Beyond Ability

“You are not bound by your abilities, but rather by your ability to be willing to go beyond them.”

Loren Thornburg

A miracle is something that is highly improbable, surprising, or not easily explained by natural ways.  My parents would be the first to tell you that my life has held many obvious miracles.  I was the kid that never could get a handle on writing well.  I continued to struggle with it through college receiving low grades on papers even after the help of tutors.  Now...I continue to write and it has become a big part of my ministry.  I was also the kid that tried really hard in sports but was just never that good.  Now...I work with a softball ministry getting to use my many years of college competition and coaching to care for others.  These are two of the many miracles I have seen in my own life that remind me that we are not bound by our current abilities, situations, or realities.  What are yours? Your current reality does not bind you to what your future reality will be.  As you look back at your own miracles remember there are more to come.  

“This is my life work; helping people understand and respond to his Message.  It came as a sheer gift to me, a real surprise, God handling all the details...I was the least qualified of any of the available Christians. God saw to it that I was equipped, but you can be sure that it had nothing to do with my natural abilities.”

Ephesians 3:7-8 Message

Paul wasn’t kidding.  It was a huge surprise, a miracle, that God chose Him to preach his Message.  God called him from a life of persecuting to a life of preaching His Message.  You might join with him in thinking that he was the least qualified of any to be the one to be called by God to preach.  You might also join with him in thinking the same of yourselves.  Our tendency is to base our level of qualification on our perspective of our natural abilities, but as Paul has so clearly shown us, it has nothing to do with that.  God may use your natural abilities at times, yet don’t forget what God’s tendency is...to be the one to qualify you. Throughout the Bible we see Him do this over and over.  He calls people out of their weaknesses and uses them in those places.  It’s in those places that we can’t help but see God’s hand in it and not accredit it to ours.  Now is not any different than it has been throughout the ages.  God looks at you and your life and sees beyond your abilities into His ability to use you just as you are.  No need to determine whether you are qualified.  When God is calling it’s up to Him...not you.