Now faith is assurance of things hoped for, proof of things not seen.
Expandable Faith: Derek Draughon on Growing Beyond Your Current Measure
About this episode
Pastor Derek Draughon of First Assembly in Saraland, Alabama joins Philip Cameron for a conversation that cuts straight to the heart of what it means to be a true Believer. Derek is also the creator of Fuelcast — a men's ministry video show found at fuelcast.tv — built around the idea of "pouring fuel on the fire of what God is already doing in a man's life." Drawing from the story of Jesus and the disciples in the boat (Mark 4), Derek unpacks why Christianity is fundamentally unpredictable and why cookie-cutter ministry formulas so often fail. He introduces the powerful image of the enemy as a tug-of-war anchor — not trying to win outright, but simply holding the rope long enough to exhaust you into quitting. "The devil knows that a delay is the same as a denial," Derek warns, "because if you get tired enough and weary enough in the battle, you end up saying, 'Maybe it's just not the will of God.'" Rooted in Hebrews 11:1 and the spectrum of faith Jesus encountered — from no faith, to little faith, to the centurion's great faith — Derek makes the case that faith is not fixed at salvation. It is expandable. Discover how to move from surviving in little faith to the kind of faith that stops Jesus in his tracks. Visit fuelcast.tv or find Fuelcast on YouTube.
Part of our Faith collection of conversations.
What's Discussed
Pastor Derek Draughon of First Assembly in Saraland, Alabama — and creator of the men's video ministry Fuelcast (fuelcast.tv) — joins Philip Cameron to explore one of the most practical truths in the New Testament: faith is expandable. Anchoring the conversation in Hebrews 11:1 and the spectrum of faith Jesus encountered throughout the Gospels, Derek argues that believers are not locked into the measure of faith they received at salvation. He uses a vivid tug-of-war illustration to expose the enemy's core strategy — not outright defeat, but exhausting delay. He also traces the biblical figure of Laban as a type of the delaying enemy, and challenges viewers to actively upgrade their faith expectations rather than shrink them under pressure.
- Fuelcast Men's Ministry Explained
- Jesus in the Boat: Unpredictable Ministry
- Tug of War: The Enemy's Strategy of Delay
- Laban as a Type of Spiritual Delay
- Hebrews 11 and the Spectrum of Faith
- Faith Is Expandable — Upgrading Your Belief
- David and Goliath: Proving a Bigger God
Scripture in this episode
Episode Transcript
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Intro
Philip:Hello, my friend. Welcome to Daily Faith. My name is Philip Cameron and I am delighted to have you with us. I'm here to tell you that our purpose in any meeting that God puts in your life — the times I've met some of my mother just hitting me all the time when I was growing up — you can meet angels unaware, and some of the most important appointments of your life, destiny moments of your life, seemingly start out just innocuously and God turns them into one of the points of purpose in your life. And I believe today can be one of those points of purpose, one of those moments when God opens up his heart and shows you something that can change the course and direction of your life. Daily Faith is here to speak into your life, to believe with you for greater things than you've ever seen before. You have dreams and God wants to see them fulfilled.
Philip:I have a bunch of grandkids. I've got six grandkids now and they're running around here in the ministry. They come after school and the warehouse is packed right now with thousands upon thousands of coats and we're putting them all together to ship them to Ukraine. And I've got six grandkids, but I got four boys — Blair and Rowan and Callen and Wesley. They are like a tribe and right now they're having the most amazing time in our warehouse climbing over mountains of boxes and they've made little alleyways. They said to me the other day, let's play hide and seek, Grandad, and I says, where you're hiding I can't seek you because it's in between boxes that stand in between power. It's great to watch them.
Philip:And they have no idea that what they're doing is they're playing in their purpose. They're playing in the things that will bring destiny into their life. And I want to tell you something — in your life today, God's gonna purpose in that plan for you. Thirty-three years ago I was living in Montgomery, Alabama. I was in all the major television programs. I'd written a book called Household Salvation — Household Salvation is the book that we use. It's the same book because it's a reprint and we sold 300,000 copies of this book. Everything I'd wanted in my life I had. Everything. It was ridiculous how God just gave me the desire of my heart. And my dad called me and spoke to me about Romania, and I went there against my will and wishes and I found a little boy in a crib standing there starving.
