The Discipline of Ministry

These next couple of days have been given the title, “Devoted to God and His mission” - what an important theme for the weekend. What are you hoping God will do? For you? For the person next to you?

PRAY that God will do what we need Him to do even if it is uncomfortable.

As we start, think of people who have played an important part in your journey to faith in Christ and the growth in Christ that you have experienced. Any who weren’t pastors?

Have a few people shout out a name and what they did.

Most people who made a difference stepped out of what could have been comfortable place to a place of personal inconvenience, to impact lives and glorify God.

They lived intentionally with a higher call.

I look back over my life and I thank God for the people, ordinary people, who lived out ordinary lives serving an extraordinary God with joy. They expercised the discipline of ministry.

I don’t remember this being taught when I was growing up, but I remember this being modelled. I saw it modelled that the pastors weren’t the only ministers in the church.

My parents modelled this - my dad holding a full time job and yet serving churches. My mom, praying.

Sunday school teachers

Youth workers

Many other who opened their homes and supported in so many ways.

The result of this was that there was hardly a time, since I surrendered my life to Jesus, when I was not actively involved in serving in some kind of ministry.

That was right!

Ephesians 2:8–10 ESV

8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

I want to spend a few minutes reflecting on those few verses.

Reflect

i. God saved you

You are an object of God’s affection

If you are in Christ, you were dead and He made you alive. You couldn’t save you - it’s a gift from God. It’s all grace. There’s nothing that you could even boast in! If you have anything to boast in, it’s in what Christ has done for you and in you!

That does something in our hearts.

Hearts filled with gratitude

Hearts remain humble

This should keep us humble when you think that God came down and went to the cross to save you.

I stop thinking too highly of myself. Phil 2:3 says I should consider others more important than myself.

This is hard when our goal is to have other people serve us. Home, work etc.

ii. You are God’s workmanship

God was making you into something! That ain’t junk!

I am a new creation.

2 Corinthians 5:17 ESV

17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

God has made me new.

New heart

New identity

New family

New life

New purpose

God is making me new - more and more into the image of Christ.

God has equipped me for more

Talents

Abilities

Gifts

Passion

Experiences

God wants to redeem them!

iii. God made me for a better purpose

“You have been created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared ahead of time for us to do.”

We could miss something so wonderful if we aren’t willing to see this or make ourselves available to God to be used - you have been made for good works - that God prepared beforehand for you to do.

You have been saved and made for more than Sunday attendance. More than safe and comfortable lives. More than reading your Bible when you remember.

The God of the universe has chosen to use you to advance His Kingdom! The work of God advances through clay pots that are cracked.

We need to think about how that impacts our lives on a daily basis.

Ephesians 4:11–13 ESV

11 And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, 12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, 13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ,

God’s will is that you see yourself as a minister and that you minister! You pastor’s are equipping you for the work of the ministry. The pastors and elders and deacons aren’t the only ministers!

What does this mean for you?

It means whatever God has given me to serve him and the needs of others.

i. Formal ministry - what is done at church

This can be quite safe for us. There will always be a need for people to serve in churches ministries.

ii. Informal - what happens when we see the need in others

Both are important. God is concerned with your heart. When ministry opportunities arise, God wants you to take them - there’s a sence in which there’s evidence that you know God (Matt 7:21; 25:31ff)

Imagine seeing our churches embracing this fully. This is important for us men, because so often we leave it to the ladies. Where we serve Jesus and people.

Why is this important for us?

1. We follow Jesus

2. We reflect Jesus

We carry the heart of Jesus.

Philippians 2:1–11 ESV

1 So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, 2 complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. 3 Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. 4 Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. 5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Ministry trains our hearts to think of others

Helps us see others

Matthew 25:35 ESV

35 For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me,

That’s the basis for ministry in our homes.

3. Models Christ for others

Even our own children.

Inviting strangers to the table.

We did this so much that there our kids would say to their friends, “If you need a place to stay, go to mom and dad’s house.”

We are making a statement that it all belongs to God. Our time, talents, possession and even our own lives.

I recently had a couple dedicate their twins to God. What a great action. What what when God says to them go to the hard places. That’s when our idols are shown.

I rejoiced when my daughter went and lived in Swaziland and then downtown Johannesburg to serve people. I rejoiced when I saw them giving away things that were their but someone else needed.

4. Opens our lives for the adventure called faith

We get to experience God in ways we could never have imagined.

That’s often uncomfortable but rewarding.

R Kent Hughes: “No one has ever cultivated a ministering heart and lived to tell of a life of ease.

Don’t think that if you are old that you don’t have anything to offer.

5. Demonstrate love

For God

For others

For ourselves

Do you get tired doing this? You bet. But Jesus, “who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.”

6. Our Challenge

i. To believe - God made me for more

ii. to surrender.

iii. To reorder our lives

iv. To declare - “as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.”