Ordination

Martin Luther was approached by a working man who wanted to know how he could serve God. Luther asked him, "What is your work now?" The man said, "I'm a shoemaker."

Much to the cobbler's surprise, Luther replied, "Then make good shoes and sell them at a fair price."

Luther didn't tell the man to make "Christian shoes." He didn't tell the man to leave his shoe business and become a monk.

As Christians, we can faithfully serve God in a variety of vocations and jobs. And we don't need to justify that work in terms of its "spiritual" value or evangelistic usefulness. We simply pursue our calling with new God-glorifying motives, goals, and standards.

Prolific children's author George Koshy spent three years writing a children's Bible, the first of its kind to be originated in any Indian language. When a local publisher rejected it, Koshy filed the manuscript in his cupboard.

Two years later, the same publisher decided to publish it. George opened the cupboard and discovered only shreds—mice had eaten his manuscript! For the next two years, he worked day and night to recreate the manuscript.

[For Christmas in 2009], Samaritan's Purse distributed 58,000 copies of this Bible in Kerala, India. Recently, George learned that two Hindu children became Christians and now attend church after reading a copy. "This is a product of much pain," Koshy says, trusting God for additional eternal results.

Used by permission from Media Associates International (MAI), a missions organization that "equips and nurtures talented men and women with a passion for producing Christian literature for their own people."

How do you feel about your job? Studs Terkel, the famous Chicago author, interviewed hundreds of people about their jobs and recorded what they said in his book, Working. He wrote this in the introduction:

This book, being about work, is, by its very nature, about violence—to the spirit as well as to the body. It is about ulcers as well as accidents, about shouting matches as well as fistfights, about nervous breakdowns as well as kicking the dog around. It is, above all (or beneath all), about daily humiliations. To survive the day is triumph enough for the walking wounded among the great many of us ….

It is about a search, too, for daily meaning as well as daily bread, for recognition as well as cash, for astonishment rather than torpor; in short, for a sort of life rather than a Monday through Friday sort of dying. Perhaps immortality, too, is part of the quest. To be remembered was the wish, spoken and unspoken, of the heroes and heroines of this book.

When Adam and Eve sinned, God said to Adam, "Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field." (Genesis 3:17-18) Once man sinned, God made work—even good work—hard. He did it so that we would be impelled to turn to him when the thorns get to be too much for us.

Dogs do some things better than humans. For one thing, most dogs have a far better sense of smell than we do, and there is a physical reason for that. The sinuses of humans have about 6 million receptor cells that can sense the chemical odors afloat in the air. By contrast, the average beagle has more than 300 million receptor cells in its snout—that's 50 times more cells for smells. The dominant sense through which most humans perceive their world is their eyesight, but the dominant sense through which dogs perceive their world is through their nose. A human can walk down the sidewalk and perhaps perceive a faint aroma of flowers upwind a few feet ahead. A dog walking the same sidewalk perceives as well the traces of every dog or animal that has been in the area.

Just as dogs and humans have different levels of ability to perceive smells, people have differences in their ability to perceive other things. Some people hear much better than others. Some people have greater ability to perceive emotions in others. Some have greater ability intellectually to perceive ideas as they read.

Most important of all, some people have greater ability to perceive things spiritually and morally because they have devoted themselves to prayer and to learning from the Bible and applying it to their lives and their world. Others have greater spiritual discernment because of the spiritual gifts and callings that God has placed on them. For many reasons, all people do not have the same ability to perceive.

The article in The Washington Post, began with these words: "The king folds her own laundry, chauffeurs herself around Washington in a 1992 Honda, and answers her own phone. Her boss's phone, too." The article was about Peggielene Bartels, secretary to the Ghanian embassy in Washington for 30 years. She's originally from Otuam, Ghana, a small city of about 7,000, and her story is a fascinating one.

