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Article Title: How to Live by Faith When You Don’t Know What Comes Next
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Meta Description: Discover how to take the next step of faith when God’s plans are uncertain. Learn from Elijah and believers in Tanzania how obedience can shape an audacious life.
Article Excerpt: What does it mean to truly live by faith? Through the story of Elijah and the lives of believers in Tanzania, discover why following God often begins with one small, uncomfortable yes—and how ordinary acts of obedience can shape a life that matters.
Category: Faith & Spiritual Growth
Tags: Faith, Obedience to God, Trusting God, Christian Living, Biblical Lessons
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How to Live by Faith When You Don’t Know What Comes Next
What does it really mean to live by faith? Is it believing the right things, going to church, and asking God to bless the life we have already planned? Or does genuine faith require something more—something that might interrupt our comfort, challenge our priorities, and lead us somewhere we never expected to go?
Sometimes, the hardest part of following God is not knowing where He will lead. We want the whole map before we take the first step. We want certainty before we obey.
But throughout Scripture, we see a different pattern. God often asks His people to trust Him with the next step before He reveals what comes after it.
In 1 Kings 17:5, describing the prophet Elijah, Scripture gives us a simple picture of faith:
“He did what the Lord told him.”
That sentence captures a life of faith. Elijah listened to God and acted on what God asked him to do. He did not need to understand the entire plan before taking the next step.
And that is where an audacious life begins—not with one extraordinary moment, but with a willingness to say yes to God, one step at a time.
When God Changes the Way You See Your Life
Recently, a trip to Tanzania, Africa, left me wrestling with questions about my faith that I have not entirely been able to put into words.
I visited a fishing village on the edge of Lake Tanganyika, far from the schools, cities, and towns. When we arrived, children watched us cautiously. Many appeared malnourished. I watched a mother finish cooking a small portion of beans over an open fire and divide it among her children. What we might order as a side dish at a restaurant was their meal.
There was a lot that was difficult to take in.
My daughter, Selah, was with me. She seemed completely at home. She smiled at the children, moved toward them, and within minutes had them surrounding her, holding her hands, and laughing with her. She did not need a plan. She simply started loving them.
Later, we walked down to the lake and swam. I looked back at the children watching from shore, whistled, and motioned for them to join us.
A local leader warned me that I was about to have dozens of naked children in the water with me. Within moments, the children were swimming all around us.
At first, they stayed close, unsure what to do. I grabbed a little boy and tossed him into the air, the way a father might play with his child in a swimming pool. He surfaced, spat out water, and broke into a huge smile. Then he swam straight back for another turn.
Soon, every child wanted to join in. For the next thirty minutes, I threw child after child into the air until my arms were exhausted. The whole lake was filled with laughter.
Later, a local man told me something I have not forgotten. Many of those children had experienced the strength of men primarily through grabbing, beating, using, or abusing them. That day, he said, they had experienced something different: strength bringing joy.
I went to Africa expecting to see poverty. I also saw courage, hardship, and extraordinary joy. I saw people following Jesus under circumstances that made my own comfortable Christianity look very small and safe.
I came home changed. My faith felt unsettled, and I began asking whether the way I lived actually reflected what I said I believed.
That experience changed the direction of what I wanted to teach our church. I had planned to begin a different sermon series, but instead, we began a series called Audacious: The Courage to Live Undivided, following the life of Elijah.
Elijah stood before kings, called fire from heaven, and outran chariots. Yet he also experienced exhaustion, fear, and discouragement. His story is about a man learning to give God his entire life.
And it begins with a surprisingly simple act of obedience.
1. Faith Begins With the Next Step, Not the Whole Plan
In 1 Kings 17:2–5, God tells Elijah to leave where he is, travel east, and hide in the Kerith Ravine. He promises that Elijah will find water from a brook and that ravens will bring him food.
The passage ends with these words:
“So he did what the Lord told him.”
Think about how ordinary that first instruction seems.
God did not tell Elijah to gather a crowd, launch a ministry, or take on a great public assignment. He told him to leave what he knew, go where God directed him, and trust Him for what came next.
Elijah was about to become one of the most remarkable prophets in the Bible. But before his public ministry unfolded, God called him to obey in private.
