Your Daily Devotional for April 11, 2006

April 11, 2006

 

Ministry or Service?

by Dr. Paul Chappell

 

“And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation;”

 

2 Corinthians 5:18

 

The true priority of the ministry is the Word of God, or more specifically the transference of the Word of God from one person to another. As I’ve reflected on this thought, it has occurred to me that oftentimes in the Christian life we use the term “ministry” in a very broad way. We tend to call everything ministry. I mean, we have the vacuum ministry and the maintenance ministry, and while it’s not wrong to say that, I don’t want to leave the impression that we’ve really involved ourselves in the true purpose of the ministry if our extent of the use of the word is relegated to what could be termed service.   

 

Friends, there’s a difference between doing service in the Lord’s work and being involved in the ministry of the Word of God.

 

Paul tells us that God had given to him the ministry of reconciliation and we find most times in the New Testament this word being used to denote the transference of God’s Word from one individual to another. It was called the ministry of Christ.

 

While serving in the local church is certainly noble and much needed in these days, let us not forget that God has given to us a ministry…the office of making known His plan of redemption. 

 

Certainly our purpose in life is serving God, but the purest form of the word ministry is in reference to the teaching or sharing of the truth of the Word of God. Folks, you don’t have to be a pastor or have graduated from Bible college to be in the ministry. As a pastor, Ephesians 4:12 tells me that my job is to equip the saints for the work of the ministry by teaching and preaching what the Bible says to the point that they in turn can show someone else what the Bible says.

 

The priority of true ministry is not necessarily to plant shrubbery on the church grounds, or paint the nursery; rather it is the Word of God.

 

Are you serving or ministering God’s Word to someone who needs it?

 

 

 

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