Momentum in Ministry

to 2nd Corinthians. I suppose there are a number
of excuses I could try to use this morning to explain why
I am back in 2nd Corinthians. I could say that I lost all my
Philippian commentaries. That isn’t accurate. I could
blame it on the fact that Trey and I purposed to make this whole
month of September about the church, particularly, and that
having already taken up that passage in 2 Corinthians several
weeks ago, even though it wasn’t technically about the church,
I was drawn again to this passage in order to fulfill my great
commitment since it is still September. But that isn’t entirely
accurate either. I suppose that I could use the
excuse that this is a case of pastoral ADD and that I forgot
where I was in Philippians and I actually thought that I had
completed Philippians, which isn’t entirely inaccurate given
the fact that the older that I get, the more forgetful I find
myself to be. And all I need to do is simply
walk up the stairs to completely forget why it is that I’ve gone
upstairs. But really, the reason is kind
of a milder version of ADD. It’s not that I’m not desirous
to get back into Philippians so that I can get back into Luke. But I was so taken with the study
of this passage Even though we purpose to have
a month dedicated to the ministry of the church, the more I began
to look at this passage, this great section of Scripture from
chapter two through chapter six of second Corinthians, all about
the ministry. If nothing else, I wanted to
encourage my own heart. But I also wanted to encourage
yours as we look again at the whole subject of the Christian
ministry. That’s where we were two weeks
ago. And even as Steve Camp was asking me what
he might preach, he asked kind of where we had been. And as
soon as I mentioned Second Corinthians, he said he seized upon Second
Corinthians four. And with that, just as kind of
an encouragement, I wanted to come back. I wanted to come back
to 2 Corinthians and I figured that we could do it in about
12 weeks. Stop laughing. I really do. I think that what we can do in
this initial time, this initial foray into 2 Corinthians, We
can probably take it in about 12 weeks, 12 little sections,
big sections where we can do an overview of the gospel ministry
as Paul laid it out. We had already begun to look
two weeks ago on the Lord’s Day at 2 Corinthians, chapter two,
where Paul laid out the foundations of ministry, what we call bedrock.
We’ll review that here briefly. He begins here in chapter three,
where we’ll spend the majority of our time today looking at
the calling and equipping of ministry. If you look at chapter
three, verse 12, he plays upon those thoughts and begins to
give us the clarity and freedom of the gospel. He builds upon
that in chapter four by giving us the character of ministry
in chapter 4, verse 7, he begins to explain what are the vessels
of ministry, those earthen vessels. In chapter 4, verse 16, he calls
for renewal in ministry. He details to those to whom he
ministers where it is he goes and how it is he gains renewal
in ministry. In chapter 5, verse 10, he talks
about the sojourning, those tents, those earthly tents that are
longing for heaven. as the temporary shelters of
ministry. In chapter 5, verse 11, he gives
us the motivation for ministry, the fear of the Lord. In chapter
5, verse 20, he gives us the message of ministry, the gospel
itself. And in chapter 6, he begins to
wrap up this great ministry called the gospel ministry, the Christian
ministry. As I said last week or two weeks
ago, We looked at this section, chapter 2, verse 12. And the
way that I did that is I just began going through and finding,
OK, where is Paul’s starting point for this whole discussion
about the Christian ministry? And I really do believe that
it’s there, chapter 2, verse 12. We’ll go back again in a
minute. But the question that I came
away with is that there Paul seems to establish The foundation,
the bedrock. The foundation is dug. The question
is, how do we proceed? Steve sang a song last week about
considering the cost of building a tower. You remember that? And
I was reminded of that passage in the Gospels, considering the
cost of building the tower and about the fool that goes off
without considering the cost of building a tower. And it’s there that, with regards
to the Christian ministry at least, the illustration breaks
down. Because if we knew the cost of building a tower, if
we knew all the difficulties, if we knew all the problems,
all the frustrations and all the hurts, we would never proceed. Not in a human sense. And so what we need is motivation. Paul says the foundation is dug
But there are problems. There are frustrations. There
are hurtful people. There are difficult occurrences
in ministry. And what keeps us pressing on?
