Money Miracles

     Have you ever noticed that the only time that people or organizations talk about money is when they are in desperate need?    I want to talk about money today without that kind of urgency or desperation.  Desperation makes it hard to be a cheerful giver and even harder to be a thankful receiver.  Today's entry is all about gratitude and wonder.

     We are in an okay place with money right now.  There are some large debts out there that we are consistently working on, but everyone else is paid and we have a little money in the bank.  I just stopped by the front desk to ask Leah if we had anything good come in.  She replied that we got $645 from Pick.Click.Give (a way that people can donate to charities from their Alaska Permanent Fund).  I was glad we had some money come in, but I had been hoping for much more than that.  She showed me the envelope and I just laughed.  It was like $645, but with an extra 0 at the end.  We just received $6,450 from the generosity of dozens of Alaskans who want to support this work that we do here.  I am so grateful to all of you who chose to give part of your PFD to us.  May God pour blessings upon you as you have poured them upon us.

     It got me thinking about other times I received unexpected money:

• After High School I joined a musical missions group that toured the southern United States before singing in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.  All 20 of us had to raise $5,000 each to fund our trip.  Our final day in the US arrived with our team still lacking $15,000, meaning that 4 members were going to have to remain behind.  That night a woman stopped our director after our service and asked how much we still needed to be funded.  As he was replying, she pulled out her checkbook and wrote a check for the entire amount.
• This past summer Mike, Linda and I were meeting with some young businessmen who had been Joel's Place kids long ago.  We described the financial crunch we were in and listened to how God had been moving in their lives.  As we were leaving, one of them slipped a check to Mike.  He just chuckled and shook his head as he showed me the $30,000 amount.  It allowed us to pay our staff who were 3 checks behind and come up to date on our bills.
• I went to a small liberal arts college in Walla Walla, Washington.  It was outstanding, but it also left me with $60,000 in school loans.  Here was the dilemma:  I felt called to go into ministry with InterVarsity in Alaska which would pay about $700/month and yet I was going to have to pay around $900/month for 10 years.  That was going to be hard to balance.  Then a crazy thing happened.  My dad had bought stocks for all his kids during my senior year of High School.  For 5 years, mine had not moved; in fact it had even dropped a bit.  Yet during the grace year after graduation it began to rise, and rise, and rise and then soar.  Within a year and a half, I sold off most of that stock and paid off all my student loans, being freed up to go into full-time ministry.  From that day on, that stock lost money.

     When I visit churches I tell them I do not need their money.  All that I need is for them to be obedient to what God is inviting them into.  If He is calling them to give, fabulous.  If He is not, that is just fine.  God is not short of money.  He is not wringing His hands, looking over spreadsheets, trying to figure out if he can cut a few corners to find enough money for Joel's Place.  He will provide the resources for what He wants done, often through unexpected ways.  It is often through the generosity of others, through gifts large and small.  Sometimes it is through the manipulation of the stock market.  Sometimes a fish has money in its mouth. He uses it all.

     I don't need to pressure you into giving money.  There are still lots of things to do and debts to pay around here, but I can say with complete peace and assurance that God will bring in the money from somewhere.  My encouragement for you is that you ask the question of whether you should give and then be obedient to the answer, whether a yes or no.  There is a freedom and joy that I want for all of you through that obedience.

     Thank you all for your support.  May you see God's miraculous provision in your lives even greater than I have seen it in mine.