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Three Truths to Remember When Times Get Tough

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The Purpose Driven Life Book

Pastor, some of the most painful moments in ministry are the ones you never planned for.

You didn’t ask for the conflict. You didn’t expect the criticism. You didn’t see the disappointment coming. One day you were serving faithfully, and the next day you were wondering how things got so complicated.

When you’re in that place, it’s easy to start asking hard questions. Why is this happening? Did I miss something? Did I mess something up? You may even wonder whether God is really using this season at all.

Here’s something you need to remember:

God never wastes a hurt.

What you’re going through is not random. It hasn’t slipped past God’s attention, and it hasn’t arrived without purpose. Even when the situation feels confusing or unfair, God is still at work—shaping you and preparing you for what he wants to do next.

The truth is, God often does his deepest work in our lives through the very experiences we would never choose for ourselves. And if you’re willing to trust him in this season, he can use even your worst experiences to shape your ministry in lasting ways.

If you’re in a painful season right now, you may not need all the answers. But you do need a few solid truths to hold onto—truths that steady you when circumstances feel uncertain and remind you of what God is really doing.

There are a few things God wants you to remember in seasons like this. These three truths won’t make the pain disappear. They won’t fix everything overnight. But they can help you see your situation through God’s eyes and trust him as he uses even your hardest experiences to shape your ministry.

Truth #1: This Isn’t Random

Pastor, what you’re walking through right now is not an accident. It didn’t sneak past God or catch him off guard, and it didn’t arrive without purpose.

If you belong to Jesus, nothing enters your life—or your ministry—without your Father’s permission. God is paying attention to every detail, even the ones that confuse you. The Bible tells us this in Romans 8:28, “We know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose" (NIV).

That doesn’t mean God caused what’s happening. It doesn’t mean he enjoys your pain. And it doesn’t mean this season is his ideal plan for your life. But it does mean that he is fully aware of it and fully present in it.

Truth #2: God Is Not the Author—He Is the Redeemer

When ministry hurts, it’s natural to assume God must be behind what you’re experiencing. But there’s an important distinction you need to remember. God is sovereign, yet he is not the author of sin, injustice, or cruelty. He never delights in your pain, and he never asks you to pretend that what hurts doesn’t hurt.

When you sin, that’s not God’s will. When others wound you, misunderstand your motives, or speak against you, that’s not God’s will either. And when pressure builds because you’ve been carrying more than you were meant to carry, that strain isn’t something God designed.

But God does allow things he does not approve of—and then he redeems them.

That means even painful experiences can be used by God for a greater purpose. Ask Joseph. Standing in front of the brothers who had wronged him, he said: “Even though you planned evil against me, God planned good to come out of it. This was to keep many people alive, as he is doing now" (Genesis 50:20 GW).God takes what is broken and brings healing, what is confusing and brings clarity, and what feels unfair and uses it to shape something good in your life and ministry.

Redemption doesn’t mean the pain didn’t matter. It means God refuses to waste it. Even when circumstances feel unfair or confusing, you can trust that God is at work in what he allows, using it to shape you and prepare you for what’s next.

Truth #3: God Is Shaping You for What’s Next

One of the hardest parts of painful seasons in ministry is not knowing how long they will last or what they are producing. When the pressure doesn’t lift and the answers don’t come, it can feel like you’re stuck—like this moment is the end of the story.

It isn’t.

God often does his deepest work in us before he does his most visible work through us. He shapes the heart long before he changes the situation. What feels like delay is often preparation.

Throughout Scripture, God brings life out of what looks finished. He uses loss, limitation, and weakness to form leaders who are more dependent on him and more compassionate toward others.

That shaping work is not wasted time. It’s how God deepens your faith, strengthens your character, and prepares you for what lies ahead. Even when you can’t see the connection yet, God is forming something lasting in you.

This season will not define you. But God can use it to refine you. And when he is finished with what he’s doing in your heart, you’ll be better prepared to serve with humility, wisdom, and grace in whatever comes next.

Pastor, take heart.

What you’re facing today may feel heavy, confusing, or unfair—but it is not meaningless. God is with you in it. He is shaping you through it. And he is not wasting a single moment of your faithfulness.

You may not yet see how this season fits into the bigger picture. But one day, you’ll look back and recognize that God was doing more than you realized—forming you, steadying you, and preparing you for what only he could see ahead.

Until then, keep trusting him. Keep walking faithfully.

And remember: God never wastes a hurt.