What keeps us putting one foot in front of the other? What keeps
us in the service of Christ? That’s where Paul wants to go
in chapter 3, beginning in verse 1. Look again, if you would, and
read along with me. Where Paul writes, are we beginning
to commend ourselves again? Or do we need some letters of
commendation to you or from you? You are our letter, written in
our hearts, known and read by all men, being manifested that
you are a letter of Christ, cared for by us, written not with ink,
but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone,
but on tablets of human hearts. Such confidence we have through
Christ toward God. Not that we are adequate in ourselves
to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our adequacy
is from God, who also made us adequate as servants of a new
covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit. For the letter
kills, but the Spirit gives life.” Paul wants to press on in ministry. He wants others to press on in
ministry. And Paul says, in essence, that
the foundation is laid. But once that work is begun,
as you stand back and look at the foundation, it is far from
completed. I remember years ago during my
tour of duty as a pool man where I had this wealthy neighborhood
in Dallas. And in this wealthy neighborhood
in Dallas, the entire time I lived there, I noticed a house. And
the house was but about a quarter of the way finished. The foundation
was dug. They’d begun to frame the building. They’d even begun to brick the
building. There was some rudimentary roof put on the structure, but
it was far from completed. And never in all my time there,
Never did I see them make any further progress on this beautiful,
beautiful home. And I think that’s what’s in
Paul’s mind here. He says, you know what? We have this incredible
foundation that is established and there are a thousand reasons
why we should quit. Frustrations at every angle. Paul said that when he went into
the ministry, there were conflicts without and fears within. There
are, as I said, a thousand reasons to quit. But the reasons to press on are
so compelling and so overwhelming that they wipe out, they obliterate
every one of those so-called reasons. Let’s look back, if
you would, at the foundation that was laid. There in chapter
2, As we said, that was the bedrock of ministry. Those foundational
components of gospel ministry where first of all, we saw God’s
sovereign providence that God is the one that opened the doors.
God is the one that took Paul there. God is the one that began
to build. God is the one that blessed the
work. And that we said that unless the Lord builds the house, they
labor in vain. There is always God’s sovereign
providence to be considered with any work of gospel ministry. Secondly, there was the promise
of absolute victory. That doesn’t mean that whatever
we do is going to be blessed and prosper in an earthly sense.
But he says, thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumph
in Christ. There isn’t ever a time where
the child of God serves God for naught. There’s never a time. You may not see the fruit of
it. You may not benefit from it personally. You may not even
see that it’s even worthwhile at all. But God says that if
we’re in His service, He always leads us. in triumph
in Christ. Ultimately speaking, it is for
our good and benefit to be in his service that he will bless
that in time. There is the promise of absolute
victory, even if it is just God eradicating in us sloth and foolishness
and sinfulness. It pays to serve God. Thirdly, there is the representation
of Christ and who can Who can even begin to grasp this one? The severity of it and the overwhelming
thought behind it, that we are a representation of Christ. We,
Paul said, are a fragrance of Christ to God. Not only that, but there is selfless
humility, because at the end of that statement, Paul says,
who is adequate for this? And the answer to that is nobody.
Nobody is adequate to step up and stand up to that kind of
a ministry. An aroma from death to death
to one. An aroma from life to life to
another. We bring the very Gospel either
of death or of life. And the proclamation of God’s
Word, fifthly, the fifth foundational element of gospel ministry, the
proclamation of many where Paul said, we are not like many peddling
the Word of God. We’re not infusing our own ideas,
our own creativity, foisting those things onto the Word of
God as if it was a Christmas tree to be adorned. The Word
of God is perfectly capable of standing on its own and doing
its mighty work. And so it’s with that backdrop
the context of Paul setting forth the bedrock of Christian ministry,
that he asks, are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Do
you think that I’m using this as some kind of a resume? Seeking
some kind of a job interview with you Corinthians? Or do we
need as some letters of commendation to you or from you? Somebody had evidently brought
this charge against Paul that perhaps he was always engaging
in this self-congratulation. That was one of the many charges
that was brought against Paul, that he was always asserting
himself, always praising himself. And from even his own writings,
you can see where an enemy would twist these words. 1 Corinthians
2.16, we have the mind of Christ. Ah, see, Paul, you’re arrogant. 1 Corinthians 3.10, according
to the grace of God which was given me, like a wise master
builder, I laid a foundation. Oh, see, Paul. You can hear enemies. You can hear enemies twist your
words all the time. And especially, Paul, When Paul says in 1 Corinthians
4, 3, it’s a very small thing that I may be examined by you.
