Remaining Faithful
By Brian Doerksen (adapted from an interview by Jon Best for Vineline)

What does “faithfulness” or “living a faithful life” mean to you?

For me faithfulness is trying to reflect the character of God. I think faithfulness is one of his core characteristics. I love what 2 Timothy 2:13 says: that even “if we are faithless, he will remain faithful.” My desire is to orient my life around the core characteristics of God so that I begin to reflect those characteristics in my own life. When I stumble in that journey, as we all do, I must come back to God’s character again and say, “Lord, make me more like you.”

I think that in almost any organization where people gather and activities happen, including the church, there is a tendency to honour success above anything. What starts to happen is that consciously and subconsciously it becomes the goal.

I can remember many moments in my life where I tasted little bits of both success and failure… Early on in my life, I remember consciously feeling God inviting me to make my life goal not to be successful but to be faithful. And that meant that there would be an ebb and flow to the things that I do having success in other peoples eyes. At times the things I do may appear to fail, but I think in God’s eyes it’s more important to live in faithfulness than for success.

Faithfulness is all about relationship. Success is about whatever it takes in order to complete a project or make something work. It is often inanimate; the goal is more important than the people that are working to achieve it. Faithfulness, on the other hand, is trying to get to the point where the people – the relationships – are more important than the bottom line in the project. Again I think that is part of God’s character, that his long-term commitment is towards relationship and that he’ll do whatever it takes over the long haul in order to restore relationship and cause it to thrive.

Maybe it’s just me; maybe it’s a confession of my own weakness of heart that I have to make faithfulness my goal because God knows that my heart is prone to really wanting success. Maybe God knows that my heart hasn’t always been the best relationally, and so calls me to a higher standard.

10 years ago, when I initially began to taste success and some of the early Langley Vineyard worship stuff started to take off, I watched some people change towards me, people that knew me before I became successful. That’s why I have a soft spot for people who believed in me and invested in me before I had experienced any success at all, who just sensed God’s hand on my life and felt like they could help and encourage me... those people who have never changed towards me, whether I was in the depths of despair for failing publicly or whether I was succeeding. I want to be like that.

I think I’ve realized, as I reach the end of my 30’s, that the most precious things are relationships: relationship with God and with others. And sometimes success gets in the way of relationship. You can’t stop success when God wants to give it. When you give something with your whole heart and you do it well, people often respond to it and deem it successful. I’m not trying to say that I sabotage the things that I do or avoid the approval of people at any cost. What I am saying is that, public approval or not, faithfulness is more important than success.

As I said, I think part of my journey to become faithful has to do with the condition of my own heart. God knows that I am a sinner, a human like anyone else, and it is one of the things that he wanted to mark in me because he knew I would need it! In some of the harder things that I’ve experienced, whether it is having special-needs kids or having some major ministry disappointments, it has helped keep my heart in the game. It’s helped me say, “Okay, this is hard right now. If my goal was success…if my goal was ‘bigger is better’ it would be so easy for me right now just to check out, retire, give up, stop risking and stop trying, but this is what I covenanted with God - faithfulness first - and this is what I want to stick with”.

A few years ago I wrote a personal mission statement based on who I felt God uniquely made me to be. I asked the question, “What do I want God and others to say about my life when it’s done?” After withdrawing for several days of reading, reflection, prayer and meditation on scripture, I realized that at the end of my life I want to know that what I did was important, but more significantly, I want to know that I have become who God has called me to be. And that becoming, to me, is about faithfulness.

What do you feel are the challenges to remaining faithful during times of failure or struggle?

Living a faithful life when things aren’t going according to your plan means several things. One of the root words of faithfulness is humility and part of how God works humility in us is helping us realize that we can’t control the outcome of, or people’s responses to, the things we do. Whatever it is – our ministry, our vision, our project – we’re doing it for the Glory of God. When it collapses, or as they say in England, “When it all turns pear shaped” living out faithfulness at that point means things like not pointing fingers, not seeking to blame others and taking responsibility for your part in it.

