Your Daily Devotional for September 10, 2006

 

September 10, 2006

 

A Preacher’s Heart

by Dr. Paul Chappell

 

“I charge thee therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom; Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.”

2 Timothy 4:1–2

 

To get the context of today’s verses, realize that the Apostle Paul was writing to Timothy, exhorting him to preach the Word.  Paul had already established the church at Thessalonica, but was forced to leave.  He traveled to Berea and Athens, and then Corinth.  Yet, he could not forget the believers in Thessalonica.  His heart neither left that place nor those people. 

 

That’s the heartbeat of a pastor.  Sometimes I have to go away to preach somewhere.  But while away, I find myself praying for our church members and writing them notes of encouragement.  There was a time in Phoenix, Arizona when I was on my knees the entire night pleading with God to help some in our church family get through some extraordinarily difficult trials.  True ministry begins when your heart is always with the people of God. Although you may be away from your Sunday school class or your church, you always have that heart for God and for being concerned about people coming to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. 

 

The Apostle Paul commissioned Timothy to go to Thessalonica to establish them in the faith.  Colossians 2:6–7 says, “As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him: Rooted and built up in him, and stablished in the faith, as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving.”  The word “establish” means to fix, to make fast, to set or to be stabilized.  Timothy was encouraged to preach the whole counsel of God to the believers in Thessalonica.  He reminded them of heaven, their eternal security in Christ, and God’s grace and mercy.

 

I believe in one-on-one discipleship, in door knocking to get the gospel out, and in the Sunday school class; but if you want to be grounded and established in the faith, then be in your place when the Word of God is being preached, line upon line, precept upon precept, word by word.  I believe that the church in Thessalonica became a mighty lighthouse because of the preaching of God’s Word. 

 

We must grow in our concern for one another.  We must care about the new Christian, the absentee in our adult Bible class, the visitor that just walked down the aisle.  I hope that today, we would ask God to give us a genuine burden for others and a desire to be a blessing to folks around us.

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