Last weekend I went to the Big Church Day Out in Sussex along with my dad, brother and a friend from church. It was incredible! Huge names like Casting Crowns, Phil Wickham, Leeland, Newworldson, Phatfish, Matt Redman and LZ7 as well as others played famous songs. There was probably about 10,000 or so people there all worshipping together. The atmosphere was incredible, we were all praising our amazing God. He was surely there among us and everyone was having a brilliant time. I loved every second of it and can't wait for next year.
I would like to share something that I experienced over the weekend. As I have mentioned in previous posts I sometimes find praying quite hard - I wander if God really hears me, because it doesn't always feel like it. How do I hear his voice? Is it him talking or me talking? These are big questions and I just long to be in his presence, especially during worship. So during one of the songs I closed my eyes and tried to think of God, to feel him. I found myself completely surrounded by a bright white light like I was looking up into Heaven. Mum and Nanny were there and I could feel them smiling at me and I knew that they were reassuring me that they were proud of me and loved me. However during this, part of me felt like this was my imagination and that this what I wanted to see. But it continued and I heard a voice, and it may have been mine but it said something like "I love you and am always with you, and I am very proud of who you are." Now whether this was God speaking or Mum I have no idea but I'm guessing it was God. But still part of me doubted that and I was disappointed that I was doubting. I'm not ashamed to say this because I'm sure many other people have been through this at some point in their life. Anyway when I opened my eyes I knew that something had happened but I wasn't quite sure what.
During this weekend, Phil Wickham shared this verse:
"For where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst of them" (Matt. 18:20).I really like this verse, I don't really know why but it's comforting.
I also came across this verse:
"This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him." (1 John 5:14-15)This got me thinking, what about when we approach God with doubt? What if we doubt that he hears us? We still have enough faith to approach God with our worries, problems and troubles but we don't fully believe that he hears us. When we realise he has answered our prayer we are astonished. Think about the story in Acts 12:1-16. Peter was in jail and his church were praying for him. An angel then released Peter from jail and he went to the home of the church who were praying for him. He was knocking at the door and a servant girl ran to tell everyone that Peter was there. No one believed her. When they finally saw him they were "astonished." Why did they not believe the servant girl? Because part of them doubted that God would answer their prayers. We all do that too at some point. But it is important to keep praying at this time not to give up. The more we pray, the more we see God and the less we doubt.
We need to start expecting our prayers to be answered rather than be astonished when they are!
As I shared before, I doubted that God was really speaking to me. But the thing is because I doubted I wasn't expecting him to. And when he did do something I was astonished and doubted. Thus the cycle began again. If we learn to take the doubt out of the equation and replace it with expectation, marvellous things will happen! I'm still working on this and I encourage you too!
"If we don't know how or what to pray, it doesn't matter.Pray, Pray, Pray!!
He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs,
our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves,
knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God."
Romans 8:26, MSG
God Bless
xx
