Nehushtan--A Piece of Brass

With New Testament Eyes: 41 - Nehushtan--A Piece of Brass

By Henry Mahan

2 Kings 18:1-8

King Hezekiah was twenty-five years old when he began to reign over Judah. He reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem.

Compared to that of his father, Ahaz, and others, his was a good reign.

v. 3. 'He did that which was right in the sight of the Lord, according to all that his ancestor David did.'

v. 5. 'He trusted in the Lord God of Israel.' None of the kings of Judah, before nor after him, reigned so well.

vv. 6-7. 'He clave to the Lord and kept his commandments, and the Lord was with him and prospered him.'


In this account of the good reign of Hezekiah, one verse stands out above all the rest and demands our special attention. Verse 4 declares that 'Hezekiah removed the high places, and brake the statues, and cut down the groves, and brake in pieces the brazen serpent that Moses had made.' The Jews say that he ground the brazen serpent to powder and scattered it to every wind, that there might be no remains of it!

In those days 'the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, married heathens, and worshipped their gods, serving Balaam and the groves' (Judges 3:7). The high places were temples and shrines built on mountains for idol worship. The statues were, like the golden calf, idol gods. The groves were wooded areas dedicated to idolatry, where altars were erected to gods. Jupiter was worshipped in a grove of oaks and Apollo in a grove of laurels. 

Hezekiah destroyed all of these high places, groves, and statues, something his father and other kings of Judah had not dared to do. But he also utterly destroyed the brazen serpent which Moses had made in the wilderness (Num. 21: 5-8). The Israelites had brought this serpent into the land of Canaan; and, being made by Moses, they imagined it might be of some service to them toward God.

Some say they did not worship it but only burned incense to it and used it in religious activities. Hezekiah knew they were ensnared by this memorial and even drawn into idolatry by it- so he destroyed the serpent, calling it 'nehushtan, a worthless piece of brass.'

I can understand a person's interest in that brazen serpent. It would be extremely interesting to see the serpent which Moses made and lifted up. Our God used that serpent as a type of the crucified Redeemer (the Lord Jesus, himself, referred to it) and on that occasion healed all who looked to it. It would be interesting to see the rod of Moses, the tables of the law, the tabernacle, the ark of the covenant, and the smitten rock. But interesting is all--certainly not inspirational, nor edifying, nor of any spiritual value, nor of any consequence where our relationship with God is concerned. In the worship of God, Christ is all (John 14:6; 1 Cor. 1:30; Col. 1:12-20; Col. 2:9-10).

Believers believe, love, and worship God in spirit, not in form, rituals, nor with visual aids. They rejoice only in Christ Jesus and have no confidence in the flesh (Phil. 3:3). True believers have no superstitions regarding days, hallowed places, religious relics, symbols and signs, nor ancestors (Phil. 3: 4-10) . Christ is our sabbath, our sin offering, our High Priest, our altar, our mediator, our prophet, priest, and king. By his blood we ourselves are made kings and priests to our God. We bow before no man, make pilgrimages to no place on earth (our God is everywhere) , carry no religious symbols, and place no merit whatsoever in religious holidays such as Christmas and Easter.

The Lord had given his church two ordinances to observe until he returns--baptism and the Lord's table. In baptism believers confess faith in Christ alone and identify publicly with him in his death, burial, and resurrection. In observing the Lord's table with the simple elements of bread and wine, we show forth his death until he comes.

I am confident that the religious, superstitious Israelites were shocked when King Hezekiah destroyed the brazen serpent which Moses had made, called it a 'piece of brass,' and declared it to be of no value in the worship of God. But if we could find the actual cross on which Christ died, it would serve no purpose and must be called a 'piece of wood.' The grave in which Christ lay is but a 'hole in the ground, ' and the winding sheet in which he was wrapped is but a 'piece of cloth.' Idolatry is such a subtle thing of Satan and must be avoided at all cost.

God is a jealous God and will not share his glory nor the worship and affection of his people. We trust, rest in, and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and abhor any effort to rob him of his preeminence. 

The lands around Jerusalem may be called 'Bible lands' or whatever, but certainly not 'Holy Land.' Let us be done with crosses, religious-pictures of our Lord, shrines, and uniforms of religion; and let us worship God in spirit, rejoice in Christ Jesus, and put no confidence in this flesh. Christ, by his perfect obedience, has imputed unto us a perfect righteousness; and by his death we have the atonement. We are accepted in the Beloved. Nothing needs to be added to his person and work to bring us to God!

Faith, Love and Hope

William Henry Griffith Thomas :


"Since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus, and of the love which ye have to all the saints, For the hope which is laid up for you in heaven..."

(Col. 1:4-5).

Faith rests on the past, love works in the present, and hope presses toward the future; or, faith looks backward and upward, love looks outward, and hope looks forward. 

