The WIGTake for Spiritual Generations
All 12 Ingredients for Spiritual Generations and Podcasts
By Pheaney (Peter) Lindell and Chuck & Deb Wood
We’ve discussed vision and the authority of the Great Commission. This week, we look at the “Hand of God” that must move if our efforts are to matter. If Jesus, the Son of God, could not produce spiritual generations without prayer, what makes us think we can? We often treat prayer as the garnish on our ministry meal, but for Jesus, it was the fire that cooked it.
The Jesus Model
His selection of the twelve was preceded by a night of prayer, and His sustaining of them was anchored in His intercession. Nowhere is this clearer than in John 17, the High Priestly Prayer.
Jesus recognized that the men He was leading were not His own discovery, but God’s gift. He prayed, “I have manifested Your name to the men whom You gave Me out of the world” (John 17:6). This acknowledgment shifts the burden; if God gave them, God must sustain them. Consequently, Jesus prayed specifically for them: “I ask on their behalf; I do not ask on behalf of the world, but of those whom You have given Me” (John 17:9). He did not just pray for their success; He prayed for their spiritual survival, asking the Father not to take them out of the world, but to “keep them from the evil one” (John 17:15).
Crucially, Jesus prayed with the future in mind. He wasn’t just looking at the men in front of Him; He was looking at the generations they would spawn. He prayed, “I do not ask on behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word” (John 17:20). He was interceding for you and me, centuries before we were born.
The Scriptural Model
The early church lived this reality. In Acts, when the Apostles were faced with the overwhelming needs of those in the church, they appointed deacons so they could dedicate themselves “to prayer and to the ministry of the word” (Acts 6:4). Later, the explosion of the church in Antioch wasn’t attributed to a strategic plan but to a spiritual reality: “And the hand of the Lord was with them, and a large number who believed turned to the Lord” (Acts 11:21). Success was synonymous with the Hand of God resting on their efforts.
Paul embodied this dependence. He didn’t just teach Timothy; he prayed him into maturity. He writes, “I constantly remember you in my prayers night and day” (2 Timothy 1:3). This wasn’t a casual mention; it was a desperate, ongoing intercession. To the Thessalonians, he described praying “night and day most earnestly” that he might see them and “complete what is lacking in your faith” (1 Thessalonians 3:10). Paul understood that while he could teach them doctrine, only God could complete their faith.
Stories
It was the era B.Z.—Before Zoom—when I was on the phone with my friend Andrew. We were discussing the state of the Navigator ministry across the US Army. Honestly, the map looked sparse. We only had a handful of functioning ministries on about eight posts. It felt like we were holding ground rather than taking it.
I told Andrew I had been meditating on Joshua 1:3: “Every place on which the sole of your foot treads, I have given it to you, just as I spoke to Moses.”
There was a pause on the line before Andrew replied, “That makes you want to take a long walk, doesn’t it?”
“Why don’t we?” I shot back. “Why don’t we go to every major Army installation and pray that God gives us the land?”
“Let’s do it,” he said.
We recruited Dave and Cecil, piled into a van, and launched a massive prayer road trip. We hit the major hubs: Fort Bragg, Fort Campbell, Fort Hood, Fort Benning, Fort Carson, and Fort Lewis, just to name a few. At every single front gate, we stopped the car and got out. Then—at my insistence—we took off our shoes and socks. We stood barefoot on the pavement, sometimes in freezing temperatures, literally placing the soles of our feet on the ground to ask God for that post.
It wasn’t just a solemn pilgrimage; it was a riot of fellowship. We drove through a blinding blizzard, survived on road snacks, and even got run off by security guards who thought four shoeless men at a military gate looked suspicious. But we trusted God for the outcome.
That act of faith sparked something. Over the next eight years, we watched Jesus multiply our efforts from those original eight posts to thirty-two functioning ministries around the country. It remains the most spectacular spiritual growth spurt I have ever witnessed.
Suggestions
- The “Top 3” List: Keep a physical list of the people you are discipling (or wanting to disciple) in your pocket or phone. Pray for them by name daily, asking for specific breakthroughs in their character.
- Prayer Walking: Physically walk the grounds of your campus, base, or neighborhood. Place your feet on the ground and ask God to give you that territory for His Kingdom.
- Fast for Breakthrough: When you hit a spiritual wall with someone, stop talking to them about God and start talking to God about them. Commit to a day of fasting specifically for their growth.
Application for Disciple Makers
For us, the WIGTake is realizing that we cannot argue, strategize, or love someone into the Kingdom or into more fruitful ministry by our own strength. We need the “Hand of God” to move. Spiritual parenting requires battling on our knees. It means praying for those you are discipling by name, asking God to protect them, sanctify them, and use them to reach the next generation. Consider D.L. Moody, one of the most effective evangelists in history. He didn’t attribute the thousands of conversions in his ministry to his eloquence, but to the engine of prayer. He famously said, “Every great work of God can be traced to a kneeling figure.” We can preach or strategize until we are exhausted, but until the Hand of God moves through prayer, hearts remain stone.
Prayer invites God to do the work, but that work is only “generational” when the conviction doesn’t stop with us. Next week, we discuss the bridge to the future: Ingredient #6: Second Generation Conviction.
All 12 Ingredients for Spiritual Generations and Podcasts
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