1. Spiritual Gifts and Missions
2. Spiritual Gifts and the Missions Field
3. Spiritual Gifts and Missions Teams
4. What is the ‘Apostolic’ and Why Is It Important?
5. The 5 Essential Elements of an Apostolic Leader
6. Indicators of an Emerging Apostolic Leader

In this series, we’ve discovered what the word “apostolic” means, given the 5 essential elements of an apostolic leader, and discussed potential indicators of an emerging apostolic leader.

In this final post, we’ll talk about how to partner with and develop these proven or emerging apostolic leaders.

We’ve previously given some very practical steps for how to network with believers, build relational trust, and filter for a potential NAV through a “NAV Process.” This includes introductory meetings, discerning if they fit the NAV profile, vision casting, participating in ministry together, and finally piloting a training with them and their group.

Hopefully by the end of this process, you have 1-3 good candidates to partner with. As you partner together, keep the 5 essential elements and the indicators in mind to help you discern if they’re truly apostolically gifted.

But what happens if it turns out that they aren’t apostolic? What then?

Then you’ve spent time either learning about what you’re really looking for and / or you’ve found a local partner who has the vision to pioneer and multiply but may need some help in certain areas to see breakthrough. Either way, it’s time well spent. We’d encourage you to shoot for an apostolic leader because it’s a gifting that God clearly uses to pioneer. If He grants it, great. But any and all gifts can be used for the Kingdom. Any believer can be given a vision for multiplication and may have a crucial role in it. 

You’ll still likely find other faithful, vision-driven local believers that want to pursue multiplication – you should absolutely work with them! It could be that one of them has latent apostolic giftings and needs more time for those things to emerge. And no matter what, these local believers will have much greater effectiveness as cultural insiders in making disciples than we will. They may eventually help you find an apostolic leader that leads to breakthrough by training other believers or through the harvest, like how Paul raised up Priscilla and Aquila as leaders in Corinth who eventually found and developed Apollos. We believe that it’s best if the apostolic gift is involved somewhere in the movement work – through the insider believer, the outsider partner, a movement coach, or through the harvest. He will lead you to these types of people in His timing! Until He does, keep praying, looking, and partnering with faithful disciple makers towards multiplication.

Partnering With an Apostolic Leader

Here are some things we would encourage you to do with an emerging or established apostolic leader that you want to partner with. Some may happen earlier or later in the process of ministry, but all are beneficial in pursuing multiplication, identifying emerging leaders, and developing and using the apostolic gift!

Pioneer Together. As apostolic leaders are called to pioneer among new peoples and places, the first step is to do pioneering work together! Whether entering and preparing new areas through prayer walking, sharing with the lost, or catalyzing others through training, apostolic leaders will thrive in a pioneering environment. You can follow a MAWL (Model-Assist-Watch-Launch) process if you’re working with a potential apostolic leader who has never engaged in pioneering before. You’ll quickly be able to gauge their faithfulness, capacity, and gifting in harvest and catalyzing activities like seeing a fish in water! During the early stages with an emerging leader, you may need to set the parameters and guide a little bit more, but the apostolic leader will intuitively and earnestly start to generate more of the initiation of pioneering activities. Encourage them to pick the target people or places to start harvesting, the groups to train, the tools to use, and help them to gradually refine the vision that the Lord has given them. The goal is to empower them to grow into their gifting, not for them to become cogs in our ministry machine – so empower them by letting them take the lead and make decisions!

Train in Multiplication Principles and Practices. Being in the pioneering environment will feel natural and exciting for the apostolic leader, but pioneering activity does not necessarily equate to multiplication activity. Train and coach the apostolic leader in multiplication principles and practices. It doesn’t need to be a formal classroom setting to train; simply sitting together in a tea or coffee shop and talking through these things with a potential apostolic leader is great! Walking through the apostle Paul’s journeys is probably the best tool in showing a combination of principle and practice. Telling stories of movement, reading case studies, and introducing apostolic leaders to movement sources can help broaden their vision from simply expanding the Kingdom to catalyzing a multiplication movement. It can also be really helpful to show a process of how multiplication can happen, whether the 4 Fields or T4T or DMM processes. We use this Multiplication Cycle that combines elements from different streams of movement to help our partners understand how to pursue multiplication. For the sake of simplicity, we generally lean towards biblical training and tools over movement-jargon types of curriculum, though both are needed and helpful.

The apostolic leader will differ from other types of leaders when engaging in a vision for multiplication – they’ll believe it can be done. It’s the faith gifted to an apostolic leader to believe that God can and will do this miraculous work in their field, where many others may feel resistance or hesitance that it can happen. As with the first point – try to empower the local leader to make decisions about what ways are best to apply these multiplication principles in their context. As the cultural insider who is a foundation and DNA setter, they will likely be far more effective in choosing multiplication practices for their context after some initial guidance.

Focus on Apostolic Functions. Clinton’s Leadership Commentary on 1st and 2 Timothy has a number of very helpful articles around the Apostolic Function and Gift. He highlights 7 functions in particular:

1. Start New Ministries
2. Appoint Leaders
3. Establish Works (help newly started works to develop and grow)
4. Intercede for Works, both new and old
5. Combat Heresy
6. Resource New and Old Ministries
7. Test New Ministries for Validity

The last 3 functions – combat heresy, resource ministries, test validity – are probably later stage functions as opposed to the first 4 focused on starting new ministries, appointing leaders, and doing the work of intercession.