These three constitute the true, complete Christian life and not one of them should be omitted or slighted. We are only too apt to emphasize faith and love and forget hope but, inasmuch as hope is invariably connected with the coming of the Lord, "that blessed hope" (Titus 2:13), it is a vital part of our Christian life. 

Faith accepts, hope expects; faith appropriates, hope anticipates; faith receives, hope realizes; faith is always and only concerned with the past and present, hope is always and only concerned with the future. 

We know that faith comes by hearing; we shall find that hope comes by experience. Faith is concerned with a person who promises, hope with the thing promised; and faith is the root of which hope is a fruit.

The Victory That Overcomes

By William M. Clow


"This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith"

(1 John 5:4).

There lies the noblest victory of the men who believe. To John and to his generation, and to all men who have had the vision of God, the world is the blinding, seducing, terrifying reality.

By the world, John does not mean the realm of earth and sea and sky, or the things which God hath made beautiful in their season. He does not mean the world of men and women, with their joys and sorrows, their hopes and fears. That is the world God loves. 

By the world John meant that merely earthly order and fashion and mode of life, with its hates, greeds, foul habits, and dark mutinies against goodness and truth. It was that pagan world in which he lived, sometimes lovely in its forms of passion, often alluring in its fascination, but always deadly to the purities and simplicities of the soul. 

It was that world which Demas loved, and for whose indulgences he became a deserter. That world we face when we go down to our businesses, enter into our pleasures, suffer our trials and losses, meet our scornings and our disappointments.

The man who has had his moment of vision, who receives in every hour the energy of God's Holy Spirit, will face its temptations, endure its trials, and he will overcome. We may feel ourselves far from the attainment of this victory. 

We conquer it in proportion as we believe. We might say, as the great believers have said, to the mountain which seems to hinder the coming of the kingdom of God and to blot out the very light of heaven, "Be thou removed," and it would be removed. 

All the splendid achievements and all the victory over the wrong, and the tyranny, and the cruelty of the past, however strongly these have been entrenched, have been gained by men of faith. Nothing has been impossible to them. 

But only One has gotten Him the faultless victory. That One is Jesus, the beginner and the consummator of faith, who endured the Cross, and despised its shame, and is now set down, in the victor's place, at the right hand of God.

Prove me now herewith

By A.B. Simpson


I once heard an old man say something that I have never forgotten. "When God tests you it is a good time for you to test Him by putting His promises to the proof. Claim from Him just as much as your trials have made necessary." 

There are two ways of getting out of a trial. One is simply to try to get rid of the trial, and be thankful when it is over. The other is to recognize the trial as a challenge from God to claim a larger blessing than we have ever had. We should greet it with delight as an opportunity of obtaining a larger measure of divine grace. Thus even the adversary becomes an auxiliary, and the things that seem to be against us turn out to be for the furtherance of our way. 

Surely, we are to be more than conquerors through him who loved us (Romans 8:37). Blessed Rose of Sharon Breathe upon our heart, Fill us with Thy fragrance, Keep us as Thou art. Then Thy life will make us Holy and complete; In Thy grace triumphant, In Thy sweetness, sweet.

THE MOTHER-IN-LAW, NAOMI

Biblical Characters, 12 - THE MOTHER-IN-LAW, NAOMI

By Clovis G. Chappell


It is thoroughly refreshing to come upon this exquisite bit of literature called "Ruth." It follows, as you know, immediately after the bloodstained stories we read in Judges. It shows that while there was war and confusion and hate there was also friendship and love and romance. It is a bit of exquisite beauty elbowed on either side by ugliness. This delightful story comes to us like a glad surprise. It is like finding a spring bubbling up in the desert. It is like plucking roses amidst ice bergs. It is like finding a violet in the very crater of a volcano.

I hope you have read the Book of Ruth and are familiar with it. If you haven't you have slighted one of the sweetest and tenderest stories ever told. If you haven't you have neglected about the most delicate and winsome idyl to be found in ancient or modern literature. I have read some good literature, first and last. I have read poetry that lifted the heart and "set the soul to dreaming." I have read prose strong as granite and songful as a mountain brook. But I confess to you, if I wanted to find a finer piece of literature than the book of Ruth, I would be at a great loss to know where to search.

The author sets you down at once amidst strange scenery. And the characters, while genuinely human, are also full of the witchery of romance and poetry.

Here is the story. The rains have failed in the Bethlehem country and the harvests have been exceedingly meager. A certain little family composed of husband, wife and two children, is having a hard fight to keep the wolf from the door. Elimelech, the husband, can find no work and Naomi, the wife and mother, "kneads hunger in an empty bread tray," and goes through the daily torture of being asked for bread that she is not able to supply.

Then one dark day the husband comes home utterly discouraged. He takes up the discussion where it was left off the day before. "Yes," he says, "there is nothing else to do. There is no bread in the land. There has been rain in Moab. We can go there. I do not know how they will receive us, but at any rate, they can only kill us and that is better than starvation."

