Louie Giglio - The Impossible Prayer
These talks are in a collection called «God of the Impossible,» and I want to ask again today that God would plant a seed in all of our hearts, our minds, and our souls that He is able. Can I get an amen? Maybe just to kind of get us going in the right direction today: God is able. If you were not here last week, I don’t know what the averages are on anyone jumping in the middle of a collection of talks and then going back to say, «Man, I missed the first one! I’m going to go back and listen to that.» But it’s really important that you know how we set up this journey.
The main thing that’s important for you to know today is that God can do abundantly, immeasurably more than we can ask or think, and at the same time, we’re living in the tension of this broken world. So we say, «God is able,» and everybody says amen. Today, that’s not just a little Christian slogan for us all to carry through the week, because the reality is that all of us in the gathering today have suffered loss; we’re on a broken planet. But that doesn’t nullify the fact that we’re walking it with a God who is able. This is how God wants to work today: He’s wanting to get in that tension and lead us in that tension.
Last week we were talking about the life of the prophet Jeremiah. Jeremiah understands that Jerusalem is going to fall into the power of Babylon; it’s going to be destroyed. But yet, God still has a plan, and in the midst of this, he prays in Jeremiah 32:17. This is what Jeremiah says about God, and it is still true about God today: «You have made the heavens and the earth by your outstretched arm.» So let’s not get lost in the poetry today. What Jeremiah is saying is that everything in the cosmos has been created by God. When I come back down into the tension of what’s going sideways in my world, I have to be grounded in the reality that by His outstretched arm, God made the galaxies and the entire cosmos. Therefore, His conclusion is that nothing is too hard for you. This is who we walk with if you know God through Christ; this is who we walk with. This is our Father. This is who we’re in a relationship with. We’re living life and doing life with the God who it is said about, because it is true, that nothing is too hard for you.
So that should mean there’s a shift in our mindset; that we don’t start with the negative; we start with the possible. Secondly, there’s a shift in our prayers that we’re not coming in with these low-level, baseline «I hope something can work out» prayers, but we’re actually praying as if we were talking to the God who can do anything. I think sometimes it’s more normal for us to read an article in a magazine or read the story of someone’s life who was thinking like this without God in the equation than it is to be around people who are believers and listen to the way that they’re thinking about life and their own situations. I’m really into technology. I’m into people who do things that people say may be impossible, and I’ve just been reading about some of these situations. One of them is Moore’s Law, which blows my mind. Anyone here who works in the technology space and knows Moore’s Law would understand this.
In 1965, this guy was a pioneer, especially in computing, and in 1965, he already understood that every 18 months—and it turns out now that it’s more like two years—computing power was going to double. In other words, they were going to be able to get more components in a small space; therefore, computers were going to double their capacity to process information every 18 months. It’s turned out to be closer to every two years. This guy was thinking this way in 1965! Do you know what computers looked like in 1965? His hypothesis, Moore’s hypothesis, has turned into Moore’s Law because it’s happened and is still happening all these decades later. He was able to see the possibility of exponential increase before anybody had seen any of the exponential increase.
Now we hold in our hands a device that has more power in it than all the computing power that sent men to the moon. The guy who brought one of those phones to us is a man named Steve Jobs. Most people remember Steve Jobs. I was watching an interview with a woman who worked very closely with him, and she said about him, «You know, he is the guy that the phrase was coined around: the reality distortion field.» He would gather these brilliant people in a room and tell them that they needed to do something, and they all looked at him, these brilliant people, and said, «I’m sorry, that’s impossible.» And he said, «Great! We need it by next Thursday!»
And guess what? They did it by next Thursday. He was distorting reality everywhere he went. She put words around it that I’d never heard anyone say about him before. She said the driving force in Steve’s life was his belief that the impossible was possible. Now I’ve read a lot about Steve Jobs. I don’t know personally by reading anything I’ve read about him whether he had a relationship with Jesus. Maybe he did; I don’t know everything about him. But I haven’t read anything that would indicate he had a belief system similar to what we’re proclaiming today. Yet he operated with the driving force and the belief that the impossible was possible.
