Jesus the Disciplemaker - Part 3 Ministry Involvement
We‘ve been looking at the various steps that Jesus used to make disciples. We’ve learned that he had a four-step program.
Step 1 - Building relationships. Jesus spent almost half of his public ministry on this step. He built relationships with lost people and let them get to know who he was. It was during this stage that they became committed to him—to following him; to learning from him.
Step 2 - Equipping for ministry. During this stage, Jesus challenged his men to a deeper level of commitment. He asked them to make some sacrifices—to lay aside their present priorities in order to follow him more closely. And in doing that, he said “I will make you fishers of men.” He would equip them for ministry.
Step 3 - Involvement in ministry. It wasn’t long before Jesus gave his disciples a chance to experience for themselves the challenges of ministry—the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat.
For most of this time, Jesus took his disciples along with him as he ministered to the crowds. They got to see him in action, but they also got to see him in prayerful preparation before he went into action. They got to see the divine hand of God at work through Jesus’ miracles. But they also got to see the hand of the enemy at work through the opposition of the Pharisees. They began to appreciate that ministry can sometimes be very, very good; but it can also be sometimes very, very hard.
There came a time during this stage of the disciplemaking process when Jesus said to his disciples “OK. You’ve seen what ministry is like. Now it’s time for you to get your feet wet. Now it’s time for you to have some hands on experience.” Let’s read about it in Mark 6:7…
Calling the Twelve to him, he sent them out two by two and gave them authority over evil spirits.
These were his instructions: “Take nothing for the journey except a staff—no bread, no bag, no money in your belts. Wear sandals but not an extra tunic. Whenever you enter a house, stay there until you leave that town. And if any place will not welcome you or listen to you, shake the dust off your feet when you leave, as a testimony against them.”
They went out and preached that people should repent. They drove out many demons and anointed many sick people with oil and healed them. King Herod heard about this, for Jesus’ name had become well known.
In these brief passage, there are eight very important lessons about ministry that God wants all of us to learn. If you’re going to be involved in a ministry of any sort—reaching out to people and caring for their needs—you’re going to have to get hold of these eight principles.
1. Calling - Notice whose idea it was for the disciples to be involved in ministry. Jesus called the Twelve to him and gave them this assignment. It happened by his initiative, and at his timing.
Why is that important? It’s important because any ministry that you and I might have must begin with the call of God.
In every case in Scripture where you see someone having a powerful ministry, that ministry began with the call of God. Moses, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Jonah, the Apostle Paul. These people didn’t volunteer; they didn’t put themselves forward as candidates for ministry.
In some cases (like Moses and Jeremiah) they were extremely reluctant to respond because they felt they were totally unsuited to the job that God was calling them to do. But respond they did, and God used them mightily.
Why is this principle so important? It’s important because there are a lot of wrong reasons for getting involved in ministry.
For example, you might get involved in some aspect of ministry simply because you want to. It’s something you like to do—like a hobby. Maybe you like to teach. Maybe you like music. Maybe you like administration. And that’s fine.
But if God hasn’t called you to that ministry, then your involvement in it will not only be ineffective; it will hinder the overall ministry of the church. Because you’ll be occupying a position that God really intended for someone else. And you’ll be ministering simply in your own power, not with the power of God.
You can get involved in ministry for selfish reasons. Maybe you don’t feel that you’re appreciated enough, so you get involved in ministry so that people will appreciate you more. Or maybe you have a hunger to be recognized, and in the spotlight.
There was a man in the NT like this. His name was Diotrephes. He was very involved in his local church. He sat on the Board; he was involved in committees. He had a lot of authority in his church. But he was involved for all the wrong reasons.
The Apostle John tells us about him in 3 John
I wrote to the church, but Diotrephes, who loves to be first, will have nothing to do with us. So if I come, I will call attention to what he is doing, gossiping maliciously about us. Not satisfied with that, he refuses to welcome the brothers. He also stops those who want to do so and puts them out of the church.
Diotrephes loved to be first. He was involved in ministry because he loved the recognition and the status that a position of leadership entailed. He was feeding off that. He was using his position of ministry to get his own needs met.
Pride cannot co-exist with ministry: they are contradictory, so one of them must die. Either ministry withers and dies because of pride, or pride will die so that ministry can flourish.
Another reason to be involved in ministry is guilt. Maybe someone comes to you and says, “Look, we really need a Sunday School teacher in the Jr. High department. If you don’t do it, those kids aren’t going to have a teacher.” And so you do it because there’s a tremendous need and you’ll feel guilty if you say “No”.
But God hasn’t called you to that ministry. He hasn’t gifted you for that ministry. And pretty soon, you realize that you’re like a square peg in a round hole.