Philip:And I had no idea that in trying to make my dad happy and please my dad — because he wanted to go to see this horrendous mess — and we brought tons and tons of food and clothes, I had no idea that I was playing in my purpose. That God had brought me to a point and he says, you don't know this yet, you don't understand where you are, but where you are, look around, because this is where you're going to be living for the rest of your life. And we are just astonished at what God has done with us over the last third of a century. It has been amazing to watch the hand of God move through us and our kids.
Philip:In fact, today in our ministry in Moldova, every one of the house parents of the homes in Vatra Village — we have a tremendous, beautiful place called Vatra Village where we take these kids out of the orphanage instead of having them put on the street and used by traffickers — they come to us. We've put them back in school and told them if you're born, God has a plan for your life. It is the most beautiful place — physically beautiful place — you've ever seen. The homes were built originally for rich people and there's the biggest lake in Moldova just a hundred yards away from it. And I know the builder who built it initially had no idea that he was playing in the purposes of God, that he would never finish the buildings, that he would end up having to sell them to us. And we finished them, and in those houses built for rich people, our young men and women today are finding out the purpose of God for their life. And it's just amazing how God has changed our ministry and their lives.
Philip:And by folk like you helping us — we've got a brand new video, when you look at it it'll give you an encapsulation of what God is doing in our lives. Watch this.
It never ends. Each part of our ministry is in constant change and evolution. When this year began, the orphan's hands could not see being involved in the desperate struggle brought about by a war in Ukraine. But we were ready. The years of caring, reading, loving broken lives allowed us to turn in a day to feeding refugees running for their lives. We evacuated our precious girls from our Odessa home and brought them, along with the others from Ukraine, to Vatra Village in Moldova.
We made space for them all in our hearts and home. As summer came, our kids shifted their focus to summer camps, going into poor villages and transforming young hearts — something they have done for many years. At the same time we conducted convoys of food to Kyiv, Bucha, and Odessa, keeping up the steady flow of help to those souls who could not leave. Putting in pastors' hands the supplies that became magnets drawing those in need to the church.
While they waited by the hundreds, the brave pastors shared the priceless gift of God's love. As the summer comes to a close, we are preparing Vatra Village to welcome 25 new young people. Six girls are coming from Ukraine to join us. As this war grinds on we expect many more. These lost kids don't know it yet, but they are about to come face to face with the loving Savior who will transform their lives with the hope of eternity. As we watch the seasons change, our heart aches for the mothers who worry about the deadly winter cold that moves ever closer.
Our Coats by Christmas challenge continues. It is our earnest prayer to provide thousands of warm coats, scarves, hats — anything that will keep families alive as they battle the bitter cold that is in Ukraine in winter. So as you can see, the orphan's hands remains committed to loving this world as Jesus would want us to do. We just need you to see and stand on the desire of God to feed, clothe, and care for the broken. Ask God what your part is to be, loving the world through the world's hands together.
Philip:The boy at the back of that video at the end of the video holding the puppy dog — his sister was in a home in Odessa, Ukraine, and when we had to evacuate them out of Ukraine to Moldova, she disappeared and we thought that she'd run away from the home because she didn't want to leave. And the next day she showed up with that little boy beside her. She says, this is my brother and if I'm going to be safe, can you please take him as well? And we said sure, he can come. And then another girl disappeared and came back with the mother that had abandoned her and says, can you take my mother as well? So they are all at Vatra Village right now and we are just amazed at how God has blessed and used our kids that were once the cast-offs of society. And God has put hope in their hands and in their heart and they are feeding and caring, as we speak, for the refugees in Moldova.
Philip:And also for the people in Ukraine — those convoys are key. They go down to Bucha and Kyiv where they're watching the missiles. I mean, I'm talking about the places you're watching in the news being bombed and destroyed as we speak, and they're down there and they feed and supply five church pastors in that area. And you saw a clip of a pastor preaching, and what happens is as the people come to gather to get their food, the pastors preach the gospel, share the gospel. I got a photograph yesterday of a thousand people standing waiting. We supply and help this ministry that provides bread and fish — cans of fish, which is a traditional meal — and a thousand people showed up yesterday to get some fish and bread.
Philip:You are part of this miracle if you care to be, and we're asking if you would help us. Your giving changes lives. We're looking for folk to help us supply these food convoys that go down to Ukraine. It costs $15,000 just to buy the groceries — not the fuel, not the vans, just for the transportation. It's a 12-hour one-way journey. It's dangerous. You've been watching the missiles and Putin has lost his mind. He's not winning the war, but Ukraine will never win the war, so they're grinding themselves to a stalemate. And Putin is withdrawing troops because his troops are getting slaughtered and now he's using long-range missiles and he can reach every part of Ukraine. Nowhere is safe.