And Naomi's sad face becomes a shade sadder and she says, "The will of the Lord be done. But I had so hoped that we might be able to remain in the land of our fathers. You see, my dear, it is not of myself that I am thinking. We have two boys. We do not want to rear them in Moab. Moab, I know, is not far off physically, but it is a long way morally. If we go there we may lose our children. The time may even come when they will break the law of Moses and marry among the Moabites."

But, hard as it was for her to consent, at last she was driven into it by sheer starvation. And we see the pathetic little family scourged by hollow-eyed hunger from the land of their fathers into the land of the heathen Moabites. Just what their reception was there we are not told. However, I am quite sure that they were received more kindly than they had expected. Their want and their own kindness seemed to have opened the hearts of the strangers among whom they went to live. Certain it is that the husband and father was able to find sufficient work to keep from actual starvation. By and by times grew better. The pinch of poverty let up, and they began to feel somewhat at home in the land of their adoption.

But the boys were playing with the children of the Moabites. Of course they were. All children are alike. They know no barriers of kindred, of class or of religion. A child is the true democrat. Sad to say, we soon train him out of this. But he is a thorough democrat by nature. He plays as gladly with the son of a scrub woman as with the son of a queen. He lavishes his love as freely upon a pickaninny as upon a prince. So these Jewish boys were playing with the heathen children.

Then a few years went by and the pious father and mother came to realize with horror that their two boys were actually in love with two Moabitish girls. Not only did they love them, but they even wanted to marry them. This was a calamity indeed. I can hear the protests of the father and mother. They warn them of the danger of such marriages. They plead the law of Moses. But all in vain. And we are not surprised. You might as well get in front of Niagara Falls and say "Boo!" and expect it to flow back the other way, as to try to reason with the average young fellow who is in love. Both boys married Moabitish women.

And then what did this wise and godly father and mother do? They did not do what is so usual in cases of an unwelcome marriage. Our boy or our girl makes what seems to us a foolish and ruinous marriage. Then what do we do? We declare that we will never speak to them again, that they shall never darken our doors. And we thereby help on a disaster that might never have come. Naomi and her husband had better sense. They took the wives of their two sons, heathens though they were, into their home and into their hearts. They felt sure that that was the one way that promised a remedy.

Then one day disaster came to the little home of the strangers. The husband and father died, and Naomi was left with the whole responsibility of the family upon her lone shoulders. Her daughters-in-law had seen her in her joy. They marked her also in her sorrow. They were impressed, no doubt, by her calmness and her strength. She walked with the sure and quiet step of one who felt underneath her and round about her the Everlasting Arm.

Then the final disaster came. Both the boys died. Naomi was not only a widow, but she was childless. There were now no bonds that held her longer from the land of her fathers. She decides, therefore, to return. Her two daughters-in-law are to accompany her as far as the border of Moab. There they are to bid her farewell and then go each her own way. They make the journey, these three women, to the borders of Moab. Here Orpah tells Naomi good-bye. She parts from her with real grief and regret, for she loves her genuinely. I think I can hear her sobbing as she takes her lone way back to her own people.

Then it is Ruth's time to say good-bye. I see her as she flings her arms about the neck of Naomi and there she clings. "There, there," says the older woman, "you must be gone now. Your sister is going. She will turn the bend of the road in a minute. Go after her and God grant that you may find rest each in the house of her husband."

But Ruth clings only the tighter. And then she makes a confession. It is a confession of love. And nothing finer in point of tenderness and beauty was ever uttered by human lips. I hope you are not too old to thrill over a love story. John Ridd's devotion to Lorna Doone still stirs my heart. And there is the confession of a heroine in another story that we can never forget. "Tell him I never nursed a thought that was not his; that daily and nightly on his wandering way pour a woman's tears. Tell him that even now I'd rather work for him, beg with him, walk by his side as an outcast, live on the light of one kind smile from him, than wear the crown that Bourbon lost."

That is a beautiful confession. It is made by a woman to a man. But this was made by a woman to a woman. And strangest of all, it was made by a daughter-in-law to a mother-in-law. Ruth has this distinction, if none other, that she loved her mother-in-law. Her mother-in-law, mind you, that creature who has been the butt of evil jokes in all languages; the one who has proved the dynamite for the wrecking of not a few homes. This confession is the confession of a daughter-in-law to a mother-in-law.

It is the confession of youth to age. It is spring-time clinging to winter. It is June flinging its arms in a passionate tenderness around the neck of November. "It is time you were going," said Naomi. And Ruth's arms clung all the closer and this exquisite bit of poetry fell from her lips, "Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people and thy God my God: where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: the Lord do so to me, and more also, if aught but death part thee and me."

You cannot beat that. No confession of love has ever surpassed it. But it is more than a confession of love. It is also a confession of faith. It is the declaration of a strong woman's choice. As Ruth clings to the woman she loves she announces her decision, a decision to which she remained true through all the future years. "Thy people shall be my people and thy God my God."

