The Work Is the Lord's
If someone were to ask me what has been the hardest assignment of my pastoral ministry, I would not hesitate to answer: church revitalization. Ironically, I would also tell them it has been one of the greatest privileges of my life.
Over more than a decade in ministry, I have witnessed God perform incredible miracles. I have watched prodigals return home, broken marriages restored, addictions broken, and countless people surrender their lives to Christ. Those moments have always reminded me that God is still in the business of resurrection. Yet nothing compares to what I have witnessed over the last few years.
When my family and I arrived at Freedom Church, we inherited a congregation of seventeen people. Three members were in long-term care, and two others went home to be with the Lord during our first year. By almost every measurable standard, this church had reached the end of its life.
Today, by God's grace alone, Freedom Church has become a multi-site, multi-generational, and multi-ethnic church ministering to more than 180 people across three campuses, with many more joining us online. We have planted two new congregations, launched ministries we never imagined possible, and watched people from every stage of life come to know Christ.
I share those numbers cautiously because this is not a story about church growth. It is a story about God's faithfulness. And if I am honest, it is also a story about how God had to rebuild the pastor before He rebuilt the church.
God Rebuilds the Pastor Before He Rebuilds the Church
When people hear stories of revitalization, they often picture overflowing services, baptisms, exciting vision meetings, and growing attendance. They rarely picture the first day. I remember walking into the church office for the very first time. No one met me. No one showed me around. There was no onboarding, no orientation, and no explanation of where anything was. I wandered through an aging building, trying to figure out something as simple as the Wi-Fi password, wondering if the church even had internet. The office I inherited was cluttered with decades of forgotten files, broken furniture, and relics from ministries that no longer existed. The parsonage was even worse. It was infested with mice. Before my wife and children could move in, I spent nearly two weeks cleaning, repairing, renovating, and making it livable. The salary was modest. The building felt frozen somewhere in the middle of the twentieth century. If I am honest, I questioned more than once whether I had misunderstood God's calling altogether. The strangest part? I never wanted this position. I accepted it because my family needed a place to live, I needed work, and despite everything I saw, I could not shake the quiet conviction that God had brought us there. Looking back, I realize something important. Before God began rebuilding the church, He began rebuilding me.
Throughout Scripture, God often prepares His servants in hidden places before using them publicly. Moses spent forty years in the wilderness before leading Israel. David learned to shepherd sheep before shepherding a nation. Nehemiah wept before he rebuilt. Even Ezekiel stood in a valley full of dry bones before he witnessed resurrection. God was teaching me the same lesson. Church revitalization was never going to be accomplished through strategy alone. It would require dependence.
Learning to See the City Before Seeing the Church
One of the greatest mistakes churches can make is assuming that the community's greatest need is simply another sermon. The gospel must certainly be proclaimed, but before many people will hear our message, they need to experience our presence. Throughout the Gospels, Jesus rarely separated proclamation from compassion. He healed the sick, fed the hungry, touched the outcast, and welcomed the overlooked. His acts of mercy did not replace the message of the Kingdom; they gave it credibility. Rather than asking how we could attract people to our Sunday gathering, we asked how we could tangibly demonstrate Christ's love in our neighbourhood.
The needs quickly became obvious. Homelessness was increasing. Food insecurity was growing. Young families struggled to access affordable extracurricular activities for their children. Waiting lists stretched for months, sometimes years, and many families simply could not afford the opportunities available. Instead of trying to build ministries people wanted, we tried to meet needs people already had.
So we started where the needs were. We launched a free children's choir. Families who would never have attended a worship service gladly brought their children each week. The children sang in seniors' homes. They performed Christmas concerts. Relationships began forming. Parents waited in our building during rehearsals, so we invited them to join an Alpha course. Many accepted. Those conversations eventually led to baptisms, professions of faith, and entire families joining our church. Later, we expanded our community food ministry. Each month, we began serving dozens of families throughout our city. Many were recent immigrants. Many spoke Spanish. Many were simply looking for community. Eventually, that ministry gave birth to our Spanish congregation. What began as a meeting of practical needs became opportunities to proclaim the hope of Christ. James reminds us that faith without works is dead. Jesus consistently ministered to both physical and spiritual needs. We discovered that evangelism is often most credible when compassion arrives first.
Resurrection Always Looks Like Death Before It Looks Like Life
Every Saturday for six months, I walked into our empty sanctuary. I prayed over every pew. I asked God to fill them with people who desperately needed Jesus. Some Saturdays, I believed those prayers. Other Saturdays, I wondered if I was praying into empty space. This past Easter, we opened our balcony for additional seating because the sanctuary was full. As I watched people worship where empty pews once sat, I remembered those quiet Saturday prayers. Only God could have done this. Yet every resurrection story carries another side that people rarely talk about. Resurrection also feels like death. While new people arrived, others left. Not because God wasn't moving. Because He was.
