What Is Ministry?

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You know, back when I was a sophomore in high school, I recognized at that time that God was calling me into ministry, and we were new at our church at the time, so I went as this annoying kid to the men on staff at the church, and I said, you know, God’s called me to be in ministry, I want you to teach me how to do ministry. And they said they, you know, they would. And so I feel like the whole time I was in high school and college, if I was not at school or at work, I was at the church and hanging out with these men, learning to do what they do.

I just would go up there. I didn’t really give them an option. I was just there.

And so they were teaching me by example. But I said, I want to learn how to do ministry. And so they did things like, okay, you’re going to be on the rotation to teach children’s church.

They didn’t hand me a mic and say, go in the auditorium. They said, you’re going to start in children’s church. You’re going to learn there.

Because if you can preach to second graders, you can preach to anybody. They gave me a mop and taught me how to mop up after a funeral meal in the kitchen. We fixed plumbing.

We went on hospital visits. I remember one particular day it was hot. It was in the middle of the summer and it was hot.

And one of the older ladies from church showed up with a flat tire. She said she’d been driving down the road and her tire was flat. So she asked if somebody could help.

We went out and helped her. And I was kind of annoyed by this because it was hot. And I was still kind of learning about cars.

And the guy I was with, then my youth pastor, now my friend, Brother Mike, he wasn’t necessarily a car guy either. But we went out and finally figured our way through changing this lady’s tire and got her on down the road. And probably wasn’t an hour later, somebody else stopped that had never been to our church before.

She’s an older lady, and she was just incredibly distraught because one of her lights on her car, I can’t remember if it was a brake light, a headlight, what it was, it was out. And she had, I don’t know if she’d gotten a ticket or a warning for it, but she’d had to go to the auto parts store and get the bulb, but now she didn’t know how to put it in. And she just, for whatever reason, stopped at the church and asked, could somebody help her?

So he and I are out there struggling to try to figure out how to change this light, put this new light bulb in the fixture and get everything back on the way it’s supposed to be. And he looked at me and he said, you know what this is? And I said, annoying?

I would say I was kind of a smart mouth back then, but I still am. I’ve just learned that there’s a right time and place for it. But he said, you know what this is?

This is ministry. I said, okay. That became a running conversation for us.

I want to say for the next several years, but even today when we’re together, we’ll talk about that. We’d do something, he’d say, you know what this is? And the first few times, no, what is this?

This is ministry. It got to the point where he’d say, you know what this is? Yes, I know this is ministry.

And it got to the point eventually where I’d look at him and say, you know what this is? And I’ve taken my kids, and we’ve done all kinds of things, and they kind of complained like I did at first. You know, we have helped people with plumbing mishaps and delivered food to places that didn’t smell good. And we’ve helped people with dead animals.

And I’ll look at my kids and say, you know what this is? Gross? Yes, but it is gross, but it’s also ministry.

Ministry does not always look like what we expect. I think a lot of people, I think even some people in ministry have the idea that ministry is wearing the suit in front of people on Sunday mornings. that it’s being up in front of people, it’s being the well-known person in the room, it’s any of those things.

This is a very small slice of what ministry is. And the book of Acts describes how a group of men stepped into ministry without necessarily realizing that that’s what they were doing because it didn’t fit with people’s idea of what ministry was at the time. Certainly And if you turn with me this morning to Acts chapter 6, that’s where we’re going to be this morning.

Acts chapter 6. If you don’t have a Bible, it’ll be up here on the screen. There’s a link to it in our bulletin today where you can get it on your phone.

Acts chapter 6. And we’re going to look at the first seven verses as we see this calling to this surprising ministry that they experienced. Acts chapter 6, starting in verse 1.

if you would stand with me as we read together from God’s Word, if you’re able to stand without too much difficulty. Acts chapter 6, starting in verse 1, it says, Now in those days, when the number of disciples was multiplying, there arose a complaint against the Hebrews by the Hellenists, because their widows were neglected in the daily distribution. Then the twelve summoned the multitude of the disciples, and said, It is not desirable that we should leave the Word of God and serve tables.

Therefore, Now verse 5 says, And the saying pleased the whole multitude, and they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit, and Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicholas, a proselyte from Antioch, whom they set before the apostles. And when they had prayed, they laid hands on them. Then the word of God spread, and the number of disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests were obedient to the faith.

And you may be seated. Now, one thing I want to caution you about this morning as we read this, is if we’re not careful to understand what’s going on here, we can get the opposite impression of what the Scripture intends. Because we read what the apostles said about it’s not good for us to leave the word of God to go wait tables, And we could look at that as so many people do of, well, there are some jobs that I’m too important to do.

