I mentioned the $2 million miracle to a few circle makers, who started praying with me for God’s provision. There were certainly weeks and months when I failed to even think or pray about the promise, but we circled that $2 million promise off and on for four years.
About a year after God gave me that prayer promise, I got what I thought was a $2 million idea for an online company called GodiPod.com. Lora and I invested the capital to get the business off the ground, but that $2 million idea turned out to be a $15,000 personal loss. In retrospect, I think I was trying to manufacture the miracle for God. This is what we often try to do, isn’t it? When God doesn’t answer our prayer right away, we try to answer it for Him. Like the day Moses took matters into his own hands and killed an Egyptian taskmaster, we get ahead of God. But when we try to do God’s job for Him, it always backfires. Trying to get ahead of God cost Moses forty years. Of course, even then, God redeemed the forty years Moses spent as a fugitive tending sheep by prepping him to tend His sheep, the people of Israel. If we repent, God always recycles our mistakes.
The one upside to our failed business is that I did learn some valuable lessons about unanswered prayers that are worth far more than the $15,000 hit we took on Godipod.com. First of all, I came to the humble conclusion that our prayers are often misguided simply because we’re not omniscient. I’ll be the first to admit that I’ve drawn some prayer circles around the wrong things for the wrong reasons, and God didn’t answer those prayers the way I wanted Him to! If we were absolutely honest, we would have to admit that most of our prayers have as their main objective personal comfort rather than God’s glory. If God answered those selfish prayers, they would actually short-circuit the purposes of God in our lives. We would fail to learn the lessons God is trying to teach us or cultivate the character God is trying to shape in us.
A second lesson learned is that no doesn’t always mean no; sometimes no means not yet. We’re too quick to give up on God when He doesn’t answer our prayers when we want or how we want. Maybe your deadline doesn’t fit God’s timeline. Maybe no simply means not yet. Maybe it’s a divine delay.
Finally, I learned that we shouldn’t seek answers as much as we should seek God. We get overanxious. We try to microwave our own answers instead of trusting God’s timing. But here’s an important reminder: If you seek answers you won’t find them, but if you seek God, the answers will find you. There comes a point after you have prayed through that you need to let go and let God. How? By resisting the temptation to manufacture your own answer to your own prayer.
It would have been easy to cash out on the $2 million promise after GodiPod.com failed, but I keep circling that promise. I still believed God was going to answer that prayer somehow, someway, sometime. I would have never guessed that the payoff would happen in a meeting about church government, but I stopped trying to manufacture my own answer and simply trusted that God would give an answer when I was ready for it. Then one afternoon, right around three o’clock, God came out of nowhere and delivered on His promise with a holy surprise.
The Element of Surprise
Our family has a handful of sayings that have been passed down from generation to generation. They are part of our family folklore. I’m not sure where this one originated, but I remember my grandma repeating it more than once: You can’t never always sometimes tell. That tongue twister is a mind-bender, so you might need to read it twice. Here’s a translation: “Anything could happen.”
Let me redeem that saying and give it a prayer twist. When you circle a promise in prayer, you can’t never always sometimes tell. Anything could happen! You never know when or how or where God will answer it. Prayer adds an element of surprise to your life that is more fun than a surprise party or surprise gift or surprise romance. In fact, prayer turns life into a party, a gift, a romance.
God has surprised me so many times that I’m no longer surprised by His surprises. That doesn’t mean I love them any less. I’m in awe of the strange and mysterious ways in which God works, but I have come to expect the unexpected because God is predictably unpredictable. God always has a holy surprise up His sovereign sleeve! The only thing I can predict with absolute certainty is this: the more you pray the more holy surprises will happen.
A few months ago, God surprised me with the opportunity to speak at an NFL chapel. I’ve done a few of them, but this one was unique because it was for the team I have cheered for since I was a kid. Not only that, my all-time favorite player whose jersey I wear on game days was there. I’ll be honest, I was a little nervous. There is something about speaking to very large men who paint their faces, put on helmets, and inflict pain that is a little intimidating, and the team sack leader was in the front row.