As we said in the post about indicators, an apostolic leader is likely to be a jack of all trades, multi-gifted in order to help the new ministry or work get off the ground. In a given week they might end up training, evangelizing, interceding, teaching, preaching, healing, shepherding, administrating ministry, leading worship, cooking food for the group, taking care of a believer’s kid, driving between multiple locations, answering the phone, helping a business, problem solving a strategic problem, encouraging a hurting believer, and 100 other things. As a leader of an emerging or multiplying work, they’ll have full plates! Your job as a Barnabas is to help them to focus. Spinning too many plates is one of the big pitfalls we see for apostolics, as their competency and the breadth of their vision drive them to end up doing everything.

As with any believer with a spiritual gift, they’ll be most effective when they can spend the majority of their time serving out of their gift instead of other things. Of course there’s some percentage of our time where we have to do things that we’re not gifted at – but honoring the Lord by releasing responsibility to other leaders is the role of an apostolic leader. Help them focus on starting new things, clarifying vision, investing in leaders, and interceding for the works! That leads us to…

Collaborate with and Release Authority to PESTs and Other Gifts. Again, one of the main pitfalls for an apostolic leader is to get caught up with all the needs of a new work and try to overcontrol everything by doing everything themselves. A critical component of an apostolic leader is to identify, appoint/recruit, develop, and release new leaders! Not just other apostolic leaders, but other Prophets, Evangelists, Shepherds, Teachers especially. These other gifts are greatly needed to establish and deepen the new works that the apostolic leader has started. Our post on the “Apostolic” covers some of the different functions of APEST leaders in a movement.

Many times a headstrong apostolic leader can butt heads with other types of leaders, especially shepherd/teachers who are particularly drawn to shepherd needs and grow maturity through teaching, which can feel slow to an apostolic leader. But a mature apostolic will be able to see their own limitations and know that Scripture teaches that we are all one body in need of each other (1 Corinthians 12). The apostolic really, really, really needs the other members of the body. A good way to see a ministry start quickly and burn out just as quickly is to leave it under the control of a fast-moving apostolic that never appoints other types of leaders to focus on health and depth.

Withdraw, Reflect, Listen, and Plan. With the apostolic leaders’ high proficiency, numerous responsibilities, and big vision, it’s likely that they will work themselves to the bone and straight to burnout. You as the Barnabas can play an intensely important role simply by reminding them and creating opportunities for them to do as Jesus did – withdraw to be with God (Luke 5:16). Many times, we’ll ask our partners to come meet us somewhere away from their place of ministry so that no one can knock the door down looking for them. We tell them to shut off their phone, and give them the first half of our time simply to rest and pray and spend time with God alone. We might spend the second half debriefing, hearing reports, training, and planning for future ministry, but our role is primarily to make space for them to rest in the Lord. In the whirlwind of busy ministry, the apostolic leader desperately needs to find the quiet space to reflect, listen to the voice of God, and plan and prioritize where they need to invest their limited time. These times are critical for them to evaluate and refine the vision they’ve received from God. When we cease to do this, we are doing ministry out of man’s power instead of God’s – and we’re guaranteed to fail one way or another.

Pulling our apostolic partners out of their ministry schedule for just a couple days of quiet, rest, and listening can make all the difference in seeing breakthrough in multiplication. But more than the strategic and ministry pieces, the apostolic leader desperately needs to focus on their intimacy and relationship and abiding with God. He cares so much more about our being than our doing. Allow them time and encourage them to hear from God for themselves and what He wants for them, not just the ministry.

Be a Friend and Encourager. Lastly, as the apostolic leader jumps into an emerging and thriving ministry, the list of problems, crises, needs, difficult people, conflicts, and burdens increases exponentially. Any ministry, and certainly pioneering ministry, can be extremely isolating and lonely for leaders. Not many will understand what they’re going through.

They need to first and foremost surrender those things to the Lord and find their motivation and peace in him. And they need a friend. Someone to listen to their frustrations, to be thoughtful in loving them, to point them to Jesus, to encourage them to persevere.

There’s a reason why Barnabas was called the Encourager. What a role he had in encouraging, supporting, empowering Paul. Without Barnabas, we don’t get the book of Acts.

I think Paul could call Barnabas a lot of things – mentor, advocate, co-laborer. My guess is when I get to ask him, he’ll first call Barnabas his friend.

How to Develop an Apostolic Leader

All of the above things will be great for an apostolic leader’s development in learning through doing. But there’s other ways to help them understand more about the apostolic gift that God has given them and use it effectively.

Study the apostolic. There’s plenty to study in the New Testament about the apostolic gifting, function, and ministry – basically anything about who Paul is or what he does will be informative. The book of Acts reveals much about the pioneering aspect and his letters give more insight into his own development, perseverance, and heart in being an apostolic leader. If you’re able, we’d recommend diving into some of the resources we listed in the 5 essential elements post. The more you can understand what the original model of the apostolic gift looks like, the better we can imitate it. It can also be helpful to read books and biographies about other pioneering leaders.

