We Must Wait on the Lord

A Chapter From My Upcoming Book -- Requesting Your Feedback

Good morning, friends!

I’ve been hard at work on my next book, Unless God Builds It: A Proposal to Radically Rethink the Church. It’s really starting to come together, and I greatly appreciate your prayers in that regard. This has been the most challenging writing project I can recall, but I’ve begun to discern that it’s some sort of spiritual warfare at play. However, the more I press into the Lord in prayer, the more I regain my conviction of how important I believe these concepts are.

Below is a chapter from the book that I would appreciate your feedback on. It is the foundation of the entire book (and, in a way, the spiritual life — as it pertains to resting from our works). It is the primary revelation that the Lord has used in my life to cause me to seek and believe for a better way of operating as the church, and it has led to innumerable blessings in my life.

The hardest part I found about writing this chapter was that I had so much to say and so many examples and testimonies to share. It honestly felt like this could have been an entire book on its own. Needless to say, I’m excited for you to read it.

I do recognize that most of my readers come from a traditional church setting, so I’m not unaware of how these things may be hard to hear/receive. I pray you can hear my heart, which I believe we share — that is, for the Bride of Christ to be fully mature. God is at work in all our midst, and if we’re humble to hear him, we won’t be offended by each other’s ideas, even if we ultimately end up disagreeing. This is my mindset — that each person is only responsible for being faithful to what they believe the Lord is stirring in them. We should fault no one for walking according to their convictions — even if their convictions are wrong — as long as they are humble and open to reason.

And lastly, if I didn’t respond to your feedback last time, my apologies. One or two of your emails went to spam, and then I accidentally deleted my spam folder. I’ll make sure not to do that again this time. Your feedback is genuinely very helpful.

God bless you all!

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In case you haven't noticed, we spend a lot of time, effort, and money on building the church. You may or may not be involved in much of it, but take a moment to try to conceptualize and appreciate the magnitude of resources devoted to it throughout the course of a week, month, or year.

Think of everything it takes to make it "run" — kids and youth ministry, small groups and discipleship classes, food and childcare, conferences and retreats, outreach and social events, board meetings and leadership trainings, websites and marketing, constructing and maintaining buildings, local charity work and foreign missions, equipping volunteers and managing church staff, choirs and worship bands, sermon-writing and pastoral care, seminary training and denominational oversight, countless books being written (and read), podcasts and videos being recorded (and consumed), and so on. It's a lot.

To start, let's not assume that any of this is inherently bad but at least ask the question: Is it working? After all this activity, does the church look like the church that God promised to build? Are we, God's people, bearing fruit like the Bible says we ought to? Are our lives being radically conformed into the image of Christ? Are we walking in unity, holiness, and love toward one another? Is Christ and his gospel being powerfully manifested to the world through our lives? Etc.

The answer to these questions are, of course, not a simple yes or no. But if we can at least agree that this is the goal, then how is all our activity helping us to reach that goal? Is the output worth the input?

Whenever I start poking around like this, someone invariably feels the need to defend the church, arguing that God uses all of these things, that he is at work in every church, and that it's offensive to suggest any otherwise. Allow me to clarify, then, that I agree. Therefore, this is an unnecessary contention.

However, God's use of something doesn't justify our use of it. God uses all sorts of things — indeed, all things — to bring about good for his children (see Romans 8:28). This includes cancer, car accidents, and horrific sins, which he redeems for his purposes. Shall we then employ such methods ourselves, weaving them into the fabric of our church model on the sole basis that God uses them? Most certainly not. So, please — let us not be childish. We can recognize that God uses something — rejoicing and giving him glory — all the while being free to discern whether it deserves a place in our ministry, whether it is a part of his intended design for this house that we're helping him to build.

