Part One of ‘Your Will Be Done’ dealt with the hierarchy of Heaven. Part Two of ‘Your Will Be Done’ dealt with the hierarchy of the governing bodies of the earth, including the home. This third and final part of ‘Your Will Be Done’ will deal with our individual daily lives.
There are quite a few preachers who are teaching a message of ‘Believe and Receive’, ‘Name and Claim’, ‘Word of Faith’, ‘Health and Wealth’ or the ‘Prosperity Gospel’. Is this really Biblical? There are arguments for and against, but many believe that its roots are more in common with New Age Metaphysics than with the Biblical Christianity. Instead of creating reality with our thoughts, as New Age Proponents advise, ‘Name it and Claim it’ teachers tell us that we can use the ‘power of faith’ to create our own reality or to get what we want. The keys words being to ‘get what we want’, which is not always what God wants for us.
Consider Jesus Christ, the Son of God, as He was in the garden praying, “Nevertheless, thy will be done.” Jesus knew that His Father was able to save Him from the Roman Cross, yet He prayed for His Father’s Will to be done on earth as it is in Heaven.
Jesus did the will of His Father with joy, yet He shrank from the agony facing Him. “Father if this cup can pass, let it pass, but if not, may your will be done.” Christ accepted His Father’s Will, and submitted to it, despite the suffering.
The three friends of Daniel were commanded to bow down and worship Nebuchadnezzar’s great statue. They were the king’s loyal subjects, but they were in utter loyalty to their Lord God. They were willing to face death rather than offer false worship. Their words to the king were:
“Our God is able to deliver us from the furnace, and we believe that He will, but if not, let it be known to you that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image.”
Jesus was God in the flesh. The fullness of the Godhead dwelt in Him, bodily. God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself. Jesus is the image of the invisible God. Jesus knew the will of His Father, as the Son. He knew it was the Father’s will to die on the cross. This is the reason He came into the world. Yet, His human flesh agonized over facing the horrible sufferings of that cross. He agonized so intensely that His capillaries broke down under the stress and released blood into His sweat. An angel came and ministered strength to Him. (Luke 22:42-44)
The three Hebrew children, on the other hand, did not know the will of Yahweh; yet they had faith that He was able to deliver them, ‘if’ He chose to do so. Their faith in Yahweh was so strong that they knew if Yahweh chose not to deliver them, they would die serving Him rather than worship a false idol. (God did deliver them without any smell of smoke on their garments)
Do you see ‘Name it and Claim it’ in either of these two scenarios? Suffering was involved for both Christ and for the three Hebrew children to fulfill the ‘Will of God’ for their respective lives.
Suffering is not a message that is preached much anymore. It doesn’t fit into the concepts of our prosperous American lifestyle. The New Age philosophies have permeated our workforce, our schools, our recreation, and the media; brainwashing us into believing that suffering is due to ignorance and lack of spiritual understanding about humans being their own gods, creating their own worlds, with right thinking and with right behavior.
Yet, we all age and we all will die and we all will go back to dust from whence we came.
C. S. Lewis said in ‘Letters to an American Lady’:
“We are not necessarily doubting that God will do the best for us; we are wondering how painful the best will turn out to be.”
Peter said that we can suffer according to God’s Will. “Therefore let those who suffer according to God’s will entrust their souls to a faithful Creator while doing good.” (I Peter 4:19) “For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God’s will, than for doing evil.” (I Peter 3:17)
Consider these Biblical facts:
Peter knew what it was to suffer, when he died upside down on a cross. Paul was beheaded for the Gospel. James, the Lord’s brother, died by the sword. Most of the Apostles died a martyr’s death for preaching the Gospel.
Jesus healed all who had need of healing. Does this mean that there were those who didn’t need healing, but were still sick? (Luke 9:11)
Paul healed many, with just handkerchiefs and aprons (Acts 19:12), yet he left Trophimus sick in Melitus. (II Timothy 4:20)
Paul had a thorn in the flesh that God would not remove. (I Corinthians 12:7)
Paul had Timothy drink wine for his medicinal needs. (I Timothy 5:23)
Epaphroditus was a devout servant of the Lord who became sick, and stayed that way for some time, and almost died. (Philippians 2:26, 30)
I have seen miraculous instantaneous healings. I have seen others healed over a long period of time. I have seen others who were never healed, and died. Was it lack of faith on my part, or on the part of the one being prayed for?
No, it was not lack of faith on anyone’s part; although faith is very important to receive any answers to prayer or healing. James says that the ‘Prayer of Faith’ will save the sick and the Lord shall raise him up. (James 5:15) He that comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. (Hebrews 11:6)
It is all about ‘Your Will Be Done’ on earth, in our personal life, as it is in Heaven!
If we look carefully at the healings of Jesus, we notice that sometimes He asked for faith, and sometimes He did not. Of the 35 miracles recorded in the Gospel accounts, the faith of the recipient is exercised in only 10 of the accounts. Jesus did not heal all the people all the time, but it was those who God willed to be healed that were healed.
The man with the infirmity was healed by God’s grace, yet he had no faith in Jesus. He didn’t even know it was Jesus who healed him, until later. (John 5:1-15) The blind man of John chapter nine did not ask to be healed. Jesus healed him without his asking.
Jesus healed those who had faith; but He also healed those who did not have faith. Everyone Jesus willed to be healed was healed, 100%. Those who God willed to be healed were healed.
The words, “Your Will Be Done’, are teaching us more than a form of prayer. They are teaching us that we, as humans, cannot always fully know the will of God for our individual lives, and we have to believe that God, as our Heavenly Father, knows what is best for us, and will heal us and provide for us and protect us when it is His will to do so.
Just look at all of the Christians who are being beheaded and tortured for their refusal to deny their faith in their Lord Jesus Christ as the Son of God. 100 million Christians are being persecuted for their faith today in over 60 countries, according to Open Doors. Rwanda, Democratic Republic of Congo, radical Islam, and many other oppressive antichrist governments torture and kill many Christians each year. Missionaries are imprisoned and die each year for obeying Matthew 28:19. America is attacking Christians more and more each year for not accepting anti-biblical teachings.
“And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.” Romans 8:28
Think on these things as you pray, ‘Your Will Be Done in my personal life on earth, as it is in Heaven.”