Look Forward: When God Calls You to Lead and Fear Says You're Not Ready

Before the yes. Before the first Sunday. Before the moment he stood in front of a room full of teenagers and realized God had been preparing him for this his entire life.

There was just a young man sitting in a parking lot asking God if He had the right person.

His name was Patrick Gates. And the calling was real but the confidence was not there yet.

The Young Man in the Back Row

Patrick Gates had been attending Cornerstone Church since he was fourteen years old.

He knew every ministry. Every program. Every face in the congregation.

He had served quietly for years.

Sound booth on Sundays. Setting up chairs on Saturday mornings. Running media for the youth department when they needed an extra hand.

He was always present. Always helpful. Always in the background.

And that was exactly where Patrick intended to stay.

He was twenty-three now. Working a steady job. Taking a few college classes at night. Living a life that was comfortable, manageable, and completely safe.

Safe was something Patrick understood very well.

He had grown up watching what happened to people who stepped out too far too fast. His own father had launched a ministry that collapsed under financial pressure when Patrick was twelve. The fallout had cost their family more than money.

Patrick had watched that. He had filed it away. And he had quietly decided that staying in the background was not cowardice.

It was wisdom.

The Conversation He Did Not Ask For

Pastor Reeves caught him after service one Sunday in March.

Not in his office. Not formally. Just in the hallway with a cup of coffee and the kind of direct eye contact that told Patrick this was not a casual conversation.

"I have been watching you for three years," Pastor Reeves said. "You show up without being asked. You serve without recognition. You know these teenagers by name. You remember their situations. You follow up without being told."

Patrick shifted his weight. "I just try to help where I can."

Pastor Reeves nodded slowly.

"The youth pastor position is open. I want you to take it."

The hallway got very quiet.

"Pastor I am twenty-three. I do not have a theology degree. I have never led anything officially. There are people far more qualified than me who could do this."

Pastor Reeves looked at him steadily.

"You just described Moses. And Gideon. And David. Every one of them had a reason they were not the obvious choice. And every one of them was exactly who God had in mind."

He put his hand on Patrick's shoulder.

"Pray about it. But Patrick — I want you to hear me clearly. I am not asking you because nobody else is available. I am asking you because you are the one God showed me."

He walked away and left Patrick standing in the hallway holding a cup of coffee that had gone cold.

The Parking Lot Prayer

Patrick sat in his car for forty-five minutes after everyone else had left.

The building was dark. The parking lot was empty. And Patrick Gates had a conversation with God that he had been avoiding for longer than he wanted to admit.

Lord I am not qualified for this.

The answer that came back was not loud. Not dramatic. Just clear.

I did not ask for your qualifications. I asked for your yes.

Patrick gripped the steering wheel.

What if I fail? What if I do what my father did? What if I step out and it falls apart and I take people down with me?

The silence that followed was not empty. It was full.

Full of every moment God had been preparing him without his permission.

The teenager he had talked off a ledge at youth camp two summers ago. The kid whose parents were divorcing who had texted Patrick at midnight because he did not know who else to call. The small group of high school boys he had been meeting with informally for a year just to talk about faith and life.

He had been doing the job already. He just had not accepted the title.

The calling is not new Patrick. You have been walking in it. I am just asking you to stop pretending you are not.

He sat with that for a long time.

Then he picked up his phone. He texted Pastor Reeves four words.

I will do it.

His hands were shaking when he hit send.

The First Sunday

He prepared for three weeks straight.

Notes. Outlines. Illustrations. Backup illustrations in case the first ones did not land. Prayers over every chair in the youth room the Saturday night before.

He stood in the doorway of the youth room at 9:47 on a Sunday morning and looked at the teenagers filing in.

Forty-three of them.

Some engaged. Some on their phones. Some who had clearly been dragged there by parents who needed a break.

Every insecurity Patrick had ever carried walked in with him that morning.

You are too young. You are not polished enough. They are not going to take you seriously. Your father's ministry failed and yours will too.

He closed his eyes.

Three seconds.

Lord. I will Look Forward.

He walked to the front of the room.

He opened his mouth.

And what came out was not the perfectly polished sermon he had rehearsed for three weeks.

It was honest. Personal. Unguarded.

He told them about the parking lot. About the fear. About the forty-five minutes of negotiating with God and losing. About the text he almost did not send.

And forty-three teenagers who had been half present became completely still.

Because every single one of them knew what it felt like to be called to something bigger than their confidence.

And not one of them had ever heard an adult admit it out loud before.

The Storm That Came After

The first month was not easy.

A parent complained that he was too young and too informal. A longtime church member questioned his theological depth publicly. Two teenagers stopped coming and Patrick carried the weight of wondering if he had failed them.

The comparison crept in quietly.

He started looking at other youth pastors online. More polished. More credentialed. Bigger rooms. Better production.

And one Wednesday night after a session that felt completely flat he sat in his car in the same parking lot and felt the same familiar pull toward retreat.

Maybe Pastor Reeves got it wrong. Maybe I misheard. Maybe safe was better after all.

He recognized the voice immediately.

Not because it was new. Because he had heard it in the parking lot the first time.

And he had learned what to do with it.

He opened his notes app. He typed three words.

Lord save me.

Not from the ministry. From the fear that was trying to convince him that the storm meant the calling was wrong.

The storm is not a sign that you missed God. It is a sign that you are exactly where the enemy does not want you to be.

The Moment Everything Clicked

Six months in a seventeen year old named Marcus stayed after session to talk.

He sat across from Patrick with the kind of weight on his face that Patrick recognized immediately because he had worn it himself.

"I feel like God might be calling me to do something," Marcus said carefully. "But I do not know if I am the right person."

Patrick looked at him for a long moment.

And then he said the same thing Pastor Reeves had said to him in that hallway.

"Sit down. I want to tell you something about a parking lot."

The Lesson

God does not call the qualified. He qualifies the called.

Patrick did not have a theology degree. He had three years of showing up.

He did not have a polished platform. He had forty-five minutes of honest wrestling with God in a parking lot.

He did not have his father's failure to repeat. He had his own story to write.

The calling on your life is not waiting for your confidence to catch up. It is not waiting for your credentials to align. It is not waiting for the fear to go away.

It is waiting for your yes.

The room is already prepared. The teenagers are already filing in. The chairs have already been prayed over.

The only thing missing is the person God already chose standing at the front of the room.

Eyes up. Walk in. Say yes.

Scripture to Stand On

"For God has not given us a spirit of fear but of power and of love and of a sound mind." — 2 Timothy 1:7

"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you. Before you were born I set you apart. I appointed you." — Jeremiah 1:5

"I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me."

— Philippians 4:13

Reflection

What calling have you been standing in the parking lot negotiating with God about?

What title have you been refusing while already doing the work?

What has fear told you that sounds like wisdom but is actually just self-protection dressed up in theological language?

Friend God is not looking for the most qualified person in the room.

He is looking for the most available one.

Send the text. Walk into the room. Eyes up.

He already chose you.

Patrick almost talked himself out of the calling in a parking lot. The fear sounded reasonable. The excuses made sense. But God was not asking for his qualifications. He was asking for his yes. What is God waiting for you to say yes to?

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 — S. A. Briddell