Genesis 1:3-8

3 Then God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. 4 And God saw that the light was good. Then he separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light “day” and the darkness “night.”

And evening passed and morning came, marking the first day.

6 Then God said, “Let there be a space between the waters, to separate the waters of the heavens from the waters of the earth.” 7 And that is what happened. God made this space to separate the waters of the earth from the waters of the heavens. 8 God called the space “sky.”

And evening passed and morning came, marking the second day.

God is a very meticulous and intentional being.  He’s everywhere, He’s all seeing and He’s all knowing. The bible says He knows when we sit and when we rise; He perceives our thoughts from afar. He discerns our going out and our lying down; He’s familiar with all our ways. (Psalm 139:2-3) He even knows the number of hairs on our heads (Matthew 10:30).

It’s very apparent that God knows the details of our lives, His specificity is outlined throughout the bible but it’s seen or recognized from the very beginning. Genesis chapter 1 is a literal illustration of the creation of this world. He is Elohim our God and creator. He gave specific commands to the light & dark, the waters above, the sky and the waters below; he never stuttered nor wavered in what he commanded. Could you imagine God being indecisive and vague? Where would we be if he changed is mind minute by minute or if he was ambiguous with his commandments or promises?

When we pray and ask God to make a way or ask for help to overcome a certain obstacle in our lives are we specific in our petitions? As we grow in God and become more familiar with prayer, I believe we should become more detailed in our requests. I understand there are some situations we cannot put into words and sometimes all we can do is cry however, God in his infinite wisdom is able to understand every tear formed.

Most often my prayers were simply, “God help me to get through this” or “God, please make a way”, but I would never tell God specifically how or in what way I needed help. I would always take God for granted in the sense that He is God and knows exactly what I’m going through, he knows what and when I needed my deliverance, miracle or breakthrough. I just figured he would get me through it gracefully and completely. Because of my mindset I started to notice a pattern of disappointment and frustrations in prayer, it was something like, “wait a minute God I’m very far from perfect and I know I can do better in a lot of ways, but I serve you to the best of my ability. When I’m in church I pour out everything I have in prayer and in my work at the church but you’re still not answering me.” I would find myself just sitting around hoping and wishing with no relief in sight.

³⁶ Gideon said to God, “If you will save Israel by my hand as you have promised— ³⁷ look, I will place a wool fleece on the threshing floor. If there is dew only on the fleece and all the ground is dry, then I will know that you will save Israel by my hand, as you said.” ³⁸ And that is what happened. Gideon rose early the next day; he squeezed the fleece and wrung out the dew—a bowlful of water.

³⁹ Then Gideon said to God, “Do not be angry with me. Let me make just one more request. Allow me one more test with the fleece, but this time make the fleece dry and let the ground be covered with dew.” ⁴⁰ That night God did so. Only the fleece was dry; all the ground was covered with dew.

In Judges 6, Gideon asks God for very specific signs as confirmation that He was truly leading him to help save Israel and He honored Gideon’s requests. God confirmed and showed Gideon exactly what he was looking for and in turn, God gave Gideon detailed instructions on how to deliver the children of Israel out of bondage. Gideon may have asked God for these signs out of uncertainty, but he was specific in his request to God twice and both times his requests/prayers were answered.

God truly works well in the details and with that in mind I began to encourage myself to start praying very specific and very detailed prayers. I’m training myself to be more decisive in what I wanted and I started to make moves in the direction I wanted my life to head. Could you imagine if every time we prayed and asked God for the things we truly thought we wanted and he gave it to us, what type of people we would be? What would the world be like if he granted every request based off that temporary desire? The answer is chaos and confusion. Because God is not the author of confusion and because he’s so wise, he releases what we need at the right time.

My prayer for us all is to be specific with God in our daily prayers. I pray that our hearts and ears are opened and attuned to Him so when He responds with instructions we’re receptive and ready to move.