This is how I view the church today. I sincerely give thanks to God for all that he has done and continues to do through the Body of Christ everywhere. I myself have been greatly blessed by the people and ministries of the church that I left before starting a church in my home. However, I have my doubts that the traditional way of doing things is the best way to achieve our common goal. It's not that I don't see any fruit but that I believe the fruit is often in spite of all the hustle and bustle, and is the simple result of the fact that God is good and has poured his love into the hearts of many faithful servants — two things that will remain the same no matter how we proceed. If this is true, I argue that much of our activity and expenditure is actually in vain, or worse, counterproductive to our shared mission.

So then, can we have a family discussion without taking offense? Can we challenge each other's ideas and ways without questioning each other's hearts? I believe we can and we must.

Do We Really Need More of the Same?

This is where a lot of books would recite to you some church statistics — like rates of divorce, addiction, and mental illness among Christians. They would paint a grim picture of the state of Christianity today, highlighting the high percentage of leaders who experience burnout or suffer some moral failure, of missionaries'/pastors' kids who end up resenting God and turning away from the faith, of Christians who feel isolated or hurt by the church, and so forth. And then they'd say, "Don’t you see we have a problem? Something needs to change."

I don't disagree, necessarily, but something I've always found interesting about the data is the fact that I've never needed it. I appreciate that it confirms what I already knew (more-or-less) to be true. But just as I don't need numbers to prove that the sky is blue, nor do I need them to tell me that most Christians' experience of Christianity is at least somewhat (if not very much) disappointing compared to the biblical vision for Christianity. All you need to do is take a step outside, look up, and if you're not blind, you'll see it.

Forgive me for my crassness. I only say it this way because I want to appeal to something deeper within you than your intellect — that is, your spirit. I am appealing not to reason but to your spiritual intuition, which God has given to you via his Holy Spirit. If you feel that you need the statistics, then you can find them quite easily yourself, but I don't actually think you need them. And, I fear, if this is your compass, there will always be a way to justify whichever conclusion you prefer.

But if you know much at all about God's desire for us to walk in love, holiness, power, and unity, then you know what I'm talking about at some level. You feel it deep within you, for the Spirit testifies that what we're doing isn't working exactly like it's supposed to. If you're a Christian — looking to the Spirit of God within you, reading your Bible, and humbly observing the church as we know it — then I believe you will ultimately discover the same discomfort that I felt for years and the same earnestness I feel today for reform.

You may very well like your church and perceive that God is doing many good things through you and the people there. Again, I don't doubt this, but this could just as well be in spite of all your activity and not the result of it, which is the point I'm trying to convey.

More importantly, this isn't just about you being happy with what your church provides to you. It's about every single person who becomes a part of your Christian community being radically conformed into the image of Christ. That's the goal, and 2,000 years in, we're nowhere near reaching it.

Then what's the solution? Is it more teaching or more evangelism? Is it better sermons or better music? More employees or volunteers? Better marketing strategies? Better hospitality, better programs, or more outreach? Bigger buildings, renovated buildings, prettier buildings, simpler buildings? Is it more inspiration, more conferences, more training, more small groups? Do we need to plant more churches, learn new strategies, or start more ministries? Do we just need to get more people to do more of the same things?

I'm not convinced that we do, but most churches continue to operate as if these kinds of things will make the difference, just in greater measure or a slightly better variance. Again, none of these things are inherently wrong, but it's becoming increasingly evident that our reliance on them is delusional. If "more" was the solution, I think we'd have seen a visible difference by now — not just in your life or your church but in the church.

Therefore, however counterintuitive it may seem at first, I'd like to propose an alternative solution: We don't actually need to do more; we need to begin by doing less.

Kill the Engines and Catch the Wind

Most churches today function like a cruise ship. God gives us a destination, and then we fire up our manmade engines, ripping through the waves without regard for the wind. "We'll get there," we reason, "because God has told us to go there and has given us the means to do so." But days turn into months, months turn into years, and it's questionable whether or not we've arrived. Yet we continue to burn fuel and pay the crew, feeling like we're accomplishing something.

