In Ezra 8, Ezra makes a bold, if presumptuous statement:

And there by the Ahava Canal, I gave orders for all of us to fast and humble ourselves before our God. We prayed that he would give us a safe journey and protect us, our children, and our goods as we traveled. For I was ashamed to ask the king for soldiers and horsemen to accompany us and protect us from enemies along the way. After all, we had told the king, "Our God protects all those who worship him, but his fierce anger rages against those who abandon him." So we fasted and earnestly prayed that our God would take care of us, and he heard our prayer.

Now, in at least one place in Scripture (Dt 18:22) God censors those who speak presumptuously for Him, though the circumstances are a little different...

What gets me about this passage is that what Ezra said, while sounding good, is not exactly true. Does God protect all those who worship Him? I guess the Clintonian answer would be that it depends on your definition of "protect." I can think of certain OT prophets, certain disciples who experienced something different. We all love Hebrews 11 (The Faith Hall of Fame®!), but those last couple of verses are rarely the ones we focus our preaching on...

"Others were tortured and refused to be released, so that they might gain a better resurrection. Some faced jeers and flogging, while still others were chained and put in prison. They were stoned; they were sawed in two; they were put to death by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated— the world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and mountains, and in caves and holes in the ground."

That having been said, I love that Ezra spoke this way. He had the...err... guts to lay God's character on the line, and to do it publically, for all to see. Ezra wrote a check... and God cashed it.

We're pretty reticent to do this, and probably with good reason.

We should be careful to not walk around saying that God will do things He hasn't guaranteed He will do.

And yet.

Sometimes, perhaps by the nudging of the Holy Spirit, I feel able to say "God will do this." It's rare, I try to hedge a little (my non-charismatic upbringing hobbles me), but sometimes, I think we need to get downright presumptuous

I can think of few endeavors in this life where this type of thing is called for more than in church planting. We step out in faith, walking away from sure things, good salaries, comfortable places to walk into... who knows what? There are absolutely no guarantees in planting churches. You can professionalize it all you want, you can test, and market, and focus group (things I think we can do without, but that's a different blog entry) and still whether anyone shows up or not, whether God shows up and is pleased to see people come into the Kingdom through our efforts, whether the risk "pays off" is completely a God thing.

We tell people- "We're gonna start a church! We'll call it (insert cool name here)! It will be church like it is supposed to be".

Presumption!

Just the act of church planting itself seems a bit presumptuous- akin to falling backwards with no visible means of support and hoping God will catch you.

I guess I'm writing this, because as I was reading this bit in Ezra today, it seemed as though (presumption coming!) God was telling me that someone who reads this blog needed to hear this. You are afraid to speak out and say, "If we do this, God will go with us- He will be behind and before and around us. And even though we can't see how it will all work out, it's still the right thing to do."

It's okay- go ahead and do it. Say those things. Talk that way. What you fear is presumption is really faith. Take the step, lean back, and trust the kind of God who watches His children say some really dumb things on His behalf sometimes... and still comes through for them.