Interact with other apostolic leaders. If you’re able to, interact with other apostolic leaders. It’s hard to describe this but an apostolic leader is probably more used to resistance, hesitance, rejection from others around them when they begin talking about big vision and multiplication. Others can feel intimidated by their intensity or just the scope of their work. But when they’re in a room with other apostolic leaders that they trust, there’s a freedom and an excitement in getting to talk to others who get you. Others who won’t frown at their big ideas but encourage them and share their own experiences and ideas. It can make them feel like they’re not crazy – at least when they’re in a room of people as crazy as they are!

A couple of disclaimers in this – just because someone is an apostolic leader doesn’t mean they don’t feel insecurity or deal with comparison. Naturally when apostolic leaders gather the focus will be on ministry. But it’s a smart idea to bring the focus on God. Highlighting shared experiences and sufferings will draw out vulnerability and increase trust before you start trucking ahead on ministry topics. Creating safety in the room before jumping in to discussing ministry can help the interaction. Secondly, although we’d encourage apostolics to interact with other apostolics, there can be some intense friction in working together. We’ve had mentors advise us that apostolic leaders can probably agree or work together at a high, 30,000 foot perspective (let’s generally share tools, or have a semi-frequent coaching meeting together, or strategically parse out people and places to focus), but can step on each others’ toes when working closely together. The apostolic leader probably wants some freedom to pursue their own ideas, and working with another highly opinionated, highly confident leader might cause some problems. This isn’t always the case but just something to be aware of.

Find apostolic mentors. This is similar to the previous point, but finding an older, more experienced apostolic leader to mentor you, especially in personal development, can be a gold mine. Hopefully this mentor has experienced and gone through many of the pitfalls and problems that an apostolic leader faces and you can learn from their wisdom. Again, the apostolic leader will want freedom to try new things on their own, but they also will value a mentor’s wisdom and shared understanding of their experiences.

Develop other leadership skills. Since the apostolic leader has so many functions in establishing a new work, it can be helpful for them to also develop leadership skills that will support their gifting. Clinton lists out several including strategy, planning, change agent, leadership styles, motivating, inspiring, mentoring, organizational skills, team building, identifying and developing leaders, and communication skills. Even though an apostolic leader may do these things intuitively, equipping them with skills and frameworks to boost their efficiency is a good idea. Or focusing on shoring up weaknesses that they may have like shepherding skills can be beneficial.

Develop intimacy with God. Whether as an apostolic yourself or in helping your apostolic partner – focus on developing intimacy with God. Learn to hear the voice of God for everyday direction and decision. Being surrendered to God is an essential element for an apostolic leader, so practice the process of surrendering and receiving from God. The pioneering ministry has an avalanche of challenges and trials that we’ve noted repeatedly. At times, Paul mentions feeling “so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself” (2 Cor. 1:8). If God grants fruitful multiplying ministry, the challenges will also multiply accordingly.

Without this critical foundation of intimacy with Christ, the apostolic leader is guaranteed to fail. The Enemy is prowling to take out those that will greatly expand the Kingdom through isolation, sin, discouragement, and spiritual warfare of many kinds. Guard yourselves in His armor and through intimacy with Him. Fight to not allow ministry to become your idol. Fight to have Philippians 2 humility in the midst of ministry fruit.

It’s an example for all believers but especially the apostolic leader that we see Paul’s own dependence on the Lord grow over the years of his ministry, from being the least of the apostles (1 Cor. 15:9), to the least of the saints (Eph. 3:8), to the foremost of all sinners (1 Timothy 1:15). He constantly prioritized his intimacy with God, withdrawing to be with God as we see our Savior did.

If God’s pattern throughout Scripture and history is to raise up apostolic leaders to pioneer the least reached people and places for His glory, then there are people He has prepared in your field.

I firmly believe there are in- or near-culture believers that He intends to use to finish the Great Commission. If you’re reading this, and you have the heart to find these modern-day “Pauls,”’ then I believe you can be a Barnabas to them. Ask the Holy Spirit, have a heart to serve, have eyes to see these people, and He will lead you to them. Remember, it only takes one.

I’ll finish this series with an exhortation to the apostolic leader reading this or the Barnabas who will empower a national apostolic leader. Sometimes we feel the temptation to cut corners or skip over inconvenient things or treat people unlovingly in pursuit of the big vision. And we use the defense – “those people don’t understand us” or “it’s worth it to see more multiplication” or something of the sort.

Apostolic gifting without apostolic character produces apostolic malfunction.

Steve U.

What’s really happening is that ministry success and numbers and fruit have become our idol. Being overly busy is a badge of pride instead of a warning indicator that we are allowing our doing to overcome our being with Jesus. Increased isolation or surrounding ourselves with only others who enable us is explained off as being a contrarian, a pioneer, a barrier breaker instead of the truth that we’re not willing to humble ourselves and submit to a group of brothers and sisters in Christ.

Scripture is abundantly clear – the ends of ministry don’t justify the means. Being an apostolic leader doesn’t give us license to trample people, to steal and extract sheep, to be disingenuous about ministry numbers, to ignore clear discipleship and maturity problems in pursuit of the more and the faster. Unfortunately, we’ve seen apostolic leaders pursuing movement do these types of things repeatedly. I won’t attempt to judge their hearts, but there often is not a humility to even admit to these things or correct them. The very thing we claim to be effective at in catalyzing movements, the apostolic gift, becomes a testimony against the ministry we are doing and against ourselves.