Don't get me wrong — God has, indeed, given us a destination and the means for getting there. However, the part we've missed is that the means for getting there are not the engines (which we can start at will) but the wind (which we cannot control). Thus, his design for the church is not to be a cruise ship but a sailboat, which has no other option than to wait for the wind to blow.

In this analogy, the "wind," of course, is the Holy Spirit, who blows wherever he wishes (John 3:8), and the "engines" are all the ways and wisdom that we employ apart from the Spirit because we don't like to wait. When I talk about "waiting," I'm talking about praying and believing that God will act. And if we really believe that he'll act, it keeps us still until he does.

Our propensity to rely on our own abilities to get somewhere can be seen in every area of the church. Our base assumption is typically that if we don't do something, it won't happen (and/or that if we do something, it will happen). This mindset breeds self-reliance and unrestful action. The truth is, however, that if God doesn't do something, it won't happen (and/or if God does something, it will happen). This mindset breeds God-reliance and rest. Hence the following scripture:

Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain. It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved sleep [or while they sleep]. (Psalm 127:1–2)

With this in mind, try asking the following questions to yourself and/or your church:

If we don't have a church calendar that ensures we preach through the Bible in some certain order, do we trust that God will still teach us and lead us through the scriptures (better than if we do it our way)?

If we don't have a denomination or a statement of faith, do we trust that God will protect our doctrine and lead us into unity (the kind of unity we've never truly been able to achieve)?

If we don't have kids and youth ministries, do we trust that God will still take care of our children and instruct them in his ways (better than we know how to)?

If we don't have prayer and deliverance ministries, do we trust that God will cause prayer and deliverance to occur organically within our midst (and that it will be exceedingly powerful)?

If we don't create a small-group ministry, do we trust that the Spirit will lead people to form intimate relationships between the people in our church (that will bear greater long-term fruit and multiplication)?

If we don't have a hospitality team, do we trust the Spirit to demonstrate the gift of hospitality through various members of the Body (in a more meaningful way that if we try to make it happen)?

If we don't send anyone to seminary, do we trust that God will still equip people for ministry (and far more so than seminary would equip them)?

If we don't have any appointed elders/overseers/shepherds, and we don't immediately appoint any, do we trust that God will raise them up in our midst at the right time (and that they'll fully meet the biblical qualifications of eldership)?

If we aren't currently sending out people to preach the gospel or hit the mission field, and if we don't make an active effort to do so right now, do we trust that the Spirit will send and equip people in time (and that they'll evangelize with much greater effectiveness than if they went today in their own strength)?

If we don't have rules about who can speak and when they can speak in the our weekly gathering, or if we don't have a pre-scripted agenda for it, do we trust that God will keep it orderly and productive (and more so than it would be otherwise)?

If we don't consult with other books, do we trust that God will teach us and lead us into the truth (far deeper than if we rely on our own intellect)?

If we don't give that semi-annual tithing sermon, do we trust that God will still provide what we need?

If we do nothing but pray and wait on the Lord, do we believe that God will be faithful to build his church?

If everything we’ve built were to start falling apart in front of our eyes, do we trust that God will rebuild something that can never fall apart?

Let us make up our minds about it — God has promised to build his church, and we can trust him to do it! Jesus said to Peter, "[O]n this rock I will build my church…" (Matthew 16:18, my italics). The writer of Hebrews said, "For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God" (Hebrews 3:3). The apostle Peter said, "[Y]ou yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house" (1 Peter 2:5). The apostle Paul said, "In [Christ] you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit" (Ephesians 2:22).

When King David finally found a bit of rest from his enemies, the first thing he thought to do was build a temple for God. He told the prophet Nathan of his ambitions, and Nathan affirmed him (presumptuously). But that night, God said to David, "Would you build me a house to dwell in?... [T]he LORD declares to you that the LORD will make you a house… I will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come from your body [i.e., Christ], and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name…" (2 Samuel 7:5-13, my italics).