When the 90-year-old king of Otuam, Ghana, died, the elders did what they always have done: a ritual to determine the next king. They prayed and poured schnapps on the ground while they read the names of the king's 25 relatives. When steam rose from the schnapps on the ground, the name that they were reading at that moment would be the new king—and that's exactly what happened when they read Peggielene's name.

So now Peggielene is a king—yes, a king, not a queen (when she pointed out to the elders that she is a woman, they replied by saying the office of king is the post that was open). When she goes back to Ghana, she has a driver and a chef and an eight-bedroom palace (though it needs repairs). She has power to resolve disputes, appoint elders, and manages more than 1,000 acres of family-owned land. "I'm a big-time king, you know," she told the reporter. When she returned for her coronation, they carried her through the streets on a litter. She even wore a heavy gold crown.

Paul Schwartzman, the reporter, wrote, "In the humdrum of ordinary life, people periodically yearn for something unexpected, some kind of gilded escape, delivered, perhaps, by an unanticipated inheritance or a winning lottery ticket." Peggielene got the unexpected.

As you think about Peggielene's story, consider what the Bible says to ordinary believers like you and me: "Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ." We are blessed with great riches—"spiritual blessings"—that have elevated us to a different status altogether. In fact, it is Peter who says we are "a royal priesthood."

Years ago, Dave Phillips and his wife, Lynn, had a talk about the callings they felt God was stirring in them. As they discussed what they were most passionate about, they agreed that bringing relief to suffering children and reaching the next generation with the gospel were at the top of the list. The thought of starting a relief agency was considered, but Dave's response was, "But that would mean I have to talk in front of people." By nature, Dave is a very quiet, behind-the-scenes man.

But after much prayer, Dave set aside his fears, and he and Lynn started Children's Hunger Fund out of their garage. Six weeks after CHF was launched, in January of 1992, he received a phone call from the director of a cancer treatment center in Honduras asking if there was any way he could obtain a certain drug for seven children who would die without it. Dave wrote down the name of the drug and told the director that he had no idea how to get this type of drug. They then prayed over the phone and asked God to provide.

As Dave hung up the phone, before he even let go of the receiver, the phone rang again. It was a pharmaceutical company in New Jersey asking Dave if he would have any use for 48,000 vials of that exact drug! Not only did they offer him eight million dollars' worth of this drug, but they told him they would airlift it anyplace in the world! Dave would later learn that the company was one of only two that manufactured this particular drug in the United States.

Within forty-eight hours, Dave had the drug sent to the treatment center in Honduras and to twenty other locations as well. It was then he believed that God was at work, validating his calling to this ministry.

Year after year, God continues to provide supernaturally.

There's a popular surfing video that captures well what it feels like to step into the awesome work of the kingdom of God. To view the video, click here. It is just over a minute and a half long.

The video starts with famed surfer Laird Hamilton upright on his board. He is holding on to a rope being towed along the water by a speeding jet ski. You sense a massive wave rests just underneath Laird and the jet ski, but the camera is focused in a manner that you can't quite tell how big it is.

As Laird gains speed via the power of the jet ski, you begin to see that he is on the downward slope of the wave. He lets go of the rope and the jet ski moves out of the camera's view. The focus is on Laird alone. As the camera pulls back, back, back, you see the surfer for what he is—a mere speck on a wave so enormous it defies comprehension. You realize that Laird is standing on the crest of a 65-foot breaker. The wave curls and the surfer zooms down its face, propelled by the wall of water crashing around him, exhilarated by the ride of a lifetime.

Like the wave, God's kingdom is on the move. It is enormous beyond our comprehension, and it's there whether we're ready to catch it or not. Should we want to ride this wave, we soon learn that it travels so fast, we can't do a thing on our own power. Our paddling simply won't do. We need the Holy Spirit to tow us along to get up to speed. Even when we catch it, we still don't do the bulk of the work. We are simply willing to ride the wave of what God is doing, exhilarated all the while by its awesome nature.

