The Keys to Church Growth: Trust & Obey

by Mike Chong Perkinson

The longer I have walked with Christ and partnered with the Father in His Kingdom enterprise, I have come to realize that the fundamental issue of my life has been housed in an inability to trust. I have discovered that it is easy to believe God. It is an entirely different matter to wait on Him. If I trust Him then I can wait on Him, even when it appears He is not doing anything.

This inability to trust has influenced my life at the very core of its being, expressing itself most clearly in a command and control persona that resulted in a lot of activity (more than necessary), stress, pressure and oftentimes, wasted energy. This life of command and control can be explicated more clearly in the graph below.

Relief (Soul feels the pleasure of control) >
Immediate Results (Pathway is now confirmed – it works, therefore it is God) >
Ache in the Soul/Boredom (Something still missing, success not enough) >
Pressure to fix the ache of the soul >
Results in increasing stress >
Discouragement & Despair (Ending point for some)>
Demand & Control (Isaiah 50:10-11; Jeremiah 2:13)

As you see, the life of command and control is lived in the authority of the self and not in the power of the resurrected Christ. For many years, I have lived in that mode, justifying it and baptizing it with Scripture. The basic ideology of a command and control leadership style is about the objective and the methodology or system employed to achieve it. Leaders who live in this world de-humanize their leadership teams and staff, providing on-going scarring of their hearts, speaking love while modeling performance and results as the basis of acceptance (you are valuable as long as you contribute). Everything we preach against somehow finds its way into our practice, undermining the very gospel we are trying to convey. How did this happen?

Without trying to answer the question categorically for everyone, let me tell you how it happened for me. The old hymn says, “trust and obey, for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey” (Word by John H. Sammis, 1997). Trust and obey, I have come to believe is the key response to the love of our Father expressed most poignantly in the Son at Calvary. We not only trust and obey for our salvation but for everything we do in our Father’s Kingdom, including how we lead His church.

An example of opting out of the life of trust and obey is found in 2 Samuel 6:1-8, when David is returning the Ark of the Covenant back to Jerusalem. He opts to carry it via a cart instead of how it was commanded in the Law which specified that it be carried by Levites who would bear it on their shoulders by means of poles passed through gold rings attached to the ark (Exodus 25:14). Even the Levites could not touch the ark or look in it. This violation of a command led to the death of Uzza.

If you’ll let me place a little modern logic to the mind of David, his rationale for carrying the Ark on a cart was based in convenience and speed. After all, you don’t need 4 people to do it, the pace can be faster and energy preserved. How do we move from doing what we know God has asked of us, to doing what is expedient and convenient? The tragedy of our choice is that it often paves the way for death to be more dominant in our ministries than life. Ironically, more people burn out, die spiritually and lose their passion for Christ – including those of us who lead it – when we opt for this life of convenience, immediacy, results and success.

Years ago, God spoke to my heart a powerful phrase that still reverberates in my soul. He said, “This is a sacred trust, never treat it as common.” This powerful exhortation had to do with His Kingdom and my small part in it, shepherding His church (a local expression of it) for His pleasure and purpose with a methodology of equip and release rather than command and control.

As much as I have known this, I have struggled with it – what I know and what I do have not always been the same. Years ago, when I came to Christ and entered ministry I knew it was about loving God and loving people and making disciples. Somewhere in the simplicity of my faith, I opted for expediency, results and success – using people to achieve my vision (or as I use to say, “God’s vision”). While I contended for those who did not know Jesus and sought to love them and include them at my Father’s table, I minimized those around me as I dictated what they should do to achieve the vision, loved them well when they performed and replaced them when they didn’t, preached about love and family but modeled perform or lose your spot. While I opted for the convenience of carrying the Ark on a cart, I still could hear the voice of my Father speaking to my heart. I simply ignored it or paid more attention to the voice of convenience, results and success.

I am a classic “Type A” personality and so, waiting has never been easy for me. My idea of patience is a 30 second wait – microwaves even irritate me. When it comes to God, who seems to move at “Three Miles an Hour”, I have found myself opting for convenience and immediacy, rather than “trust and obey”.

When we adopted our second daughter, we were so amazed at God’s kindness to us. Ephesians 3:20 seemed to be happening as God was simply blowing our minds. However, during the second week of the adoption the birth mother changed her mind. It was a time of tremendous heartache for us as we were well aware that we were about to lose our daughter. We prayed and trusted God, with no other options but prayer and waiting on Him (rather good options, I think). The following Sunday my wife went to the altar and laid our little girl on it (I joined her) and thanked God that we were able to be parents of a newborn baby for 2 weeks. With our baby girl in her arms fully extended to God, we said thank you to God and wept. We let our baby go into the hands of our loving Father (waiting on God which is to look to God, Isaiah 40:28-31). Well, God took our daughter and gave her right back to us and we have enjoyed this sacred trust and will never treat it as common. What I have learned is that when you wait or look to God (Isaiah 40:28-31) the results are far greater, the death happens inside of us and the life and health of those around us is vibrant, alive and maturing.

Dear leader, as you contend for our God, be mindful of His voice. You know, the one that reminds you to love your spouse and speak kindly and tenderly to her; the voice that prompts you to show affection and verbalize it to your children; the voice that encourages you to appreciate your staff and leadership team with words and acts of kindness; the voice that asks you to give up your fear; the voice that tells you are a beloved son/daughter before you are a servant or a steward. Whatever you do, be sure to carry the Ark the way it is supposed to be carried – “trust and obey for there is no other way.”