Wide Open Spaces

“Wide open spaces”

These three words woke with me this morning. I thought about the scenery I have taken in during drives with my husband since moving to New Mexico. Wide open spaces. No people around. No noise. Nothing but land and sky as far as the eye can see.

I thought about the old country song, about leaving home to explore wide open spaces. Those words hit home, because this is the farthest I have been from “home” for longer than a couple weeks. I want to explore the new area I have found myself, not just the town. I want to explore the region and the nations. From the few reservations we have driven on, I have again only seen wide open spaces, no people or towns. I have just seen the sign telling us that we are entering or leaving a reservation. There is a big wide world that has opened up to me, that I am excited to be able to explore.

As I looked up the song lyrics, I came across a few Christian songs that expressed a little more where my thoughts were starting to formulate. Like the words from LIFE Worship:

In Your love is a place like a wide open space. Call me out into all I can be.

Or, from ICF Worship

You are the compass
You lead the way
To wide open spaces
We will follow You

As far as the heavens
Grace made a way
And wide open spaces
Are what we find in You

I started thinking of a passage that I have journaled many times, about how God wants us to pray wide open. When I looked it up, I was looking for a specific version. I came across this wording from a version I am not familiar with, but was similar to what I remember. (Each year I try to read through the Bible in a different version, in addition to my regular studies).

When I think of the greatness of this great plan I fall on my knees before God the Father (from whom all fatherhood, earthly or heavenly, derives its name), and I pray that out of the glorious richness of his resources he will enable you to know the strength of the spirit’s inner re-inforcement—that Christ may actually live in your hearts by your faith. And I pray that you, firmly fixed in love yourselves, may be able to grasp (with all Christians) how wide and deep and long and high is the love of Christ—and to know for yourselves that love so far beyond our comprehension. May you be filled though all your being with God himself! Now to him who by his power within us is able to do far more than we ever dare to ask or imagine—to him be glory in the Church through Jesus Christ for ever and ever, amen! Ephesians 3:14-20

So often I put God into a box with my prayers. I don’t think or imagine of the big things that God wants to do in this world. I rarely dare to ask the big and bold prayers. Prayers that put God on the line to fulfill His promises. I don’t think about the wide open space or prayers that God has provided and wants to answer in.

“But he said, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.”” Luke‬ ‭18:27‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Wide open spaces lead me to a God that makes even the impossible possible. I know that God is the God of the impossible, yet I rarely find myself asking or believing for the impossible. Recently I have asked Him and believed for a few: I am boldly standing on the finished work of Christ in healing for my nephew who was diagnosed with an in curable cancer. I prayed for peace during the transition of power and for a Saul to Paul conversion for those who are legislating things that are against God, especially full-term abortions.

I realize I should be asking God for the impossible regularly. There is nothing stopping me, except me. He’s able to do more than I ever dare to ask or even imagine.

What impossible things what I ask God for if I believed He would answer?

I ask for the end of child abuse and neglect. I ask that the effects would have no effect on those who have experienced abuse, and that what the enemy meant to destroy them would be used for God’s glory.

I would ask for the end of human trafficking. I ask that God would change the heart of those who are selling humans and those who are buying. I pray that God would help those trapped to see themselves as He sees them, to know their worth and value, is based on the price God paid, not on what has been done to them or what they have done.

I would ask for the end of addiction. I pray that God would set the captives free from drugs, alcohol, food, pornography, sex, toxic relationships, approval and any other thing that people are addicted to and held captive by.

I would ask for the end of cancer and disease. I know that Christ took sickness and disease at the Christ. He said “It is finished.” I want to see cancer and other diseases finished once and for all.

I would ask, the impossible dream of my heart for the church to be the church. I would see the Church being the active hands and feet of God meeting the tangible needs of people.

Then there are some less “impossible things” I would consistently stand in faith for, until they became completely possible.

I would ask and believe I could be the person God created me to be and to fulfill all that He has called me too.

I would ask and believe that I can honor God with my body and stop making excuses for not being as active as I should. I would stop making excuses for how I eat.

I would ask and believe that my husband and I would operate in unity and pay off our debt and live debt free.

I would ask and walk in the truth that my husband is the man God created him to be.

I would stand in complete faith for my children, grandchildren, siblings, nieces, nephews, cousins, and in-laws to all know and serve the Lord.

I know that God hears me when I ask and that He wants to give me the desires of my heart. He already knows these desires. I just need to be willing to ask those wide open prayers. I need to stop trying to put God in a box. I also have to let go of how I think it will look when He answers.

Prayer – Lord, you know the desires of my heart. You know how I desire peace and safety for others. How my heart longs to see the end of illness and disease. You know my desire for Your people, including all of my family, to rise up and be the church, your hands and feet to the world around us. I asked these impossible things of You. I also ask you to help me be all that you created me to be and that Tim and I would honor you with our bodies, our finances, our time, our skills, and resources. Wide open spaces are what I want to find in You. Wide open spaces are what I want to walk in with You. Wide open spaces are where I want to find the answers to my prayers.