Sermon delivered at the convocation of Newman Theological College, 1991. Historical series, no 6. 2 Cor 3:5-6

Jacobson, J. Robert

English

Wilfrid Laurier University

ConsensusVolume 31Issue 1 Preaching the Gospel in Canada in the 21stCenturyArticle 115-1-2006Christian ministry -- a high-risk callingJ. Robert JacobsonFollow this and additional works at: http://scholars.wlu.ca/consensusThis Sermons is brought to you for free and open access by Scholars Commons @ Laurier. It has been accepted for inclusion in Consensus by anauthorized editor of Scholars Commons @ Laurier. For more information, please contact scholarscommons@wlu.ca.Recommended CitationJacobson, J. Robert (2006) "Christian ministry -- a high-risk calling ," Consensus: Vol. 31 : Iss. 1 , Article 11.Available at: http://scholars.wlu.ca/consensus/vol31/iss1/11HISTORICAL SERIES, 6Christian Ministry – A High-risk CallingJ. Robert JacobsonBashaw, Alberta(Editor’s Note: During the time of his ordained ministry in theEvangelical Lutheran Church in Canada the Rev. J. RobertJacobson served as the first bishop of the Synod of Alberta andthe Territories from 1986 to 1994. This sermon was preachedat the Convocation of Newman Theological College in 1991and in a modified form at a Bishop’s Study conference in 1994.)Text: 2 Corinthians 3:5-6To ask a bishop to address a Convocation is to guarantee that it willbe set in the context of the painful struggles involved in the Church’scall to be faithful to our Lord Jesus Christ. It is probably also safe toassume that the speaker is expected to be battle-scarred but notbroken; one who carries in his body the death of Christ so that the lifeof Christ may be manifested in the Church for the world; a survivorwho through grace alone has managed at one and the same time to bethe off-scouring of the earth and a sign of the world’s best andbrightest hope; someone who in the highest degree is unlikely to floatoff into theological abstractions and clever mind-games.I hope so, because that is what you have today.First, may I congratulate you graduates on having come to thepoint where you are able to offer some significant ministry to theChurch and the world through Christ. You have all invested muchtime and effort in equipping yourselves for ministry, and today werecognize and celebrate your fine achievement of faith thus far.If what I have to say to you sounds stern and harsh at points, it isonly because many of you have now arrived at the very juncturewhere Jesus’ disciples stood when he urged them to “sit down andcount the cost, to see whether [they] had enough to complete [thetask]” (Luke 14:28). Far from taking anything away from yourachievements to date, nothing I have to say would make any sensewithout them.147Published by Scholars Commons @ Laurier, 2006Most of you are surely aware that Christian ministry is a high-riskcalling. But I wonder if anyone at this stage of preparation can trulyappreciate how high-risk it is, or what a colossal impact entering intothat high-risk zone will have on your personal life, right down to thecore. It is a good idea to look ahead, as our Lord advises, and to countthe cost; but in spite of our most careful projections and deliberateestimates, we will almost all experience a cost overrun of quitestaggering proportions as we fulfill the ministry we have receivedfrom the Lord Jesus (Acts 20:24). And, I hasten to add, the highestjoys through the deepest sorrows, and life most abundant in taking upour cross.What makes Christian ministry such a high-risk calling?For one thing, the moment you are entrusted with a publicministry on behalf of Christ and his Church you must see yourselfand everything you do and say as representing Christ and his Church.Why? Because – and to a degree you can scarcely appreciate at thispoint – everybody else, including God, does so, whether you like it ornot. This is actually a gift that enables you to do immeasurable goodfor people on behalf of Christ and his Church, but it also empowersyou to do them more harm than you can imagine. Ministry is a sacredtrust in the most literal sense of those words. So much is at stake forpeople in it.Jesus was making just this point to the disciples when Peter,cringing at the implications of Jesus’ words, asked him point-blankwhether he was saying this for the benefit of the apostles or ofeveryone. We need to hear Jesus’ unequivocal answer, for the simplereason that it had better register with us before we get into ministry,not afterwards. Jesus’ answer is, “I’m saying this for your benefitbecause you are the ones to whom I am committing the task ofkeeping the rest of my household well fed and cared for. So manypeople are blessed when you are faithful, and so many people sufferwhen you are not. I am holding you especially accountable to me.Because I have entrusted so much to you, I require that much morefrom you” (Luke 12:41-42 in paraphrase). These are Jesus’ words tohis