And the people of the little village of Bethlehem had something interesting to talk about a few days later. Two strange women had come their way, women who were poverty-stricken and homeless. One of them was a Jewess. The other was a Gentile. Neither of them was welcome. Naomi had lost her place in the life of the community. Ruth, the Moabitess had never had any place.

The days that immediately followed their arrival were sad and bitter days. But the younger woman, with a fine courage, refuses to be a burden. Instead, she will be the support of the mother of her dead husband. So she takes upon herself the menial task of a gleaner. It is harvest time and she goes out into the fields to glean.

Now, it happens in the good providence of God, that the field in which she went to glean belonged to a very rich and prosperous man named Boaz. And to that very field where Ruth was gleaning Boaz came that day. He was a young, vigorous, and positive man. He was accustomed to command. There was a dignity about him that made him seem older than his years. Everybody respected him. He was just and generous and religious.

No sooner was he among the workers than his attention was attracted by the winsome young stranger from Moab. I do not know why he should notice her at once, but I have a fancy that Ruth was attractive, that she had personality and charm. I feel confident that she had that superior beauty that is born of superior character. Anyway, the great landlord saw her and was interested. And he spoke kindly to her, and when Ruth got home that evening she had an interesting story to tell.

And Naomi--wasn't she interested? I can see the flush of her face and the sparkle of her eye across the centuries. She is a woman, too, every ounce of her. And being a woman, she is by instinct and by nature a match maker. She guesses at once what is going on in the hearts of these two young people. And she sets about with delicate good sense to help them to understand each other. By her wise advice things turn out just as they ought to turn out, and . . . "they lived happy ever after."

Who is the heroine of this exquisite story? I know that first place is given to Ruth. And I am in no sense disposed to try to put her in an inferior position. She cannot be honored too highly. She is so absolutely lovable. But I am going to give first place to Naomi. I do not do this because she is more winsome than Ruth. I do it because she accounts for Ruth. If it had not have been for Naomi, Ruth would have lived and died a heathen in the land of Moab.

Now, what are some of the lessons that we learn from the beautiful life of this ancient woman, Naomi? Were we privileged to sit down beside her in the Father's house to-day, she could teach us many wonderful lessons. But one truth she would impress upon us would be this: that life's greatest losses may, through the grace of God, become its richest gains. She would tell you then of the black despair of those days when she was being driven from her home by the cruel hand of poverty. She would not hesitate to say that it was very difficult for her to keep up faith in God in those dark days. "But the Lord was sending me then to find Ruth. You know He had to have her. The world could not keep house without her at all. Yet I would never have found her but for my terrible poverty."

Then, I think she would tell how she was beginning to feel at home in Moab. "My life was taking root in that foreign soil. I was about making up my mind to live my life there. Then death came. One by one I buried my loved ones till not one of my own flesh and blood was left. Then it was that I resolved to come back home. It was my bitter loss that sent me back. I would never have come back but for that. And had I not come back the marriage of Ruth with its blessed outcome would never have been possible."

This woman learned the fine art of capitalizing her calamities. In the midst of all her poverty and heartache she kept firm her faith in God. And she came thus to realize the sufficiency of His grace. She came to know, even in that distant day, the truth of Paul's great word, "All things work together for good to them that love God." There are times, I know, that it is hard for us to believe this, just as there were times when it was hard for Naomi to believe it. But there came a day when she was privileged to know the truth of it in her own experience. And if you cling to your faith you, too, will come to know, if not here, then by and by.

Then we learn from Naomi, as another has pointed out, the power for blessing that may be in one consecrated life. Naomi was a very hidden and obscure woman. Had you walked by her side as, hunger driven, she left her native land, she would not have told you anything of the great destiny that was ahead. She never dreamed of enriching the world as she did. It never occurred to her that she was to be one of the great light bringers of all the centuries. And yet such was to be the case. The world simply could not get on without Naomi. It could not for the simple reason that Naomi led Ruth into the knowledge of God and into the fellowship of the people of God.

"Thy people shall be my people and thy God my God." That is Ruth's confession of faith. How did she come to make it? How did this lovely heathen ever come to fall in love with Naomi's people? She had never even seen them. She made up her mind, however, that they were the people, of all others, that were most worth knowing. She made up her mind that they must be very winsome and very lovable people. How did she come to that conclusion? Answer: By association with her mother-in-law. That is also how she came to fall in love with God. She was led to the realization of the charm of Him through the God-possessed personality of Naomi.

So it was Naomi who won Ruth to God. It was Naomi who made possible Ruth's successful marriage. Then one day the sweet angel of suffering came to the home where the one-time-stranger lived and Ruth held her first-born in her arms. And the years went by and there was another child born among the Judean hills and the sunshine was tangled in his hair and countless songs were pent up in his heart. And he so sang and battled and sinned and repented that everybody loved him and we thank God still for David. And David was Ruth's grandbaby.

