The Circle Maker (Enhanced Edition): Praying Circles Around Your Biggest Dreams and Greatest Fears

by Mark Batterson

And the timeless truth secreted within this ancient legend is as true now as it was then: Bold prayers honor God, and God honors bold prayers.

There is nothing God loves more than keeping promises, answering prayers, performing miracles, and fulfilling dreams.

It is absolutely imperative at the outset that you come to terms with this simple yet life-changing truth: God is for you.

Prayers are prophecies. They are the best predictors of your spiritual future. Who you become is determined by how you pray.

Miracles are the by-product of prayers that were prayed by you or for you.

God has determined that certain expressions of His power will only be exercised in response to prayer. Simply put, God won’t do it unless you pray for it.

The greatest tragedy in life is the prayers that go unanswered bec...

We pray out of our ignorance, but God answers out of His omniscience. We pray out of our impotence, but God answers out of His omnipotence. God has the ability to answer the prayers we should have prayed but lacked the knowledge or ability to even ask.

You are only one defining decision away from a totally different life. One defining decision can change your trajectory and put you on a new path toward the Promised Land. One defining decision can totally change the forecast of your life. And it’s those defining decisions that become the defining moments of our lives.

What do you do when the will of God doesn’t add up? What do you do when a dream doesn’t fit within the logical constraints of your left brain? What do you do with a promise that seems impossible? What do you do when faith seems foolish? So Moses went out and told the people what the LORD had said. Moses risked his reputation and circled the promise. He pushed all of his credibility chips to the middle of the table and told the Israelites that God was going to give them meat to eat. This had to be one of the toughest decisions he ever made, one of the scariest sermons he ever preached, one of the craziest visions he ever cast. It doesn’t add up, but the will of God never does add up by human calculation. Moses had no earthly idea how God was going to keep His promise, but that isn’t our business anyway. That is God’s business.

Too often we let how get in the way of what God wants us to do.

I learned that if you aren’t willing to put yourself in “this is crazy” situations, you’ll never experience “this is awesome” moments. If you aren’t willing to run off the cliff, you’ll never fly. I also learned that paragliding is amazing for your prayer life. You can’t not pray when you are running off a cliff. The same is true when we take a flying leap of faith.

I believe in the law of measures. If you give big, God will bless big. That certainly doesn’t mean that you can play God like a slot machine, but if you give for the right reasons, I’m convinced of this: You’ll never outgive God. It’s not possible because God has promised that in the grand scheme of eternity, He will always give back more than you gave up.

Your job is not to crunch numbers and make sure the will of God adds up. After all, the will of God is not a zero-sum game. When God enters the equation, His output always exceeds your input. Your only job is to draw circles in the sand. And if you do the geometry, God will multiply the miracles in your life.

In typical God fashion, He exceeded my highest expectations. He has a way of making our wildest dreams seem tame, our biggest dreams seem small.

As an author, I’ve learned to pray circles around my books. As a pastor, I’ve learned to pray circles around our church. As a parent, I’ve learned to pray circles around our children. It doesn’t matter what you do, you need to circle it in prayer. If you’re a teacher, pray circles around your class by laying hands on the desks and asking God to bless the students who sit there. If you’re a doctor, pray circles around your patients and ask God to give you X-ray insight. If you’re a politician, pray circles around the constituents you serve and the legislation you draft. If you’re an entrepreneur, pray circles around your product. If you do the geometry and draw prayer circles around your Jericho, God will take care of the multiplication. And the bigger the prayer circle the more God can multiply.

“We want to give a gift, and there are no strings attached. But before I tell you how much we’re going to give, I want you to know why we’re giving it. We’re giving this gift because you have vision beyond your resources.” I’ll never forget that phrase: “vision beyond your resources.”

The rationale behind the gift was just as meaningful as the gift itself. And that rationale has inspired us to keep dreaming irrational dreams. Those four words, vision beyond your resources, have become a mantra for the ministry of National Community Church. We refuse to let our budget determine our vision. That left-brained approach is a wrong-brained approach because it’s based on our limited resources rather than on God’s unlimited provision. Faith is allowing your God-given vision to determine your budget. That certainly does not mean you practice poor financial stewardship, spend beyond your means, and accumulate a huge debt load. It does mean that you take a step of faith when God gives you a vision because you trust that the One who gave you the vision is going to make provision. And for the record, if the vision is from God, it will most definitely be beyond your means.