That’s not what the apostles were saying. They’re not saying we’re too important to go deal with these practical needs. We’re too important to be bothered by the widows.

As a matter of fact, my mother-in-law was listening to her church this morning, and I love listening to her pastor. He said something. He was talking about vacation Bible school this week, and he was talking about how all the staff joined in and they all worked vacation Bible school.

And he said, one of the things that we work very hard to instill in the staff here is that if you’re too good to mop a floor or clean a bathroom or something like that, then you’re too good to be on staff here. All right? I thought, not that I ever doubted, but he gets it.

All right? That’s the right attitude in ministry. So the apostles were not saying we are too good to go deal with the widows.

What they were talking about was this administrative work. Because this word tables here, it can mean just a regular table, like we think of as a table. But this word is also used in Greek to describe, for example, the money changing tables in the temple.

It’s used to describe even in one case, a bank, a banking situation. So when they said it’s not good for us to walk away from what we’re doing to go wait tables. They’re not saying that we’re too good to put on an apron and go fill somebody’s glass up.

We’re too good to put on an apron and go clear away the empties from the table and wipe things down. They’re not saying that. They’re talking about this task of administering this program because the widows, there was no social security.

There was no stimulus. There was no any of these things. These ladies were completely dependent on the church if they had no family to take care of them.

And so as you’ve got people from a Jewish background in the church from Jerusalem and people who were from a different Greek cultural background in the church, there arose some controversy because they said one group is being favored over another. And these widows, it wasn’t just, oh, they got their dessert first and we had to pick what was left. They’re they’re talking about having to administer a major program that was going to take a great deal of their time.

And they’re not saying they’re too good to do it. They’re saying we have a calling over here and we cannot possibly accomplish all the ministry that needs to be accomplished. By the way, none of us can possibly accomplish all the ministry that needs to be accomplished.

If everything at Central Baptist Church depended on me to get done, there’d be a lot that wouldn’t get done. There may be a lot of stuff that I don’t even know that gets done because people just step in and do it. But they were pointing out, we cannot, when they say it’s not good for us to leave this to go and wait tables, what they’re talking about is something that was such a big task that it was going to take these seven men to do it, and it was going to be a practically a full-time job.

So they’re saying we cannot completely abandon what God has called us to do to come take care of everything. And some of the burden, some of this administrative work. And that’s important because it seems like the kind of thing that they were doing is the kind of thing that we associate with ministry a lot of times, with the teaching and the spiritual. But we forget about how some of the practical is ministry as well.

And so these men were being called to serve in an area that people didn’t necessarily think of as ministry, but it was. It absolutely was ministry. They were waiting tables, and they could look at it and say, that’s all we’re doing is making sure people get fed.

But as we look at this, as we see what’s going on in this church, it absolutely is ministry. And it was absolutely as important as what the apostles were doing. And it’s important for us to understand that because, again, we don’t want to get the impression that I’ve read this for years and thought, that doesn’t sound like the apostles.

It sounds like they were kind of being jerks, Like we’re too good for that. Until you realize they’re talking about the enormity of this project. And we just cannot take.

. . You know what?

I have the same 24 hours in the day that you do. People in ministry have the same 24 hours in the day that everybody else does. And they were saying we cannot, we physically cannot accomplish everything there is to do.

And we need somebody else to step in and take part of this. And these men might have looked at it as we’re just making sure people get fed. but it was ministry and it was vital. Now, over the next few weeks, I want to talk to you about our calling to ministry.

Each of us have a call to ministry. You may not believe that, or you may think, well, yeah, the people at church, they do the ministry. Now, if you’re a believer in Jesus Christ, excuse me, if you’re somebody who’s trusted in Christ as your Savior, God has called you into ministry.

It may not be the exact same thing anybody else is doing. It may not be this kind of ministry. Again, this is a small part.

What I do on Sunday mornings is a small part of my week. It’s a fun part of my week. It’s an important part of my week, but it’s a small part of my week Now that’s good news for some of you We say wait god’s called me in a ministry.

I can’t I can’t do what you do Some people would rather would rather die Than get up and talk in front of people and the number one fear in america is not death. It’s not dental surgery It’s public speaking. That’s okay.

There’s ministry that does not involve this if you’re a believer in jesus christ If you’ve been born again through faith in him, then god has called you into ministry And we’re going to spend the next few weeks talking about that. But to start with, this morning we’re going to look at this passage to understand what is ministry. Because again, so many times we think, got to be something up front.

How can I be in ministry? I don’t preach, I don’t sing, I don’t, you know. My dad is a great example of this.