Public courage is usually built through private obedience.
That is an important truth for us, too. We often imagine that an audacious life begins with one dramatic decision. In reality, it is usually built through smaller decisions that nobody else sees.
It might mean having an honest conversation you have been avoiding. It might mean giving generously when doing so requires trust. It might mean serving someone who cannot repay you, asking for help, or taking a step of faith that makes you uncomfortable.
We do not become courageous in one huge moment. We become courageous by saying yes in the small moments when God calls us to act.
Notice something else in God's promise to Elijah: God tells him that the ravens will provide food there.
Elijah could not remain where he was and receive what God had prepared for him at the brook. He had to move.
Sometimes we want what God has for us without leaving what is familiar. We want the provision, the growth, and the opportunity, but we hesitate when the next step requires us to trust Him beyond what we can see.
God did not give Elijah the entire itinerary. He gave him the next step.
Faith often works the same way.
2. One Small Yes Can Grow Into Something Bigger Than You Imagined
While in Tanzania, I met Harold and Connie Knepper, who arrived there twenty years ago with little more than their suitcases.
They saw children who were too poor to receive a meaningful education. Without learning English, many would have limited access to universities and future employment.
Harold and Connie responded to what they saw. They prayed, trusted God, found land, and started a school that would provide free education to families who could not afford it.
Twenty years later, I sat at that school's graduation. I watched kindergarteners speak English and talk about Jesus. I listened as graduates spoke about becoming doctors, engineers, and attending college.
Harold explained that their goal was not simply to educate children. They wanted to disciple them—to help them grow as followers of Jesus who could carry their faith into the world.
Then Harold and Connie saw another need. Churches were being planted in villages, but many pastors had little biblical training. Some became exhausted, while others began teaching things that had little to do with Jesus.
So they responded again. They helped establish a Bible college to ground men and women in Scripture, train pastors, and send them to places where there was no church.
A longtime friend and partner named Sylvester told me that Harold and Connie had changed Kigoma and Tanzania by raising up children who love Jesus and pastors who carried His message into new communities.
Looking at the school, the Bible college, and the churches, I would call their work audacious. But their story did not begin with a grand plan to change a nation.
It began with one quiet yes.
Their first yes was not a decision to move to Tanzania, build a school, establish a Bible college, and plant churches. Tanzania was not even on their radar.
The first step was simply being willing to look beyond their comfortable lives and consider what God might be asking of them.
Then came another step. And another.
What looked extraordinary twenty years later began with ordinary acts of obedience along the way.
The Bible describes a similar pattern in the life of Abraham. Hebrews 11:8 explains that when Abraham was called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, he obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going.
Abraham did not know the destination, but he trusted the One who had called him.
We often want God to show us the final destination, the cost, the route, and every possible obstacle before we move. We keep asking for the whole map.
God may instead be asking us for a yes.
If we insist on certainty before obedience, we may be seeking control rather than living by faith. Faith does not mean we abandon wisdom or stop asking questions. It means we can trust God enough to take the next step even when we cannot see the entire journey.
3. A Life of Faith Is Not a Life Without Hardship
Another person I met in Tanzania was Pastor Bahati, a church planter whose story gave me a different picture of what it means to follow Jesus.
Bahati had planted a church in Baraka, Congo. When rebels attacked his church, he and his family were forced to flee. They left their home, their church, and the life they had known.
He eventually arrived in Uvira, Congo, where he planted another church. But the M23 rebels later took control of the area, and his family was forced to flee again.
During their escape, Bahati and his family were trying to reach a boat while gunfire sounded around them. He managed to get his children onto the boat, but when he looked around, his wife and youngest child were missing.
He faced an agonizing decision: leave with the children and hope his wife would find her way to safety, or return into the chaos to search for her.
He would not leave without his wife.
He told his older children that he had to go find their mother. Then he ran back into the gunfire, found his wife and youngest child, and helped his entire family escape to Burundi.
In Burundi, they were arrested and placed in a temporary refugee camp. Their home was gone. Their familiar life was gone. They were living in conditions no family should have to endure.
Yet Bahati continued to do what he believed God had called him to do.
