Jesus said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” (Matthew 19:26)
What a word of encouragement we have before us today! Much is impossible with man, but with God all things are possible. In other words, the believer is to look at life through the lens of our Lord and live a life that rises above impossible to Him-possible.
Throughout my years in the personal development field, I was a student of all things positive. I was a big fan of the 1952 book, The Power of Positive Thinking, by Norman Vincent Peale, a book which stayed on The New York Times bestseller list for 186 consecutive weeks. The thrust of the book was rooted in maintaining a positive mental attitude. Believe and succeed, readers were told; the power of positive thinking will overcome any obstacle that stands in your way. More than 60 years later, that’s still not bad advice; we should all strive to live out each day with a positive mental attitude.
However, in today’s passage of Scripture, we have something infinitely more powerful than a positive mental attitude; we have the very power of God at our disposal! Scripture tells us that we are “being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might” (Colossians 1:11), which enables us to go from impossible to Him-possible. We are all facing some situation or trial that seems impossible to overcome . . .
- Troubles at the office
- Difficulties in your marriage
- Prodigal child
- Broken friendship
- Financial shortfall
- Mounting debt
- Sickness and disease
Perhaps you have something to add to this list? Regardless of what it is that you are currently facing that seems absolutely irreparable, it only seems that way because you are trying to overcome in your strength rather than His. To go from impossible to Him-possible is to go from living in the natural to trusting in the supernatural. It is walking by faith and not by sight. It is trusting God even when we cannot trace Him. It is looking at something that seems utterly hopeless and yet still having hope. Why? Because with God nothing is impossible; all things are Him-possible!
God did not bring you this far just to leave you here. He has promised to take you to the other side, but He did not promise to get you there trouble free. In fact, He promised that you would experience trials and tribulations on your way to the Celestial City. During those times, we must remember this: trials and tribulations are simply tests to reveal in whom we will trust. Will we trust in the self or will we trust in our Savior?
At a time when many disciples turned their backs on Jesus, He asked the Twelve, “You do not want to leave too, do you?” To which Peter responded, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life” (John 6:67-68). And that is how we go from impossible to Him-possible: by trusting in the Word of life and truth that has been given to us by our Lord.
This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!
Grace for the Race 