Stepping Forward in Faith

I’d like to tell you a true story about a man and woman who learned to step forward in faith. Bill and Helen Furnish were high school sweethearts. Soon after they graduated they got married. Their parents thought they were a little too young. But there comes a time when parents have to let their children go.

Bill and Helen worked hard to put themselves through college. It was a struggle, but they were young and they had lots of energy. After college, Bill began a promising career in sales. They decided it was finally time to begin a family. How they had longed for a baby. For eleven years they had waited to have children.

Finally, with the joy that only an expectant mother can know, Helen broke the good news to Bill. “We’re going to have a baby.” They were excited. Soon after the birth of their son Steven, the doctor told Helen that other children would be too great a risk to her health. Helen’s surgery made it impossible for them to have any more children. That was 1951.

Bill and Helen thanked God daily for all the blessings He had given them, especially for their son Steve. Time passed too quickly for them, as it always does when you’re raising children, and pretty soon Steve graduated from high school.

That’s when the dark clouds began to gather over the Furnish family. The Viet Nam war was raging, and Steve decided, along with a few of his friends, to join the Marines. Bill and Helen had a lot of misgivings about his decision. They tried to talk him out of it, but he was insistent. So finally, they stood by him and supported him in it.

To make a long story short, just five days after Steve had been assigned to Viet Nam, a Marine chaplain and another officer knocked on Bill and Helen’s front door. Steve had been killed by a sniper on his very first patrol.

Bill and Helen’s world shattered. They had feared the worst, and now the worst had happened.

Bill took a leave from work, and for three months they withdrew and mourned the loss of their only son. Finally, Bill’s company offered him a job transfer to Southern California. After much prayer, they decided to take the new job, hoping that their new surroundings would help them cope with their grief.

They moved to the town of Oceanside and found a lovely house. On most days they could look to the west and see the blue Pacific Ocean.

But to their surprise, they soon discovered that their new home was only a few miles from the Camp Pendleton Marine Base. It seemed that everywhere they looked in their new community, they saw young men n uniform. And every Marine they saw was a painful reminder of Steve, the son they had lost.

I want to tell you more about Bill and Helen later. But first I’d like you to turn in your Bibles to Genesis 12. (That’s found on page 11 in the pew Bible). Genesis 12 is the beginning of the story of Abraham. The story of Abraham is the beginning of the story of the nation Israel. And the story of the nation Israel is the beginning of the story of how God brought redemption to all mankind through His Son Jesus Christ. But it all begins back in Genesis 12 with a man God challenged to step forward in faith.

Today, we’re going to look at three video clips of Abraham’s life; three faith-steps that he took. And we’re going to try to see what stepping forward in faith means in practical terms for us today. Let’s read Genesis 12:1…

Genesis 12:1 The Lord had said to Abram, “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you. I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.

The very first step of faith that God challenged Abraham to take was to LEAVE. Leave his homeland. Abraham was living in the city of Ur, which was kind of like the New York City of the ancient world. Ur was located in the lower Mesopotamian valley, near present-day Kuwait. Ur was the leading city of the ancient world. It was a center of commerce and culture. Archaeologists have dug up some of the treasures of Ur, and they are breathtakingly beautiful works of art.

God wanted Abraham to leave Ur. “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you.” God was not challenging Abraham to move to the suburbs, he was asking him to get out of the country completely!

“Leave your homeland. Leave your extended family. (The extended family, or clan, was extremely important in those days.) Leave your culture. Leave the land of your birth. Leave all your familiar surroundings, and go to a place I will show you.”

God expected Abraham to go to a place he didn’t even know about yet. God said “Leave… and later, I will show you where you’re going. But first, you’ve gotta LEAVE.”

The first thing we’ve got to learn about trusting God is that we’ve got to be willing to LEAVE our comfort zone. We’ve got to be willing to step out into the unknown.

Every one of us has a circle in which we live. Let’s call it our “circle of confidence”. All the things in our circle of confidence are things that we feel comfortable with. Things that we like to do; things that we know we can do. Things we’re familiar with. Everybody’s circle of confidence is different.

For example, if I were to ask you to prepare a sermon for next Sunday morning, you’d probably say “Oh no! I can’t do that! That’s way outside my circle of confidence.”

But if you were to ask me to come up with a menu and prepare meals for a family of seven, which is what my wife does every week, I would have kittens! I’d say “I can’t do that! That’s way outside my circle of confidence!”

You see, everybody has a circle of confidence, and everybody’s circle of confidence is different. Btu here’s the important lesson to get hold of: God is always challenging you to take a step outside of your circle of confidence in order to prove to you that He is real.

As long as you stay inside your circle of confidence, you never really have to trust God. As long as life is safe and predictable and you feel secure in what you’re doing, you never have to rely on God. Because you don’t really need Him. You can handle everything in your circle of confidence on your own.

And so you never grow in faith. And you never get to see God’s blessing; you never get to see Him work in your life.

In aviation, they have a term they use about the flight characterisitics of any given airplane. They call it “the flight envelope”. The flight envelope is defined by several variables such as speed, weight, altitude, engine power, and so forth. As long as you stay within the envelope, the airplane will fly safely. If you get outside of the envelope, though, there’s no telling what can happen. The job of a test pilot is to find out where the edges of the flight envelope are.