He planted a church in the refugee camp and preached about Jesus. Later, his family was moved to a permanent camp, where they spent six months unable to leave. There, too, Bahati planted a church, preached, and trained other leaders to minister to the people around them.
Eventually, Harold, Connie, and Sylvester helped Bahati and his family get to Kigoma, Tanzania.
And there, Bahati planted another church.
What Matters Most When You Have Lost So Much?
Bahati's church meets under a large mango tree. There are no electric lights, no walls, and no roof. The congregation gathers in the open air, rain or shine.
They worship with a traditional drum and a guitar. Their voices fill the gathering with singing, and in the middle of a song, the worship leader sometimes shouts something in Swahili and everyone begins to dance.
I loved worshiping with them.
Whatever they lacked in resources, they made up for in the passion of their hearts and voices. Harold translated the chorus of one song for me. They were praising God for His goodness, provision, and kindness.
To my American eyes, it looked as though they had very little of those things.
But they knew the goodness of God in a way I was still learning to understand.
Bahati's life kept telling the same story: he did what the Lord asked him to do.
He even invited me to preach at his church under the mango tree. I have preached on stages in front of thousands of people, but standing on that dirt beneath the tree marked me in a way many of those larger settings never had.
Afterward, I pulled Bahati aside, thanked him, and asked how I could pray for him.
He could have named a hundred needs. The rainy season was coming, and his congregation had no building or roof. I was an American visitor who might be able to help, and the opportunity to ask for something practical was right there.
Instead, Bahati held both of my hands and looked me in the eye.
He asked me to pray that God would give his church favor and that many people would be saved.
After being attacked, fleeing for his life, losing so much, and starting over again and again, his deepest concern was that more people would come to know Jesus.
That request stayed with me.
Bahati's circumstances were difficult, and his practical needs were real. His faith did not make those hardships disappear. But even amid them, his attention remained fixed on something larger than his own comfort.
His example challenged me to ask whether my priorities and prayers reflected what I believed mattered most.
4. Has Comfort Become More Important Than Following God?
Since returning from Tanzania, I have been unsettled by how small my prayers had become and how often my attention was fixed on my own things.
God, bless this food.
God, keep us safe.
God, help this work out.
God, this is hard. Can You make it easier?
There is nothing wrong with praying for protection, provision, or help. God welcomes us to bring our needs to Him.
But what happens when those are our biggest prayers—or our only prayers?
What happens when we become more concerned with God making our lives comfortable than with asking how we can participate in what He is doing?
Sometimes our prayers amount to this: God, please help the life I have already arranged work out the way I want it to.
What if we have confused a blessed life with a comfortable life?
Comfort is a gift, but comfort is a terrible god.
Comfort does not always tell us to reject God. Often, it simply tells us to wait.
Not yet, God.
It promises to protect our lives while quietly shrinking them. We become so determined to preserve the life we have built that we may miss the very thing God is asking us to surrender.
And comfort is not always about having an easy life. Sometimes it is a calendar so settled that we leave no room for God to interrupt it.
Our schedules may be full. Our goals may be worthwhile. Our plans may be working. Yet we can become so focused on making our own plans succeed that we stop asking what God wants to do with our time, our resources, our families, and our lives.
If Jesus is Lord, He has the authority to interrupt our plans.
That does not mean every uncomfortable opportunity is automatically from God or that we should make every decision impulsively. It means we must be willing to listen, discern what He is asking of us, and respond faithfully rather than allowing comfort or fear to make every decision for us.
Faith takes a step toward something we cannot fully control. It moves forward without certainty about the outcome.
That uncertainty can bring discomfort and even fear.
Faith does not always make those feelings disappear. Sometimes faith means taking the step while your heart is still pounding.
You do not have to stop feeling nervous about baptism before you follow Jesus in it. You do not have to feel completely comfortable before inviting a friend to church or giving in a way that requires trust.
The question is not whether you feel afraid. The question is whether fear gets to decide what you do.
5. How to Recognize Your Next Step of Faith
You do not need to move to Africa, start a school, or plant a church to live an audacious life. Your next step may be much closer to home.
Ephesians 2:10 describes us as God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works that God prepared in advance for us to do.
