What modern overzealous discipleship teaching is missing
(selection from new book, Lessons In Faith—learned the hard way), by C. Aaron Russell
When it comes to Christianity, is activity the best evidence of a faith that will bear good fruit? What about taking some time or even a season being still and silent, praying and listening, all in the peaceful presence of the Lord? If we study our Bibles and look to the examples in Scripture at the lives of men and women devoted to God, we’ll see a more well rounded picture of faith. Often in our spiritual walk we get in a hurry, but instead we must slow down and wait on the Shepherd. Often, there are changes in ourselves we need to let God make before He can use us to do His will. Patience is a sign of maturity in faith among the flock. Taking time to seek the Lord and grow in our relationship with Him is wise.
Martha and Mary were excellent examples of conflicting personalities among Christians. Martha was an example of a good old-fashioned conservative Baptist. She got to church and got busy right away. The church is good at that—bringing us in and putting us immediately to doing the work of the Lord. The kitchen always needs help. There are openings in the bus ministry for drivers. They’ll even get you saved and immediately put you straight into the Children’s Ministry teaching Sunday School (though you still may be in your infancy spiritually yourself). The church will let you know how much your work means to God.
It is natural to get excited and want to pitch in, but soon it’s also natural to notice all those half-hearted lazy Christians who aren’t carrying their weight and can’t possible love the Lord as much as we do. That was Martha. She was busy making hamburgers and hot dogs to sell at the church luncheon in order to raise money for the new building project going on.
Then there was Mary. She was satisfied to just sit around, listening and chatting with the guest—Jesus. When we host a dinner party, it takes a lot of preparation and work behind the scenes to feed and take care of guests. Martha got aggravated with Mary because she was not pulling her weight. But, if we are so busy serving that we’re too busy to fellowship and enjoy one another’s company, what’s the point of inviting people over? Jesus told us it was Mary that got the better part from the Lord.
Everything has its time and place. Although it is good to serve, sometimes it is more important to listen and learn. When it comes to Jesus—if our desire to serve Him exceeds our desire to know Him, that can indicate a lack of love. To put it this way, if we don’t know Jesus, how can we love Him? And if we don’t love Him, how can we serve Him properly? King Solomon said:
“Unless the Lord builds a house, the work of the builders is wasted. Unless the Lord protects a city, guarding it with sentries will do no good. It is useless for you to work so hard from early morning until late at night, anxiously working for food to eat; for God gives rest to his loved ones” (Psalms 127:1-2 NLT).
Elijah had his time at Brook Cherith. Elijah pops up out of nowhere in the Bible to boldly tell the king there will be a terrible drought in the land. Then God sent Elijah to hide out near a little brook (wisely because the King and Queen, Ahab and Jezebel, had a temper). Elijah was basically on vacation. He just rested there, patiently waiting, studying, and praying. He did no work, being fed by ravens and drinking fresh water from the flowing stream, while the rest of the land was suffering in drought.
A less experienced believer might have called that slothful and would not have considered such inaction much of a ministry at all. I mean, why wouldn’t Elijah take a drink to some poor, thirsty lost souls in a nearby village, and use the opportunity to preach the Gospel? What a bum! After the brook dried up, he finally left, only to go and live off of a poor widow woman who barely had enough food for herself and son, but Elijah asked for what little food she had left anyway. How selfish! What kind of man of God takes the last morsel of a poor widow and her son? Christians don’t believe in welfare—get a job!
The faithful widow woman Elijah was sent to did not have an exciting ministry with the zeal of traversing the globe for God, and she did nothing more than open her house to a stranger. Up to that point, other than warning the King of an upcoming drought, Elijah’s ministry consisted of being nothing more than a freeloader, if you take things at face value. Eventually, the Lord did go on to use Elijah to do amazing feats on His behalf.
Today, so many Christians want to be great champions for God and have a ministry like Elijah. That is a prideful worldview, that we should all be “rock stars,” and to be ordinary is failure. We do not need to strive to be some elite class of Christian. We should not become disappointed when we are not called to rain down fire from Heaven or raise the dead like Elijah. In fact most all of us were called to be more like the widow—and that is no insignificant thing. Elijah and the widow had a common element to their ministry—they waited on instructions, were obedient, and each fulfilled the Lord’s purpose. That is the only way to have a truly successful ministry.
C. Aaron Russell—author of Lessons In Faith—learned the hard way. Celebrating new release with free Kindle Ebook promotion for Thanksgiving Holidays.
