Called, by God's will

Colossians 1:1-2
Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by God’s will, and Timothy our brother:
To the saints and faithful brothers in Christ in Colossae.

Paul is an apostle…by God’s will.  He didn’t choose this for himself.  God appointed him to specific service.  An apostle is a delegate or messenger.  Someone who is an apostle has a specific function – that person is chosen by Christ to be His ambassador. 

Notice also that Paul doesn’t identify himself as a believer by God’s will.  Trusting Christ for eternal life is something that Paul chose to do; however, the work we do in God’s family is something that God chooses for us.

There are many examples of God choosing both groups of people and individuals for specific service to Him.  Moses told the Israelites:

Deuteronomy 7:6
For you are a holy people belonging to the Lord your God.  The Lord you God has chosen you to be His own possession out of all the peoples on the face of the earth.

Even then, from among the Israelites, God chose the Levites to serve as His priests.  God also chose individuals who would be the leaders, judges, prophets, and kings for the nation.  Some served faithfully (Joshua, David) but others struggled in their appointed positions (Samson, Jonah).  Even though none of them were perfect, each person God chose had a specific responsibility toward the people.  They were to aid the people in fulfilling God’s desired purpose for the nation of Israel:

Exodus 19:5-6
Now if you will listen to Me and carefully keep My covenant, you will be My own possession out of all the peoples, although all the earth is Mine, and you will be My kingdom of priests and My holy nation.

When the nation of Israel was in right relationship with God, they became a shining example to the rest of the world.  The groups and individuals which God chose for specific service were to help guide the nation toward this end.

Paul sees his apostleship in the same light.  He also sees that Jesus calls others in the church family to specific kinds of service:

Ephesians 4:11-12
And He personally gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, for the training of the saints in the work of ministry, to build up the body of Christ, until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of God’s Son

We all have our roles, and Paul is doing his part.  As an apostle, he has specific insight from God to share with those in Colossae – which we can also benefit from as we read his letter.

Whether you find your calling in the list above, or you are one of the saints being trained in the work of ministry, God has work for us to do.  By God’s will, some of us work to build up the body and some of us work to minister to those outside of the body.  Either way, we have the opportunity to partner with the Creator of Everything in His most important mission.

Do you know what service you are called to?  If not, ask God to show you.  His answer might surprise you…but you can trust that He knows where you belong.

Keep Pressing,
Ken 

Praying for those we haven't met

Let’s face it.  Praying for God’s help is awkward when you’re not intimately involved in the situation.  Whether it’s request for prayer from a good friend, a family member, or even a total stranger…we often don’t know what to say to God about it.  I mean, He’s God, after all…shouldn’t He know what they need more than I do?  How does my few moments of a mumbled, semi-sympathetic prayer really help anyone else?

Yet we often feel the same way even when we are praying for someone we do know.  When someone we love and care about – even those we deeply care about – are in another town and not in our day-to-day lives, how do we pray for them?  Again, it just feels awkward because God knows what’s going on better than I do.

In both these cases, I usually end up praying something like “God…please help them with their…stuff…they’re going through.  I pray that they rely on You.  Amen.”  If I’m honest, that kind of prayer leaves me feeling rather unsatisfied and wondering if I have just wasted my time – and maybe God’s, too.

The Apostle Paul came in contact with thousands, if not tens of thousands, of people over the known world as he spread the good news about Jesus and ministered to those who believed on Him for eternal life.  However, Paul didn’t talk to everyone.  There were churches started in other towns by others who were also spreading the gospel. 

At some point during his journeys, Paul met a man named Epaphras.  Biblical evidence suggests that he was from the town of Colossae, which was about 100 miles inland from Ephesus, in modern-day Turkey.  Although Epaphras was away from his hometown while he was ministering with Paul, the believers in Colossae were always on his heart.  His prayers for them were full of passion and concern…so much so that Paul also joined Epaphras in prayer, and then wrote the believers in Colossae a letter of encouragement and teaching.

