For the eleventh time in the history of Lancaster Baptist Church, we thrust our silver shovel in the ground, beginning a new building project by faith. Yesterday morning we broke ground for our West Wing Tower—the first in a three-phase expansion project for our auditorium.

From a human standpoint, starting a multi-million dollar building project during an economic recession is poor timing. But as we gathered on the lawn yesterday, we looked at another time in history when God’s people began a massive building project in uncertain days. Like Nehemiah and the Israelites who built the wall with him, we believe that “The God of heaven, he will prosper us; therefore we his servants will arise and build” (Nehemiah 2:20)!

Many times over the past twenty-five years we have stepped out in faith and made the sacrifices necessary to provide more space. Every time, God has not only been faithful to provide each need, but He has also filled every new seat! This week, we embark on another spiritual journey that will expand our capacity to reach more people and will increase our faith in God to provide. (more…)

Have you ever thought of your trial as a stewardship from God? It is. And when stewarded properly, God will use your trial to give you some of His greatest gifts.

God has given us an incredible, amazing resource with which to steward our trials. It’s called grace.

And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.—2 Corinthians 12:9

If we will receive the grace which God offers during difficult seasons, we can steward our trials in a way that results in unimaginable blessings.

So how do we steward our trial with the grace of God?

1. Trust God’s ways.

Faith trusts God, even when it can’t trace Him. Anyone can trust when we see how circumstances are working together for good. But when we can’t see, when it looks as if nothing good could come of our circumstances, this is when true faith is developed. (more…)

In part 1 of this post, we saw that God does some of His greatest works in our lives through suffering, and we began looking at a list of seven reasons for adversity.

For a quick recap, here are the first three:

1. The glory of God
2. The growth of His servant
3. The fulfillment of God’s will

4. The focusing of priorities

During suffering, realities of life change our perspective on priorities. Suddenly, the trivial and petty things that used to mean so much to us, mean almost nothing. Through these times, God refocuses our vision and realigns our priorities with His.

Through a ministry characterized by constant adversity and suffering, Paul’s greatest desire reflected the most important priorities: “That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death” (Philippians 3:10). (more…)

Without hesitation, I can say that God has done His greatest works in my life through seasons of adversity. Sometimes, however, in moments of introspection we wonder, Why all the suffering?

I truly believe that God does far more through suffering than we see at first glance, and perhaps we will never know all the reasons and all the good that He brings through it. But, through His Word,  He makes some of His purposes clear to us. In this two-part post, I’d like to highlight seven reasons for adversity:

1. The glory of God

All of life is to be lived for this purpose. Even in adversity, God desires to be glorified. In fact, it is in these times that we can often best reflect His glory by responding in faith and trust.

“But rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ’s sufferings; that, when his glory shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy. If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye; for the spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you: on their part he is evil spoken of, but on your part he is glorified” (1 Peter 4:13-14). (more…)

Growth and victory in the Christian life is the fruit of faith. Hebrews 11 records many of the heroes of the Old Testament, and it reminds us that all of these exploits for God were accomplished “by faith.”

Faith is what enables us to live in the victorious reality of the promises of God, rather than in our feeble efforts that sooner or later bring defeat.

So, if faith is this vital to our Christian lives, how can we develop faith? (more…)