Every Revitalization Exposes What We Truly Worship
One of the hardest lessons I learned was that resistance is rarely about what people say it is about. Eventually, the Lord began changing my perspective. I realized that not everyone opposing the vision was actually opposing the mission. Many were grieving. They weren't grieving hymnals or name changes. They were grieving memories. Grieving the sanctuary where they had dedicated their children, celebrated weddings, buried spouses, and worshipped faithfully for decades. Every change represented another reminder that the church they had loved was disappearing. While I could see what God was building, many of them could only see what they were losing.
I was called selfish, prideful and a heretic. Anonymous letters appeared monthly, and then weekly after every sermon. Emails arrived questioning my character. Some threatened to withhold giving. One individual even threatened physical harm after wrongly assuming I had made a decision that I had never actually made. There were countless moments when I wanted to defend myself. To explain, to argue or to point to baptisms, conversions, restored marriages, and transformed lives as evidence that God was blessing the work. But I slowly realized something. No amount of fruit could convince someone who had already decided that preserving the past mattered more than embracing God's future. That realization hurt. It still does.
Instead of viewing every critic as an enemy, I began seeing many as wounded saints struggling to let go of what had once been precious to them. Revitalization isn't simply about leading people into a new future; it is also about helping them grieve an old one. Sometimes they will make the journey with you. Sometimes they won't. Both realities require pastoral compassion.
The Hidden Cost Nobody Sees
This is the part few pastors talk about. People celebrate growing churches. They celebrate attendance, baptisms, new campuses and healthy budgets. Very few see what happens behind closed doors. They don't see the nights when criticism keeps you awake. They don't hear the conversations between husband and wife after another painful meeting. They don't watch pastors wipe away tears before standing behind a pulpit on Sunday morning. Pastors often carry burdens they cannot publicly share because protecting the church sometimes means silently absorbing wounds. The Apostle Paul understood this well. Again and again, he describes ministry as weakness, affliction, endurance, and suffering. Not because God had abandoned him. But because Christ was being formed within him. Perhaps that is one of the greatest surprises of revitalization. The greatest miracle is not simply what God does in the church. It is what He does inside the shepherd.
Faithfulness Does Not Mean Everyone Crosses the Jordan
One biblical story continually brought me comfort. Moses faithfully led Israel through Egypt, across the Red Sea, and through the wilderness. He watched God provide manna, water from the rock, and victory over impossible enemies. When Israel finally arrived at the edge of the Promised Land, many still refused to enter.
They had seen God's faithfulness. Yet they would not trust Him. That story became deeply personal. There were people I desperately wanted to walk into the future with us. People I loved. People I prayed for. People who witnessed the baptisms, the new families, the restored lives, and the unmistakable hand of God. Yet some still chose to leave. For a long time, I believed I had failed them. Eventually, the Lord reminded me of something freeing. My responsibility was never to make people cross. My responsibility was to faithfully lead them to the place where they could choose obedience. Only God changes hearts.
The Work Is the Lord's
If church revitalization has taught me anything, it is this: The church never belonged to me. It belongs to Christ.
Looking back, I realize I misunderstood my assignment. When I first arrived, I thought God had called me to revive a church. Every success felt like my responsibility, and every setback felt like my failure. I carried burdens that were never mine to carry. I believed that if I just preached better, strategized better, worked harder, or loved people more faithfully, somehow I could breathe life into dry bones. But that was never my calling. Ezekiel stood in a valley full of dry bones, yet God never asked him to manufacture a resurrection. He simply told him to prophesy, to faithfully proclaim the Word the Lord had given him. God alone supplied the breath. Paul echoes the same truth when he reminds us that one plants, another waters, but God alone gives the growth. The miracle has never belonged to the servant; it has always belonged to the Master. That truth has become the anchor of my ministry.
My calling is not to produce revival. It is not to convince every critic. It is not to ensure every person embraces the vision or crosses the Jordan into God's future. My calling is to remain faithful, to preach Christ, to shepherd His people, to love my community, to endure hardship, and to trust the Holy Spirit with what only He can accomplish.
If you're serving in a difficult church today, let me encourage you with the words I wish someone had spoken to me at the beginning of this journey: you are not responsible for resurrection. One day you may look back, as I have, and discover that while you thought God was rebuilding a church, He was quietly rebuilding you. And perhaps that was His greatest work all along.