I preached my heart out that night because, quite frankly, I wanted them to win the next day! But I also knew it was a divine appointment, and I felt a unique anointing. There was a reason that God would choose a die-hard fan to speak to the team. Afterward I shook hands with the guys, and I thought that was that, but you can’t never always sometimes tell. After the season was over, I had dinner with the guy I had cheered for during his entire career. After dinner we were standing in the parking lot of the restaurant, and I couldn’t help but chuckle. I told him that I had prayed for him a thousand times, but every prayer was focused on football. That night I prayed for him. Not the football player. The person. That’s just like God, isn’t it? When you draw a prayer circle, even if that circle is limited by your ignorance, you never know how or when or where God will answer it. One prayer leads to another, which leads to another, and where they will take you no one knows except the One who knows all.
Over the past year, I’ve been repeating one prayer with great frequency: “Lord, do something unpredictable and uncontrollable.”
That is a scary prayer, especially for a control freak like me, but it doesn’t scare me nearly as much as a life void of holy surprises. And you can’t have it both ways. If you want God to surprise you, you have to give up control. You will lose a measure of predictability, but you will begin to see God move in uncontrollable ways!
Anything could happen. Anyplace. Anytime.
One Afternoon
I believe that every word of Scripture is inspired by God, right down to the jot and tittle. And while chapters like Psalm 23 or verses like John 3:16 top the memorization charts, there are also moments when the same Holy Spirit who inspired the writers of Scripture will inspire the readers of Scripture with an unlikely jot or tittle. Some word or phrase will jump off the page and get into your spirit. One of those unlikely inspirations happened as I was reading Acts 10:3 right before our $3 million quail call.
One day at about three in the afternoon he had a vision.
Here’s the context. There was a Roman captain named Cornelius who gave generously to the poor and “prayed to God regularly.” That prayer habit kept him dialed into God’s frequency and set the stage for this vision. At this point, Christianity was a sect of Judaism, but this vision changes the course of Christianity because the gospel is opened up to the Gentiles. Christianity crosses the Rubicon, and whosoever will may come!
The timing of the vision almost seems coincidental, doesn’t it? “One day at about three in the afternoon.” But that’s what I love about it. When you pray regularly, you never know when God will show up or speak up. Today could be the day. When you live in prayer mode, you live with holy anticipation. You know that coincidences are providences. Any moment can turn into a holy moment. God can invade the reality of your life at three o’clock one afternoon and change everything.
The moment I heard $3 million I knew that God had answered our four-year prayer for a $2 million miracle. The only catch is that it was $3 million instead of $2 million. I was a little confused by the fact that it wasn’t exactly $2 million. Of course, I wasn’t about to complain. That’s when the Holy Spirit in His still small voice said to my spirit, Mark, I just wanted to show you that I can do one better. And by one better, He mean
t one million better!
God didn’t just do us one better one time. Less than a year later, we received a $4 million gift that was one better than the $3 million gift. It was like God said, I can do one better one more time. With that $7 million-dollar provision that came out of nowhere, we purchased “the last piece of property on Capitol Hill” debt free.
Only God.
Perplex Me
One of the biggest surprises in Scripture happened on the day of Pentecost. No one could have scripted that miracle. When Peter got up that morning, he had no idea that God would pour out His Spirit like flames of fire or that the believers would spontaneously speak in the languages they had never learned or that they would baptize three thousand people before the day was done. It was unpredictable and uncontrollable. Yet how appropriate that this holy surprise happens on the birthday of the church. God threw a surprise party!
A few years ago, I had a revelation while reading the description of what happened on the day of Pentecost. It says the people were “amazed and perplexed.” All of us want to be amazed by God, right? It’s easy to pray, “Amaze me!” But I don’t know anyone who prays, “Perplex me!” But it’s a package deal. If you aren’t willing to be perplexed, you’ll never be amazed.
