Latest / The Living Waters Podcast / Ep. 406 - How to Know if You’re Called to Ministry

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Ep. 406 - How to Know if You’re Called to Ministry · The Living Waters Podcast

• 1:04
  SPEAKER_03: Do not enter the ministry if you can help it.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_03: If any student in this room could be content to be a newspaper editor or a grocer or a farmer or a doctor or a lawyer or a senator or a king in the name of heaven and earth, let him go his way.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_03: If, on the other hand, you can say that for all the wealth of both Indies, you could not and would not give up preaching Christ and depend upon it.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_03: If other things be equally satisfactory, you have the seed of a true call.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_04: We're going to the chapel and we're gonna get married.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_04: Go into the chapel of love.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_04: Sorry.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_03: So of all days, to forget putting on your wedding ring, it had to be the day I was officiating at my son's wedding.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: You forgot to put on your ring.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, I get to the venue.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_03: By the way, Franzel, my son got married this past Saturday.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_03: This was our third to get married.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_05: Beautiful wedding.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_05: So is the wedding still valid?
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_03: No.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, completely disqualified.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_03: Look at McCole.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_03: So I show up and I'm talking, you know, getting ready, and I look and I'm like, I don't have my wedding ring.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_03: The only other time I remember doing that was when Rachel and I went on a podcast to talk about marriage together.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_05: So do you ever take it off regularly?
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_03: Well, yeah, at night when I sleep.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_03: You what?
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_03: Single bust, Rachel.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_05: I have ever taken this off since I got married.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, right.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_03: No wow.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_03: You won't better get it off.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, you have.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_05: I'd probably take it off for like five seconds and put it back on, but yeah, it's been proven.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_03: Then you lied.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_03: My ring.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_01: Because my fingers are so tweaked.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's a silicone ring.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, very smart.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_03: Put it on your pinky and cover up that disgusting broken.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_03: Oh.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_03: Wait, have you not?
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_08: Have you ever seen his VP?
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_03: Should be illegal.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_03: Seriously.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_08: This evidence of fallen creation.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_08: That's symbolism for the crickness of your soul.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_03: By the way, friends, you hear people laughing in the studio today because they understand good quality humor.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_03: Mine, welcome, our friends, here in the studio for the Ambassador's Academy.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_03: And our dear friend Michael Clark is with us today, too.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_03: Not for the academy, but the hang.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_03: So anyway, yeah.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_03: So anyway, yeah.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_03: Yep.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_03: That's the title of the stuff.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_05: So anyway.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_03: But yeah, Danny got married and what a He married his fiance.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_05: It was wonderful.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_05: His ex-girlfriend was actually.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I had the idea on the spot.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so that's just weird.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_03: But forgetting things.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_03: You know, Rachel said something to me that I thought about all the time.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_03: She goes, Do you ever double check to make sure you actually put on your deodorant?
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_03: You guys go through that?
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_03: Like where you you do something like that.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_03: Well we know when you do and when you don't.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_03: That's true.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_03: Every Monday.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_03: You do something so so routine that you don't even recognize you're doing it.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_05: Why do you think we have worship without raising hands in this ministry?
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_03: Because of me.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_03: I know.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_05: Keep the arms down.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_05: And speaking of that, please don't hug me if you're tall.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_05: I go straight into the armpit.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_05: At least all the time.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_05: People say, I love your ministry.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_05: Let me out of here.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_03: Get me out of here.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_03: Oh man.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_03: And uh I seriously, I you guys were playing patty cakes before we went on the contest.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_03: That's what I have to deal with here on this podcast.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_03: And who was joining them in the patty cakes?
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_03: None other than uh John Haris.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_03: Hariz.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_03: My Lebanese brother.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_03: Keep a kabib.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_03: Habib it open.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_03: I was offended you didn't bring me tabuli with you from England.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_00: I wanted to imported Tabouli from English.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: I've got to tell you, Tabul is the hardest thing you can do.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: My wife can do it, but it takes all day.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_05: Really?
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_05: All day?
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_05: Tabul is really hard work.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_05: You have to grow the parsley or what?
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_03: Of course.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_03: It's just the shop is so far away.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, is that one of this?
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_03: So good to have you back with us, brother.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_03: It's great to be here.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you so much.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_03: You survived with Oscar and Mark messing with your screen and sure.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: I survived.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: I'm actually I look very strange right now, hugging my DJ.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_03: I know.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_03: He's putting a portrait.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_03: Poor guy.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_03: All right, time for a cool classy comment.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_03: Whoa.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_03: This is from Fiona.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_03: Hi, I have been listening to your podcast for years, and the Lord's greatly used you in my sanctification.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_03: I remember you mentioning that you try to use up all the toothpaste in the tube.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_03: Makes me wonder if you open up the tube too, or have you not yet struggled to the point of shedding the tube.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_03: Referencing Hebrews there.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_03: I love you all.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_03: Especially easy singing.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_03: And Oscar's dad jokeslash Chuck Norris.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_03: Do you sing?
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_03: Fiona.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_03: Ray, you know you're jealous.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you so much, Fiona.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you for encouraging.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_03: Appreciate it.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_08: Fiona, Fiona.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_08: That's one way of looking at it.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_03: All right.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_03: You've just entered the quality question section.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_03: This one will be answered by Ray Comfort.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_03: Hello, friends.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_03: First of all, I would like to say thank you for your ministry.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_03: I love the tracts that Living Waters produces and enjoyed listening often to the Living Waters podcast.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_03: I've been aware of your ministry for about two years now.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_03: And about one year ago, I almost stopped listening to any content because I believed that some of the comments I heard from the men were indicating that you believe that your belief was that good works comes alongside to help save a person and keep that person out of hell.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_03: No.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_03: That's the furthest thing from what we believe.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_03: I prayed much about this and dug deeper, researching previous podcasts and articles and YouTube videos from your ministry and had peace that in fact you do not believe that good works produces salvation.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_03: But rather it's a fruit of salvation.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_03: With this conclusion, I've continued to purchase your tracts and consume your content.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_03: I'm wondering, what's your stance?
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_03: What is your stance on young children getting saved?
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_03: Do you believe that a child can really repent and believe the sit the weight that is needed, or that a person must have a fuller understanding of the weight of their sin and the gravity of Jesus' sacrifice on the cross?
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_05: Yes and no.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_05: I saw what happened.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_05: I just got a text and um I watched my three children get born.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_05: And the first time my child was born, the first kid, I just thought the doctor was incredible.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_05: And the nurses were incredible.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_05: What they did was just amazing, blew me away.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_05: The second child that was born, I thought, that was good.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_05: Third one, I thought I could do this myself at home.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_05: Seriously, it's just really zero.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_05: No complications.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_05: All you've got to do in the birthing of a child is guide the head.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_05: And if I was called to some woman who's having a baby, they say, Would you do this?
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_05: I know exactly what to do.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_05: You guide the head as it comes out and it's there.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_05: And that's that's as simple as that.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_05: And it's exactly the same spiritually.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_05: All we've got to do is guide the head.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_05: The good soil herer and the parable of the sower is he who hears and understands.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_05: Philip the Ethiopian, Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch, he said to the Ethiopian, Do you understand what you're reading?
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_05: And that's what must be necessary.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_05: That's what's necessary with a child.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_05: He must understand that he's a sinner, that Jesus died for him, that he must repent and trust in Jesus.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_05: It's actually very simple.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_05: We make it very complicated, but I don't think we can discount a five-year-old from coming to a place of repentance.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_05: And he stayed within the church until the hormones kicked in and then he's off and he's hardened against the gospel.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_05: You don't want to do that.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_05: You want to make sure the child, so if I had a child that was, say, five years old and says, I want to become a Christian, I'd say, Tell me why you want to become a Christian.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_05: What's your motive?
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_05: Is it because your friends are, or because you know you're a sinner?
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_05: Get a confession of sin from his own heart.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_05: Do you realize you're a sinner in God's eyes?
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_05: Tell me what did Jesus did do on the cross, and are you sorry for your sins and willing to turn from them?
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_05: And then I'd say, You want to pray and ask God to forgive you, I'll pray with you, and then I want to take you outside and show you something very important.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_05: And after we prayed, I'd bring him outside and show him an apple tree.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_05: I'd say, see this?
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_05: It's an apple tree.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_05: If this tree didn't show apples coming forth, what would I do?
