Waiting For The Lord.

(A story of encouragement, which includes some of the Grats genesis story.)

“We’re not in ministry anymore.”

Those were the words that I spoke to my lovely wife as we quietly drove back to our hotel near one of Kansas' big cities. I didn’t think they were forever words, “We’re not in ministry anymore”, but I truly didn’t know… that was up to Him. I simply couldn't believe that they had just come out of my mouth.

It was a beautiful Saturday afternoon in the late spring of 2018. A church in Kansas was considering me to be their next Senior Pastor. We had been searching for our next pastoring job for almost 5 years at that point; ever since the Lord had closed my time as the Senior Pastor of a church in Oregon. During that 5-year search, the Lord had constantly (and at different stages) closed doors within the pastoral search process; including once AFTER we were voted in as the pastor! This church in Kansas was the last church in our long search, and so we took a "covert trip" down to Kansas to hear from the Lord about it.

I have to say that we were hopeful and excited. We had previously connected with the denominational leadership there in Kansas and to say that I was impressed would be an understatement. In fact, their leader had become a friend and mentor. Could this finally be the church and location that we had been looking for on this long journey? Surely it was. It would be just like God to bring it all home at the very end.

When we drove into the town, we were captivated by it. Quaint would be an understatement. When we pulled up to the church, its façade seemingly matched the town… quiet, quaint, and cozy. Being a Saturday, the parking lot of the church was empty. We were counting on that fact. Often times, to hear the Lord, you need to silence the noise and distractions around you.

My family waited in the car, now idling alone in the empty parking lot, as I got out and put my hand on the front door of the church. I began to pray.

And I quickly heard four words from Jesus – “You’re not the guy”.

Four words that I doubt I will ever forget.

I quietly went back to the car, put it in gear, and drove out of the parking lot.

My wife was looking at me intently. “What happened?” she asked. “What did the Lord say?” I told her the four words that He had just told me: “You’re not the guy”.

Then she asked me her own four words: “What does that mean?”

And without thinking, out of my mouth came the five words that started this story: “We’re not in ministry anymore”.

I need to stop the story here to give some background...

Ministry is my life's calling from Jesus. I have been doing ministry in some form or another since I was 16, including my first pastoral role at 18. And over those years, I have done a lot of ministry in a variety of ways. In fact, I have been a pastor/leader in almost every department of the church, including as a school chaplain and a Lead/Senior Pastor. I even spent over 10 years traveling and preaching as an evangelist… many of those years doing so full-time. Actually, that is how I initially got into coaching. When I was travelling full-time as an evangelist, pastors that I would speak for would call me to bounce ideas and thoughts off of me. I would help them navigate through their thoughts, struggles, and even trials. Back then, no one called this coaching or ministry coaching or pastoral coaching… it was just one church leader helping another. I was limited on how many people that I could help because it was happening in my free time. But that was totally fine… I was happy to help, but certainly did not want to do this as a job. When I was called to go into bi-vocational ministry, I began working a non-church job in addition to my church roles. The Lord opened doors for me to quickly ascend numerous ranks at that company, and soon I was a corporate trainer for an entire state level operation. My boss was the top leader for the entire state operation. It was a VERY fitting non-church role for me. One day, a new boss came into power above me. He began to train me on how to coach the District and Regional Managers that reported to us.  That was when I began to realize that I had been coaching pastors much of my adult life.  And now, I coach pastors full time (and again am travelling and preaching).

All of that to say - the paragraph above is why the 5 years prior to that moment in Kansas, had been so surprising. We had searched and searched for our next vocational ministry role over those 5 years. Again however, the Lord had constantly just closed all of those doors... and that day in Kansas, He had closed the last of those doors.

You are probably thinking that you would have figured it all out way before I did, and that it would not have taken you five years like it did me. And if you are thinking that, you are probably correct. I just couldn't see it... maybe I just didn't want to see it. However, after that moment in Kansas, I was finally beginning to accept that I was "on the shelf" from vocational/public ministry.

Now, that certainly isn't the end of this story. You are probably thinking, "Of course not, I can see that there is much more story to read. I can't wait for the great end of this story." I will get there, but many important lessons lay here, in the middle of the story. Lessons like needing to follow Him diligently (when you know it is Him), even when it seems to your human mind and intellect to be the wrong direction. Lessons like trusting Him over your own experiences, hopes, and wants. Lessons like just follow Him because of who He is; and because He came and did what He did; and because He loves you as He does.

And please understand that it wasn't that the Lord had stopped my ministry. It was that He had paused my public/vocational ministry. But why?

He had told me a few years prior to that moment in Kansas, to pastor my family. I had heard that. I agreed with that. But that certainly could not mean that I had to pause my life's calling of vocational/public preaching ministry to accomplish that - could it? It literally took His voice bringing me to the end of myself in that Kansas church parking lot that Saturday afternoon, to understand that pastoring my family was not to compete with or play second fiddle to any other ministry. He was calling it to be my sole focus for a season, and a prime focus always. Had i missed where the Bible talks about ministers and their families? No. But I hadn't fully had revelation about it yet either!