Then there’s architecture, and I’ve been blown away all over again this week just by what people can build in the world. I walked into a friend’s office this week, and on his coffee table was a book commemorating the World Expo that happened in the UAE in the spring of this year. I can’t even get into the fact that they built a city, and in that city built all these amazing buildings to celebrate the world, and every nation had its own building and architectural exhibit there. In the midst of it, this book I’m looking at on the guy’s coffee table—I didn’t get to go to the World Expo; I would have loved to have seen it—so I’m flipping through really fast and some of the amazing stuff. In it is a stack of brochures like these, and I said, «Wow! Can I have one of these? I would like to take the whole book, but could I maybe just have a brochure?» He said, «Sure, have one!»
Long story short, the brochure is about an architecture firm, and the name of the firm is on the top: Adrian Smith and Gordon Gill. Adrian Smith is a very well-known architect if you’re in the building space. This thing has a building on the front. I think maybe there’s a close-up so you don’t feel left out. This is a rendering of a building that they’re hoping to build, which would become the tallest building in the world. Pretty spectacular! Then on the inside is just some of the buildings they are planning to build, some of the buildings they have built, and a little bit of the core values of their firm. I brought this over. You’re like, «Where are we going here? We got Moore’s Law going, and you know, surely you’re going to bring this around to help us at some point.»
So I come back to the office with my brochure, and it’s sitting on the table in my office. I’m working on this message, and I have my scripture open, and I can’t stop looking at this building. So I want to know, like, «Man, where are they building this? When is it going to get built? Who is this guy?» And then I realized Adrian Smith is the architect of the Burj Khalifa in Dubai. Has anyone been to Dubai, by the way? Just for anyone? You know, no one? Someone? Yeah? Oh thank God! Thank you so much for coming to this gathering. I’m so grateful! Thank you! Thank you! Man, something isn’t it? Get out, travel, and go somewhere. It’s incredible! They have a mini-Mirage at Disney World, though, so you can see that when you’re there.
The Burj Khalifa is the tallest building in the world currently in Dubai, and it looks like this. You probably have seen a photograph of it. That’s real, by the way; you’re like, «I know that was photoshopped into there.» No, that’s a real building, and all those other buildings you see, those are buildings the size of the Bank of America tower here in Atlanta. The observation deck, which I’ve been to, is on the 124th floor. Anyone want to go somewhere? You’re like, «I’d go.» Others are like, «No, I’m going to let you go do that and tell me about it later.» When you go to Dubai, your brain just goes like, «What?» Then my brain goes to, «Who imagined that and thought that was a good idea, A, and that it was possible?»
That it was this guy I got the brochure of on my table while I’m doing a message in a series called «God of the Impossible.» So I’m looking at the brochure, I’m looking at their core values, and then I’m frozen by this statement right here on the top of this page: «Our firm, in case you want us to design something and create something for you, needs to know this about our firm: We are not limited by known solutions.» I went, «Hello! This is the talk of people who do the impossible!» I sat there with that phrase rolling through my mind: «We are not limited by known solutions. We are not limited by known solutions.» Don’t come in here if you’re going to start telling us about known solutions because we’re not limited by known solutions. You don’t do what we do if you’re operating in the limitation of known solutions.
I thought, I don’t know Adrian Smith. I’m sure he’s a wonderful person. I don’t know Steve Jobs. I didn’t know the more of Moore’s Law, and I’m sure they’re all amazing people. But we walk with Yahweh, and so much of the time we start our process with «no way.» We walk with Yahweh, and nothing is too hard for Him. God wants us to awaken to who He is so that we can then pray with the faith of a child. You’re like, «Well, why would we be encouraged to pray with the faith of a child?» Because a child looks up at his parents and thinks its parents can pull a rabbit out of a hat and do things that aren’t possible. The child doesn’t think to calculate whether or not the ask is good; he or she just comes out with the ask anyway. God is saying, «I would like to be in a relationship with you like that so that you would know you have a heavenly Father who is pleased when you come out with something absolutely not limited by known solutions because you believe that He is, in fact, the God of the impossible.»
