PERSEVERANCE THE ESSENCE OF CHRISTIAN MINISTRY

 

Pastoral ministry is patterned after the nature of enduring parental love. From the moment children are born, parents begin a lifelong journey of training by instruction and example. Routine and repetition are the parents and the pastor’s best allies. Is it any wonder that Paul often alludes to his ministry in parental terminology (I.e. 1 Thessalonians 2, 2 Timothy 2)? Two words would sum up parenting and pastoring: love and Patience. You cannot effectively persevere in both parental and pastoral ministry if you lack those two qualities. Perseverance is the foundational essence of pastoral life and ministry. And it is the antidote to ministerial frustration and discontentment. Here are four characteristics necessary for ministerial perseverance.

YOU MUST CARE FOR THE PEOPLE

Paul had an up-and-down relationship with the Corinthians, yet his love and care for them were unwavering. He was burdened for them and concerned about their spiritual standing and growth. Paul’s priority was the Corinthians’ best interest, regardless of how they treated or responded to him.

Like loving parenting, enduring pastoral ministry involves living in the trenches daily and in all seasons. It deals with all the cries, laughs, sibling squabbles, talkbacks, failures, and successes. You teach, instruct, rebuke, exhort, and correct with all patience daily. The motivation and drive for all this is to build people up in the most holy faith.

YOU MUST TAKE RESPONSIBILITY

Authority comes with great responsibility. For a pastor to lovingly endure in his ministry, he must grow in his appreciation of the awesome and solemn responsibility that comes with the office. Pastoral ministry comes with privileges and responsibilities. Loving ministers are willing to forego their rights but cannot forego their responsibilities. The minister strives to be enduringly faithful because they are a steward who will be held accountable. They are driven by their devotion to please the Lord as their master.

They want to shepherd the flock the Lord has entrusted to their care. Ministers always looking out for their interests will soon grow weary and disgruntled because shepherding comes with frustrations and hardships. While ministers might forego their rights, they must never relinquish their responsibilities. And this comes with both blessings and burdens.

YOU MUST BE WILLING TO SACRIFICE

One of Paul’s mottoes for Christian life and ministry was to spend and be spent for the cause of Jesus Christ. An enduring pastor is eager to give both what he has and of himself. Not once or twice, but daily. This is hard because sometimes ministers are tempted to think they have sacrificed enough by going into the ministry. But we learn from the life and ministry of Paul that one must be willing to spend and be spent for the sake of Christ daily. They must give everything that they are and everything that they have to serve their Lord and master and to the benefit of their congregation, and they do so with joy. Ministers with an entitled spirit are on a dangerous path to their ruin and do significant harm to the body of Christ.

YOU MUST BE VULNERABLE

A minister must be known for their love for people. A minister must be known for the many relationships they foster with people from all walks of life. They love people to the point that they are personally affected by the seasons others are going through. Pastors will weep with those who are grieving and rejoice with those who are rejoicing. You have a significant burden for the well-being and growth of people under your care.

This love is only possible when you foster and pursue relationships with people, when you are known for who you truly are. And that means you welcome people into your life, and they welcome you into theirs. You are not withdrawn, isolated, or distant. It is possible to minister to people while keeping them at arm's length. You do your preaching and teaching and go back into your safe zone. You are not doing life with them.

To love the people you minister to is to be vulnerable, open yourself up to them, and risk being hurt. Paul experienced this with the Corinthians, after investing in them and pouring his heart out, they attacked him and accused them of all kinds of things. And yet, with so much pain and heartache, he was still invested in them, wrote multiple letters, and was still desirous of going to them. He says to them, “For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities…” (2 Corinthians 12:10)

To love people is to be vulnerable. Open to hurt. But to love people is to be considerably fulfilled, and through the life-altering relationships that come, pour yourself into people’s lives as they invest into yours. Ministers who withdraw, isolate or put up barriers to keep at bay will be safe from hurt, but extremely miserable, because they will miss out on God’s design for every Christian’s life to live in community and pursue loving, enduring relationships.