ministers.These words, of course, contain an equal amount of promise andof threat for the very reason that they are one way of describing thesacred trust of Christian ministry. Faithful stewards have nothing lessthan the very Bread of Heaven in its varied forms to share with148 Consensushttp://scholars.wlu.ca/consensus/vol31/iss1/11hungry people, an awesome empowerment in the hands of a faithfulminister to give and sustain the life of God in human beings. There isno more exquisite form of blessing than this, for the people and forus. But if we betray this sacred trust by redirecting the divineresources away from those for whom they are intended and towardour own narrow self-interest … well, human language fails evenJesus in describing the suffering and horrors to which that can lead,for the people and for us.Paul underscores in Acts 20 the subtleness with which ministerscan experience over time a gradual shift from faithfulness tounfaithfulness in the exercise of their stewardship from God. As inJesus’ story to Peter, here too the nub of the problem is defined as amovement from a Christ-centred and Christ-shaped ministry to aministry that slowly comes to centre on the minister’s desire forpersonal gratification. That can twist everything. “Some even fromamong our own group (whom the Holy Spirit has made guardians ofthe flock) will come distorting the truth in order to entice the disciplesto follow them” (Acts 20:30).A high-risk calling, indeed – the risk of failure and becoming asource of terrible damage in the course of our ministry! No wonderAmbrose was moved to say, Mirum est, si sacerdos salvus est. “It’s awonder any priest is saved.”What else makes Christian ministry such a high-risk calling? Ithas always been true, but today it is truer than ever: Anyone whothinks that it is a small private matter for a Christian minister tomisbehave a little on the side, or that the minister’s private life is noone else’s business, is out of touch with reality. You need to know thisbefore you start. Nothing destroys faith faster in people ordisillusions them more irreparably about what the Church has tooffer, than the discovery that the minister they thought they couldsurely trust has betrayed them. God’s people may not have the rightto know every detail of your private life and mine, but they do havethe right to assume that if they did know it there would be nosurprises revealed, nothing incompatible with our public ministry.Why? Because wherever people cannot make that assumption,ministry stops dead! Just try to minister effectively to someone who,justly or unjustly, suspects you of being incongruent, one thing inpublic and something else in private. You haven’t got a hope! I haveseen the ministry of one pastor, who had slowly won the confidenceA High-risk Calling 149Published by Scholars Commons @ Laurier, 2006of a distrustful people, set back overnight by the news of a belovedneighbouring pastor’s breach of his people’s trust. The faithfulpastor’s ministry was badly hurt by the suspicion that he might be astwo-faced as his colleague.Are you ready to accept that burden as a Christian minister, theburden of committing yourself to congruity in your public and yourprivate life, so that in fact you are living but one life, a life coram deo(“before the face of God”)? Can you furthermore accept the burdenof knowing that the integrity of your own ministry is subject to betorn to shreds in the eyes of some people by the behaviour ofcolleagues who abuse the sacred trust which all Christian ministershold? And above all, can you assume the burden of knowing that asa Christian minister your conduct categorically cannot be just aprivate matter? More than you can imagine, you hold the credibilityof the ministry of your colleagues in your hands. There is no moredelicate way of saying it. It’s part of what it means to count the costof discipleship at this juncture. Please count it now.Of course, thank God, this same principle works in reverse.People who experience Christ in you will come to expect toexperience Christ in your colleagues as well. What a blessing yougive them when this happens! And you will be amazed constantly atthe number of people who are still prepared to trust you withoutknowing anything more about you than the fact that you are aminister of Jesus Christ. This is probably because one of yourcolleagues somewhere else has served them so faithfully in Christ’slove. Yes, this treasure still exists, but every minister will tell you thatit has been tragically depleted in recent years, with countlessopportunities to be the Gospel for people lost simply because somany people are scandalized by stories or experiences of ministerswho have betrayed their sacred trust. Cynicism abounds, and the sadtruth is that it plagues those who deserve it least as much as those whodeserve it most.In public ministry at any level you enter upon a high-risk calling.The stakes are high. Human