The Progress Principle

The less progress you are seeing in ministry, the more important it is you have another place to see it.

We, as human beings created by God, are wired to see progress. We feel affirmed by progress, and I don’t mean that in a “think positive thoughts and everything will be alright” type of way. I just mean that without visible evidence that things are changing, growing, etc, we can get discouraged.

Sometimes the work of making disciples is progress-less. What do we do then?

First, if we’re not seeing any fruit in ministry, we need to do some soul-searching and re-evaluation.

Haggai 1:5-6: “Consider your ways! You have sown much, but harvest little; you eat, but there is not enough to be satisfied…”

If we are not seeing the type of fruit we want to see, and like Haggai says, are not satisfied with our work, this should cause us to ask tough questions. God is using Haggai to ask the people of Israel to stop and consider their lives and why things are the way they are. We need to do this. We should take time, probably significant time, and seek the Lord when we feel this way.¹

But if you do that soul searching and problem solving with the Lord and others, you may arrive at the point that your real answer is this:

Keep praying, keep engaging the lost, keep sowing the seed, keep making disciples…

In short, you may need to just persevere.

A friend regularly reminds me: What if God has us in a similar place to the prophet Jeremiah? He was asked to keep at his calling even when God told him there would never be a favorable result. Repeat: God told him the people would ignore him… his entire life. But God also told Jeremiah to speak his message anyway.

If you’re a pioneer who is not seeing progress in the work of your calling, I want to throw out an idea:

I think it’s okay, and probably necessary, to keep your soul strong by finding progress in other areas.

We are not bifurcated beings… with a spiritual side that can grind on endlessly and a physical side that just has to eat and sleep. We are whole beings.²

Seeing progress somewhere (anywhere!) can be a huge help to stay consistent in the pioneering work God has called you to…

Some guardrails:

1. If you have a full-time calling from the Lord, this probably shouldn’t become another or different full-time job. If your full-time calling is to make disciples, keep that the main thing. But it is okay to spend some time pursuing something where you will see progress.

2. Don’t forget to re-evaluate and problem-solve. Are you seeking the Lord for ways you should be more Biblical in your work? I know of a time in a major US Metro where the Gospel was shared 14,000 times in just a couple of years. But despite this wide seed sowing, multiplicative disciple-making was not happening. This caused the pioneers there to stop, seek the Lord, and make some specific changes to their methods. Which in turn led to more fruit.³

If you are in a place where you simply need to persevere, here are some examples of what I’m talking about:

• Build a prayer team. I’ve heard a great saying from an African pioneer: “When we work, we work, but when we pray, God works.” If this is so, then make progress in building prayer efforts, prayer teams, prayer meetings, etc.

• Start a house project. If you own your own place, start an update you have been wanting to see. Take pictures along the way. Celebrate the before and after of getting something done.

• Run a race. Run multiple races. Improve your golf game. I have a friend who “walked across Israel” one summer through nightly walks… right here in America. She tracked her miles and knew where she would have been in Israel at any given point. She was tracking progress.

• Start a side hustle. Getting paid for something you’ve done brings a feeling of accomplishment.

• Read. A lot. Set some goals and track the books you read. They don’t even need to be 100% related to your work. Keep track of your progress over the course of a year.

• Write a blog. Or a book.⁴ Again, it doesn’t need to be 100% related to your work. A friend of mine sometimes writes about the work of disciple-making, but he also writes fiction.

This is a total dance with you, the Holy Spirit, and possibly your organization and ministry partners. But I think it is a dance worth figuring out.

Being a motivated pioneer who is finding joy in life is key for long-haul ministry. And we need to remember that long-haul ministry is what we are after! We can read Acts in an afternoon, but it represents 25+ years of kingdom pioneers laboring for Jesus.

There’s a hyper-spiritual counter-argument to this that says: “You just need God.”

Yes, that’s true. But the “God that you need” wants you to sleep, eat, and be an overall healthy individual. My point here is this: If you are not seeing progress in your ministry for a season, go make some progress somewhere else for the good of your soul.

Two anecdotes to close:

• My uncle was a full-time pastor for his entire career. A few years ago, he was looking at a brick column I had refinished at my house and commented, “Ministry work is hard. You are trying to help people, and sometimes you’re not sure if you're accomplishing anything. But it is good to be able to come home and say ‘I did this’.” This is the progress principle in action.

• I was connecting with a co-vocational kingdom pioneer who made an aside comment about how his job in the electrical trade is “therapy” for him. When I explained the ideas in this post to him, he agreed 100%. He said, “When I go back to a job, the wires haven’t pulled themselves out of the wall.”

What about you?

• Are you feeling discouraged in the work of making disciples?

• For starters, have you spent time seeking the Lord and problem-solving?

• If you have, what can you do to encourage your soul to keep at the task of making disciples?

• Is there one thing from my list of examples you could start this week?

1. One of my favorite methods for this is a “SWAP Meet” using Steve Smith’s SWAP framework from his book Spirit Walk. Other helpful formats to facilitate problem-solving are “Iron on Irons” and “Word, Works, Wineskins.”

2. “When Helping Hurts” and additional works by Brian Fikkert highlight this well when it comes to poverty alleviation. The same is true for all of us as God’s image bearers.

3. You can hear that story here:

4. Send them my way if you do!