God is already at work. We are invited to participate in what He is doing.
So what might that look like in your life?
Ask what God has already brought to your attention
Is there something you have sensed you need to do more than once? Perhaps a conversation you need to have, a person you need to encourage, or a responsibility you need to stop avoiding.
Pay attention to the things you keep bringing before God. Pray for wisdom, seek biblical guidance, and consider what a faithful response would look like.
Identify where fear is holding you back
Have you delayed an act of obedience until you feel ready, have all the information, understand the full cost, or know exactly where it will lead?
Sometimes waiting is wise. But sometimes what we call wisdom is fear dressed up as caution.
Ask yourself honestly: Am I waiting because I need to discern God's direction, or am I waiting because I want a guarantee that everything will turn out the way I prefer?
Take one concrete step
Faith becomes visible in what we do.
Your next step might be:
•Getting baptized as a response to your faith in Jesus.
•Giving generously in a new way.
•Serving someone in your church or community.
•Inviting a friend to join you at church.
•Admitting that you are struggling with an addiction and asking for help.
•Showing up at a support group, recovery group, men's group, or women's group.
•Being honest with someone about the fact that you are not okay.
•Returning to Scripture and rebuilding a life centered on God's Word and ways.
•Revisiting something you believe God asked of you years ago and making yourself available again.
Some of these steps require courage because they involve vulnerability. Others require sacrifice, humility, or a willingness to change direction.
You do not need to do everything at once. You need to take the next faithful step.
Make room for God to interrupt your plans
Look at your calendar, spending, priorities, and commitments. Do they reflect only what you want to accomplish, or is there room for God to redirect you?
This is not about filling every spare moment with activity. An audacious life is not a frantic life. It is a life surrendered to God, willing to respond when He calls.
You may already be doing well by the measures you have chosen for success. Your work may be going well, your finances may be growing, and your schedule may be full.
But an important question remains: Does God have the authority to speak into those things?
Can He redirect your spending or your giving? Can He interrupt your calendar? Can He lead you into something uncertain?
The invitation is to hold your plans with open hands.
6. You Don't Have to Know the Whole Journey to Say Yes
One of the things that stayed with me from Tanzania was seeing how God had worked through people who simply responded to the next thing in front of them.
Harold and Connie did not begin with a plan to change an entire region. They responded to the needs God placed before them, one step at a time.
Bahati lost his home and was forced to flee violence, yet he continued to serve people and share the message of Jesus wherever he found himself.
Elijah began by leaving a familiar place and trusting God to provide for him at a brook.
Their circumstances were very different, but each story points us toward the same truth: An audacious life is not about doing everything. It is about doing the next thing God asks of you.
That next step may not be visible to anyone else. It may not seem impressive. It may not lead where you expect.
But faithfulness is not measured by how extraordinary a decision looks from the outside. It begins with trusting God enough to respond to what He has made clear.
You do not have to go to Africa to live an audacious life. Your yes begins in your neighborhood, your office, your classroom, your home, and your heart.
And you do not have to wait until next week, next year, or until you finally feel ready.
A simple question to pray today
The next time you have a quiet moment with God, pause before asking Him to bless the plans you have already made.
Instead, ask:
“God, what is the one next step You want me to take?”
Then listen. Give yourself time to reflect on Scripture, seek wise counsel when needed, and respond to what God is asking of you.
You might even write 1 Kings 17:5 somewhere you will see it each morning:
“He did what the Lord told him.”
Imagine what it would mean for those words to describe your life. Not perfectly, and not all at once, but through a growing willingness to hear God and obey Him.
One surrendered yes at a time, God can shape a life you never could have planned on your own.
God is not asking you to make your life impressive. He is asking you to place it in His hands.
You have one life. Do not spend it protecting every part of it from God's direction.
Hear His prompting. Take the next step. Say yes.
This article was adapted from a message at The Orchard Church in Carbondale, Colorado.
Explore more messages and resources from The Orchard Church at https://theorchardlife.com/media.
Article Title: How to Live by Faith When You Don’t Know What Comes Next
URL Slug: live-by-faith-one-step-at-a-time
SEO Title: How to Live by Faith When You Don’t Know What Comes Next
Meta Description: Discover how to take the next step of faith when God’s plans are uncertain. Learn from Elijah and believers in Tanzania how obedience can shape an audacious life.