lives hang in the balance. You are subjectfrom now on to a greatly heightened responsibility for the broadimpact of your own words and actions on the lives of others and onthe very mission and Church of Jesus Christ. There’s no way aroundit. It’s the agony and ecstasy of ministry. It is most appealing, andmost daunting. “Who is sufficient for these things?” asked Paul (2150 Consensushttp://scholars.wlu.ca/consensus/vol31/iss1/11Corinthians 2:16). And he was talking about the things of Christianministry! Who, indeed?!Don’t expect a cheap and easy answer from me! Paul’s answer isneither cheap nor easy: “Our sufficiency is from God who hasqualified us to be ministers of a New Covenant,” he says (2Corinthians 3:5-6). Believe me, any minister striving to be faithfulthese days clings to the truth of these words as to a life-raft in deepand troubled waters. “Our sufficiency is from God who gives us whatit takes to serve his purposes in bringing people back to himselfthrough Jesus’ death and resurrection.”To be sure, God calls and uses all kinds of people in ministry. Butthose to whom public ministry is entrusted, whether in its ordained orin its non-ordained forms, all share a few things in common. All arecalled to demonstrate an adequate supply of a few essential qualities,precisely because it is a public ministry and so much hinges on howthey exercise it. A few years ago I did a careful study of the list ofqualities found in the Pastoral Epistles (1 and 2 Timothy and Titus)and compared them with the qualities which Jesus sought to establishin his disciples and which St. Paul stressed at length in his primaryepistles. They are virtually identical. Their absence in any personspresenting themselves for public ministry is reason enough towithhold the laying-on of hands, whatever other gifts these peoplemay have. Otherwise the blame for the harm they do to themselvesand to others falls as much on a careless Church as it does on them (1Timothy 5:22).What, then, does the Church require and what do people have aright to expect of those who present themselves for public ministry ofany kind? “A firm grasp of the Word,” to cite Titus 1:9, and acharacter above public reproach; a history of faithful and responsiblefamily life and a gentle spirit; a personality free of addictions tothings like wine, money, or sex, and a long track record as Christiansto show that they can endure the trials and temptations of our life inJesus Christ. If any one of these areas gets out of control in aminister’s life, the damage to self and others and to the credibility ofthe Gospel can be massive.So if you have all that, you are “sufficient for these things?” Onlyif you hold it all not as a personal possession or attainment, but as agift from God renewed moment by moment by the Holy Spirit at thefoot of the cross and in the presence of the risen Christ.A High-risk Calling 151Published by Scholars Commons @ Laurier, 2006Do you have a firm grasp of the Word? Is it not because the Wordhas a firm grasp of you? Do you have a character above publicreproach? Is it not because you simply cannot imagine hurting orabusing others when you feel so cherished and honoured by our Lordyourself? Are you free of serious addictions? Is it not because Godhas so filled you with his beauty and life that you are spared the sickcravings of an empty heart? Do you have a history of faithful andresponsible family life? How would that be possible without theblessing of Heaven and the gifts of the Spirit? “What indeed do youhave that you did not receive as a gift?” (1 Corinthians 4:7) There isno room to boast. If you are one of those whom God has equippedthus for public ministry, it is God’s achievement, not yours. The mostyou and I can claim is that we have sought as faithful disciples toreceive rather than reject God’s gifts, but only God knows how muchresistance he has had to overcome in any of us in the process.And, friends, it gets tougher, not easier. Having some of thebasics in place by God’s grace means just that, and no more. There isno guarantee to us any more than to the elders at Ephesus referred toin Acts 20 that the basics will stay in place. For us to be useful to God,he must put us in compromising circumstances up to the limit of ourspiritual tolerance (1 Corinthians 10:13); but the moment we starttrusting ourselves to make it through, the moment we presume thatour track record proves that we cannot fall, we’re in danger. “Oursufficiency is from God” in every circumstance, always. It is only bylooking to Jesus who created our faith in God’s love for us in the firstplace and who is committed to bringing it to its fullest expression inus – only by looking always to Jesus that we can finish the course setbefore us (Hebrews 12:1-2). Now I want to turn that around. Because we look to Jesus andcling to him in all our trials, we will fulfill the ministry we receivefrom him despite the disappointments and