See, Paul, you just don’t submit to authority. You’re just above
scrutiny. That’s your problem, Paul. You
talk about yourself too much, like one of the candidates on
the TV whose favorite word is I. Therefore, 1 Corinthians 9.25,
I run in such a way as not without aim. I box in such a way as not
beating the air. I discipline my body and make
it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself
will not… You talk about yourself too much,
Paul, thought his enemies. Be imitators of me. How arrogant,
they said. It had become an almost common feature,
though, in the church, in the early life of the church, to
have and to seek these letters of commendation. And Paul, in
expressing the thought that he didn’t need to do so with the
Corinthians, wasn’t saying that these letters of commendation
weren’t useful and even necessary. Those letters had become customary
and even necessary in the early church because of the great advance
of so many false teachers. Those sanctimonious charlatans,
as one commentator called them, who sought to lead a a parasitic
existence by imposing themselves on local churches. There were
these so many false teachers that saw in this ministry deal
an easy dollar, some easy coin. And if they could just get some
letters of commendation from somebody that they had served
in some capacity, then it was almost like the golden key that
would unlock every door. So in an attempt to discredit
Paul, the false teachers claimed that he lacked the proper letters
of commendation and that because of that he was always boasting
about himself. Such letters, as I said, were
often used in the early church to introduce people who did not
know them, and Paul isn’t against them. And it remains a common practice
even to our own day. When somebody asks me to write
a letter of recommendation, I take that as a very serious thing.
I’m putting my name on it. I’m putting my integrity on that
document. And that’s exactly how Paul utilized
these things. We already talked about the church,
the ministry rather, when we looked at the establishing of
the Philippian church. Remember the Philippian church?
In the book of Acts, there was this element of sentness, right? The churches were constantly
sending others. They were sending them out. And
they were sending them out with authority. And they were sending
them out with authority by way, often, of a letter. Acts 18.27
He wanted to go across to Achaia. The brethren encouraged him and
wrote to the disciples to welcome him. A letter of commendation
isn’t a bad thing inherently. 1 Corinthians 16.1. Paul used it himself. I commend
to you our sister Phoebe. To the Corinthians. 1 Corinthians
16.10. Now, if Timothy comes, see that
he is with you without cause to be afraid. Paul isn’t saying that letters
of commendation are inherently evil. It’s not that Paul says
that they’re inherently worthless. He merely makes the point that
to the Corinthians of all people, he didn’t need a letter among
them. He shouldn’t. They knew the Apostle Paul. They knew his work. They knew
his labor in the gospel. They knew the fruit of it because
it was them. They were the fruit of his labor in the gospel. Those little words tell us a
number of things. First of all, that the Judaizers
probably had brought letters of commendation from someone.
They came into Corinth with these so-called letters of commendation,
spurious as they were, seeking to try and gain a foothold. They
probably even sought letters from the Corinthians before they
departed. OK, give us just a little bump on our resume, would you
please? And now they were criticizing
Paul because he didn’t have it. But Paul says, let me tell you
something about momentum in ministry. Let me tell you something about
service. Let me tell you something about commendation in ministry. And what Paul presents here in
this passage, these first six verses of chapter 3, is the momentum
of ministry What I’ve identified for us this morning is three
energizing features that urge us forward in ministry. And as
I said, there are a thousand reasons to quit. But these three
little features are so overwhelming that they eradicate any reason
to step out of the service of Christ. First of all, The first
feature in serving Christ. Paul says we are impelled in
the service of Christ, first of all, by the by the fruit of
ministry. We are impelled in the service
of Christ by the fruit of ministry, look at verse two. Where Paul
says, you are our letter. Written in our hearts, known
and read by all men. If Paul needed any commendation
at all among the Corinthian church, he just basically says, go and
look in the mirror. Consider your own lives. Consider
what you were like when I came to you. Consider who you were
before you met Christ. There is no other testimony that
was needed, either to the Corinthians or from the Corinthians. Paul
could have very easily gone to any city and said, consider the
Corinthians. You want to examine me? You want to look at my resume?