Article Excerpt: What does it mean to truly live by faith? Through the story of Elijah and the lives of believers in Tanzania, discover why following God often begins with one small, uncomfortable yes—and how ordinary acts of obedience can shape a life that matters.
Category: Faith & Spiritual Growth
Tags: Faith, Obedience to God, Trusting God, Christian Living, Biblical Lessons
Featured Image Idea: A quiet, natural photograph of a winding path leading toward a distant landscape in warm morning light, conveying trust, courage, and taking the next step without knowing the entire journey.
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Image Alt Text: A winding path leading toward distant hills in the morning light, representing the journey of faith and trusting God with the next step.
How to Live by Faith When You Don’t Know What Comes Next
What does it really mean to live by faith? Is it believing the right things, going to church, and asking God to bless the life we have already planned? Or does genuine faith require something more—something that might interrupt our comfort, challenge our priorities, and lead us somewhere we never expected to go?
Sometimes, the hardest part of following God is not knowing where He will lead. We want the whole map before we take the first step. We want certainty before we obey.
But throughout Scripture, we see a different pattern. God often asks His people to trust Him with the next step before He reveals what comes after it.
In 1 Kings 17:5, describing the prophet Elijah, Scripture gives us a simple picture of faith:
“He did what the Lord told him.”
That sentence captures a life of faith. Elijah listened to God and acted on what God asked him to do. He did not need to understand the entire plan before taking the next step.
And that is where an audacious life begins—not with one extraordinary moment, but with a willingness to say yes to God, one step at a time.
When God Changes the Way You See Your Life
Recently, a trip to Tanzania, Africa, left me wrestling with questions about my faith that I have not entirely been able to put into words.
I visited a fishing village on the edge of Lake Tanganyika, far from the schools, cities, and towns. When we arrived, children watched us cautiously. Many appeared malnourished. I watched a mother finish cooking a small portion of beans over an open fire and divide it among her children. What we might order as a side dish at a restaurant was their meal.
There was a lot that was difficult to take in.
My daughter, Selah, was with me. She seemed completely at home. She smiled at the children, moved toward them, and within minutes had them surrounding her, holding her hands, and laughing with her. She did not need a plan. She simply started loving them.
Later, we walked down to the lake and swam. I looked back at the children watching from shore, whistled, and motioned for them to join us.
A local leader warned me that I was about to have dozens of naked children in the water with me. Within moments, the children were swimming all around us.
At first, they stayed close, unsure what to do. I grabbed a little boy and tossed him into the air, the way a father might play with his child in a swimming pool. He surfaced, spat out water, and broke into a huge smile. Then he swam straight back for another turn.
Soon, every child wanted to join in. For the next thirty minutes, I threw child after child into the air until my arms were exhausted. The whole lake was filled with laughter.
Later, a local man told me something I have not forgotten. Many of those children had experienced the strength of men primarily through grabbing, beating, using, or abusing them. That day, he said, they had experienced something different: strength bringing joy.
I went to Africa expecting to see poverty. I also saw courage, hardship, and extraordinary joy. I saw people following Jesus under circumstances that made my own comfortable Christianity look very small and safe.
I came home changed. My faith felt unsettled, and I began asking whether the way I lived actually reflected what I said I believed.
That experience changed the direction of what I wanted to teach our church. I had planned to begin a different sermon series, but instead, we began a series called Audacious: The Courage to Live Undivided, following the life of Elijah.
Elijah stood before kings, called fire from heaven, and outran chariots. Yet he also experienced exhaustion, fear, and discouragement. His story is about a man learning to give God his entire life.
And it begins with a surprisingly simple act of obedience.
1. Faith Begins With the Next Step, Not the Whole Plan
In 1 Kings 17:2–5, God tells Elijah to leave where he is, travel east, and hide in the Kerith Ravine. He promises that Elijah will find water from a brook and that ravens will bring him food.
The passage ends with these words:
“So he did what the Lord told him.”
Think about how ordinary that first instruction seems.