heartaches we meet,despite the dangers from within and the dangers from without. “I amwith you always,” he says to his public ministers. “Without me youcan do nothing.” But we can do all things through Christ who givesus his strength (Matthew 28:20; John15:5; cf. Philippians 4:13).If I have felt compelled to focus today on the call of our Lord tocount the cost entailed in faithful ministry in our time, and if I havemoreover chosen to focus on only a part of that cost – the partconnected with the public nature of our ministry – it is because the152 Consensushttp://scholars.wlu.ca/consensus/vol31/iss1/11Church has suffered much in recent times at the hands of those whohave not counted that part. One contributing factor may well be thatthe ministry has been infected by some of the viruses of our age, likethe individualism that discounts the importance of the effect of ourconduct on the lives of others; or the professionalism that sees noneed to harmonize our public and private life; or the various cults ofself-actualization that defy the Gospel mystery of finding our life bylosing it for Jesus’ sake. Ministers who are badly infected by virusessuch as these are a menace to the people entrusted to their care, totheir colleagues in ministry, and to the credibility of the wholeChurch. Christian ministers are called to serve in Christ’s way byChrist’s power in the communion of the Church.“Our sufficiency is from God.” Those Christian ministers whocling to God and serve each other well will continue to be a blessingin our time because God will continue to make them radiant sourcesof his saving love. I know, because God has given me the privilege ofserving a remarkable body of such ministers, lay and ordained, whoexercise the sacred trust they have received from the Lord Jesus withreverence, humility, gratitude and joy. They’re not the ones that grabthe headlines, unfortunately. But they offer their communities anexperience of someone who has been sent by Jesus through hisChurch in response to their need. And when they are finished in oneplace and move on to the next, I know that they have exercised theirsacred trust well when someone says, “How God has loved usthrough that man!” or, “She treated us as though we really matter!”As you step into your various ministries and exercise them inJesus’ name, I pray that our Lord will be loving people well throughyou and giving them a sense of their worth in his eyes by the worththey have in yours.May the peace of God which surpasses all understanding keepyour hearts and minds in Christ Jesus! Amen.A High-risk Calling 153Published by Scholars Commons @ Laurier, 2006

Christian ministry -- a high-risk calling

Scholars Commons

Consensus
Volume 31
Issue 1 Preaching the Gospel in Canada in the 21st
Century
Article 11
5-1-2006
Christian ministry -- a high-risk calling
J. Robert Jacobson
Follow this and additional works at: http://scholars.wlu.ca/consensus
This Sermons is brought to you for free and open access by Scholars Commons @ Laurier. It has been accepted for inclusion in Consensus by an
authorized editor of Scholars Commons @ Laurier. For more information, please contact scholarscommons@wlu.ca.
Recommended Citation
Jacobson, J. Robert (2006) "Christian ministry -- a high-risk calling ," Consensus: Vol. 31 : Iss. 1 , Article 11.
Available at: http://scholars.wlu.ca/consensus/vol31/iss1/11
HISTORICAL SERIES, 6
Christian Ministry – A High-risk Calling
J. Robert Jacobson
Bashaw, Alberta
(Editor’s Note: During the time of his ordained ministry in the
Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada the Rev. J. Robert
Jacobson served as the first bishop of the Synod of Alberta and
the Territories from 1986 to 1994. This sermon was preached
at the Convocation of Newman Theological College in 1991
and in a modified form at a Bishop’s Study conference in 1994.)
Text: 2 Corinthians 3:5-6
To ask a bishop to address a Convocation is to guarantee that it will
be set in the context of the painful struggles involved in the Church’s
call to be faithful to our Lord Jesus Christ. It is probably also safe to
assume that the speaker is expected to be battle-scarred but not
broken; one who carries in his body the death of Christ so that the life
of Christ may be manifested in the Church for the world; a survivor
who through grace alone has managed at one and the same time to be
the off-scouring of the earth and a sign of the world’s best and
brightest hope; someone who in the highest degree is unlikely to float
off into theological abstractions and clever mind-games.
I hope so, because that is what you have today.
First, may I congratulate you graduates on having come to the
point where you are able to offer some significant ministry to the
Church and the world through Christ. You have all invested much
time and effort in equipping yourselves for ministry, and today we
recognize and celebrate your fine achievement of faith thus far.