CONCLUSION 

 What made Paul an enduring and joyful minister? Is it his upbringing? Or did he have an iron-clad personality that enabled him to go through walls? Is it possible that brother Paul had an I don’t care attitude and didn’t mind what people said or did to him? All this might be true, but we really cannot tell. What we know for sure is that he relied on God's grace. In his back and forth with the Corinthians, he tells them, He rests in the grace of God, he is content in his own weakness, so that he can rely on Christ's power (2 Corinthians 12:8-10). Enduring, joyful and loving ministry is only possible in the grace and strength of the Lord. Ministers who rely on their gifts, power, and experience will either burn out, blow up, or become grumpy. May God raise us loving, joyful and enduring ministers.

 

Popular and Unbiblical views on Marriage

PLEASE NOTE: This is my last blog on this site. You can read and follow the write-ups here https://www.chopomwanza.com/post/popular-and-unbiblical-views-on-marriage
When a couple is on the verge of a wedding, much preparation goes into the big day. Top on the list is the various forms of formal and informal counselling. People are generous with their counsel, whether solicited or not. In many ways, it is a blessing to be loaded with counsel from other people's experiences. That said, some of the counsel given is shallow and outright unbiblical but sadly popular. Here are five advice a bride and groom will most likely hear that should not be entertained.

    1. The man's unfaithfulness does not break the marriage.

This is, in fact, a proverb in one of our local languages: "Ubuchende bwamwaume tabutoba ng' anda

". Young women are, in essence, taught to expect their husbands to be unfaithful. This starts off the marriage with high levels of mistrust. 'A man is a man', some would say. This thinking is straight from the pit of hell. The marriage bed must be undefiled and kept holy. It speaks to the moral decay of society when unfaithfulness is not only expected but also encouraged.

    2. The wife keeps a marriage.

In our culture, the woman is blamed for a failed marriage and a broken home. This kind of thinking began in Genesis 3 when Satan usurped the man's responsibility in the marriage. By approaching Eve, Satan was making a subtle but deadly move to ignore Adam, the husband. Thankfully, God calls out Adam and squarely places the responsibility where it lies in man. Headship is equal to responsibility. A failed marriage and a broken home reflect the man's leadership.

    3. People can steal your spouse.

This is often a warning to young women to be wary of female siblings, friends, house helpers, and her husband's female workmates because they can snatch or steal your spouse. The problem with such a line of thinking is that it strips the man of any form of responsibility. It portrays him as an innocent person who, for some strange reason, is powerless to the aura of anyone in a skirt! A grown man cannot be stolen unless, of course, he is kidnapped at gunpoint! A man or woman who falls into a sexual affair does so willingly[1].

    4. A marriage cannot succeed without traditional counselling. 

This is a hot issue in most churches and among Christians. The general thinking is that a marriage cannot work or succeed without the couple undergoing traditional counselling. It is, therefore, sadly common to find Christian parents find non-believers to teach and prepare their children for marriage. In a way, that is a Christian parent saying to the world; I am not equipped to prepare my child for marriage. However, dear Christian parent, marriage is God's idea, and He has laid it out in His word for us. The scriptures are sufficient.

    5. Oneness only refers to sex.

Our traditional counselling can be explicitly sexual. Besides, the common reason for marrying seems to be sexual satisfaction. Therefore, the understanding of oneness seems to be primarily physical, while emotional, spiritual and mental oneness is not encouraged. Now, while it is true that sexual union in marriage is a blessing, oneness is broader than just physical union. An overemphasis on the physical union and neglect of the other aspects leads to frustration and joylessness going through the marriage relationship's motions.

    Conclusion

I am convinced that these and many other popular but unbiblical counsels of marriage have contributed to a very negative view of this most wonderful of unions. Marriage requires work and effort but is not meant to be a chore. It should be built on the truth of God's word if it is to be a blessing to those who enter into it lawfully and willingly.

The Grace to Serve and be Served

Recently, I have been reflecting on a famous hymn, "The Servant Song", better known as "Brother, let me be your servant". It was written in the 1970s by a man called Richard Gillard. Though the song has been altered over the years, Matthew 20:26b- 28 provides the primary scriptural background for the song; it reads;

"…but whoever decides to be great among you, let him be your servant. And whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave—just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many."

Many believers thrive on the idea of servanthood. Christ himself calls us to servanthood. He came not to be served but to serve. I will leave this here for now and let it simmer while I move on to my next thought.

