I wish I could go to sleep and not wake up until June 16th, and that, in doing so, some satisfactory amount of money would be raised for me to go to the Chapter Planter's Cohort at the end of the month.
But it doesn't work that way. Even if I didn't have to do the work to make the results happen, I couldn't sleep for 15 days straight, no matter how much it might feel like I could sometimes.
But I've still got a long way to go, and it's taking all I've got to believe that I really can raise $15,000 by June 15th. It's taking all I've got to believe that that's at all possible. Honestly, I've no reason to believe it's possible beyond the fact that God can do anything. That is enough, but it'd be a lie to say I've got a plan that will get that much money. I don't. I don't have those sorts of contacts, that rich or supportive of a family, and no "church-I-grew-up-in" to turn to. In the most perfect world, where everyone I've got to talk to yet gives as much as I'm hoping they will, I'm looking at 11,900, and that sounds like and is a lot. I'll just be honest, I don't expect all of those people and churches to fulfill my wildest hopes. Like I said, I don't know how this is going to happen.
But God does. God knows how it's going to happen if he's planning to make it happen. And I've got faith in that, but I'll be honest that my faith in anything else just isn't there right now. Rebuke that lack of faith all you want; I'm just being real. God is bigger than my unbelief though. I'm confident that what he wants to make happen will. All the while, I'm doing all I can to not slide into the despondency that beset me while I was fundraising (rather unsuccessfully) in 2009. I do feel like I'm getting somewhere this time though, more than that time. But even so, as such, I'm not doing it fast enough. I raised $2000 last week, which would have been an incredible week...but it's not even half what I "needed" to raise to be on track.
But I'm resting in the truth that God's in control. It's his money and he'll raise it up for me if that's to be the case. I'm not worried, and I'm not afraid. At the end of the day, God's love for me and for all of us transcends all strivings for anything to do with money or material comfort or even physical necessity provision. Whether I'm in the cohort, whether I'm on staff with Intervarsity, whether anything this is or will be now is or will be at the end of the month, it's my life's work to proclaim that love. I don't need money to do that. Sure, "the worker deserves his wages," but whether we get what we deserve or not, God's love is bigger. That's what grace means, all the way around. There is no justice, there is no peace. There is only forgiveness, because love is broader, deeper, and more important than $15,000 or $150,000.
If you want to help make it happen, go here: donate.intervarsity.org/support/zacharybelcher If you don't or can't, then pray. That means more and will do more anyway. I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength, with or without money. But I could always use more prayers that I stay in Christ so that he can give me strength.
No, I don't believe Christians are justified in being capitalists. Sorry.
-Zack
"Lead me to the truth and I will follow you with my whole life"
-Mumford and Sons
