
I know many of you have been praying for C3. For that reason, now that I’ve had the opportunity to share the results with C3 this past Sunday, I’d like to share them with anyone else that maybe missed this past Sunday or doesn’t attend C3. God has done something truly phenomenal here in Tri-State!
One of our Board of Directors and close friends, Dean Fulks worked with us throughout this project and told us that an ambitious goal would be $100,000 over 18 months. I started praying and asking God to do something so enormous and accelerated through our project that everyone would know that it could only be God.
Then I started to realize we had a few problems and we probably should have planned this project at a different time. For one, we also asked C3 to sponsor 200 Thanksgiving baskets this year for those in need in our area. After including the price of hams and bread payed for by C3, I realized that was going to be over $6,000 from the church and due the same day as commitment Sunday. I also realized that Secret Santa was going to follow the week after and we were hoping to sponsor over 100 kids as well. 100 kids would be an additional $5,000 within two weeks of the Thanksgiving baskets. By the way, without much publicity for Secret Santa, we are now sponsoring 123 kids total which is over $6,000!
Needless to say, I was nervous and sweating that goal of $100,000 which now seemed like 1 million dollars to me. So, we fasted, prayed, cast vision, and stretched our faith to the limit.
Honestly, there was nothing that could have prepared us for the outpouring of generosity that we experienced:
The incredible people of C3 pledged a total of over $150,000 to our What If Project!
I don’t think any of us saw that one coming. We knew God was going to show up big, but man! Over $150,000 in total pledges with more still coming in… it could only be God.
The most encouraging statistic of the entire campaign is the sheer number of families and individuals who participated. In other words, the success of our project is a testimony to the power of everybody. Commitments ranged from kids who gave all of their Christmas money, to single moms that stretched themselves more than they ever could have imagined. We all did all we could do. And now, God will receive all the glory.
Oh, and one more thing. During the What If series, our attendance went up. I don’t understand it either. It was one of our highest attended series in the history of the church. It could only be God.
Now, I believe we are positioned to take another huge step in sharing the Gospel with the Tri-State and the world!
I have never been more amazed or proud of the amazing generosity of C3 and better yet….the best is yet to come!