Pray Big

Your success in dealing with God and dealing with life will be exactly proportional to how much control He has inside of you.


Scripture: Ephesians 3:20, Mark 2
Topics: Trust, Prayer, Faith

Transcript

Alright, thank you very much. And hello again, radio friends, how in the world are you? Doing alright today?

I trust so bless your heart. This is your good friend, Bob Cook. I’m glad to be back with you. And I’m looking at Ephesians 3:20, “Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us. Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end.”

Now you take the doxology and take the little… That’s a rather long qualifying phrase there out of it and it reads, “Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages,” but what identifies the word Him is the phrase that we left out. What is it? Him that is able, Him that is able to do, Him that is able to do exceeding abundantly, Him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think. And all of this depends on the power that works in us. You wanna walk around in that verse a little bit there?

Now all of your dealings with God depend on His ability. You start there, in our training of young people at the college we start with God and with his inspired Word, the Bible. We don’t wobble around with something else, but we start with the Word of God, we believe that the Bible is, not just contains the Word of God, we believe the Bible is inspired, and infallible in its original documents and that it is the Christian’s only rule of faith and practice. We start with God, the Bible says, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and a good understanding of all they that love thy law.”

So that’s where it is, unto Him that is able. If you have some doubt as to whether God can handle the matter then indeed you have a right to worry. Somebody told me one day, this is sort of a wry statement, he said, “The only time you need to worry is when you’re not quite sure God can handle things,” and you think about that a while, it comes home to you and you realize the truth of it. He’s able. God is able to handle the situation.

The old timers there in the Old Testament, they prayed, “Lord, it is nothing with thee, to save by many or by them that have no power. Help us, O Lord our God, for we rest upon thee, neither know we what to do.” See? One of the best things to do is to tell God the truth about yourself but to hang your praying on the fact that He knows the score and He can handle it.

That’s the combination, it seems to me that really wins. I think it’s a prophet that quotes God as saying, “Behold, I dwell in the high and holy place with him also that is of a contrite spirit and that trembleth at my word.” Here you have that combination again. You come into the throne room of God, he’s in the high and holy place, He’s able, He’s almighty. But you’re trembling. Why? Because you know your weakness and you know your failures, and you know that you can’t make it on your own, but you know that He can. It is the case of the leprosy person coming to the Lord Jesus Christ. You’ll find his story there in the second chapter of Mark. And he came to him, knelt down to him, beseeching him and saying, “Lord if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean.” Jesus said, “I will: Be thou clean.” He touched him and healed him. “Unto him that is able,” he’s able to do what you need.

Don’t wobble on the matter of can God handle things? Now, what are you up against today? See, these are real truths. They get right in where we live. What are you up against today? Are you in business? Is there too much month at the end of the money, are things not going as well as you like? Are collection’s slow? Do you need a new salesman? Or do you have to cut the budget? Or maybe it is that you’re just confused, you don’t really know what to do, you’ve done everything you know. You’re like the lady who was stalled in the middle of a busy intersection, and everyone was honking their horns and she was in the way, and the police officers strode up to her and said impatiently, “Lady, use your noodle.” She said, “Where is it? I’ve pushed everything else.” [chuckle] Maybe you feel that way.

Well, now it’s just about time for you to turn to your heavenly Father and say, “Lord, you know how to handle this.” ‘Cause he does, he’s able. He’s able to do. Now that means there could be action. You never need to hesitate about asking God to take a hand in your life, never need to hesitate about asking God to take a hand in your life. And things may be going terribly and you may not have any semblance of hope that things really work out in this situation, but don’t hesitate to say, “Lord, take over.” He’s able to do.

Oh, what a comfort that is when your heart is aching, or when your head is aching, and when you don’t know what to do next. And you can say, “God, I know you know. I know you care.” the Bible says, “Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.” You know that He knows and you know that He cares and you know that He can do something and you know that He will. “Call unto me,” His promise says, “Call unto me and I will answer thee and show thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not.” Oh, I’m so glad that we’ve got a God who can do things. He can do it. What is it you need today? Oh, some of you precious people are facing impossible situations and you’re saying to yourself, almost bitterly, “Cook doesn’t know what he’s talking about, so far as I’m concerned, he doesn’t know what I’m going through, he can’t feel like I feel.”