God is always pushing us outside the envelope. He’s not content to have us comfortable, because He’s trying to make us Christ-like. And to do that, he has to take us outside the envelope. Outside our circle of confidence.

If Abraham had never left Ur, he never would have become the father of a great nation. He never would have become the ancestor of the Messiah. He never would have been such a tremendous blessing to the whole world. He would have lived a safe, secure, predictable, comfortable, anonymous, meaningless, empty life in Ur. And he would have died without ever knowing that God is real.

The first step of faith is to be willing to LEAVE you circle of confidence and follow God where He is leading. Is God challenging you to do that today?

Let’s take a look at another video clip in Abraham’s life. Turn to Genesis chapter 13. When Abraham left Ur, he didn’t obey God completely. (He wasn’t perfect.) He took part of his extended family along with him. He took his nephew Lot. And in Genesis 13, we read that Lot became a bit of a problem.

You see, Abraham and Lot were what we would call nomads. They were like bedouin sheep herders. They had flocks, and they had servants, and they lived off the land, moving from place to place wherever the grazing was good.

Genesis 13:2 Abram had become very wealthy in livestock and in silver and gold.

Genesis 13:5 Now Lot, who was moving about with Abram, also had flocks and herds and tents. But the land could not support them while they stayed together, for their possessions were so great that they were not able to stay together. And quarreling arose between Abram’s herdsmen and the herdsmen of Lot.

So here’s the problem. Abraham and Lot have to split up. But how would they decide which family goes where? Abraham comes up with a solution. Look at verse 8…

So Abram said to Lot, “Let’s not have any quarreling between you and me, or between your herdsmen and mine, for we are brothers. Is not the whole land before you? Let’s part company. If you go to the left, I’ll go to the right; if you go to the right, I’ll go to the left.

Abraham asked Lot to choose where he wanted to go. Now that’s pretty remarkable. Because in the Middle East, they put a lot of value on age, and Abraham was certainly the elder here. He was Lot’s uncle. He had the right to first choice of the land. But Abraham did not insist on his rights as the elder. He let Lot choose first. And on the basis of Lot’s choice, Abraham was wiling to go the other way.

What did Lot choose? Look at verse 10

Genesis 13:10 Lot looked up and saw that the whole plain of the Jordan was well watered, like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt, toward Zoar… So Lot chose for himself the whole plain of the Jordan and set out toward the east. The two men parted company: Abram lived in the land of Canaan, while Lot lived among the cities of the plain and pitched his tents near Sodom.

Not fair! Lot got to choose first, and he chose the best land. He left poor old Uncle Abe with the scruffy, rocky, infertile hill-country of Canaan. But who let him make that choice? Abraham did.

When Abraham let his nephew make a choice that would determine his own destiny, he was really putting his fate in God’s hands. He was willling to let God work in his own life through the choice that someone else made.

You see, by this time in his life, Abraham had walked with God long enough to know that he wouldn’t be alone whatever way this thing happened to come out. He knew that when God promises to bless us, He Himself is our blessing. Abraham knew that since God was with him, it didn’t matter if he went to the left or to the right. It didn’t matter which way Lot chose. It didn’t matter what that left him.

The first step of faith is to LEAVE. The second is to LET. Let God be sovereign. Let God unfold His will for your life through the choices that other people make. The question is control. We have such a hard time letting go and letting others have control, especially when what they do is going to affect us.

You may have a boss that you think is totally unreasonable. And you’re not going to stand for the way he treats you! You’re not going to let him have control! Or you may have children who show a pronounced tendency to choose the total opposite of the way you would choose. So you’re not going to let them have control over those choices.

But have you ever stopped to ask: Is God trying to accomplish something in my life through the choices that other people make that affect me? Do I believe that God is sovereign enough that he can accomplish his will for me even when other people make choices that I think are wrong?

If anybody ever got mistreated at the hands of others, it had to have been Joseph. Joseph’s own brothers sold him into slavery. His new boss’s wife framed him and he ended up in jail in Egypt. As far as his brothers were concerned, Joseph was dead.

But God put Joseph in that jail so that he might ultimately save his brothers and his father. That jail was just one step away from the prime ministership of all Egypt. And at the end of the story, Joseph could say to his brothers “You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good.” Joseph had come to appreciate who was really in control.

Are you willing to let God work in your life through the choices of others?

Parents, are you wiling to let your teenagers make choices, even if they might be the wrong choices? Or do you have to maintain control? Run the show. Make all their choices for them.

When you let others make choices that bring change into your life—sometimes wrenching, painful change—what you’re really doing is trusting God’s sovereignty.

Turn over to Genesis 22. There’s one more faith step that Abraham had to take.

Genesis 22:1 Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!” “Here I am,” he replied. Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about.”

We don’t have time to get into the theology behind this story. It’s really remarkable what God was doing here. But let’s just look at Abraham’s response. He got up early the next morning, cut some wood for the burnt offering, saddled up his donkey, and set out for the place God had told him about.