Matthew 7 has a haunting statement from Jesus, that “on that day, many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not do… many mighty works in your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’”

My prayer for myself and to others reading this – 

May we keep our hearts tender before the Lord. 
May we always mirror the character and heart of Jesus to others in pursuing big vision for him. 
May we not twist the gift He has given to us for our own personal and selfish gain. 
May we not allow ministry to become an idol that keeps us from worshipping Jesus.

I’d recommend Andrew Murray’s books Humility and Absolute Surrender as regular reads to help us check our hearts. And about this specific topic of losing our way in pursuing movement, I highly recommend my friend David’s book, How to Pursue Great Works without Losing Your Soul.

Every believer, every gift can be used towards completing the Great Commission, but I believe that He means to use those with the apostolic gift as first in sequence to pioneer. My hope is that these few at the tip of the spear could be surrendered to Jesus and become who God has called them to be, leading to multiplying movements among the remaining unreached peoples and places of the world.

The world has yet to see what God can do through a man [or woman] who is totally yielded to Him.

Henry Varley

Main Resource:

Humility: The Journey Toward Holiness by Andrew Murray, a missionary to South Africa in the 1840s, is highly recommended reading for anyone who joins our team. Murray’s writings challenge and focus our hearts to love Jesus through deeper abiding that starts with a humble and surrendered heart. It is only out of this constant dying to self are we able to access the power and presence of God for our ministry.

Quotes:

Here are a couple excerpts that we consistently return to.

When people are frustrating:

Accept every humiliation, look upon every fellow-man who tries or vexes you, as a means of grace to humble you. Use every opportunity of humbling yourself before your fellow-man as a help to remain humble before God. It is by the mighty strengthening of His Holy Spirit that God reveals Christ fully in you.

When life feels out of control:

Humility is perfect quietness of heart. It is to expect nothing, to wonder at nothing that is done to me, to feel nothing done against me. It is to be at rest when nobody praises me, and when I am blamed or despised. It is to have a blessed home in the Lord, where I can go in and shut the door, and kneel to my Father in secret, and am at peace as in a deep sea of calmness, when all around and above is trouble.

When feeling powerless:

Here is the path to the higher life: down, lower down! Just as water always seeks and fills the lowest place, so the moment God finds men abased and empty, His glory and power flow in to exalt and to bless.

This has been one of the most impactful books on our walks with God and we highly recommend it to you!

Our hope for these posts is that the Spirit would point you towards a greater reality and desire for abiding from some of the lessons we’ve learned this past year. If we had to answer the question – why did God have us go through cancer? Our answer would be that He wanted us to learn this lesson, and He wanted us to share this lesson with others.

We’ll list at the end a few of the books and Scriptures that were critical in guiding us towards these lessons, but if I were to recommend just one, it’d be Absolute Surrender by Andrew Murray. It’s a short read and probably the most impactful book I’ve ever read about life in Christ. And these posts are largely built on the foundations of learning about Union with Christ.

Surrender the Self

Jenn’s main point from the first post is that in order to abide more deeply in Jesus, we have to come to a place of surrender. Sometimes, he uses suffering to bring us to surrender. 

What do we need to surrender? Jesus calls us to surrender the ‘self.’ He says in Luke 9, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it.’ Deny your SELF, and follow him.

To abide, we must first surrender the self. Self-will, self-reliance, self-comfort, self-confidence.

And when we surrender our selves, we can then receive resurrection life and resurrection power in Jesus that is more amazing and glorious and rich than we could have ever imagined.

God brought us to the book of 2nd Corinthians to learn the lessons that He had for us in this season. It’s what I read through in the hospital when Jenn was in her 8 hour brain surgery. The ESV commentary describes the theme of 2nd Corinthians as ‘the relationship between suffering and the power of the Spirit in Paul’s apostolic life, ministry, and message.’

“So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited. Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

2 Corinthians 12:7-10

Most of us know this as the passage about Paul’s thorn. Throughout 2 Corinthians, Paul is making an argument about the legitimacy of his apostleship and ministry. His opponents argued that Paul had suffered too much to be a legitimate apostle. But Paul says that his suffering is the very means of identification with Christ and the way that resurrection power comes through his life.

In the first part of chapter 12, Paul’s talking about these revelations he had 14 years before where he was literally exposed to paradise, to the direct presence of God, hearing such amazing things that he can’t even repeat them. That sounds awesome.

But then here comes the self. From those visions, there was the temptation to become conceited. ‘I must be special, or better than others, because of these revelations that God gave me.’

Pride is at the heart of every sin of self. It’s a belief that we did something or deserve something apart from God. Andrew Murray says, ‘Religious self-effort always ends in sinful flesh.’

And some of these insidious thoughts of pride creep in, even in and especially concerning the things that we do for God:

‘My team is doing really well because I’m a gifted leader.’
‘My family is really healthy because I’m such a good parent and spouse.’
‘I’m a better Christian than those people because I don’t struggle with these sins.’
‘God needs me to uphold this ministry, and we’re seeing success because of my gifts and hard work.’

We would never say these things out loud. We might not even actively think them. But if we’re being honest, our self and our pride believes that we accomplished things apart from God.

There was so much pride and self effort that I didn’t even know I had, so much sin that was embedded with how I thought and operated that I didn’t even know I needed to repent of it. Cancer brought all of these things to the top. 

