A blogger named Shawn Blanc who writes at The Fight Spot that I have just begun reading wrote a great post today. It is a post for those who long to be God’s hands, feet, eyes, ears, mind and heart to the world, but feel like they lack leadership ability, maturity in God and knowledge of His Word. And as Shawn says, “The Western Church has told them they ought to graduate seminary and be a youth pastor for six years before they can really get going. But that doesn’t work for everyone.” He goes on to share some great wisdom from Psalm 119:
If you open up the word to the book of
ProverbsPsalms, David lays out the secret to wisdom, understanding and leadership ability. It’s called spiritual hunger. It’s a road to leadership ability, maturity in God and knowledge of the Word that all can take. The greatest king Israel has ever had tells us how him and God did it:“You, through Your commandments, make me wiser than my enemies; for they (Gods commandments) are ever with me. I have more understanding than all my teachers, for Your testimonies (the Bible) are my meditation. I understand more than the ancients (past leaders), because I keep your precepts.”
Psalm 119 is the poor man’s psalm. It’s a psalm for those of us who are desperate for maturity and understanding and wisdom from God but have no means to get it. We are poor and helpless. The only place we have to turn is to the Bible. We have no incredible mentors. We don’t have amazingly Godly parents. We’re stuck cleaning toilets while the leaders are off in another room.
I remember feeling this way when I began ministry work almost 4 years ago. I was 23 and called to minister to people in positions of power in the American government. I remember thinking, “How the heck can I minister and lead THESE people?” Sure I could speak their language because I had a Political Science degree and worked with them for a year, but I had no “formal” training in pastoring or ministry at all…
Like Shawn, really the only thing I worked off of was my hunger for the Lord and His Words and love of those people to whom I ministered.
Now as I prep to begin seminary this fall to “train” to be a pastor, I am thankful for a beginning that was build solely on a love of God and people and not academia or knowledge and a deep down sense that my calling as a pastor was just that, a calling NOT based on a piece of paper that says Master of Divinity on it. And as I begin a new season of preparation I hope that doesn’t change, I hope my focus remains on growing as a child of God first and growing in the wisdom of the Lord first and developing as a leader of God’s people first, rather than simply becoming a seminary student studying for another career move.
-jeremy