Having vision beyond your resources is synonymous with dreaming big. And it may feel like you’re setting yourself up for failure, but you’re actually setting God up for a miracle. How God performs the miracle is His job. Your job is drawing a circle around the God-given dream. And if you do your...

It’s not our man-made plans that move the Almighty; the Almighty is moved by big dreams and bold prayers.

The one upside to our failed business is that I did learn some valuable lessons about unanswered prayers that are worth far more than the $15,000 hit we took on Godipod.com. First of all, I came to the humble conclusion that our prayers are often misguided simply because we’re not omniscient. I’ll be the first to admit that I’ve drawn some prayer circles around the wrong things for the wrong reasons, and God didn’t answer those prayers the way I wanted Him to! If we were absolutely honest, we would have to admit that most of our prayers have as their main objective personal comfort rather than God’s glory. If God answered those selfish prayers, they would actually short-circuit the purposes of God in our lives. We would fail to learn the lessons God is trying to teach us or cultivate the character God is trying to shape in us. A second lesson learned is that no doesn’t always mean no; sometimes no means not yet. We’re too quick to give up on God when He doesn’t answer our prayers when we want or how we want. Maybe your deadline doesn’t fit God’s timeline. Maybe no simply means not yet. Maybe it’s a divine delay. Finally, I learned that we shouldn’t seek answers as much as we should seek God. We get overanxious. We try to microwave our own answers instead of trusting God’s timing. But here’s an important reminder: If you seek answers you won’t find them, but if you seek God, the answers will find you. There comes a point after you have prayed through that you need to let go...

When you circle a promise in prayer, you can’t never always sometimes tell. Anything could happen! You never know when or how or where God will answer it. Prayer adds an element of surprise to your life that is more fun than a surprise party or surprise gift or surprise romance. In fact, prayer turns life into a party, a gift, a romance.

I’m in awe of the strange and mysterious ways in which God works, but I have come to expect the unexpected because God is predictably unpredictable. God always has a holy surprise up His sovereign sleeve! The only thing I can predict with absolute certainty is this: the more you pray the more holy surprises will happen.

When you draw a prayer circle, even if that circle is limited by your ignorance, you never know how or when or where God will answer it. One prayer leads to another, which leads to another, and where they will take you no one knows except the One who knows all.

Over the past year, I’ve been repeating one prayer with great frequency: “Lord, do something unpredictable and uncontrollable.” That is a scary prayer, especially for a control freak like me, but it doesn’t scare me nearly as much as a life void of holy surprises. And you can’t have it both ways. If you want God to surprise you, you have to give up control. You will lose a measure of predictability, but you will begin to see God move in uncontrollable ways! Anything could happen. Anyplace. Anytime.

No novel has had a greater effect on the conscience of a country than Harriet Beecher Stowe’s vision, Uncle Tom’s Cabin. In fact, when Hattie met President Lincoln, he is purported to have said: “So you’re the little woman who started this Great War!”

Never underestimate the power of a single prayer. God can do anything through anyone who circles their big dreams with bold prayers. With God, there is no precedent, because all things are possible. Providing meat for a month in the middle of nowhere is no problem when you own the cattle on the thousand hills. God can use the bold prayer of an eccentric sage to end a drought or the bold pen of a young mother to end slavery. If you have the courage to circle the dream in prayer, you can’t never always sometimes tell.

I believe in planning. In fact, failing to plan is planning to fail. But I also believe this: One bold prayer can accomplish more than a thousand well-laid plans. So go ahead and plan, but make sure you circle your plans in prayer. If your plans aren’t birthed in prayer and bathed in prayer, they won’t succeed. This I know from personal experience.

I just think God is sometimes amazed at how small our plans are. He allows our small plans to fail so that His big dream for us can prevail. So keep planning like it depends on you, but make sure you pray like it depends on God. Prayer is the alpha and omega of planning. Don’t just brainstorm; praystorm.

Are you willing to be perplexed? If you are, then God can and will amaze you!

God is infinitely bigger than your biggest problem or biggest dream. And while we’re on the topic, His grace is infinitely bigger than your biggest sin.

The modern mystic, A. W. Tozer, believed that a low view of God is the cause of a hundred lesser evils, but a high view of God is the solution to ten thousand temporal problems.