For me, with the failure of the ‘96 Father’s House musical project, it has meant years of paying off a debt that was legally protected by a company but that I felt was morally my responsibility. Faithfulness meant writing a cheque I wasn’t sure I could afford because I couldn’t afford the cost to my character that would result from not writing it. I took on this responsibility, in essence, by being the leader of that project and I couldn’t just walk away and say, “Oh well. It didn’t work out.”

When that project collapsed and the weight of it in those days and weeks came upon me, I cried out to God. I said, “I don’t think I can live under the weight of this – such a public failure and a couple hundred thousand dollars of debt – but I know you enough, Lord, to know that somehow you are going to work good out of all of this and I don’t want to just go into a corner and suck my thumb.” So I made a decision at that point. I said, “Lord, lead me somewhere where I can go and serve someone else’s vision. I have tried my vision and it didn’t work, so show me where I can go to serve someone else’s vision and where I can get some clarity and healing.”

At that time there were people telling me to just rise up and try it again the next year, but for me – I guess we all have to wrestle with what faithfulness to what God has spoken means – I just knew at that point the issue was keeping my family together. I had to do a job to put bread on the table. I couldn’t embark on some major risk taking adventure right at that point because I had to be responsible as a father and as a husband. I just sensed that if God wanted me to have another shot at it he would give me another shot at some point down the road.

What are the difficulties to living faithfully in times of prosperity and blessing?

When things go really well and you experience success it can be a greater test than when things go badly. When everything is going well and your vision, your creativity your product – whatever it is – takes off, success has a Siren’s call that pulls you to ask what you can do to make it happen again. In times of success it is easy to forget what is so easy to remember in times of hardship: you can’t control the outcome; all you can do is be faithful to what God calls you to.

As a songwriter, I could write a song that becomes hugely “successful” in the church and the next song that I write could be a song that I write for our church that is right for a season. Or it could be a song that is just for me that experiences no success, or one that I put on an album and it dies. I must simply do the next thing that God is calling me to, offer it up to him and walk away. I try to learn from my failures – but when it comes down to it I am just like any other ordinary worship leader that is trying to hear the voice of God. I have to walk in such a way that what I do doesn’t have to be blessed, cheered or praised by others, because I didn’t do it for others in the first place.

I think success can be very dangerous; the tests that come with it can be very great and if we put success first, I think God will very quickly arrange to humble us again.

After I went through the collapse of the Father’s House in ‘96 I thought, “I may not experience anything successful again. Well, I guess it doesn’t matter.” But in some ways, some of my songs since then have been more successful than any of my songs before. And so I wonder, what’s around the corner? Is there another “failure” around the corner? I don’t know, but I will continue to do what I feel the Lord calling me to regardless.

In what ways do you think that culture, including church culture, makes it more difficult to live out faithfulness?

I think what we honour makes it difficult to live faithfully because over and over again we honour success. We wait to honour people until either one of two things occurs: they are successful or they are dead. And I think that instead we have to be looking for ways to encourage the faithful, find ways to affirm faithful service in people and not a) wait until their funeral or b) wait until they win an award.

Sometimes encouraging people is so simple. When you find out what someone has been doing, sometimes it’s just sitting down and writing them a note that says, “I’ve noticed your faithful service and I am grateful. This is just a small reflection of what God is saying.” I am asking God to make me better at that. Publicly recognizing what people have done is also wonderful. It, especially, fosters and multiplies faithfulness in people. Not all of us have the venue to be able to thank people publicly but all of us are able to do it privately, by sending a note expressing thanks.

It may sound simplistic but I think we need to be less in line with our culture and more in line with God and what he says through scripture. What does he honour? What is honoured in scripture? I think one of the things that’s honoured most in scripture is faithfulness and leaders that exemplify that kind of life style. In our culture image is everything. It’s all about how we can position something in order for it to have the right look.

Faithfulness speaks of something that can be successful but most importantly has integrity. The faithful person says, “This is who I am, this is who I am called to be and I am just going to do it.” Because culture is always shifting, if we are looking for success we are always going to be tempted to shift along with it to find what’s “hot” or what’s “in.” When we imitate whatever is successful it often results in scatteredness. We need to slow down and trust that being who we are called to be is going to bear more fruit in the long haul.

