Deep and Wide

Celebrating John MacArthur’s 40 years of ministry at Grace Community Church has led to a time of reflection by many people. One of those people is Justin Taylor who recorded this quote from a conversation he had with MacArthur:

Early in my first year or so at Grace Community Church, I had this little kind of motto that I used: “If you concentrate on the depth of your ministry, God will take care of the breadth of it.” My ministry hasn’t changed since that first year in that small, little church. For me, it’s all about getting into the depth of Scripture and my own personal walk with the Lord. Breadth is something that God does….

What a lesson to be learned—a lesson that flies in the face of most of today’s church-growth practices. A ministry that is deep in the teaching and preaching of God’s Word will, by God’s grace, be widely influential. But a ministry that uses man’s methodology to be widely popular will be shamefully shallow. While the immediate numbers of the deep ministry might not be able to compete with the shamefully shallow ministry, it is far more eternally influential. Which one do you think brings glory and honor to God?

Revelation 2:5

(Quote taken from Stand: A Call for the Endurance of the Saints)