July 20.
Outrageous Confidence

Genesis 22:5

And Abraham said unto his young men, Abide ye here with the ass; and I and the lad will go yonder and worship, and come again to you.

Here is an unusual promise. Abraham told his young men to stay with the ass while he and Isaac went up the mountain and then they would return. Now wait a minute, Abraham. Are you not going to offer your son? Didn’t you hear God when he told you to go up and kill your boy? But you just said, “We’re going up to worship and we’re coming back.” Abraham said he wasn’t coming back by himself. What an incredible example of faith! Anytime a person can see God well enough to know that God is going to offer up his son and bring back the son he offered up, that is faith. And that’s how God wants us to move is by faith.

Hebrews 11:17-19 By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac: and he that had received the promises offered up his only begotten son, of whom it was said, That in Isaac shall thy seed be called: accounting that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead… So Abraham said, “I’m going to give up my boy, but I know the power of God. God is able to raise him back up again.” We may not see a door there, a way out, but God makes a door.

When we started building this church, I was convinced that we couldn’t afford any more than the 2. 5 million dollar structure. I talked to the contractor. However, he lied to me. (Although it took me a couple of years to get to this point, I’m now glad he did lie to me.) He said he could build the building for 3. 8 million. If he had said then that it was going to cost 10. 5 million, the church would still be at the previous address. We would have erased the idea of even making an attempt to come this far. But we had to trust God to go forward and He provided the rest!