What Would You Ask?

I just got a glimpse of the message that Louie Giglio gave at Passion 2013.  From Isaiah 61 he asks " if its the year of the Lords favor, what would you like? What would you ask for?"

So my mind is spinning from ''me and mine' to the great Big world'.
What to ask for!  ( I takes wishes seriously if I'm asking God)
What will make the biggest difference?

So I start with what God has been teaching me this year.
MAKE DISCIPLES!
Jesus made disciples.
The world will be changed, One disciple at a time!

So if this is the year of the Lords favor,
This is what I ask,
Give me the desire to make disciples
So I will pray for 'divine appointments'.
And recognize them quickly,
And make myself available when they happen.
That I will have Faith to believe that God will answer this prayer,
And Faith that He will 'divinely enable' me to mentor those He brings  to me.

This year as I have studied Genesis in BSF, I am reminded that God always starts small when He plans to do something Big.  So instead of asking Him to change a world that is quickly on her way to the full measure of wickedness (Genesis 15:16), I'm asking that He change my Heart so that I might make a difference in the lives of those He gives me.
And since God is able to do immeasurably more that I ask or imagine, ( Ephesians 3:20). I also asked The Lord, to enable and empower  as many as will respond to the call to make disciples.
And then I Believe we will see a changed world.

Now being filled with Thankfulness and great expectancy I give God the Glory and Thanksgiving for what He will do in 2013 and beyond.

And you my friend are included in this request to the Great God.
Go and make disciples just as our Lord commissioned us.

How Can I 'know for certain'?

As I studied Genesis 15 I was fascinated by Abraham asking The Lord how he could know for certain the the promises he had been given would come to pass.  I always feel terrible when I doubt what The Lord says, but here the Father of the Faithful questioned our Lord. I thought I should step away in case The Lord 'took him out'.  Instead I continued to read and found that God actually answered him and said 'know for certain' that these things will come to pass.  Then as I studied each of the promises I saw that they actually did happen. Just as he had said they would.

Now Abraham did not live to see these things happen. He walked about on the promised land but did not own any of it except enough to bury his dead.  However his descendants were given it many years later.
He did see a son from his own body, the result of a miracle in two very old bodies. And that was enough for Abraham.  He believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. If Abraham questioned God and is remembered today as faithful, what can I learn from this passage?

My take away

I should care enough to find out what God has planned for me by reading his word and asking him what he wants to accomplish through my life. I should not be afraid to ask questions. It would be foolish to be disrespectful or accusing. But I see from the example of a man God called his friend that I can ask and that I can 'know for certain'.