I
know they were in the wilderness and not in the Land but there is something
appealing about this image of following the pillar of cloud and fire. Just to know you were where you were supposed
to be and that God would be there too is comforting, even if you’re in a desert
place. I doubt that I would be able to
rest in that for very long, I would be impatient to get to the Land. What a sight this must have been to see an
enormous caravan of people, more than 600,000 of them with whatever animals
they kept, moving as one with a gigantic pillar of cloud during the day and
fire at night leading their movements.
God wants that with the church and it requires abiding, it requires
prayer and seeking Him.
The
disciples have done remarkable things but they don’t have the faith to heal
this particular boy. In another version
of the story Jesus says that this kind only comes out with prayer. Why do they lack faith? Perhaps the reason is that they have
misplaced faith, they are too reliant on their belief in themselves and haven’t
depended on the Lord. The more they try
the more desperate and faithless they become and ultimately they are unable to
do anything at all. The only thing I
don’t like about this story is the application some make with respect to
healing. I have seen similar situations
where people blame the parent of the sick child for not having enough faith or
they put the blame on the person praying.
God doesn’t heal in all cases, we cannot make such judgments without a
very specific revelation from the Lord.
We need to learn to move with the Spirit if we will see healings.
Paul
is thankful for the faith of the church at Rome which he says is known all over
the world. In spite of that, Paul
believes he has something to offer them and he also wants to visit that their
faith may be mutually encouraged. It is
important to leaders to have their faith encouraged by the people of God, it is
not a one way transaction. The heart of
a leader is greatly blessed by the knowledge that the people he is given to
lead are growing in their faith and that the leader’s work is bearing fruit in
the lives of the people. The greatest
joy a leader knows is not being told he preached a good sermon, it is when what
is sown bears fruit, we need to hear what God is doing in one another’s lives
in order to see the pillar of cloud and fire.
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