MINISTERIAL RACE

 

Throwing-Out the Life Line

I Timothy 4:11-16

One of the greatest losses to the local church is its doctrinally trained pastors who have given up the ministry. One out of ten pastors gives up before their work is done. Many begin as skilled speakers and many are versed in all the principles of biblical hermeneutics. Their education is finally paid for, and their churches are healthy, but many of these men are not. Distractions and disappointments like the derecho that came through the mid-Atlantic on June 29, 2012 have devastated their hopes and ambitions.

An example of great loss to the work of the Lord is found in three preachers whose ministries resulted in stark contrast.

Three men starting out in their mid-twenties:

1. Chuck Templeton – At the age of 18 he was saved, and became a firebrand preacher for Youth for Christ with enormous results. He filled stadiums with his evangelistic crusades in America and Europe, and many churches sprung up following his meetings. He began a church that grew to more than 1,200 members in one year’s time. He hosted the weekly radio show “Look Up and Live”, on CBS radio. One seminary president said of him “he is the most gifted and talented young man in America today for preaching.”

The National Association of Evangelicals published an article on men who were “best used of God” and Chuck is highlighted in that article. His traveling preaching partner is not mentioned, his name was Billy Graham.

2. Bron Clifford, a twenty-five year old gifted fireball for God. In 1945, he was considered the most gifted and powerful preacher the church had seen in centuries. His crusades took him all over America and Europe. At the age of 25 Clifford had touched more lives, influenced more leaders, and set more attendance records than any other preacher of his age in American history. He was tall, handsome, intelligent, and eloquent.

3. Billy Graham – Began preaching the gospel in 1943 and remained faithful for more than 60 years. Mr. Graham is now reaching the end of his life.

What became of Graham is well known. He is a beloved preacher who stayed the course for the Lord, but what about Templeton and Clifford?

Templeton was convinced he needed a deeper education so he enrolled in graduate school at Princeton Theological Seminary in 1948, and two years later, he came out an agnostic. He left the ministry, parted company with his close friend, Billy Graham and decided he was no longer a Christian in the orthodox sense of the term. He rejected the inspiration of the Bible and the claims of Jesus Christ. He became a newspaper columnist and television commentator. He eventually wrote the book, “Farewell to God, My Reasons for Rejecting the Christian Faith. He died in 2001 of Alzheimer’s disease.

Clifford, some nine years after his rise to Christian stardom lost his ministry in 1954. He also lost his family, his health, and then his life. After a few years of preaching, alcohol and financial irresponsibility did him in. He wound up leaving his wife and their two Down’s syndrome children. At just thirty-five years of age, this promising young preacher died from cirrhosis of the liver in a run down motel on the edge of Amarillo, Texas.

Of the three men who started out with such promising careers, only one stayed on track for the Lord, Billy Graham.

The lust for fame, fortune, and flesh has ruined many men who have started out in the ministry, as well as many who are in the rank and file of believers in Christ.

Intellectualism has displaced faith in God’s word for some men such as Templeton, and it even tempted Billy Graham in 1949. However, he prayed after reading how our Lord Jesus Christ so often quoted the Old Testament, that Christ himself never questioned the authority of the word of God, and so with this in mind, Graham never questioned it again.

However, as some have said, it is not how you start out, its how you finish.

Phase Two of the Christian life is not an emotional sprint, it is a life long marathon of which two of these three evangelist were not prepared.

This marathon requires regimental training and then more training. Moreover, this is where the pastor-teacher needs to exercise his God-given gifts in the local church. More than ever, we need Bible teaching pastors, not community organizers, and entertainment booking agents for the church.

The Christian marathon also requires personal dedication on the part of the Christian. The Lord will not make you come to church to hear the word, and if you will not come to church to hear the word, the Lord will not be able to guide and protect you from the world or yourself.

As a matter of biblical reference, according to Prov.1:20-32; if the believer scoffs, and ignores the call to worship to learn the word of God, than when their calamity comes God will nowhere be found. As it was prophesied in Amos 8:11-12, there is a famine in the land for the words of the Lord. Too many of God’s people risk shipwreck of the faith.

As a Christian we all must stay in the word, and weed out the world.

The seed of sinful disobedience is constant and it lies deeply in every one of us.

As one respected Bible theologian and writer says, “apart from the filling of the Holy Spirit, all believers are just like the lost, depraved.”

It is not enough that you know you need to be in your local church on the Lord’s Day, you need to know why you need to be here. You need the word of the Lord more than any thing.

Jesus Christ said… “He that hath ears to hear, let them hear.” Matt.11:15; Mk.4:9; Lk.8:8. Do you have spiritual ears to hear, or have they become insensitive due to the hardening of your spiritual hearts. A spiritually hardhearted believer has spiritually deaf ears. I believe that much that I say from the scriptures falls on deaf ears.

Thus, the Lord throws out the lifeline to both his pastors and his people.

I Tim.4:13-16

As a pastor, be sure to preserve your own fellowship with God, and stay in the word. Then allow the word to preserve the body of believers given to your charge.

II Tim.2:19-26

Help those who let you help them, and be patient with them.

Reach the reachable, teach the teachable, and leave the rest up to the Lord.

In Acts 28:17-29 Paul explained Jesus Christ to the Jews, some believed and others believed not. Their unbelief was prophesied in Isa.6:9-10. The Lord knew Israel’s unbelief thus He gave Israel the eyes of slumber and ears dull of hearing as per Rom.11:7-12. The Lord knows the heart of every man and woman.

Proverbs 23:9 “Speak not in the ears of a fool; for he will despise the wisdom of thy words.”

CULLED FROM BAPTIST LIBRARY