Daily Prayer: When "If You Can" Meets the God Who Can
Daily Prayer: When "If You Can" Meets the God Who Can
"'If you can'?" said Jesus. "Everything is possible for him who believes."
— Mark 9:23
I was stirring my coffee this morning — the second cup, the one I actually taste — when I noticed I was holding my breath a little. Not dramatically. Just that small, almost imperceptible thing you do when something is sitting with you and you haven't found the words for it yet.
There's a situation I've been praying about. Nothing catastrophic. Just one of those things that feels genuinely stuck, the kind where you've done what you can do and now you're just… waiting to see if it moves.
That's when I landed on Mark 9:23 and stayed there a while.
The Part That Caught Me
The father in this story comes to Jesus and says, essentially, if you can do anything, please help us. And Jesus — and I love this about Him — repeats it back. "If you can'?" You can almost hear the gentle incredulity in it. Not unkind. Just… are you hearing yourself right now?
I've said that phrase more times than I'd like to count. Dressed it up in polite prayer language, maybe. But underneath it: if you can. As if the question were ever about His ability and not about my willingness to actually believe it.
That's the part that lands.
The Ordinary Faith of an Ordinary Week
I think about belief a lot in the context of the small stuff. Whether my adult daughter's new season is going to settle into something good for her. Whether a work project I'm quietly rooting for will actually come through. Whether the thing I've been hoping for — not a miracle exactly, just a yes where there's been a long silence — is still on the table.
These aren't mountain-moving prayers. Or maybe they are, and I've just normalized them because they live inside ordinary days.
My husband asked me this week what I was thinking about, the way he does when he can tell I've gone a little internal. I said, "Oh, just processing." Which is true. I process slowly, in layers, usually with coffee and a Bible verse I can't quite shake.
This is one I can't quite shake.
Everything Is Possible
Not some things. Not things that seem reasonable given the circumstances. Everything.
I'm not naive about what that means — I've lived long enough to know that "possible" doesn't always mean "immediate" or "the way I pictured it." But it does mean the ceiling is higher than I keep acting like it is. It means I can bring the actual thing, the real stuck thing, and not pre-apologize for asking.
The father in the story immediately says, I do believe — help me with my unbelief. And that line has always felt like the most honest prayer in the whole Bible to me. Not a crisis of faith. Just a person telling the truth about where they are.
I think Jesus loves that kind of honesty. I think He'd rather have the real version of us than the composed one.
What I'm Taking Into Today
I'm going to stop pre-shrinking my prayers to fit what feels possible from where I'm standing. I'm going to bring the actual thing. And I'm going to let the "if you can" be Jesus's problem to correct, because apparently, He's happy to do that.
That's enough for a Wednesday morning. Or any morning, really.
A Prayer for Today
Lord, I keep walking into Your presence with my prayers already edited down. Like I'm trying to be reasonable on Your behalf, which — looking at Scripture — You have never once asked me to do.
I believe. Help me with the part where I don't quite believe enough. Help me bring the real thing instead of the polished version. Remind me that "if you can" isn't a question that applies to You — it's just the place I sometimes start from, and You're patient enough to meet me there anyway.
I'm bringing You the stuck thing today. I'm not going to dress it up. You know what it is. I trust that You can — and I'm working on trusting that You will, in the way and time that's actually good, not just the way I've mapped out in my head.
Thank You for the father in that story. Thank You that his honesty made it into the Bible. I feel less alone for it.
Amen.
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