Peter Witkowski Discipleship

God’s Stirring: The Primary Means of Church Growth

Vanishing men’s breakfasts, shrinking children’s classes, and plummeting worship attendance often drive local church members to despair and then to complaints. They assert that their church would be growing if only their leaders were more relevant, if their fellow members would do more, and if their facilities were nicer. In short, they complain because they believe the solution to their church’s woes lies in the power of other men and women.

How God Worked in Ezra

Though such thinking pervades local churches, it does not align with the realities of Ezra chapter one. The book about the restoration of faithful worship after seventy years of desolation attributes that revival of true worship to the stirring of the Lord. Ezra 1:5 reports, “Then rose up the heads of the fathers’ houses of Judah and Benjamin, and the priests and the Levites, everyone whose spirit God had stirred to go up to rebuild the house of the Lord that is in Jerusalem.” God brings about and expands worship through his sovereign call.

What was true of temple worship proves true of new covenant church worship. God builds his church through the stirring of his people to action. Commenting on his church planting and evangelistic ministry, the Apostle Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 3:6: “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth.”

Pray for Stirrings

When church attendance sags and ministries dry up, men and women should first and foremost take their concerns to the Lord. Instead of complaining to their friends or attempting to guilt the bottom tier of the church’s roles into action, believers should implore the Lord to stir them, their fellow church members, and their unsaved neighbors to action. As J.I. Packer notes, “This is the universal rule, in evangelism as elsewhere. God will make us pray before he blesses our labors in order that we may constantly learn afresh that we depend on God for everything.” In other words, Christians should pray that the Lord would stir the lost out of Babylon and into their local church through the waters of baptism. Christians should pray that the Lord would stir their fellow church members to be done with pornography, greed, and anger. They should ask the Lord to raise up the elders and deacons that the church needs to care for the saints. They should ask the Lord to stir up older women to disciple younger women, to stir up men to evangelize their neighborhoods, and to stir people of all ages to serve in the nursery. They should pray to the Lord who builds his church.

At times the growth will be slow and almost unnoticeable. The nation of Israel waited seventy years for their restoration. Our prayers too may have to span generations. But the Lord will answer. The gates of hell will not prevail. Though our local churches may come and go, the great church triumphant will never disappear and will be forever renewed in local assemblies until all are gathered to Jesus in the unending worship of the new heavens and the new earth. Pray for the Lord to stir, for he will not abandon his church.

Act on the Stirrings

Second, church members should follow the Lord’s stirring. Those who long to see their churches revived must join with the Jews of Ezra’s day and go rebuild their church as they are able. They must respond to the Lord’s stirring and put sin to death when their consciences convict them. Following the Lord’s leading, they should pursue righteousness and knowledge so that they can be qualified to lead their church and to disciple their brothers and sisters in Christ. They should follow the Lord’s stirring and invite their neighbor over for dinner and begin a relationship that will facilitate the sharing of the gospel. Those who are stirred to see more children in the church should begin volunteering in the nursery or teach a children’s Sunday school class. Those stirred to give to the church should increase their tithe and support of gospel ministry. Those who truly long to see their church grow and the worship of the Lord expand will ask the Lord to stir and also act on his stirring.

Test the Stirring

However, not every idea that pops into a believer’s head should be equated with the Lord’s divine leading. To determine an idea’s or a stirring’s source, the believer must ask and answer two questions. First, he should ask, “Does this idea or desire align with the clear teaching of Scripture?” The Lord stirred the Jews toward Jerusalem because he had promised to bring them back to Jerusalem after seventy years of desolation (Jer. 25:11–12; Dan. 9:1–2). Consequently, the man stirred to confess his sins to a trusted mentor should do so and turn from his sins. The woman stirred to divorce her husband because she finds him boring has not been stirred by the Lord and should not act on those stirrings.

Secondly, the believer should ask, “Has the Lord given him the skills, the station in life, and the resources needed to accomplish this stirring?” When God sent the Jews to Jerusalem, he sent them with the resources needed to accomplish the rebuilding of the temple. As Ezra 1:6 notes, “And all who were about them aided them with vessels of silver, with gold, with goods, with beasts, and with costly wares, besides all that was freely offered.” Consequently, if a man feels called to go on a mission trip that will cost him his job and his ability to provide for his family, he should not go. He lacks the resources. But if the man feels stirred to have his neighbor over for dinner to share the gospel, he should work with his wife to put that dinner on his calendar. Similarly, if a woman feels called to give a large sum of money to her church’s building fund but would have to take out a loan to cover her gift, she should not follow that stirring. The Lord has not blessed her with the ability to wisely fulfill her desire. Conversely, if she receives an unexpected bonus and is stirred to give some of that as a special offering to her church, she can and should give in accordance with her resources. God provides his people with the resources they need to follow his stirring.

Final Thoughts

Though Christians can be tempted to view the rebuilding or revitalization of their church as the work of others, Ezra 1 presents a different narrative. The Lord rebuilds his church through the stirring of his people to action. Those who long to see their church renewed so do two things: pray that the Lord stirs his people and then follow the stirring of the Lord. The Lord must build the house.