Look at the Corinthians. They weren’t a perfect people,
but they were a people that had embraced Christ and begun to
walk with Him and begun to grow with Him. And Paul says, there’s
all the proof you need. fruit in ministry impels us further
into the ministry. When we see that of all people,
God would use us, and that for some reason, God wants to use
us, and that in some great and incredible way, God has used
us and begun to use us in the ministry and service to others,
in changing people’s lives and encouraging them, in serving
them, Paul says that fruit is all we need to take the next
step, isn’t it? When we see some life dredged
out of the gutter that comes by God’s grace to repentance,
doesn’t that make us want to tell someone else? When we see
someone who is plateaued in their Christian life and God uses us
to give them some exhortation that gets them up off the spiritual
couch and back into ministry. Doesn’t that want to make us
want to serve someone else in that capacity? When we see a
Christian brother down in the dumps, frustrated, bummed out,
on the sidelines as it were, and God uses us to encourage
them with a little note, with some prayer, with a basket of
fruit or whatever, doesn’t that encourage us? Doesn’t that kind
of fruit encourage us to get back in the game and to reach
out to someone else? To be a Barnabas to whoever else
we might find? If it doesn’t, I wonder if we’re
even spiritually alive. Fruit impels us to ministry. When we see that of all people,
God would use us, how could we not? How could we not serve that
Christ? The Corinthians knew what God
had done among them. The God by His Word and by His
Spirit through this great Apostle. And all the world could see it
as well. It was objective. They were a changed people. And
so are we. So the apostle appeals not to
a written testimony, not to a resume, which very easily could have
been false and trumped up. But to the experience of everyone
that he spoke to who knew the facts, they knew they had received
the gospel, they knew they were a changed people. Paul’s letter
was far superior to the letter that the false apostles brought
because it was the Corinthians themselves, the very lives God had used Paul in the writing
of that letter. Paul was literally the pen, as
I’ll tell you more in a moment. He was nothing more than an instrument
in God’s hands. God wrote the letter. God is
the one that changed their vile and sin-sick lives. But He did
it through the instrumentality of a person named Paul. And God
wants to do the same thing through every saint. God wants you. God wants to use you. It is a humbling thing, people,
to know that on the one hand, God doesn’t need us, but on the
other hand, God desires to use us. God can do His ministry without
any one of us or all of us. God can do it. God could save
this whole city in an instant if He wanted through the instrumentality
of us. or someone else, or no one at
all. I’ve said it before, if God used
a donkey, God could use anything. It is humbling to know that God
doesn’t need us, but God desires to use us. And it’s even more
humbling when God desires to use us and God begins to use
us to look at that and to say, Me, Lord? You’re using me? to conduct this ministry? Because
it was just a short time ago that I was that guy. God says,
I know. He knows who you are. He knows
what you were. And isn’t it more to his glory
to have everyone in town say, what are you using him for? To see a changed life. that is changed by God’s grace
and in every step forward is a testimony to that grace. I’ll never forget our college ministry at our church
where we met the Magnusons. In that college ministry, the
group had grown numerically, but the thing that was astounding
to us and overwhelmingly true was how many of those young people
had come to Christ and how many have been really grounded in
Christ. And it’s only now in the last
five, six years that we’ve begun to see the fruit of it. Those
serving as administrators of schools and elders in churches
and having a ministry of their own and raising up godly children
of their own. You’ve met some of them, and
perhaps you’ll meet more in the future. But I’ll never forget
sensing that objective blessing of God. That God had used us
in those young people’s lives merely as the instruments in
God’s hand. But that God had used us to write
the gospel on their hearts. And I remember coming before
that young group of people as we had a celebration in honor
of my graduation. I remember telling them, you
are my GPA. And this is the exact passage
I had in mind. My GPA wasn’t so much to speak
of, and so what I was trying to communicate to them is that
they were in every way my commendation into further ministry. God had
used them to minister to me in allowing to be used and serve
to serve in the Christian ministry, to know that there was any fruit
at all. And we had seen great and overwhelming fruit. That
in and of itself. Was an encouragement to press
on into further ministry, and isn’t it always? So the apostle did. To set forth
that was absolute It was absolutely certain with him that his apostolic
mission was authentic. That it had authority. It had
authority because he said, if you want to look, look. If you
want to examine me, examine the fruit of my labors. Here are
the Corinthians. We do it a little bit differently
in our day and age. If a church needs a pastor, they
simply call up some list, bring in a guy for a weekend, examine him, look at his resume.
I like the way the Puritans did it. The brother would move to the
community and get a job. And if he rose like cream to
the top, then he was the pastor. They looked at the fruit of his
lives. They looked at the fruit of his ministry. Does he have
what it takes? Is he who he says he was? Last Sunday, I looked around.
