Get Off The Treadmill

Get Off The Treadmill

Recently a missionary couple serving their first year in Muslim dominated northern Iraq (Kurdistan) e-mailed me about their ministry frustration of so few converts to Christianity!  In all their efforts to demonstrate kindness in tangible ways to these people, only two had genuinely accepted Christ Jesus as their Savior and Lord.  I know these American missionaries and I am well acquainted with their focused work ethics.  I know their small results were not from a lack of effort and prayer.  I couldn’t shake their frustration for days, as I reflected on my own painful first 10 years of pastoring in Clovis, NM…Curry County…small county America.  We seldom saw 10 new converts each year.  I’m acquainted with the echoing reality of a lot of activity, but very little progress (Treadmill Ministry).

I prayed and asked the Lord to encourage and strengthen His servants who labor in such harsh environments, that He would grant them His perspective and strategies to build the Kingdom of God in the hearts of people.  I sincerely felt like the Lord spoke to me in that still, small voice and said, “Never despise the impact your firstfruit converts will have on the world.”  In Paul’s ministry to the Gentile people, Lydia was his first recorded convert in Europe.  Her home was later used to form the church of Philippi. 

He took me back to my first three converts in Clovis, where I’ve been now for 30 years.  Remember, I didn’t win a total of 100 people to Christ in the first 10 years of my ministry.  My brother, Stormy, gave his heart to Christ and then told a childhood friend, Steve, about getting saved as they competed to see who could drink the most beer on Saturday night.  Out of his inquisitiveness, Steve attended church the next day with my brother, hung over from the night before, and he accepted Christ as Savior.  He then told his younger brother, Troy, about the church and he got mad and said we must be a cult and that he was going to come to church and straighten me out!  He got saved instead!

Little did I know then that my brother, many years later, would become a loving pastor in Lubbock, TX and see 500 converts a year come to Christ!  Troy now pastors a church in Roswell, NM and is used by God to win 2,000 people to Jesus annually.  Steve pastors the fastest growing church in New Mexico.  His church has grown in attendance to 7,000 people on Sundays!

We can count the number of seeds in an apple, but no one except God can count the number of apples in each seed!

“Do not despise the days of small beginnings.”

I wonder how God will use the firstfruit converts in Iraq.  I wonder how the Lord will work through your efforts and prayers.  By the way, this year, that missionary couple in Kurdistan has seen between 100 and 200 Muslims convert to Christianity!

God is faithful!

David Swann
Senior Pastor Faith Christian Family Church
Clovis, NM