Circumstances... You don't want to answer my prayer?

Listening to another podcast from the Austin Stone Community Church, Matt Carter said, "Did you ever think that maybe God won't change your circumstance because He wants to change YOU?"

Why, of course I have never thought of that because my view of myself is so ridiculously good looking.

Circumstance 1:

The scripture is John 9.

Short version: Jesus makes clay and makes the blind man see. Pharisees jump all over this because it was the Sabbath, and they claim this was labor. Default, Jesus is a sinner (for healing a blind man? pretty positive 'no work on Sabbath' was intended to mean don't make your kids mow the grass or fold laundry on Sunday-not quite... but it's def OK for Jesus to heal a blind guy any day He wants to). Pharisees ask him not once but three times why can he see now and is Jesus a known sinner. After questioning his parents for crying out loud, he said,

"Whether he is a sinner I do not know. One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see." John 9:25

He's been surprisingly collective up til now. I start to sense a little sarcasm here though...

They say, 'We're disciples of Moses, but have it your way, if you want to be his disciple.' In their most LiLo-Mean-Girls voice they add, 'You know, God spoke to Moses. I don't know where this Jesus character came from.'

Now, the keep-calm-and-carry-on attitude just flew out the window, and the once-blind-but-now-he-sees man says,

"Why, this is an amazing thing! You do not know where he comes from, and yet he opened my eyes.
We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if anyone is a worshiper of God and does his will, God listens to him.
Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a man born blind.
If this man were not from God, he could do nothing." John 9:30-33

Circumstance 2:

Now, don't go thinking, how in the world don't these pharisees get it? Jesus's own disciples who would have been tagged in most of his Fbook pics and been a fan of the Jesus page had Al Gore and Steve Jobs been around said something similar after Jesus's resurrection. They look at the man who they know to be Savior and Messiah before He ascends to HEAVEN and ask him, "Are you going to restore the kingdom of God to Israel now?"

What a bunch of nincompoops. He 's not going to Happy Hour at Sonic. He's going to Heaven because He just restored the kingdom!

He restored it in ME. in You. in ALL who will believe for Pete's sake-o that was punny.

Jesus responds in Acts 1:7,

"And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power."

Our circumstance (me interpreting Matt Carter):

God, my life is hard right now. What do I do?

David is a great place to start. Ask to be bailed out just like he did... Because I'm God's daughter, He wants to love me and dust the dirt off my J.Crew skirt. But if he says, "No..." to my pleading, I must cling to the Word, and you guessed it, wait.

Psalm 86:11 "...unite my heart to fear Your name."

Be changed.