Arctic Hope

A couple of weeks ago, in ‘Off We Go … Part 1′, I relayed how God had provided amazingly as I meditated on 2 Corinthians 9:8, “And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that always having all sufficiency in everything, you may have an abundance for every good deed …” I told how we had confidence that God would provide our operational budget for the summer. I spoke of assurance of God’s faithfulness in providing the necessary support for us to operate a Cessna 310 and take the Good News to the isolated communities of northwest Canada. Well …

God is amazing!! Over the last two weeks, God has provided. We can now joyfully say that God has provided all sufficiency in everything so that we have an abundance for every good work. How has this happened? God has moved a number of you to partner with us. Your gifts and commitments will provide all the needed operational funds for our work this summer. I can not wipe the smile off my face. I am deeply grateful to those of you who have been praying and to those of you who have shared resources with us.

Only a short month ago, Michelle and I were considering whether or not God had really called us to do this thing. We had a small portion of our seemingly huge budget. We had the summer rapidly approaching. The mountain of fund raising we faced looked too steep to climb. As we used to say in the Air Force, ‘we’re out of airspeed and ideas.’

Was it time to stop this ‘foolish’ attempt to walk on water and get back in the boat? As we faced a crisis of belief, we offered God other options for how we could serve Him. Yet each time the answer came back … persevere, keep going, don’t quit.

In our crisis we used those divinely inspired words of Peter as he sank into the Sea of Galilee, “Lord, save me!” (Matthew 14:22-33) And just as Jesus reached out and lifted Peter out of the water into the boat, He has lifted us out of our circumstances. And just as Jesus gently rebuked Peter, we have heard the words in our heart, “Why did you doubt?”

Why did we doubt? We have a little faith. But do we have a mountain’s worth of faith. As we looked at the seeming lack of resources, we had to honestly go back to God and ask, “Did we miss something Lord? Are you saying something different? Have we substituted our own plans for Your commands? Lord we do believe, help us overcome our unbelief!”(Mark 9:24)

God is always honored by the honest prayers His children when we go to Him and say, “I believe. I really want to believe, but Lord it is just so hard to believe when I look at all the circumstances. Please help me move from doubt to faith.”

We persevered. God used you to provide abundantly according to His promises. We are abundantly supplied for an amazing summer of service. God is worthy of all glory.

Some of you are facing big challenges in your life. What circumstances are you looking at that are bigger than your faith? Where is God asking you to keep at it and keep your eyes on Him? Where are you struggling and feel like resigning, retiring, quitting, or leaving? I leave you with the words of Paul to the Galatians, “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.”

Beginning next week, we will try to blog more often as we take the opportunity to share with you how God is working and how you can pray with us and for us. I would also like to take the opportunity to give you more details of God’s amazing faithfulness. Your continued prayer support is so vital to all that we are attempting. We thank God for you!

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 15th, 2008 at 10:40 and is filed under Summer of Exploration, Blogroll. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.