I Believe in....FAIRIES?????

I believe.  Easy statement, hard action verb.   Remember in the The Wizard of Oz, the Lion says that he's not afraid because he doesn't believe in "spooks", only to change his mind when approaching the wizard..."I do believe I spooks, I do believe in spooks!"  Remember in Peter Pan, Tinkerbell was dying and Peter pleads with the audience that they only way to save a fairy is say that they believe in fairies.  Everyone yells that they believe over and over, knowing full well that they do NOT believe in fairies. 

How many times have I said that I believe?  When I did, was it a statement or a verb?  In many cases, I know now that it was a statement.  I mean, if you say it, you do it...right?  I don't think so.  At least in my case.  I mean, I say that I believe that the sun is going to rise tomorrow.  But I don't really believe that, I have no faith that it will, I just assume it will.  Why would I not, it always does, every day on time.  And believing and assuming are not the same thing.  When you assume, you just take it for granted because you have no reason to think that what should happen will not happen.  Believing is having faith and hope in something that in the natural doesn't even seem remotely possible.

In Mark 11:24, it says "whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them."  Do I pray believing that I will receive them?  That is what I had to ask myself this weeekend, and the answer was a resounding no!  I mean, I HOPE that I will receive them, that is enough right, I mean Lamentations 3:26 says that "it is good that one should hope and wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord." But when we say hope today, we mean it more like a wish. Hope was never a question.  If someone hoped, it meant that they waited with expectancy.  We have separated hope and belief into two different camps, one a wish, the other a fact.

So today, I make a change, to work on believing.  To work on waiting with expectancy.  After all, it comes with a guarantee!  Believe that you will receive what you pray for (praying in line with His will of course) and you WILL have them.  Those are much better odds than Tinkerbell had.
~D