The Bible is clear on this fact. We are not the builders of God's house. He is. And while he definitely intends to use us for this task, the only way we become useful to him is by relying on him, by depending solely on his Spirit. Hence, Jesus says: "Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing" (John 15:5).

We therefore must come to terms with the futility of our self-supplied efforts and our human wisdom, no matter how good our intentions are. In Psalm 20:7, David wrote: "Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the LORD our God." In the same way, we need to stop trusting in our "engines" — those things that make us feel productive and powerful — and start trusting in our God. As Moses told the Israelites who had their backs against the Red Sea, "The LORD will fight for you, and you have only to be silent" (Exodus 14:14). Once we see this, we will strive for one thing — "to enter that rest" (Hebrews 4:10). We will finally be still and know that he is God (Psalm 46:10). From there, and there only, we will start to bear fruit.

It's here — in silence and rest, in abiding and waiting — where God alone gets the glory, where no one can say that they built it, and no one can deny that God built it. We could argue all day about whether or not the Lord is the one who built your ministry or my ministry — whether he's the one inspiring and empowering all the things we do — but there's only one way to be sure: Stop. Rest. Wait. The only way to prove that God himself has been watching over the city is to put it in his hands and get your sleep. If you arise from your rest to find the city destroyed, then you'll know that your labor was in vain, that the only thing keeping it together was your restlessness. But if you arise to find it holding together — and not only that, but flourishing — you'll have greater confidence than ever before that God is truly the one watching over it.

Only by living this way can we look back on our lives, look back at what we've built and claim truly, "God built it", for it is not humanly possible to keep watch over this size of a city or to build a house this spectacular, and to sleep the way we slept.

This is how God gets the glory.

It is not that we do it in our own strength and then dedicate it to God. It is not that we do it ourselves and then simply give credit to God, "humbly" ascribing it to him. It's not even that we ask God to help us, and then go about doing it. It's that based on what we've witnessed, there is no other sensible conclusion than that God has done it. It's that no human concept of what's possible would describe what we've built. It's that, in sheer appearance, as a matter of fact, an outsider must conclude that something they cannot explain has taken place.

That is how God gets the glory.

Man can build cathedrals, denominations, seminaries, and ministries of all kinds. Man can also write sermons, start podcasts, gain large followings, and organize their followers in various ways. If we're honest, there is nothing about these things that inherently declare the glory of God, for there is nothing about them that necessarily require the power of God.

But to desire the glory of God is to long for the impossible. It's to desire to build something that cannot be built without the power of God. It's to refuse to rely on one's own strength — not out of laziness or apathy but out of zeal, understanding that there is no other way. There is only one way to become a thriving church, and that is to wait on the Lord.

This does not necessitate that we remain still (outwardly) forever — only long enough to see God beginning to move us. It isn't that we should be against doing things — only doing things in vain. And the only way to know that our work is not in vain, the only way to be sure that God himself is the one empowering it, is to kill the engines, making rest our constant disposition. Then, if the ship begins moving while we're at rest, we will know it's not us but the Spirit of God.

Ishmael and Isaac

There is one Old Testament story that I think conveys this idea better than any other, and it's the story of Abraham's two sons — Ishmael and Isaac.

Abram (later renamed Abraham) — was seventy-five years old with no children when God promised to give him a son (see Genesis 12:1-3; 15:2-6). But ten years later, his wife, Sarai (later renamed Sarah), had still given him no children, and she herself was now seventy-five years old. Concluding that God had prevented her from bearing children, she instructed her husband to go into their servant, Hagar. From this action, he received his first son, Ishmael (see Genesis 16:1-16).

Ishmael, however, was not the son that God promised. And thirteen years after he was born, God visited Abraham again to tell him that the son of the promise would surely come through his wife, Sarah, who was now ninety years old (Genesis 17:16-21) and past menopause (Genesis 18:11).