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_05: I'd cut it down.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_05: So the apple tree proves to be a genuine apple tree because it brings forth fruit.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_05: And so I'd say as a father, I'm gonna look for fruit in your life as a Christian.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_05: And if there's no fruit, then there's no salvation.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_05: I'd explain.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_05: I'd cut them off, totally cut them off, just lamb by limb.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_05: Chainsaw out.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_05: But seriously, that's what I'd say.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_05: I want to see fruit.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_05: I want to see you show respect to your mom, not because you're trying to earn heaven, because you want to show God you're genuine in your faith.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_05: I want to look for fruit.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_03: That's such a such a great balance, Ray.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_03: You know, I I've shared before that Rachel, your daughter, my wife, came to Christ through recognizing that she couldn't stop being horrible to her brothers.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_05: She was how old was she seven?
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, I think so.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_03: And she genuinely was broken over her sin.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_03: And same thing, you know, we again using the law as a schoolmaster.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_03: Um, you want to hold up God's standard so your kids see they they fall short of it and then they're ready for the gospel.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_03: You can't do it.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_03: Christ can.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_03: All five of my children got got saved at a young age.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_03: You and I baptized them all, and they're all going on for the Lord.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_03: So yeah, I would never withhold the kingdom from uh from anyone if they understand and they're broken over their sin.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_03: It's great.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_03: Amen.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_02: All right, get ready.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_02: Make sure I'm in the right place.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, get ready for a shout-out from the Sheikh of Shawarma, the number one top podcast in Fiji.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_02: Bula Bula.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_02: Bula Bula.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_03: What's Bula Bula?
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_03: Fiji.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_03: That's like their greeting.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_03: Hello.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_03: It's Bula Bula.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, I had a blast in Fiji.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_03: It was one of my favorite.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_03: Very friendly, very friendly people.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_05: And very good rugby players.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_03: Oscar, you had an amazing encounter.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_03: Was it in Fiji when you went on the boat?
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_03: Moses.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_08: Yes, the fisherman.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_08: Oh man, that was incredible.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_08: He was he was weeping over the gospel.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_08: Yeah, that's season 10 of uh Way of the Master.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_08: The Fiji boat with him, right?
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_08: Yeah, he took us out deep deep sea fishing.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_08: We went out there for about 15 minutes, and I no disrespect to people like to fish.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_08: It's the most boring thing in the world.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_08: You're just sitting there holding a stick in water.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_08: Like I don't understand.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_08: Why did they call it sports?
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_08: They call that a sport.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_08: Yeah, I'm not kidding you.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_05: It's a sport apparently.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_05: Hate fishing.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_05: I love catching.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_08: Yeah, that's a really good point.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_08: So we went out there fishing and it took us 30 seconds.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_08: And then uh he goes, you know, there's a coral that we can snorkel when we're done fishing.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_08: And I go, We're done fishing.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_03: So we went and snorkeled the coral, and I got to share the gospel with him.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_03: And yeah, he wept.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_03: Moses.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_03: How many of each animal did Moses take on the ark?
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_05: The word snorkel is an amazing word, isn't it?
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_03: Snorkel.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_05: What's the etymology of snorkel?
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_05: It comes from the word snork, which is Greek, which means you cannot sniff underwater.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_05: Snorkel.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_05: It's always going to be bearing as cool.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_03: Number one, top Christian podcast in Fiji, number two top podcasts in religion and spirituality there, and the top ten podcasts out of all categories.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_03: Really?
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_03: That's incredible.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_03: Awesome.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_08: Listen, Mark and Ray and Easy talk about how they only go to countries they've never visited.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_08: I, on the other hand, will revisit Fiji for the Lord.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_08: So if you want us to come out there, I would love to revisit Fiji.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_08: No, no, no.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_03: You've already been there.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_03: You've already been to Fiji.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_02: All right, friends, and now a radically revolutionary resource.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_03: This podcast is brought to you by All Things Broken and Beautiful by my beautiful daughter, Ray's granddaughter, Julia Zwain.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_03: And it's fitting.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_03: Uh in fact, I I wasn't going to be promoting this today until Daniel, uh Ray's son, my brother-in-law, told me that we got an email about the book.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_03: So I'm going to read that right now to you all.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_03: I found this book while listening to the Living Waters Podcast episode, Finding Beauty and Brokenness.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_03: It was definitely God's timing when I heard that episode, as I was in a very dark place the first time I heard it.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_03: While Julia was sharing her story in the episode, it felt like she was speaking directly to me.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_03: And then when she read the poems, it broke me and healed me all at once.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_03: It broke the darkness that was around me and brought me back and reminded me of the joy, goodness, and beauty of God and his power and faithfulness to us.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_03: I've listened to that episode multiple times since then in other seasons of darkness.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_03: And I finally decided I needed to buy the full book.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_03: I've been so lifted up by the poems in this book.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_03: The light and encouragement it shines is so powerful and so reflective of Christ's strength and his love.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you for sharing the joy and pain God brought you through to be able to encourage others.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_03: There truly is so much beauty in the brokenness that brings us to Christ.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_03: Your sister in Christ, Victoria Atkins.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_03: How did you not cry over here?
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_03: I cried in my office when I first read it.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_03: So I already got it off.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_05: Have we got an audiobook of that?
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_05: She could have audio.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_05: Get her in the studio to read.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_03: We should do that, yeah.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_03: So, friends, check it out.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_03: It really is uh I can read it in an Indian accent.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_08: We want people to listen to it, though.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_02: All things broken and beautiful by Julia Zwain.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_02: And don't forget Living Waters Money Devon Study Bible, Living Waters TV, all that Living Waters, the death metal version.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_03: And don't forget, friends, the podcast YouTube channel.
• 14:27
  unknown: Doing better.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_03: Habib you got a lag job?
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, Habibia and Hon.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_03: All for you.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_03: All right, friends.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_03: Today, along with our friend John Harris, who's gonna be helping us deal with this.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_03: You needed some help.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_03: We needed a graciously accepted.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_03: We brought the big gun.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_03: Today we're talking about how to know if you're called to ministry.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_03: Funny, we're all in ministry.
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_03: I still don't know if I'm calling.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, Oscar said the jury's still out of your discover.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_03: Um what what you know what a what an important thing to discuss.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_03: Um, how do we what's going on?
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_03: Something happened?
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_03: What are you laughing at?
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_03: I have to protect myself because you guys are dangerous.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_08: You guys will not see him open air preach to vile people and have more confidence than he does right now and sitting next to Mark and I.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_03: You guys are terrible.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um, anything that Mark says that sounds remotely wise, I want to say he read them off my notes.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: Just saying.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_03: For sure.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_03: That's how he gets all his content.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_03: Well mine.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_03: Um yeah, but but you know, that this is important, guys.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_03: Uh a lot of ministry obviously deals with the handling of the word of God.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_03: And I think that one of the first verses that comes to mind in that regard is James 3:1.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_03: My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we will receive a stricter judgment.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_03: And that that I think that has deterred many uh people from entering ministry because they recognize, wow, that this is serious, this is this is important.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_03: But at the same time, God doesn't make the standard so elusive that no one could be in ministry, which God calls people to be in.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_03: And so I I I think it's it's important for us to to probe this and to ask ourselves, yeah, how does someone know?
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_03: Because that that's ultimately the question we all asked it at some point in our lives.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_03: You know, Ray, for you, ministry came quickly.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, in terms of getting into the ministry, you you weren't full-time at first, but how how quickly did you end up becoming full-time?
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_03: I have no idea.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_05: Yes, I do.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_05: Um, I I hadn't my own business, um, and I used to pay um rent, and I didn't have uh the guy that that I paid rent to just sold it under me, and a guy walked in my business and said, You're out of here.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_05: So I got kicked out, had to work from home.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_05: Moved out of home to the local um city into the city and started working in there and began preaching in the in the square for many years.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_05: That opened up into a an itinerant ministry through the drug prevention thing.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_05: Remember, we had a drug prevention center on High Street, which is an unfortunate choice of street names for a drug center.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_05: And then uh instead of making leather jackets, but I used to make five leather jackets for people each week, it moved to one a week because I was so caught up in ministry for the for the gospel.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_05: And so uh our local pastor in a in a church I was going to said, Would you come full time?
