Proclaimer Blog
Here we go again… and three old friends back again
I know it’s still August, but we’re back. In the UK we’ve had a bank holiday (public holiday) so today is the first working day of the autumn/winter (gulp!) stretch. Hard to write when the sun is shining and Miss R is still to go back to school. But for the most part, it’s business as usual. Praying. Reading. Studying. Preaching. Pastoring.
Don’t you ever get bored of it, someone once asked me? Simple answer: no. I get tired sometimes, but not of the task. I am often wearied by the hard-hearted response that ministering seems to bring. But my heart is always livened by three ministry truths, old friends really.
1. Jesus has saved me by grace. My ministry work is not going to make a jot of difference to my salvation. Of course, I have to work hard, and I have to work out my salvation – and that will sometimes be wearisome for all kinds of reasons. But I am not – thank God – working for my salvation.
2. It is Jesus’ church and not mine. Caught up in the business of ministry, it’s easy to forget that I’m nothing more than an under-shepherd serving the great Shepherd of the sheep. It’s his church. I am – at best – a caretaker. When people reject the word they are rejecting him. When people flourish under ministry they are flourishing under Christ. Not me.
3. Jesus sustains all things by his powerful hand. I serve and love an absolutely sovereign God. Nothing I experience or manage to achieve is outside of his loving control. That does not make everything easy, but ultimately it makes everything right.
Three old friends; three old truths that always sustain me in ministry, whatever the season.