As a teenager at Falls Creek, he told me he felt called into ministry. But he said, I knew I wasn’t going to be a pastor. I knew I wasn’t supposed to be a youth pastor.

I knew I wasn’t supposed to be a missionary, and I thought, what else is there? And so he just put it aside for years and years. And he told me he was an adult when he realized that what he was doing was ministry.

As he was serving the Lord and being a witness to people in his job, that was ministry. As he was teaching Sunday school to generations of boys, I may be making him sound older than he is, but as he taught Sunday school for years and years, As he for several years poured his life, and my mom poured her life into a group of college kids at our church, about half of whom now are in some kind of ministry, as he was doing that, that was ministry. He said it just took him far too many years to realize that there was more to ministry than pastor, youth pastor, song leader, or missionary.

And so we need to understand what ministry was. What these men were doing here in Acts chapter 6, yes, they were just going out making sure the older ladies got fed, but it absolutely was ministry. And some reasons why we know this.

First of all, they treated their work as a calling. You look at verses 5 and 6, we can see how they were set apart here by the church, and it says, and the saying pleased the whole multitude. So the apostles came to the church there and said, we need some guys to help out.

Who would you have to serve? So in a way, they were kind of volunteered. Sometimes we’re called by God, sometimes we’re called by the church.

They were kind of volunteered. I’m certain they prayed about it, though, that the church did before they appointed these men. They chose these men.

It says whom they set before the apostles. They went back to the apostles and said, this is who we think ought to serve. And when they had prayed, they prayed for these men and they laid their hands on them.

That doesn’t mean they had to go and twist their arms to make them serve. Have you ever been in one of those situations where you feel like I’m going to serve in this capacity at church because somebody laid hands on me. They’re not going to let me go until I say yes just to get away from them.

That’s not what we’re talking about. They took these men, they laid hands on them like you would see at a blessing, like you would see at an ordination service today. And they committed these men.

They set them apart and gave them this blessing, and it was a symbol of their calling. They didn’t just look at this as any other job. These men and the church they were serving, they treated their work like a calling.

So the church recognized that God had called them. Now it says here again, the church is the one who said, we think it was these men. But knowing what we know about the church at Jerusalem, they almost didn’t sneeze without praying about it first. Which, by the way, is a good example for us.

They didn’t do much of anything without praying about it first. So I have no doubt that they prayed for, not only prayed for these men once they called them, but prayed for these men and prayed about these men ahead of the call. But they recognized that God had called them, that God had put them there, that God had given the church the idea of these are the men that we want, and that they were set apart for the purpose of serving by the laying on of hands. That laying on of hands is a way of showing we are sending you, we are behind you, we support you in this work, we recognize that God’s called you to do this work.

And I’m not saying we have to have a laying on of hands ceremony every time somebody goes to teach Sunday school or clean a restroom. But it’s a sign that they recognized their job, what they were doing. It’s not just something we’re doing because it needs to be done, it’s something we’re doing because we’re fulfilling the call of God.

And if we’re doing it to fulfill the call of God, it’s a ministry. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a big ministry, a little ministry. It doesn’t matter whether we’re doing something that millions will see or whether we’re digging up sprinklers at the church.

There’s a lot of that that went on this week. If we’re doing it because we feel called of God to do it, it’s ministry. If we’re doing it because the church recognizes the call of God on us to do it, it’s ministry.

It was not just a job they did. It was done with the recognition that God had a purpose for their lives. Folks, anything you do with the recognition that you are fulfilling the purpose of God on your life, it is ministry.

And I’ll get to this a little bit more later on. That doesn’t mean it has to be done within the confines of the four walls of the church to be a ministry. Plenty of people do plenty of things outside the church as a ministry.

But if you’re fulfilling the fact that you understand God has a call on your life, and it may be something small, but you know God’s called you to do it, it’s ministry. We know this was ministry for them not only because they treated the work as a calling, but because they were serving in Jesus’ name. Now that’s important because there are a lot of people, and there are even a lot of churches that are really focused on doing good things and helping people, and that’s wonderful, but they omit the spiritual dimension of it and forget that what they’re doing is to represent Jesus, or it really has no impact in eternity.

There’s a difference between ministry and humanitarianism. Repetarianism is great. It’s great to help people.

It’s great to do things with people and take care of problems. But if our goal in what we do is not ultimately to point people to Jesus Christ, then we’re only helping them in this life and leaving them in the dark for the life to come. Now please don’t misunderstand what I said or read in something I didn’t say. This is not the idea that in order for people to get our help, they have to say they’re becoming Christian.