Then other years went by and there was a burst of light upon those Judean hills. And there was music from a choir that came from that country where everybody sings. "There were shepherds abiding in the fields, keeping watch over their flocks by night. And the angel of the Lord came upon them and the glory of the Lord shone round about them and they were sore afraid. And the angel said, 'Fear not, ye, for behold, I bring you glad tidings of great joy which shall be to all the people; for there is born unto you this day, in the city of David, a Savior who is Christ the Lord.'" And that Savior was another one of Ruth's grandbabies.

But in the purpose of God, neither David nor David's Greater Son would have been possible without Naomi. And so one woman remaining true to God became a roadway along which the Almighty walked to the accomplishment of His great purpose, even the salvation of the world.

Leaving Things Undone

The Lesson of Love: Chapter 10 - Leaving Things Undone

By J.R. Miller

Among the memorabilia of a departed godly man, it is said: "He left nothing undone." That is more than can be said of most people. The best of us are apt to leave many things undone. We confess that we have left undone those things which we ought to have done--and we have done those things which we ought not to have done!

Perhaps we do not often think of it, however, as really sinful--not to do things. We admit that it is wrong to treat another unkindly; do we understand that it is wrong also not to show the kindness we had the opportunity to show? We know it is sinful to speak a harsh or bitter word to another; but do we always remember that it is a sin not to say the word of cheer or comfort we had the opportunity to say, and which our neighbor so much needed and longed to hear? If we must give account for idle words, we must also give account for idle silences?

"What silences we keep year after year
With those who are most near to us and dear;
We live beside each other day by day,
And speak of myriad things, but seldom say
The full sweet word that lies just in our reach,
Beneath the commonplace of common speech.

"Then out of sight and out of reach they go--
These close, familiar friends who loved us so!
And sitting in the shadow they have left,
Alone with loneliness, and sore bereft,
We think with vain regret of some fond word
That once we might have said, and they have heard."

Very much of our Lord's teaching, refers to sins of not doing. The man with the one talent was condemned, not because he used his talent in any evil way, but because he did not use it at all. The priest and the Levite did the wounded man no injury. They probably even felt kindly toward him and expressed sympathy with him. Yet the story reads as if they sinned grievously against him. They wronged him by not giving him the help and the relief he needed, and which they had been sent there expressly to give. Their passing by on the other side was a cruel wrong against him--a sin of leaving a duty undone.

In our Lords' description of the Judgment, those on the left hand are condemned, not for evil things which they had done--but for their neglect of love's duties. "For I was hungry and you gave Me nothing to eat; I was thirsty and you gave Me nothing to drink; I was a stranger and you didn't take Me in; I was naked and you didn't clothe Me, sick and in prison and you didn't take care of Me." They had not oppressed the poor, they had not robbed men, and they had not gone about wounding other. Nothing whatever is said of their sins--except that they had not done the deeds of love to those who needed such ministries. They had left undone, things which they ought to have done.

It is in this way, that many people fail most seriously in living. No grave fault can be found with their conduct, with the things they do. They are upright, true, diligent in business--but their lives are full of omissions and neglects. How was it yesterday with you? Did you see one who needed help, comfort, relief, or encouragement, and did you fail to do anything for him? Do not many of us need to pray with the saintly man who used to say, "Lord, forgive my sins, especially my sins of omission! especially my sins of omission!"

Many of the best of us leave many things untouched which we ought to have finished. Most men die with many tasks only begun--and left uncompleted. Life is too large for us; we cannot do all that it is our duty to do. After we have done our best--we have not attained even our own standard of what we ought to have done. None of us do any day--all the things we meant to do, and none of us ever do anything as well as we intended to do it.

Indeed no one ever ought to do everything that he might do. There is a duty of omitting. Some people scatter their energies over a hundred broad fields of activity--when it would be far better if they would confine themselves to one little spot which they could transform into a garden of beauty. There are those who know a little of everything--but know nothing well enough to make a definite and accurate statement about it. We should show our wisdom, in the selection we make of the things which we shall do. 

Some people select a few things--but choose those that are least worth while, and omit the most important! Each one of us is set to do but a little fragment of work. No one does all of anything. We are responsible only for the small section which is allotted to us. We should do that well, putting into it our best skill, our utmost faithfulness. Then we need not trouble ourselves about the part which we cannot do. That is not our work at all--some other one is waiting to do it, and at the right time he will come forward ready for it.

Many of us vex ourselves unnecessarily over things for which we have not the smallest measure of responsibility. We would save ourselves a vast outlay of strength and energy--if we would learn to confine ourselves strictly to the things that clearly belong to us!

But we should be certain always really to seek to "discover and to do" our own part, small or large, with the utmost faithfulness. Not to do this, to leave undone the things we ought to have done, will be to leave a blank in the universe, where there ought to have been good work well done.

