ENCOURAGEMENT >> FAITH TO REMOVE
MOUNTAINS
Faith
to remove mountains
Author:
Sent in by Ronnie Richardson
A small
congregation in the foothills of the Great Smokey's
>built a new sanctuary on a piece of land willed to them by a
>church member. Ten days before the new church was to
>open, the local building inspector informed the pastor that
>the parking lot was inadequate for the size of the building.
>
>Until the church doubled the size of the parking lot, they
>would not be able to use the new sanctuary. Unfortunately,
>the church with its undersized parking lot had used every
>inch of their land except for the mountain against which it
>had been built. In order to build more parking spaces, they
>would have to move the mountain out of the backyard.
>
>Undaunted, the pastor announced the next Sunday Morning
>that he would meet that evening with all members who had
>"mountain moving faith."
>
>They would hold a prayer session asking God to remove
>the mountain from the back yard and to somehow provide
>enough money to have it paved and painted before the
>scheduled opening dedication service the following week.
>
>At the appointed time, 24 of the congregation's 300
>Members assembled for prayer. They prayed for nearly
>three hours. At ten o'clock the pastor said the final
>"Amen".
>"We'll open next Sunday as scheduled," he assured
>everyone. "God has never let us down before, and I believe
>He will be faithful this time too."
>
>The next morning as he was working in his study there
>came a loud knock at his door. When he called "come in",
>a rough looking construction foreman appeared, removing
>his hard hat as he entered.
>
>"Excuse me, Reverend. I'm from Acme Construction
>Company over in the next county. We're building a huge
>new shopping mall over there and we need some fill dirt.
>Would you be willing to sell us a chunk of that mountain
>behind the church? We'll pay you for the dirt we remove
>and pave all the exposed area free of charge, if we can have
>it right away. We can't do anything else until we get the
>dirt in and allow it to settle properly."
>
>The little church was dedicated the next Sunday as
>originally planned and there were far more members with
>"mountain moving faith" on opening Sunday than there had
>been the previous week!
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