Project Isaac

9.30am Sunday 9 September 2007

Readings: Romans 4:1-5, 16-25 Msg

As you entered this morning you received this laminated bookmark with the picture of a sunrise over Hillsborough and several members of our congregation kneeling facing the empty cross with their hands raised in prayer. At the top are the words of the Bible promise, "Call unto me and I WILL answer you and show you great and mighty things which are hidden from you..."[1]

On the reverse side are the words of Acts 18:10 - "...I have many people in this city" -spoken by the Lord to Paul while in Corinth in the first century. These words are just as applicable to Auckland in the twenty-first century. I firmly believe that God has many people in the city who are "Christians in the making," as a former member of our congregation called them. It is God's desire that they come to know him. Many will be people with whom we rub shoulders each day. I encourage you to ask the Lord to open your eyes to see who these people are, to pray for them, and at the appropriate time to share the Good News with them. This is what we are calling "PROJECT ISAAC."

Why this name? It all began ten years ago. Early in 1997 and at the beginning of three months Study Leave I, along with about one thousand other church leaders from all around the world, attended the International Cell Church Conference hosted by Faith Community Baptist Church in Singapore. I had been challenged by the vision of the Pastor, Lawrence Khong, who over the three days of the conference spoke passionately about God's vision for his church, and how they were seeking to apply that vision within their own setting. Towards the end of that three months Study Leave I went on a weeklong Silent Retreat at the Friary. During the Retreat I set aside three days to fast and pray. While out running on the second of those three days, and thinking about the vision God had given Lawrence Khong for his church I was asking God what was his vision for St David's in the Fields. What came to mind as I ran is what is on the bookmark. A worshipping congregation of five hundred people, fifty cell groups, 5 people in full time Christian ministry, and fifty percent of our income to mission beyond our doors. It was much, much smaller in scale than the vision of the church in Singapore, but it was a start. I wrote it down and then shared it with the Session at their first meeting after I returned. They discussed it at their next two meetings and after making some modifications "Vision 2001" was launched in July of that year. Two of the initiatives that came out of the vision were the 'Special Events Team' and the two-morning service format. By 2001 the vision had not been realised. In fact, the number attending church was less than when the vision was launched. I was beginning to think that maybe I had not heard God correctly, and had more or less decided not to push it any further.

However, a year later one of the elders came to see me to say that while sitting in church one Sunday the Holy Spirit had prompted this elder to count the seats in the church at the beginning of the service. The elder started counting to himself and felt led to continue to count up to five hundred, and sensed the Spirit say that one day this would be the size of the congregation of St David's in the Fields, and that we would share our story with other congregations to help them grow. As we talked about it I said that that was the figure God had given me in 1997. The elder had forgotten all about "Vision 2001" and was amazed that we had both been given the same figure.

Then early last year another member of the congregation shared a vision God had given this person of the church being full, with more people in the extension of the church and many more standing outside as there was not sufficient room for them all in the church.

By now I was beginning to think that it was becoming more difficult to dismiss completely "Vision 2001." If it had only been myself who had received the vision, and it had not happened, then I had obviously got it wrong, because the test of any prophetic vision is if what is prophesied comes to pass. In fact, in some instances particularly where the prophet was inciting God's people to rebel against him, the prophet was to be put to death.[2] Also, it is easy to dismiss a vision if it the vision of only one person. But if three people have had a vision of growth and two of the three were given the figure five hundred, then it is more difficult to dismiss it altogether. However, as you and I know, the reality of the situation is that attendance at worship has not been growing but declining. Added to this, we have thus far in 2007 had a number of key people in the congregation who have either moved away from Hillsborough or for good reasons now attend elsewhere.

Then in February of this year, while reading through Genesis, "Vision 2001" surfaced again. As I read about Abraham I was challenged by his amazing faith. In Genesis 11 we are told that Sarai, Abraham's wife, was childless because she was unable to conceive.[3] But then a short time later God gives him this amazing promise: "I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you ... all the people on earth will be blessed through you." How was it going to happen if his wife was childless? Remember that Abraham was seventy-five years old then, so time was quickly running out. And yet he believed what God had told him. He left his country and his people and set out for the land that God promised to show him. As Hebrews puts it, he "obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going."[4] We know that he was led to the land of Canaan, but it was twenty-five years later God when the rest of the promise was fulfilled. When Abraham was ninety-nine God told him that he and Sarah would have a son. The Bible tells us, and one thing you notice about the Bible is that it never whitewashes its saints, we are told that "Abraham fell facedown; he laughed and said to himself, 'Will a son be born to a man a hundred years old? Will Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety?'" Then the Bible says that Abraham tried to reason with God and put forward the suggestion that Ishmael, the son born to him through Sarah's handmaid, Hagar, be the one to receive God's blessing. But God said in effect, "No!" "'...your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac." [5]