Never let need determine your involvement in ministry. Listen for the call of God. God in his sovereignty has a plan for every one of us. And if we all just listen for his call, then all the needs will be met.
2. Sending - Notice that it says in Mark 6:7 that Jesus “sent them out”. They had been together as a little group for some time now, but in order to have a ministry, they had to go out.
They had to break out of their comfort zone. A ministry that God calls you to will always take you out of your comfort zone.
Look at Moses. God said “Mo, I want you to go. I want you to go and talk to Pharaoh.” And Moses said “ME??? I’m not a public speaker. I’ve been talking to sheep and goats for forty years now—I don’t know how to talk to a king.” Out of his comfort zone.
Look at Paul. A highly-trained orthodox Jewish rabbi. Spent his whole life studying the Jewish Law. Jesus gets hold of his life and says “I want you to go to the Gentiles.” For the first half of his life, Paul had been doing everything in his power to avoid Gentiles! Out of his comfort zone.
Any ministry that God wants you to do will take you outside of your comfort zone because that’s where you will have to rely on God’s power to get the job done. If your ministry only involves you in doing things that you feel pretty competent in doing by yourself, then God probably hasn’t called you to that ministry.
Jesus sent his disciples OUT, because that’s where the lost people were, and that’s where they had to learn to trust God.
3. Team - Jesus sent them out two by two. Ministry is all about teamwork.
If I want to be involved in ministry, but I only want to work alone—I don’t want the hassle of having to work alongside other people, I don’t want anyone else telling me what to do, I want to be my own boss, I want to make my own decisions—then I’ve just proved one thing: I don’t understand the first thing about ministry.
Ministry is about learning to work with people. It’s about learning to work together as a team.
You’re going to watch the Super Bowl tonight. In the Dallas Cowboys’ backfield there are two running backs. Number 22 is Emmitt Smith. He gets all the glory. He sets all the records. He gets the zillion dollar contracts. He gets all the commercial endorsements. His name and his face are instantly recognizable wherever he goes. And the Cowboys are going to give him the ball about 25 times tonight.
The other running back is number 40, Butch Johnson. If Butch Johnson were to walk in here today, I dare say that hardly any of you would recognize him. He’s probably going to get to carry the ball about twice in the Super Bowl. Because his job is to open the holes for Emmitt to run through.
And the reason that Emmitt runs so good, is because Butch is opening the holes for him. They are a team. They work together. They need each other.
You know the number one reason why missionaries come home from the mission field? It isn’t because of the language. It isn’t because they can’t get used to living in a foreign culture. It isn’t because of medical problems. It is because they can’t get along with the other missionaries.
Ministry is about teamwork. That’s why Jesus sent his disciples out two by two.
4. Authority - Jesus gave them authority over evil spirits.
Once upon a time there was a professional photographer. He did a lot of work for a national magazine, and one day they assigned him to shoot a great forest fire that was raging in Yellowstone National Park. They told him that a small plane would be waiting at a certain airstrip in Wyoming to fly him over the fire.
Well he arrived at that airstrip just about an hour before sundown, and sure enough, there was a little Cessna waiting, with its engine warmed up, and a young man sitting in the pilot seat. So he jumped in with all his equipment and he shouted “Let’s go!”
The pilot taxied out and took off. Once they were airborne, they could see the great pall of smoke from the forest fire in the distance. The photographer said “I want you to fly me over the north side of that fire and make several low-level passes.”
The pilot’s hands began to shake, and he gulped out the question “Why?”
The photographer replied “Because I’m going to take pictures, that’s why. I’m a photographer and photographers take pictures.”
After a long pause, the nervous pilot—who was really shaking by now— said “You mean you’re not the flight instructor?”
That man was flying that airplane without the proper authority to do so. And there are a lot of people in ministry like that too. They are trying to minister to people’s spiritual needs without ever having received from the Master the authority to do so.
Authority for ministry comes from the call of God. When God called Jeremiah to be his prophet, he didn’t just give him a job to do, he gave him the authority and the power to do it.
Jeremiah says “the Lord reached out his hand and touched my mouth and said to me, “Now, I have put my words in your mouth. See, today I appoint you over nations and kingdoms to uproot and tear down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and to plant.”
When God calls you to minister, he gives you authority to minister. Because ministry is a spiritual battle. There are evil forces out there trying to do everything in their power to make sure that ministry never takes place. And if you and I are ever going to succeed in ministry, we’re going to need the authority that only God can give us.
And we lay hold of that authority and that power through prayer. That is what we have been doing all this past week—praying for power and God’s blessing in every aspect of our ministry.
You’ve seen pictures of our troops in Bosnia. Although they are on a peacekeeping mission, I hope that you’ve noticed they’re carrying real weapons. Those are real guns and tanks and missiles and they have the authority to use them. That’s what gives our men credibility in that war-torn country.
