Several years ago, I spoke at Teen Challenge in Lancaster PA. The director put me on his mailing list and for months I received numerous e-mails concerning their center’s effort to purchase some property for a badly needed induction center for addicted teenagers. The one they have now is badly overcrowded and they are daily turning away people who desperately need help.
Week after week the e-mails indicated that he had been fasting and praying and asking others to pray that they would somehow find the property and the funds to buy it. He thought he had found the perfect property and excitement hit a fever pitch only to be dashed when the zoning request was turned down by neighbors that said, “not in my neighborhood”.
The next series of e-mails dealt with another piece of property that they found in a different location, and everyone got fired up about it; however, the seller would not divide it and insisted on an “all or nothing” sale which was cost prohibitive to the center.
More e-mails and yet another property was found, but the overall price was very high. A lower more reasonable offer was discussed with the seller, but he countered back with a much higher offer. Rather than accept the counteroffer, my friend’s Board of Directors said wait it out and stick with the offer we can afford.
They did and the next round of e-mails I saw said that this potential seller would accept the offer, but that they needed to move quickly. There was one problem, the center was $252,000 short of what was needed for the down payment and the money needed to be raised quickly. After seeing this go on literally for months, I thought, well maybe this is it. I called my friend and made a pledge offer. I told him that I would pledge a certain amount and would match dollar for dollar provided that the rest could be raised by folks within their own community and organization and that they could close the deal on that specific property.
Miraculously within *one hour* the entire $252,000 plus an additional $21K was raised.
He told me later that all he had been able to raise in the past TWO YEARS was just $200,000 and yet after my call he raised $275,000 plus in just over an HOUR.
Huh?
Hmmm How could he raise more money with a few calls in an hour on a Friday afternoon than he had raised in the past two years? What did he do differently?
In addition to fasting and praying for God to give him a miracle, he got off his duff and went out there and became a part of making the miracle happen! I urged him in no uncertain terms to go visit some of the people in the community and make some calls and to leave no stone unturned and he did just that. Yes it was a miracle of God, but he had to do his part to make it happen.
Friends God expects us to do our part. I have seen this time and again. Preachers and leaders sit back and lamely say if God wants it to happen HE will make it happen and then they hardly lift a finger except maybe to eat some chips and slurp down a Coke and pontificate that God is good – all the time.
They take a look at the stocking that they left hanging on the alter for their building fund and count the money. I can see them now checking it in the morning and when they see it is empty and are disappointed, they will be sure to blame the project’s failure on it “not being God’s will”. The thought that their inaction has nothing to do with it never enters their minds.
Barf!
I do not believe that God works that way. He is not some big Santa in the sky lavishing gifts upon us while we sit on the sidelines and relax. He works and he expects us to work. He will provide opportunities, enlighten us with ideas, bless us, give us strength, and move people’s hearts to give, but it is up to us to do the physical labor including asking for money for God’s work in tough economic times.
The same holds true for our personal lives. Do you want to see some improvement in your life? Then get out there and get to work and pray to God for guidance and strength in carrying it out. Remember God worked six days and only rested on the seventh. Are you doing likewise?
Gen. 2:2
By the seventh day God completed His work which He
had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work
which He had done . . .