Don’t Let

Ministry Steal

from Your Test-I-mony

Cheryl Floyd January 2006©

Everyone has a ministry. Everyone has a testimony. Your testimony adds to ministry. However, ministry can steal from your testimony.

Troy and I have good news to share. In August we’ll be receiving a fifth addition to our family. Not through our decision, intervention, or exertion; simply through the divine process of… the two becoming one flesh… for a Godly heritage… (Gen. 2:24, Mal. 2:15). Through these scriptures I’ve come to believe the Lord intends for me not to prevent or despise the heritage he wants to bring forth through me whether one or many. But I will be honest with you. My stomach does flips and my temples begin to sweat when I contemplate five, ten, or fifteen children. Troy’s retirement party, not a baby shower, is my idea of life in my 40’s. Maybe out of all of you I am the only one who has a tinge of fear at the prospect of babyhood forever - or at least a looooooooooong time. Perhaps it’s just me that justifies this form of selfish thinking with the statement: but I have work to do; I have ministry to do.

After all, Jesus in fact said that if anyone gives up house or family or field for the Kingdom will be rewarded. Isn’t that why it’s reasonable for missionaries to ship their children off to boarding school while they advance the Kingdom to the ends of the earth? Perhaps what Jesus implores is when forced to choose between the scorn of an unbelieving family or Him, we sacrifice and be called by His name. This scripture is about sacrificing for your faith in Jesus as Savior. Jesus didn’t sacrifice his family for his ministry; he sacrificed himself for his family through ministry. Jesus was born in the flesh to glorify God through sacrifice. Surely we don’t think God expects any less of us.

Philippians 3:10-11 states: I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.

How might we fellowship with Jesus through his sufferings? Jesus suffered through sacrifice. Those of us not living in persecuted countries full of torture and mayhem, find the sacrifices we are called to make have more to do with our vanity than our mortality. Is the price of your “field” more costly to you than the cost of your salvation (Matt. 13:44)?

Contrasting our desire for the power of his resurrection with the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings has been the topic of sermons aplenty. But the causeway of sacrifice as the dusty trail in between is the road less traveled by. Verse 11 clarifies that to become like Jesus in his death you have to suffer. His suffering came from sacrificing; that is how you attain the power of the resurrection. Sometimes we are more like the rich young man who went away sad after Jesus’ instruction to sacrifice all his wealth than we are the writer of Philippians 3 who embraced the challenge of suffering through sacrifice as a means to receive power from on high. Remember the author, Paul, was wealthy by all worldly standards till he gave it all up to follow Jesus and do his will. Paul said he had learned in plenty or in want to be content. He found fulfillment in sacrifice.

We, on the other hand, are quite unaccustomed to sacrifice in our society. Whatever your wealth is it’s the features of your life that make you feel rich, comfortable, powerful, respected, esteemed, useful, proud. Nevertheless God doesn’t want you to hoard up earthly wealth. The currency of heaven, your true riches, are: sacrifice, faith, faithfulness, love, righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. You may have to sacrifice the wealth you’re accustomed to on earth to gain riches in heaven. However, too often we build upon the self-gratifying earthly sands of success rather than offering the sacrifice of our flesh upon the altar of obedience. The ministry (career, relationships, or ambitions) we worked so hard for slips through our fingers and out of our grasp, causing our testimony to suffer the most damage.

Ministry is built on the living stones of testimony. Testimony is built upon the acts of God. Even God’s ministry to the Children of Israel was built on testimony. In Exodus the Ark of the Covenant was first known as the Ark of the Testimony. Moses was commanded to put in the ark the manna that God had given in the desert for generations to see and know God provides. The tablets inscribed by the finger of God, the Ten Commandments, were also to be put in there. They were called the tablets of the testimony. Exodus 25:22 tells us: There, above the cover between the two cherubim that are over the ark of the Testimony, I will meet with you… that place was called the Mercy Seat. It is the place where the manifested presence of God dwelt. It is where God ministered. But it was on top of the testimony. God’s ministry is seated upon testimony. If you ruin your testimony you don’t have a place for God to be seated in ministry in your life.

What is your testimony? The Apostle John qualified his account of the gospel with his testimony and not his ministry in John 21:24. Jesus insisted on being established by the testimony of God concerning him and ministry. God established in Exodus ministry must be built on testimony and testimony comes from the acts of God. What has God done in your life? Are you giving God space in your home to make your life a testimony? If you’re married, God wants to make you a testimony concerning matrimony. He gives children to be his Godly manifested offspring, his inheritance. What are you doing with them? Are you shipping them off to “boarding school” so you can do your “ministry”? Remember ministry includes your job, your school, your ambitions, and your dreams for yourself. Are you investing your home and your life in the Lord or spending your life on earthly riches and labeling it “ministry”?

My oldest son is only 14. I can’t say yet how our investment is going. I feel like I’ve sacrificed so much already by leaving my career to be at home and on top of that committing to home school all my children. But I still find myself spending time ‘‘away” from them by working on the computer, reading, or watching Christian programming. I am involved with ministerial projects because I need the “break”. I completely believe in being at home and why I am doing it. Once again I am in need of regrouping as I perceive my ministry hand stealing from my testimony jar. But sacrificing by centering myself even more in my home burns my flesh. It devours all my plans and ideas for “ministry.” However, it is my opportunity to build for God a testimony. You know what? God’s not interested in my ministry anyway. He’s interested in HIS ministry! His ministry is hindered when my testimony is tainted. In my death to self however,  I provide the opportunity for God to shape living stones – testaments – out of my children, out of my marriage, out of my life. It is called sacrifice. I sacrifice what I feel is valuable then God gets the most value out of my life. From that testimony God can do some ministry. Sometimes ministry to the masses starts with cleaning messes.

The Bible declares it is God who opens and closes the womb. This is one of the ways God wants to manifest his testimony through me: motherhood. I am glad in my spirit and humbled to think how much God must trust me to give me five of his own special testaments. Even though I question in my soul and fear a bit for the future, I will not submit to my feelings. I choose to “feel” blessed and excited even as Mary chose to bless the Lord with her confession upon hearing the news of her impending immaculate conception. She knew immediately the journey would be difficult. No one was going to believe she was pregnant by God. How many unfaithful girls had tried that one before? What was Joseph going to think or say? How was she going to manage a child at such a young age? Yet, she knew that if God gave her this child it was his good will and pleasure to ensure a victorious outcome in the end. And he did; a very victorious outcome. Surely, we don’t think God will do any less for us?

Every good and perfect gift comes from the Father above. If you being evil know how to give good gifts how much more your Father in Heaven. Children are a heritage from the Lord; a gift from him. He makes the two become one flesh. Why one flesh? For a Godly offspring.  These are all declarations from the word of God. They are God’s words. They are his testimony concerning family. Maybe we need to redefine our words concerning testimony. Perhaps a change is in order with regards to priorities and ministry. I for one have taken another look, with good reason, at what sacrificing my life for his glory means. I never want to stray from God’s will for my life. I want to be a living testimony God can dwell in and minister through. I will not steal from the ministry of God; I will add to his testimony. And if it be through having more children while having less time, energy, and opportunity to minister, “may it be unto me as You have said.” May ministry never steal from the testimony God created me to give to the world concerning his glory.

What will you say?

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