Preachers need to know this, and God showed it to me recently. I want to live before Him as if my public ministry depends on my private moments with Him. Because it does.
Are you spending enough time alone with Him? Not in the multi-tasking world of today, but truly in the back of the boat, resting in Him alone?
Here is a second lesson we learn.
II. Ministry effectiveness is not dependent upon ministry efficiency but God's sovereignty.
Jesus' ministry effectiveness was not dependent upon His ministry efficiency, but rather His Father's sovereignty.
There were always crowds pressing in on our Savior. But the greatest thing He needed to do at that time was rest in the storm. What we learn is that His effectiveness was not gauged by how much He did, but how He did it.
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Over and over God teaches us this. Gideon was called by God to take on the enemy of God's people, the Midianites, who had 135,000. Gideon had 32,000. Then 22,000 got scared and left. He had 10,000 . But we read something amazing:
The LORD said to Gideon, "The people with you are too many for me to give the Midianites into their hand, lest Israel boast over me, saying, ‘My own hand has saved me.' Judges 7:2
So God began to whittle down the numbers of soldiers until Gideon had 300 soldiers. But that was small enough so that when victory came they would be the few and the faithful, and God would gain the credit.
Listen to these passages and consider what they teach us about how to live our lives as His people:
Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit, says the LORD of hosts (Zechariah 4:6),
Some trust in chariots, and some in horses; but we will remember the name of the LORD our God (Psalm 20:7).
Isn't God telling us that when the wind and waves toss our lives to and fro, we can rest in His sovereign grace? Doesn't it tell us that great things happen not by our ingenious insights and irrepressible gifts, but by His power?
Likewise, our Lord didn't go to the ends of the earth. He was obedient to God in a relatively small area of the earth and was obedient even unto death on a cross. But the cross and the grave gave way to resurrection, and this became the sign of God's power. That power has spread to the ends of the earth.
I recently read John Piper's wonderful book, The Hidden Smile of God, about the lives of John Bunyan, William Cowper and David Brainerd. Do you know what really struck me about these men? John Bunyan's ministry effectiveness was not dependent upon his efficiency, but God's sovereignty. For John Bunyan spent most of his ministry in jail. In fact, it was there he wrote the great Pilgrim's Progress. William Cowper, who wrote such hymn classics as "There is a Fountain Filled with Blood" and "God Moves in a Mysterious Way" spent his whole life afflicted by severe depression. But William Cowper's ministry effectiveness was not dependent upon his ministry efficiency, but God's sovereignty.