I looked around as Steve was talking just to the men on Saturday
night. I had the privilege of basically
sitting on the sidelines all weekend long. My one day a week
to work, and I didn’t even work last Lord’s Day. But I had the
privilege of looking around and seeing those in our midst Not many that I can say the Lord
has used me to lead them to Christ. But those whom I can look at
and know that in tangible ways, the Lord has used me to minister
to them and has used others. And God has used them in my life
to further sharpen and enhance my own ministry. It’s always an encouragement
when God allows you to see the fruit, to take another step,
to serve Him further, to serve Him with greater vigor and enthusiasm
than you had to that point. Paul said, you are our letter
written in our hearts. That heart, as one described
it, the center of love and devotion. And it was in Paul’s heart that
the Corinthians were written. You are our letter written in
our hearts. Paul said some of these people, they come around
carrying their resumes in their pocket, in their hands. But he
said, you know of my love and devotion to you, and that’s what
impels us to ministry too, isn’t it? That once we have the fruit
of changed lives in our hearts, don’t we want more people changed?
We do. We just do. You are our letter. Look at verse
two, written in our hearts, known and read by all men, being manifest
that you are a letter of Christ. The Corinthians had been enriched
by Christ in every conceivable way. Those were the well-known
facts. They were known and read by all
men. Everybody could see it. They were changed people. The
Corinthians themselves were an epistle. And what an incredible
thought that is. That as we go out, we are a letter
of Christ that can easily be opened and read by everybody.
They read it every time they see us conduct ourselves in our
daily life. The Corinthians were open for
all to read, as one said, a letter possessing no less an author
than Christ Himself. The character imprinted on them
was that of Christ. It was the writing of Christ.
Paul was merely an instrument used by the divine author. Paul
was the ink pen. He didn’t even have the ink in
himself. He had to be dipped in the ink.
And utilized by Christ, it was a letter written by Christ, imparted
by Christ, a letter that spoke of Christ. Paul here was pointing
out that They were a letter of Christ, a letter that Christ
had by His Spirit composed. And he takes himself in doing
so almost completely out of the equation. Paul says, I’m nothing.
I was the ink pen, the feathered quill, if you will, laying on
the desk that unless Christ picked it up and used it. I’m useless. Paul certainly took himself out
of a place of indispensability. God had used him, but he didn’t
need to use him. You are our letter written in
our hearts, known and read by all men, being manifested that
you are a letter of Christ cared for by us. Written not with ink,
but with the Spirit of the living God. Not on tablets of stone,
but on tablets of human hearts. Paul and his colleagues were
Christ’s servants in bringing the gospel, which converted the
Corinthians. They were servants. They were
cared for by Paul and his companions. Paul never loses sight that ultimately
the gospel, ultimately Christianity is due to the motivations of
God himself. They were written with the spirit
of the living God. Regardless of what any of us
ever says or does, whether we teach Sunday school or whether
we preach a sermon or whether we write a note of encouragement,
whether we pick up the phone and call someone, regardless
of anything that we say. There is nothing that we say
that if it isn’t attended with the Spirit of God. It’s worth
anything. But. The opposite is equally
true. If we pick up the phone, if we
teach the Sunday school, if we proclaim the sermon, if we sit
down with a brother and pray and the Spirit of God attends
to it, there is nothing so powerful in another brother’s life. Nothing. Paul knew this fact and he wrote
it to the Romans where the law of this, pardon me, the law of
the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the
law of sin and death. Romans 8 10, if Christ is in
you, though the body be dead because of sin, yet the spirit
is alive because of righteousness. It is the spirit of the living
God that must attend our work and our ministry. And if he does.
What a fruitful work. ink can be blotted or washed
off. There’s even such a thing as
disappearing ink. The paper fades over time, becomes
so brittle. I have a commentary that somehow
sat on a shelf and absorbed, I think it was pipe smoke. And
the paper is so brittle. I literally have about one chance
to read this thing before it literally begins to disintegrate
in my hands. ink fades, paper fades, but not
the writing of the Spirit of the living God. Any person can
write with ink, but Christ is the one that writes with the
Spirit of God, said one. This is a figurative way of expressing
the idea that the conversion of the Corinthians was a divine,
supernatural work and that therefore an irrefutable proof that Paul
was a minister of Christ. Isn’t it encouraging to you,
saints of God, to know those occasions, rare as they may be,
where your effort dovetailed with the Spirit of God and He
allowed you to minister profitably to another saint? If that doesn’t
propel us further into ministry, nothing will. Nothing will. Paul
says lastly here in this section, not on tablets of stone, but
on tablets of human hearts. And what he already has in mind
here is this whole comparison and the contrast that he sets
up between the old covenant, the old situation with the law
and the new covenant. Not on tablets of stone, but
on tablets of human hearts. That’s where ministry is done. That’s the kind of ministry that
Paul was about. When we write a letter, most
times now we type it out, and if we even print it, we don’t
even have to print our letters anymore, do we? We just send
it via email and those two will fade, I’m told, in time. But the letters that God writes, They don’t fade. They’re not
written on tablets of stone, even a stone tablet is not indestructible
as Moses proved. The apostle, what he’s already
beginning to do is set up this contrast between the Mosaic and
the Christian ministry, and he introduces here the tablets of
stone as the typical writing materials, if you wanted to put
something down for a long, long period of time, we even say it
to this day, it’s not written in stone, right? Well, Paul says, you know what?
