June’s Impact Article

Last Sunday night around 7:50 pm there were maybe 30 of us in the chapel waiting for the final votes to come in regarding the building campaign. Al Braun came into the chapel at 8:10 or so with a piece of paper stating the results of the vote. He handed it to Ray and the people at our table, unable to read Ray’s poker-face-response, waited in anticipation of the results. I suppose we expected a smile to spread across his face if the results were positive, but no expression at all. We almost took that to mean defeat and our excitement momentarily fell. What if…?

About 20 seconds later, Ray proceeded to tell the rest of us that the members of the church voted 88% in favour of the new building. A few sighs of relief found our table. Wahoo!! Here we go! I can say for myself that if the results had come back negative, I would have been really disappointed.

I remember when we first heard about the building project at Apex, a meeting for small group leaders. We were at Paul and Laura Stanley’s house and Paul passed pictures of the proposed plan around while explaining the cost. That night I was a bit overwhelmed and freaked out. How in the world are we gonna find 2.5 million dollars?

Since that night, my thoughts and emotions have been up and down. Do I like the look of the new building? Absolutely, yes! Do I want to pay for it? Well…?! Part of the problem I have personally is that I get sidetracked easily. I can be in favour of something but if someone else has concerns and shares those strongly, I sway to the side of uncertainty fairly quickly. Tim and I made it a point to go to the question and answer meetings concerning this project because we wanted to hear the answers for ourselves in order to make a final decision we could be comfortable with.

After the second question and answer meeting, I came away feeling at peace. The building is tired and there is no question that it needs a face-lift. I am excited that my family gets to be part of something faith-building. Is it scary? Yes. Do I think the money will come in to pay for it all? Absolutely! God has His hand on PAC and I anticipate Him continuing to do great things through us.

I need to tell you also that Tim and I wrestled greatly with the pledge idea. At first we just didn’t want to deal with the pledge cards. We were frustrated by them—not because we didn’t want to give, but because the future is unknown for us. My job is temporary, until June. At the end of June I am back to square one and will be looking for another job. I have my foot in the door with the school division and that helps but I am not guaranteed a job. So the question for us was, how do we pledge when we don’t know our income?

Some couples told us that they prayed and asked God for a number, and they both came up with the same one. That’s great but that didn’t happen for us. We were way off base with each other. That was a very uncomfortable conversation. Discussing finances is at the bottom of the list of “things I like to talk about.” We slept on it, talked it out, and did some budgeting. We figured out our debt plan and came to a happy medium, which we are both at peace with.

I am reading through James this week and today I came across James 2:14 “Dear brothers and sisters, what’s the use of saying you have faith if you don’t prove it by your actions? That kind of faith can’t save anyone.” It’s easy to say we have faith but when it comes time to act it out, sometimes it’s a different story. We struggled through this process but God saw us through it and brought us to action.

I have become a different person in this church. This church took me in, a very broken person. I was already saved but not whole. I learned to love God, others, and above all, myself here. I want more than anything to be able to give that gift to someone else and I’ll do it, whatever the cost. This is not about me and my comfort, it’s about kingdom building!

James 2:21 goes on to talk about Abraham’s faith in sacrificing his son on the altar. He trusted God so much that he did whatever God told him to do, and in this, his faith was made complete. 2:23 “Abraham believed God, so God declared him to be righteous.” He was even called “the friend of God.” So you see, we are made right with God by what we do, not by faith alone.” I want to be like Abraham.