But I want us to squeeze this, if we can, into the tension, and Jesus is going to show us how to do that. If you remember last week in Jeremiah’s story, they’re building a siege ramp; the Babylonians are about to come over the wall into Jerusalem, and it’s going to be a wipeout; everything’s going to be destroyed. Jeremiah knows it; he’s been prophesying about this for a minute. While this is all happening, the word of the Lord comes to him and tells him that his cousin is going to come and try to sell him a field in a little town down the way called Anathoth. So he says, «When he does, buy the field. Do it publicly; sign the deal publicly, and buy the field even though the enemy is coming over the wall.» So what is he doing? He’s living in tension; he’s believing that God’s making a promise that in that field there’s going to be a future, but it ain’t going to be today. Right now the army is coming over the wall, but I want you to buy the field by faith so that when I come through in my plan, you will have invested in the sovereign ways of God, and you will see the miraculous happen in this field. That’s the tension we got: armies coming over the wall while God’s asking us to believe that He’s able.
And Jesus shows us that tension in the Garden of Gethsemane. This is the night, the last night of Jesus' life before He’s crucified. Jesus knows what is happening, obviously, because He is the mastermind of the plan that brought Him to the garden. Can we just all remember this for a moment? It’s God in human flesh—the God-man, equally God and equally man. But before stepping out of heaven onto planet Earth, Jesus co-signed on the plan that would bring you and me back to God. In other words, this chasm of our sin separating us from a holy God is going to be bridged by the finished work of Jesus on the cross, taking our shame in our place; therefore, extending to us something called amazing grace. This plan has been set in motion since before there was time, and Jesus set it in motion. He’s co-signed; now he’s entered into humanity, and now it’s the last night. But He could not anticipate what the plan was going to feel like in a human body until He was in a human body, and the weight was overwhelming.
After the supper where He held up the cup and held up the bread and washed His followers' feet, they went out and they went across to the Mount of Olives into an olive grove where they would normally go. Then Jesus, Matthew 26:36, went with His disciples to a place called Gethsemane. Now, we’ve already said this a lot of different ways around here, but that word «Gethsemane» means «crushing.» That’s how you translate that word. In other words, this is a place where the olive trees not only grow, but we harvest the olives, and then we put the olives in the press, and we crush them to produce the oil. So this is obviously where Jesus would be on this night. He said to them, «Sit here while I go over there and pray.» He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with Him, and He began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then He said to them, «My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.» Going a little further, He fell with His face toward the ground and prayed, «My Father!» Now, the word is «Abba.» It’s what any son or daughter would call out to their father. «Abba, if it is possible» —here’s our word—"may this cup be taken from me; yet not as I will, but as you will.»
Then He returned to His disciples and found them sleeping. «Could you not keep watch with me for even one hour? Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation.» Because there should be an amen here: «The spirit is willing, but the body is weak.» He went away a second time and prayed, «Abba, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done.» When He came back, He again found them sleeping because their eyes were heavy. So He left them and went away once more and prayed the third time, saying the same thing. Then He returned to His disciples and said to them, «Are you still sleeping and resting? Look, the hour is near, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise and let us go; here comes my betrayer.» This took me right back to Jeremiah: they’re coming over the wall; I’m buying a field! Oh, my betrayer; he’s coming into the garden right now, and I just knelt down right here and bought a field!
What was the tension of this moment? The tension of this moment was that God knew His Abba wasn’t limited by known solutions! This word «possible» that’s right here in the text and is in other places in the text as well—most notably on the day Jesus' conception was announced to the virgin Mary—we found that verse and that word in Luke 1:37 last week when she said, «Okay, I’m getting the message that I’m going to bring forth a child, but I’m also kind of confused because I’m innocent.» The angel said in verse 37, «For nothing is impossible with God.» In other words, divinity is going to conceive within you a miracle because God is the God of the impossible. So on the conception announcement, miraculous possibility in the impossible, but now on the last night of the one who was conceived, now again the question rings out, «If it’s possible, let this cup pass from me.»
That word «possible» is the Greek word «dunatos.» It means strong, mighty, and powerful; it’s where we get the word «dynamite.» So what He’s saying is: «Father, you are strong, you are mighty, you are powerful.» Where we started this talk: «You, my Father, are able!» So I’m going to ask for the impossible. Are you with me? And I’m not going to just ask one time; I’m not going to just ask two times. The Son of God is going to ask three times, «Is there any other option?» Abba, mighty Abba, miracle-working Abba, powerful Abba, is there another option? Knowing full well that all things are possible with God, except for one thing. One thing is impossible for God, and that thing is to make a way for you and me to come from spiritual death to spiritual life without a mediator named Jesus Christ. That is impossible; that’s why this talk is called the Impossible Prayer.