So our lesson calls us to earnestness and fidelity in the doing of our allotted tasks. "He left nothing undone." This fine commendation of one man, should set us to thinking about ourselves and our own doing. We need not fret about the little that our neighbor does--and the much that he is leaving undone; he may be very negligent-- perhaps he is--but that is not our concern.

 Our own life is our concern, however, for we shall have to give account for it. What blanks are we leaving, you and I, these passing days? What things that we ought to have done for others--things of love, kindness, encouragement, uplifting, cheer, comfort--have we been leaving undone? What things that we ought to have done for our Master--holy living, heroism in duty, firmness in purpose, self-effacement that he may be honored--have we been omitting?

The only way to make sure of leaving nothing undone at the last--is to do each day's work in its day. Let us never postpone or defer any duty that comes to our hand, for we shall not pass this way again. Let us make sure before we sleep any night, that nothing has been omitted that day, no little task, no service of love. Life is too sacred to be marred by blanks and breaks. 

One of the darkest shadows that can fall upon any soul in its last days--is the shadow cast by the things left undone.

God Hunger

By A.W. Tozer


These words are addressed to those of God's children who have been pierced with the arrow of infinite desire, who yearn for God with a yearning that has overcome them, who long with a longing that has become pain. 

"Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled" (Matthew 5:6). Hunger is a pain. It is God's merciful provision, a divinely sent stimulus to propel us in the direction of food. 

If food-hunger is a pain, thirst, which is water-hunger, is a hundredfold worse, and the more critical the need becomes within the living organism the more acute the pain. It is nature's last drastic effort to rouse the imperiled life to seek to renew itself. A dead body feels no hunger and the dead soul knows not the pangs of holy desire. "If you want God," said the old saint, "you have already found Him." 

Our desire for fuller life is proof that some life must be there already. Our very dissatisfactions should encourage us, our yet unfulfilled aspirations should give us hope. "What I aspired to be, and was not, comforts me," wrote Browning with true spiritual insight. The dead heart cannot aspire.

The Ministry of One-Anothering

Chip Brogden


Every Christian is called to the ministry of One-Anothering. We are to love one another, serve one another, submit to one another, instruct one another, encourage one another, help one another, forgive one another, and so forth. This is our spiritual service. This is your ministry to the Body of Christ and the basis from which every spiritual gift should operate. 

It would be profitable for you to do a study of all the places in the New Testament that mention "one another". There are a considerable number of references. You will immediately benefit by seeing that Christianity is not for hermits. There is no place for individualism in the Kingdom of God, for we are a Body of many members, each fashioned together into interdependence. You will also see that we are called to live very simple lives of quiet service to our brothers and sisters. It is neither complicated nor difficult.

People ask me all the time, "How do I know if I'm called to the ministry?" I answer by saying you are definitely called to the ministry. They think perhaps I am a prophet or I can see something that they cannot. Then I have to clarify it by explaining that all of us are called to the ministry of One-Anothering. No one is exempt. How that will eventually work itself out in your life is a wonderful mystery that you will have to discover for yourself. Only don't look to do some great thing to begin with, just find some brothers and sisters and begin your practice of One-Anothering.

Others will ask, "But how do I know if God is calling me to a full-time ministry?" My response is that He is calling all of us to the full-time ministry of One-Anothering. I'm missing the page in my Bible that talks about a part-time commitment. There's no such thing as a part-time ministry, a part-time minister, or a part-time Christian. It is either all the time or none of the time.

The problem with many people who aspire to some "full-time" ministry is they want to do some great thing, something immediately visible, appreciated, and recognized that will take up all their time and support them so they won't have to work at a "secular" job. They want to start up at the top with a title and a position but they don't know anything about the ministry of One-Anothering. They want to preach, or teach, or sing, or be up on center stage someplace.

I have counseled more than one young man who believes the Lord is calling them into some ministry. Certainly their motives are sincere, and they desire to do a good work. But upon close examination you find that they have a certain idea or presupposition about what ministry is. They imagine that having a ministry means people will come and hear them preach. They think about what it will be like to stand behind the pulpit and talk, hearing people say, "Amen!" and "Preach it, brother!". In some cases they are looking to me to wave my hand over them or speak some word to them which will confirm their calling and give them clear direction. Or they will talk about giving up their "secular" employment so they can be in the "full-time" ministry.

HOW TO GO INTO MINISTRY THE WRONG WAY

When I was twenty-three years old I sensed that it was time for me to take a big step and enter the ministry "full-time". I knew I was called to the ministry and I was already an associate pastor in our church, but I was impatient and anxious to devote all my time to what I thought ministry was all about - preaching and teaching. I thought going into the ministry "full-time" was some great event that would be accompanied by trumpets and heralds. I wanted to be sure of the Lord's leading so I fasted and prayed to see if He would approve of my plans (please note how I worded that). For three days I did not eat or drink. At the end of the three days I quit my job and announced to everyone that now I was in the "full-time" ministry.