Overnight, we went from leading a thriving, multiplying team and ministry to not being able to do anything apart from Him at all. No amount of self-effort would heal my wife’s cancer. We were taken out from our ability to do ministry, to lead. Our capacity and strength and emotions and giftings all completely failed in the face of death. I foolishly found myself asking the question, “Why did God take us out from our team and ministry when we are the ones holding all of this up?” I didn’t even realize I was believing this lie of pride and self until we were forcibly removed, with no power to change any of it.

Like Paul, suffering brought us to a point of weakness. It was that weakness that revealed this conceitedness and entitlement that we had. We had pride that we’re good leaders, or that we’re seeing fruit in Thailand, or that we run hard in ministry. That our giftings and efforts made those things happen.

Weakness shows you who you really are. 

Surrender through Grief

Jenn and I had been meeting with our counselor regularly to help us process the things we were going through in this season. She recommended some exercises to help us grieve the things we’ve lost from this cancer season and even the last 7 years on the field, and to offer them to the Lord. I thought I could knock it out in 3-4 hours. 

It took me 3 days.

The beginning of the process was to protest: all the things that were wrong and all the emotions that I felt. I was angry – so angry – and disappointed and anguished, and I unloaded everything at God.

The pain of cancer, 
the fear of Jenn dying, 
the loss of teammates leaving the field, 
the disappointment at disunity in our team and organization, 
the rage at racism and hypocrisy in the church, 
the loneliness and burden of 7 years of leadership on the field, 
the lament that our Thai friends endured such hardship and trial, 
and most of all, how far I still felt from holiness and complete abiding.

Physically, mentally, emotionally, I tried to release these things to Jesus – but I couldn’t bring myself to surrender this massive well of pain, anger, and loss.

All I could do was just write the words down:
‘God, I repent of the pride I have in my ministry.’ 
‘God, I surrender the complete helplessness I feel with Jenn’s cancer.’

And as I wrote, I felt the gentle presence of the Spirit. Tears began to flow down and drop onto the paper where I was writing.

And he brought me to repentance, forgiveness, and surrender. 

It took unloading all the pain and grief and burden and helplessness that came from going through cancer and 7 years of leadership on the field for me to realize – I have not surrendered the self. My pride and desire to control continually got in the way of truly surrendering the self and receiving from Jesus all that I needed.

I had no power and no control over cancer or ministry, no way to live or serve without my pride and self getting in the way. The only answer was completely surrendering to Him. We had to put everything on the table. Being in Thailand, our roles, our leadership, our lives, how long Jenn and I would get to have together, all of it.

“God, I surrender all of these things and all of my self to you. Show me what you want me to receive and where you want me to follow you, and we will do only that.”

After 3 days of this, I was completely exhausted. But I began to feel a new freedom and lightness that has persisted since that time. All this pride and sin and self was blocking my intimacy with him, blocking my abiding. He began to remind us of who we are in him, not what other people say we are, not what cancer prognoses say we are. He was showing us that there is much, much more life and power in Jesus that he wants us to receive.

This pride of self is what Jesus wants to release you from. And he’ll even bring a thorn to bring you to the end of yourself, to remind you of your weakness and your need for him. He wants you to surrender your whole self to him.

In Absolute Surrender, Andrew Murray asks: 

How do we trust Him perfectly? How do you abide?

By the death of self. The great hindrance to trust is self effort. So long as you have got your own wisdom and thoughts and strength, you cannot fully trust God. But when God breaks you down, when everything begins to grow dim before your eyes, and you see that you understand nothing, then God is coming near, and if you will bow down in nothingness and wait upon God, He will become all.

Surrender to the Point of Death

Why does Jesus go so far to bring us to weakness and surrender?

We see why in 2 Corinthians 4:

We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies. For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh.

2 Corinthians 4:8-11

The thorn, the afflictions, the weakness are there to bring us to surrender our selves to the point of death. So that the life of Jesus may be manifested in us. So that we could experience the fullness of resurrection life and union with Christ right now. 

And He will let nothing get in the way of bringing us to this point of surrender.

One of the hardest days of this past season for me was near the beginning. We were still reeling from everything that had happened and had just arrived in the States and were getting ready for Jenn’s surgery. 

We were trying to believe the promises, trying to prepare our hearts for what was coming. I actually felt like I was in a pretty peaceful and surrendered place.

Then, one afternoon, we got the call from our neurosurgeon that the scans were showing that there were some Grade 3 cells in Jenn’s tumor. 

It felt like the bottom fell out.

I remember being on the phone trying to hold it together, but felt my heart sink into my stomach.

The average survival rate for people with a Grade 3 oligodendroglioma is 3.5 years.

I was overcome with numbness because of the significance of the fear that I felt about losing my wife in less than 5 years.

I don’t remember most of the rest of that day. I tried to pray and surrender and just couldn’t. Jenn had a phone call with her sister at night and I remember the only option I had was to turn on some worship music.

That night was the most intense and intimate time of worship and abiding with Jesus that I’ve ever experienced in my life. I was just sitting in his presence, weeping, and singing hymns of Jesus’ victory over death and the love of the Father in the midst of suffering. The hymn that was a continual comfort was ‘Abide with Me.’

Abide with me
Fast falls the eventide
The darkness deepens
Lord with me abide
When other helpers fail
And comforts flee
Help of the helpless abide with me

I fear no foe
With Thee at hand to bless
Ills have no weight
Tears lose their bitterness
Where is thy sting death
Where grave thy victory
I triumph still abide with me

And as I was sitting in the intensity of his love, I started to realize that if Jesus would meet me with the nearest intimacy I have ever felt through the reality of my worst fear – the loss of my wife – then what else could affect me? No matter what happens, I am secure because I have Jesus.

