Where are the prophets of our day, speaking to power for the powerless? Where is the modern day Amos or James, or Moses or, yes, Jesus? Where are the Christian leaders who will serve God first, not men and women, but God?
The sadness is that so many pastors are afraid to speak up for fear they might lose their "jobs." If they speak truth to power they might get in trouble with the session, the board, the earthly powers that be. Our contemporary system of finding and hiring and paying pastors seems to often work against the power of the prophetic sermon or powerful social action. Many contemporary pastors are neutered by the system humans have created.
We must always remember that being a pastor is not simply a "job." It is a calling that initiates with God. And we are ordained and commissioned to be God's ambassadors, to speak forth God's Word and principles with power and clarity.
In our world, just as in the time of Amos and Jeremiah and Micah, there is a burning need to speak God's truth, not matter how negative the earthly consequences may seem. Serving God has to come first. Indeed, if you serve God rightly, that is how the people are really and justly served.
We must return to a reverence for the Hebrew prophetic tradition of speaking truth to earthly power, of standing up for God and God's allegiance to the poor and disenfranchised, of giving voice to the powerless in a broken and often evil world. We need more preachers like Amos and Moses and Isaiah, like Stephen and Paul and Peter, and yes, Jesus, speaking God's truth to earthly power. In the richest nation on earth we have shocking income inequality,with 25 million people unemployed or underemployed and 50 million people without access to proper health care.
Yet we often seem to major in the minors, clamoring for things that pale in comparison to hunger and sickness and injustice. Sadly, for many Christians thier pro-life stance seems to end at the birth of a human being, not in the rigors of that ongoing life. Sadly, many people seem far more concerned with fear of gays and illegal immigrants, than in feeding the hungry and healing the sick.
Priorities are misplaced and the great truths of the Bible are turned on their end to please men, not God, because there is so much more in the Bible about the evils of greed and political corruption, and the need for social justice and helping the poor, than there is about sex. But too many pastors major on sex, the easy target, rather than greed and avarice, because that might get someone in power, in their church or community, upset with them. They allow lies to go unchallenged, and injustice to fester and grow.
The whole idea of speaking forth God's prophetic Word in prophetic ways has been lost to many. Too many people in today's churches see pastors only as helpers; that ours is a helping profession, counted alongside doctors and nurses and emergency responders and teachers and social workers.
But being a minister of God is more than being a helper. It is to also be a shepherd, which is a guide and a protector, one who leads beside still waters for a refreshing drink and rest, and, as David did, one who fights the lion and the bear when they threaten God's flock.
Pastors need to first serve God and proclaim God's Word and encourage people to pray and wash in that precious, life-giving Word. They need to be prophetic, being God-pleasers first, not human-pleasers.
“Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ.” Galatians 1:10
Our aim must be higher than comparing ourselves to others. When we take stock in our own lives, we need to do so in light of Who we are trying to please. As servants of Christ, our only desire should be that of doing His will, of serving Him and doing what He guides us to do. As we evaluate our ministry, our work, our activity, our speech, our thoughts need rest only in our Lord’s pleasure.
Are we living lives that honor God, living in humility, in love, and in peace? Are we faithful to His call? Are we serving to gain notoriety, success, or popularity in a human or worldly sense? Or are we doing what we do as a willing and cheerful sacrifice of praise for the righteousness we have in Christ, our risen Lord? Are we fully living for Jesus?
God loved us while we were yet sinners. He gave His life that we might have His life within us. In Christ we have all we need to bring glory to Him. May we lay aside our need to please humans, and live only to magnify Him and point others to Him.
In my own life, as a minister called by God, I must seek to please God first in my life and ministry. I must strive to preach the unadulterated Word of the Living God, for it is the Word in its pure form that is supernatural, cutting like a two-edged sword.
My own calling as a pastor is to God first and foremost. When the time comes for me to leave the churches where God has now placed me to preach His Word faithfully, I am assured that God will use me where God chooses -- but God will continue to use me, because pastors have a lifetime call, and we will serve God in some ministry capacity until we leave this earth.
Every pastor lives with the sometimes harsh reality that a call to a particular church or churches is temporary. Either you will move to another church one day, after the purposes God has given you in that particular church have been fulfilled, or you will go to heaven. Sometimes the brokenness of the world and the evils of the devil seem to short circuit this process, and the time in a particular church is shorter than anyone would have planned, but even in the best of circumstances, a pastorate is a temporary call within a greater call.
But, as a minister called by God, i am convinced that God will use me even when my days in these two blessed churches that I serve are over. God may take me to a storefront or a street corner, but there will be things to do until that day God calls me home. And there is no doubt in my mind that God will take care of me and provide for my family, whether I go back to driving a truck or a bus, or work again on a farm, or teach in a university or callege.
Never forget that Paul was a tent maker and Amos was a farmer, which may have aided them in being boldly prophetic. The simple truth is this -- Where God guides, God will provide. That is a holy guarantee.
The important thing for pastors is to always put God first, and not get in a ditch trying to please men and women before God, or trying to build one's own "earthly kingdom", instead of working for Christ's kingdom. We must be God pleasers first, not human pleasers.
In my own life, as a minister called by God, I must seek to please God first in my life and ministry. I must strive to preach the unadulterated Word of the Living God, for it is the Word in its pure form that is supernatural, cutting like a two-edged sword.
My own calling as a pastor is to God first and foremost. When the time comes for me to leave the churches where God has now placed me to preach His Word faithfully, I am assured that God will use me where God chooses -- but God will continue to use me, because pastors have a lifetime call, and we will serve God in some ministry capacity until we leave this earth.
Every pastor lives with the sometimes harsh reality that a call to a particular church or churches is temporary. Either you will move to another church one day, after the purposes God has given you in that particular church have been fulfilled, or you will go to heaven. Sometimes the brokenness of the world and the evils of the devil seem to short circuit this process, and the time in a particular church is shorter than anyone would have planned, but even in the best of circumstances, a pastorate is a temporary call within a greater call.
But, as a minister called by God, i am convinced that God will use me even when my days in these two blessed churches that I serve are over. God may take me to a storefront or a street corner, but there will be things to do until that day God calls me home. And there is no doubt in my mind that God will take care of me and provide for my family, whether I go back to driving a truck or a bus, or work again on a farm, or teach in a university or callege.
Never forget that Paul was a tent maker and Amos was a farmer, which may have aided them in being boldly prophetic. The simple truth is this -- Where God guides, God will provide. That is a holy guarantee.
The important thing for pastors is to always put God first, and not get in a ditch trying to please men and women before God, or trying to build one's own "earthly kingdom", instead of working for Christ's kingdom. We must be God pleasers first, not human pleasers.
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