But man, Jesus is modeling for us the tension. I already know it’s not possible, but that’s not going to stop me from asking because my God is powerful. So I’m going to ask even though I already know because I co-signed on the plan. So really what He was asking was, «If it’s possible to do what I plan to do while I’m here right now, if it’s possible to do what I’ve already planned to do without doing what I plan to do, then could you show me that right now?» What faith! I really never seen it before, and I just marveled at the faith of my Savior who already knew the outcome of the moment, but yet He believed so much in the miraculous power of God that He asked. But then He said every time, «But not my will, but your will be done.» On the doorstep of the greatest act of sacrificial love ever seen, Jesus started with possibility, but then He surrendered in confidence that there was going to be a miracle. It just might not look like what He was hoping it could have looked like.
That night, «Is there another way?» See, when we step out in that kind of faith, things shift. Sometimes they shift, and we see it, and everyone sees it. But even when we don’t see it with our physical eyes, I am telling you, when you call on the God of the impossible in faith, things change whether you see them or not. And in this case, if you were standing there in the moment and you weren’t asleep and you were taking notes the whole time and learning how to pray, you’d have probably folded up your notes and said, «You know what? This prayer thing is a joke! Don’t need it.
What did I learn tonight in the Garden of Gethsemane? I learned that you can three times call out to God. You can be so distressed that you’re literally sweating drops of blood, and guess what? While you’re praying and while you’re calling and while you’re trusting and while you’re surrendering to God, a dude comes through the door and a whole host of people who are armed to the hilt come and arrest you. Well, that looked like that worked out fantastically! I’m going to pray more!» But I’m telling you, it was working out miraculously.
I remember a time in my life when I was trying to learn how to pray, and I was feeling this tension but was not really at a place where I was probably mature enough to articulate it. A lot of my prayers were coming out, «God, I believe you can do a miracle.» But I learned from Jesus: «Nevertheless, not my will but your will be done.» Someone said to me, «Hey! You need to stop praying like that; that’s a cop-out! You need to stand on your faith! You need to stand on the Word! Stand on the promise; don’t give in! You need to believe God’s going to do it! If you add on this thing, 'Nevertheless, not my will but your will, ' you’re just creating a cop-out in case God doesn’t do what you were believing Him to do! You just need to stand on faith until you see God do it, and that’s it!»
I was like, «Well, hey! I don’t think Jesus copped out.» And, «B, I don’t think it’s a cop-out; I’ve actually learned in time it’s an opt-in. It’s me saying I can both have faith in the God of the impossible and yield and surrender to His sovereign plans at the same time. I can both be filled with great faith that my God does not operate in the constraints of known solutions and at the same time say, and I’ll tell you what, I don’t know hardly anything. So I’m going to trust you, and I’m going to trust your outcome, and I’m going to trust that I am going to see a miracle. I don’t know what it’s going to look like or when it’s going to come, but when it comes, I’m going to say, 'I’m so glad I started with possible.' Because as it turns out, when it wasn’t possible for the cup to pass from Him and me still be saved, it became possible for me to do the impossible, which is to breathe the air of forgiveness and mercy and grace and to be called a son of the Most High God.
So technically, Jesus did not have to take the cup! He could have said no, but we wouldn’t be here today. There was no other way. I don’t know what tension you’re in today, but I just want to plant a seed: Buy the field! It doesn’t matter, my betrayer is coming through the garden—he’s coming through the garden. Great! Buy the field! Believe God; the army is coming over the wall. Buy the field. What does that mean? It means start with possibility! Thinking, you walk with Yahweh. Don’t start with „no way“; you walk with Yahweh. Don’t start with „I can’t see a way.“
You walk with Yahweh. So start with, „I don’t know, but you do miracles! I don’t know, but you are the God of the impossible!“ So I’m going to take a step of faith, and I’m going to pray. Faith—not one time, not two times, not three times. I’m going to pray all the way until I’m done praying that prayer. I’m going to say in joyful surrender, „You know what? I do believe! But not my will but your will be done. Not my way, but your way be done!“ Because I know your way is the way of the miraculous. I might not see it in this life, but I will see, at some point, the goodness of God in the land of the living. I am convinced all things are possible! God, your thing is possible with God!