The Faith of Leap

From a message preached on November 06, 2011, by Pastor Randy Thornton, pictured above

Pastor Randy Thornton said he saw Jordan, a small child, holding his father’s hand. As father and son came to a descending flight of stairs, Jordan boldly negotiated the first step but would have missed the second and stumbled had his father not air-lifted him by the hand and zoomed him to the bottom of the stairs.

That pictured “The Faith of Leap,” said Thornton, senior pastor of Grace Church in Southern Pines, N.C. He delivered the following message, “The Faith of Leap,” on Sunday morning, Nov. 6, 2011. Someone said he should call his message “The Leap of Faith,” but he called it “The Faith of Leap.”

“By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going” (Hebrews 11:8 NIV).

“Abraham was called from Ur of the Chaldees,” Thornton said. The ancient city of Ur was located in southern Mesopotamia, near the Euphrates River. “He was called from a plush land to go to a barren land. Being able to hear from God is very crucial for our livelihoods and families. Abraham was 75 when he left Ur of the Chaldees. ‘As a man thinks in his heart, so is he.’ If you don’t think you’re smart enough, you probably never will be. Everyone say, ‘I’m God’s favorite child.’ God has greater plans than what we can see.”

Thornton said there are going to be some young “Davids” among the youths of our time and that Paul told Timothy, a young Christian, to set an example for the believers.

“When did David begin to be a giant-killer?” Thornton asked. “David killed a wolf, a bear, a lion. David heard Goliath and believed God. He believed God gave him the victory – not he, himself. God wants to teach us to be giant-killers – young and old.”

Taking a leap of faith depends on the “faith factor.”

“James says show me your faith by your works,” Thornton noted, adding that the necessary step of risk is the faith of leap. “Satan wants to cripple us. Conviction is a gift from God. Condemnation is a gift from Satan. Satan does not want us to take that leap of faith. He wants to cripple us, immobilize us and tell us we’re junk.”

“If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:8-9). 

  

To exercise faith, one must take a risk, expecting God to do a miracle.

“God wants you to know he loves you and is going to take care of you when you step out in faith. He wants to bless you, so you can bless others,” Thornton said. “Many say they have faith in God – ‘We have entrusted our lives and hopes to a good and powerful God’ – but this faith is usually inward and passive, inwardly focused, comforting, with a sense of security.”

That’s good, Thornton said.

“The other kind of faith is active and is outwardly focused and usually very discomforting,” he said. “Knowing that we are sent and to whom we are sent, we take deliberate risks that put us in complete dependence on God for a miracle.”

Many Christians play the “safe mode.”

“It’s time to kick it up a step,” Thornton said. “The risk key is a purposeful action you take, in spite of discomfort or fear, to exercise your faith during an act of obedience.”

Matthew 17:19-20: Then the disciples came to Jesus in private and asked, “Why couldn’t we drive it [a demon] out?” He replied, “Because you have so little faith. Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”

“How many of you parents know your kids have to learn some things the hard way?” Thornton asked. “How many of you know you are all in fulltime Christian ministry? The amount of our faith is directly related to our understanding that we have heard from God.”

“And he did not do many miracles there because of their lack of faith,” (Matthew 13:58).

“Sometimes those who are going to be the last to believe you’ve heard from God is your own family,” Thornton said. “We must name our unbelief in an all-powerful God – where it lies – and reject it [unbelief]. If we want to pursue the life of the supernatural, we must take action. I’m really glad it doesn’t take a superstar. It just takes you and me.”

Thornton prayed this benediction:

"Father, I thank you, today, that we are your favorite children because of what you’ve done on the cross … God, I pray you’d begin to set your people free in Jesus’ name … Raise up a generation of young people wholly devoted and sold out to you!”

A Child Is Impressionable

A lady (on the left in this photo) worships with her arms half raised, while her granddaughter, standing in the center aisle, lifts her hands during a 2011 worship service at Grace Church in Southern Pines, N.C. Most children attending this service had already gone to Grace's children's church meeting, but the grandmother in this photo wanted her granddaughter to experience the worship service before joining the other children. (Left-click on this photo and see it enlarged.)

Dealing with Despair

From a message given by the Rev. Randy Thornton (pictured above) on September 5, 2010

“Despair can come in a multitude of situations,” said Senior Pastor Randy Thornton, 52, during a recent sermon at Grace Church in Southern Pines, N.C., “but for believers in Jesus Christ, God has given us hope.”

The word “despair” means “sunk down,” and the word “encourage” in Greek means “putting wind in your sails to move you forward,” Thornton said, adding that despair involves a sense of hopelessness and can connect to past wounds.

