He Provides

1st John 5 gives us some encouragement when we come to the Lord in prayer.  He responds to the prayer offered in faith, in humility, aligned with His will.  He answers our prayers because He loves
us, and a passage in that chapter says:
14 Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.
15 And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him.

We can have confidence in God, and we have to guard against thinking we have all the answers and all the resources to make our lives work.  He wants us to depend on Him - and when we humble ourselves before the Lord, acknowledging our need for Him, then He will show up in phenomenal ways.  But, we have to realize that we don't have the answers and that our human devices are inferior to the power and provision of Almighty God.

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In Mark chapter 10, a blind man came to Jesus - in dramatic fashion.  We can read:
50 And throwing aside his garment, he rose and came to Jesus.
51 So Jesus answered and said to him, "What do you want Me to do for you?" The blind man said to Him, "Rabboni, that I may receive my sight."
52 Then Jesus said to him, "Go your way; your faith has made you well." And immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus on the road.

GracePoint Church is located in the Valparaiso, Indiana area.  The Chicago Tribune says that the church started in 2009 with 24 members, and the congregation has grown to around 750.  The church is meeting at an elementary school, but plans to renovate a former furniture store as a permanent location.

The church faced a deadline back in February, when pastor Ken Lamb informed his congregation that the church was short of funds in order to meet a financial deadline.  The newspaper article says: "Church officials needed to provide $300,000 to their lender before the bank would release the funds for the project. The money was due in a matter of days and the church didn't have it."

After the first service, a man donated half the amount, and then after the second service a woman said that she possessed a gold coin that she was willing to offer as a "guarantor for the lender. If the church raised the money, the coin would be returned to her."

But, the next day, she announced she had changed her mind and told Lamb, according to the story, "God had been good to her and she had to give the coin to the church outright." The article states:

The 1866 Double Eagle gold coin was stamped with "In God We Trust," and coin experts said it was the first year the motto appeared on $20 coins. It was a proof coin, meant for collectors and not commerce, though many may have been spent or melted down over the years. Of the original 30 coins in the batch, experts said that maybe half of those are still in existence.

The woman told Lamb her late husband was a coin collector and the coin was the first one he found.

"It's just weird because I began to not trust" as the church neared its deadline without the money it needed, Lamb said, "and this is the first $20 gold piece stamped with 'In God We Trust.'"

Heritage Auctions anticipates selling the coin tomorrow for $300,000.  The company was able to wire the church $150,000 to meet its financial obligation.

A CBN News piece on this story said this:

GracePoint's story is a reminder of the Luke chapter 21 story of the widow's two mites where Jesus praises the woman for giving two small coins to the synagogue. "She out of her poverty put in all she had to live on," he said in verse four.

Its headline read: "'Widow's Mite' Saves Church."

It is a pretty amazing story, and provided a reminder to Pastor Ben Lamb and his congregation - it can also be a reminder to us.  When you have a need, perhaps a financial deadline, maybe a health concern, a relationship that needs to be mended - it's simple, but profound: trust God.  That was the message carried by that coin that was given to the church.

Sometimes we want to telegraph how God provides for us.  We work out our plans and maybe it occurs to us that He may want to be involved.  But, He will provide in creative ways, ways much bigger than our limited human wisdom.  For some reason, those coins that showed up in the mouth of the fish comes to mind - taxes were due, and He provided.  Jesus taught people who were hungry, and He provided through a little boy who brought five loaves and two fish - Jesus multiplied that simple offering.  

So, we come back to the question that Jesus asked of the blind man in Mark chapter 10: What do you want Me to do for you?"  There is a Biblical principle that if we come to God in humility, with faith, and ask according to His will, He not only hears us but He will answer our prayers.  The answer may not come in the form that we might think it will, but we can be confident that we serve a God to Whom we can bring our needs and concerns.