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_05: And it came at a time that was perfect for me because I didn't have much income because I was so caught up in itinerating for the whole drug prevention work.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_05: So I think it was a desire of my heart that that God gave me, I really wanted to go full time, and um he had prepared me for it.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_05: So I think that's that's how you know that God's in something, circumstances and your desire has been given by God beforehand.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_03: That's good.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_05: If any man desire the offer, the uh position of a bishop, he desires a good work.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_05: So that word desire is in there twice in that one verse, first Timothy chapter three, verse one.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_05: Thank you.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and you know, let me let me just be clear here.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_03: When we're talking about ministry, friends, we're we're not just talking about full-time ministry.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_03: Um this could be ministry in your church, it could be ministry in your neighborhood, it could be ministry in connection with a parachurch organization or a church and so on and so forth.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_03: But but that that sense of like how do I know I'm called?
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_03: And you know, obviously we're also gonna be talking about the full-time ministry, that's an important thing to touch on.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_03: How do I know that I'm called?
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_03: And then how do I know what I'm called to do?
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_03: I think are are important questions.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_03: Good questions.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_08: Uh I get asked this question a lot um from both young men who are of college age trying to figure out what to do with their lives, uh, and by adults who have full-time careers, uh successful careers, own their own home, trying to figure out where the Lord is calling them to.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_08: And and so one, I have I have the five C's that I'll go over later on when we're ready for that.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_08: But one of the other conversations that I have with them right away is to make sure they have a clear understanding of the of the uh dichotomy, the false dichotomy of a secular sacred divide.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_08: That's super important.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_08: And what I mean by that sorry, Oscar.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_08: What's dichotomy means?
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, we know what dichotomy means.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_05: It means a contrasting of two things for inner society.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_07: Oh, yeah.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_05: It was nothing really.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_05: Uh so what came after it was a little bit of a brain fall.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_08: Secular sacred divide?
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, thank you.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_08: Yeah, so one of the things that Roman Catholicism did in the 1200 to 1500s is created this secular sacred divide in which you walked into this huge cathedral on a Sunday with the bells ringing, calling you to come in, and you'd sit down in the pew and you would watch the priest perform the sacred.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_08: And they would teach what we are doing up here on stage, a ministering communion, preaching from the Bible.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_08: This is sacred work.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_08: What you do out there in this city, that's secular work.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_08: And the only way that you can really participate in our sacred work is by financing it or moving completely into the sacred, right?
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_08: So there's this secular sacred divide.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_08: And one of the things we talk about the Reformation often, uh, you know, a lot of what they the five solas is as a prime example of a lot of the stuff that they focused on.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_08: But one of the things that we lose focus on is the reality that they also hold the walls of the secular sacred divide down.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_08: Uh, one of the things that Luther and Calvin and others really wanted to promenade is the reality is that there is no secular sacred divide.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_08: All work is work done to the glory of God.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_08: And there's this famous story, we don't even know if it's true or not.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_08: Um, let's just call it an idiom.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_08: Uh, and it goes like this: that a shoemaker becomes a Christian one day during the Reformation and he writes Luther a letter, and he's like, Man, I'm a Christian now.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_08: What should I do?
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_08: Should I sell my business and go into full-time ministry, go to seminary?
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_08: Should I start putting crosses on every shoe that I ever made?
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_08: Should I start, you know, sliding gospel tracts in every soul?
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_08: What should I do?
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_08: Every soul?
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_08: You like that?
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah, I thought that's good.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_08: What should I do?
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_08: And uh the the the story goes that Luther wrote back simply make excellent shoes.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_08: And the idea here is that all work is God-glorifying work when we do it with excellence.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_08: And the problem is, is that today we have a secular, sacred divide still.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_08: We think we walk in a church and what we see our worship leader and pastor doing is the sacred, and we are the secular.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_08: And how how do you know this?
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_08: I I think that often when you assume that ministry, that vocation in ministry somehow equals proximity to God.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_08: Because I see that a lot of guys are like, man, if I just got into full-time ministry, I'd finally be able to kill that sin.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_08: I'd finally be able to grow in confidence, I'd finally be able to shield myself from sinful people.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_08: We think that the answer is getting into ministry, then everything will click into place.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_08: But I mean, uh man, the second you get into ministry, if anything else, the devil really starts to focus on you, right?
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_08: The faith crisis really comes uh to fruition.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_08: And so faithfulness is a calling, not a vocation.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_08: And first and foremost, before you're asking, Am I called?
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_08: It's important for you to recognize that all work is sacred work.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_08: Amen.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_03: Amen.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_03: That's good.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I mean, when you think about how many people are called to ministry versus how many are not, and then when you think about how many people there are in the world, who's called to reach them, right?
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_03: And that's what I love.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_03: In 2 Corinthians 5, where Paul's talking about a ministry that we all have, it says he's given us the ministry of reconciliation, that God wants to plead through us to the world to be reconciled to Christ.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_03: So I would say, as a primary point to make, look, all of us are called into ministry, and our primary ministry is being conduits through which God proclaims the gospel.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_03: Isn't that powerful?
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_03: Plead through us to the world.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_03: Amen.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_03: Be reconciled to God on behalf of Christ.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_01: So then therefore the topic of today's show is how do I know I'm called into ministry vocationally by teaching vocationally.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_01: That's it.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that's a part of it.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I love what Oscar shared there.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's so good.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: It's not, you're not in ministry once you are vocationally getting paid or something to that degree.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, vocation is a part of it.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_03: We're touching on all subjects.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_03: John, you know, what I love about you is that you weren't one of those people that was waiting around for full-time ministry vocation, but ministry has just been an kind of an outgrowth of who you are in Christ.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_03: Tell us a little bit about your story.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I I mean I like what um um Oscar said earlier, talking about before I'm a before you ask, Am I cold?
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: And therefore I would say, Am I already serving?
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_00: Am I already serving?
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_00: What am I serving in?
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_00: Is the gift that you have?
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_00: Are you uh is it evident in the way that you're serving?
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: Are you um, for example, when David went out to slaughter Goliath, he was already serving as a shepherd, protecting the sheep from bears and lions.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_00: So he was already doing it.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: Before Moses went out there and brought out people, the the Hebrews out of Egypt, he was already, he already loved the Hebrews, he was already protecting them, he was already responding in a way that you would expect him to do because he loved the people that he that God called him to rescue.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: Also, Joseph, when he became, before he became a ruler over all of Egypt, he was already doing ministry work.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_00: He was the head of Potiphar's household, he was already the head of the uh the in prison, the other of other prisoners.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_00: So in every situation he was put into, he was already serving in that area until God then called him for a greater purpose.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I think in our ministry and the work that we do, the question really to ask is that are you faithful in what God has given you today?
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_00: Are you doing what you're supposed to be doing for him, for the kingdom?
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_00: And then ministry can grow out of that.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_00: So your faithfulness in the work that you're doing determines the outcome of the ministry that you're doing.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_03: Faithfulness.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_03: Faithfulness.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_03: Mark, you and I have been serving in full-time ministry together now for over a quarter of a century.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_03: Long time.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, well, over 25 years.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_03: And I I remember the different challenges that you went through back both in Bible college as you were heading toward ministry and then in af even afterwards.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_03: So, what what's your background in that?
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_03: And how did you get that sense, like, okay, this is what God has for me?
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I I desired since I got saved to enter into full-time vocational uh ministry.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_01: I I didn't know what that was gonna look like.
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_01: I thought, I thought that was gonna deal with evangelism, and it and it happened to be that very thing.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_01: But I remember even sharing with you um several years ago when we were on staff at another church, where you said, Mark, where do you where do you see yourself?
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_01: You know, the future I said, serving you, you know, when I wasn't, when I wasn't even in ministry, you know, I at the time.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_01: I was just living in a house uh with a bunch of guys, and we were teaching them how to play the guitar, teaching them uh how to uh be brick masons and to do uh different carpentry, uh things of that nature, and then also uh teaching them.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_01: And I it was my job to just cook the guys and to make sure that they're not burning down the house.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_01: And then it got to the place where the different teachers that were supposed to come in uh every day, Monday through Friday, that they would kind of call out for whatever reason.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_01: They they were busy with whatever they were doing.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_01: So now we have all these guys, this full-time one-year internship at this house across the street from the Richard Nixon Library birthplace.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_01: And they're saying, All right, so we're ready to learn, you know, teach us.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, I what?
