Phil Callaway didn’t know what to say when his children asked if Mommy was going to die. His wife, Ramona, suffered horrible seizures. Hundreds of friends and relatives prayed. Medical specialists tried everything. But Ramona’s weight eventually slipped to ninety pounds. And soon the seizures occurred daily, sometimes hourly.

One evening, when things looked utterly hopeless, Phil fell to his knees. “God!” he cried out. “I can’t take it anymore. Please do something!” As he stood, a doctor’s name came to mind. Phil called the doctor, who saw Ramona the next morning and diagnosed a rare chemical deficiency. Within a week, Ramona’s seizures ended. She was a different person. The miracle was so incredible that Phil says, “God gave me back my wife.”

Immediate answers to prayer. You want them. I want them. But God simply does not always work that way. And to receive His best, we must be patient. The Bible says, “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.”

When praying for our loved ones who do not know Jesus, we must persist. Because sometimes God will answer with, “Yes, but you’ll have to wait.” So, don’t give up. Keep praying that your loved one will come to the Lord.

When I was a teenager in Argentina, a missionary from California taught me how to pray. His name was Keith Benson. Keith asked if I would like to pray with him once a week. I was thrilled! The first afternoon we got together, Keith put a map on the wall. On the map was the city of Cordoba, which is the second largest city in Argentina.

We began praying for each and every church in Cordoba. It took many months, but we did it! Then Keith began putting up maps of other cities throughout Argentina, and we prayed for those by name, week after week.

Eventually, it was on to South America. We prayed for each and every country. Finally, Keith brought out a globe of the world! And I fell in love with the nations! I learned so much through those prayer sessions. Keith taught me that regular prayer not only enhances your relationship with God, but it increases your vision for what God can do through your prayers. I determined that I was ready to go wherever the Lord called me!

In John 16, Jesus says: “My Father will give you whatever you ask in my name.” Whatever we ask in Jesus’ name, He promises to do it. So dream big – but pray even bigger – that God will use you to reach your world for Jesus Christ!

There’s a wonderful promise in the Old Testament that I came to understand when I was a young boy. The promise is found in Genesis 26:6. God says to Abraham, “Through your descendants all the nations on earth will be blessed.”

When I read that as a boy, I remember thinking, This is something I can pray for my own kids someday! So, as my wife and I started our family, we prayed that prayer for each of our four boys. We said, “Lord, through these boys, please bless all the nations of the world.”

Now, there were some rough years. One of our sons, Andrew, took a big spiritual hike for about 13 years. We experienced a lot of sadness. But we kept praying, “Lord, bless the nations of the world through our boys.” And praise God, Andrew did finally surrender his life to Jesus Christ!

Now, he’s an evangelist – sharing the Good News all around the world. In fact, each one of our boys is serving the Lord in different capacities. It’s thrilling to watch how God has answered that prayer of ours!

So, dream great dreams for your family. No matter where your kids are right now with the Lord, don’t despair. Pray for your children by name, asking God to bless the nations of the world through them. The Lord will hear, and answer!

Are you feeling spiritually dry? Discouraged? Unmotivated? Have you had a recent failure, either a personal mistake, or the death of a dream? Does it seem like all your hopes and prayers of God using you have come to nothing?

The Lord says to you today, “Keep dreaming great dreams, and planning great plans to reach your world.” Jesus says in John 14:15, “I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.”

What an incredible promise of our potential to reach our world for Jesus Christ! When Jesus says He’s going to the Father, that means the Holy Spirit is coming to us! And it’s God’s Holy Spirit who indwells us. His Spirit gives us power to accomplish whatever evangelistic vision God has given us.

You and I have serve a God who says, “I know you’re discouraged, I know you feel dry, but keep dreaming great dreams and planning great plans, because the Holy Spirit will empower you to accomplish them!” God’s Spirit is the power and the anointing that we need to do great things for Jesus Christ