 

Not long after God appeared to Abraham again and repeated his promise. Only this time Sarah was within earshot. When she heard the promise, she also laughed at the thought of having a child, being past the age of childbearing. Both Abraham and Sarah thought it was impossible. Their age precluded it. But God said to them, "Is anything too hard for the Lord? I will return to you at the appointed time next year and Sarah will have a son."[6]

 

The Message version of the Bible puts it very well in Romans 4 when it says, "Abraham didn't focus on his own impotence and say, 'It's hopeless. This hundred-year-old body could never father a child.' Nor did he survey Sarah's decades of infertility and give up. He didn't tiptoe around God's promise asking cautiously sceptical questions. He plunged into the promise and came up strong, ready for God, sure that God would make good on what he had said."[7] Or as the TNIV puts this last verse like this, "...being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised."

 

After reading this it immediately brought to mind "Vision 2001." One might say that it is laughable to visualise that one day St David's in the Fields will have a worshipping congregation of five hundred, particularly with the way things have been going over the past ten years. In purely human terms it is impossibility. Everything points against it. It is "hopeless," that is, of course, if God is left out of the equation. What really challenged me was that if "nothing is too hard for the Lord," and if God said it would happen, and if he has said the same thing to others within the congregation, then should I not have the faith to believe it, even as Abraham had the faith to believe that God would come through with his promise of a son?

 

"Project Isaac" is the name we have adopted for this, to remind us of and to be encouraged by the faith of Abraham who believed that God would through for him and Sarah and do what he had promised. However, that does not mean that we sit back and do nothing. I am sure that Abraham and Sarah did what they could to have a son. "Project Isaac" calls us to have an 'Action Plan,' which is on the bookmark. Often when we consider something really big it seems impossible, But if a big task can be broken down into manageable steps then we realise it can be done. The highest mountains in the world are climbed one step at a time. When we faced the challenge of upgrading our buildings in Ngaruawahia, it took the initiative of one person who broke the project down into manageable steps, namely what we would need to find each week to service the repayments on the loan and then got people to pledge so much weekly towards that, that we realised we could do it. The total amount seemed beyond us, but when we broke it down to what each one of us could do we saw it was possible, and the end result was a facility that has proved its worth over and over in the past twenty years.

 

We are a congregation of approximately 100 people. If each one of us will undertake to pray for four people to come to the church and become a follower of Christ then we would have a worshipping congregation of five hundred people. It cannot be done by just a few. We need to work together on this, to continually encourage one another, and utilise our different gifts and abilities to accomplish the goal. We can begin with the things that all of us can do, and that is to pray. All of us can ask God to show us four people who do not know Christ for whom we can pray. If you would find it helpful you can work together in groups of two or three to pray for your groups of four people. We are also offering to do this at Power Plant.

 

The second part of the 'Action Plan' is at the appropriate time to contact those we have been praying for and share God's love and the Gospel with them. Not all of us have the confidence to share the Gospel in a way that will assist people to receive Christ as their Saviour. We can learn to do this and we have training available so that you can have the confidence to do this yourself. Alternatively, when you believe the time is right, you can arrange for someone who is experienced in sharing the Gospel to go with you when you visit the person.

Two things in closing: in the September Parish News there is an article about the professor who used some gold balls and a jar to teach his students an important lesson. In summary it was that the main thing in life is to provide space for the really important things first and then fit the less important things around them, that is, to keep the main thing the main thing. God wants to bless the world through his church. He wants his lost sheep found. He wants everyone to be reconciled to him through the forgiveness of their sins, so that they might enter their true inheritance. This is the fulfilment of his promise to Abraham that all the people on earth would be blessed through him.

 

Secondly, it took twenty-five years before God fulfilled his promise to Abraham. Although he tried to help God out at times, as with Ishmael, he never wavered in his obedience to God, and God eventually came through for him. So we will need patience and perseverance to see the project fulfilled. God wants us to do what we can do, and that is to pray and witness. We are to leave the rest up to him for only he can make the church to grow.[8]