Is there a movie you could watch unlimited times? Feelings of joy, pride, excitement, and wonder trigger each time you re-watch the show? Well, that’s how I feel when I look at the movie Hidden Figures. Emotions of pride for the African-American women who performed mathematical calculations for NASA fill me to the brim.
There’s one scene in particular that stays with me for days. A gifted woman named Katherine Johnson worked all day to complete her rocket trajectory calculations. After she hands her boss her work, he throws it in the trash. You can see shock engulfing her face at the sight of her hard work being tossed away. But amazingly he didn’t do this out of disrespect.
NASA was trying to send a human into space. They were attempting to orbit the earth for the first time and the math was changing by the minute. Her calculations were obsolete before the day was even over. He apologizes, but tells her that they had an extraordinary task at hand. They had to look beyond the numbers and possibly through them to answer questions they didn’t think to ask or know existed. And then he says one of my favorite lines in the movie, “in my mind I am already there. Are you?”
He wasn’t about to let the obvious facts of unresolved math stop his foresightedness of orbiting the Earth. These were significant problems, but they were not significant enough to ground his project, his focus, or ground his belief to the right-now problems. He saw past it to the future. He, Katherine, and his staff persisted until the answer was finally revealed. And in 1961, “Mercury-Redstone 3,” also known as “Freedom 7,” orbited around the Earth and returned home safely.
Even though his quote, “in my mind I am already there. Are you?” was said in the context of math and science or orbiting the Earth, it echoed like a God-question desperate to be incorporated into a spiritual opportunity.
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My mind’s paraphraser reworded it this way, “The answer is fixed in God’s timing. It’s waiting for me to learn, grow, have patience, trust God, and believe God’s plan through this trial.”
Katherine’s boss problem and your problem have nothing to do with having psychic ability or wishful thinking. But, it has everything to do with faith in God’s ability to fulfill his promises.
This type of faith isn’t easy. I know. Numerous times I have failed to trust God, only to reflect back and see His sticky fingerprints all over the situation. And each time, this backward glance built my confidence for the next trial. Do you have the mental persuasion that God’s answer awaits you on the other side of what you are dealing with?
How about if you were blind for many years? Would that diminish your confidence that God could heal you — if it’s in His will? Let’s be honest. Some of us probably would have lost hope along the way. But, in Matt. 9:28-29, two blind men’s faith were tested with a somewhat similar question when they asked Jesus to heal them. And this is what Jesus said, “Do you believe that I am able to do this?”
“Yes, LORD,” they replied. Then he touched their eyes and said, “According to your faith let it be done to you.”
The blind men said yes to Jesus’s “do you believe you are already there” question. They saw past their problem and believed Jesus. And they were healed. They believed past dark days (without sight) to days of light (with sight). And they were healed. They believed what faith expected – dependency and belief. And they became open eyed, sightseeing men of faith. One version of the Bible put Jesus’ response this way, Jesus said, “Become what you believe.” And that’s exactly what they did.
As you become what you believe, trust God for your future, receive His promises in faith, and you will hear the ever-present, always working God say, you are already there.
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Brenette Wilder of Lee’s Summit, Mo., (formerly of Altheimer, Ark.), is president of Kansas City Teen Summit and blogs at wordstoinspire105953116. word-press.com.
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Editor’s note: Pastors, ministers or other writers interested in writing for this section may submit articles to shope@adgnewsroom.com. Please include your phone number and the name and location of your church or ministry.