Well, what now?

I stepped into a new "non-ministry" job and tried to focus on pastoring my family. I still didn't fully understand at the time how much they needed that ministry. So, at that point, I was still operating more out of blind obedience than from a place of understanding, vision, and/or passionate calling.

Look, it is hard to lay your dreams, hopes, desires, and calling - down. It is hard to deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. Not that pastoring my family was a cross to bear, but giving myself up like that certainly felt like one - many times.

Ok, we can get back to the storyline... fast forward from that Kansas parking lot 3 years later... I was focused on pastoring my family, as the Lord had called me to do. God was moving mightily in our lives. My "non-ministry" work was going stellar. In fact, after a series of promotions, I was now running the day-to-day operations of a sales, recruiting, and business coaching company... and was in line to become the CEO. And, as I have been doing much of my adult life, I had again started coaching a couple of pastors/missionaries pro-bono in my free time, as the Lord brought them to me. God was moving mightily.

But there was some confusion in our lives as well. Within that last year and a half, God had spoken to me through two different people (who still to this day have no idea of the other's existence) the same message of my return to ministry... and get this, it sounded like returning to the travelling and preaching ministry again - my original calling and heart's desire. I had learned enough at this point though, to not try and help God. He had purposefully obligated Himself to my return to that ministry, and He was going to bring it to pass - in His time and His way.

His way began with me resigning from my then current job as Director of Operations of a business coaching and recruiting company. I had started as a coach and team leader. I then became the Coaching Team Manager, and eventually, Director of Operations. (Am I telling you some of this to give you some foundation that I might know a little of what I am talking about? YES!) The only two people above me in that director’s role were the two owners of the company. They didn’t want me to resign. In fact, it was only at that time that they told me that they were intending to shortly promote me to CEO of their company… to give them the time that they needed to pursue other ventures. I had no other job lined up when I resigned. I wasn't sure what was next for me or my family.

A month after resigning, His call back to ministry came... beginning with the full-time ministry of coaching pastors through Transformational Ministry Coaching.

Maybe surprising to you - I initially kicked against that calling. I didn't want to coach pastors full time. I wanted to travel and preach. And I certainly didn't want to rest my family's livelihood on coaching pastors. Many pastors don't want to be coached. They need it! Oh, do they need it, and often times they know they need it. I knew this then because I would still occasionally coach pastors, missionaries, and church leaders pro-bono, on the side. Still, many of them don’t want it and won't accept it... because sadly, they are being driven in most areas of their lives by pride and/or fear. To prove this fact, one missionary who travels the world coaching missionaries, told me that coaching US pastors might be the toughest (ministry) calling there is in the US.

And on top of all of that, this unexpected calling to ministry coaching came through unexpected means. The Lord didn’t even speak the calling to me directly, but through various different people (again, independent of each other). I was a bit bewildered at the time. Though I have now come to understand much more why He called me in this way. I had no idea the leap of faith I was about to take, and how much I needed to know that this calling was not "all in my head". So, in August of 2021, we went live with Grats, the ministry that has become what you know it to be today.

(Sidenote here: I know that Grats is a terrible name for a ministry. We hadn't originally formed the legal entity Grats for ministry. We had originally formed it for a potential business opportunity that had been in front of us. And since the name of the business would almost never be public facing, I went with the first name that came to mind.)

It is important for you to know that originally stepping out into this ministry didn't require great faith. I didn't have much else going on work-wise at the time. And I had also been coached by some to continue my "non-ministry" job-search during the time that we were launching Grats (our pastoral coaching ministry). It isn’t really great faith to launch a business/ministry when you have nothing else going AND are still working on developing your other vocational options. It is often great wisdom to launch that way, but not necessarily great faith. But, the need for faith was about to come quickly.

In October of 2021, the job search had landed me a FANTASTIC job offer, making more money than I had ever made - with an ability to make even more than that. And with that job offer came a very surprising uncomfortableness in my spirit. Actually, troubling might be a better word for it.

Why was I feeling this way? Was I not supposed to take this miracle job? It was a "no-brainer", wasn't it?

The Lord used multiple people to confirm that we were to say no to that job and its potential promise of financial stability; and that we were to take a leap of faith by going full time with Grats. So, we obeyed and took that leap of faith. I can't tell you how free I felt when I turned that job offer down.

I don't want you to think that we made this faith-leap lightly. I was terrified to the core. Especially because getting pastors to even consider ministry coaching had been like pulling teeth up to that point (Like I thought it would be). We had no pastoral clients. In fact, we actually started with a couple of business clients doing Transformational Business Coaching, months before we ever brought on our first ministry coaching client. (We didn't realize at the time that this was the Lord making sure that we kept one arm of Grats involved in the business world.)