Both Abraham and Sarah disbelieved at first, for obvious reasons (Genesis 17:17-18; 18:12-15). In natural terms, this was not possible. But then, that's exactly the point. God would leave no room for doubt that their son was God's doing, not man's doing. And so, by the power of God, Isaac was born (Genesis 21:1-7).

Now, as Paul says, "this may be interpreted allegorically: these women are two covenants" (Galatians 4:24). Hagar represents the old way of life — under the law, according to the flesh, where the fruit and promises of God are dependent on the strength and will of man. This way of life is defined by vain labor, anxious toil, and (as God designed it) is doomed to fail. Whatever it produces is not the real promise, but must be sent away like Ishmael was sent away (Genesis 21:10-14).

Sarah, on the other hand, represents the new way of life under grace, according to the Spirit, where the fruit and promises of God are dependent on the strength and will of God. This way of life is defined by fruitful labor, born out of faith and rest, and (as God designed it) is destined to succeed. Whatever it produces is the real promise and remains forever (Genesis 17:19).

Now, do you see how this applies to the church?

Let us view Abraham as the Christ figure, the one who carries the seed that will bless the whole world. As such, let us view Sarah as the church (i.e., us), for she is his bride. From our union, God promises miraculous fruit, multiplication, and blessing to the whole world. However, as time has gone by, as we have waited on the Lord to fulfill his promise, we have grown weary. We have stopped believing that the Lord will do it. But instead of admitting that we stopped believing, we changed the definition of what it means for God to "do it."

We have acted like Sarah, who said: "Go in to my servant… that I shall obtain children [in Hebrew: be built up] by her" (Genesis 16:2). Notice what she desires — that is, to "be built up". These words are prophetic, pointing toward the building up of the church. Therefore, just as she demands that Abraham build her up by going into her servant, Hagar, so we tell Christ to go into our ideas and our efforts, intending to be built up this way.

When it results in something merely resembling what God promised, we declare that we've received the promise. Just as Sarah could look at Ishmael and say, "See, God gave us a son, just as he promised to do," so we look at the church and say "See, God built this church, just as he promised to do." But the truth is, though God did bless Ishmael, Ishmael was never was the promise, and neither is much of what the church is producing today, despite that God still blesses it.

Preaching in Vain

Until now, I understand that this concept may seem a bit vague. Perhaps you are thinking: What exactly does he meaning by "waiting on the Lord"? What does it practically look like to do this, and how would it change the way we operate? This can be easily illustrated with a real-life example.

In the traditional church model, I had regular preaching responsibilities on Sunday mornings. Despite always seeking the Lord for his help with writing a message — meaning in prayer, usually for many hours — I would often find myself without any real inspiration. And yet, I had to preach anyway, for that was everyone's expectation. It's what I was hired to do, and it was not acceptable for a teaching pastor to come without a message on Sunday, let alone to make that a regular practice.

So, what did I do? If the wind wasn't blowing (i.e., if the Spirit wasn't giving me a message), I turned on my engines, using the abilities of my flesh to get the job done — whether that be my intellect, my Bible knowledge, my creativity, my work ethic, etc. Sometimes the Spirit was putting something on my heart, but it was only a 2-minute message, not a 30-minute message. In these instances, I still felt the need to conjure up more content (that the Spirit didn't give to me) in order to make the sermon a more acceptable length.

The scary but obvious truth is that it doesn't take the Holy Spirit to write a sermon. People without the Holy Spirit write speeches all the time, and they can be highly motivating, too. But only the Holy Spirit can build up the church so that it bears lasting spiritual fruit, and only the Holy Spirit knows what God's people need to hear on a given day. On a very practical level, then, what I wanted was the freedom to not preach when the Lord wasn't stirring me, even if that meant the church didn't get a sermon that day. What I needed was a system or structure that actually encouraged the practice of waiting on the Lord, not discouraged it. For this reason, I began to deeply question why we structure the church and its gatherings in such a way to put pastor's in this position.

