Topical Studies
What the Bible says about
Calling of Ministry
(From Forerunner Commentary)
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1 Corinthians 9:16
Notice the attitude with which Paul presents his message here: He says that he had a need to preach the gospel, that "necessity is laid upon me." He is saying, "I've got to preach this. And if I don't, I'd better hide under a rock somewhere." His approach to preaching the gospel was that lightning could strike at any time if he stopped preaching it. Remember how Jesus started this apostle's ministry—by blinding him out in the middle of the road to Damascus! What Jesus did made quite an impression on him. Paul probably thought about that often—and about what would happen if he stopped doing the charge that had been laid upon him. So, a true minister feels a compulsion to preach the gospel. On the flipside, he feels a certaindoom if he does not. He feels as though, if he tried anything else, he would be a fish out of water. In him would be an emptiness that was not being filled because the ministry of Jesus Christ is a calling. To a true minister of God, it is not just a job done for a paycheck, but a vocation that he feels compelled to do because the truth must be preached. The information cannot remain in his mind. Uncommunicated knowledge and understanding of God's way is absolutely useless to anybody else; it cannot help anybody take even one step along the road to the Kingdom of God. This is why God gives ministers mouths to speak. Paul calls it "the foolishness of preaching" (I Corinthians 1:21, KJV), but God accomplishes a great deal through it. The serious, devoted servant of Jesus Christ must do it. He just must! It is almost like a man who has just walked out of the desert and has not had anything to eat or drink. He feels compelled, obviously, to find something to satisfy his need—particularly to drink. A true minister of God feels this way if he has not preached the truth in a long while. A "pressure" builds up after a time, and if it is not released, it explodes. The truth must be passed on because a compulsion from God Himself drives a true minister to speak the truth. This may be dramatizing it a bit, but there is a feeling in a true minister's gut to let other people know the truth that he has been given to preach. In a true minister of God, the truth will out, to borrow a line from Shakespeare. On the other hand, what does the minister get out of it? What does Paul say that he got from it? In verse 18, he says that, when he preached the truth, other people were helped. He was able to preach the gospel in love, without charge. He did not need anything for it personally because he was driven from the inside—not the outside. Thus, it made him feel good—it relieved that God-sent pressure and gave him the satisfaction that he had done his job.
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Itching Ears
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2 Corinthians 5:9-11
When God summoned us to His way of life, He persuaded us with various proofs that He exists, desires a relationship with us, and rules not just the universe but also the affairs of men. As often happens during our first love (Revelation 2:4-5), we desire to share our joy and newfound truth with others. Most of the time, our early evangelistic efforts fail to produce any new converts to the faith—instead, our efforts usually cause problems in our relationships. Most lay-members, after one or two failures of this sort, get smart and desist in trying to convert their relatives and friends. They realize that nothing will ever happen without God first calling the other individual and changing his heart by His Spirit to accept the truth (John 6:44; Romans 2:4-5; 8:7; I Corinthians 2:10-14; Hebrews 8:10; Ezekiel 11:19). All our preaching and cajoling will accomplish nothing unless God moves to initiate a personal relationship with him. Ministers do not have such an easy out. Certainly, in their personal relationships they can quit trying to "save" those unconverted members of their families, but in their professional capacity, their job is to "persuade men." In personal conduct, counsel, sermons, and articles, they must devote their energies to showing and explaining why God's way is true and will lead to eternal life in His Kingdom. Today, that is not an easy task. It has never been easy, really, but the current environment makes it harder than it has been historically. For starters, though a high percentage of people say they believe in God, most people are no longer religious but secular. Religion is not a high-ranking concern, and because of this, religious issues fly under their radar and over their heads. They just do not care, and even when they inquire about them, they do not understand them because they lack the background and education necessary to evaluate them properly. Another problem is competition. It used to be that most people at least treated Sunday, the so-called "Lord's day," as a Sabbath and devoted most or all of that time to religious pursuits. No longer. Sunday, though it is not God's Sabbath day, is used just like any other day: for work and entertainment. If God receives a few hours on Sunday morning for worship services, most Americans—and Europeans to an even greater degree—think He should feel satisfied that they could spare Him even that much! Yet a third hindrance is the way moderns think. Too many people, especially younger adults, have absorbed the postmodern, values-neutral approach. This way of thinking considers every idea and belief as equally valid, neither right nor wrong. A person can believe anything he likes—even that the moon is made of green cheese—and he should not be judged as right or wrong. Any god one worships, or for that matter, if one chooses to worship no god, is fine, and no one god or belief system is better than any other. In such an environment, how can we persuade anyone of the truth? Our success certainly looks bleak. The answer lies in what Paul writes in II Corinthians 5:9-11: "We make it our aim . . . to be well pleasing to Him." Our judgment does not rest on how many men we persuade but on whether we do the job. We are called to make the witness for God and Christ to the best of our ability and strength. Christ will judge us "according to what [we have] done, whether good or bad." How others react to us and what we say or write matters little; it is "God who gives the increase" (I Corinthians 3:5-8). As Paul says, one plants and another waters, but what happens to the sprout is not under their control but God's. Thus, we cannot quantify the results of our persuasion as others can. We cannot see the growth of our "business" in statistical form. The true measure of our success will be revealed in God's Kingdom, and even then, we will be unable to claim the glory for it. For in persuading men, we "do all to the glory of God" (I Corinthians 10:31).