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_01: And I didn't know what I was doing.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_07: Yeah.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: So I remember uh listening to a sermon and then beginning to read commentaries and then piecing together different commentaries to put together a message without having any idea how melodically to put a message together.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_01: And then uh I just sat down and I began to teach the guys, and I was getting blessed as I was studying it.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_01: And then they started to get blessed as I was teaching it.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_01: And then finally, I was called into an elders' meeting and I and I was asked the question, Mark, do you desire to become a pastor?
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, I I I do.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I do.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_01: I desire to minister to God's people in a full-time capacity.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_01: I I'm not sure what that's going to look like, but I was already serving in that capacity.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_01: I was already teaching to John's point.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I didn't realize that I was doing that very thing.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_01: I thought that I had to be in front of the church on the Thursday night midweek or on the Sunday morning service or the Sunday night.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_01: Though I wasn't doing those things, I was teaching, I was discipling the people around me in a very small fashion.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_01: And it reminds me, right, be faithful to small things, then you become leader or ruler over much.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_01: And if you can't teach five-year-olds, you're not gonna be able to teach 50-year-olds.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_01: So start off with uh the the children's ministry.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_01: Go in and serve.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_01: You should already be serving, you should get to church early and you should leave late.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_01: This is your community.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_01: I remember going to our senior pastor and saying, Hey, we should start a uh a barbecue ministry.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_01: And he said, What do you mean?
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, Well, after service, everybody goes uh away to lunch.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_01: Well, why what if we just cooked up some hamburgers and some hot dogs here and we get to know the people at our own church?
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_01: They're gonna spend the money anyways.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_01: Why not spend it on the food here and we'll give them at cost?
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_01: And he says, Great, start it.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_01: And so I did.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_01: I I started our the barbecue ministry uh at the church, and it was at just a neat time for Coinania to have that uh fellowship with one another, and then you find yourself just ministering around the table, ministering a little bit.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_01: So that's kind of my testimony, kind of getting involved there at the church.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_01: And I thought I was gonna die at that church, and then things got financially tight.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_01: And when things got financially tight, Ray came to me and he said, Hey, what do you think about coming on staff uh for me full time?
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, Well, how about part-time?
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_01: So I came on part-time and then things got financially tight as well, and then Ray said, Hey, come on board, you know, full time.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_01: And I uh came alongside Ray to help uh design our online school, Biblical Evangelism.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_01: And then I've been here ever since.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_03: And that was you're the longest non-family staff member at Living Waters.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_03: Right, right.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_01: And the tallest.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_01: That's not saying much.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_08: Mark Mark's employee ID number is one.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_03: Um yeah, it's you know, Ray, one of the things that grieves me most with young people, I've seen this happen time and again, is they they can't find success in anything they do.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_03: And so they say, Oh, I guess I'll go into mention.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_03: I I mean it's a common thing.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_03: Oh man.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_03: I guess, you know, I I guess I mean that's a scary thought.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, there should be a passion um for God's people and for the unsaved.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_05: Um I've always had a passion for the unsaved, uh an all-consuming passion.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_05: And one thing I found that's been very effective is to be violent in prayer.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_05: And by that I mean um when the angel of the Lord um got held of by by Jacob, he said, I'll not let you go until you bless me.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_05: And he wrestled with the angel.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_05: And so, this is many years ago before I came over here.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_05: I used to get violent in prayer.
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_05: At night, I get up to pray and I'd get a pillow.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_05: Seriously, I get a pillow and I'd punch the pillow with every amount of energy I got and say, Oh God, you've got to use me.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_05: You've got to open doors.
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_05: You know, raise up laborers, give me wisdom.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_05: And I grip my teeth and punch that pillow because I had the precedent in scripture of Jacob saying, I'll not let you go until you bless me.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_05: Because God doesn't consider that to be arrogance, he considers it to be faith.
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_05: And uh and God did open doors and did raise up laborers, and it just blows me away.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_05: So I still get violent now and then.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_03: Is that what led to your book, Punchy Prayers?
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_05: Um You know, Paul, you know, uh don't pass me by was my it's always been my prayer.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_05: Don't, don't, don't consider my sins.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_05: Uh overlook them for the sake of the gospel, for the sake of the ungodly.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_05: And I plead with God to do that.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_05: And Paul said, necessity is laid upon me.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_05: You know, woe unto me if I preach not the gospel.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_05: So we've got God's will to reach the lost.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_05: He's the one that said that through Paul.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_05: Woe unto me if I preach not the gospel.
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_05: So we've got to get before God and say, Lord, please use me.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_05: Give me wisdom.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I remember for me, it was it was instant.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_03: You know, I get saved, I'm transformed, my whole life is just, I mean, turned upside down or maybe right side up.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_03: And all I knew was I I needed to tell people.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_03: There was this this burning that just wouldn't stop.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, seriously, people would practically duck and cover when they'd see me coming in those days because the gospel transformed me.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_03: But but then I I wanted to nurture people, I wanted to build people up in the Lord.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_03: And I remember I was a part of a Bible study that became the church where Mark and I pastored, and it was a little Bible study in the backyard, and it grew grew to over 200 people.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_03: And and I that's where I taught my first message ever.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_03: I was four and about four months old in the Lord.
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_03: I taught John chapter one, the deity of Christ.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_03: And I remember that night someone came up to me and just said, I see the call of God on your life, like you're called to teach.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_03: And I want to get into a little more of that, Oscar.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_03: I know you're the prophet.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_03: That's true.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_03: He's the one that ruined many people's lives, I tell you.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_03: But I want to get into that.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_03: Um but uh but but John, I I want you to touch on um the dangers in pride connected with ministry, because I mean Paul talked about being careful to not raise up a novice.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_05: Shouldn't you ask Oscar this one?
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, Oscar.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, Oscar tells about pride.
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_03: Um yeah, so touch on that, and then I want Oscar to get into he has a good breakdown here, and we can go through that.
• 33:45
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um I think the danger is that just because you're good at something, which gives you pride in knowing that you can do something, it doesn't mean you should have a ministry in that area.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um I think the danger would be that I have a burden or I want to do something, I think I'm good at it, therefore a ministry should open a door should open up.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_00: I like music, therefore I should be a worship leader.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_00: I like preaching, therefore I should be the next purgant.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um I can uh you can say I like missionary and therefore I should be in missionary uh work.
• 34:16
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's why being in the council or in the presence of other mature Christians would help you to make your decision whether you should be in a ministry in in a certain area or not.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why being grounded in a church, a good Bible-believing, God-fearing church, will help you to identify the areas where you should be in ministry because other people are probably encouraging you to be uh in those uh in those areas.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_00: Because maybe it's pride that's leading you there.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you think you're good enough, maybe you think you're great at a certain area, and therefore that's uh influencing whether you should be in ministry in a certain work or not.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_00: I know one missionary that um felt he was called to be a mission in missionary work.
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_00: I've seen him do missionary work, and it was no missionary work.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_00: It really was not producing the fruit, or even he wasn't even producing the effort.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_00: And therefore he thought he should be in ministry.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_00: But when you look at it from the outside, maybe somebody needs to advise him and say, maybe this is not your calling after all.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_05: It was more misery than mission.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'm afraid it was.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, very true.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_00: So uh yes, the danger is that you might think you're good enough because you've got certain qualities or you've got certain gifts, but your pride is getting in the way, and maybe other people need to help you to identify the areas you should be uh serving in.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_00: That's good.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_03: I I love the saying that says God doesn't call the equipped, he equips the called.
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_03: And uh sometimes people just think, yeah, I'm equipped.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_03: This is what I I'm a good speaker, I'm a good but and that's dangerous.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, we've seen it.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_03: We've seen people who are capable launch out into ministry.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_03: They were capable both with personality, dynamism, uh also with uh, you know, charis charisma, good looks, and also money.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_03: That that's where it also gets dangerous.
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_03: Also, money, the ability to fund their own ministry.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_03: That's when it gets scary.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you know, and so that that's a good point.
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_03: Um, Oscar, I want you to jump in, but I want to read this quote by Tozer.
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_03: He said, the true minister must be a man who has first met with God.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_03: He must have stood in the presence of God before he stands before men.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_03: His authority does not rise from personality, education, or position, but from a life that has been brought under the authority of God himself.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_03: That's adapted from pursuit of God.
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_03: Um a calling from God himself.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_08: So there's another aspect too, and it actually it stands out to me when you guys were talking about your um move.
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_08: You guys, Ray, Mark, easy were talking about your move into ministry, which is people might hop online and they see that you guys have a large following, um, but you've been doing ministry work before the internet, you know, at least for sure you, Ray.