You may think it is irrelevant that I wasn't feeling "stirred" sometimes and that I went about it this way. It was my job to do it, regardless of how I felt about it on a given day or week. But you see, that's where you've got it wrong, fundamentally. You're mistaken about the role of a spiritual leader and the way God intends to build his church.

A true spiritual leader isn't one who goes through the motions, who musters up his own strength and resorts to using his own knowledge whenever God doesn't provide him what he thinks the church needs. Even if he is trying to serve the church, a true spiritual leader knows that this doesn't actually serve the church but teaches the church a way that is not from God. A true spiritual leader does not eat the bread of anxious toil; he learns the way of bearing fruit while at rest. A true spiritual is one who demonstrates the Way — always resisting the ways of man and insisting on the ways of God. He proves through his life to those whom he leads that God is faithful to build his church even when we, individually, don't feel like we have anything to offer. Therefore, by his lived example — not merely through good sermons — the true spiritual leader teaches everyone around him to rest and believe and depend on God at all costs. In this way, and in no other way, both him and his followers bear fruit.

Now, compare what I've just described to the last five years of my life in the house church. From the outset, this was one of the things I was most excited to change. Never again would I live under the pressure of having to conjure something up that the Spirit wasn't providing to me. I became determined to practice total dependence on God, which meant that if I wasn't feeling empowered or inspired to speak, if I didn't believe that God was giving me anything to say, then I would not speak. If God put a scripture on my heart but gave me no teaching, then I was free to read the scripture to the congregation without giving a teaching. If God gave me a two minute mini-sermon, then I was free to teach for only two minutes, thereby always operating in a state of empowerment — never experiencing burnout, yet bearing fruit.

No longer was I required to spend hours upon hours putting a sermon together to meet others' expectations. I cannot tell you the last time I spent more than 30-60 minutes "preparing" for a teaching, and even then, I'm not usually writing anything down but simply having a conversation with God. There is no part of my job description that requires me to give a sermon each week. My job description is (unofficially) to rely on God and teach others to do the same.

Just to clarify, I'm obviously not opposed to the hard work of putting together spiritual teaching in a way that is didactic, comprehensive, cohesive, and ultimately helpful to the Body of Christ. Or else I wouldn't be writing this book (which I am, by no means, writing spontaneously). The question is, can a shepherd justify spending even one minute of his time writing a sermon (or doing anything) about something that God is not powerfully stirring within his heart. I don't think so. All effort that is not born of the Spirit and sustained in the Spirit is, by definition, anxious toil and vain labor.

At the end of the day, preaching and teaching effectively doesn't depend on going to seminary and taking an exegesis or hermeneutics class. It doesn't depend on being a naturally charismatic speaker. It doesn't depend on countless hours of preparation, planning, and study. It depends on learning the ways of God to rely on his Spirit, such that you always have exactly what you need. And here, it is safe. Here, one does not speak about something they don't actually know. One does not move beyond where God is moving within them. One does not become a play actor or a hypocrite, speaking on holy things with a seared conscience because they're not living up to the standard. Here, one can only operate in the grace that is being given to them for that day and time. And as one grows faithful in operating this way, the grace they've been given multiplies.

At Odds With the System

So far, I've only provided the one example about preaching, but this principle can be applied to just about everything. One memory that has stuck with me for years is what I experienced my first day on staff at a church.

I was hired, in part, because I was already doing quite a bit of ministry — leading small groups, discipling men individually, preaching occasionally, and things like that. All of these were things I felt the Lord empowering me to do outside the confines of my nine-to-five job. But during my first day on staff at the church, I remember sitting down in my office, opening my laptop, and feeling the new sensation of having to figure out how to fill my day with "ministry." Now, all of a sudden, my way of approaching ministry had to change. No longer could I do it strictly as the Lord was leading, but even if/when he wasn't leading, I still felt the pressure to fill my time with whatever type of activity justified my pay.

