A Word to Pastors and Leaders
As pastors and leaders, we must continually return to Paul’s question: Having begun in the Spirit, are we now attempting to be perfected by human effort?
When Jesus ascended into heaven, the situation did not look promising from any human perspective. A small group of men stood watching Him leave. They had given up everything to follow Him. They had witnessed His miracles, absorbed His teaching, and believed Him to be the Messiah. And now He was gone. If we were evaluating that moment as leaders assessing sustainability and long-term impact, we would not have predicted global transformation. There was no visible infrastructure, no institutional continuity plan, no strategic rollout. There was simply a fragile band of ordinary men who, according to John, were meeting behind locked doors out of fear.
And yet the movement did not collapse. Within a few centuries the message they carried had spread throughout the Roman Empire and beyond. The explanation is not found in organizational genius or cultural leverage. It is found in the coming of the Holy Spirit. Jesus had told them to wait, not for improved conditions, but for power from on high. When the Spirit came, fear gave way to boldness and fragility gave way to joy. The Book of Acts is exactly that: the record of the sovereign, loving, saving Spirit at work in the world and the people of God yielding to Him.
As Calvary Chapel pastors and leaders, this should resonate deeply with us because we ourselves are the fruit of a move of the Spirit. Our history as a movement was not engineered by corporate strategy or sustained by marketing sophistication. We have seen with our own eyes the power of the Spirit in people’s lives. We have seen Him convert hearts that seemed immovable. We have seen Him transform broken men and women into faithful servants. We have seen Him equip ordinary believers to teach, shepherd, serve, and go. We have seen the power of God at work in ways that cannot be explained by human method alone. That history is not sentimental memory. It is theological grounding.
Yet leadership carries a subtle danger. Over time we can invest enormous energy in planning, structuring, forecasting, and building systems. Faithful stewardship requires diligence and wisdom, but the drift can happen almost imperceptibly. We can begin in dependence and slowly move toward self-reliance. We can create a plan and then ask God to bless it, while missing what He is presently doing.
Paul’s words to the Galatians confront that drift with unusual clarity:
“You foolish Galatians! Before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law, or by believing what you heard? … After beginning with the Spirit, are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort? … Does God work miracles among you because you observe the law, or because you believe what you heard? Consider Abraham …” (Galatians 3:1-6)
Paul’s concern was not methodology. It was the integrity of the gospel itself. Christ crucified had been clearly proclaimed. The Spirit had been received through faith. Miracles had occurred because people believed what they heard. And now, having begun in the Spirit, they were drifting toward human effort as the means of completion.
That question belongs to every generation of leaders. Did we receive the Spirit because we engineered the right structure, or because we believed the gospel? Did God transform lives among us because we perfected systems, or because Christ was preached and trusted?
Paul directs them to Abraham. Abraham believed the promise, yet struggled with delay. At one point, he attempted to secure through human initiative what God had promised to accomplish by divine power. It did not go well. The flesh can produce results, but it cannot produce the promise.
Over time Abraham grew in confidence. He became fully persuaded that what God had promised He was able also to perform. Even then, he did not see the fullness of the promise in his lifetime. He saw beginnings, not completion. He died in faith, trusting a promise that would unfold beyond him.
There is deep freedom for leaders in that truth. We do not hold the work God does. We participate in it. We steward what is entrusted to us. We preach Christ. We shepherd faithfully. But the long arc of fulfillment rests in the hands of God.
Recently I had a conversation with a friend about Calvary Chapel, and the subject of freedom surfaced. One friend emphasized trust. I found myself sensing that what many feel more strongly today is restraint. The more I reflected, the more I realized these are not opposing realities. The deeper question is what we believe must be preserved and how it is preserved.
When we speak of trust and integrity, we must be careful that we are not merely defending our own perspective of what needs protection. Paul was pleading for the integrity of the gospel in Galatians, and that gospel was a gospel of freedom. Freedom from law as a means of righteousness. Freedom from human performance as the basis of acceptance. Freedom for the Spirit to form Christ in believers.
In Corinth, addressing a very different context, Paul spoke of diversities of ministries and diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit, the same Lord, the same God who works all in all. Unity was not enforced through uniformity but grounded in the sovereignty of the Spirit.
Over the years in ministry, I have learned that it is essential to distinguish between the objective work of the Spirit and His subjective movement in particular seasons.
There are realities the Spirit is accomplishing that are objective and undisputed. He glorifies Christ. He convicts and converts. He regenerates. He indwells. He distributes gifts. He builds the church. He advances the gospel. These are not impressions or preferences. They are promises rooted in the revealed will of God. We do not have to guess whether He desires to exalt Jesus or bring people to salvation. These truths anchor us.
But alongside these objective works, there are also subjective movements of the Spirit that require discernment. In Acts we see Him forbidding Paul to enter certain regions and later directing him elsewhere. We see the church fasting and praying, and the Spirit setting apart Barnabas and Saul. The leaders at Jerusalem say, “It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us.” They were discerning, not dictating. They were responding, not controlling.
In pastoral leadership, this distinction matters deeply. The Spirit may stir unusual hunger in one congregation while allowing another to walk through refinement. He may restrain an initiative that appears promising while quietly blessing something small and unseen. He may deepen repentance before expanding influence. These movements are not always obvious. They require prayer, patience, and humility.
The objective work of the Spirit gives us confidence. The subjective movement of the Spirit calls for discernment.
One situation that has pressed this into my heart recently is watching a thriving youth group of around one hundred and sixty young people. They are not numbers. They are faces and stories. The Lord is clearly raising them up. There is hunger. There is life.
And precisely there lies the temptation.
When we see something flourishing within a movement we love, we may instinctively shape it in our image. We want to equip them well. We want to ground them deeply. But beneath those good desires another subtle impulse can arise: that we make them Calvary Chapel before we make them disciples of Jesus.
Our calling is not to reproduce a movement. It is to make disciples who follow Christ, who love His Word, who walk in the Spirit. Movements serve the church, but they are not the church. If the Spirit began this work, then the Spirit must continue it. What God is doing in this generation does not belong to us. We steward it, but we do not control it.
Through the prophet Zechariah, the Lord declared that it is not by might nor by power, but by His Spirit that mountains become plains. That promise still stands. We began in the Spirit. We must continue in the Spirit. We may not see the full fruit in our lifetime. But the promise belongs to God.
There is a moment in the life of Elisha that captures this beautifully. Elijah had just been taken up. The mantle had fallen. The prophet who had shaped a generation was gone. Elisha stood at the Jordan holding what once belonged to another man. He did not cling to the past. He did not try to preserve Elijah. He struck the water and asked a decisive question: “Where is the Lord, the God of Elijah?”
He was not asking for Elijah’s spirit. He was asking for Elijah’s God.
That is the question for every generation of leaders.
Not, where is the movement as it once was?
Not, how do we preserve what has been?
But, where is the Lord?
And the answer has not changed.
He is here.
He is faithful.
He is at work.
We can be confident in the Spirit’s Lordship and tireless work. He is not passive. He is not distant. He is actively glorifying Christ, building His church, convicting hearts, and shaping generations. The work does not rest on our strength, our structures, or our ability to manage outcomes. It rests on Him.
If we are weak but He is with us, that is enough.
If we are perplexed but dependent, that is enough.
If we have no support but His Spirit is present, that is enough.
That is the longing of our hearts as pastors and leaders.
To begin in the Spirit.
To continue in the Spirit.
To trust the Lordship and tireless work of the Holy Spirit until our part is finished.
And that is enough.