“Despair slices your sails and leaves you dead in the water,” he said.

King David wrote, “O my God, my soul (one’s “soul” involves one’s mind, will and emotions) is cast down within me: therefore will I remember thee from the land of Jordan…” (Psalm 42:6).

Thornton referred to the Old Testament account of Nehemiah the Cupbearer:

According to writer John C. Westervelt, the Hebrews of Judah, the Southern Kingdom of divided Israel, were exiled to Babylon before Nehemiah’s time. The Persians under King Cyrus overthrew the Babylonians in 539 B.C. The new king let foreigners return home. Cyrus decreed that Hebrews could return to Judah and rebuild the temple in Jerusalem. Fifty thousand Jews accepted the offer to go home. Nehemiah had risen through the ranks to become cupbearer to King Artaxerxes. Besides certifying wine served to the king was safe, Nehemiah was a counselor to the king. When Nehemiah asked men who returned from Judah about the Jewish homeland, they said, “The wall of Jerusalem is broken down, and its gates have been burned with fire.”

Nehemiah fasted and prayed. He had never shown sorrow in the king’s presence, but the king saw his sad countenance and inquired. Nehemiah said, “May the king live forever! Why should my face not look sad when the city where my fathers are buried lies in ruins, and its gates have been destroyed by fire?" (Nehemiah 2:3).

The king sponsored Nehemiah’s return and his project to rebuild Jerusalem. The prophesied 70 years of Jewish captivity were fulfilled when the new Temple was completed in 516 B.C., but Nehemiah faced danger and despair while rebuilding the Temple.

“Meanwhile, the people in Judah said, ‘The strength of the laborers is giving out, and there is so much rubble that we cannot rebuild the wall’” (Nehemiah 4:10).  

Fatigue may cause despair by draining energy and making a person feel as though he “can’t take another step,” Thornton said.

Despair often comes when we are in the middle of building. Jerusalem’s walls were erected halfway when discouragement came (Nehemiah 4:6).

“You may say, ‘I thought I was a good Christian until I got married,’” Thornton noted. “In life, God doesn’t put two perfect people together. We walk into relationships wounded and hurt. And what do wounded people do? They wound people.”

There is a good plan God has for you, but we often have to go through “dark timber,” he said.

Thornton, who grew up in Colorado, described his love of hunting and hiking in that state’s rugged mountains. He told of encountering forests with foliage that darkened the sun and of growing weary of “one more log to cross.”

“‘Dark timber’ is so thick you lose direction, lose perspective,” he said. “In life, we’re all going to have patches of ‘dark timber.’”

Failure can generate despair that dominates our feelings, but we must trust God. “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28).

“Emotions don’t tell you the truth all the time,” Thornton said. “There is a ‘clearing’ on the other side.”
Fear may cause despair.

“There is a spirit of Sanballet and Tobiah that wants to kill you,” Thornton said, referring to Nehemiah 4, which tells of conspirators against the Jew rebuilding Jerusalem. “But we are more than conquerors. We cannot let fear dominate us. Despair is not the expression of faith.”

How to get rid of despair:

1. Get rest for your body.

“In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat – for he grants sleep to those he loves” (Psalm 127:2).

Do something that energizes you, Thornton said, adding that God created a time for rest.

“There are six days when you may work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of rest, a day of sacred assembly. You are not to do any work; wherever you live, it is a Sabbath to the LORD” (Leviticus 23:3).

“Our culture has robbed us,” Thornton said. “God created a Sabbath rest. God designed a day to bet built up with the love of God.”

“But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well” (Matthew 6:33).

“Put God in your life,” Thornton said.

2. Reorganize your life.

Get priorities straight.

“The fire must be kept burning on the altar continuously; it must not go out” (Leviticus 6:13).

“God put us in families,” Thornton said.

“Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their work” (Ecclesiastes 4:9).

“Lone rangers always get shot down,” Thornton said.

“Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken” (Ecclesiastes 4:12).

“Reorganize your life,” Thornton said. “You may be here today, and you’re trying to do life alone.”

“For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will” (Ephesians 1:4-5).

3. Remember the Lord.

“When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze” (Isaiah 43:2).

Three things to remember when feeling despair:
God knows your situation.
God cares about your situation.
God can change you and your situation.

The Apostle Paul wrote, “I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come” (Ephesians 1:18-21).

“Despair is a real thing,” Thornton said. “You don’t have to stay there. You have a choice! Believe there’s a clearing at the end, or stay in the dark timber!”