God did not tell Elijah to gather a crowd, launch a ministry, or take on a great public assignment. He told him to leave what he knew, go where God directed him, and trust Him for what came next.
Elijah was about to become one of the most remarkable prophets in the Bible. But before his public ministry unfolded, God called him to obey in private.
Public courage is usually built through private obedience.
That is an important truth for us, too. We often imagine that an audacious life begins with one dramatic decision. In reality, it is usually built through smaller decisions that nobody else sees.
It might mean having an honest conversation you have been avoiding. It might mean giving generously when doing so requires trust. It might mean serving someone who cannot repay you, asking for help, or taking a step of faith that makes you uncomfortable.
We do not become courageous in one huge moment. We become courageous by saying yes in the small moments when God calls us to act.
Notice something else in God's promise to Elijah: God tells him that the ravens will provide food there.
Elijah could not remain where he was and receive what God had prepared for him at the brook. He had to move.
Sometimes we want what God has for us without leaving what is familiar. We want the provision, the growth, and the opportunity, but we hesitate when the next step requires us to trust Him beyond what we can see.
God did not give Elijah the entire itinerary. He gave him the next step.
Faith often works the same way.
2. One Small Yes Can Grow Into Something Bigger Than You Imagined
While in Tanzania, I met Harold and Connie Knepper, who arrived there twenty years ago with little more than their suitcases.
They saw children who were too poor to receive a meaningful education. Without learning English, many would have limited access to universities and future employment.
Harold and Connie responded to what they saw. They prayed, trusted God, found land, and started a school that would provide free education to families who could not afford it.
Twenty years later, I sat at that school's graduation. I watched kindergarteners speak English and talk about Jesus. I listened as graduates spoke about becoming doctors, engineers, and attending college.
Harold explained that their goal was not simply to educate children. They wanted to disciple them—to help them grow as followers of Jesus who could carry their faith into the world.
Then Harold and Connie saw another need. Churches were being planted in villages, but many pastors had little biblical training. Some became exhausted, while others began teaching things that had little to do with Jesus.
So they responded again. They helped establish a Bible college to ground men and women in Scripture, train pastors, and send them to places where there was no church.
A longtime friend and partner named Sylvester told me that Harold and Connie had changed Kigoma and Tanzania by raising up children who love Jesus and pastors who carried His message into new communities.
Looking at the school, the Bible college, and the churches, I would call their work audacious. But their story did not begin with a grand plan to change a nation.
It began with one quiet yes.
Their first yes was not a decision to move to Tanzania, build a school, establish a Bible college, and plant churches. Tanzania was not even on their radar.
The first step was simply being willing to look beyond their comfortable lives and consider what God might be asking of them.
Then came another step. And another.
What looked extraordinary twenty years later began with ordinary acts of obedience along the way.
The Bible describes a similar pattern in the life of Abraham. Hebrews 11:8 explains that when Abraham was called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, he obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going.
Abraham did not know the destination, but he trusted the One who had called him.
We often want God to show us the final destination, the cost, the route, and every possible obstacle before we move. We keep asking for the whole map.
God may instead be asking us for a yes.
If we insist on certainty before obedience, we may be seeking control rather than living by faith. Faith does not mean we abandon wisdom or stop asking questions. It means we can trust God enough to take the next step even when we cannot see the entire journey.
3. A Life of Faith Is Not a Life Without Hardship
Another person I met in Tanzania was Pastor Bahati, a church planter whose story gave me a different picture of what it means to follow Jesus.
Bahati had planted a church in Baraka, Congo. When rebels attacked his church, he and his family were forced to flee. They left their home, their church, and the life they had known.
He eventually arrived in Uvira, Congo, where he planted another church. But the M23 rebels later took control of the area, and his family was forced to flee again.
During their escape, Bahati and his family were trying to reach a boat while gunfire sounded around them. He managed to get his children onto the boat, but when he looked around, his wife and youngest child were missing.
He faced an agonizing decision: leave with the children and hope his wife would find her way to safety, or return into the chaos to search for her.
He would not leave without his wife.
He told his older children that he had to go find their mother. Then he ran back into the gunfire, found his wife and youngest child, and helped his entire family escape to Burundi.
