how and when he will use us and answer these prayers. This is faith: “Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see,” Hebrews 11:1.

Faith urges us to prepare for God to move. Preparation to meet God’s movement and facilitate his calling on our lives recognizes God is at work in the background to facilitate the mechanism of the answers to our prayers. Galatians 3:22, “But Scripture has locked up everything under the control of sin, so that what was promised, being given through faith in Jesus Christ, might be given to those who believe.”

Preparing for God to move in our lives, families, teams and church requires focused prayers and reliance on God’s promises. God wants to give us the gift of faith to believe for big things to happen. Miracles happen when we join in his plan by praying his word over situations, dreams, and visions.  First Corinthians 12:9, “The same Spirit gives great faith to another, and to someone else the one Spirit gives the gift of healing.”

Here are some great ways to prepare for a move of God:

1. Examine, explore, and then disengage from the past. Self-examination can position you to see where you need to grow in your faith. “Examine yourselves to see if your faith is genuine. Test yourselves. Surely you know that Jesus Christ is among you; if not, you have failed the test of genuine faith,” 2 Corinthians 13:5.
2. Raise your faith level. Faith is like a muscle; the more you exercise it, the stronger it gets. Be in the word and speaking it out to increase your faith. Faith comes by hearing the word of God. James 1:22-24 offers a second way to increase your faith: “But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was.”
3. Position yourself to be near God. Jesus can touch you and your needs when you are in proximity to him (see Luke 13).
4. Expect miracles. “Jesus replied, ‘Truly I tell you, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only can you do what was done to the fig tree, but also you can say to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and it will be done,’” Matthew 21:21.
5. Be willing to step out in the unknown. “Jesus looked at them and said, ‘With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God,’” Mark 10:27.

Join me in prayer and expectation for an amazing year of miracles with God!