Andy Crouch writes in an article titled "Teaching People to Flourish”:

I lived in Boston in the 1980s, and I spoke with a pastor of a major church there. We were reflecting on the ways the church doesn't always recognize the culture cultivators and creators in its midst. This pastor said, "There's a woman in our church who was the lead litigator for the Environmental Protection Agency for the clean up of Boston Harbor. It's occurred to me since then that she played this incredibly important role in one of the great environmental success stories of the second half of the Twentieth Century. When I started high school, no one would put a toe in Boston Harbor, it was so polluted. And now there are beaches, and people go to the beach and swim. This Christian woman lawyer succeeded in litigating that case." He said, "The only time we have ever recognized her in church was for her role in teaching second grade Sunday school. And of course we absolutely should celebrate Sunday school teachers, but why did we never celebrate her incredible contribution to our whole city as a Christian, taking care of God's creation?"

First grade teacher, Linda, shares an interaction she had with one of her students on the first day of school. Accustomed to going home at noon in kindergarten, Ryan was getting his things ready to leave for home when he was actually supposed to be heading to lunch with the rest of the class. Linda asked him what he was doing. "I'm going home," he replied. Linda tried to explain that, now that he is in the first grade, he would have a longer school day. "You'll go eat lunch now," she said, "and then you'll come back to the room and do some more work before you go home." Ryan looked up at her in disbelief, hoping she was kidding. Convinced of her seriousness, Ryan then put his hands on his hips and demanded, "Who on earth signed me up for this program?"

As believers, it's easy to feel a little like Ryan when we consider the Christian life. The requirements are daunting—"Surely the Lord doesn't expect me to forgive seventy times seven;" "Surely he doesn't want me to turn the other cheek when someone hurts me;" "What does he mean, 'take up my cross'?" It isn't long before you want to say, "Who on earth signed me up for this program?"

That you may love [Jesus Christ] truly, understand that his love is proved in three areas of your life—in your thinking, in your talking, and in your manner of working.

—Richard Rolle, 14th century English theologian

In The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien writes about a kingdom called Gondor which for many years has had no king. While waiting for the rightful heir to come and claim his throne, a series of stewards has been placed in charge of the land. The steward in charge at the time of the events described in the book is named Denethor. He has two sons, Boromir and Faramir, both of whom figure prominently in the story (and subsequently, in the movie). As steward of the land, Denethor had the power of the king but without the title and without the full measure of honor. He was able to make decisions and to pass judgment. He received the respect and admiration of the people of the land. His primary task was to do whatever was best for the land in the absence of its rightful ruler. In all he did he was to remember his position—to remember that he was not, and never would be, the king. As a constant reminder of his temporary position he was forbidden to rule from the king's throne. [Tolkien writes:]

Awe fell upon him as he looked down that avenue of kings long dead. At the far end upon a dais of many steps was set a throne under a canopy of marble shaped like a crowned helm; behind it was carved upon the wall and set with gems an image of a tree in flower. But the throne was empty. At the foot of the dais, upon the lowest step which was broad and deep, there was a stone chair, black and unadorned, and on it sat an old man gazing at his lap.

That man, of course, was the steward. Where the king was allowed the full honor of sitting upon the throne, surrounded by splendor, the steward was consigned to rule from a plain, unadorned chair that sat at the foot of the throne.

Denethor was not a very good steward. He dreaded the day the king would return, for he knew that with the return of the king would come his own return to obscurity. He jealously guarded the power that had been given him and did not look forward to the day when he would have to relinquish the kingdom to its rightful owner. This attitude affected his every decision, and he often ruled based on his own desire for preservation rather than on the basis of what would be best for the kingdom he was sworn to protect.

Denethor said," The Lord of Gondor is not to be made the tool of other men's purposes, however worthy. And to him there is no purpose higher in the world as it now stands than the good of Gondor; and the rule of Gondor, my lord, is mine and no other man's, unless the king should come again."