Philip:The other day — it wasn't yesterday but the day before — I was told that Moldova has announced that they are starting a partial mobilization of all the troops. They can only say semi because they don't want to activate Russia against them. So pray, pray, pray with us. We are right in the middle of this. Our kids are going into harm's way to feed people, and I think if they're brave enough to go there, you and I can have enough courage to support them.
Philip:So if you'd like to help us, you can go to the address — it's very easy. It's either the Orphan's Hands or Daily Faith, PO Box 25, Clinton, Tennessee 37716. PO Box 25, Clinton, Tennessee 37716. You can go to our website, dailyfaith.tv — so easy to do this — dailyfaith.tv. And you can help us by giving a gift. Anything you can give helps us. Everything in Moldova has doubled in price since this war — doubled. Every food has doubled. We are spending thousands of dollars a month on bus tickets to get our kids from Vatra Village to all the schools and universities they go to across the city, and we just need folks like you to say, I'll be God's hand extended, I will help to make this miracle happen.
Philip:Those who give any gift — if you'd like to help us by giving a dollar a day, that is the mainstay, that is the lifeblood of what we do. I want to send you this book that I wrote telling the story of how I adopted Andrew, my son, who is now 36 years of age. We adopted him when he was three. That's how we started this ministry. This book is called Our Bummer Lamb. A bummer lamb is a lamb that's been abandoned by its mom, and if the shepherd doesn't intervene the lamb will be beaten to death by its own mother. And this book is mind-blowing. I read it — I reread it the other weekend — I thought, my goodness, the miracles of how he came into our lives and God was getting us to that point of special delivery, that unique place that he gets us to in our lives to utilize us for our greatest good for the kingdom of God.
Philip:And so please help us. We are living in desperate days in Moldova and Ukraine. Far more desperate than you hear in the news. Nuclear war is not a fantasy. People are preparing for it in that part of the world. It is desperately dangerous and we need you to help us. We're willing to go, we just need you to help us, and by doing so you can make a difference. The address is on the screen. The website is there. You can get in contact with me. But I want to get straight to my guest.
Philip:He's a friend of mine, a great friend of mine, just a man of God that has brought faith and power into my life, and I appreciate him so much. Derek Draughon, pastor of Saraland First Assembly in Saraland, Alabama. And he's also — I want you to do this today — I want you to go and find out on YouTube, Fuel Cast. He has the most crazy show. If you've got a man in your life, if you love your husband, tell them to watch Fuel Cast. This is a guy's show. I mean, he's in amongst all kinds of stuff. I don't know how he manages to get so much content. He blows my mind. But fuelcast.tv — www.fuelcast.tv — or if you want to go to YouTube, it's youtube.com/c/fuelcast. That sounds like a tongue twister. Derek, I am so happy to have you with us today. Tell us about Fuel Cast before we get lost in preaching — tell us what God's doing.
Derek Draughon:You know what, me and Courtney were actually talking about a little bit of that this morning. And it just — you know, we're not trying to create something new. There's a lot of great ministries out there that want to help churches start something like a ministry to men, but really Fuel Cast is about pouring the fuel on the fire. That's where the name actually comes from — pouring fuel on the fire of what God's already doing in a man's life. Now, we want to lead men to Christ, but most men have a knowledge — they just have a spark somewhere in their life and we just want to pour fuel on it. You know, I like my grill all the time and I get it going and sometimes I'll lean over in there and I'll blow on the coals to get it stoked up. But then sometimes I drag my air hose out of the shop and I put it in the grill and you talk about building a fire — and that's what we want to be for men's spiritual lives, is just that air of the Spirit that blows fuel into their lives. So that's really what it's about — getting the world, getting dirty, sweaty, greasy, and then talking about how it applies to our spiritual life. So that's Fuel Cast in a nutshell.
Fuelcast Men's Ministry Explained
Philip:I was watching the other day and I'm thinking — just the angle that you come at stuff — I was thinking, how on earth, and how it's presented, it's so wonderful. So please check out Fuel Cast with Derek Draughon and you'll be blessed by it. God's been doing great things with you and I know the church is in a great position going into the autumn for a harvest season. I believe that God works in harvest seasons and I sense that in my spirit. What is God been talking about in church recently?