Cornelius had a vision one day at three in the afternoon. The next afternoon, around noon, Peter had a perplexing vision while praying on the rooftop of Simon the tanner’s house. He saw a large sheet filled with animals, reptiles, and birds, and the Lord said to Peter, “Kill and eat.” You’ve got to love Peter’s response: “Surely not, Lord!” Peter rebukes Jesus. But before you criticize Peter, realize that we often do the same thing when God gives us a dream that is beyond our ability to comprehend.
Peter had a hard time processing this perplexing vision. He wasn’t just perplexed; Scripture says he was “very perplexed.” Why? Because the vision was in direct violation of everything he had ever known. Jewish dietary laws forbade eating unclean animals. Peter says, “I have never eaten anything impure or unclean.” So God in His endless patience repeats the vision three times. That must have been Peter’s magic number. And the third time was the charm.
It’s at this place where God wants to do something unprecedented that many of us get stuck spiritually. Instead of operating by faith, we switch back to our default setting of logic. Instead of embracing the new move of God, we fall back into the rut of our old routines.
Peter was perplexed by this vision, but he took a step of faith. He risked his reputation by breaking every law in the Jewish books and stepping foot into Cornelius’s house. It was unprecedented because it was considered unclean, but that one small step proved to be a giant leap. That doorframe was a wormhole. The nanosecond that Peter crossed that threshold, all Gentiles were given complete access to the gospel. If you are not Jewish, your spiritual genealogy traces back to this moment. Peter had the faith to cross the chasm because he circled a perplexing vision in prayer. Every Gentile who comes to faith in Jesus Christ is an answer to the prayer circle that Peter drew one afternoon on the rooftop of Simon the tanner’s house.
Are you willing to be perplexed? Are you open to holy surprises? Do you have the courage for God to move in unpredictable and uncontrollable ways?
If you are not open to the unprecedented, you will repeat history. If you are open to the unprecedented, you will change history. The difference is prayer.
The Brown Grocery-Paper Vision
Hattie was born into the most distinguished family of clergymen in America. Her father, Lyman Beecher, was considered the greatest orator in America. That mantle was passed down to her brother, Henry Ward Beecher. But it was Hattie who would change the course of American history.
One Sunday morning in 1851, during a Communion service, Harriet fell into a trance not unlike the trance that Peter had on the rooftop of Simon the tanner’s house. In her trance, Hattie saw an old slave being beaten to death. The vision left her so shaken that she could hardly keep from weeping. She walked her children home from church and skipped lunch. She immediately started writing down the vision God had given her as words poured from her pen. When she ran out of paper, she found brown grocery paper and continued to write. When she finally stopped, and read what she wrote, she could hardly believe she had written it. It was nothing short of divine inspiration. Hattie said that God wrote the book; she just put the words on paper.
In January 1852, a year after Harriet Beecher Stowe’s vision, the forty-five-chapter manuscript of Uncle Tom’s Cabin was ready for publication. The publisher, John P. Jewett, didn’t think the book would sell many copies, but three thousand copies were sold the first day. The entire first printing was sold out by the end of the second day. The third and fourth printings were sold out before the book was even reviewed. The book that Jewett didn’t think would sell many copies ended up in almost every house in America, including the White House. No novel has had a greater effect on the conscience of a country than Harriet Beecher Stowe’s vision, Uncle Tom’s Cabin. In fact, when Hattie met President Lincoln, he is purported to have said: “So you’re the little woman who started this Great War!”
Never underestimate the power of a single prayer. God can do anything through anyone who circles their big dreams with bold prayers. With God, there is no precedent, because all things are possible. Providing meat for a month in the middle of nowhere is no problem when you own the cattle on the thousand hills. God can use the bold prayer of an eccentric sage to end a drought or the bold pen of a young mother to end slavery. If you have the courage to circle the dream in prayer, you can’t never always sometimes tell.