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_08: Um, I mean 70s, 80s, that's pre-internet.
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_08: Uh that's super important because here's the thing.
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_08: I see so often now people also going, oh, I want to go into ministry.
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_08: I'm gonna start my own YouTube channel.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_08: I'm gonna become a social media influencer.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_08: And that is so dangerous.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_08: Listen, if you aren't qualified to shepherd a local body, you're not qualified to shepherd, influence an entire people online.
• 37:19
  SPEAKER_08: First Peter 5.2 stood out to me this morning.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_08: I was reading it.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_08: Shepherd God's flock among you.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_08: Among you.
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_08: Not overseeing out of compulsion, but willingly as God would have you.
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_08: It's important to recognize that calling is first local.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_08: It is a local, you know.
• 37:39
  SPEAKER_08: I mean, you think about Paul and Peter, like they were shepherding a local church.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_08: Yeah, they were writing, even in their letter writing, they didn't write letters to the broader audience of Christianity.
• 37:52
  SPEAKER_08: They didn't write a letter to go, this letter is being written to my 80,000 followers.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_08: No, it says to you, the Church of Philippi.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_08: They were locally focused, and everything that that they influence outside of that was God's will to influence outside of that, but it was a local thing.
• 38:12
  SPEAKER_08: And I think the problem here is that to the fact that you can grow a social media audience to be a Christian influencer, it's a spiritual bypassing of the mat of the maturation process that happens when you are being raised up in a local church by elders who are discipling you and watching your heart and seeing you serve others, seeing you pick up chairs and clean.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_08: Yeah, so true.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_03: That's good.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_03: Um, John, you went through a lot with establishing Living Waters Europe, and it's been many years.
• 38:45
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, I just remember I get this email from a guy, and I'm like, yeah, yeah, whatever, whatever, whatever.
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_03: Lebanese.
• 38:50
  SPEAKER_03: Ah.
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_03: And that's what qualified me instantly.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_03: Instantly, of course.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_03: Everything so, but one of the things people don't recognize is the intense warfare and challenges that that is a part of ministry.
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, and in part, when I hear people go, yeah, I'm gonna go into ministry, I'm like, yeah, well, you're not gonna last long because I know their attitude is not, here's what I'm here to do.
• 39:13
  SPEAKER_03: Because primarily the word ministry means service.
• 39:16
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 39:16
  SPEAKER_03: It means a minister is a servant.
• 39:18
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, I love that in Europe the the top title is usually prime minister.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_03: That means top servant, really.
• 39:25
  SPEAKER_03: But people forget that.
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_03: But talk to the challenges and the warfare that's involved in ministry so people understand what they're getting into.
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I I think in theory, if you're not being attacked, if something is not, uh if you're not feeling that um, you know, you there there are things happening around you that's trying to get in the way, it's you're probably not in ministry.
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_00: Because if everything is going well, if the devil is not targeting you, you're probably not doing something right.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_00: So the first thing is to realize that.
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_00: But uh the Paul was very clear when he spoke about the armor of God.
• 39:53
  SPEAKER_00: He told us to protect ourselves because the enemy will throw not just normal arrows, but fiery arrows.
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_00: He will throw up fiery arrows because he's trying to create as much damage as possible.
• 40:04
  SPEAKER_00: And and uh Paul was trying to warn us and be careful uh and be ready for those things.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_00: So in ministry, when you're involved in ministry, expect things not to go your way.
• 40:14
  SPEAKER_00: Expect to face challenges, expect to face trials and tribulations, and to be faithful throughout all of that.
• 40:21
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, you don't know whether somebody is faithful or not until he goes through trials and tribulations and you see his response.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um a guy once uh said, you wouldn't really know if orange is really an orange until you squeeze it, and what comes out is what's inside.
• 40:37
  SPEAKER_00: So if we're not faithful in our walk, if we don't do um, if we're not right inside, it will certainly come out during tribulations.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes God will allow that to highlight areas in your life that you need to brush up and sharpen up in order to be effective in your ministry.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_03: I heard a quote this this uh past Sunday a faith that has not been tested is a faith that cannot be trusted.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, that's good.
• 41:01
  SPEAKER_03: That is powerful.
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_03: You know, you gotta be tested because people will experience the high of, for example, a short-term missionary trip.
• 41:10
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, it's great, and you know, everything's great.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_03: And so they think, oh, I'm called into ministry, I want to do this.
• 41:15
  SPEAKER_03: What they're what they're thinking is is I love adventure, not I love service.
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_03: I want to see the person who said, Oh yeah, we went to this missionary trip into Afghanistan or Iran and and and we got persecuted and it was tough.
• 41:30
  SPEAKER_03: And oh I I just I loved doing it because we were reaching people with the God.
• 41:35
  SPEAKER_03: That's someone whose faith has been tested and it can be trusted.
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_03: You know.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_03: Uh Ray, we're we're talking about the challenges of ministry.
• 41:42
  SPEAKER_03: There are also the glories of ministry.
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_03: Uh uh Martin Lloyd Jones said this.
• 41:46
  SPEAKER_03: He said, the work of preaching is the highest and the greatest and the most glorious calling to which anyone can ever be called.
• 41:53
  SPEAKER_03: If you want something thrilling, if you want something exciting, if you want something rewarding, if you want something uplifting, there's nothing that compares with the work of preaching the gospel.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_03: It is the greatest work in the world, the most thrilling, the most exciting, the most rewarding.
• 42:08
  SPEAKER_03: Sounds like you wrote that, right?
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, well, I just uh read recently where um 11 skydivers were killed in a plane crash.
• 42:16
  SPEAKER_05: I'm not sure where it was.
• 42:17
  SPEAKER_05: Missouri.
• 42:18
  SPEAKER_05: Missouri, yeah.
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_05: And I thought, what a terrible waste.
• 42:22
  SPEAKER_05: Um and every time I hear of someone skydiving, just don't listen, Oscar.
• 42:27
  SPEAKER_05: It just uh horrifies me that any Christian would put their life on the line for the sake of a big thrill.
• 42:33
  SPEAKER_05: If you want a big thrill, go to a local university, set up a soapbox and preach to atheists that.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_03: You want adrenaline, yeah.
• 42:40
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, that'll be a great adrenaline rush, and you're not risking your life.
• 42:43
  SPEAKER_05: Well, you probably are, but it's for a good cause for the gospel.
• 42:47
  SPEAKER_05: So don't risk your life.
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_05: I I saw recently where a girl somewhere else, this is absolutely horrific, was thrown off to do a bungee jump by a number of guys, and they just forgot to attach the bungee to her and she fell to her death.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_05: And um don't risk your life unless it's for the gospel.
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_05: That's what I think.
• 43:06
  SPEAKER_05: Who is it that said?
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_05: Why'd they say that?
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_05: I think it was an idiot.
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_05: With clarity.
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_01: Who was it that said uh if God has called you to be a preacher, don't stoop to be a king?
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, right.
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_03: That was probably Spurgeon, wouldn't it?
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it probably was.
• 43:23
  SPEAKER_03: Speaking of Spurgeon, France.
• 43:25
  SPEAKER_03: Mark, comment on this one.
• 43:27
  SPEAKER_03: The first sign of the heavenly call.
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_03: No, no, not that one, another one.
• 43:30
  SPEAKER_03: Do not enter.
• 43:33
  SPEAKER_03: Even that was eloquent by Spurgeon, though.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_03: Do not enter the ministry if you can help it.
• 43:37
  SPEAKER_03: If any student in this room could be content to be a newspaper editor or a grocer or a farmer or a doctor or a lawyer or a senator or a king, in the name of heaven and earth, let him go his way.
• 43:48
  SPEAKER_03: If, on the other hand, you can say that for all the wealth of both Indies, you could not and would not give up preaching Christ and depend upon it.
• 43:57
  SPEAKER_03: If other things be equally satisfactory, you have the seed of a true call.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_03: That's powerful.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_01: It's the the ministry is difficult, you know.
• 44:08
  SPEAKER_01: Service is hard.
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I think there I think it was Spurgeon as well that said, I I'm not tired of the ministry.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_01: I'm just I'm tired in the ministry.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_01: I'm just I'm just tired.
• 44:19
  SPEAKER_01: You know, that it's it's a lot of work to to do the different things and to continually uh counsel to people who are not going to be heeding counsel.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_01: That's the pastor, doesn't it?