Jesus in the Boat: Unpredictable Ministry
Derek Draughon:I'm gonna tell you what's really been on my heart. We seem to talk about Jesus in a boat every time I come on this show, but I was reading again the other day when he was in the boat with the disciples and there's a great crowd gathered. Here's a message for the church — there's a great crowd gathered, it looks like we ought to set up camp right here, and Jesus has the disciples take him in the boat and push off and leave the crowd. And I was just thinking, man, this is for the church going through a time of pandemic, going through wars in our world — that Christianity and ministry really is unpredictable. We want it to be predictable. We want to go to a conference and get a cookie-cutter idea and apply it to our church. And honestly, man, I've been to many conferences and brought back cookie-cutter ideas, and in our minds that's easy. And a lot of times it's just that we're worn out from it — me and you were talking about delay before we came on. A lot of times it's just that I'm worn out from that, so if I could just apply the cookie cutter to it. But Jesus never did that with the disciples. It was unpredictable. He gets them in the boat, he goes to sleep, a storm blows up.
Tug of War: The Enemy's Strategy of Delay
Derek Draughon:And I think the basis of that, Philip, and what's on my heart today for our viewers, is faith. Hebrews 11 — now faith is. How much more simple could the writer make it? He didn't give us a puzzle to figure out. He said now faith is. It's confidence. It's assurance. It's believing that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him. So ministry, living this Christian life, being a believer — I did a little reel this week talking about being a believer, because we all call ourselves believers. But the fact of being a believer is we've got to believe something, which means we've got to stand on it in faith. And when we call ourselves believers it means that we're going to stand on something in faith.
Philip:And that's what's on my heart today. Just that mindset of faith. As you're talking, a mental image came in my mind — back in Scotland we have Highland Games. In fact, we have some over here as well in the Carolinas. And one of the great fun events is the tug of war. And you have two teams and they're pulling this rope, and it seems that we're always in this tug of war. And one of the strategies of the opposition team — or the enemy, if you're going to call them that — is if they can hold the rope, they'll dig themselves in. The big guy in the back with the rope, he'll dig himself in and you'll see him pushing his feet into the soil and he'll scream, hold. And all that team — they won't be pulling to win, they'll be pulling to delay. And the other side will pull and try to break that grip that they have, but what's happening is they're exhausting themselves by delay.
Philip:And when the Lord — we were talking just earlier — Laban. Laban is a character in the Bible that's used two times that I can know of off the top of my head. And both times, when Rebecca met Eliezer and she brought him to her — it doesn't mention her father, Laban, her older brother — and he said to Eliezer, does this have to go now? Does it have to be now? When Jacob went to find Rachel, it was Laban, same guy, that said you're going to marry Leah first and you're going to have to work for her. And what the devil is doing in a lot of people's lives — he has got that rope and he's holding, hoping that we can exhaust ourselves in the pull and the struggle and the fight and the battle. And if he can hold us long enough — I was watching yesterday on TV and there was a guy doing arm wrestling. And he beat everybody and his secret was he held it. The other guy would be pulling and pulling and trying to get him over, and he had locked himself into this position until the guy exhausted himself, and then he won.
Laban as a Type of Spiritual Delay
Philip:And there are people today — Derek, in your life, in my life — there are things that I want to do for God that there's a delay put on it. And the devil knows that a delay is the same as a denial, because if you get tired enough and you weary enough in the battle, you end up saying, well, maybe it's just not the will of God. And I know watching just now, there are people that are watching us that the devil has got them in a delay. And my word and God's word for you just now is stay the course. Don't quit. I am not quitting today. Write this date down and say, I am not quitting today. And if you don't quit, the devil's gonna get tired and you're gonna win the tug of war that you're in right now.
Derek Draughon:That's it. That's it. I think what we have to realize with faith is faith is expandable. We're not limited in our faith. It is expandable. You know, I think about Jesus through the word and he dealt with different types of people. With the disciples in the boat that day he says, do you still have no faith? So he dealt with people with no faith. He talked to the disciples at one point — there was a young man, the man brought his son to Jesus, and he said, I brought him to your disciples but they couldn't heal him, and Jesus says, why do you have such little faith? And then he talks about those who have great faith. But do you remember the one man that came to him and he said, my servant is sick, and Jesus said, well, I'll go with you, and the man says, no, you don't even have to come, but just say the word.
