Praying to grow

https://odb.org/2026/06/30/praying-to-grow

1 Corinthians 3:1–9 (NIV): 3 Brothers and sisters, I could not address you as people who live by the Spirit but as people who are still worldly—mere infants in Christ. 2 I gave you milk, not solid food, for you were not yet ready for it. Indeed, you are still not ready. 3 You are still worldly. For since there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not worldly? Are you not acting like mere humans? 4 For when one says, “I follow Paul,” and another, “I follow Apollos,” are you not mere human beings?
5 What, after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe—as the Lord has assigned to each his task. 6 I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God has been making it grow. 7 So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow. 8 The one who plants and the one who waters have one purpose, and they will each be rewarded according to their own labor. 9 For we are co-workers in God’s service; you are God’s field, God’s building.

After Lam Wai Chan moved from his native Singapore to pastor a church in Japan, he panicked. The church had barely twenty members. In a nation known as a “missionary graveyard,” where about one percent of the nation’s people are Christian and many churches sit empty, Lam felt “like I was taking over a sinking ship.” Crying out to God, he sensed the answer: Offer the church back to Me.

Rather than “update” worship or music, Wai Chan asked members to pray—for their needs, family members, and friends who didn’t know Jesus. Slowly, the church doubled in size. (Patricia Raybon, Our Daily Bread 30th June 2026)

The Corinthian church was plagued by a partisan spirit that threatened to divide it. Each group exalted their favorite teacher over the other teachers (1 Corinthians 1:10-17). Paul warned that leaders like himself were merely God’s servants whom God had assigned specific tasks to help build up the community (3:5). He stressed that it’s God who makes the church grow (vv. 6-7). It doesn’t matter which tasks we’ve been assigned—“what’s important is that God makes the seed grow” (v. 7 nlt). Those entrusted to build up God’s people are “servants of Christ,” and all servants “must prove faithful” (4:1-2). As “co-workers in God’s service” (3:9), God will help us be faithful in building up each other. As we persevere through prayer, He’ll grow His church and reward His faithful servants “for their own hard work” (v. 8 nlt). (K.T. Sim, Insight, Our Daily Bread 30th June 2026)

In ministry, we strive to show tangible results to justify our position and in some situations funding. So if there’s a budget allocation (for example, from the church’s coffers which are usually tithes and offerings), we need to show results. This unfortunately is very much like the world in terms of the key performance indicators (KPIs) of our secular job. We understand the rationale for KPIs, even in the church context. But in ministry and church work, 1 Corinthians 3:6-8 is an important principle to always bear in mind:

6 I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God has been making it grow. 7 So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow. 8 The one who plants and the one who waters have one purpose, and they will each be rewarded according to their own labor.

If there needs to have KPIs, it should be in terms of the planting and the watering of the seed, not the growth itself. So if there is an outreach, the people tasked with that outreach should be evaluated based on their faithfulness and diligence doing the work there. For example, conducting worship services, preaching, bible study classes, visitations and evangelism. Whether there is spiritual growth in the lives or an increase in numbers, that’s the work of the Holy Spirit. We can only teach the Word and guide. In the end, it is for the congregation to apply the Word for their own spiritual growth. Salvation is a free gift from God by grace, and thus accepting Jesus is not something for us to engineer or manipulate. It is always a battle between spiritual forces influencing the heart with a free will to decide.

As taught in today’s ODB life example of Lam Wai Chan, we pray for God’s intervention. We give back His work to Him. We pray and let Him prosper and grow the work. It is His outreach, fellowship or cell group. Sometimes God’s work may be confined to the handful of people in our midst, the 8 to 10 faithful people in our cell group or house fellowship. That’s our sphere of influence, our field. That is where we water and plant. But it is God who grows and nourishes as we apply His Word in the challenges we face in life. We grow spiritually as we rely on God and walk in faith. We remain stagnant in our faith if we are always fearful to trust God and instead walk by sight and our own understanding, and not in faith or in God’s wisdom. We need to step out of our comfort zone and trust Him.

Have a good week, everyone! May we live in the wisdom of His overflowing grace and achieve much for His glory this coming week!

P/s – I was not able to write yesterday as I needed to leave my home in a smaller city for our city home 70 kms away early in the morning to avoid rush-hour traffic. It took us 45 mins to reach our city home, instead of the usual 90 mins plus.