Throwing in the towel?

I think honesty matters.  So I thought I'd blog about some of the frustrations of ministry which I've been experiencing over the last few months.  I'm hoping it doesn't come across as venting, that's not the aim, I'm hoping rather that it will encourage others that they are not alone.  I'm also not after sympathy, it has driven me back to old truths which I hold precious, I'm hoping rather to share what I have found helpful in the hope that it may provide some encouragement to others.

How do you deal with discouragement?  It's a question every pastor has to answer because we all experience it.  It is a question every church should have an answer too as well because it will come, probably again and again and again.  There are lots of discouragements in ministry: The couple who leave church because they want their kids in a better school and so are relocating.  The person who quietly points you to a better Tim Keller, or John Piper, or John MacArthur sermon than the one you just preached at the door after the service.  The person who regularly emails the whole church with any issue rather than coming to speak to the leaders.  Being told you can no longer use a venue because of what you teach.  The other pastor who discourages people from moving to serve in your church because you just can't offer what they can or because there is no one like them.  Being told that the church does not have a class problem in Britain.  Abusive and aggressive responses to either sermons or blogs that accuse you of being too liberal, too conservative, of being in danger of losing the gospel to social action, or of being a preaching church/pastor not a caring one.  Being stymied in your every attempt to buy a building or land.  Seeing little fruit in terms of the lost won for Christ.

Most of those are discouragements I've experienced, many of them repeatedly, others I anticipate facing.  How should we deal with them?  There is a danger that we go into hedgehog mode, we ball up at the slightest sign of discouragement and become prickly towards any and everyone - rejecting both help and harm.  Or at the opposite extreme we wall ourselves off, develop a Teflon coat, and resolve not to care/listen so that we don't get hurt and redouble our efforts in an 'I'll show them' recipe for burn out.  Neither of those are helpful, neither are godly.

I love and repeatedly come back to the story of Elijah post Carmel in 1 Kings 19 when I'm feeling discouraged.  I love the tenderness with which God treats him, I love the care you see lavished on him.  I also love Elijah's passion for God's glory that we see restored.  I think too there is much for us to learn from this.

We are meant to care about our ministry.  For those who charge Elijah with an unhealthy focus on himself.  Be honest with yourself, if we care passionately and invest in the ministry God calls us to, if we care for people and see them want to follow Jesus and grow as disciples then we are emotionally involved.  When someone we've been sharing the gospel with, or our children, reject Christ, or someone in leadership or in the church falls away, as Israel have, we do feel our ministry has been a waste of time.  It is Elijah's passion for God's glory that leads to his discouragement.

But God knows and God does something interesting.  What does Elijah need in this situation?  Notice God's wisdom he provides him with food and rest.  So often part of our discouragement is exhaustion, tiredness and that in busy seasons of ministry, intense pastoral situations, we don't look after ourselves very well.  God knows that spiritual warfare is exhausting and so he recharges Elijah's batteries with sleep and food (also a remind of past provision in difficulty).

Then God calls him to come into his presence and God's question "What are you doing here, Elijah?" It isn't a rebuke, it cannot be he has just led him there.  It is an invitation to speak his discouragement to God.  Elijah tell me what has led you here?  Too often we stew on our discouragements rather than pray to God about them.  God invites Elijah to speak and he listens.  And then God reminds him he is part of something bigger(v15-18) and gently corrects him, he is not alone, his passion is not misplaced, and God will be glorified and he will save.

Discouragement is real.  How will we deal with it?

Joy filler or killer, which are you?

Hebrews 13:17 is a fascinating verse.  "Obey your leader and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your soul, as those who will have to give an account.  Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you."

We have two choices when it comes to what sort of people we are in church, we are either burdensome making leadership hard and groan filled or we are a joy to lead.  But what does that look like?  How do I make leadership a joy for those in leadership in my church?  Let me make some suggestions:

1. Be there.  Your presence is a blessing and an encouragement.  It conveys commitment and that you appreciate all that they do and take your spiritual wellbeing as seriously as they do.  And that applies not just on Sunday's, endeavour to be part of a gospel or home group, be at prayer meetings.  As you do so you are inviting and enabling the leadership, and other people, to know you and care for you well.
2. Be engaged.  Engage with what the leaders are teaching from the Bible, ask them questions about it (leaders aren't afraid of this, they love it when people want to explore God's word, or even be clear in their minds on something that is just a bit vague after the sermon or bible study).  Engage with the direction the leadership are taking the church, question them about why they are making the decisions they are making and what they hope the outcome will be - convey that you have confidence in them but want to understand and support and get onboard.
3. Be Growing.  If you asked what leaders of churches want it is for people to be progressing in their faith, to be growing and changing as they wrestle to apply the gospel to every area of their lives.  If you want to make your leaders leadership a joy, to encourage them to keep going let them know where and when you are wrestling to apply God's word, or when it has encouraged you or challenged you and what you are praying the outcome would be.
4. Be giving.  Be giving financially to support the work of the church, the Bible calls us to do just that as an act of love in reasons to the gospel.  And not tight-fistedly but as generously as Christ has given to us.  Why not start with the tithe as a bare minimum and then challenges yourself to give more when you review it after 3 months?  Give of your time and gifts too, this shouldn't be done in lieu of financial support but alongside it.  Where can you serve, how can you be involved, how can you support, who can you encourage?  
5. Be fishing.  Be engaged with taking the gospel to your work colleagues, friends, family and neighbourhood.  Be that by starting an Uncover Bible study, bringing friends to services, serving the community in act of practical love or in any number of other ways.  But make Jesus mission your mission, not just the leaders.

Perhaps the negative is helpful.  How could I fill a leaders life with groaning?  Let me again make some suggestions:

1. Be sporadic.  Be infrequent never really committing so that no-one every really knows whether you are committed or not.  Be busy so that you dash in late and have to hurry away afterwards.  Be too busy to attend a home group and ensure that your children are so busy they can't really be involved or build good relationships.  That's bound to make your leaders nervous and concerned.
2. Be disinterested.  In part this will show in number 1.  But you can also be present but disinterested.  Approaching the pastor straight after the sermon finishes to ask him about his Fantasy football team, or to tell him of the interesting anecdote his first illustration made you think of is not encouraging.  Neither is texting, updating your status on Facebook, or playing clash of clans during his sermon.  Disinterest can also take the form of criticism or cynicism, that says no matter what you do I'm not inserted in following.
3. Be static.  Be totally uninterested in changing.  Show no interest in applying what you hear to life.  Or alternately if you are changing don't tell anyone or share what God is doing.
4. Be a consumer.  Don't support the church financial, or if you do make sure it's just a token offering.  Don't give anything whilst making the most of every opportunity you can to leech as much as you can from the church.  Give nothing by way of time and support.  Consume the teaching, send as many kids as you can to the youth work.  Criticise and tell the leaders of programmes other churches are running that fit just what you need and pressure them to start one just like that - though of course you're too busy to help with it.
5. Be insular.  Don't engage with the outside world.  Don't bring anyone to church ever.  Don't go along to support guest events let alone take anyone.  Don't be welcoming to visitors.  And if every you're asked let your leaders know evangelism is their job after all it's their church.

They are just a few ways we could encourage or discourage our leaders, I'd love to hear others if you have them.

Facing discouragement

If you are in ministry for any significant time you will come across discouragement.  Everything seems to be fine and then something happens which just sets back all the progress you feel that has previously been made. It may be a pastoral crisis, it may be illness, it may be someone leaving or moving, or it may be an accusation against one of the leadership.  However, discouragement doesn't necessarily follow any one of these, it is not inevitable.  But when it is more likely to hit is when there is a combination of some or all of these.  Or when there is just a growing feeling of helplessness, a lack of vision, or a frustration of vision which leads us to think that things are just pointless or hopeless.

There are a number of ways we react to discouragement depending on a variety of factors; age, personality type, outlook, health, tiredness, and circumstances.  We may get down, just struggling due to a lowness of spirit that leads to a lethargy, or we may get angry, bitterness invades our soul and effects everything manifesting itself in a resentment of others, a desire for sympathy and a criticism or blaming of other ministries.

I guess I write this because I know all of the above.  I recognise the sin that lies behind it; sins of pride, desiring reputation and significance, failing to trust in the sovereignty of God, having my view of what my ministry should look like rather than trusting God knows what he is doing.  My reason for writing this post is to try to think through how we help one another during these times, because in ministry in a fallen world we will face discouragement and I've found that people are singularly clueless in how to help me when I am discouraged.  In fact sometimes their "help" actually adds fuel to the fire of frustration and helplessness.