If what I have to say to you sounds stern and harsh at points, it is
only because many of you have now arrived at the very juncture
where Jesus’ disciples stood when he urged them to “sit down and
count the cost, to see whether [they] had enough to complete [the
task]” (Luke 14:28). Far from taking anything away from your
achievements to date, nothing I have to say would make any sense
without them.
147
Published by Scholars Commons @ Laurier, 2006
Most of you are surely aware that Christian ministry is a high-risk
calling. But I wonder if anyone at this stage of preparation can truly
appreciate how high-risk it is, or what a colossal impact entering into
that high-risk zone will have on your personal life, right down to the
core. It is a good idea to look ahead, as our Lord advises, and to count
the cost; but in spite of our most careful projections and deliberate
estimates, we will almost all experience a cost overrun of quite
staggering proportions as we fulfill the ministry we have received
from the Lord Jesus (Acts 20:24). And, I hasten to add, the highest
joys through the deepest sorrows, and life most abundant in taking up
our cross.
What makes Christian ministry such a high-risk calling?
For one thing, the moment you are entrusted with a public
ministry on behalf of Christ and his Church you must see yourself
and everything you do and say as representing Christ and his Church.
Why? Because – and to a degree you can scarcely appreciate at this
point – everybody else, including God, does so, whether you like it or
not. This is actually a gift that enables you to do immeasurable good
for people on behalf of Christ and his Church, but it also empowers
you to do them more harm than you can imagine. Ministry is a sacred
trust in the most literal sense of those words. So much is at stake for
people in it.
Jesus was making just this point to the disciples when Peter,
cringing at the implications of Jesus’ words, asked him point-blank
whether he was saying this for the benefit of the apostles or of
everyone. We need to hear Jesus’ unequivocal answer, for the simple
reason that it had better register with us before we get into ministry,
not afterwards. Jesus’ answer is, “I’m saying this for your benefit
because you are the ones to whom I am committing the task of
keeping the rest of my household well fed and cared for. So many
people are blessed when you are faithful, and so many people suffer
when you are not. I am holding you especially accountable to me.
Because I have entrusted so much to you, I require that much more
from you” (Luke 12:41-42 in paraphrase). These are Jesus’ words to
his ministers.
These words, of course, contain an equal amount of promise and
of threat for the very reason that they are one way of describing the
sacred trust of Christian ministry. Faithful stewards have nothing less
than the very Bread of Heaven in its varied forms to share with
148 Consensus
http://scholars.wlu.ca/consensus/vol31/iss1/11
hungry people, an awesome empowerment in the hands of a faithful
minister to give and sustain the life of God in human beings. There is
no more exquisite form of blessing than this, for the people and for
us. But if we betray this sacred trust by redirecting the divine
resources away from those for whom they are intended and toward
our own narrow self-interest … well, human language fails even
Jesus in describing the suffering and horrors to which that can lead,
for the people and for us.
Paul underscores in Acts 20 the subtleness with which ministers
can experience over time a gradual shift from faithfulness to
unfaithfulness in the exercise of their stewardship from God. As in
Jesus’ story to Peter, here too the nub of the problem is defined as a
movement from a Christ-centred and Christ-shaped ministry to a
ministry that slowly comes to centre on the minister’s desire for
personal gratification. That can twist everything. “Some even from
among our own group (whom the Holy Spirit has made guardians of
the flock) will come distorting the truth in order to entice the disciples
to follow them” (Acts 20:30).
A high-risk calling, indeed – the risk of failure and becoming a
source of terrible damage in the course of our ministry! No wonder
Ambrose was moved to say, Mirum est, si sacerdos salvus est. “It’s a
wonder any priest is saved.”
What else makes Christian ministry such a high-risk calling? It
has always been true, but today it is truer than ever: Anyone who
thinks that it is a small private matter for a Christian minister to
misbehave a little on the side, or that the minister’s private life is no
one else’s business, is out of touch with reality. You need to know this
before you start. Nothing destroys faith faster in people or
disillusions them more irreparably about what the Church has to
offer, than the discovery that the minister they thought they could
surely trust has betrayed them. God’s people may not have the right
to know every detail of your private life and mine, but they do have
the right to assume that if they did know it there would be no
surprises revealed, nothing incompatible with our public ministry.