And of course, you’re right. I don’t live inside your skin, but I know Jesus and I know the Bible, and I know that God can do things, and I know that He answers prayer and I know that if you turn to Him right now, He can do it. “He’s able to do,” it says. Can you get hold of that for yourself? And then He wants to surprise you. He’s able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or even think. He’s able to do exceeding abundantly, exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think. Oh… You know, these Greek words is something. This exceeding abundantly thing is huper, that means up over, then the prefix ex, then a word that means all around, so it’s up over, and out of, and all around, that covers the territory, doesn’t it? [chuckle] Up over, and out of, and all around, God can work. If you can’t go through it, you can go over it and you can get out of it, and He can work all around you.

Hallelujah for that. Yes, He can. He’s able to do exceeding abundantly. Now, he says, “Above all that we ask or think.” Make room, in your praying, for God’s extras and God’s surprises. Make room, in your thinking, for God’s dimensions. Make room in your thinking for God’s dimensions. I visited a little church in Chicago some years ago, beautiful little church built there on the west side, and I said, “My, that’s a pretty church. You people design it?” “Well,” the pastor said, “some of our members were builders and they did design.” And I looked around and I said, “You got one regret. Shall I guess it?” And he smiled and he said, “Well, you probably have guessed it. We didn’t think big enough and we didn’t buy enough property.” They were boxed in, they had a pretty little church with no place to go, no expansion possible.

Make room in your thinking whether you’re building churches, or building a life, or building a business, or whatever. Make room, in you’re thinking, for God’s dimensions. Alright? I can’t particularize on that ’cause I don’t know your situation, but I can give you the operating concept and you can follow it out, can’t you? Make room for God’s dimensions. He may wanna do something far more than you think. He may wanna do something far bigger than you are used to. Make room for God’s dimensions above all that we ask or even think. You can’t imagine, humanly, all that God can have in mind for you, but you can experience it, if you yield yourself to Him. You don’t have to be smart enough to plan for God, all you have to do is to be humble enough to obey God.

He’s able to do exceeding abundantly. The eyes of the Lord run to and throughout the whole earth to show Himself mighty on behalf of them, who trust in Him. God is looking for people who will let Him work in their lives. Most of us have closed him off by custom, by habit, by unbelief, and any number of things. God is looking for people who will let Him work in their lives above all that we ask or think. Now, here you have the qualifier: “All that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us.” How much of God are you willing to let work in you? See, we come back to that old theme again, “Lord change me,” and the word that Paul uses here in his epistle is a word that means, it’s related to our word energize, according to the power that’s energizing us, working in us.

Energema. You see, working in us, according to the power. Now, what is he saying? Your success in dealing with God and dealing with life will be exactly proportional to how much control He has inside of you. According means right down along the line that’s an exact measurement. The proportion is exact. You will have success, you will have the surprises of God, you will have an experience that God can do more than you can ask or think, you will experience that God is able to do, the wonder-working God, you will experience Him in exact proportion as He has control of what’s inside you, working in us.

Now, how does that happen? It happens through the Word, and prayer, and obedience. Very simple. You read his Word and meditate on it, you pray and listen to the voice of the indwelling Holy Spirit as you dwell in the Word of God, and then you obey what God tells you to do day by day, and He works in you. You wanna apply that to your life today? I think you’re gonna have a great time if you will. Some of you are in difficult circumstances. I know that. But God isn’t nervous. He didn’t go off the throne today just because you and I are scared or nervous. So let Him work, let Him work. Think big, pray big, believe God for the exceeding abundantly above all that you’re able to ask or think. Bless your heart, God bless you.

Dear Father, work your surprising, wonderful, encouraging work in our lives today, through Jesus Christ, our Lord, I pray, Amen.

Till I meet you once again by way of radio, walk with the King today and be a blessing!



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