Chapter One
the spiritual art of
ministry
Whatever happens, conduct yourselves
in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ.
Philippians 1:27
People often say to me, "I wish I knew what God wanted me to
do with my life."
"That's easy," I reply. "Ministry."
Their eyes open wide. "You mean give up my job and go away
to a nunnery or something?"
"No," I reply, "probably not. Just get going. Look around
you. The mission field is between your own two feet at any one
time."
Ministry is not something for the professional Christian only-someone
who has been to seminary or Bible school or on the mission
field. It is for all who have become new persons in Christ Jesus
and have experienced "the old things passing away, and all things
becoming new" (see 2 Corinthians 5:17 KJV). It is for those who
have had a radical change in their lives because of their conversion
and who want-more than that, feel-a responsibility to make
sure everyone has the same opportunity.
Ministry is being a blessing. It's serving and giving and not
counting the cost. It's what we who love Jesus are supposed to be
doing all day, every day. Ministry is talking about Jesus, serving
Jesus, being Jesus where people are in need of Jesus. Ministry is
the most exciting, stretching thing in the world. It's an art-a
spiritual art.
Ministry-helping people-happens all day every day and all
night every night. Ministry goes on all over the world and on all
seven continents. Old people and young people minister. Black
people and white people. Wealthy people and poor people. Sick
people and healthy people. Ministry is a full-time twenty-four-hour
thing. An "I can't wait to get going in the morning" thing.
An "I don't have time to sleep" thing. An "I can't believe I have
the privilege of doing this" thing. It's a hard thing, a glorious
thing, a stretch, a reach, a "pulling you in every direction" thing.
It is exhausting and exhilarating, an emptying of yourself and a
"filling up to overflowing" thing. Ministry is in the end an art of
the Spirit-a spiritual art.
A CHAIN OF BLESSING
Christian ministry is a chain of blessing that begins with someone
getting blessed-someone coming to faith in Jesus Christ
and being converted, turned around, transformed from the inside
out-and in turn being a blessing to everyone in their orbit. It's a
chain. A chain of blessing.
When I was converted, the girl who led me to the Lord handed
me a Bible and told me to start reading it and to share my discoveries
with everyone in sight. Seeing that I was in the hospital at
the time and she was sick in the bed next to me, I looked at her
inquiringly, suspecting she actually meant for me to share with all
the people in the ward and the nurses, doctors, friends, and family
members who came to visit. She did.
"Look," she said, pointing to a starched and somewhat formidable
woman, "the chief nurse is coming. Tell her what you've just
told God when you prayed with me."
Before I could protest, the nurse was at my bedside, and conscious
of the eagle eye of my spiritual mother on my every move,
I prayed my second prayer (the first had been prayed a brief time
before, when I had invited Christ into my life) and wondered what
on earth I was going to say. I needn't have worried.
"What's this?" asked the nurse, picking up the Bible that had
suddenly appeared on my bedside table.
"Uh, a Bible," I answered somewhat lamely. She shot me a
look I couldn't read-or rather didn't want to interpret, because I
knew she had heard my crude language and seen my wild friends
visiting me and was obviously thinking, "Oh my, this is a change
of personality; she needs the psychiatrist"-and she did actually
send one to see me that afternoon!
Janet, my new friend, had told me about Jesus, and now I told
the nurse about him as best I could. I did an awful job of it, of
course. I was less than a few hours old-a baby Christian-but
something happened to me as I confessed my very new faith to her.
I didn't know then that the Bible said I was to believe in my heart
and make confession with my lips about my salvation (Romans
10:10), but spurred on by Janet, I obeyed.
I remember looking at the startled nurse and seeing a rather
hard woman who was worried about something, who didn't know
she needed a God to lean on, a Christ to save her, and some peace
of mind. In my tiny way I put a link on the chain. And I got it. This
was it. I was to be part of chains of blessing for the rest of my life.
I was to learn this spiritual ability, this spiritual art of ministry.
Of course, I realized at once that I had a lot to learn. It would
take a lot of expertise to lead this woman to Jesus as Janet had led
me, and for that I would need to go to some sort of school, I supposed.
It was Janet who told me that I was enrolled already in the
school of spiritual arts, and the Spirit himself would show me how
to minister. It was also Janet who showed me that I would have
opportunities every day to practice ministry. She opened my eyes
to the opportunities 24-7, as they say.
"Wake up in the morning, Jill, determined to be a blessing,"
Janet had said. I should have this attitude, whether people wanted
me to be a blessing or not. This was conversion. I who had woken
up most mornings determined to be a bane was now to wake up
determined to be a blessing? Well now, that would surely get my
friends' attention. It did.