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_01: Uh for sure, right?
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_01: And you you served three and a half years.
• 44:32
  SPEAKER_01: Three and a half years, the time of tribulation.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_01: I absolutely hated every minute.
• 44:37
  SPEAKER_01: But but listen, the the ministry, to your point, it it's it's a beautiful thing.
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_01: If God's calling you uh to do it.
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_01: But you have to understand that's oftentimes people are willing to travel 10,000 miles to try to minister to people when God has opened up doors to travel a hundred feet across the street.
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_01: And if you're not willing to to do that, then what good do you think you're gonna be ten thousand feet away, away from your the comforts of food and family and the fellowship that you're used to having?
• 45:05
  SPEAKER_01: So I I think that what what we need to do is continually pause, continually try to seek uh a way out of the ministry before you enter into ministry.
• 45:13
  SPEAKER_01: And then if God's called you into ministry, man, just realize that it's a thankless job.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, go to the abortion mill and plead with women to turn.
• 45:21
  SPEAKER_01: Thankless.
• 45:22
  SPEAKER_01: No, nobody's thanking you for being there.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's hard going to abortion mills.
• 45:26
  SPEAKER_01: And it's hard to continually minister to people.
• 45:30
  SPEAKER_01: And oftentimes I think that uh especially in today's day and age, that we're we're we're seeking after to 10,000 followers, right?
• 45:40
  SPEAKER_01: And in reality, we need to be following Christ.
• 45:43
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we we had the opportunity to sit with a missionary at uh ShepCon a couple years ago, and he uh we were looking out the window at all the different people that were uh in ministry or aspiring to be inside ministry, and he said, the majority of these people are are seeking to enter into to be a social media minister, right?
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_01: And that's kind of what the way the way it is that who's your pastor?
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, I have several pastors, I have several people that I follow, right?
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_01: That hey, I I I love John Piper, he's my pastor.
• 46:19
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, you do you live in Minneapolis?
• 46:21
  SPEAKER_01: No, no, no, I I I live in Orange County.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_01: Well, what about what church do you go to?
• 46:25
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, I'm not really going to church because nobody can minister to me the way so-and-so can minister to me, whoever that, whoever that may be.
• 46:32
  SPEAKER_01: And there there's a danger with that.
• 46:35
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, we we don't have homie, ain't got no time for that.
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_01: We we we gotta we we gotta hunker down and we have to um try to get out.
• 46:43
  SPEAKER_01: And if you can't get out, if God's calling you to do this, you know, other people are gonna be able to see it, they're gonna recognize it, they're gonna see that calling on your life.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_01: You have the gift of teaching, the gift of ministering, and and then do what Spurgeon said, study yourself to death and then pray yourself alive and preach as a dying man to dying men, and uh preach each message as if it's your last because one day you'll be dead dead and right.
• 47:07
  SPEAKER_01: And uh uh you know, and I shared with my kids, as I've once heard from somebody else, that I I have no desire to have uh a tombstone with my information on it.
• 47:19
  SPEAKER_01: I I want to preach the gospel, die, and then be forgotten.
• 47:23
  SPEAKER_01: I was up in uh Scotland.
• 47:25
  SPEAKER_05: You've got to have a tombstone with a gospel on it.
• 47:28
  SPEAKER_05: I I I was uh Yeah, you've got instructions, haven't you?
• 47:31
  SPEAKER_05: Oh yeah, instructions.
• 47:33
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think they die, so you know several years ago I was in a uh a cemetery up in Eureka, California.
• 47:44
  SPEAKER_01: And I was just walking.
• 47:45
  SPEAKER_01: I looked at the only Lazarus can say I was taking naps from Tombstone to do some, but I was looking at the different epitaphs and things that were written, and something that stood out to me was a number, which was 032-01972.
• 47:57
  SPEAKER_01: And that was the day that this gentleman died, which was March 20th, 1972, which was also the day that I was born.
• 48:03
  unknown: Wow.
• 48:03
  SPEAKER_01: And I think this guy died the day that I was born.
• 48:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I just began to think through, you know, who was he?
• 48:09
  SPEAKER_01: How are people remembering him?
• 48:11
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe it was reincarnation.
• 48:13
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 48:13
  SPEAKER_01: That that is when he died, I died, but came back alive.
• 48:19
  SPEAKER_01: But a few weeks ago, I was in Scotland and I went to a cemetery, and as I was going, as I started to go through the cemetery, you couldn't read the writings on a lot of these tombstones because they were so old.
• 48:32
  SPEAKER_01: And I remember I just paused and I prayed as I went by about 10 or so, and I couldn't read them.
• 48:36
  SPEAKER_01: I was going, it'd be neat to come across somebody who died on my birthday uh a hundred years before my birthday.
• 48:41
  SPEAKER_01: I've already seen somebody die on my birthday.
• 48:43
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I'd like to see them die a hundred years prior.
• 48:45
  SPEAKER_01: And I just kept on going and I came across and I and I saw this tombstone, and this guy named Andrew Tate, no relation, because he died a hundred years before I was born.
• 48:53
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Andrew Tate, and he died March 20th, uh, 19 or 1872.
• 48:59
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 48:59
  SPEAKER_01: 1872.
• 49:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I was just kind of like, I was done, and I wasn't looking for it.
• 49:03
  SPEAKER_01: Because like I said, you can't read these tombstones.
• 49:06
  SPEAKER_01: But I was just thinking of what sort of an impact did this person leave behind.
• 49:12
  SPEAKER_01: And you think of all these ministers that are falling into gross sexual sin.
• 49:18
  SPEAKER_01: They entered into ministry, and the only thing that they knew how to do was become persuasive, motivational speakers.
• 49:26
  SPEAKER_01: And now they don't know how to do anything else because all they did was enter into ministry and then not use it for the purpose for which God designed it, and fleece the flock and and fed their flesh and the pride of life, you know.
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_05: What you're doing is actually biblical.
• 49:43
  SPEAKER_05: Uh legion used to hang around the tombs as well.
• 49:47
  SPEAKER_01: When I go by cemetery, I like to say, oh look at that.
• 49:51
  SPEAKER_03: Mark, that's that's so good, man.
• 49:54
  SPEAKER_03: You know, we we just don't we don't think about the consequences of a life that was in ministry and how it impacts others when there's devastation.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, we always encourage people to look to Christ, right?
• 50:08
  SPEAKER_03: Man is fallible, they'll fail you all the time.
• 50:10
  SPEAKER_03: But but the the fact is that there are tragedies associated with that.
• 50:14
  SPEAKER_03: Um, John, this is such a powerful verse in Acts 20.
• 50:20
  SPEAKER_03: This is Paul, he's he's speaking with the elders in Ephesus.
• 50:23
  SPEAKER_03: They're telling him that, you know, whose ever belt this is, they're gonna chains and imprison that imprisonment await them.
• 50:30
  SPEAKER_05: That's when I want to swap belts or someone.
• 50:32
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, Paul said, but none of these things move me, nor do I count my life dear to myself, so that I may finish my race with joy and the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_03: Paul said, I'm willing to go to prison to death for the sake of the Lord Jesus.
• 50:50
  SPEAKER_03: Perseverance in the midst of difficulty.
• 50:53
  SPEAKER_03: Leave John alone, you guys, poor guy.
• 50:57
  SPEAKER_00: If you don't mind repeating everything, that would be absolutely fantastic.
• 51:04
  SPEAKER_05: Oscar twice, he's touched his computer.
• 51:06
  SPEAKER_05: Twice.
• 51:08
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure I'm following my notes anymore.
• 51:10
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, go ahead.
• 51:11
  SPEAKER_00: I can do this.
• 51:12
  SPEAKER_03: No worries, John.
• 51:13
  SPEAKER_03: Next time you're here, Mark and Oscar will not be.
• 51:15
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 51:16
  SPEAKER_03: Just not on my left and right.
• 51:18
  SPEAKER_03: Um so yeah, but but what Paul said there, none of these things move me, nor do I count my life dear to me so that I may finish my race with joy in the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus to testify the gospel of the grace of God.
• 51:28
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, they're telling him here, he's he's going to imprison.
• 51:30
  SPEAKER_03: He said, I'll go to death for the sake of Jesus.
• 51:32
  SPEAKER_03: Like, what is it that causes that in the heart of a true minister?