Why? Because wherever people cannot make that assumption,
ministry stops dead! Just try to minister effectively to someone who,
justly or unjustly, suspects you of being incongruent, one thing in
public and something else in private. You haven’t got a hope! I have
seen the ministry of one pastor, who had slowly won the confidence
A High-risk Calling 149
Published by Scholars Commons @ Laurier, 2006
of a distrustful people, set back overnight by the news of a beloved
neighbouring pastor’s breach of his people’s trust. The faithful
pastor’s ministry was badly hurt by the suspicion that he might be as
two-faced as his colleague.
Are you ready to accept that burden as a Christian minister, the
burden of committing yourself to congruity in your public and your
private life, so that in fact you are living but one life, a life coram deo
(“before the face of God”)? Can you furthermore accept the burden
of knowing that the integrity of your own ministry is subject to be
torn to shreds in the eyes of some people by the behaviour of
colleagues who abuse the sacred trust which all Christian ministers
hold? And above all, can you assume the burden of knowing that as
a Christian minister your conduct categorically cannot be just a
private matter? More than you can imagine, you hold the credibility
of the ministry of your colleagues in your hands. There is no more
delicate way of saying it. It’s part of what it means to count the cost
of discipleship at this juncture. Please count it now.
Of course, thank God, this same principle works in reverse.
People who experience Christ in you will come to expect to
experience Christ in your colleagues as well. What a blessing you
give them when this happens! And you will be amazed constantly at
the number of people who are still prepared to trust you without
knowing anything more about you than the fact that you are a
minister of Jesus Christ. This is probably because one of your
colleagues somewhere else has served them so faithfully in Christ’s
love. Yes, this treasure still exists, but every minister will tell you that
it has been tragically depleted in recent years, with countless
opportunities to be the Gospel for people lost simply because so
many people are scandalized by stories or experiences of ministers
who have betrayed their sacred trust. Cynicism abounds, and the sad
truth is that it plagues those who deserve it least as much as those who
deserve it most.
In public ministry at any level you enter upon a high-risk calling.
The stakes are high. Human lives hang in the balance. You are subject
from now on to a greatly heightened responsibility for the broad
impact of your own words and actions on the lives of others and on
the very mission and Church of Jesus Christ. There’s no way around
it. It’s the agony and ecstasy of ministry. It is most appealing, and
most daunting. “Who is sufficient for these things?” asked Paul (2
150 Consensus
http://scholars.wlu.ca/consensus/vol31/iss1/11
Corinthians 2:16). And he was talking about the things of Christian
ministry! Who, indeed?!
Don’t expect a cheap and easy answer from me! Paul’s answer is
neither cheap nor easy: “Our sufficiency is from God who has
qualified us to be ministers of a New Covenant,” he says (2
Corinthians 3:5-6). Believe me, any minister striving to be faithful
these days clings to the truth of these words as to a life-raft in deep
and troubled waters. “Our sufficiency is from God who gives us what
it takes to serve his purposes in bringing people back to himself
through Jesus’ death and resurrection.”
To be sure, God calls and uses all kinds of people in ministry. But
those to whom public ministry is entrusted, whether in its ordained or
in its non-ordained forms, all share a few things in common. All are
called to demonstrate an adequate supply of a few essential qualities,
precisely because it is a public ministry and so much hinges on how
they exercise it. A few years ago I did a careful study of the list of
qualities found in the Pastoral Epistles (1 and 2 Timothy and Titus)
and compared them with the qualities which Jesus sought to establish
in his disciples and which St. Paul stressed at length in his primary
epistles. They are virtually identical. Their absence in any persons
presenting themselves for public ministry is reason enough to
withhold the laying-on of hands, whatever other gifts these people
may have. Otherwise the blame for the harm they do to themselves
and to others falls as much on a careless Church as it does on them (1
Timothy 5:22).
What, then, does the Church require and what do people have a
right to expect of those who present themselves for public ministry of
any kind? “A firm grasp of the Word,” to cite Titus 1:9, and a
character above public reproach; a history of faithful and responsible
family life and a gentle spirit; a personality free of addictions to
things like wine, money, or sex, and a long track record as Christians
to show that they can endure the trials and temptations of our life in
Jesus Christ. If any one of these areas gets out of control in a
minister’s life, the damage to self and others and to the credibility of
the Gospel can be massive.