It's important to note that my superiors at the time (whom I still deeply love) are Spirit-filled believers who always encouraged me to spend time on the clock in prayer, and they regularly did it with me. It wasn't that there was a lack of effort to be a Spirit-led church. In fact, there was considerable effort put toward that end, and more than most churches, as far as I'm aware. However, in spite of the desire to be that kind of church, I personally found the unspoken pressure to "do" and "prove" and "move" too powerful to keep me (and all of us) from actually waiting on the Lord as long as was needed. I'm sure others may see it differently, and that's okay. But this is sincerely what I believe was the case.

If waiting on the Lord was our constant practice — i.e., to not do anything except pray until God moved us and gave us total agreement about how he was moving — how long would it take before we started seeing results? Could we risk the possibility that it would take much longer than expected? What would people think about how we were spending our time, if we didn't have any immediate and visible results? What would they think if no one on staff had a sermon to give for weeks or months, if the worship leaders didn't have any songs to sing, if the kids didn't have a Sunday school lesson? What would people think if we started killing the ministries that we realized we'd been doing in our own strength? What might be the ramifications of all this? People leaving? Losing tithes? Losing the building? Losing our jobs?

You get the idea. This system most Christians are operating within has them captured in a way that even the leaders have never fully comprehended. Only when you fully embrace the practice of waiting on the Lord can you begin to see how the system inherently works against this practice — for it demands that you move even when God isn't moving you. Those who are highly involved in their church, or very active in ministry — if they begin practicing waiting on the Lord, they will likely feel that they're swimming upstream.

This was, above everything, the main reason that I left the system. My deep sense of urgency to wait on the Lord put me at odds with its expectations and demands. I didn't know how to continue in it without tearing it all down, which I didn't have the heart or the authority to do. But I felt God calling me to go learn a different way and to see if that way was viable. Thankfully, it is.

When I started the house church, the first thing I set out to do was wait on the Lord. This means that for many weeks, I spent most of my days in prayer and intercession. I spent hours and hours each day sitting in the same light-blue sofa chair, seeking God for some type of movement that I couldn't deny was him. This culminated in the most powerful spiritual experience I've ever had (which I'll describe in a later chapter), and it dramatically changed the course of my ministry, equipping me in ways I didn't know that I needed to be equipped.

Since the inception of the house church, I've continued to function this way in all things. I could go on and on with examples of how waiting on the Lord has changed the way that I go about ministry (or, honestly, the way that I go about anything). But the point is that God has proven to me, time and again, that he moves when we wait, and the result is always better than if we move ourselves.

So then, what does this mean for you or your church? Well, as I said in the beginning, I'm not Holy Spirit. I can't tell you when God will move you or in what direction, but I can tell you for certain that God will move if you wait on him. I can't tell you how God will lead you to build the church — it may look different than me — but I can tell you that he will build the church if you wait on him. And the fruit you bear — which will be far greater — won't be because you toiled and labored and spent yourself for him, but to the contrary, because you rested from your works and trusted in him, ceasing to put any trust in the flesh.

Therefore, stop trusting in the ways and the wisdom of men. Regarding everything you do you, start asking, "Is God empowering this?" because if he isn't, then your labor is in vain. If you don't believe that he's empowering something, then quit it, kill it, cut it off, and trust with your whole heart that he will provide you the supernatural means to do something better.

Today, remember his promise that if you learn from him, you'll find rest for your souls (Matthew 11:39), all the while being exceedingly more fruitful than you ever could be otherwise. Let this be your compass, to know whether or not you've learned his way. Hold on to this promise as you hold on to Christ, for it is the life of God that he wants us all to know. It won't be without trial, but each trial is simply to teach us to "rely not on ourselves but on God" (2 Corinthians 1:9), who alone can build his church.