So ministry is for all of us-those of us who have grown up in
the church and those of us who, like me, have come to Christ from
the outside of "Christian everything." So don't say, "But I don't
have any opportunity to minister. I have no training." Ask God to
show you the hundreds of opportunities that are right under your
nose every day.
MINISTRY IN DIFFICULTIES
Some people see a difficulty in every opportunity, while others
see an opportunity in every difficulty. It's a question of the way
you look at life. Something unfavorable happens to us that we are
not expecting-how do we handle it? The book of Philippians
is a marvelous book that gives us good examples of how to take
advantage of trouble for God.
Sitting in a cold, dark jail cell, Paul wrote to his friends in
Philippi: "What has happened to me has really served to advance
the gospel" (1:12). He declares that because of his chains (1:14), he
has this marvelous opportunity. He may as well have said "in spite
of" my chains. Paul considered himself a prisoner not of Rome
but of Jesus Christ. He was there as an ambassador to represent his
Lord and Savior. Hadn't the Lord said, "I will show him [Paul]
how much he must suffer for my name" (Acts 9:16)? God had also
promised Paul that he would one day take the gospel to Rome,
the heart of the empire (see Acts 23:11). When something hard
happened to the apostle Paul, his instant reaction was, "How can
I use this as a platform to explain the gospel?"
Paul had no idea how he was ever going to get to Rome. But he
knew that one way or another, God would get him to the heart of
the empire. And what would happen when he got there? Perhaps
Paul envisaged a great crusade in the Coliseum. I doubt it though.
He didn't know how this trip to Rome would actually happen and
probably thought it could happen only if he were a free man. But
Paul had a wonderful habit of seeing an opportunity to minister
in every difficulty.
Paul, therefore, looked at his chains as a positive. "These are
chains of blessing," he would have said to himself. In fact, he didn't
just say it to himself; he said it to his friends: "These chains on my
wrists have turned out to be chains of blessings for others." What
an attitude! And Paul wants them to learn the lesson too. In another
letter, Paul tells the Christians to make sure they learned to "make
the most of every opportunity" (Ephesians 5:16). He wanted them
to begin to practice the art of ministry.
Whether we find it easy or difficult to take the opportunity
to make Christ known when we're in tough situations may have
something to do with our personalities. It may be harder for some
than others. I am a negative sort of person to begin with, while my
husband Stuart is the positive part of the partnership. He would see
the doughnut; I would see the hole. And if perchance Stuart would
see the hole, he would spell it w-h-o-l-e. But faith can turn even a
melancholy person into a positive one. To discover this was a huge
encouragement that helped me see even confining situations as a
chance to practice this spiritual art.
As we meet Paul in prison, most likely in Rome, there is little
encouragement for him on the horizon. He is preparing to defend
his life in a Roman court. He is to be put on trial for his faith, and
he is not really expecting to win his case. However, he is quite at
ease, as his faith tells him that if God wants him around a bit longer
for the good of the young believers, he will be released. If not, he
will walk through the front door of heaven and be with Jesus. He
can't quite make up his mind which he prefers. He reckons he'd
rather have heaven, but he's quite content to stay a while longer on
earth for the sake of his beloved Philippians. "For to me, to live is
Christ and to die is gain," he writes in his letter (1:21). You can't
beat an attitude like that.
Shakespeare's Hamlet, prince of Denmark, would at a particularly
dark time in his life walk around the ramparts of his castle
with the same musings but draw quite a different conclusion. "If
I live, it's awful; and if I die, it's worse!" he mused-or in other
words, "To be or not to be: that is the question." Paul, on the other
hand, was thinking about the same alternatives in front of him and
saying to himself, "If I live, it's all about Christ; and if I die, I'll be
with him forever. So keep me alive or kill me, no problem; take
your pick."
A Christian has two great opportunities: to live and to die. Do
you think of living and dying as two grand-slam opportunities?
Well, it all depends on whether Christ is in your life. And if Christ
is in your life, then death is your gain!
Back at the ranch, or rather at the jail, Paul was making the
most of things. He was busy using his unusual opportunities and
exercising the spiritual art of ministry.
THE MINISTRY OF PRAYER
Shortly after finishing school and beginning to teach in my hometown
of Liverpool, I was rushed to the hospital by ambulance with
suspected appendicitis. On the way, I thought to myself, "Well, I
may be able to witness to some patients or nurses while I'm there."
Then I thought, "But it's a good chance to catch up on my reading,
or just relax as best I can and concentrate on getting well. Christians
are allowed a little time off, aren't they?"
An idea intruded into my thinking at this point. What if Janet
had spent her time in the hospital looking after only her own interests
and had never had time for Jill Ryder? What if she had been
solely absorbed with her considerable pain and not been amazingly
able to reach out of it into mine? What if she hadn't prayed
for me?