In Burundi, they were arrested and placed in a temporary refugee camp. Their home was gone. Their familiar life was gone. They were living in conditions no family should have to endure.
Yet Bahati continued to do what he believed God had called him to do.
He planted a church in the refugee camp and preached about Jesus. Later, his family was moved to a permanent camp, where they spent six months unable to leave. There, too, Bahati planted a church, preached, and trained other leaders to minister to the people around them.
Eventually, Harold, Connie, and Sylvester helped Bahati and his family get to Kigoma, Tanzania.
And there, Bahati planted another church.
What Matters Most When You Have Lost So Much?
Bahati's church meets under a large mango tree. There are no electric lights, no walls, and no roof. The congregation gathers in the open air, rain or shine.
They worship with a traditional drum and a guitar. Their voices fill the gathering with singing, and in the middle of a song, the worship leader sometimes shouts something in Swahili and everyone begins to dance.
I loved worshiping with them.
Whatever they lacked in resources, they made up for in the passion of their hearts and voices. Harold translated the chorus of one song for me. They were praising God for His goodness, provision, and kindness.
To my American eyes, it looked as though they had very little of those things.
But they knew the goodness of God in a way I was still learning to understand.
Bahati's life kept telling the same story: he did what the Lord asked him to do.
He even invited me to preach at his church under the mango tree. I have preached on stages in front of thousands of people, but standing on that dirt beneath the tree marked me in a way many of those larger settings never had.
Afterward, I pulled Bahati aside, thanked him, and asked how I could pray for him.
He could have named a hundred needs. The rainy season was coming, and his congregation had no building or roof. I was an American visitor who might be able to help, and the opportunity to ask for something practical was right there.
Instead, Bahati held both of my hands and looked me in the eye.
He asked me to pray that God would give his church favor and that many people would be saved.
After being attacked, fleeing for his life, losing so much, and starting over again and again, his deepest concern was that more people would come to know Jesus.
That request stayed with me.
Bahati's circumstances were difficult, and his practical needs were real. His faith did not make those hardships disappear. But even amid them, his attention remained fixed on something larger than his own comfort.
His example challenged me to ask whether my priorities and prayers reflected what I believed mattered most.
4. Has Comfort Become More Important Than Following God?
Since returning from Tanzania, I have been unsettled by how small my prayers had become and how often my attention was fixed on my own things.
God, bless this food.
God, keep us safe.
God, help this work out.
God, this is hard. Can You make it easier?
There is nothing wrong with praying for protection, provision, or help. God welcomes us to bring our needs to Him.
But what happens when those are our biggest prayers—or our only prayers?
What happens when we become more concerned with God making our lives comfortable than with asking how we can participate in what He is doing?
Sometimes our prayers amount to this: God, please help the life I have already arranged work out the way I want it to.
What if we have confused a blessed life with a comfortable life?
Comfort is a gift, but comfort is a terrible god.
Comfort does not always tell us to reject God. Often, it simply tells us to wait.
Not yet, God.
It promises to protect our lives while quietly shrinking them. We become so determined to preserve the life we have built that we may miss the very thing God is asking us to surrender.
And comfort is not always about having an easy life. Sometimes it is a calendar so settled that we leave no room for God to interrupt it.
Our schedules may be full. Our goals may be worthwhile. Our plans may be working. Yet we can become so focused on making our own plans succeed that we stop asking what God wants to do with our time, our resources, our families, and our lives.
If Jesus is Lord, He has the authority to interrupt our plans.
That does not mean every uncomfortable opportunity is automatically from God or that we should make every decision impulsively. It means we must be willing to listen, discern what He is asking of us, and respond faithfully rather than allowing comfort or fear to make every decision for us.
Faith takes a step toward something we cannot fully control. It moves forward without certainty about the outcome.
That uncertainty can bring discomfort and even fear.
Faith does not always make those feelings disappear. Sometimes faith means taking the step while your heart is still pounding.
You do not have to stop feeling nervous about baptism before you follow Jesus in it. You do not have to feel completely comfortable before inviting a friend to church or giving in a way that requires trust.
The question is not whether you feel afraid. The question is whether fear gets to decide what you do.