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_00: You know, um, when you're in ministry, you're doing it because you have this incredible burden in your heart that you want to go out and reach the lost.
• 51:45
  SPEAKER_00: And umce you make that step that this is the purpose that you have in life, there is nothing that should stop you on the way.
• 51:55
  SPEAKER_00: And it was amazing because with Paul and with John and with Peter, they were threatening them, saying, You can go free, but speak no more of this person, Jesus.
• 52:05
  SPEAKER_00: And they said, Well, you decide what's right to do.
• 52:08
  SPEAKER_00: God told us to do this.
• 52:09
  SPEAKER_00: Shall we listen to God or should we listen to you?
• 52:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I think what do you do with a man that you cannot threaten?
• 52:16
  SPEAKER_00: You cannot tell him to stop.
• 52:18
  SPEAKER_00: You say, Well, I'm gonna, you die.
• 52:20
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I'm willing to lay down my life for the Lord Jesus.
• 52:23
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the attitude by which we should go in there.
• 52:25
  SPEAKER_00: And you can tell the difference between somebody who's speaking because uh they're into prosperity, um, the prosperity gospel, the prosperity message, and a guy who genuinely wants to see people saved.
• 52:36
  SPEAKER_00: The difference between them is, well, if you tell the guy that his message is not gonna make him any more money, he will stop.
• 52:42
  SPEAKER_00: The other one, you can't tell him anything to stop.
• 52:44
  SPEAKER_00: You need to go out there.
• 52:45
  SPEAKER_00: And I think uh the probably one of the main problems with being called for ministry is that people get confused because they think they need to have some sort of um a revelation that's gonna be equivalent to the burning bush revelation, or the experience on the Damascus Road, or being able to hear a voice from heaven.
• 53:05
  SPEAKER_00: None of those things are true.
• 53:06
  SPEAKER_00: What they what is true is where where you think God has called you to go.
• 53:11
  SPEAKER_00: And when you apply that and you move in that direction, make sure that nothing gets in the way because you're serving a greater purpose, a greater Lord than people uh and and even even at the at the stake, even at the cost of suffering.
• 53:26
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, um, I I love that Paul said, nor do I count my life dear to myself.
• 53:32
  SPEAKER_03: You know, that's the thing.
• 53:33
  SPEAKER_03: It's it's realizing it's not our life, it doesn't belong to us.
• 53:37
  SPEAKER_03: We're not our own.
• 53:39
  SPEAKER_03: We've been bought with a price.
• 53:41
  SPEAKER_03: And it's not just that we were bought with a price, like, okay, I'm buying you as a slave, but it's whose slaves we were and what we were destined for.
• 53:51
  SPEAKER_03: He bought us out of the flames of hell.
• 53:54
  SPEAKER_03: And he's not telling us now, just go tell people, be nice, and live a good life.
• 53:58
  SPEAKER_03: I saved you from the flames of hell.
• 54:00
  SPEAKER_03: Now go tell others how they can be saved from the flames of hell.
• 54:03
  SPEAKER_03: You know, gospel ministry is is it's an empathy ministry because we know what it was like to be headed for hell and we were snatched out of it.
• 54:13
  SPEAKER_03: Now go tell others.
• 54:14
  SPEAKER_03: That's a calling.
• 54:16
  SPEAKER_03: Oscar, you got any more C's to hit?
• 54:18
  SPEAKER_08: I haven't hit any of them, yeah.
• 54:19
  SPEAKER_08: I mean, we've we've kind of touched on them here and there.
• 54:21
  SPEAKER_08: Um, but yeah, it's something that I do whenever somebody comes up to me and asks if they're called to ministry.
• 54:26
  SPEAKER_08: So I've got the five C's.
• 54:28
  SPEAKER_08: The first is conviction.
• 54:29
  SPEAKER_08: Uh 1 Timothy 3 tells us that it's a noble thing, a normal desire, but we also need to search our hearts.
• 54:36
  SPEAKER_08: Because often what we think is a conviction towards ministry is actually the desire for power, for praise, or to for our own egos and pride.
• 54:46
  SPEAKER_08: Like, why do you want to go into ministry?
• 54:49
  SPEAKER_08: Is it for the sake of the proclamation of the gospel?
• 54:52
  SPEAKER_08: Do you feel that conviction, that um, to make Christ's glory known among the people around you?
• 55:00
  SPEAKER_08: Uh, conviction is the beginning, calling.
• 55:03
  SPEAKER_08: It's so important for you to be affirmed by elders and members of your local church.
• 55:09
  SPEAKER_08: It is the body that recognizes you serving.
• 55:13
  SPEAKER_08: It is the elders that disciple and shape you and prepare you for serving.
• 55:18
  SPEAKER_08: No algorithm or audience can replace that.
• 55:22
  SPEAKER_08: You guys have shared moments when you realize you were called.
• 55:24
  SPEAKER_08: I remember my moment.
• 55:25
  SPEAKER_08: It was the most California moment ever.
• 55:27
  SPEAKER_08: I was on my way to an In N Out from a Bible study in California, and the person said, dude, I think God's calling you to ministry, bro.
• 55:40
  SPEAKER_08: Totally.
• 55:42
  SPEAKER_08: Uh we have to be called, and the way that you're called is not algorithm or audience.
• 55:48
  SPEAKER_08: It is local members and local elders raising you up.
• 55:53
  SPEAKER_08: The third one is capacity.
• 55:55
  SPEAKER_08: John Newton says, if it be the Lord's will to bring you into his ministry, he has already appointed your place and service.
• 56:03
  SPEAKER_08: And though you know it is not at present, you shall at a proper time.
• 56:08
  SPEAKER_08: This is important.
• 56:09
  SPEAKER_08: Capacity is important because I've met guys who they've got full-time jobs, kids in school, wife at home, and they're like, I want to go into ministry.
• 56:17
  SPEAKER_08: And it's like, okay, maybe, but maybe this is not your season because you don't have the capacity for it.
• 56:24
  SPEAKER_08: Or vice versa, you meet someone who's fascinated in eldership, but they're running a business and they're raising kids.
• 56:31
  SPEAKER_08: They are called, they are capable, they simply don't have the capacity in that time and place.
• 56:37
  SPEAKER_08: So capacity is super important.
• 56:40
  SPEAKER_08: Company, you touched on this.
• 56:42
  SPEAKER_08: Uh, you know, we all know Easy wants to be a singer, but he can't sing.
• 56:47
  SPEAKER_03: False prophet.
• 56:49
  SPEAKER_08: People love preaching.
• 56:50
  SPEAKER_08: They want to be a preacher, but we gotta be honest, not everyone is gifted to preach.
• 56:55
  SPEAKER_08: It's important to recognize that desire and conviction does not equal gifting.
• 57:01
  SPEAKER_08: And we just gotta be brutally honest.
• 57:03
  SPEAKER_08: Maybe you're called in the ministry, but not that ministry, right?
• 57:07
  SPEAKER_08: Or maybe you're called to come alongside and serve your preaching pastor with helping him study and prepare, but not be the one that preaches.
• 57:16
  SPEAKER_08: It's important.
• 57:16
  SPEAKER_08: We just gotta be honest.
• 57:17
  SPEAKER_08: Like there are way too many.
• 57:19
  SPEAKER_08: We talked about this.
• 57:19
  SPEAKER_08: There are way too many people in ministry that should not be in ministry because they lack competency.
• 57:26
  SPEAKER_08: They have a heart for the Lord, but they don't have the competency that they're gonna be able to do.
• 57:29
  SPEAKER_01: That's the adage that everybody should sing, but not everybody should be given a microphone to sing.
• 57:34
  SPEAKER_08: Yeah, and the final one and the most important one is character.
• 57:39
  SPEAKER_08: Your ultimate sort of filter isn't your giftedness, it is your fruitfulness.
• 57:47
  SPEAKER_08: There are so many people, you touched on this, so many people who are gifted, who had strong and powerful gifts, but their fruitfulness did not grow alongside their giftedness.
• 58:00
  SPEAKER_08: Timothy Keller once said, never mistake a man's giftedness for his fruitfulness.
• 58:05
  SPEAKER_08: And that's where all of these things fall together, right?
• 58:07
  SPEAKER_08: The local church, the local elder.
• 58:09
  SPEAKER_08: I remember my wife looked at me and she goes, Man, you, I feel like you are called to be a pastor.
• 58:14
  SPEAKER_08: And I was like, How could you say that when you know me?