After about three months of being in the ministry "full-time" I had preached in three churches and mailed out a newsletter so everyone would know where to send their money. It wasn't long before there was no food in the house, so we began visiting friends and relatives for "fellowship" in hopes that they would invite us to stay for dinner. We depended on the church to pay our phone and electric bills. About this time I found out that my wife was pregnant with our second child. Of course, we had no insurance.

When things were really tight I remembered a man who owed me money an hour's drive away. Since it was dinnertime I asked my wife to fix something for me to eat on the way to this man's house. She gave me a single Beef Jerky and a thermos of Kool-Aid because there was nothing else. Eventually I went to the food ministry our church supported and asked if I could help load trucks in exchange for one of the boxes of food. For the next few weeks we lived on microwave pizzas and frozen tortellini which we had to boil and learn to serve in a variety of interesting ways. I understand now how the Hebrews were able to complain about manna from heaven after eating it for so long. To this day I will not eat tortellini.

Eventually we had to leave our house since we couldn't pay the rent. We moved in with my wife's parents and lived out of a single bedroom. Since we had no money to put our things in storage, we wrapped them in plastic and put them in her parent's garage. Meanwhile someone had told me about a small church that was looking for a pastor. It paid the amazing sum of $100 a week, which sounded like a king's ransom to us at the time. So we went.

The church was able to increase our pay a little over time, but it was soon clear that I would have to leave the "full-time" ministry and go back to the "secular" job market to support my family. I remember when this first dawned on me, and how deeply my pride was offended. I remember praying as I drove over the Tar River bridge to get home, "Lord, I'll do anything if You will only let me stay in 'full-time' ministry." I didn't want to go get a job because I thought that would be interpreted as a lack of faith. The following week I was offered a job, and I took it at the insistence of my wife.

Why am I sharing this with you? Am I holding this up as a model of what it means to suffer for Jesus? Is this an example of what it means to be in the ministry? By no means. I was committed, no doubt about it. Somebody might say it happened that way because you didn't have enough faith. Maybe, but I bet I had more faith at twenty-three years old than you did. I could out-pray, out-fast, out-preach, and out-work anyone. As Paul said, "I labored more abundantly than them all." But as the saying goes, fanaticism consists of continuing to do something when you have forgotten why you are doing it.

SPIRITUAL MINISTRY IS PRACTICAL

I have since learned (after many more trials and tests) that the loftiest spiritual service will never cause us to neglect our most menial earthly duty. If you are not faithful with respect to earthly things, who is going to commit spiritual things with you? Paul's letters always begin with the spiritual reality and end with the earthly responsibility. This is why he urged people to remain where they are when they are first called. That is to say, if you are a husband, love your wife. If you are a wife, love your husband. If you have children, raise them in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Be there for them. If you will not take care of your family, no matter what spiritual excuse you offer, you are worse than a pagan. And if you will not work, you will not eat.

BALANCE is the Holy Grail that we so desperately need to re-discover in the Church today. This is Paul's counsel, and it is sound. His example was to work with his own hands to provide his own support so he could make the Good News available without charge. Technically, yes he could receive support, and he did on occasion, but most of the time he chose not to do so. When he said his last goodbye's to the Ephesian elders at Miletus he could testify that in his three years of ministry in Ephesus he had coveted no one's gold, silver, or clothing, but had worked to support himself and those with him so as not to be a burden to the church. What a glorious testimony!

How different were the false apostles who followed after, claiming all the support they could muster and refusing to work, eating and drinking everyone else's groceries, robbing the widows and making merchandise of the Good News. Yet this is precisely what many who claim a "full-time" ministry do today.

Our idea of ministry is narrow and ill-defined. Most folks have one notion about ministry - preaching in a church. If I am preaching in a church, I am a minister. But if I am waiting on tables or washing dishes or working in an office or doing other menial, secular things I am not a real minister. This is the way people have been led to believe.

As a pastor I was supposed to attend ministerial conferences and gatherings. After the introductions, the first question we asked a new acquaintance was NOT how many in your church are growing in grace and in the knowledge of Jesus Christ, but rather, "How many people do you have on Sunday morning?" The second question we asked was, "Are you full-time or bi-vocational?" The size of your church and your status as full-time or bi-vocational helped establish the pecking order. I noticed the pastors with large churches and "full-time" ministries were typically selected to leadership positions within the denomination.

One of these successful pastors spoke once and "encouraged" those of us with small churches by saying, "God is with you, too."

But I noticed that whenever these pastors would gather together everyone would talk about how hard it was and how they were just trying to hold on for dear life. The bigger the church the more stressed out the pastor was. They were walking around with the weight of the world on their shoulders, trying to deal with so many problems. They were so enmeshed and caught up in themselves that they seemed almost catatonic. I would come home from these meetings depressed.