A ministry leader who doesn’t pray about his ministry is like a soldier going into Bosnia carrying a Super-soaker water gun instead of a real rifle. No power. No credibility. No impact.
5. Provision - Jesus said “Take nothing for the journey except a staff—no bread, no bag, no money in your belts. Wear sandals but not an extra tunic.” Why did he give them a big list of what NOT to bring?
Because he wanted to teach them that their provision for ministry was going to come from God. He didn’t want them to go out into ministry feeling self-sufficient. He wanted them to learn to depend on God’s provision for their needs.
If you ever get to the place in your ministry where you feel that you’ve got what it takes—you’ve got everything you need to get the job done—then your ministry is going to have very little impact. Because you’re not depending on God.
In Philippians 4, Paul commends the church at Philippi for sharing in his support. They sent money to him again and again, even though they were not a wealthy church. And he says in that context—the context of giving and ministry involvement— “my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.”
6. Consistency - Jesus said “Whenever you enter a house, stay there until you leave that town. Establish your ministry from that base. Don’t be jumping around from house to house.”
One of the key factors to effectiveness in ministry is long-term consistency.
William Carey was a pioneer missionary to India in the 1800’s. He spent forty years there, ministering to the people and teaching them about Jesus. During that time, he translated all or parts of the Bible into 34 of the different languages of India.
One day, someone asked him about his remarkable career and accomplishments. He said “I am not a genius; I am just a plodder.” William Carey had learned the secret of consistency.
We live in a day when people seem to be afraid of making long-term commitments. It’s getting harder and harder to find folks who are willing to sign up for long-term ministry involvement, because they are afraid that it is going to cut down their “options”, it’s going to restrict their “freedom”.
Ask God to give you consistency in ministry.
7. Opposition - You know, one of the hardest lessons to learn in ministry is that not everyone is going to welcome your ministry with open arms. You’re not always going to be appreciated.
Jesus said “There are some towns and villages out there that are not going to welcome you. They’re not going to listen to you. But that says more about them than it does about you. So don’t let that deflect you from your calling. Shake their dust off, and move on.”
Not too long ago, the Space Shuttle was grounded because of an insulation problem on the main fuel tank. It seems that the foam coating used to insulate that super-cold fuel tank was made of a material that proved to be irresistible to a certain species of woodpecker. The woodpeckers were pecking the foam off the tank, and that’s what grounded the shuttle.
Think of it—the world’s most sophisticated and powerful spacecraft grounded by a few lousy woodpeckers!
There are woodpeckers out there waiting to peck holes in your ministry. They are on the devil’s payroll. What are you going to do when they start pecking at you? Are you going to say “Oh dear. I’m getting criticized. People don’t like me. People don’t appreciate my ministry.” Are you going to let them ground you?
Or are you going to simply re-commit yourself to being faithful to the ministry to which God has called you? Jesus said “If they persecuted me, they will persecute you too.” So don’t be surprised when it happens.
And the more effective a ministry, the more likely it is to happen. Because the enemy sits up and takes notice when people are being won to Christ. And he rolls in his heavy guns to try to stop that from happening.
See what it says down in verse 12? “They went out and preached that people should repent. They drove out many demons and anointed many sick people with oil and healed them. And King Herod heard about this.” Herod—the big woodpecker.
Opposition is part of ministry. It comes with the territory.
8. Results - when you are faithful to the calling of God, good things happen. People are helped, people are healed, broken lives are put back together. And most importantly, as it says in verse 14, the name of Jesus becomes well known.
That’s the goal of ministry—to get people thinking about, and talking about, and wanting to know Jesus.
Beware of any situation where people come away from your ministry talking about YOU. If your ministry is all that God wants it to be, they will come away talking about Jesus, and excited about Jesus.
Ministry is about getting people turned on to Jesus.
Not too long ago down in Tucson, Arizona, they had a Gem and Mineral show—a sort of convention of amateur rock-hounds. A certain gem dealer was strolling the aisles, looking at the exhibits, when he noticed a blue-violet stone about the size and shape of a potato for sale on one of the tables.
He asked the fellow manning the table how much he wanted for the stone. The seller said $15, but realizing that the stone wasn’t as pretty as many others going for that price, he lowered it to $10. That’s the price the gem dealer paid for it—$10.
That stone has since been certified as a 1,905 carat natural star sapphire. That’s about 800 carats larger than the next largest sapphire ever discovered. It now sits in a velvet lined box in a bank vault in Arizona, because it has been appraised at 2.28 million dollars. The gem dealer knew exactly what he was buying, because he was a lover of stones and he had seen thousands and thousands of them.
Ministry is something like that, only with people. It’s seeing people as gems in the rough just waiting for Jesus to take them and transform them and polish them. And being involved in ministry is to be a part of that process.