5. How to Recognize Your Next Step of Faith
You do not need to move to Africa, start a school, or plant a church to live an audacious life. Your next step may be much closer to home.
Ephesians 2:10 describes us as God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works that God prepared in advance for us to do.
God is already at work. We are invited to participate in what He is doing.
So what might that look like in your life?
Ask what God has already brought to your attention
Is there something you have sensed you need to do more than once? Perhaps a conversation you need to have, a person you need to encourage, or a responsibility you need to stop avoiding.
Pay attention to the things you keep bringing before God. Pray for wisdom, seek biblical guidance, and consider what a faithful response would look like.
Identify where fear is holding you back
Have you delayed an act of obedience until you feel ready, have all the information, understand the full cost, or know exactly where it will lead?
Sometimes waiting is wise. But sometimes what we call wisdom is fear dressed up as caution.
Ask yourself honestly: Am I waiting because I need to discern God's direction, or am I waiting because I want a guarantee that everything will turn out the way I prefer?
Take one concrete step
Faith becomes visible in what we do.
Your next step might be:
•Getting baptized as a response to your faith in Jesus.
•Giving generously in a new way.
•Serving someone in your church or community.
•Inviting a friend to join you at church.
•Admitting that you are struggling with an addiction and asking for help.
•Showing up at a support group, recovery group, men's group, or women's group.
•Being honest with someone about the fact that you are not okay.
•Returning to Scripture and rebuilding a life centered on God's Word and ways.
•Revisiting something you believe God asked of you years ago and making yourself available again.
Some of these steps require courage because they involve vulnerability. Others require sacrifice, humility, or a willingness to change direction.
You do not need to do everything at once. You need to take the next faithful step.
Make room for God to interrupt your plans
Look at your calendar, spending, priorities, and commitments. Do they reflect only what you want to accomplish, or is there room for God to redirect you?
This is not about filling every spare moment with activity. An audacious life is not a frantic life. It is a life surrendered to God, willing to respond when He calls.
You may already be doing well by the measures you have chosen for success. Your work may be going well, your finances may be growing, and your schedule may be full.
But an important question remains: Does God have the authority to speak into those things?
Can He redirect your spending or your giving? Can He interrupt your calendar? Can He lead you into something uncertain?
The invitation is to hold your plans with open hands.
6. You Don't Have to Know the Whole Journey to Say Yes
One of the things that stayed with me from Tanzania was seeing how God had worked through people who simply responded to the next thing in front of them.
Harold and Connie did not begin with a plan to change an entire region. They responded to the needs God placed before them, one step at a time.
Bahati lost his home and was forced to flee violence, yet he continued to serve people and share the message of Jesus wherever he found himself.
Elijah began by leaving a familiar place and trusting God to provide for him at a brook.
Their circumstances were very different, but each story points us toward the same truth: An audacious life is not about doing everything. It is about doing the next thing God asks of you.
That next step may not be visible to anyone else. It may not seem impressive. It may not lead where you expect.
But faithfulness is not measured by how extraordinary a decision looks from the outside. It begins with trusting God enough to respond to what He has made clear.
You do not have to go to Africa to live an audacious life. Your yes begins in your neighborhood, your office, your classroom, your home, and your heart.
And you do not have to wait until next week, next year, or until you finally feel ready.
A simple question to pray today
The next time you have a quiet moment with God, pause before asking Him to bless the plans you have already made.
Instead, ask:
“God, what is the one next step You want me to take?”
Then listen. Give yourself time to reflect on Scripture, seek wise counsel when needed, and respond to what God is asking of you.
You might even write 1 Kings 17:5 somewhere you will see it each morning:
“He did what the Lord told him.”
Imagine what it would mean for those words to describe your life. Not perfectly, and not all at once, but through a growing willingness to hear God and obey Him.
One surrendered yes at a time, God can shape a life you never could have planned on your own.
God is not asking you to make your life impressive. He is asking you to place it in His hands.
You have one life. Do not spend it protecting every part of it from God's direction.
Hear His prompting. Take the next step. Say yes.
This article was adapted from a message at The Orchard Church in Carbondale, Colorado.
Explore more messages and resources from The Orchard Church at https://theorchardlife.com/media.