I began thinking to myself, what is wrong with this picture? Why am I aspiring to do this full-time? Why am I seeking to advance myself within this group of nervous wrecks? What do I stand to gain, but more problems and stress? How did we get so far removed from the New Testament? Why are we so concerned about numbers and size when we aren't faithful to what little we have to begin with? Why are so many pastor's wives taking antidepressants? Why are so many pastor's kids in serious trouble? What am I doing here? What will my family look like in twenty years?

This began a process through which God radically changed my perception of ministry. It was the beginning of the end of my career as a preacher for Organized Religion. I gave up my little penny-ante ministry and took my place with the One Flock under the One Shepherd. I do not regret that decision, for what I received is far greater than what I gave up.

THE LAW OF THE SPIRIT OF LIFE IN CHRIST

Friends, the situation as I have described it is not God's intention for ministry. I have learned that there is something called the Law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:2). I have seen this in operation and I know when it is at work in someone's life and when it is not. I can look within myself and instantly know if I am cooperating with the Life or not. I give thanks to God for teaching me this, and I pray He will grant all of us to see it, for it will set captives free. Let me explain how the Law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus relates to our work and ministry in the Lord. It is summed up in this maxim: God will not LEAD you where His grace cannot KEEP you.

That is to say, when we undertake the work assigned to us by the Lord we will find the Life of the Lord is present to give us all the inner spiritual strength to see it through to completion. I am not saying everything will go smoothly and you will never have any self-doubt or fear. Far from it. But listen to what Paul says:

"We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed (II Corinthians 4:8,9). His secret? "I labor according to His mighty power which works in me (Colossian 1:29)." Not I, but Christ. This is the secret to the Christian life and it is the key to all fruitful spiritual work.

The majority of people in Christian service are given methods, plans, formulas, books, tapes, seminars, conferences, education, and training in order to fulfill their ministry. There are currently more pastors than there are churches for them to pastor. These young people fresh out of college are sitting around waiting for churches to open up to them so they can come in and begin their ministry. They are looking forward to the day when they can put all they have learned into practice. What happens when they finally get elected to pastor their first church? They make a mess of the whole thing.

I worked with a fellow like this. I can truthfully say today that I love him, but at the time of our working together I came close to breaking his nose on more than one occasion. I'm sure he felt the same way about me! He was intelligent, articulate, and well-educated. He was committed to his idea of ministry. We cannot judge his heart, but we can look at the fruit of his pastoral ministry and see all the people damaged as a result of his best intentions and efforts. After driving off a sufficient number of people and putting the whole congregation and staff into an uproar, he came under such stress that his body rebelled and he was sick for three weeks. Suddenly he "felt called" to accept another church in another state, where we can only pray that he will not make the same mistakes.

What is missing? How has the Church reached such a pitiful condition? We give people a method, but God desires us to cooperate with His Life working through us. This is a spiritual matter. This cannot be taught in a classroom. People cannot pay a tuition and get a degree and say that they are now fit to shepherd the flock. A thousand times no!

BEGIN YOUR MINISTRY TODAY

When anyone comes to me now and wants my advice about "going" into the ministry, the first thing I seek to do is upset all their ideas about ministry and talk to them about being a servant, taking the back seat, being hidden from view, lowering yourself, and practicing the art of One-Anothering.

The ministry of One-Anothering doesn't require a platform, a pulpit, a building, a budget, or a Board. You can start immediately, with no training and with no experience, and you don't have to quit your job or do anything dramatic. You cannot be voted in, and you cannot be voted out. The Life you possess qualifies you to be in the full-time ministry of One-Anothering. Your wounds are your credentials. You can go to your brothers and sisters right now and say, "The Lord has called me to the ministry, and I am beginning it today." Love, pray for, encourage, and serve the saints. So many times we have observed individuals who claim to be called to some great work but they neglect the basic principles of One-Anothering. There is no competition for the lowest position, so let all who love the Lord go there first and become a servant.

So what if we can't preach, teach, or sing? Is that all there is to the Lord's work? Hardly. You could begin a ministry of affirmation. Just make it your mission to encourage everyone you meet, building them up in the Lord. Most people tear each other down, so determine in God that you will lift up and encourage the Church at every opportunity. Keep a list of addresses and every so often send them a little note. That is a simple way to start. The possibilities are endless!

You see, ministry is not some great, profound, extraordinary thing, but ordinary things done in an extraordinary way.

Whatever our age or stage of spiritual growth we are called to the Ministry of One-Anothering. It is a rewarding call. Only let us walk in love and work diligently according to the Law of Life (not in our own strength) and we will do well. Let us learn to buy up the opportunities and redeem the time. The servants are not greater than their Master, but the servants may aspire to be as their Master. I pray the Lord will raise up more servants as a result of these words. Amen.