What...you're not in the ministry?
I thought we were all in the ministry. Every member is a minister. Everyone of us have something we can do for Christ. The word "ministry" means "service." We're all His SERVANTS.
Jesus came to SERVE and He teaches us to serve. Since we're all ministers...we will all experience emotions about ministry.
Maybe your ministry is to your family.
Maybe your ministry is to the people you work with.
Maybe your ministry is in the church.
Maybe your ministry is specifically to unbelievers.
Again...we're all in the ministry!
We all have three things in common
- We all need to be loved.
- We all need to learn how to love.
- We all have people in our lives who need our love.
Let's talk about the emotions of ministry.
The Emotion of Intense Desire
- 1 Thessalonians 2:17 "But we, brethren, having been taken away from you for a short time in presence, not in heart, endeavored more eagerly to see your face with great desire."
Ever have an intense desire? How about after a long stretch of not eating sweets? You walk into Krispy Kreme Doughnuts and order 1/2 a dozen of "hot" doughnuts. They hand you the box and you walk to the car and it's just you and that box of doughnuts all alone. Is that what I'm talking about when I talk about intense desire? NO! It's something much bigger!
We all know what it means to really want something to happen for our success. We have a desire to succeed and achieve success. It's not any different in ministry.
But Apostle Paul is talking about something even deeper than that. It's more than just a desire to succeed. It's more than just a desire to be fruitful. It's a desire to MAKE a DIFFERENCE in the world! It's a desire to see people's lives changed.
Friend...it's not just about us anymore! It's about lives being changed! In the book of 1 Thessalonians, Paul talks about his experiences with these people. His desires grows out of:
- Times when you're torn away from people. (1 Thessalonians 2:17 "But we, brethren, having been taken away from you for a short time in presence, not in heart, endeavored more eagerly to see your face with great desire.")
I sense what Paul is saying here. There's an intense longing when you try to minister to someone but you're torn away from that circumstance. You love what you're doing and God moves you. You love a particular ministry and God sends you somewhere else. You love your small group and God leads you to leave that small group and go make a difference somewhere else. And you have an intense longing that comes out of that.
Remember elementary school and the first day of Kindergarten? The parents watch their little kindergartners go into the class. The look on their faces is this feeling of being torn away.
Sometimes you'll have that in ministry. Some of you will have it when you go on a missions trip. You'll fall in love with the people and they'll fall in love with you. You'll only be there for one week but when you have to leave, there will be that feeling of being torn away. That's part of ministry.
- Times when you try again and again - Paul tells those people in Thessalonica I tried to see you, "But we, brethren...endeavored more eagerly to see your face with great desire. Therefore we wanted to come to you - even I, Paul, time and again..." (1 Thessalonians 2:17b, 18)
Friends, sometimes things don't work out...even in ministry. Even if God has called you to do it...it doesn't mean it's always going to be easy. Things aren't always going to work out like you had hoped or prayed. There are many times when you're ministering to someone in your family or on a mission trip or at work or in a small group where you'll try again and again and again! It may work out in time...but you'll find that it's sometimes the 10th or 20th try before it does.
- Times when you feel like Satan stops you - "But we, brethren...endeavored more eagerly to see your face with great desire. Therefore we wanted to come to you - even I, Paul, time and again - but Satan hindered us..." (v.5a)
Sometimes you'll seemingly come to a standstill because of opposition, persecution or temptation. Who do you think is behind that? Satan is behind that.
There will be times when the enemy will throw up a barrier in our way of ministry. He doesn't want us to succeed in ministry. He will attempt to stop you. But Satan CANNOT stop GOD! He may try to stop you or me, but he cannot stop God's will from happening in this world. That's good news. Although he can stop you for a moment, he cannot stop God from being at work. That's what you take comfort in - - that intense desire!
- Times when you can stand it no longer. He says in 3:1, 2a "Therefore, when we could not longer endure it, we thought it good to be left in Athens alone, and sent Timothy..." Then a few verses later "when I could no longer endure it, I sent to know your faith..." (v.5a)
That's part of this intense desire. There are times when a concern for others and a conviction about what needs to be done in their life, and they start to grow in your life and the volume of God saying, "You need to be doing this. You need to be living here. You need to help with this area of the church ministry."
Maybe it's with preschoolers or junior highers or senior highers. "You need to make a difference with your life in this are of ministering to women or men or..." There's a time when you have the sense of "that's the right thing to do," and the volume keeps getting louder and louder and louder.
That's an intense desire! There comes a point when the volume gets so loud...like in your car if the volume kept getting louder and louder, that finally you say, "I've got to do something about that! I've got to do something about that NOW!"
How did Paul deal with this longing? He sent Timothy to STRENGTHEN and ENCOURAGE them!
When you have an intense desire about ministry...do something about it! Strengthen God's people, encourage God's people!