Start small. Dig deep. Let God give the increase.

A young missionary arrives on the field, and within a year he is doing everything. A service on Sunday morning and Sunday night. A Bible study on Wednesday. A new work in the next town. A building fund. A school. A radio program. He is everywhere, all the time, and he is proud of it.

By the second year, he is exhausted. His wife is tired. His children barely see him. The churches he started are shallow, because he never stayed in one place long enough to dig deep. And the work he built so fast begins to crumble, because it had no foundation.

He did too much too soon. And the price was high.

The Mistake

The mistake is overextending yourself and your resources by trying to do too much too soon.

It is the pressure to perform. The supporters back home want reports, and reports need numbers. The other missionaries seem to be doing more. The sending church wants to see progress, and progress looks like buildings, baptisms, and new works. So the missionary stretches himself thin, taking on more than one man can carry, and calling it faith.

It is not faith. It is haste. And haste has a high price.

Why It Happens

There are a few reasons a missionary overextends himself, and all of them feel like faithfulness at the time.

The first is the pressure from home. Supporters give money, and money creates an expectation. The missionary feels he has to prove the support is worth it, so he produces. More services, more towns, more reports. He is afraid that if the numbers slow down, the support will stop. So he runs faster.

The second is comparison. He hears about another missionary who started three churches in two years, and he wonders what is wrong with him. He forgets that God does not measure every man by the same work, and that the man he is comparing himself to may be paying a price nobody sees.

The third is the fear that slowing down means failure. If he is not busy, he feels he is not faithful. Rest feels like laziness. A quiet week feels like a wasted week. So he fills every hour, and calls the fullness fruitfulness.

And the fourth is that he confuses activity with growth. A full calendar looks like a growing ministry. But a man can be busy all day and build nothing that lasts. Busyness is not the same as fruitfulness.

What It Costs

Haste costs the missionary his health. He burns out, and burnout does not announce itself. It creeps in slowly, until one morning he cannot pray, cannot preach, and cannot remember why he came.

It costs the family. A missionary who is everywhere is nowhere for his wife and children.

"But if any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel" (1 Timothy 5:8).

No success in the ministry compensates for failure in the home. The family is not a resource to be spent on the work. The family is part of the work.

It costs the church plant its depth. A church that is started fast and left fast will be shallow. New believers never get discipled because the missionary has already moved on to the next town. The leaders never get trained, because there was no time. The foundation never gets laid, because he was too busy building the roof.

And it costs the missionary his joy. He started out excited, and he ends up exhausted, wondering if the gospel works at all. It does work. But it works slowly, like a seed, and haste is the enemy of a seed.

The Lord Builds the House

"Except the LORD build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the LORD keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain" (Psalm 127:1).

That verse is the whole answer to haste. If the Lord does not build it, your labor is in vain. And the Lord does not build in a hurry.

Jesus spent three and a half years with twelve men. He did not start a hundred churches. He did not hold a crusade in every town. He walked with twelve men, and He stayed with them, until they could carry the work themselves.

"And he ordained twelve, that they should be with him, and that he might send them forth to preach" (Mark 3:14). With Him first. Then sent.

The kingdom grows like a seed.

 "So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground; And should sleep, and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how. For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself; first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear" (Mark 4:26-28).

First the blade, then the ear, then the full corn. In order. You cannot skip the blade and get to the harvest. The seed grows while the farmer sleeps. That is not laziness. That is trust.

"Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain" (James 5:7).

The husbandman waits. He has long patience. He knows the fruit comes in its time, and no amount of pulling on the plant will make it grow faster.

"And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not" (Galatians 6:9).

In due time. Not in ours. If we faint not.

Start Small

So start small. That is the better way, not a lesser way.

Start with one place. One group of people. A few faithful men. Teach them well. Disciple them deeply. Train them until they can carry the work. Then, when the foundation is solid, expand.

The foundation is everything.

"Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock" (Matthew 7:24-25).

The wise man dug deep and laid his foundation on a rock. The foolish man built fast on the sand, and the storm took it all.

"According to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise masterbuilder, I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon. For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ" (1 Corinthians 3:10-11).

A wise masterbuilder lays the foundation first, and he lays it well. He does not rush past it to get to the walls.

And do not despise the small beginning. "For who hath despised the day of small things?" (Zechariah 4:10).

Small is not failure. Small is how God starts most things. Twelve men. One seed. One church in one town. The day of small things is the day the foundation gets laid, and the foundation is what the whole building stands on.

If you spend three and a half years and can only train eleven decent men, you will have done a world-changing ministry. That is not a small result. That is Jesus' own math.

The Increase Is God's

"I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase" (1 Corinthians 3:6).

You plant. You water. God gives the increase. Your job is the faithful part, the planting and the watering, the slow work of digging deep and building well. His job is the increase, and He gives it in His time.

So stop measuring your ministry by how much you do, and start measuring it by how deep you dig. One solid church, built on Christ, with trained leaders and discipled believers, is worth more than ten works that crumble when you leave.

Start small. Dig deep. Be patient. Let God give the increase.