Onward, Christian Soldiers!

2 Timothy 2:1-4 You therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. 2 And the things that you have heard from me among many witnesses, commit these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also. 3 You therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. 4 No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier.

     No one who is called to serve the Lord in the Christian ministry at any level should expect things to be easy. There are many passages of the Bible that teach us this. Moses led the children of Israel out of Egypt with tremendous miracles. Yet he struggled constantly with problems: the golden calf, the refusal to go into the promised land, and Korah’s rebellion. God punished Moses by not allowing him to enter the promised land because he became angry with the people when they complained. David suffered persecution from Saul and rebellion from his own son Absalom. Jesus healed ten lepers, but only one returned to give thanks. Paul was beaten, stoned, shipwrecked and imprisoned for preaching the Gospel. Christians should not expect an overwhelming positive response to their labors. 

     I was once a circuit visitor who gave guidance to a dozen or so churches and pastors. One morning a young pastor who had recently graduated from the seminary wept in my office as he told me about the problems in his congregation: “I have a congregation of Methodists,” he lamented. I told him be thankful you didn’t have a congregation of pagans! When I was a student pastor in Wisconsin, I attended a church meeting that became a little heated. Afterwards, and elderly, retired teacher told me: “Don’t get worried about meetings like this until they bring baseball bats!” 

     Christian servants must expect difficulties, ask God for His help, and soldier on with all their duties. Paul told Timothy to be strong in the grace of God. That is indeed where we find our strength to endure all the hardships of ministry. We realize how God has graciously helped us and has been patient with us. We realize how important God’s grace is when we remember that the opposition to all our labors demonic. Paul said, 

“For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 6.12)

     I have seen a number of pastors and lay people leave the service of Christian ministry because they expected that ministry to be like their labors in other endeavors. That is a big mistake. Satan may not be so happy with someone who builds a house for his family, but he is really unhappy with Christians who tried to build churches in what he thinks is his spiritual domain. He throws every possible obstacle in their way. In fact it is probably true that the more valuable the ministry that you are called to perform, the more opposition to it there will be. Paul told Timothy and us to expect this, but also to be strong and to endure. 

     How does one “be strong in the grace of God”? That strength has always come through prayer. Jesus regularly went out into the wilderness to pray, and He often did so for hours at a time. His prayers were not just laments to God and pleas for help. As we see in his temptation in the wilderness and in His prayer in the Upper Room, He was focused on the truths of God’s word. Those truths, remembered again and again, strengthen our faith and give us stamina to keep serving. Sirach, the rabbi who lived a couple of hundred years before Jesus said, 

My son, if you come forward to serve the Lord,
    prepare yourself for temptation.
² Set your heart right and be steadfast,    and do not be hasty in time of calamity.³ Cleave to him and do not depart,    that you may be honored at the end of your life. (Sirach 2.1-3)

     God help us to cling to You and to find strength in Your grace to endure all hardships of Christian service. Amen. 

Onward Christian Soldiers

Mustard Seed Faith

Luke 17:1-6 Then He said to the disciples, “It is impossible that no offenses should come, but woe to him through whom they do come! 2 It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones. 3 Take heed to yourselves. If your brother sins against you, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him. 4 And if he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times in a day returns to you, saying, ‘I repent,’ you shall forgive him.”5 And the apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith.”

6 So the Lord said, “If you have faith as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be pulled up by the roots and be planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.

     Following Jesus has never been easy. In Luke seventeen Jesus told His disciples that they must live by the divine law that says: Call out sin, but forgive sin. Hate the sin, but love the sinner. And do this over and over and over again. This is also what Jesus taught us to pray in the Lord’s Prayer... “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” It is not easy to confess our sins and call out the sins of others. It is not easy to forgive those who have sinned against us. Sometimes we find it hard to believe that God can forgive our sins. How do we avoid getting angry when someone has said something inappropriate about us? How do we forgive the person who has stolen from us? How do we fight that feeling that says, “Sorry” is not good enough? How do we pray for those who promote false, wicked and destructive ideas? At its very heart and core, the Christian life is a very hard life that goes against everything in our nature. 

     The disciples rightly responded to Jesus’s teaching by saying, “Increase our faith.” This is another one of those very beautiful prayers that we find in the Bible. It is very similar to the prayer of the father of the demon possessed boy who said, “Lord, I believe, help Thou mine unbelief!” (Mark 9.24) Faith can and certainly does increase. In Psalm one we read that faith like a tree planted by streams of water. It grows and produces fruit. But for faith to increase, Jesus impresses something very important upon His disciples. He tells them that faith must be a gift from God, like a mustard seed. No one has ever created their own seed. Seeds come from God. Seeds are miraculous. Seeds that are hundreds of years old and have been planted and have sprouted to life. 

     Mustard seed faith is the gift of faith. Peter said that we were redeemed, “not of corruptible seed but of incorruptible, through the word of God that lives and abides forever” (1 Peter 1.23). So the answer to the disciple’s request, Increase our faith, is: continue to follow Jesus. Listen to all that He says. Meditate on His word and respond to it with your prayers. Follow Him to the cross for your redemption. As you continually ask God for forgiveness, you will find the power of faith in your own heart to forgive the sins of others.