I have often quoted R. Kent Hughes on prayer and the church. Hughes says, “The slow advancement of the gospel today is no doubt due to the prayerlessness of the church.” As R. Kent Hughes retells it, the church’s original mission was to those who had been shipwrecked at sea and rescued. These once-drowning people then set up a lifesaving station on the edge of a dangerous shore, serving as guides for the wandering and rescuers for the lost. Nobody in that story voted to stop rescuing people. They just got comfortable because the waves never stopped hitting them, and comfort was the one thing they could control.
In 1971, Jim Cymbala took over a dying church in downtown Brooklyn — fewer than twenty people in a rundown building on Atlantic Avenue. He had no seminary training. His wife, Carol, would go on to direct a seven-time Grammy-winning choir, and to this day she cannot read music. What turned it around was a prayer meeting on a random Tuesday night that they never stopped holding.
In Pastor Cymbala’s book Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire: What Happens When God’s Spirit Invades the Hearts of His People, he tells us that the only way to reignite our calling to be a lifesaving station to the wandering and weary travelers of life is through the power of prayer and the Holy Spirit. Cymbala calls us to an urgent reliance on the Holy Spirit to empower regular people to do extraordinary things, and what I appreciate most about his book is that the goal of these things is not fame, but power from the Holy Spirit in life, leadership, love, and labor (my words, not his). He actually tells us that the goal is not to be famous, but to be known by God. He speaks of well-known men and women, most of them historical figures, but he equally speaks of the obscure, those who labored for decades and whose names will never be widely known.
Here are three quick points that I took away from the book that you might find useful:
Don’t fall into the trap of building your church or ministry with get-rich-quick schemes.
Use Brooklyn Tabernacle’s story as encouragement, not a guide.
God can do extraordinary things through ordinary people.
First, don’t fall into the trap of building your church or ministry with get-rich-quick schemes. We all know of people who have ruined their lives and the lives of others by trying to make money fast through less-than-above-board means. In ministry, it’s easy to fall into this trap as well, especially when we are starting out or have grown discouraged. Resist the temptation to take shortcuts and hear the wisdom of Pastor Cymbala: “We are too easily distracted from the call to simply wait on the Lord. We get pulled away from the simplicity of the gospel. In Acts 4, the apostles wanted only to preach the Word. It sounds too minimal to modern ears, doesn’t it — isn’t there something more, something greater, something newer?”
Second, be encouraged by Brooklyn Tabernacle’s story, but don’t use it as the blueprint for your life or ministry. Too often we read or hear stories of men and women who did amazing things, and we try to emulate exactly what they did, step-for-step, as if the power lies in doing it just as they did. Instead of treating it like a guide to follow, let their story encourage you and build your faith. Your church may never have 10,000 members; most churches won’t, but that doesn’t mean that your life has to lack the power of prayer and God’s Spirit. Fall in love with Jesus and His presence, and not just numerical “success.” I write this as someone about to launch a cohort with ten Birmingham congregations, in a season when the money for this kind of work is getting harder to find, not easier. I have read the reports. I know what the funding trend lines look like for organizations like the ones I serve. And I will tell you honestly that when the numbers tighten, prayer starts to feel like the thing you do because the strategy ran out. Cymbala's argument is that it was never the fallback. It was the strategy all along.
“Therefore, since we also have such a large cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us lay aside every hindrance and the sin that so easily ensnares us. Let us run with endurance the race that lies before us, 2 keeping our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith. For the joy that lay before him, he endured the cross, despising the shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:1-2, CSB).
Finally, I want you to know that God can do extraordinary things through ordinary people. To drive this point home, Pastor Cymbala points over and over to the fact that it was God who took a man with no formal seminary training and used him to reach thousands of people with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. In the final chapter of his book entitled In Search of Ordinary Heroes, he cites example after example of those who did extraordinary things for God. They weren’t the smartest, most eloquent, or most talented people, but they surrendered their lives to God to use for His glory. I don’t know where you come from or what limits have been placed on you, but I want you to know two things. First, limits are a gift from God to keep us from overfunctioning, and that teaches us to be interdependent. Second, what we consider limits is usually fear masquerading as wisdom. God can use you for your good and His glory, no matter your past, present, geographical location, or life situation. I will write more about this in a future essay.
The series No One Is Coming is a collection of essays from my writing in this season of life. It speaks to how we often wait for some metaphorical figure to step in and make all things better. The title comes from Geoffrey Canada, who said that when he learned Superman wasn't real, he cried because no one was coming with enough power to save them. In this series, I will write about what I am reading. Essays will range widely. I invite you on this journey, and if something resonates with you, would you do two things for me? Would you leave me a comment or send me an email and let me know, and would you act on your convictions, inspirations, and encouragements? Stop waiting for someone to rescue you or your community and join in the work of restoration, renewal, and revitalization.