This is not saying that we only help people who say they’re going to become Christians, that we’re doing this as something to dangle over them so that they’ll pray a prayer or whatever it is. No, the idea is that we genuinely love people because Jesus Christ loved them, and we serve them out of the overflow of that love in hopes of pointing them to Jesus Christ, in hopes of gaining the opportunity of telling them about Jesus Christ. but it’s not a situation where somebody says, no, I don’t think I’m there yet. And we say, all right, no help for you.

That’s not what we’re talking about. But these men took on the job that the church was doing where it talks about this daily distribution in verse one. They were doing this because that was part of the role of the church.

That was part of the ministry of the church was to care for these widows in Jesus name. As a matter of fact, James wrote that our religion is demonstrated by caring for the widows and the orphans. Not just our niceness is demonstrated, not just what good people we are is demonstrated by caring for the widows and orphans, but he talks about pure religion.

Our faith in Jesus Christ, our relationship with Jesus Christ is on display in the way we care for these people. And so he said in verse 3, the apostle said in verse 3, to seek out from among you seven men of good reputation, full of the Holy Spirit and of wisdom. This was not just a humanitarian effort.

This was ministry done in Jesus’ name. at the leadership of the Holy Spirit, at the guidance of the Holy Spirit, for them to go out and point people to Jesus Christ. They were caring for these widows on behalf of the church, and that meant they were doing it in Jesus’ name. And so they were given this area of responsibility not just to accomplish a task, but to represent Jesus.

And that’s what you and I have to remember in our ministry, whatever your ministry may be, because it’s so easy to get to a point where we get so busy, We get so busy and it’s easy to just put yourself in the mode where you’re trying to check things off the list. Just get it done. Just get it done. And at the end of the day, if I’ve got all the things checked off and all the things done, then it’s good.

And it becomes more about doing the thing than it is about representing Jesus. I’m so bad about this. If I was going to make a list of things that annoy me about myself, this would be at the top of the list. But what they were doing was not just about getting the distribution done, the distribution of food.

It wasn’t just about the project. There was a reason behind the project. There’s a reason behind the work they were doing, and it was to point people to Jesus Christ. It was to demonstrate the love of Jesus Christ. So if you have a ministry that you do now, don’t get to the point where you just focus on the task that needs to be done.

For one thing, you’ll burn out doing it that way. Instead, remember why you do it. They were given this area of responsibility to represent Jesus.

That’s why it mattered that they picked men who were full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom. They didn’t want just people that were good at administration, people that were good at business. They wanted people who looked at this as a spiritual endeavor.

And then we know this morning that this was ministry because they helped the gospel advance. And you might think, well, if they were doing this administrative work, and I know some of them were probably actually going out and handing out the food. Some of them were probably inventorying.

They were packaging things up, probably working behind the scenes. How did that help the gospel advance? Don’t you need to be out preaching?

Don’t you need to be out with a bullhorn on a soapbox doing that? It’s said here that because of what they did, the gospel was able to move forward. You see in verse 2, the apostles said, we can’t neglect the word of God to go do this.

If they had had to go do all the administrative tasks, then what they had been called to do, they wouldn’t have had time to do. And then in verse 4, When they called these men, when these men were called to do this work, it says we will give ourselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the word. And then verse 7 says the word of God spread and the number of disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem.

The word of God spread. Many people came to faith in Jesus Christ. And it even says that a great many of the priests were obedient to the faith. Even some of the leaders of the Jewish religion, even some of the religious leaders came to recognize their need for Jesus Christ. And the reason for that is because everybody was doing the ministry that God called them to do.

Everybody was pulling their weight, and so it freed people up to do what God called them to do. And God used that, and the gospel was multiplied. Now, their area of service wasn’t necessarily the most glamorous.

It wasn’t specifically preaching or teaching, but it freed up the apostles to go and proclaim the word. And by doing that part, they contributed to the advance of the gospel. One example of this here is that over the last few months, Mike and Rick and Jack have taken on the responsibility of being a finance committee.

That means I haven’t had to do all that. I love that. And I love you all for doing that.

Because that’s a lot of responsibility that I’d take on if I had to, but I didn’t want to. And so not having to do all of that freed me up for other things. More time to prepare for messages.

more time to visit with people who need to know about Jesus, more time to visit with people when they come in needing counseling, more time to help with just all the stuff that needs to be done. They took that on, and I didn’t have to. And we might look at that and say, they’re a finance committee.

How is that ministry? Well, they recognize that they’re doing it for the good of the church, they’re doing it for the sake of the gospel, and they’re freeing up others to spread the word. That’s what they did for these men.