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
We Persuade Men
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Revelation 3:7-10
A common belief is the Doctrine of "Eternal Security"—commonly called "once saved, always saved." It is the assumption that once a man accepts Jesus Christ as his personal Savior, and accepts His perfect sacrifice for the remission of his sins, his salvation is assured for all time. Under this line of reasoning, from this point on he is eternally saved, and nothing he does can ever take away his salvation. The problem with this assertion—in addition to it being entirely unscriptural (see John 15:4-6; I Corinthians 9:27; Colossians 1:22-23; Hebrews 4:1-2; 6:4-6; 10:26-31; Titus 1:16; II Peter 1:10-11)—is the effect that it has on the Christian. True, it gives a sense of relief and imbues its adherents with a tremendous amount of confidence, both of which may be seen as good. But it is a false confidence and a destructive one because it steals the urgency and zeal to overcome, become holy, and take on God's spiritual image. It gives the euphoric sensation of invincibility—that God's judgment cannot touch such a man, and God's law no longer needs to be considered. In short, it stalls the whole sanctification process by giving the impression that one is already at the end of his race. Yet, even among those who reject this doctrine, an unofficial corollary sometimes springs up that can wreak similar havoc: the tenuous assertion that casting one's lot in with the right man or being a part of a certain group or church will instantly cause God to look more highly on a person. We may be sure, though, that God does not work through such a system of "salvation by association"—except in the sense of association with Him. But the unstated doctrine of "Leader Security" (or "Church Security"), based on the premise that one's standing with God is assured once one accepts a human leader or organization, is as destructive as the doctrine of "Eternal Security," and for the very same reasons. It instills false confidence, steals the urgency and zeal to overcome and learn how to walk with God, tempts one to fall into the trap of thinking "that can't happen to me", and can seriously impede—if not outright end—the sanctification process of growing in holiness. This is not to suggest that church leadership is unimportant or that the doctrines of an organization should remain unproved by its members. On the contrary, our teachers and learning environment are both vital factors in our spiritual development. Nor are all churches the same in God's eyes—the letters in Revelation 2 and 3 are addressed to assemblies of varying degrees of faithfulness. But the danger lies in trusting in a man—any man—or organization to see us across the finish line. Or, worse yet, one can believe that we are essentially already there because of our affiliation with a certain man or church. The simple truth is that human leadership cannot take the place of God in the lives of the individual without devastating consequences, nor can it stand in the place of the individual in the eyes of God. By way of example, let us suppose that we find a "perfect" human leader (note the contradiction) whose teaching does not have a trace of doctrinal impurity, and we pledge allegiance to him. How should we now spend our lives? Should we rest easy in the confidence that we will not go through any tribulation? Should we become a cheerleader for a servant of God? Should we spend our days trying to convince others to hop on the bandwagon on which we are currently riding? Should we pray for God's wrath to fall on those who do not see things as we do? Clearly, such ideas are absurd. They would serve no purpose in developing our own relationship with God. They would add nothing to our walk with Him so that we, like Jesus Christ, can be a "faithful witness" of the Father (Revelation 1:5; 3:14). The development of character—putting on the "new man," growing in holiness, working out of our own salvation with fear and trembling—are all things that must take place as a result of a joint effort between God and the child of God. The apostle Paul states the position of church leaders in II Corinthians 1:24: "Not that we have dominion over your faith, but are fellow workers for your joy; for by faith you stand." Similarly, in Ephesians 4:12-13, Paul states that the various types of servant leaders are given for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. Paul tells us that God has provided the ministry for our instruction and edification, and as such, we are to respect them. But the responsibility falls on each one of us to make sure our relationship with God is spiritually sound and continually growing, for that is where our security lies.
David C. Grabbe
The Problem with 'Leader Security'
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