Hebrews 11 and the Spectrum of Faith
Derek Draughon:I love that part of the scripture where he says just say the word. And what does Jesus say about that man? He says, I've never seen this kind of faith. So this whole level within the Christian spectrum — those who have no faith, now we're given a measure of faith whereby we can get saved, but then faith is expandable. And I'm telling you, Philip, as the church, as a believer, as a pastor, but beyond that as a husband, as a father, just as a man — I want to be a man that God would look at and say, wait a minute, everybody stop and look at Derek Draughon over here in Saraland, Alabama. I've never seen such faith. He says, I haven't even seen such faith in Jerusalem, which should be the house of faith. And I think we've got to find the expansion.
Derek Draughon:And when we go through those no-faith situations, Jesus needs to speak, so we've got to get people to Jesus. I think in little-faith situations we have to just stick it out, like you're talking about, and find more faith. And at every level I think there's a different attitude we have to have in order to expand our faith, in order to grow it. And we know faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God — not just the rhema word, the spoken word of God. We've got to expand our faith so that we can begin to see the things God believes for.
Faith Is Expandable — Upgrading Your Belief
Derek Draughon:I'm gonna tell you what my faith did this week. I believed for a certain airplane my whole life and I want to use it for ministry. But even outside of ministry, I just like planes. And I joke with my church all the time and I tell them, look, I'm not going to use y'all's money to get a plane unless you designate it — then that gives me legal reason to use it. So I kid with them about that. But my church prays with me about an airplane. They know the heart and the dream. But this week in my journal I changed my plane dream. The devil's delayed it long enough. He's delayed access — every time a plane gets close to me it's like the devil chops it and cuts it off, because he does not want that expansion in my life. So this week I just changed what plane I'm praying for and I upgraded it. And I told the devil, I said, you notice I'm not praying for that plane anymore — I'm praying for this plane now. I moved it from a Bonanza, which I absolutely love, to an Aero Commander, which is a twin engine, because I'm not going to let my faith suffer because the enemy's holding back on me. I'm just ready to expand my faith, and I think it is expandable, and I'm ready to get to the faith where Jesus says, I'm blown away by Derek Draughon's faith. I'm blown away by it. I've never seen faith like this.
Derek Draughon:And I guess that's a big statement — what it means to have expandable faith. So when you find Jesus you're given a measure of faith, but then it's up to us to expand our faith and believe. When David killed Goliath he did something that no other soldier in all of Israel could do. By the act of destroying Goliath he had the faith to kill the Goliath that no one else had. His brothers didn't, Saul didn't, no one else did. But it was the only way that this little boy could prove himself to all the armies of Israel that this God that I serve is bigger than the god that you're serving. It was the same God — he just had a bigger grasp of him. He had a great measure of faith.
David and Goliath: Proving a Bigger God
Philip:We're out of time, Derek. Thank you so much for being with us. I'm believing God with you for your airplane — a twin engine. I'm all for that. If you want to get a hold of Pastor Derek, the church is Saraland First Assembly in Saraland, Alabama. And I want you to go this week to his Fuel Cast show — it's called Fuel Cast, www.fuelcast.tv, or on YouTube you can find him there as well. Thank you so much for being part of this show and part of my faith growth. I love you, my friend. And thank you for watching Daily Faith today. We are here every day to speak into your life, expand your faith, in the name of Jesus. We'll see you again. Bye-bye.
For over 25 years the Cameron family has been changing the lives of orphans in Romania and Moldova — from providing running water, flushing toilets, and clean wells, to coal for heat, new windows, as well as food and clothing. They championed the physical needs of the orphans in these broken and desolate countries. Many of Moldova's orphans are saved from the horrors of trafficking through homes founded by the Camerons. And in the process, orphans become daughters and sons. They come to know their heavenly Father and are forever changed by the love of Jesus. God helped the Camerons lift these amazing young men and women out of darkness. Now no longer orphans, they want to return and invade that very same darkness with the light of Jesus Christ.
The Orphan's Hands equips these daughters and sons to become missionaries. Your monthly gift of $31 will allow us to rescue and take in more girls and boys, saving them from the hell of human trafficking. Your monthly partnership will allow us to care for those in the Orphan's Hands homes in Moldova and Ukraine. If you want to join Philip and Chrissy in taking care of these precious young people, please contact us today by calling 833-Daily-Faith. You can also give by going online to www.dailyfaith.tv or by writing to Post Office Box 25, Clinton, Tennessee 37716. So many lives depend on what we do. Thank you for loving the lost.
Topics
derek draughonexpandable faithspiritual delayfuelcasthebrews 11men's ministryspiritual warfare