To this Gandalf replied, "Unless the king should come again? Well, my lord Steward, it is your task to keep some kingdom against that even, which few now look to see.

Denethor went beyond the care of his office and became corrupted by the enemy. His abuse of what had been entrusted to him led to his own corruption.

This concept of stewardship is one that has been largely lost to our time and our culture. We understand ownership, borrowing, leasing, and mortgaging but have little knowledge of stewardship. Yet it is a crucial concept in the Bible. Scripture tells us that we are to regard all that God gives us as if we are stewards, not owners (see, for example, Luke 12). This is true of wealth; it is true of talents; it is true of opportunities and children and spouses and property and businesses and everything else. Where God has given richly, much is expected in return. At no time does God give us full and final ownership of what he has given us. He gives us but the opportunity to be stewards of his gifts.

Stewardship is more difficult than we may think. How tightly we like to cling to those things that we regard as ours. How tightly we cling to our money and how quick we are to set our hope in the uncertainty of riches (1 Timothy 6:17). How difficult it is to release our children to the care of God, knowing that we are but stewards of them for the short time God grants them to us. How prone we are to hold fast to all of the wrong things. How hard it is for us to understand that we do not occupy the throne. No, we are those who sit in the steward's unadorned stone chair, far below, in the shadow of the throne.

Denethor held fast to the wrong things. Drunk with corruption and power and unwilling to hand over the kingdom, Denethor, steward of Gondor, eventually took his own life, ending his years of poor stewardship. He would rather die than give up the power that he thought was his. He would rather die than humble himself before the king.

Denethor's son, Faramir, took his father's place as the next in a long line of stewards. And no sooner did he do this than Aragorn, the heir to the throne, returned to Gondor. Faramir was faced with all that was so important to his father. Would Faramir be like his father? Or would he be a faithful steward? [Tolkien writes:]

Faramir met Aragorn in the midst of those there assembled, and he knelt, and said: "The last steward of Gondor begs leave to surrender his office." …

Then Faramir stood up and spoke in a clear voice: "Men of Gondor, hear now the Steward of this realm! Behold! One has come to claim the kingship again at last. Here is Aragorn son of Arathorn… . Shall he be king and enter into the city and dwell there?" And all the host and all the people cried yea with one voice.

Moments later, when the new king has been crowned, it is Faramir who leads the cries of "Behold the king!"

Faramir was everything his father was not. He was a good and faithful steward who looked forward to the return of his king and who was willing and ready to hand what had been entrusted to him to its rightful owner. Faramir proved his character.

It is said that Queen Victoria, who reigned over England for over 63 years said, "I wish Jesus would come back in my lifetime. I would lay my crown at his feet." Would you do the same? Will you lead the chorus of "Behold the King!"?

Luis Palau, the Argentine-born international evangelist, describes how God expanded his ministry:

I was organizing campaigns for other evangelists, but I wanted to be an evangelist myself. So I was going through a lot of soul-searching and wondering, Will the missionary society I was with understand that I want to be an evangelist? Or do they want me forever to be an organizer of somebody else's campaign?

And the Lord gave me a verse. It sounds a bit bombastic, sort of big-headed, so I don't like to quote it in public. But to paraphrase, the Lord basically says, "I will open up nations to you." I took it personally, as a word from the Lord, and I wrote in the flyleaf of my Bible, "1966 (February, I think it was)—the Lord is going to do this for me."

At that point, we hadn't even had a big campaign in Colombia, let alone anywhere else. We had nice little campaigns. But then in Bologna, Colombia, Dec. 8-12, 1966, we had 30,000 people in the plaza, and the president was watching from the presidential palace. It was a breakthrough, and it just gave me the conviction: God is going to do what he promised.

Once in a while, when I feel things are going slow or income isn't up to par, I go back to that as reassurance. It happened in a great way, but I knew there was still more to come.