Here are some things that don't help:

• Sympathy - don't feed the monster.
• Platitudes - at least show you have experienced and thought about this and are dealing with a real hurting person who is personally struggling with real issues or simply shut up!
• Doctrinal lectures - the issue here isn't not knowing the truths it is a struggle to rub them into our lives, to see them in our situation.

Things that do help:

• Presence - isolation only magnifies things but presence, even if it is just silent presence, helps.
  
• Space - This may sound counter to the first help, but when discouraged we need time to process and do the talking to ourselves that needs to be done.
• Food - I'm not making this up.  When Elijah is discouraged God provides him with food.
• Rest - The second things God provides Elijah with is rest.  Sleep is restorative.
• Biblical narrative - it's helpful to spend time in God's word seeing how God deals with his discouraged servants.  So I've mentioned Elijah twice already from 1 Kings 19, just seeing how tenderly God loves and cares for him restores my soul, it reminds me God cares more about his mission than I do, and that he has plans to grow the gospel beyond my capability or ministry or lifetime.  That perspective matters both on God, self and ministry

Dealing with Discouragement

Discouragement is part of parcel of ministry, so how do we deal with it?  1 Kings 19 is such a helpful passage when we are feeling either elated by ministry joys (its a helpful reminder) or discouraged by ministry hardships.  Here's a recent talk I gave on the issue:

I'm sure you’ve seen quiz shows where they stop the action and ask ‘What happens next?’ Sometimes it’s helpful to do that with the Bible.

In 1 Kings 19 God’s people are ruled by evil King Ahab, ignore God and worship idols. God has disciplined them by withholding rain for 3 years so they turn back to him. But Ahab and the people have refused. So God through Elijah calls for a show down on Mount Carmel. In one corner is Elijah representing Yahweh. In the other; 450 prophets of Baal. Each builds an altar, puts wood and an offering on it but mustn’t light it. They’re to pray to their God and the one who sends fire from heaven to consume the sacrifice is the real God.

The priests of Baal go first, they pray, plead, shout, cut themselves, and dance from morning till evening but nothing happens. Why? Because Baal isn’t God. Then it’s Elijah’s turn, he rebuilds God’s altar, sets up the wood, cuts up the bull, then has 12 large jars of water poured over it all. Then he prays to God. And fire falls on the offering burning up the sacrifice, wood, stones, soil, and water. Israel fall down and say “The LORD, he is God!” and put the prophets of Baal to death, then Elijah prays and for the first time in 3 years there’s rain.

What happens next? You’d expect everything to change wouldn’t you? Ahab and Israel will turn back to God and Elijah and Ahab lead God’s people to live enjoying his rule.

But that’s not what happens. Ch19 focuses on Elijah. In a one on one with God we see God’s love and plans for his people and in dealing with his servants when we’re discouraged.

Be Passionate about God and his People

A survey of pastors asked; ‘what the best thing about their job was?’ The results were put into a top ten. What do you think was number 1? Seeing people change. My hunch is that’s why you do what you do; we love to see people trust Jesus, we love seeing people go on and grow as they’re changed by the gospel. It’s thrilling.

That was Elijah’s big hope and what he expected as he left Mount Carmel. Israel will change, things will be different. It’s what he’s been longing for, preaching for, praying for. His name means ‘Yahweh is God’ and that’s what Israel have just declared. Surely now everything will change, God is going to be glorified as Israel live serving and praising him.

But look at(1-2). Ahab tells Jezebel everything that happened, but she isn’t repentant, she doesn’t weigh the evidence and think wow Baal isn’t God and Yahweh is I better change. No, she ignores the evidence and sets out to kill Elijah. And that’s not a one off in the Bible, some people just won’t accept that God is God. And will do anything to crush those who say he is. Just think of North Korea or part of India right now where Christians are being killed for exactly that reason. We mustn’t be surprised when some people just won’t accept or even look at the evidence but react to it with aggression.

(3)Elijah sees what’s happening and runs away to Beersheeba, and then goes a further day’s journey into the desert. There he sits under a broom tree and prays “I have had enough, LORD... Take my life; I am no better than my ancestors.” That ought to shock us! God’s prophets aren’t meant to pray like this, I’m done, I’m finished, Lord kill me now. What’s going on?