So, yeah - I was a little worried. Not that the Lord's calling would have been wrong (NEVER!), but that maybe I had misunderstood the Lord… that I had been wrong. I mean, I was putting it ALL on the line. It would not have been the first time I had missed the Lord. I have ALWAYS tried to learn from ever misstep, every mistake. And to this day, I always live in a deep gratitude for the Grace and Mercy shown me by Him. His Grace and Mercy drive me to serve Him, and give back to Him by giving to His kingdom. It is one of my biggest motivators in life.

But now you know why He needed to speak through multiple people. Could all of these people be wrong? No! Surely, we were on the right track - His track!

And then we experienced what the old preacher Smith Wigglesworth stated: "God cannot bring anyone into blessing and into full co-operation with Him except through testings and trials."

It is very easy when in health and strength, to make pledges, to utter vows, and even to say that you are stepping out in faith. However, it is being faithful when the time of testing comes that really counts. Little did we know how soon we were going to have that first big test.

It was only a few days after saying no to that job offer, and bills were quickly coming due... bills that I had no way to pay. And, in my soul’s reassessing whether or not our leap was truly of the Lord, my heart quietly put a “fleece” (as in Judges 6:36 - 40) before Him – unbeknownst to the rest of me. My heart had covertly determined that if the Lord would provide for these bills "on time", then this would finally confirm to me that the leap of faith was of Him. And "on time" for us was noon on November 1st. I didn’t even realize that my heart had done this until a few days before the deadline.

November 1st, 2021 was a Monday. I was on the couch that morning, just sitting with the Lord, wracked with various, strong emotions. Noon was quickly approaching, and so were the due dates of those bills. In fact, some of those bills had come due that very morning! What was I going to do?

Suddenly, my wife came bursting into the room (as much as my wife would burst into a room). We had received a pledge for 2/3's of our entire budget for the month of November, for half of our budget for December, and for smaller amounts for January and February. That pledge had actually come the night before, but we had not seen it until my wife saw it that morning. The November money from that pledge would be deposited the next day. I was floored, and deeply grateful.

And then, a few hours later (that same day mind you), we received a sizeable check in the mail from one of our (then) new prayer team members - who was also the outside voice that the Lord had used to speak to us to even start the pastoral coaching ministry we now called Grats. That check covered the rest of our bills for November, and the one last outstanding bill from October - and even gave us a little left over! THANK YOU, JESUS!!

(Sidenote: That same prayer team member that gave the check that had come later in the day on November 1st (that gift was a big faith step for him and his wife, as he had been unemployed at the time for some months), he was offered a dream job a week later - making A LOT of money!)

So, not only had the Lord provided for every bill due on November 1st, He just went ahead and provided for every bill for the month, and started the provision for the next couple of months! Awesome miracle! But, what does this have to do with the moment in the church parking lot in Kansas?

The next day, November 2, something bubbled up to the surface of my being. Jesus didn’t just provide for our bills, he had confirmed in my heart through this provision, that our leap of faith was correct. And if the leap of faith was truly of Him, then Grats and this coaching ministry was truly of Him. And if this all was of Him, then...

I went into the next room where my family was and proclaimed:

“Guys, we are in full-time ministry again!”.

The Lord will do what He has promised. Sometimes, we have to wait. And we also have to live (and wait), in faith!

Another quote by Smith Wigglesworth along these lines: "There is something about believing God that makes God willing to pass over a million people just to anoint you. God will always turn out to meet you on a special line if you dare to believe God."

End of the story? Almost.

About a year later, in 2022, the Lord opened the door for the traveling and preaching/speaking ministry to be part of the Grats portfolio!! (I know, you may have seen that coming much earlier in this story too.)

And about 6 months after that came the call to build out the Pastoral Search Committee Operating System... helping churches best navigate Senior/Lead pastor transitions. All of that recruiting experience in the business world came front and center!

And some months after that, came the leading to build out the Business Process Outsourcing arm of Grats; helping churches and businesses accomplish taxing backend tasks such as Websites, Bookkeeping & Financial Report Generation, Payroll & HR services, and Merchant Services/Payment Processing.

More important though than the services we offer, are the results that we have seen. We have pages and pages of testimonies, and testimonials (some of which are recorded on our website) of what God has done in people's lives through this ministry! 

So, what is the leap of faith that the Lord is calling you to? Maybe it is something as simple as putting your pride down and contacting Grats for assistance. Or maybe it is putting your control down and just obeying what you know He has told you to do.

Whatever it is, I will leave you with this:

Follow Him! Do what He is calling you to do. And let His cross keep reminding you that He loves you, and that knows what He is doing when He asks you to take up your cross!

We bless you in Jesus' name!