Adele Grobler  – May – 2025 

Do you feel like you are being “decreased” or “demoted”?

If you have experienced a lot of changes happening in your life this year, particularly in the area of ministry—where maybe for a few years you’ve been working on specific areas in your ministry and now the Lord all of a sudden has asked you to let that go—to maybe leave your church and go to a different church, or to leave your church ministry entirely and go somewhere else. Or maybe even if you have not been in church settings but maybe a career or family life or location, and you’ve had a lot of changes and you’ve been having these questions in your mind asking God, “Is this the right decision?” because it almost looks like the thing that you’re walking into is like a demotion. It almost looks like where you are going is not where God might have been calling; it just doesn’t fit your paradigm in the way that you expected that God would continue.

Because you see, sometimes God makes things last for many years, but sometimes God also wants things to only last for certain periods and seasons of time—and then He moves on. But we are still kind of stuck in basically working on the stuff that He wanted us to work on before. But when He has moved on, we sometimes struggle to move with Him in those new areas because He doesn’t look the way that we thought.

— John 3:22 NIV

After this, Jesus and His disciples went out into the Judean countryside, where He spent some time with them, and baptized. ²³ Now John also was baptizing at Aenon near Salim, because there was plenty of water, and people were coming and being baptized. ²⁴ (This was before John was put in prison.) ²⁵ An argument developed between some of John’s disciples and a certain Jew over the matter of ceremonial washing. ²⁶ They came to John and said to him, “Rabbi, that man who was with you on the other side of the Jordan—the one you testified about—look, He is baptizing, and everyone is going to Him.”

²⁷ To this John replied, “A person can receive only what is given them from heaven. ²⁸ You yourselves can testify that I said, ‘I am not the Messiah but am sent ahead of him.’ ²⁹ The bride belongs to the bridegroom. The friend who attends the bridegroom waits and listens for him, and is full of joy when he hears the bridegroom’s voice. That joy is mine, and it is now complete. ³⁰ He must become greater; I must become less.”

³¹ The one who comes from above is above all; the one who is from the earth belongs to the earth, and speaks as one from the earth. The one who comes from heaven is above all. ³² He testifies to what he has seen and heard, but no one accepts his testimony. ³³ Whoever has accepted it has certified that God is truthful. ³⁴ For the one whom God has sent speaks the words of God, for God gives the Spirit without limit. ³⁵ The Father loves the Son and has placed everything in his hands. ³⁶ Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on them.

You see, when John the Baptist started out, he was in the wilderness. Then he came and baptized people in the Jordan, and many people were drawn to him. In our modern day time, you would put that as a following. And so he had many followers, and he even had disciples, and it was multitudes of people.

But then, when Jesus came and John pointed out that Jesus was the Messiah, what then happened was a lot of people stopped following John the Baptist and they started following Jesus. And so John the Baptist, again in modern-day language, started losing followers from his ministry and what he was doing—baptizing with water. These people now started to go away from John into following Jesus and to become His followers.

And then John’s disciples started to notice this, and they came and said to John the Baptist, and I am paraphrasing here,  “Hey John, you know that person you pointed out”—they were referencing Jesus—“He’s also baptizing people, and everyone is flocking to Him.” And so John’s disciples were concerned for John’s ministry. They were concerned by seeing people leaving John and going after someone else. They were wondering what they were to do, because now all of a sudden they had a big ministry—baptizing people—and now someone else is having a ministry of baptizing people, and He seems to draw all the people to Him.

John’s response to them was that a man can only receive what is given to him from heaven. And he himself said that God needs to become greater and he, John, needs to become less. So he knew that Jesus came for the sins of the world, and he knew that that was the whole point of it.

But then when you fast forward and you see John ending up in prison, John then sent some of his disciples to Jesus to go and ask Jesus if He was the one who was to come. Now John the Baptist himself was the one who pointed out Jesus as the Messiah, but now John is questioning as to whether or not Jesus is the Messiah.

Because you see, John the Baptist went from having a big ministry—baptism ministry and having followers—to now having no followers, being in prison, a handful of disciples staying with him. And he hears Jesus having a lot of people drawn to Him. And so if you can put yourself in his shoes, he’s thinking at that point in time most likely, “God, are You with me? Is this what it’s supposed to be? How can I go from big ministry, serving people, baptizing them, to now being in prison and someone else is doing what I have been doing? Have I done wrong? Have I sinned? Is He the one? Is He not the one? Did I point out the wrong one?”

