Over the years, God has taught me a number of things about prayer. 1) God wants us to bring our petitions to Him. 2) God's ability to answer prayer is not dependent upon my presence, or anyone else's presence with the person or situation being prayed for. 3) When I have taken my request to God, the next step is to leave it in His hands...I may bring it back to Him over and over again, or I may be able to simply leave it there...but the key point is that it is His to answer --- not mine to force and answer. 4) If and when it will bring glory to Him, He will answer favorable. 5) If the time is not right, or my motive is impure, or He has something different in mind...I may not "hear" anything, or I may have a sense of His telling me to "wait." Whether "heard" or not, it is my job to wait for Him to reveal His will and His job to determine when is the best time for it to be revealed. Remember, that the heroes of the faith (BC) did not receive what had been promised during their lifetimes...God had something better in mind (see Hebrews 11). All that being said, shortly after arriving here at the Peninsula Evangelical Friends Church in 1986, I noticed this wonderful adjoining property and building, called the Agnew Community Hall. The building was of the same vintage as the older portion of our facility...meaning OLD. The organization that owned the Hall, the Agnew Helpful Neighbors Club, and our congregation had worked out some land sharing ideas in the 50's and 60's that benefited both organizations.
God seemed to lay this property on my heart...so I prayed about it. It would often come back to mind, so I would pray about it again. When God brought it back to mind again, I would pray about it again. I would say something like, "Lord, it would sure be nice to own that property. If you think it would be helpful to us, please provide it to us."
A few months ago, we were approached by the AHNC. They informed us that they were getting to a place where they did not have a sufficient membership base to justify continuing to own the property and the building, asking if we would be willing to accept a donation from them to the church of the facility and land.
We thanked the Lord and thanked them as we accepted this gift.
Incidentally, our church was founded in 1937 by the American Sunday School Union...in...the Agnew Hall. One of our Elders was present as a young boy at those first meetings.
We recently held our first Bring-and-Share dinner (potluck) in the Hall. Though many of our folk were absent that day, we enjoyed the celebration anyway.
We continue to use it for a number of community service meetings as well as an outreach location for one of our community outreach ministries.
Thank you Lord for your provision. We pray that you will continue to provide for the stewardship of this gift and that that we will faithfully use it for the glory of the Kingdom of God.
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