Property of Multiplication

Math class with God is considerably more difficult than any math class in school. Why? Because what He does often does not make sense in our limited capacity to understand His ways. We know that He can take whatever we give Him and multiply it to do more than we could ever ask or imagine. This is clearly evident in the miracle of fishes and loaves. Think about it. Jesus takes 2 fish and 5 loaves, multiplies it (last I checked 5x2=10), divides it by 5,000 and ends up with a remainder? What? It's crazy. Crazy good, but crazy nonetheless.

What I have realized though, specifically this morning, is that I try to manipulate His formula for my benefit.

Now, I heard Beth Moore say years ago that her last name is appropriate because she tends to go above and beyond. As she said it, if less is good, moore is better. I think back to my days in Mary Kay and take that analogy to one of the facial treatments. It might be designed to reduce wrinkles but that doesn't mean you can use an entire bottle at once and make them magically disappear.

I realize this is going to sound ridiculously funny, but I try to obey His directions more, as if you can increase obedience. Clearly this makes no logical sense because if you are adding to what you've been told to do, you aren't obeying in the first place. And the only thing that does increase when I try to do more than I've been asked is my stress and frustration which ultimately leads to a decrease of peace.

Throughout the struggle I have with my health, I have always been of the mindset that I needed to do more to get more results. But the fact of the matter is, God designed my body and He ultimately knows what it will and will not respond to with regards to how it should be trained and how it should be fueled. Anything that I do that goes beyond what He's prescribing or is surpassing the boundaries of safety He's installed, isn't going to blessed and multiplied because that's a plan of my own design, not His.

In the past two weeks I have realized that God is capable of doing a lot more with a 30 minute workout done to my best ability for His glory than He ever did do with a 90 minute workout that was not in my best interest. I might have been able to do the other one, but over time, I was simply not able to maintain it. The idea is to be healthy for a lifetime not fit for a season.

We all have areas of struggle that we want to see God move in massive ways. But unless He is asking for a specific action on our part, He isn't going to speed up the refining process because we're trying to earn extra credit. He gets all the glory He truly deserves when what we give looks like too little and somehow ends up exponentially multiplied. But in order for that to happen, we have to lay down our ideas on how it will work best by putting it in His hands.