On the third day, they arrive at Moriah. Abraham gets off his donkey, tells his two servants to wait behind, and starts up the hill, with his son Isaac carrying the wood.

Genesis 22:9 When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son Isaac and LAID HIM ON THE ALTAR, on top of the wood.

The first step of faith is to LEAVE your circle of confidence. That’s hard. The second step of faith is to LET God be sovereign in your life through circumstances and people. That’s hard. But the third step of faith is hardest of all.

The third step of faith is to LAY your most precious possession on the altar of God. Isaac was the son that God had promised Abraham. He was the apple of his father’s eye. Isaac was the key to everything that God intended to do through Abraham; he was the heir through whom Abraham’s descendants were supposed to come.

And now God wanted Abraham to kill him! To do away with his only son. To sacrifice him on the altar. To destroy the only means through which those promises could be fulfilled.

Wouldn’t Abraham have had the right to refuse to do such a thing? What a terrible thing to ask a father to do!

And yet what was Abraham’s response? He didn’t cling to Isaac. He bound him up and LAID him on the altar, even though he knew it might mean the end of all his hopes and dreams

Hebrews 11:17 By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had received the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, even though God had said to him, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.” Abraham reasoned that God could raise the dead…

Are you willing to LAY your most prized possessionon the altar of God this morning? That which is closest to your heart? It may be your family. It may be your reputation. Your career. Your plans. Your goals. Your dreams.

You will never know the resurrection power of God in your life unless you are wiling to sacrifice whatever that treasure is on the altar of God. For anything that you cannot sacrifice to God becomes your god.

Bill and Helen Furnish had had to give up their only son Steve. And for a long time they couldn’t understand why. They got in their car that first Sunday in their new home in California and they began to drive around looking for a church. As they sat through the service, they were haunted by the question “Why?” “Why did God take our Steve?” “And why has He led us here to California, only to be tormented by the sight of all these Marines?”

After church, they stopped for lunch at a little café where they could watch the ocean. They tried again to make sense of their situation. As they drove back home, they saw a young Marine hitchhiking with a sign that said “Home”.

On impulse, Bill pulled over and offered the young soldier a ride. As they drove along, the Marine explained that he had finished his training and was going to Arizona to see his folks before shipping overseas.

Bill and Helen didn’t reveal the sadness in their own hearts; they just listened to the boy and drove him all the way into town. There, Bill bought him a bus ticket to Arizona. “You can waste a lot of valuable time hitchhiking.” Bill said. “I know your parents must be anxious to see you.”

Ffrom that day on, Bill and Helen Furnish made a silent commitment to be available to the young men and women that God might send their way as they trained at the Marine base. Their pastor encouraged them to begin a ministry to these lonely young recruits who were far from home. Before long, dozens of people in the church got involved.

Hardly a week went by when Bill and Helen did not have Marine recruits in their home. The women of the church began a “cookie ministry” for the boys who were far from Mom’s home-baked treats. Bill got some business cards printed up with their name and address and the phrase “a home away from home”.

Bill and Helen’s pain and sorrow over losing their son Steve slowly began to heal as they gave themselves away in ministry. The spring returned to their step, and they felt that God had, indeed, led them to where they were.

One day in the mail, as often happened, there was a letter from a grateful Marine. It went like this:

“Dear Mr. and Mrs. Furnish,

You probably don’t remember me, but I was hitchhiking a few months ago and you picked me up. I just had to write and tell you something. When you picked me up, I was running away from Camp Pendleton. I was AWOL.

I was angry and confused. I felt that nobody in the world cared whether I lived or died. But you were so loving to me. You were so kind. Mr. Furnish, when you prayed with me and slipped me that $20 bill, I tried to be cool. But Mrs. Furnish, when you hugged me and told me you hoped to see me again, my heart practically broke.

I did not know of another person on earth who wanted to see me again. I cried when my bus pulled away.

When you stopped to give me a lift, I was desperate. I had decided that if a car picked me up, I would kill the people and steal the car. I had a sharpened bayonet with me, and as soon as I got into the back seat, I took it out of my bag and laid it across my knees.

But as we drove along, you talked kindly to me and I you showed me so much love. Your spirit was so sweet that I just couldn’t do what I had planned. If you’ll look under the back seat of your car, you’ll find where I hid the bayonet when you weren’t looking.

Bill and Helen put down the letter and went out to the car. They looked in the back seat and sure enough there it was. A shiny silver knife, maybe something like that knife that Abraham held in his hands on Mount Moriah.

That bayonet now hangs on the wall of Bill and Helen’s den, very close to a picture of their son Steve And in that den there are hundreds of other photos of young men and women who have passed through Camp Pendleton and had their lives changed by the ministry of Bill and Helen Furnish.

God wants to use you like that. But he can’t do it unless you’re willing to take those steps of faith.

Leave your circle of confidence to follow God.

Let God be sovereign in your life through the decisions and actions of others

Lay your most prized treasure on His altar.

If I am going to be God’s steward, I am going to have to…

Leave behind my claim to live my life my way

Let God be sovereign in my life through His arrangement of my circumstances

Lay my most prized possession on His altar