In the book of Ephesians, the Apostle Paul writes to the Church at Ephesus, now a combination of Jews and Gentiles who have believed in Jesus Christ and are now in him because of his finished work on the cross. Among other things, Paul instructs them on how they should live their lives due to their coming into the fold of God. In chapter 4, Paul prays they walk in unity as a body. He further highlights God's many different gifts that the body is blessed with so that the saints can be equipped and edified and grow in unity, faith, and the knowledge of God.

In reflecting on the servant song, chapter 4: 11-16 caught my attention. It says;

"And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but speaking in truth and love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head-Christ from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love."

Among other things, this passage screams Service! Service! Service! We serve one another in unity to achieve a goal: glorify God. We joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, to the effective working by which every part does its share. In this picture, every part uses its gift to serve in the body. Serving other believers and ultimately serving God.

There have been two points of reflection for me;

1. Brother, let me be your servant; if Christ himself, the head of the body, came not to be served but to serve, who am I that I should not serve within the body of Christ? The Bible asks believers to serve one another and do their part in the body of Christ according to the gifts that the good Lord has blessed us with. Imagine what it would be if every single part of the body did its share as described by the Apostle Paul. Right now, we are plagued with one-eyed, one-armed, peg-legged churches going about handicapped because there are parts that remain idle as if they have yet not met Grace. May God give me the grace to do my part wholeheartedly.

2. I pray that I might have the grace to let you be my servant, too; this is interesting. The last time I mentioned this to someone, they gasped. So, if everyone is going around serving everyone, everyone should be giving and receiving. It's such a joy to serve others and equally a joy to be blessed by someone's service. There are a lot of people who turn down service from others in the name of being a "servant", being "polite" "a battle of the service as it were. The "no no no, I can't take this", or the "you take the seat, no you sit, no you sit" battle, or turning down an offer of help with chores, watching the kids, or running errands so you can rest. The examples are endless. We can all think of a time when we needed some kind of help, but we turned it down or were too afraid to ask. Sadly, sometimes, our need to be the perpetual "service providers" denies us the opportunity to be blessed by the service of others who would like to partake in the blessing of serving. It takes humility to be on the receiving end. To be in need, accept help, and ask for help. Why should this be uncomfortable?

The Church is a body. We are meant to depend on each other, to rely on each other. We are meant to all do our part, whatever our area of gifting is, whatever love compels us to do. We are pilgrims on a journey; we are brothers on the road. We are here to help each other, walk the mile, and bear the load.

Note: This post is written by my wife, Kunda Mwanza. 

Four Pitfalls to Avoid When Choosing a Church

Last week, I shared what to look for when choosing a church to join. Choosing a church to be a member of is one the most important decisions a Christian makes, and it should, therefore, be made wisely. The most important reason is that membership is essential to the health and growth of the believer. This week, I would like to share some pitfalls people fall into when deciding on a church family to join. 

Looking for Perfection

Moving Churches can be difficult for various reasons. In some ways, leaving a church can sometimes feel like a divorce (and it should), such that joining another is like moving on after being ripped from a relationship. With that comes the temptation to seek perfection due to comparisons (good or bad) or a consumer mindset. Remember, the church is the people, and people are not perfect (much like you). Churches are not perfect because people are not perfect. There are shortcomings, and there are areas of growth. So, you look for progress, not perfection. 

Delaying the Decision

Some people look for a church the way they do their shopping. They check Shoprite, PnP, Game, and Choppies and then go to Chisokone market, then decide to wait until the kwacha gains against the dollar for them to buy online. All in the effort of looking for an ideal buy. It doesn’t exist! Be clear on what to look for in a local church and make a decision. Taking months and years to settle on a church in a place is, at best, being indecisive and, at worst, being disobedient. Further, the longer you prolong the decision, the more you develop unhealthy habits and patterns for yourself and your family (if you are a family person). 

Ignoring the Distance

Proximity to the church premises and the church family is easy to ignore. This is, in essence, a practical outworking of one’s understanding of a local church. A biblical view of a local church will affect your decision regarding proximity, either by how close the church premises are or where you live. Gathering and fellowship with your church family should not be hectic or a hustle. Your distance should not be why you fail or struggle to faithfully attend and participate in church life. When you think about it, people factor in the distance to work or school; sometimes, they shift to be closer to their school or workplace. Again, this is an implication of one’s understanding of what a church is and membership demands.