• 58:17
  SPEAKER_08: And she goes, Exactly.
• 58:19
  SPEAKER_08: I would trust you to shepherd me as a pastor.
• 58:22
  SPEAKER_08: So our our fruitfulness is so important and it should not, our giftedness should never overshadow our fruitfulness.
• 58:31
  SPEAKER_03: And I would say that this is how you would definitely know you're not called to ministry.
• 58:37
  SPEAKER_03: Um if you are harsh with people, if you mock people, if you look down on people.
• 58:46
  SPEAKER_03: We've seen those videos of these preachers that that show arrogance and pride.
• 58:51
  SPEAKER_03: There was that one where the guy will goes out into the congress and he says, I am somebody.
• 58:55
  SPEAKER_03: You're gonna listen to me when I talk.
• 58:57
  SPEAKER_03: Like I listen to that, I just trembled.
• 58:59
  SPEAKER_03: I'm just like, what what a what an uh antithesis of who the preacher is called to be.
• 59:07
  SPEAKER_01: Can you finish off one quick thought on maybe just the timing of being called into ministry?
• 59:12
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 59:13
  SPEAKER_03: I think I think you need to make sure that, as Oscar said, you have people in your life who could speak to things like that.
• 59:22
  SPEAKER_03: And remember why God has given leaders.
• 59:24
  SPEAKER_03: We've quoted this uh uh you know ad infinitum, and that's Ephesians 4, right?
• 59:29
  SPEAKER_03: Why he gave all those different roles for the equipping of the saints, for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, the building up of the body of Christ.
• 59:36
  SPEAKER_03: What you don't want to do is rush into ministry because you think God needs you.
• 59:43
  SPEAKER_03: That's the biggest fear.
• 59:45
  SPEAKER_03: God does not need you.
• 59:47
  SPEAKER_03: And the other tragedy is people thinking, and why people rush into ministry in terms of not waiting on God is identity.
• 59:53
  SPEAKER_03: Ministry is their identity.
• 59:55
  SPEAKER_03: I remember talking to someone, and basically some ministry opportunity that they they were pursuing for years over the course of their life didn't work out and they couldn't get it, and they're like, My life is done.
• 1:00:06
  SPEAKER_03: And and that grieved me so deeply because they're thinking ministry is what their life is all about.
• 1:00:12
  SPEAKER_03: These are the people whose marriages fall apart, who end up committing adultery, whose lives end up being disastrous.
• 1:00:18
  SPEAKER_03: It's because they're looking for this identity.
• 1:00:21
  SPEAKER_03: Well, they've achieved it, but it's not for the glory of God, it's for their glory.
• 1:00:25
  SPEAKER_03: And that's that's the biggest tragedy of all.
• 1:00:27
  SPEAKER_05: And also what are you doing, right?
• 1:00:29
  SPEAKER_05: I'm saying, can I say something?
• 1:00:30
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, that's what I want to do.
• 1:00:32
  SPEAKER_02: Of course, please.
• 1:00:33
  SPEAKER_05: Just my humble way.
• 1:00:34
  SPEAKER_05: I want to qualify why I said before I hated ministry, three and a half years, hard labor, um, time of tribulation, it's because I'm not gifted as a pastor.
• 1:00:43
  SPEAKER_05: Um, not a shepherd.
• 1:00:45
  SPEAKER_05: If if a little lamb is put in my hands or a sheep and it's lame, instead of cuddling it to myself, I want to say, get on your own feet and go and reproduce.
• 1:00:53
  SPEAKER_05: That's my heart.
• 1:00:54
  SPEAKER_05: It's always been like that.
• 1:00:55
  SPEAKER_05: But my three and a half years as a pastor was very, very beneficial for me because as I began itinerating, I'd go into a local church and the pastor would let me into his pulpit.
• 1:01:06
  SPEAKER_05: And that's like giving your car keys to a stranger, sitting in the back with your family and saying, please stay on the right side of the road.
• 1:01:12
  SPEAKER_05: He was entrusting me with that pulpit.
• 1:01:15
  SPEAKER_05: And I learned that through that three and a half years, it prepared me for the miseries of the pastoral, the pastorship or whatever you call it, that every local pastor has.
• 1:01:26
  SPEAKER_05: And I love what John Wesley said.
• 1:01:28
  SPEAKER_05: He said, if I was to preach to the same people week after week, I'd drive them and myself crazy.
• 1:01:32
  SPEAKER_05: And that's exactly how I felt.
• 1:01:34
  SPEAKER_05: I think I mentioned here before once, where I spoke in a church once, and with a pastor standing there, a member of the congregation came up and says, I wish our pastor was as funny as you.
• 1:01:43
  SPEAKER_05: And what I was saying, no, no, this is the cream.
• 1:01:46
  SPEAKER_05: I speak to different people every week.
• 1:01:48
  SPEAKER_05: Your poor pastor says the same joke twice, and your eyes he's senile.
• 1:01:52
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 1:01:52
  SPEAKER_05: You know, so it's very, very hard to be a pastor speaking to the same people each week, and I empathize with them because of that three and a half years.
• 1:01:59
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 1:01:59
  SPEAKER_00: How do you feel about Green Doors, right?
• 1:02:01
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, you know.
• 1:02:04
  SPEAKER_00: I was gonna say that um it's probably uh sometimes people are in ministry and they don't know it.
• 1:02:10
  SPEAKER_00: When they're discipling, they're in ministry, when they're evangelizing, they're in ministry, when they're when they're serving, they're loving their church, they're in ministry.
• 1:02:17
  SPEAKER_00: The important thing is that we continue serving no matter what.
• 1:02:20
  SPEAKER_00: And it is easier to stir a ship that's moving than a ship that's not moving at all.
• 1:02:27
  SPEAKER_00: So that's what we need to focus on.
• 1:02:28
  SPEAKER_00: Continue serving, whether you recognize it as a ministry or not.
• 1:02:31
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 1:02:32
  SPEAKER_03: And remember, faithful in the small things, knowing there are no small things.
• 1:02:36
  SPEAKER_03: We say small things by man's estimation, right?
• 1:02:39
  SPEAKER_03: And the saying that I love one of my favorites, do the small things as though they were the big things, because you do them in God's name, do the big things as though they were the small things because you do them in God's strength and God's power.
• 1:02:52
  SPEAKER_03: And let me say finally, as I wrap up, this is very key.
• 1:02:56
  SPEAKER_03: If you don't have a ministry at home, you don't have a ministry.
• 1:03:03
  SPEAKER_03: Very good.
• 1:03:03
  SPEAKER_07: Good point.
• 1:03:04
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm speaking to those of you that are married, I'm speaking to those of you who are single.
• 1:03:07
  SPEAKER_03: We all live with somebody, and if home is you as a single person living in your own apartment, well, then call home your neighborhood.
• 1:03:14
  SPEAKER_03: If you're not ministering to your neighbors and those around you, you don't have a ministry.
• 1:03:18
  SPEAKER_03: And remember, who we are in private, when we're most comfortable, least self-conscious, and there's no one to impress, that is who we are.
• 1:03:27
  SPEAKER_03: And if we recognize it, that person is hypocritical, we shouldn't be in ministry.
• 1:03:32
  SPEAKER_03: But there's hope for the hypocrites.
• 1:03:33
  SPEAKER_03: It's called repentance.
• 1:03:34
  SPEAKER_03: And so do that and let the Lord use you for his glory.
• 1:03:37
  SPEAKER_03: Amen.
• 1:03:38
  SPEAKER_03: Amen.
• 1:03:39
  SPEAKER_03: All right.
• 1:03:39
  SPEAKER_03: Don't forget all things broken and beautiful by my beautiful daughter Julia Zwain.
• 1:03:44
  SPEAKER_03: She is a gem.
• 1:03:45
  SPEAKER_03: What if pain was not forever?
• 1:03:47
  SPEAKER_03: Don't forget to like, subscribe, share, and podcast at livingdogders.com with your thoughts, questions, objections, criticisms for Mark Arsker and Ray, and praise for John Harris, our beloved brother.
• 1:03:59
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 1:04:00
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you for joining us, friends.
• 1:04:01
  SPEAKER_02: We'll see you here next time on the Living Laughters.
• 1:04:04
  SPEAKER_03: Podcast.
• 1:04:05
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, Ray.
• 1:04:07
  SPEAKER_03: That was that's a gift where we have no idea what we're doing.