Even if he takes Jenn away, even if our ministry in Thailand gets crushed, even if my own personal health is affected – whatever my greatest fear, Jesus is enough. Jesus is better than all of it. 

In the face of death, in the worst possible scenario, when the most important thing in your life is about to be taken away – he meets us with his presence. And his presence is our joy, and it is so rich and intense that you truly feel that you don’t need anything else.

When you are faced with that moment of death to self, and you are able to surrender and trust him completely – it unlocks the ability to surrender everything else in your life. There is no suffering, or failure, or betrayal, or conflict, or sickness, or opposition that has victory over us when we have surrendered to the point of death. Death was destroyed on the Cross, and Jesus will come again to destroy it completely at his return.

Surrendering the self to the point of death unlocks resurrection life and power in Jesus.

Hudson Taylor, in 1870, lost his wife to sickness just a year after he learned about the experience of union with Christ in 1869. He says this in a letter following her death:

“No language can express what [Christ] has been and is to me. Never does he leave me; constantly does he cheer me with his love. 

Often I find myself wondering whether it is possible for her, who is taken, to have more joy in his presence than he has given me.”

That is the type of resurrection life and abiding that I want, and it is available for all of us.

But surrender, dying to self has to happen first. Death always precedes resurrection life.

In the last post, we’ll talk about the result of surrendering the self to the point of death – receiving resurrection life and power in Christ.

Questions for Reflection

1. Where do you have pride of self in your life or ministry? (You can use Tim Keller’s questions for identifying idols from Counterfeit Gods – what does your imagination, money, disappointment, and emotion center around?)
2. What is your greatest fear? Have you surrendered even that fear to Jesus? Are you able to say, like Job, ‘Though he slay me, yet I will trust him’ (Job 13:15)?
3. What burdens, losses, and pain have you left unresolved and unprocessed? Where do you need to grieve, lament, and release these things to God?

My Story

Learning about Union with Christ was critical in sustaining us through our first years of life and ministry in Thailand. But through this past year, God has been teaching me a precious but difficult lesson – that there is MORE to receive in our abiding and in union.

But my pride and my flesh keep me from truly surrendering to him. And this limits how abundantly I can receive from him.

Over a year ago in March 2021, when we were on a trip to train Thai church planters in Northeastern Thailand, Steven and I were resting in a hotel when suddenly Steven noticed I had begun to mutter. He couldn’t understand what I was saying and called my name several times when suddenly I stood up.

Steven reached me right in time to catch me as I collapsed and suffered multiple grand mal seizures. 

Six hours later, I woke up in the ICU, intubated and with no memory of how I had gotten there. I panicked and my first instinct was to reach up and pull the tube out of my mouth, only for me to realize that I had been tied down to the bed. Thankfully, Steven was there to explain to me what had happened. He was very calm, despite the fact that he had just watched me seize and pass out without any guarantee that I would wake up. 

He very gently explained that I was in a hospital and that while I was unconscious, a CT scan had revealed a 5 centimeter brain tumor in my right forebrain. We needed to go back to America as soon as possible for medical treatment. I’d have to get surgery, and who knows what else and for how long. We needed to leave Thailand and entrust our team and our ministry to God. 

Deep within me, I felt the Spirit and my flesh at war. In my flesh, I was terrified and so anxious – What is happening? Am I going to die? Will I be permanently affected or disabled? Will Steven be OK? What’s going to happen to our teams and our Thai friends? 

A kind nurse had given me a pad of paper to write on. With tears in my eyes, I wrote, “I’m scared.”

But even as I wrote those words, I felt the Holy Spirit come alive within me. In my deepest fear and hopelessness, his love was nearer to me than I had ever experienced, and he put a promise in my mind that has served as my theme for this whole last year. It comes from Philippians 3.

Paul says:

I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection that I may share in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible, I might attain the resurrection from the dead.

Philippians 3:10

Over the course of the year, I have been learning what God meant for me in that verse. That to receive more of Christ, to truly have continuous deep intimacy with him, I must fully surrender and die to myself – even if suffering is the means to do so. 

The Breaking Point

We came back to the States in April 2021, and God provided for us in so many ways. I had an amazing medical team, the surgery went really well, and they got the whole tumor removed. But after the surgery, my doctor called and told me that I would need to stay longer than expected because pathology results showed that this tumor was high-grade and cancerous. I would need further treatment of radiation and chemotherapy. And we would not be going back to Thailand. 

All of a sudden, our lives and ministries were forced to take an indefinite pause as we focused all our efforts toward fighting brain cancer. And although God was with us in so many ways, inside me I still felt so much turmoil and pain. 

I vividly remember one day where I was trying to pray. I was recovering from a surprise case of extremely painful shingles, a side effect of my medication.

I had never felt more alone.

As much as they tried, my friends and family could never truly understand what I was going through. I became resentful toward them and started isolating myself.

I felt helpless, and I couldn’t even trust my own mind, because the cancer was in my own brain.

I was trying to surrender and muster up faith for the medical journey to come. But instead, I devolved into rage. I was so angry with God and unleashed all my frustration and doubt and pain and sorrow at him. 