So if you have all that, you are “sufficient for these things?” Only
if you hold it all not as a personal possession or attainment, but as a
gift from God renewed moment by moment by the Holy Spirit at the
foot of the cross and in the presence of the risen Christ.
A High-risk Calling 151
Published by Scholars Commons @ Laurier, 2006
Do you have a firm grasp of the Word? Is it not because the Word
has a firm grasp of you? Do you have a character above public
reproach? Is it not because you simply cannot imagine hurting or
abusing others when you feel so cherished and honoured by our Lord
yourself? Are you free of serious addictions? Is it not because God
has so filled you with his beauty and life that you are spared the sick
cravings of an empty heart? Do you have a history of faithful and
responsible family life? How would that be possible without the
blessing of Heaven and the gifts of the Spirit? “What indeed do you
have that you did not receive as a gift?” (1 Corinthians 4:7) There is
no room to boast. If you are one of those whom God has equipped
thus for public ministry, it is God’s achievement, not yours. The most
you and I can claim is that we have sought as faithful disciples to
receive rather than reject God’s gifts, but only God knows how much
resistance he has had to overcome in any of us in the process.
And, friends, it gets tougher, not easier. Having some of the
basics in place by God’s grace means just that, and no more. There is
no guarantee to us any more than to the elders at Ephesus referred to
in Acts 20 that the basics will stay in place. For us to be useful to God,
he must put us in compromising circumstances up to the limit of our
spiritual tolerance (1 Corinthians 10:13); but the moment we start
trusting ourselves to make it through, the moment we presume that
our track record proves that we cannot fall, we’re in danger. “Our
sufficiency is from God” in every circumstance, always. It is only by
looking to Jesus who created our faith in God’s love for us in the first
place and who is committed to bringing it to its fullest expression in
us – only by looking always to Jesus that we can finish the course set
before us (Hebrews 12:1-2). 
Now I want to turn that around. Because we look to Jesus and
cling to him in all our trials, we will fulfill the ministry we receive
from him despite the disappointments and heartaches we meet,
despite the dangers from within and the dangers from without. “I am
with you always,” he says to his public ministers. “Without me you
can do nothing.” But we can do all things through Christ who gives
us his strength (Matthew 28:20; John15:5; cf. Philippians 4:13).
If I have felt compelled to focus today on the call of our Lord to
count the cost entailed in faithful ministry in our time, and if I have
moreover chosen to focus on only a part of that cost – the part
connected with the public nature of our ministry – it is because the
152 Consensus
http://scholars.wlu.ca/consensus/vol31/iss1/11
Church has suffered much in recent times at the hands of those who
have not counted that part. One contributing factor may well be that
the ministry has been infected by some of the viruses of our age, like
the individualism that discounts the importance of the effect of our
conduct on the lives of others; or the professionalism that sees no
need to harmonize our public and private life; or the various cults of
self-actualization that defy the Gospel mystery of finding our life by
losing it for Jesus’ sake. Ministers who are badly infected by viruses
such as these are a menace to the people entrusted to their care, to
their colleagues in ministry, and to the credibility of the whole
Church. Christian ministers are called to serve in Christ’s way by
Christ’s power in the communion of the Church.
“Our sufficiency is from God.” Those Christian ministers who
cling to God and serve each other well will continue to be a blessing
in our time because God will continue to make them radiant sources
of his saving love. I know, because God has given me the privilege of
serving a remarkable body of such ministers, lay and ordained, who
exercise the sacred trust they have received from the Lord Jesus with
reverence, humility, gratitude and joy. They’re not the ones that grab
the headlines, unfortunately. But they offer their communities an
experience of someone who has been sent by Jesus through his
Church in response to their need. And when they are finished in one
place and move on to the next, I know that they have exercised their
sacred trust well when someone says, “How God has loved us
through that man!” or, “She treated us as though we really matter!”
As you step into your various ministries and exercise them in
Jesus’ name, I pray that our Lord will be loving people well through
you and giving them a sense of their worth in his eyes by the worth
they have in yours.
May the peace of God which surpasses all understanding keep
your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus! Amen.
A High-risk Calling 153
Published by Scholars Commons @ Laurier, 2006


https://scholars.wlu.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1161&amp;context=consensus

Christian ministry -- a high-risk calling

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