Staying in Awe of Jesus

"There is no question that faith is a key element in effective prayer.  On one occasion, Jesus could not do many miracles in a certain place because of the unbelief of the people there." -Greg Laurie

When Jesus began teaching in his hometown, He taught the people as He had in every other place He had been, only these people treated Him as something commonplace and familiar.  They had known Jesus as a little boy and then, therefore, they were not in awe of Him as so many others had been.  Jesus said, “A prophet is not without honor except in his own town” (Mark 6:4).  Consequently, Jesus performed no miracles there.  The people there didn’t recognize that as Jesus entered into His ministry at 30 He’d been empowered from on high to teach the gospel and perform miracles.  The thing about those people is that many of them probably were not bad people, but they nevertheless missed out on God’s favor and blessings.  Over time in our relationships with God, we too can begin to pray routine and faithless prayers to a God that we are treating as commonplace and familiar.  The lesson for those people in Jesus’s hometown is true for me and you: if we want to see Jesus do the miraculous in our lives then we must stay in constant awe of an all-powerful God that can do anything.  

Jesus said, “Everything is possible for one who believes” (Mark 9:23, NIV).