Master Magician

These have been some tense days. Can you relate? I have spent many moments calling out to God, asking him to turn back the clock to pre-Wednesday when my daughter collapsed, the victim of stroke. Many times after hurricanes, the school shootings and other macabre incidents of violence I’ve begged God to not let it be real. You have too. “God if you are the controller of all things, if you can do anything, please don’t let this be real.” But it is real and God reminds me that He is God. He is not a magician. I ask Him for favor.  “Please God touch my daughter and make her brain work so her legs work too.” But my daughter still can’t walk.
Matthew 17:20 says “Because you have so little 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.” Does this mean there’s something wrong with my faith? Or can it mean that God is really not able to do everything? Not at all!  We have to remember that God is God. He is not at limited magician status.  Psalm 135:5, 6 The Lord is superior to all gods. He does whatever he pleases in heaven and on earth, in the seas and all the ocean depths.
So if God is superior, why doesn’t he just wave his arm and presto! everything changes? Why, why, why.  Listen, God is not a magician, He is God. He plainly spells it out for us in Isaiah 55: 8 & 9 The Lord says, “My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.
I can beg God. I can insist that he see things my way. “God you said, “Call unto me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which are greater than you can comprehend.” – Jeremiah 33:3 “So God, I’m doing that. Wave your arm, God.  Change things.” Then God speaks to my heart and reminds me in Isaiah 41:13 “I am the Lord your God who takes hold of your right and says to you, Do not fear; I will help you.”  See, what I need right now is to not live in fear. God does not give us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and a strong mind. – 2 Timothy 1:7
And Romans 8:28 says “We know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” God’s purpose – not for human gain, but for His purpose that should be the foundation which I live on.
All of this living? It makes me weary. Humanly speaking, it’s too much. Do you ever feel like that? Is there a mountain in your way today? God where are you in all this.  Do you see me here? Go with me back to Isaiah 40:28-31 The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom. He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.