By doing that part, by doing their part, they contributed to the advancement of the gospel. And that’s why we don’t ever want to get to a point where we say, what I do is not important. You know what?

I will probably never be Billy Graham out there preaching to millions. You will probably never be Billy Graham with an audience of millions. And we can compare ourselves to somebody else and what they do and conclude that what I do is not important.

I’m just here preaching to my church. I’m just teaching Sunday school. I’m just working the nursery.

I’m just picking people up for church that need a ride. I’m just cleaning the floors. I’m just..

. We can look at it and say what I do is not important. But we don’t realize how our obedience in some area can contribute to the spread of the gospel.

Now, it’s also not an excuse for us to not open our mouths. If your ministry is mopping floors, that doesn’t mean you never open your mouth and tell somebody the gospel. But we don’t know how all the ministries that we fulfill, we don’t know how those all contribute.

God knows, and He uses all of it. But don’t ever think that what you do is not important to the spread of the gospel because God used these men in an administrative capacity and the gospel spread like wildfire. So the reason I bring this to you this morning is that many of us sit on the sidelines because we have this narrow view of what ministry is.

We think of it as what I’m doing here this morning. We think of it as what Christi does in leading music. We think of it as what the missionaries do when they go off to another country.

We have this narrow idea of ministry, that it’s something somebody does as a full-time job, or it’s something that they do only at the church. We have this narrow view, and the things that we feel called to do, the things that we are equipped to do, the things that we are gifted to do, don’t fit within that narrow view we have, and so we assume that’s not ministry, and so we conclude that ministry is not for us. And so we sit on the sidelines.

But ministry is any effort we make with the intent of pointing others to Jesus Christ. Ministry is any effort we make with the intent of pointing others to Jesus Christ. I don’t care what particular gifts you have, what particular abilities you have. There is a place for you in ministry if you’re a believer in Jesus Christ. If you can make any effort to point others to Jesus Christ, you can do ministry. Even if you’re stuck in your house, you can’t get out because of health reasons.

If you can pray for people, if you can pray for people who need Jesus, If you can pray for people who are telling others about Jesus, folks, that is a ministry. There’s a lady that many of you know is part of this church. I still don’t think I’ve ever met her in person.

But she sends cards frequently to me and to my children, to many of you. She hasn’t been able to get out since I’ve been here for health reasons. But she is a tremendous encouragement.

And those cards show up at just the time when I’m having a day that I think, why do I do this? not that I don’t love central but there are times that just in ministry I’m like what is anybody even paying attention am I doing any good here and one of those cards will show up and it’s just like the little shot in the arm that says keep going you know what that’s ministry not me her she’s doing ministry any effort you make with the intent of pointing others to Jesus whether those others are believers or non-believers it’s ministry these guys were just doing some administrative work they were just taking care of some physical needs they were just doing the non-glamorous part of things, but it doesn’t matter. It was ministry because they were doing it so that others could be pointed to Jesus.

We can all do that. Where can you point others to Jesus this morning? That’s what I want you to think of.

That’s the question I want you leaving here thinking about this morning. And into this coming week, where can you serve to point others to Jesus? We have numerous opportunities here at Central. You may think I could never teach a class.

Could rock babies in the nursery and tell them Jesus loves them. Maybe you wouldn’t mind teaching a class or just working with kids, encouraging them, helping them with crafts, and telling them Jesus loves you. We have helper positions available in Sunday school.

Now, the whole purpose of this message is not a recruiting tool, but things do sometimes overlap. Next Saturday, we have a community-free lunch coming up that we’re going to resume finally after the pandemic. It’s an opportunity to minister to people in need and let them know that our church cares about them.

and more importantly, that Jesus cares about them. And we can always use help with that. We’ve got a clothes closet ministry.

And I know a lot of you don’t see it because it happens during the week, but we get people that show up here week after week saying, I’m new in town, or I just got kicked out of my house, or there was a fire, we lost everything, do you have any clothes? We’re able to give people clothes. And it’s second-hand stuff.

It’s not like we’re giving them brand names. I can’t even think of brand names and designers right now. but they are so thrilled to get it.

They can’t believe that we do this ministry. And it touches lives. We’re working on putting together a food pantry.

Maybe not a huge one, but something where people, when they come and they ask us, can I get something to eat, where we have something we can give them. There’s a group of men in this church who are involved with some other men at Cameron Baptist, who go and hold block parties in some of the parks, in some of the neighborhoods here in town. And they’ll partner with other churches, And they’ll invite people out for hamburgers and hot dogs.

And I don’t know what all they put out there. I’m anxious to see this in action. I’ve heard stories about it even since before we were coming here.

And they go out and minister to these