Our biggest problem is our small view of God. That is the cause of all lesser evils. And it’s a high view of God that is the solution to all other problems.

Is there a limit to my power? Have you answered the question? There are only two options: yes or no. Until you come to the conviction that God’s grace and power know no limits, you will draw small prayer circles. Once you embrace the omnipotence of God, you’ll draw ever-enlarging circles around your God-given, God-sized dreams.

The size of prayers depends on the size of our God. And if God knows no limits, then neither should our prayers. God exists outside of the four space-time dimensions He created. We should pray that way!

With God, there is no big or small, easy or difficult, possible or impossible. This is difficult to comprehend because all we’ve ever known are the four dimensions we were born into, but God is not subject to the natural laws He instituted. He has no beginning and no end. To the infinite, all finites are equal. Even our hardest prayers are easy for the Omnipotent One to answer because there is no degree of difficulty.

Is there a limit to my power? With God, it’s never an issue of “Can He?” It’s only a question of “Will He?” And while you don’t always know if He will, you know He can. And because you know He can, you can pray with holy confidence.

How can you not believe when God has proven Himself over and over again? One footnote. This question — Is there a limit to my power? — is translated differently in different versions of the Bible. One version reads, “Is the LORD’S arm too short?” Another translation reads, “Is the LORD’S hand waxed short?” In both instances, the hand or arm of the Lord is referenced as a metaphor for God’s power. With this as a backdrop, reconsider the ten miracles God performed to deliver Israel out of Egypt. These miracles are not attributed to the hand of God or arm of God. “This is the finger of God.” While we don’t know which finger it was, those ten miracles were attributed to one digit. My guess? His pinky! And if one finger is capable of ten miracles, then what can the hand of God or arm of God accomplish?

By definition, a big dream is a dream that is bigger than you. In other words, it’s beyond your human ability to accomplish. And this means there will be moments when you doubt yourself. That’s normal. But that’s when you need to remind yourself that your dream isn’t bigger than God; God is 15.5 billion light-years bigger than your dream.

If you’ve never had a God-sized dream that scared you half to death, then you haven’t really come to life. If you’ve never been overwhelmed by the impossibility of your plans, then your God is too small. If your vision isn’t perplexingly impossible, then you need to expand the radiuses of your prayer circles.

A big dream is simultaneously the best feeling and worst feeling in the world. It’s exhilarating because it’s beyond your ability; it’s frightening for the same exact reason. So if you are going to dream big, you have to manage the emotional tension. Facing your fears is the beginning of the battle. Then you have to circle them over and over again.

In my experience, you’ll never feel qualified. But God doesn’t call the qualified; God qualifies the called.

But it doesn’t matter if you qualify for the loan, qualify for the job, or qualify for the program. If God has called you, you’re qualified. The issue is never, “Are you qualified?” The issue is always, “Are you called?”

If you want to keep growing spiritually, you need to keep stretching. How? By going after dreams that are bigger than you are.

Is your dream too big for you? It better be because that will force you to pray circles around it. If you keep circling it in prayer, God will get bigger and bigger until you see your impossible prayer for what it really is: an easy answer for an almighty God.

Praying hard is going twelve rounds with God. A heavyweight prayer bout with God Almighty can be excruciating and exhausting, but that is how the greatest prayer victories are won. Praying hard is more than words; it’s blood, sweat, and tears. Praying hard is two-dimensional: praying like it depends on God, and working like it depends on you. It’s praying until God answers, no matter how long it takes. It’s doing whatever it takes to show God you’re serious.

Desperate times call for desperate measures, and there is no more desperate act than praying hard. There comes a moment when you need to throw caution to the wind and draw a circle in the sand. There comes a moment when you need to defy protocol, drop to your knees, and pray for the impossible. There comes a moment when you need to muster every ounce of faith you have and call down rain from heaven.

The judge knew there was no quit in the persistent widow. Does The Judge know that about you? How desperate are you for the miracle? Desperate enough to pray through the night? How many times are you willing to circle the promise? Until the day you die? How long and loud will you knock on the door of opportunity? Until you knock the door down?

If you aren’t desperate, you won’t take desperate measures.

But if you learn how to pray hard, like the persistent widow, God will honor your bold prayers because your bold prayers honor God.