Recent Articles

You're Always on God's Mind

"The LORD, who is always thinking about us, will bless us.” Psalm 115:12 (GW)Pastor, you spend your whole week paying attention to everyone else. You notice the family that slipped out early. You notice the volunteer who seemed discouraged, the member in the hospital, the email you still haven't answered. You carry a hundred details no one else even sees.But here's something easy to forget on a Monday morning: While you're paying attention to everyone else, God is paying attention to you.You are always on God's mind. He is never not thinking about you. He's thinking about you right now.The Bible says this over and over. Psalm 115:12 says, "The LORD, who is always thinking about us, will bless us" (GW). And the Living Bible paraphrase says, "Let him have all your worries and cares, for he is always thinking about you and watching everything that concerns you" (1 Peter 5:7).Whatever concerns you concerns God. The board meeting weighing on you. The number you're afraid to look at. The person you can't seem to reach. There is nothing you carry that God isn't already carrying with you, because you are always on his mind.And because you're always on his mind, he's always looking out for you. That means you can trust his plan—not just for your church, but for you.Think about what it means that God is mindful of you. That word means he's alert. He's attentive. He's aware. When nobody else is paying attention to the shepherd, to you, God is. He notices everything. Jesus said, "What is the price of two sparrows—one copper coin? But not a single sparrow can fall to the ground without your Father knowing it. And the very hairs on your head are all numbered" (Matthew 10:29-30 NLT).You've counted a lot of things this week. God has counted the hairs on your head.So before you pour yourself out again, let that settle in. You are seen. You are known. You are not carrying this alone.Pastor, you spend yourself taking care of everyone else. This week, let God take care of you.

Start with the Person, Not the Empty Slot

Every August the same stress lands in a pastor's inbox. The nursery is short. The parking team needs bodies. Someone has to run kids' check-in before the fall ministry campaign launch, and the list of empty slots is a lot longer than the list of people who've said yes.So we do what feels natural. We stand up and beg. We print the sign-up sheet, announce the gaps, and hope enough hands go up to keep the machine running one more season.I understand the instinct. But after years of leading a church, I became convinced that this is exactly the wrong place to start.Don't start with the empty slotMost churches recruit the same way. We look at the org chart, find the holes, and go hunting for warm bodies to fill them: We need more Sunday school workers, so go get some. We're down three greeters; who's available?I call that the institutional approach, and it treats people like interchangeable parts. The program comes first, and the person exists to keep it running.Here's the problem: When you start with the slot, you'll always be short, and the people you talk into serving rarely last. They said yes to plug a gap, not to answer a calling. By spring they're burned out, and you're back to begging.Start with the person insteadAt Saddleback we flipped the question. Instead of asking, "How do we fill this slot?" we asked, "How has God made this person?"We interviewed people for ministry based on what we called their SHAPE (spiritual gifts, heart, abilities, personality, and experiences). Paul put it this way: "Try to have a sane estimate of your capabilities by the light of the faith that God has given you" (Romans 12:3 PHILLIPS).That was the step I got most excited about, because almost nobody was doing it. We weren't there to plug a program; we were there to help a person discover what God had already built them to do.Make that one shift, and everything about recruiting changes. Now you're looking at a room full of ministers who simply need help finding where they fit.A gift is never for the one who holds itWhen you help people find their SHAPE, you're not just solving a staffing problem; you're handing them a purpose."Each one, as a good manager of God's different gifts, must use for the good of others the special gift he has received from God" (1 Peter 4:10 GNT). Notice who the gift is for. It isn't for you; it's for the other person.That's why someone serving in their SHAPE almost never burns out the way a slot-filler does. Doing the very thing God wired you to do fills you up even as it pours out to everyone around you.The ministries you'd never have plannedThere's a payoff I didn't expect. Give people room to serve out of their SHAPE, and they'll start ministries you never would have dreamed up.I'll tell you the truth: I didn't start most of Saddleback's ministries. They were launched by people in our church who felt called by God to meet a need they saw. My job, and my staff's job, was to help those leaders succeed.If I had only recruited people into the slots I could see, we would have missed most of what God wanted to do. Your church is no different. The person you're about to guilt into the nursery may be carrying a ministry you can't even picture yet.Keep the real goal in front of youIn a busy season it's easy to forget why we do any of this. The point was never to keep the programs staffed. The goal is to develop disciples, and the programs are just tools that help us do it.So before you print the sign-up sheet this fall, ask a different question. Don’t ask, “Who can fill this?” Instead, ask, “Who has God already shaped for this, and how do I help them find it?” Fill your slots with people who were made for them, and you won't just survive the fall. You'll build something that outlasts the season.

Who Tells You the Truth?