Peter Witkowski Discipleship

Building Back Better: Church Growth After Covid-19

The COVID19 Pandemic has reduced the size of the average evangelical church. An overwhelming majority of churches (88%) have failed to regain their pre-COVID attendance levels. According to a PEW research study, most people who planned to return to church after the mask mandates were rolled back have already reclaimed their spot on the church pew. With each passing day, the rather bleak 2020 Barna estimation that as many as 1 out of every 3 Christians would not return to church appears to be prophetic.

Both those in the pew and behind the pulpit must once again face the question of: How do we grow the local church? Or to borrow, the language of the Gospel of Matthew: How do we expand the kingdom of God?

God’s Plan For Church Growth

In Matthew 9:35, we find Jesus’s plan for kingdom expansion. The verse says, “And Jesus went throughout all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction.” To advance the kingdom of God, pastors do not need to hangout in the metaverse, host town halls, or double down on green goo in the children’s ministry. To press back against the kingdom of darkness, we need to champion and commit to teaching the full counsel of God within the Church, to proclaiming the gospel to the lost, and to caring for the sick and oppressed.

Teach/Preach the Word

We often think of Jesus bouncing about the Judean hillside, holding tent revivals. However, the gospels report that Jesus located much of his teaching ministry within the contexts of local synagogues. Mark, Luke, and John place Jesus’s teaching ministry within these pseudo temple structures whose services were built around Scripture reading and exposition. Luke writes,

And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. And as was his custom, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and he stood up to read (Lk 4:16).

In other words, Jesus anticipated the primacy of local church preaching. Gospel expansion occurs through faithful exposition. As the apostle Paul told Timothy, “Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers (1 Tim 4:16).” Preaching both protects the church from decay and adds to its number through conversion.

Though preaching proves essential to kingdom expansion, it forever proves controversial. Well meaning men and women will forever call their pastors to preach less and to share more stories, jokes, and illustrations. But the local church must not give into the impulse to hire preachers that preach twenty minutes sermons that feature a joke, two moving stories about the pastor’s dog, and a brief moralistic sentiment about loving one’s neighbor. Such calls for less teaching arise not from faith but from unbelief. Again, Paul tells Timothy, “For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths (2 Tim 4:3).” The truth of God’s Word is never irrelevant. Preach the word!

Proclaim the Gospel

In addition to teaching, Jesus proclaimed the gospel. The concept of proclamation in Matthew is tied to evangelistic teaching. Such teaching should occur in the church. Each sermon should articulate humanity’s sinfulness and Jesus’s redemptive actions. As Paul tells Timothy, “Do the work of an evangelist.” But the task of proclamation proves not to be the exclusive domain of the pulpitare. All believers should share the gospel in whatever context they find themselves. Jesus preached the coming kingdom of God when eating dinner, when chatting at the local watering hole, when visiting the dead, when resting on the mountain tops, and when walking from town to town. He evangelized all the time. The believer should do the same.

Many will punt on verbal proclamation, pointing to their faithfulness in nominal tasks. In other words, they hope coworkers will come to faith when they observe the Christian’s commitment to the company schedule. Similarly, they believe praying for a meal will bring world transformation. To use the somewhat trite phrase, many think they should “Preach the gospel always and if necessary, use words.” Jesus leaves no room for such a sentiment. The kingdom expands through words and proclamation. Unless we explain our reasons for our faithfulness at work and for our gratitude for the food we eat, the world will never connect the dots back to Christ. If we long to see the kingdom expand, we must proclaim the gospel of God.

Help Others

Some have wrongfully drawn a line of separation between the practice of teaching and proclaiming and that of caring for earthly needs. Jesus did not believe that proclamation and love of neighbor were at war with one another. He affirmed both saving those whom he healed and healing those whom he saved. While I do not believe the gifts of healing continue today (I have yet to meet someone who could heal people on demand), I do believe the principle of care remains in force. In other words, as the gospel expands into hearts, it should also improve lives. When the apostle Paul prepared to set out for his first missionary journey, the church asked Paul to take an interest in social ministry. Paul writes, “Only they asked us to remember the poor, the very thing I was eager to do (Gal 2:10).” As we carry the gospel forth into this dark and dingy world, we will encounter men who need Jesus and help cleaning out their alcohol cabinet. We will bump into women who need Jesus and a safe place to stay as the escape an abusive spouse. We will counsel with those who need Jesus and help paying their electric bill. The faithful Christian responds to both concerns. The author of James reminds us: “If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace, be warmed and be filled,”’ without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? So also faith by itself, if it does not have works is dead (Jm 2:14).” If we have been saved, we will both share the gospel and meet needs. The failure to do either militates against the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Final Thoughts

The effects of COVID19 upon the local church can be easily accessed. But so can the plan back towards kingdom expansion. To grow the church, we don’t have to hire some church guru. We need to only reflect upon Jesus who expanded the kingdom through teaching, proclamation, and helping others. And then we do as Jesus did!