Before we jump into Paul’s letter, stop and think about the situation.  Epaphras hadn’t been in recent contact with the Colossae church (no phones or email) and Paul has never met them.  Certainly Epaphras gave Paul some ideas on what he could be praying…but what, specifically, would he say to God?  What would you say?  Or to ask a question that might be even more daunting – What would you write to believers who are total strangers to you?  What reason would you give that would convince them that your advice is worth listening to?

Here’s what Paul had to say about his reasons for writing the letter:

Colossians 2:1-3
For I want you to know how great a struggle I have for you, for those in Laodicea, and for all who have not seen me in person.  I want their hearts to be encouraged and joined together in love, so that they may have all the riches of assured understanding, and have the knowledge of God’s mystery – Christ.  In Him all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden.

Paul’s aim is to encourage believers, even those he hasn’t come in direct contact with.  He desires for all believers to walk confident in their understanding, knowledge, and relationship with Christ.  There is much to learn from his example and from what he desires to teach the Colossian church.

For now, let’s ask God to show us how to be an encouragement to others – even those we haven’t met.

Keep Pressing,
Ken 

House of prayer (part 3)

A few days before His final Passover meal, Jesus cleared the temple in a symbolic gesture which represented the reform needed within the Jewish religious practices.

Mark 11:15-17 They came to Jerusalem, and He went into the temple complex and began to throw out those buying and selling in the temple.  He overturned the money changers’ tables and the chairs of those selling doves, and would not permit anyone to carry goods through the temple complex.

Then He began to teach them: “Is it not written, My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations?  But you have made it a den of thieves!”

Growing up in Israel, children were educated and taught to read using the Old Testament Scriptures.  Constant repetition was considered an essential part of their learning process.  As such, all Israelites would memorize large portions of the Old Testament.  The priests and scribes of Jesus’ day would have the entire Old Testament, as well as the Jewish traditions, perfectly memorized.  So when Jesus quoted Isaiah with His question “Is it not written, My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations?”, everyone knew what He was quoting.

While Jesus quoted Isaiah with His question, His audience would have also recognized that He quoted Jeremiah in His emphatic statement “But you have made it a den of thieves!”.  The Isaiah passage was an encouraging invitation to foreigners, but the Jeremiah passage is one where God rebukes Israel for living for their own desires while showing up on the Sabbath and verbally praising God.  The Israelites at that time also believed that the physical presence of the temple was proof enough that God was satisfied with how the nation treated Him.  Jeremiah was warning the nation that if they did not change their hypocrisy, judgment would come:

Jeremiah 7:3-11 “This is what the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: Correct your ways and your deeds, and I will allow you to live in this place.  Do not trust deceitful words, chanting: This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord.

Instead, if you really change your ways and your actions, if you act justly toward one another, if you no longer oppress the alien, the fatherless, and the widow and no longer shed innocent blood in this place or follow other gods, bringing harm on yourselves, I will allow you to live in this place, the land I gave to your ancestors forever and ever.  But look, you keep trusting in deceitful words that cannot help.

“Do you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, burn incense to Baal, and follow other gods that you have not known?  Then do you come and stand before Me in this house called by My name and insist: We are safe?  As a result, you are free to continue doing all these detestable acts!  Has this house, which is called by My name, become a den of robbers in your view?

For their hypocrisy, judgment and exile came on those in Jeremiah’s time.  By referring back to the Jeremiah passage, Jesus was indicating that the priests and scribes of Jesus’ day also acted this way.  Of course, they did not take kindly to Jesus’ teaching.  

Mark 11:18 Then the chief priests and the scribes heard it and started looking for a way to destroy Him.  For they were afraid of Him, because the whole crowd was astonished by His teaching.

As a result of their hypocrisy, the priests and scribes missed the fact that Jesus was the Messiah…and Jerusalem was soon after destroyed.  We would be foolish to think that we modern believers would never see judgment like they did.  Do we live hypocritical lives and then show up for an hour on Sunday to offer verbal praise to God?  Do we acknowledge Jesus with our lips, but walk out the door and deny Him by our lifestyle?

Will we persist in making God’s house a den of robbers, or will we take the necessary – even painful – steps to ensure that God’s house is as it should be, a house of prayer for all nations?

Keep Pressing,
Ken