Prayer, Faith or Presumption
Glenn Coon tells of his ‘Gethsemane Experience’
There was a time in his life when his doctor told him if he didn’t get a place in the country where he could keep a garden, he would not have long to live. But try as he might, he could not find a place in the country or a farmer willing to sell him even a couple of acres. One day, he wrote a love letter to his Lord, saying that he would spend one more day looking and if God wanted them to get a place in the country that it would be today. He showed it to his wife and they claimed the verse Matthew 18:19 “If two of you agree here on earth concerning anything you ask, my Father in heaven will do it for you.” Then they went looking.
After dropping his wife home to prepare dinner, he drove out again to look one more time. Suddenly, he felt impressed that this was the place, even though there was no ‘for sale’ sign. Sure enough when he asked the lady of the house, she said it had just been put on the market that day.
So Glenn made arrangements with a lawyer to buy the place, with an initial payment and at least 2 payments of specific amounts on specific dates. He told the lawyer that God was giving him the place and God would provide the money. The selling of his house would help with the next payment (although he admitted he didn’t have that much equity in it) and although he had no idea where the following payment would come from God would provide it.
But when he showed the property—the answer to prayer—to his family, they were not impressed. Because of it’s run down state they did not believe that it was an answer to prayer; they felt that Glenn was being presumptuous.
When the first payment was due the house had sold and they had enough money. But as the due date for the second amount approached, Glenn had no idea where the money would come from. He was at times plagued by doubts, put in his mind by the negative attitude of his family and friends. Yet he could not see any way that he had been presumptuous, he had merely claimed God’s promises in the Bible and so after much prayer and heart searching he came to the conclusion that God would do what He had promised.
Six days before the money was due he claimed the verse Philippians 4:19, “And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of His glory in Christ Jesus.” He felt God’s peace, and would not have been surprised to open his eyes and see the money sitting there. But it wasn’t, and he laughed when he realised that he didn’t need the money today, he didn’t need it for 6 more days. The same thing happened on day 5, day 4, 3, 2 and 1.
On the day the money was due the same thing happened again! And then he remembered that as a boy, the hens didn’t bring their eggs to the house, he had had to go and search for them. So asking God to lead him, he got in his car. The Lord told him to turn left; and then half way up the street the devil caught up and said ‘How do you know the Lord told you to turn left?’ But claiming a Bible verse he drove on until he found himself parked near the office of his lawyer.
So he went up and asked “Where can I borrow $6000 for three months on my personal note?”
The lawyer picked up his phone and made a call, ‘Bill, will you loan Dr Coon $6000 for three months on his personal note? Thank you Bill.” And he directed Glenn to a nearby bank.
By the end of three months he had the money to repay it. God had kept his promise. The time spent in his new garden improved his health and when the property finally sold, it gave them enough to buy their retirement home.
Sometime after getting the $6000 loan, he asked the bank if they usually loaned money to ministers and was told they only looked at loans if there were two guarantors, and even then they would almost never loaned money to ministers.