Got Abundant Life?

“We always ask for less than we should and often think God is not willing to give us what we ask for. We don’t ask right away. We don’t understand that what we pray about is more important than we can understand. We think small, but the Lord is great and powerful. He expects us to ask for great things. He wants to give them to us to demonstrate his almighty power.” That quote is brutally accurate. While it is impossible for us to think exactly as God thinks (although we can get a good idea from his word), we are forever selling God short…looking for just enough God to make our circumstances bearable. Why is it we settle for tolerable instead of seeking excellence? God wants us to have the very best (John 10:10) and James tells us the reason we don’t have it is because we don’t ask (4:2b). To complicate matters, our inability to attain the abundant life in turn causes our ministry to suffer. It’s the snowball effect…we live powerless lives and our witness is powerless; it’s a vicious circle. Oh, by the way, that quote above is attributed to Martin Luther, the father of the Reformation, who lived from 1483 to 1546…it would seem the old saying is true: some things never change.