MINISTERING TO THE LORD
Bless the Lord, 0 my soul; and all that is within me, bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, 0 my soul, and forget not all his benefits. Who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases. Who redeemeth thy life from destruction; who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies. Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things; so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle's.
Psalm 103:1-5
Our Lord expects us to get things done.
By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be my disciples.
John 15:8
And he who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five talents more, saying, "Master, you delivered to me five talents; here I have made five talents more."
His master said to him, "Well done good and faithful servant; you have been faithful over a little, I will set you over much; enter into the joy of your master."
Matthew 15:20-23
Jesus didn't call Peter to be a mystic sitting on top of a mountain for the rest of his life, He called him to be a fisher of men. When Jesus called Paul, He didn't call him to be pacing the floor in the cell of some monastery, He sent him to stand before Gentiles and kings, to bring them from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God.
Never was so much accomplished by so few in so short a time. Yet we seem to miss the fact that they went about this in a way very different from the way most so-called "Christian work" is accomplished these days. They didn't formulate a plan, appoint committees, raise money, and then launch some "new Christian enterprise." They would be sickened by the way we are so sure that we know exactly what to do.
Those believers began, continued, and ended by ministering first to God. Their basic ministry was always to the Lord.
As they ministered to the Lord and fasted the Holy Ghost said, "Separate unto me Saul and Barnabas for the work for which I have called them." Acts 13:2
When Cornelius sent messengers to the place in Joppa where Peter was staying, where did they find Peter? Was Peter holding a strategy meeting in the back room? No, Peter was up on the rooftop praying.
Our apostolic brothers and sisters had a relationship with the living God of which we still have no conception. And all the mighty things which flowed from their lives,
- 3000 baptized at Pentecost,
- 5000 entering the Kingdom after the lame man was healed,
- communities of believers just springing up in city after city equipped with all the gifts of the Spirit,
- these things were the result, the outflow, of the fact that they were first ministering to God.
We, on the other hand, are so eager to get things done that we turn away from the Throne of the Father and from that stream of living water which flows from it, and we take our little bag of spiritual insights and go marching off into Satan's big-time, fast-moving world and try to play his game. Before we know it we find we're serving Satan instead of God. All the things that we're doing are going to have to be undone because they are done,
- not in the humility of our Lord,
- not in His lowliness,
- not in His mercy,
- not to His glory,
– but as our own spiritual enterprise which, when you scrape off the surface, turns out to be a demonic monstrosity.
Except the Lord build the house,
they labor in vain that build it.
Psalms 127:1
How is the Lord going to build the house through us unless we first get our eyes off the house and on to Him?
"Abide in me, and I in you, as the branch cannot bear fruit except it abide in the vine, no more can you unless you abide in me. He who abides in me and I in him, he it is, she it is, who bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing." John 15:4-5
Many of us are so quick to say, "I'm abiding in Jesus!"
Like the husband who protests,
"What do you mean? I love my wife."
Talk to her and you hear a different story. What a thrill this woman would get if she received a bit of kindness from this man, a little mercy, a little patience. If she just had some evidence that he really honors her and thinks of her as something special.
This man who protests so loudly that he loves his wife has many lessons to learn about love. And until he learns to treat her with honor and tenderness and kindness, his home is going to remain bleak. He's living in a marital desert and he's got her living in a marital desert and the hypocrite doesn't even know it!
This is how it is, so often, with our relationship with our Lord Jesus. "I'm abiding in the Lord!" when we don't even know the first thing about abiding in Him.
When we talk about a relationship with Jesus we are, of course, talking about our relationship with God, for Jesus is the brightness of God's glory in the express image of His person. He is the door through which we walk into the Father's presence. He is the window by which we see the Father.
He who has seen me has seen the Father. John 14:9
Draw near to me and you have drawn near to the Father.
For some time the Spirit of the Lord Jesus has been calling us to come away from all the scattered busy things that we've been up to, and learn , to minister to Him; knowing that when we have learned to minister to Him we will accomplish more in five minutes than we accomplished in five years.
We say, "How can I minister to God? What do I have to offer God that He doesn't already have?" There is one thing which only you can give God: your blessing. This simple thing, which any child can do, marks the beginning of our ministry to God.
To cause all that is within us to bless Him.
Oh, you think you're too busy! You've got more important things to do than bless God! What about His angels which excel in strength, which do His will, hearkening to the voice of His word? They're blessing God all the time! His hosts that do His pleasure? Constantly blessing God.
All God's work in all places of His dominion, the trees, the flowers, the throbbing spaces, the silent rivers, the suns and the stars - all the time they do nothing but bless God.