“ME!? Why ME? I do so much for you. I’ve given everything to serve you! And still you take! All you do is take!”

Jesus’ answer came almost immediately:

“I want to go deeper with you. I want all of you. I love you.” 

And my anger disappeared and my pride deflated like a balloon. Jesus wasn’t taking from me – he was trying to show me how much more of his love he wanted me to experience! But it was only after he brought me to the end of myself that God was able to show me where my heart was not yielded. And he wanted those things out so that he could fill those places with himself.

I had nothing to offer him but brain cancer. 

But these are the lengths of suffering that our loving Father was willing to bring me through to obtain true surrender and intimacy with him.

Suffering Leads to Surrender

Lilias Trotter, one of the first women goers to North Africa, wrote this prayer in her book, Parables of the Cross:

“May God show us every withholding thread of self that needs breaking still.”

Lilias Trotter, Parables of the Cross

God used this past season of suffering and cancer to bring me to a level of surrender that I didn’t even think was possible. It wasn’t enough that I had quit my job, moved to Thailand, and lived the goer life overseas. Deep in my heart, there were still huge parts of myself that God needed to break. 

As cancer brought me low, I learned how weak I really am. How nothing was actually ever in my power or control. I had been taking for granted the gifts that God had given me and was calling them mine. My life, my timeline, my giftings, my ministry. And in weakness and suffering, God was telling me, “Those things are mine to carry. Just give them to me.”

Even though I always knew the “right answer” was that God is in control of my life and of every part of ministry, deep down there were still parts of me that believed I was the answer, that I was in control, and that results happened because of my ability. That if I just set agendas and expectations, then more or less, my plans would come to fruition. One specific way that this came to the surface was the importance I imagined I had in leading our team. As new 25-year-old team leaders, we jumped head first into every problem, conflict, and issue that came up on our team. I would think to myself, ‘if I don’t fix this, it’s going to be catastrophe for everyone.’ In some ways, my intentions were good. I wanted to be a good leader and to make sure the team didn’t struggle. But over time, that desire warped into, ‘only I can solve these issues. These people and this work need me.’ I was putting myself into a position that God alone should occupy.

But cancer suddenly and painfully removed me from ‘being the answer’ for our team. Unable to communicate with teammates or lead in ministry, I was left with no other option but to surrender our team, our work, and more specifically, my self-importance as a leader, to Jesus. Through my helplessness in cancer, he was asking me: ‘Do you trust that the team and ministry belong to me, and that I will direct and guide them in the best way – even without you?’

In having my role ripped away, God was revealing deep roots of pride. Acts 17 says:

The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else.

Acts 17:24-25

God himself gives life and breath. My so-called abilities and leadership that I was so proud of, at the end of the day, still depended on whether or not it pleased God to give me breath and health to even operate. With that perspective, things that used to consume my thoughts and energy like people’s opinions of me or always making the right decisions, just stopped mattering as much.

Absolute surrender means that what I do, how I do it, and the outcome and timing is completely dependent on what God has for me, not what I think is best or what I desire to do. It means, realizing truly that God actually is who he says he is, eternal and powerful and responsible for the work of bringing his own glory to the nations. My role is not to be necessary or to fix all the problems, but to simply be his child and follow where He tells me.

Through cancer, He caused me to surrender these things and be free of the burden and weightiness they bring. But to get to this point, I needed the suffering to strip everything away in order to begin to see how much better and how much worthier Jesus was in comparison. 

In her book, A Path Through Suffering, which we read through daily in the weeks leading up to my surgery, Elisabeth Elliot defines suffering very simply:

Suffering is having what you don’t want, and wanting what you don’t have.

Elisabeth Elliot

While your suffering may not look like mine in the form of cancer, I can guarantee that at some point, you will have something you don’t want, or want something you don’t have. These suffering moments, both “big” and “small”, are when we most realize our limits. They give us a lens to understand that our ways and our abilities are never enough in comparison to Jesus. That we must die to ourselves completely. 

It is a merciful Father who strips us when we need to be stripped…He is not finished with us yet, whatever the loss we suffer, for as we lose our hold on visible things, the invisible becomes more precious – where our treasure is, there will our hearts be.

Elisabeth Elliot

Suffering leads us to surrender.

Surrender Prepares Us To Receive From God

And surrender prepares us to receive from God. Paul shows us this in Philippians 3: 

I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection that I may share in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible, I might attain the resurrection from the dead.

Philippians 3:10

According to Paul, suffering leads us to surrender to the point of death, like Jesus. Only then are we prepared to receive resurrection life.

Death to self is nothing less than what Jesus himself did. With total submission to the Father, His death was death on a cross for our sins. We can trust him with our surrender, because he did the same for us.

And out of that death, he received resurrection life. Surrender prepares us to receive from God.

Here is what Andrew Murray says about the link between surrender and receiving:

“…Here is the path to the higher life: down, lower down! Just as water always seeks and fills the lowest place, so the moment God finds men abased and empty, His glory and power flow in to exalt and to bless.”

– Andrew Murray, Humility

When Jesus told me, “I want to go deeper with you,” on the day of my breakdown, he was actually saying he had so much more blessing for me. More power and more glory! But for me to receive, I needed to surrender all. 

When I went in for brain surgery, the doctors told me their goal was to aggressively cut out every tumor cell that was trying to kill me. In the same way, God was performing a spiritual surgery. Cutting out idols of ministry success, control, and expectations of long life with Steven.