Elijah isn’t despairing because Jezebel wants to kill him, he’s not afraid of dying or why would he ask God to kill him? Elijah’s in despair because Israel haven’t turned back to God. After Carmel Israel should’ve turned back to God, Baal should be finished, God’s people should be God’s people, revival should have broken out. But, Jezebel has just ignored it and Ahab and therefore Israel are just going to be led back into idolatry. ‘God, my ministry is a failure, just like every other judge, leader and prophet of your people, nothing changes, take away my life.’

Don’t read this through the filter of psychology, some people do, looking for signs of depression and diagnosing Elijah with all sorts of disorders. He doesn’t have our self-esteem hang ups. His name is his mission, and he’s devastated because even when it’s blindingly obvious to everyone that Yahweh is God Israel aren’t going to change. He thought Carmel was the key turning point but it was just a temporary high, nothing and no-one has changed.

Elijah is passionate for God’s glory and for his people, that’s what we’re meant to see, and he feels like his whole ministry is a failure. If they didn’t change at Carmel when will they?

We need not just to see Elijah’s passion for God and his people but to share it, the danger is discouragment saps that passion.

Have you ever felt like this? You share the gospel with a friend and they begin to respond, to see Jesus, to recognise their sin and they can’t make themselves right with God. They’re amazed at Jesus love in dying for them. But then something or someone holds them back from trusting him.

Or you’re studying the bible with someone and they are grasping it, it’s exciting watching them grow and change. Then suddenly the shutters come down and they make excuses as to why they can’t meet, and grow cold.

Or someone in leadership begins to drift; they close up, get into an unhelpful relationship, become distant, then irregular, then just disappear.

Or maybe it’s a low after a high. The term looked so good and promising; there is growth, people are engaging, unbelievers hearing the gospel, but then comes your Jezebel moment – your opposition that threatens to derail everything, and it can come from an unusual source can’t it. It can be a church or a leader or a Christian organisation, or even internal.

In each case we find our hearts breaking, we find ourselves discouraged, and yes sometimes we can find ourselves like Elijah saying ‘that’s it Lord I’m done, that’s enough.’ We don’t go as far as take my life. In fact we often don’t verbalise it at all, we just withdraw from sharing the gospel with people, from discipling, from relationships. Every disappointment, every person that drifts, every contentious issue seems to take a scalpel to our heart and cut it open a little more and the danger is we wall off our hearts so we don’t get hurt, don’t feel the disappointment.

The danger is a slow bleed of gospel joy from our lives. We’ve got a small leak in our central heating system. It’s nothing major, you just lose a little bit of pressure every day. It’s barely even noticeable. But if you leave it then the system will break, there will be nothing to pump round to keep the system going. Disappointment and discouragement is like that small leak.

We need to realise this if we’re to be sustained in gospel ministry: God doesn’t rebuke Elijah for his discouragement, rather as we’ll see God lovingly, graciously ministers to him in it.

But before we get to that can I ask; do we share Elijah’s passion for God’s glory and his people? And have discouragement and disappointment begun to do their deadly work of hardening you one slow leak of joy at a time?

Trust God and his plans

(5-8)God doesn’t tell Elijah off for running away, twice God provides food and allows him to sleep. It’s vital we get this; God is concerned with Elijah’s physical needs. God doesn’t want Elijah burning the candle at both ends to try to right the situation! He mustn't develop a 'Mini-Messiah complex'.  God provides physical rest and refreshment. Notice the food is described in detail, why? Because the angel prepares the same food(6) the widow prepared when Elijah was on the run from Ahab and Jezebel before. God provides and has a track record of protecting Elijah. God’s previous faithfulness and protection is supposed to provide a positive feedback loop to fuel Elijah’s bold ministry. And (7-9)the Angel feeds Elijah enough for a journey to Mount Horeb, God provides for his physical needs and leads him to where he’ll teach him about his plans and purposes.

What did you dream serving God where you are would look like? For some of us where we are doesn’t look like we imagined. We rarely dream of serving God in the ordinary and the mundane, or in the small and slow to change, or in the difficult and the opposed. We long for significance, we don’t dream of the slow, the hard and the steady.

But God teaches Elijah to trust him and his plans even if they don’t look like he imagined.

Elijah is led to Mount Horeb, or Sinai, as it’s sometimes called, his journey of 40 days and nights mirrors Israel’s journey to the Mountain where the covenant was made. His experience there also mirrors Moses seeing God pass by. It’s a deliberate leading by God to the Mountain of the LORD. And when Elijah gets there God asks (9) “What are you doing here, Elijah?” It seems an odd question, some argue it’s a rebuke, but it can’t be if God has led him there can it. It’s not a rebuke it’s an invitation; ‘Elijah share with me your disappointment and despair.’ Isn’t that encouraging, the Almighty God of the universe who knows asks Elijah to share what is on his heart, he doesn’t want any less from us. That is gracious loving care.

