7 Things I Learned In The Last 5 Years Of Ministry

God has every person who is honestly seeking Him, on the planet on a spiritual journey. He is teaching you something right now. And he’s taught us at this church so many things over the last 5 years. So we’re going to look at the top 7 things that I’ve seen God say to us over this period, and we’ll look at how it changed and transformed this body of believers for the better.

We start at the beginning.

I remember coming here in 2019 and being so afraid. I had never in my life experienced the kind of fear I had when I first came here. I was terrified. I didn’t know anyone. I didn’t know how to manage a staff or administrate or anything.

But God gave me courage, and taught me courage through that initial battle.

It reminds me of what God said to Jeremiah when he called him, “Get yourself ready! Stand up and say to them whatever I command you. Do not be terrified by them, or I will terrify you before them.” -Jeremiah 1:17

If I could give advice to any pastor or officer stepping into a new role, it would be this: Don't give up in those first few months. When you're afraid and it seems impossible, keep going. If you can push through that initial phase you'll be alright. It gets better. You'll feel faith and courage begin to replace fear and doubt.

I remember we started dinner church back in 2019 and suddenly we went from just a handful of people to about 30 people coming regularly. It was amazing. I was shocked. And we hadn’t really done that much. Sure we spread the work, talked to people during the week, handed out fliers, did posts on social media, but in the end God simply brought a family together.

If you don’t give up, you find your courage. God builds it in you as you refuse to stop. As you cling to His promises, as you keep showing up, the courage slowly forms.

I saw it in all our people, they slowly learned courage, from hiding their faith to speaking it boldly to the people around them. God taught us courage and it was amazing. We became a body of believers who wasn’t afraid to speak up for Jesus, and try different things, events, groups, and activities outside the box and the norm.

Second, God taught us the fear of the Lord.

Proverbs 1:7 ESV, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.”

There was this gift I found as a I studied the word, testimonies, near death experiences, the prophets, and as I studied about hell and what it is, I began to fear the Lord. And this changed my whole approach to everything I do in ministry.

I used to treat God’s commands as optional. Do it if you want to. Don’t commit adultery, nice suggestion. Don’t steal, nice suggestion. Isn’t that nice? And it shook me up, the fear of the Lord, to realize our God is a consuming fire, he’s not playing around, he is purifying us for heaven, because he loves us.

If you can accept it, embrace the fear of God, tremble at God, it helped me so much to find freedom.

It drew my wife to me, honestly, she knew many men who were “Christian” but it was all very casual, sort of something on the side, along with the porn and the selfish life, the gossip and the empty life. But Chelsey knew when she met me, that’s a guy who honestly fears and regards God and has a deep sense of, “I need to do what God wants me to do.” It’s not just some option near the bottom of a list, it’s the only thing.

What if you embraced that? What if you feared the God who can send you to hell for sin? How would that change your life?

I fear God. And that has been the greatest gift. Because when a temptation to sin comes into my mind, and they do for all of us, I fear God enough, to say no. Part of the love of God is the fear of God. It helps me stay on the right path when temptations attack. No, I fear the Lord, I know His power and that he’s not messing around.

Things that were going on in the background, in my heart, as a pastor, that didn’t belong there, things with lust, things to do with pride, things to do with showing off my own abilities, one by one they disappeared in the face of the fear of God.

Our church members began to take God’s commands seriously, they began to fear God and repent of sins in their lives. Gossip died down. Addictions faded away. God began delivering us from evils of the flesh. And it has been powerful.