The author of Psalm 103 understands this well. He understands that there is no possible way that he could minister in any fashion until he begins blessing God. So he says to his soul, (and we would do well to join him),
"Bless the Lord, 0 my soul;
and all that is within me, bless his holy name!
Bless the Lord, 0 my soul, and forget not all his benefits.
Who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases.
Who redeemeth thy life from destruction;
who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies.
Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things;
so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle's."
How easy it becomes to bless the Lord with all that is within us, when we remember all his benefits. It's only because we turn our eyes away from His Throne and His goodness that we become weary and ingrown and depressed, full of self-pity, impatient with each other and critical about everything we see. But when our eyes are fixed on Him, and on His Throne, and we remember His benefits, what else can we do but bless Him?
For what?
Who forgiveth all thine iniquities;
The one thing we have in common is our iniquity. Our only claim on God, every time we pray, is His forgiveness for our iniquity. We can't come to God and say, "But Lord, you've got to answer my prayers, I've been so good this week. I witnessed to ten people. Five people found their way into the Kingdom." That's not the basis of our prayers. The basis of our prayers is that He has forgiven our iniquity, even today. And if iniquity clings to any of our hearts, right now, the Lord is present to take it away if we'll give it to Him.
Who healeth all thy diseases.
All thy diseases. But you say, "Wait a minute. My healing isn't complete. My body is still twisted. My mind is tormented." The closer we come to Jesus the more we begin to experience that Jesus truly is our healer. If there's a need for healing in our lives surely we can expect from Him the touch of His hand in some way to encourage us.... for our own healing, or for the healing of the one for whom we pray. And when we begin to see that, what else can we do but praise God with a loud voice and throw our lives at His feet, giving Him thanks? .
Who redeemeth thy life from destruction;
If there's any way to describe an assembly of people who have found Jesus, is that it's a collection of lives that have been ruined, destroyed. It doesn't make any difference whether you fell as a skid row ruin or a middle class ruin. Somewhere along the line you woke up and realized that your life is a mess....that you didn't have all the answers, and that you blew it. You were going merrily on your way, doing all right, and all of a sudden, Boom! And you wake up in ruin, a taste of the ruin which lies ahead.
Then the Shepherd came and redeemed us. We've been taken up out of the pit and set up on the plain of redemption. When we begin to see that afresh every day, what can we do but bless God?
Who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies.
We're not even in heaven yet and we're wearing a crown, a living crown! Poured down from God's Throne upon our heads; Lovingkindness and tender mercy that come on us like an anointing. How in the world can we receive that crown every day and wear that crown moment-by-moment without blessing God for it?
Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things so
that thy youth is renewed like the eagle's.
He begins by touching the heart with forgiveness and he ends by changing this mouth, which was the instrument of destruction, in every one of our lives. This vile member that once spewed forth death is now filled with
- living water,
- living bread,
- living breath,
- songs of praise.
And when I begin to find myself satisfied with the breath of God's Spirit, what can I do but use this mouth to bless God? And as I do I mount up on wings as the eagle's, I run and I'm not weary, I walk and I do not faint.
Bless the Lord, 0 my soul;
and all that is within me, bless his holy name.
Bless the Lord, 0 my soul, and forget not all his benefits.
Who forgiveth all thine iniquities;
who healeth all thy diseases.
Who redeemeth thy life from destruction;
who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies.
Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things;
so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle's.
How in the world are we going to minister life to the people out there until this becomes a reality to us? How can we say we're abiding in Jesus and He in us unless all that is within us is truly blessing His holy name? As a step in this direction why not take this 103rd Psalm into our prayer room every day for a while, and learn, as the Spirit teaches through this Psalm, how to bless God. Do this until our whole being is soaked with the Spirit that comes forth in Psalm 103.
The day will come when Jesus will talk to us like He did to Peter after the resurrection,
"Simon, son of Jonas, do you love me?"
"Lord, you know that I love you."
"Feed my sheep."
God will tell us things to do.
But first, can we truly say with Peter today, like he could that morning, "Lord, you know that I love you. Everything within my heart loves you." Very few of us, if any, can do that.
And if there's anything that we need, it's to let the Spirit of God teach us how to,
- love Him,
- praise Him,
- bless Him,
- adore Him,
- worship Him,
- serve Him,
- minister to Him.
And when we have come to the place where this becomes our second nature, then you can be sure that we will have food for His sheep, healing for the sick, and such comfort, and such hope for those who are hungering and thirsting for God that God's presence will be clearly manifest. It will just flow like a river from our mouths,
from our hands,
and from our lives.
May God help us to learn to minister first to Him.