Wanting Special Attention

The slogan for one of the bread companies in our city says, “It’s not just the best; it’s far beyond the rest.” Sometimes, I feel like churches would like to use that to lure ‘customers.’ When churches package themselves as brands and market themselves like business entities, they begin to attract, well, consumers. One way the consumer mindset plays out is in the way people want special attention or, should we say, customer care. Joining a church because it gives you the special attention you desire is not the most helpful thing for your soul. They either simply want to grow numbers, and it is very clear that you are high up in society or rich! With that said, churches should be loving, welcoming, and hospitable and should have a genuine concern for your spiritual welfare. Such that, they will have no problems if that takes place in another congregation.

Dear Christian, when choosing a church family, choose wisely and decisively.

 

Five Considerations When Looking for a Church

There are several reasons that people find themselves in situations where they have to choose a local church to which they want to belong. It could be because one has just recently become a Christian and realise they need to belong to a church. Or maybe one relocates to another area, so they must find a new church family. Sometimes, it is for theological or philosophical reasons that people feel the need to move on to another church. Whatever the reason, choosing a church is an important decision a Christian can make. Here are some helpful questions to consider.

1.       Is the preaching and teaching faithful to the scriptures?

The word of God is central to the health and spiritual vitality of the Christian. Therefore, the faithful and consistent teaching and preaching of the scriptures in a local church is non-negotiable. A serious child of God will ask if the local church they want to join is serious and committed to preaching the word. Is the word of God read, explained, and applied to people’s lives, and is it handled with seriousness and reverence? How do you know if the word is preached faithfully? For starters, the preachers and teachers read and explain the truths from the Bible. You can follow along and see the truths from the texts as the teaching and preaching are going on. You are often instructed, rebuked, encouraged and corrected. In the process, your own ability to handle the scriptures grows. So you ask, does this church teach and preach the word faithfully, accurately and consistently? Will I be fed God's word or man's opinions?

2.       Will they hold me and my family accountable?

Does this group of people pursue one another, and are they committed to developing relationships with each other? Are they concerned for your spiritual well-being? Are they committed to your growth and holiness, and do they encourage and exhort you to be committed and consistent? Do they lovingly confront and confess sin? Will the members call out sin when you live inconsistently with your profession of faith? Will they check up on you when you are absent? And will they persist in their confrontation if you are unrepentant? Disciples of Jesus Christ are committed to one another and are compelled to hold each other accountable in their walk with the Lord. A church that will ignore or tolerate your sin or lack of commitment is not good for your soul. A healthy family of believers is committed to loving one another and building one another up in the most holy faith.

3.       Are they committed to evangelism and church planting?

The marching order of our Lord and Master is that we make disciples of Jesus Christ. A church that is committed to Jesus Christ is committed to proclaiming his name and obligated to share the gospel with the lost. They will reach their community and will take the gospel to other areas by planting churches in areas where the gospel is needed. Such a church will often be welcoming people through baptism. A church that is not committed to gospel proclamation and church planting has drifted from its mission.

4.       Do they have a healthy view of leadership?

The Lord Jesus has appointed shepherds to lead his people; these are called elders (other terms used to refer to the same office are bishop-overseer and pastor-shepherd). The Bible calls these men to lead faithfully, humbly and selflessly, and it admonishes the congregations to submit to their leaders because they will give an account to the Lord. In a healthy church, the elders are viewed as fellow members. They are not an elite group of men with special access to the throne of grace. Further, their authority over the congregation is in so far as they teach and preach God’s word. They lead by example, and they exercise oversight over the flock the way a shepherd would tend to the sheep. 

5.       Do they encourage every member to serve?

Another aspect to consider when looking for a local church is whether or not the members are encouraged to do the work of ministry. In other words, service is not limited to the leaders. But every member is encouraged and equipped to use their gifts for the edification of the body. Biblical Christianity calls for every member of the body using their gifts and resources to be a blessing to fellow believers and reach out to none believers. And that’s one of the things you should be looking for in a local Church. 

With that said, we must be weary of treating looking for a local Church like shopping at the mall. So here are three final thoughts;

1. No one local church is perfect, because people are not perfect. Every local church has it’s struggles and areas of growth. It is therefore important that you do not look for a local church like picking the best product. 

2. Avoid making decisions primarily based on personal preferences or based on what role(s) you might play in that Church.

3. Do not delay the decision or prolong the process of deciding on joining a Church. It is an important and urgent enough decision, so make it!