Written in stone, what is that? Big deal. Perhaps he even saw
ruins already of previous cities with their so-called great entryways
and declarations carved in stone And he saw that they, too, were
passing away. They, too, would be turned back
to dust, but not the human heart. The living letter that Christ
writes, which is Paul’s testimony, testimonial rather, is superior
because. The letters that other others
bring will fade away, even the tablets of Sinai would fade away. But the gospel ministry that
touches men’s hearts, that ministers to the heart of flesh in a spiritual
way will never fade away. Charles Hodge said it this way,
the writing by the spirit was inward spiritual work. The work
of regeneration and sanctification is always represented in the
Scripture as a much higher manifestation of divine power and grace than
any external miracle. Do you remember in Ephesians
1 when Paul says, I want you to know the power of God? Do
you remember what he uses as the illustration there? It’s
the resurrection of Christ. And he says it’s that same kind
of power, maximum power that raised us from the dead. It’s
a miracle. It’s a miracle done in the human
heart. The miracle of Sinai, the writing
on the tablets, that was external. And that law confronted people
with their inability to obey the perfect, holy, righteous
will of God, didn’t it? It showed them what the law was. It showed them what God’s demand
was. But it didn’t give them anything
to help. It didn’t give them the ability to obey. And thereby
it condemned them, but in this new covenant, Paul says. God
writes the law on the hearts of those he redeems. And all
of this is forecasted in the Old Testament script or Old Testament
scriptures. We know about the law and the
giving of the law, the writing on the tablets, the miracle that
that was. But there’s a greater miracle
that is spoken of by the prophets, Ezekiel 11, 9, I will give them
one heart. I will put a new spirit within
them. I will take the heart of stone out of their flesh and
give them a heart of flesh. Ezekiel 36, Moreover, I will
give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you. I will
remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart
of flesh. Jeremiah 31, 33. But this is the covenant which
I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares
the Lord. I will put my law within them
and on their people, on their heart rather, I will write it
and I will be their God and they shall be my people. That letter of which Paul spoke
wasn’t a resume. It wasn’t a letter of recommendation,
crass as that may be, with some imprimatur on it, some signature
attesting some great work that Paul had done. The letter that
he speaks of is changed lives that were changed by nothing
other than the Spirit of God changing the hearts from within.
internally and perpetually. There are energizing features
here in this passage, and we’ve only been able to look at one
that will propel us into further ministry to others, to actually
be used by God to take the gospel to others. to share with them
and know that the Spirit of God may write upon their own hearts
and transform their own lives for His glory. And to use us
in the process? Overwhelming. It’s absolutely
overwhelming that God would consider to stoop to using us. But He does. He does every day. If we would humble ourselves
and avail ourselves to Him for that purpose, let’s examine our hearts. Our merciful King, we see an example of one who
was willing, who didn’t come as so many in our own day and
age with some idea of self-importance, Self-congratulation and pride,
thinking that he really had something in and of himself to offer to
your kingdom’s work. We see a man that came and said,
except by the grace of God. Lord, we thank you that Paul
said that it was by the grace of God I am what I am. Lord, we thank you and praise
you that to each one of us, the call to serve you goes out. We
know that there is a bedrock established. We know that there
is a foundation and we know that there are elements to that foundation,
but there are so many reasons to quit. But the very first reason
that we’ve pondered this morning. That calls us to press on the
very fact that we can be fruitfully used in the kingdom. in ministering
to the lives of others, in encouraging the saints, in praying for them,
in serving others, and ultimately in holding forth the gospel of
life. Father, we can be used. We have
been used. And that’s what propels us to
take that next step. God, grant us the grace To examine
our hearts and to find whether we are sitting on the couch,
whether we are passive in observing. Or whether by your grace we have
purposed to serve. Grant us the grace, Father. To
serve you for the sake of your kingdom, your glory. It’s in
Christ’s name that we pray. Amen. So.