As I invest my time and energy in those I come alongside – through coffee meet-ups, studying the Bible and praying together – I feel for them deeply and I care about their journey. I get excited when I see growth in their walk with Jesus and, in some cases, I begin mentally preparing an invitation into some form of leadership…

Then there are those who seem to do the opposite. They begin to disengage with me and/or their Christian communities. No matter how much I try, they seem to be going nowhere and I find myself wallowing in disappointment.

My thoughts easily enter a downward spiral. Is it my fault? Did I explain certain passages incorrectly? Was I not challenging them enough? Was I too keen? Was I not praying hard enough? 

It is here I need to catch myself and stop. It’s helpful in these moments to acknowledge three things that help me break out of this spiral and move on.

1. It’s okay to be disappointed

It’s natural to feel aggrieved when people disengage with Jesus. We long to see people saved, to experience the fullness of Christ and the transformation he brings to our lives. But when someone we deeply care about doesn’t appear to be following this path, it’s okay to be upset about that – particularly so when this is somebody you’ve invested time, love and energy into.

2. God brings the growth

Why is my immediate reaction to spiral and blame myself? Because, ultimately, I wasn’t being fully reliant on God in my disciple-making. I was unintentionally trying to do this in my own strength and forgetting that it is God who does the hard work.

1 Corinthians 3:6-7 reads, ‘I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth…’ (ESV).

This passage is a beautiful reminder to me in my everyday disciple-making that it is God who brings the transformation in their lives. I find it easy to put pressure on myself and can fall into a ‘saviour mentality’, taking on all of the responsibility for their faith, and therefore panicking when their response isn’t what I’d hoped for. But God relieves us of the burden of thinking it all depends on us. It isn’t our responsibility how others respond. God invites us to cast all of our burdens onto him (Psalm 55:22, Matthew 11:28-30).

3. It’s worth persevering

Our job is to plant seeds, get alongside people and trust that God will make them grow. This can look like helping them – even in the smallest of ways – to discover who Jesus is, how to engage with God’s word and how to develop a prayer life. Sharing small snapshots of how God has worked in our lives can plant seeds with huge potential.

1 Corinthians 3 continues, ‘He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor. For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field, God’s building’ (verses 8-9 ESV).

We persevere in alongsiding because that is where God is, that’s what He is doing. We are his and we are obeying his call on our life, so even when we can’t see or understand what is happening in the person we are getting alongside, we can trust that our time hasn’t been wasted. Maybe God wants us to plant and for someone else to water. We need to depend on God’s direction.

We might quickly see the fruit of our discipleship and that is such a joy. We might see fruit many years later and rejoice then, or we might lose contact and never find out if the seeds we panted were able to grow. And we have to be able to say, ‘That’s okay!’ As God reminds us in Zechariah 4:6, ‘Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit.’

Is there someone you are getting alongside that you need to entrust to God afresh today?