With those out, I could then receive his unconditional love for me, security in His will, and gratitude for each new breath that I have.

Trust him with your full surrender.

Because the other side of surrender is true abiding. 

The other side of surrender is intimacy with Christ. 

The other side of surrender is resurrection life and power! 
Absolute surrender prepares us to receive all from God. When we are surrendered, we are finally low enough and emptied enough to even begin to receive all that God desires to give us.

How Do You Surrender?

In order to fully abide, you must surrender all. You must learn that the gateway into abiding starts by telling God the dreaded words, “I give up. I can’t do it. So you must.” 

As a military term, to surrender means to yield yourself to the possession or power of another. Surrendering in these situations means giving up control and entrusting your fate to another, likely an enemy. But thankfully in our case, we are not yielding to an enemy. We yield to our best friend who knows us, who loves us, and who never withholds. 

I have experienced firsthand how difficult and painful surrender can be. But your good Father is waiting on the other side. He is poised and ready to bless you! And as you practice surrendering, here are some things to consider. 

1. Learn The Lesson in Suffering

A friend previously shared with me that it seemed like her friends in full-time ministry seemed to experience suffering more painfully and more often than others. Because of this, she was afraid to surrender more to Jesus because of the suffering that might follow. Even though this may be true, this statement makes me so sad. Jesus is better than any suffering we might endure. May we rejoice when we are counted worthy to suffer for his name. 

In the gospels, Jesus guarantees to his disciples that, “in this world, you will have troubles. But take heart, I have overcome the world!” Suffering is guaranteed for the life of a disciple. It’s not something we are actively looking for. But when you encounter pain and suffering, my encouragement for you is that you would not waste those opportunities. And these opportunities come each and every day for us. 

As you go through it, as much as you can, try to learn the lessons in suffering that God gives, to surrender and receive from him. Surrender your pain, your timeline, your expectations, your results. And wait and see what the Lord does.

2. Make weakness your aim. 

Elizabeth Elliot says, “the experience of weakness puts us in the position of seeking another’s strength.”

I don’t know if it’s just me, but I have a harder time accepting the fact that I am weak and unable, more than I do the idea that I will need to suffer. There is something in us that cannot accept uncertainty, failure, or powerlessness. But apart from Christ, that IS our constant state. Much like in suffering, God uses weakness to drive us toward humility and dependence on him. 

Don’t run away from situations you can’t control. Don’t grit your way through difficult circumstances. Embrace situations where you can be weak. These are opportunities to learn greater surrender and to call upon God to be your strength! It is okay to be weak because Christ is strong.

We often quote Hudson Taylor as a good example of someone who lived out of union life. But even Hudson Taylor would still struggle with weakness – but instead of trying to will his way out of hard situations, he would realize those were times to draw near to and draw from God. Whenever he felt himself weak or overwhelmed, he would very simply pray, “God, I thirst.” 

Sometimes, he would pray this 20 times a day! “God, I thirst.” And by acknowledging his thirst, his weakness, Hudson Taylor was able to experience deep comfort from God.

Paths of Righteousness

I want to conclude with an encouragement from Psalm 23. This is a popular one, full of the promises of God. The Lord is our shepherd, he will lead us to green pastures, and he will make us lie beside still waters. But there is a disturbing verse right in the middle: 

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me. 

Psalm 23:4

Why are we talking about death in the middle of one of the most uplifting Psalms? A teammate pointed out to me that perhaps it is actually connected with the previous verse – “He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.” 

After this past year, I am convinced that the good shepherd’s path of righteousness includes the valley of the shadow of death. 

And yet even there, we do not fear evil because he is with us the entire way.

The end of Psalm 23 is beautiful. David starts the Psalm speaking about God in the third person – He makes me lie down, he leads me, he restores. But in and after the valley of the shadow of death, David changes his language and speaks to God directly. You are with me. Your rod and staff comfort me. You prepare a table for me. 

David’s language changes from the distant ‘he’ to the personal you, because David has walked through death and seen his good shepherd with him the whole way. This is why David has the confidence to say, surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life. Before the valley, David said he shall not want…but after the valley, his cup overflows. These promises are ours to receive, if we would walk with him through every path of righteousness, even the ones that feel like death. 

As you pursue deeper abiding through surrender, I hope that this Psalm is a comfort for you. That in suffering, in exhaustion, in the deepest valleys, in the lowest points of surrender, your good shepherd Jesus is with you. And even the valley of the shadow of death is his to use as he guides you on the path of righteousness.

Don’t fear suffering. Don’t fear surrender. He is with you, and he desires to go deeper in abiding with you until your cup overflows.

Questions For Reflection

If you feel the Spirit pushing at you in any way, my encouragement with you is to stop and listen. Listen to his voice. Tell him that you desire deeper abiding. Examine yourself and the places where you are not surrendered. Here are some questions that you might bring to him:

• Where have I been self reliant or prideful? 
• Where am I afraid to suffer or to be weak?
• What situations am I going through that make me anxious, afraid, or angry? 
• Where have I let ministry come between me and God?
• Where have I not forgiven? 

If you’re walking through a season of difficulty or suffering, we’d love to hear from you, encourage you, and pray for you. Please reach out at contact@missionsleaders.com.

In the next post, Steven will share about what is received out of absolute surrender – receiving resurrection life and power.