“Stupid people always think they are right. Wise people listen to advice.” (Proverbs 12:15 (GNT)Every week you help people see what they can’t see on their own. From the pulpit, in a counseling appointment, over coffee, in a hospital hallway, you name the blind spots other people miss. It’s part of your calling. But here’s a quiet question worth sitting with this morning: Who does that for you?We all have blind spots. There are things in each of us that need correcting, and we just can’t see them. Sometimes we don’t look closely enough. Sometimes, if we’re honest, we’d rather not look at all. We settle into habits that feel comfortable, and comfortable is usually where growth quietly stalls. That’s true for the people in your church. It’s true for you and me too.God never meant for us to grow alone. He puts people around us who care enough to be honest with us. For a pastor, though, those people can be hard to come by. You’re the one everyone else leans on, so it starts to feel easier, even safer, to keep a little distance. Trouble is, distance is right where blind spots like to hide.So let me just ask: Is there anyone who will level with you? Not someone who just says what you want to hear, but a friend who thinks enough of you to say the hard thing kindly. If nobody has that kind of access to you, chances are you’re carrying mistakes you can’t even see yet.Pride is what makes this so hard. It puts us on the defensive and quietly talks us into believing we’ve got nothing left to learn. It builds walls, holds people at arm’s length, and then leaves us wondering why God feels distant, when part of how he speaks is through the very people we’re keeping out. Humility goes the other way. It leaves the door open and says, “Go ahead. Tell me the truth. I can take it.”God wants to speak through you. He also wants to speak to you. One of those takes courage. The other takes humility. You need both to go the distance in ministry.Maybe a face already came to mind while you were reading. A friend, a fellow pastor, your spouse, someone who’s earned the right to be honest with you. This week, give that person the opportunity to speak truth to you. Ask them, “What do you see in me that I might be missing?” And then, as hard as it is, just listen.When you’re willing to ask and humble enough to really hear it, God can use those words to breathe life back into you, the same way he’s used yours for so many other people.

Stop Treating the Sermon like the Whole Ballgame

A lot of pastors treat the weekend service like it's the whole ballgame. You pour 40 hours into 35 minutes. You stand up and give it everything you've got, and when it's over, you feel like the week's ministry is basically done.But it isn't, and the sooner you feel that in your bones, the better. The weekend is the mouth of the church. But the heartbeat of the church is the small groups.Here's the picture I want you to keep in your head: The weekend service is the tip of the iceberg. Ninety-five percent of what actually changes people is unseen. It's under the water. And it happens in small groups during the week.That's how they did it in the New Testament too. "Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts" (Acts 2:46 NIV). Large-group worship in the temple courts. Small-group fellowship house to house. They needed both. The weekend gathering was never meant to carry the whole load by itself.The weekend is the mouth, not the heartbeatLet me give you the numbers that reordered my thinking. In my years at Saddleback, on a typical weekend we'd have around 20,000 people at our services. During the week we'd have 30,000 or more in small groups. That is not a typo. There were about 10,000 more people in our homes than in our services.That changed how I saw my own preaching. The heartbeat of our church was never the Sunday morning service. It was the small-group fellowship. That's where the strength was. That's where the relationships were. The weekend is loud and visible and important, but it's the mouth. The life happens in the body.So the sermon matters, but not the way a lot of us secretly think it does. It's the funnel, not the finish line.A funnel is for pouring people somewhereNobody admires a funnel. A funnel has one job: to take what you pour into it and move it into something that can actually hold it. That's what a weekend message is for.So the real question after you preach isn't, "Was that a good sermon?" The question is, "Where is this sermon sending people next?" If your preaching ends when the service ends, you've built a funnel that pours onto the floor. The truth lands, people nod, and then it runs off before it ever gets caught in a relationship where it can grow.That's why, at Saddleback, I always preached with the next step in mind. I wasn't just trying to deliver information on Sunday. I was trying to move people from "come and see" to "come and die." You don't get there in a crowd. You get there in a circle.Don't build a church of looky-loosI'll be honest with you about a truth that kept me humble. I used to tell our people that if I dropped dead, we'd lose maybe 1,000 of what I called the looky-loos, the folks who showed up on the weekend mostly to hear me. But the church would keep right on growing, because its heartbeat was never my sermon. It was the small groups.Ask yourself which church you're building. A church gathered around your preaching is only as strong as your next weekend, and only as durable as you are. A church gathered into groups keeps growing whether you're in the pulpit or in the hospital.That should take pressure off you, not add it. You don't have to be brilliant every weekend. You have to point people somewhere deeper than the seat they're sitting in.The Word does its deepest work in a circleHere's why the group matters so much for what you preach. People apply God's Word better in a small group, because in a group they can ask questions. They can say, "I don't understand this," or "I tried this and it didn't work," or "Pray for me; this is hard." You can't do that in a row of chairs facing the same direction. You can only do it in a circle where people face each other.Groups are also how you close the back door. People who are known in a group rarely slip out unnoticed. The person who only ever hears you preach can disappear next week and nobody calls. The person in a group gets missed by name.So when you preach, you're the one who starts the work and hands it off, not the one who finishes it. The sermon opens the truth. The group is where people wrestle it into their actual lives.Preach them toward each otherSo preach your heart out this weekend, Pastor. Prepare hard and say it clearly. But hold it with an open hand, because the sermon was never the whole church.Before you preach, ask one more question you may have been skipping: “Where does this land after the service?” Give people a next step that gets them off the row and into a circle. Point them toward a group, a place where they can be known and can put the truth to work.Your best sermon this weekend isn't the one that earns the most compliments at the door. It's the one that funnels someone into a group by Tuesday, where the Word can finally do what it came to do.

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