EXTRAORDINARY FAITH

Do you sense that God is about to unleash something tremendous in your life? Perhaps He has spoken to your heart: “I have prepared something special for you. You’re about to enter a walk with Me that you’ve never known before.” Maybe your life has already been greatly blessed by God. Now the Holy Spirit is telling you that His longstanding promise is about to come into full fruition—and that it will amaze you.

If this describes your life right now, I can tell you with the authority of Scripture: Get ready to examine your heart.

Let’s talk about what I call experiencing “crazy faith.” Crazy faith is believing that no matter how good things are, the best is yet to come. It’s a faith that says, “As much as we dream and do big things for God’s kingdom, His vision is always greater.” What the Lord has done in the brief existence of the church I pastor has exceeded my wildest expectations. Not a week has gone by when someone has not given his or her life to Jesus—and most weeks it’s multiple people. Whenever we distribute food to the poor, many of them ask, “Why are you doing this?” We answer, “It’s Jesus,” and they give their lives to Him.

This is all happening miraculously. In a few short years our church attendance has grown phenomenally. New believers are quickly maturing into faithful disciples, growing in their knowledge of God. They are well on their way to our ultimate goal for them: to become radically devoted missionaries for Jesus, wherever He may lead them.

God isn’t just exceeding our expectations, He’s showing us what His expectations are, and it is amazing to see. There are still a quarter of a million people in our area alone who don’t know Christ, and the Lord stirred us to plant two new churches here, one in a troubled area of the city. I’m simply astonished by God’s great works.

Here is the craziest part of all: I believe greater things are yet to come.

“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1, ESV).