Praystorm
I believe in planning. In fact, failing to plan is planning to fail. But I also believe this: One bold prayer can accomplish more than a thousand well-laid plans. So go ahead and plan, but make sure you circle your plans in prayer. If your plans aren’t birthed in prayer and bathed in prayer, they won’t succeed. This I know from personal experience. Prior to our church plant in Chicago, I developed a twenty-five-year plan. That well-laid plan was a project for one of my seminary classes, and I actually got an A on it. In reality, I should have gotten an F because it failed. I still have that twenty-five-year plan in my files. It keeps me humble. It also reminds me that “unless the LORD builds the house, the builders labor in vain.”
Few things are more painful than a failed plan, but I’ve always drawn a little bit of levity and humility from the old adage “If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans.” While we’re busy planning, sometimes God is chuckling. And if our plans are way off, that contagious chuckle probably makes its way through angelic ranks like a laugh track. It’s not a vindictive chuckle, as if God relishes our failure. I just think God is sometimes amazed at how small our plans are. He allows our small plans to fail so that His big dream for us can prevail. So keep planning like it depends on you, but make sure you pray like it depends on God. Prayer is the alpha and omega of planning. Don’t just brainstorm; praystorm.
When God gave me a second chance to plant a church, I did every bit as much planning, but I also did a lot more praying. It started with a prayer circle around Capitol Hill, but it was a perplexing vision while in prayer mode that changed the trajectory of our church.
I was walking home from Union Station one morning when God gave me a vision of our future at the corner of 5th and F Street NE. There weren’t any angel choirs singing. No graffiti on the sidewalk. But in my mind’s eye, I saw a map of the metro system in Washington, DC, and I envisioned us meeting in movie theaters at metro stops throughout the DC area. One reason the vision was perplexing is that the term “multisite church” didn’t exist in the ecclesiological dictionary yet. It was unprecedented. A decade later, National Community Church meets in six theaters, and with thirty-nine theaters in the metro DC area, we’ve got plenty of room to grow! Our 2020 vision is twenty locations. Translation: We’re coming soon to a theater near you! In faith, I dream of the day when there is a church in every theater in
America. Why not?
Doing church in marketplace environments like movie theaters has become part of our DNA. We love the comfortable seats and large screens. We also love the smell of popcorn. It’s our incense. Whenever I catch a whiff of buttered popcorn, my Pavlovian reaction is to raise my hands in worship.
Are you willing to be perplexed? If you are, then God can and will amaze you!
You can’t never always sometimes tell.
Chapter 7
The Solution to
Ten Thousand Problems
Before the quailstorm appeared on Doppler radar, God asks Moses a question. It’s more than a question; it’s the question. Your answer to this question, the question, will determine the size of your prayer circles.
“Is there a limit to my power?”
The obvious answer to that question is no. God is omnipotent, which means by definition, there is nothing God cannot do. Yet many of us pray as if our problems are bigger than God. So let me remind you of this high-octane truth that should fuel your faith: God is infinitely bigger than your biggest problem or biggest dream. And while we’re on the topic, His grace is infinitely bigger than your biggest sin.
The modern mystic, A. W. Tozer, believed that a low view of God is the cause of a hundred lesser evils, but a high view of God is the solution to ten thousand temporal problems. If that’s true, and I believe it is, then your biggest problem isn’t an impending divorce or failing business or doctor’s diagnosis. Please understand, I’m not making light of your relational or financial or health issues. I certainly don’t want to minimize the overwhelming challenges you may be facing. But in order to regain a godly perspective on your problems, you have to answer this question: Are your problems bigger than God, or is God bigger than your problems? Our biggest problem is our small view of God. That is the cause of all lesser evils. And it’s a high view of God that is the solution to all other problems.
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