Do you think that your definition of faithfulness has changed as you have gotten older?

I think it has. When I was younger I was doing some of the same activities that I am doing now but I probably relied more on how I felt to help me to determine whether or not I was being faithful. I needed more confirmation in my feelings, physical sensations and emotions that I was doing the right things. If I didn’t get those physical affirmations quickly enough, then I would think that I wasn’t doing the right thing - that maybe I should be doing something else. Whereas I think that when you get older – and of course I have a lot longer to go, I am somewhere in the middle of the journey – you learn to trust those less or need them less.

I talk to many worship leaders who walk off after they lead worship and think, “Oh man that was terrible.” They immediately write it off because of what they were physically and emotionally feeling when they did it. I just smile and say, “I can relate but just let me give you my perspective. You did some songs that you felt led to do and, yah, it wasn’t a great morning but you gave what you had to give. You have to just offer it up to the Lord as worship.”

I think the definition has changed a bit for me and the pace has slowed down a bit because I realize I’m not in control of everything and that I can’t do everything. I’ve become a little bit more careful in the things that I choose to do. There are things that God is calling me to do and there are all these other things that are all good things…I’ve become a little bit more relaxed about saying, “No, I am just going to do what I am called to do and I am going to encourage others to do what they are called to do.” Whereas I think that when you are younger you tend to try to do everything yourself.

What are some practical ways that you have found to build faithfulness into your life?

One thing I have found that builds faithfulness in my life is taking faithful people for my heroes. Who are my heroes? King David. Yes, he wrote songs, but for me it’s more about his whole journey with God. Corey Ten Boom is another one. My heroes are people that were faithful to the call of God no matter what was thrown at them.

Choosing faithful heroes affects what books I read and what movies I watch. I need to fill my mind with real life examples of faithful people so that when I am in the midst of my own real life choices I can remember the choices that they made when they were in difficult circumstances, that they made the faithful choice. True story inspires me.

Another tool that builds faithfulness is practicing the spiritual disciplines. They help you stay anchored to the source of all faithfulness: God. Ongoing involvement in a local church is also important and keeps one anchored. For me it’s a place where I am just Brian not [the famous] Brian Doerksen.

I think the marriage relationship is life’s most important relationship. It’s all about faithfulness. The deeper you grow in your marriage and turn your hearts to one another, holding one another accountable in that covenant the more it is a picture of our covenant with God, which at the core is about faithfulness.

Joyce and I we are closing in on 20 years of marriage, and when you consider that over 80% of marriages with special needs children end in divorce, that is a testament to faithfulness. We feel that we are more in love with each other every year and our marriage relationship and communication is continually improving. I think faithfulness is worked out in our lives as we invest in one another.

I also find it helpful to establish consistent rhythms in my week. For me that means working out 3 times a week and taking care of my physical body. I can’t just try to live on a crazy, metaphysical, creative plane of existence and live for the next creative idea. Part of life is just finding a rhythm and being faithful to a basic routine: working out three times a week, having family times on Sundays, etc. I think success looks for the next experience, which is a constantly moving target, whereas I think sometimes faithfulness looks a lot more humdrum and boring. I think that establishing a healthy rhythm of life can lead hopefully not to boredom but to creating healthy and helpful structure in our lives – it just anchors us.

Faithfulness becomes more important to us the further along the journey we go. We are promised that in this world we will have trouble and suffering. I think faithfulness anchors us in these times. What does past success mean in the moment of suffering? Not a lot, but hanging on to the character of God in that moment means a lot. It allows faithfulness to spill into our lives in a way that enables us to be faithful right in the midst of suffering.

Before I surrendered to God I had already tasted of success. I was an All Star basketball player, yet God began to call me to serve him in music ministry and worship. I didn’t know that it would lead to success or a career, I just knew that it was what I was called to do. It was hard to walk that out; my friends thought I was nuts. Yet looking back the journey begins whenever God calls us. He calls us away from becoming slaves to success to becoming faithful to what he’s called us to do. In some ways the journey has never changed for me.

Brian Doerksen

More Interviews:

>> Songs 4 Worship
>> Western Pentecostal, March 2002
>> Worship Leader Song Stories, July 2001