And Elijah does, he pours out his heart about how Israel have broken the covenant on the Mountain where the covenant was made, and how his ministry is a failure. His words(10) are primarily about God’s glory and Israel’s breaking of the covenant – they’ve torn down God’s altar, put God’s prophets to death, and rejected God’s covenant. And we hear the pain and despair Elijah feels in each charge.

And God listens. God doesn’t tell him to ‘Man-up!’ God graciously, tenderly and lovingly teaches and encourages him to see God’s plan. God appears not in the hurricane force winds, or the earthquake or the fire. But in the gentle whisper.

And God invites him to repeat his charge against Israel again. And just as God was in the gentle whisper, the quiet word, so God reassures Elijah that he is at work through his word, and that change will come as he keeps his word(15-19). It won’t be the spectacular that sees Israel judged for breaking the covenant, it won’t be the spectacular that leads the people to repent. But as God’s word works in ordinary ways. God tells Elijah to appoint Hazael, Jehu and Elisha who will act in judgement. And promises that there will be a faithful remnant who follow him.

Israel may not have turned at Carmel but God isn’t done with them yet. Elijah be encouraged and trust me.

But I want you to notice something else too Elijah is told to go back to where ministry is hard and keep going, to be link in the chain in God’s gospel project to the world he has called him to be. The revival he longs for won’t come through his ministry but through Elisha’s – whose name means God saves. Elijah is to prepare the way for those who will lead Israel back to God.

Don’t despair, don’t think you care more about God’s glory than he does. Don’t think you know what your role in God’s kingdom looks like better than he does. God has put you where he has put you to serve him. Don’t mortgage the present by longing for something more significant in your eyes, be the link in the gospel chain God has called you to be.

Where you are may not be as you imagined it but God has put you there to serve his kingdom and is working his purposes out. It may not look glorious and significant as you dreamed it would. And the temptation is to despair in the unspectacular, slow, steady, and opposed or maybe even to think of going somewhere else. You long for God’s glory and salvation to be known and realised but it doesn’t seem to be. God knows your longing for what he longs for, but he is working. 

Elijah lived his whole life longing to see God bring salvation, to see his glory, he never did in his lifetime, the temporary high on Carmel was as good as it got. But years later at the transfiguration he saw Jesus – the word made flesh, the Saviour of the world who would bring millions from every nation back to him, he sees the importance of his link in the chain. And the wonder of God’s salvation plan through the ages. God will fulfil every longing one day, we will see his glory, we will see the significance of our ministry, our link in the chain, in hard places for his glory and it will all seem worth it.

But as we labour, God provides, he doesn’t want us to burn out but to take time to be refreshed, he wants us to trust in what he is doing, to serve trusting, to serve reliant, and to come and speak to him about how we feel. Be it that we are at the top of Mount Carmel, or feel like we’re running from or facing down a Jezebel.

Discouragement

How do we deal with discouragement? Maybe its with a young couple for whom we had such great hopes or the person we've invested time in or someone who just doesn't seem to get the gospel, or maybe its in frustrations over practicalities? 1. Recognise reality Firstly we live in a broken world, sin affects everything we see around us. But it also affects us and our perspective - we have a tendency to make ourselves the centre of the world (at the very least if not the universe) and judge how everything impacts us. We also have a tendency to DIY-ism or wallowing in self pity. But I am not god, it is not my universe to command or to set up to bring 'me' glory. 2. Recognise our call As Christians we are sinners saved by grace who are being changed ministering to other sinners saved by grace who are being changed, or to a world which will not recognise grace. We are called to live now in the midst of this broken creation declaring the praises of him who has made us part of his kingdom. We are aliens and strangers, and we will long for our heavenly home. 3. Recognise our only hope That only hope is the gospel of Jesus Christ. God has revealed to us his plan of salvation throughout history, and it is our only hope. It is what we must go to when discouraged - I am not judged by my ministry successes or failings, or how others perceive me, I am not judged on my discouragements. I am God's loved and blood bought child. And so are others around me - and our job is to help one another recognise who we are where we live and apply our hope. Discouragement is in God's grand design yet another way of driving us back to the gospel.