So I do remember realizing that I had an opportunity to exploit
this difficulty for the Lord, just as Janet had used hers. But I don't
remember thinking, "Yeah! This is a great chance to spend hours
and hours in prayer for other people." But then I had not fully realized
that taking every opportunity for Christ doesn't only mean
talking to people but also involves praying for them. When trouble
comes, we need to train our minds to go to God first and foremost
in prayer, and then to keep on going.
A friend sent me a get-well card that said, "The world says, `laid
aside for illness.' Christ says, `called aside for stillness.'"
"Bother," I remember saying out loud. I didn't want to hear
that. I knew it was right, however, and so I told God I was sorry
and began to use the hours I would have used talking to everyone
and their wives who came on by or catching up on magazine
gossip to learn the spiritual art of intercession. Chained to my
hospital bed for a couple of weeks, my prayer life took a giant leap
forward.
Now, we can pray anywhere, anytime, but sometimes we need
a nudge to remember that. Circumstance can lend us a hand. After
he gives his greeting, Paul is found in the opening lines of his letter
praying for his friends, and he tells them so.
"I am praying for you," he says. He has had hours and hours of
uninterrupted time in his cell to talk to his heavenly Father about
his friends and their troubles. If he had been free, it wouldn't have
been so easy to make the time. True, he is uncomfortable, and a
guard is attached to him at all times of day or night-but no matter,
it is downtime!
The prayer in Philippians 1:3-11 is fascinating. It tells us much
about Paul. Paul's prayer isn't first filled with a list of prayer requests
for his health or laments about the conditions "inside,"
though elsewhere in the letter he does ask people to pray specifically
about his practical and personal needs, but Paul shows us here
the heart of prayer by telling the Philippians that they are the focus
of his thinking.
"I thank my God for you," he says. "I remember you-all of
you-with joy all the time." He tells them what a sheer joy they
are to him. So often we pray for people, and there's not too much
joy in the doing of it. What a boost to our own faith when someone
is bringing us joy, and how it encourages us to keep on praying
for those who make our hearts smile.
Paul tells them that he believes in them and in the work of
God within them that will continue in their hearts and lives to
the end. He has confidence that they will stay the course. This
isn't a reason to stop praying for them, he says, but a good reason
to redouble his efforts. He is well aware that the Devil will not be
idle when he sees people such as the Philippians finishing strong.
Someone once said to me, "You seem so strong that I don't feel
the need to pray for you as much as for those who are weak." That
didn't make me feel very safe! Paul knows that the Philippians are
strong, but this is all the more reason to go on praying for them.
He tells them that he loves them, misses them, and is homesick
for them all (1:8).
Paul's intercession tells us about his relationship with the Gentile
believers, and how deeply he loves the people he prays for. "I
have you in my heart," he tells them (1:7). It always helps-loving
the people you are praying for, having them in your heart.
Ask God to put the people you pray for in your heart. Ask the
Spirit to transfer a piece of his heart for them to your heart. Loving
someone will help you to keep your mind on others and off
yourself and your own problems when you pray. And what does
Paul pray for his friends?
First, he prays that their love for each other will grow and
abound "more and more" (1:9). We all need more and more love
for each other. Do you have anyone in your life that needs more
and more love for others? I do. Pray "more and more love" prayers
for them. Then Paul prays that they will know and discern what
is best, and that they will live godly lives. He prays they may be
people of integrity-Christlike-and that comes from the Spirit.
Being like Christ is pure spiritual art. Lastly, Paul prays that God
will get a lot of credit for the lives lived for him in Philippi. If you
don't know what to pray for the people you love, borrow Paul's
words or the pattern of his prayers.
Think about all the opportunities you've had this week to exercise
the art of intercession for your friends. Unexpected times.
Did you do it, or were you and the people in your heart poorer as
a result of the lost opportunity?
THE MINISTRY OF EVANGELISM
Paul casually mentions that he is practicing the art of evangelism
in jail. He writes, "What has happened to me has really served to
advance the gospel. As a result, it has become clear throughout the
whole palace guard and to everyone else that I am in chains for
Christ" (1:12-13).
There are some situations we do not choose for ourselves where
we find ourselves chained to a person, situation, or circumstance
that is downright difficult or discouraging-or worse, dangerous.
What will we do with them? Will we see the person or persons
on the other end of the chain getting blessed? It's up to us. I ask
myself, "In what way has what has happened to me advanced the
gospel?" Or to put it another way, "What happened through me
when something happened to me?" For example, did I miss the opportunity
when I was in the hospital not only to pray for those in
my heart but to evangelize as well? The hospital is a great place to
talk about the Lord. People are a little scared, or at least apprehensive
and certainly vulnerable, and we should take full advantage
of it for the Lord.
(Continues.)