Because surely in John’s mind, his story would not have ended up with him being in prison and being beheaded. I’m using a human argument here from a fleshly point of view, because of course none of us really truly knows what went on in John’s heart and mind in those moments when he was in prison. But it was enough to make him doubt the call on his life. And the call on his life was to come and preach repentance and to prepare the way for Jesus and to point Him out—and that is what John accomplished.

But the outworking at the end of John’s baptism life—he didn’t think that that is what it would have looked like. And yet he still completed the assignment.

The most important thing that the Lord highlighted in that was that John said, “I must become less, and He must become greater.” And “A man can receive nothing apart from what’s given him from above.”

Then the Lord started just showing me that there are quite a few in the body of Christ right now in places I won’t necessarily call a “transition”—even though it is a transition—but it’s more of a stepping into new and big changes, massive changes. And some of you are actually finding that you are leaving old places behind, and you are finding that the old things that you used to do do not seem to have the same effect than what they used to. And you are getting yourself in a spin and you are asking the Lord, “Am I doing something wrong? What is happening, God?”

And the Lord wants to actually encourage your heart today: that if you have been one that has been seeking Him, being obedient to Him and following Him—there is no problem on your end. The only problem on your end is your perspective.

Because you see, Jesus still testified that John the Baptist—from those born of women, there was no one better than him. Jesus gave John the Baptist such great honor in His eyes—even though John the Baptist went from big baptism ministry to in prison and losing followers and disciples—to Jesus’s sight. And yet Jesus called him, from those born of women, the greatest.

So the point of the whole thing is: if the Lord is asking you to maneuver and to change complete careers, complete churches, complete locations, complete family dynamics—whatever it might be in your world—and it looks almost to you like you’re in prison, or it looks almost to you like you are being decreased and not actually increased—don’t worry. Just be at peace, because God needs to become greater, and you must become less.

God has a mission and a purpose for each and every person under the sun. And for some of you, God is going to maneuver you like pieces on a chessboard. He might need you to be in one facet for a season, then He will shift you to another, and then to another. Because wherever He’s maneuvering and shifting you, it’s opening the doors for others, and it’s giving keys for others that they need in those specific places.

But if you’re going to have a perspective of thinking that God’s favor only looks in a certain aspect, then you are going to be trapped. And then you can’t be flexible in God’s hands to actually do what He needs you to do. So as you are surrendering yourself to Him and entrusting yourself to Him, take heart—it’s not because of anything you’re doing wrong. It’s just the time and the season.

Because John could not go to the cross. John was not the Messiah. So he had to let go. He had to then stop his ministry and allow the Lord to actually do what He needed to so that the Lord could carry that through and onwards to what it was ordained and purposed for.

Sometimes we can stay too long in a place, in a space, when the Lord is trying to move us and maneuver us. But we stay there because of fear of what we might lose. But don’t have that fear—just let go. Because you want to be where the Lord is.

The Lord reminded me of how the Israelites followed the Ark of the Covenant when they were crossing the Jordan—even before that, when Moses was still alive. When the Lord’s presence came on the ark, the people just had to move wherever the ark went, whether they knew where they were going or not. And it’s the same here.

Just allow the Lord to lead you. Do not mind if it looks like you are being diminished. Do not mind if it looks like what used to fit does not fit anymore. Just trust God, because He knows exactly what is needed for both you and the people that He needs to minister to.

So just be at peace. It’s not because of anything you’ve done wrong. If you’ve been seeking the Lord, loving Him—then just trust Him. Because the Lord needs obedience more now than sacrifice. He needs obedience more now than us wanting what we want. It’s literally just hearkening to the voice of the Lord, and He will get you where you need to be.

Let’s pray:

My beautiful God, I come in the name of Jesus and I just thank You so much, God, that You do not work the way that normal people do. Lord, even in our eyes and mindsets—what we might think means You’re present or doing stuff—Lord, it doesn’t necessarily make that true. Because, my Lord, Your ways are higher and Your thoughts are higher. But Lord, help each and every one of us to become lesser and You become greater. Help us to be so flexible, my Lord, that if You say to us to leave something completely, we will leave it completely. If You tell us, Lord, to go to that place and that place, let us do that, Lord, with complete obedience, trusting You with the results and the outcome. In Jesus’ most holy and powerful name, Amen.

Be blessed,

Adele Grobler

Bold Existence Founder and Director