The Stories God Writes

Have you ever thought about the fact that God is an Author? It says in Hebrews 12 that He is the “Author and Perfecter of our faith.” God is actually a writer and He writes amazing stories.

The stories God writes are full of every element of a good story—suspense, drama, thrill, excitement, pain, sorrow, loss, romance, joy, despair, hope, life, and death. God does not write boring stories. He writes stories that take us on a journey of hope and trust in Him, stories that stretch our faith and perfect it.

Why did God write “history” like He did? Why did He have to grow through the promise of the Messiah, the long wait, the first Coming, His death and resurrection, and the long wait again for His Second Coming? It seems like God could have done it all quickly and gotten it over with—of course He could. But, God is an author who is writing one of the most spectacular stories ever written. When we look back over His Story, we will see the remarkable leadership of the best Author who has ever written. God writes beautiful stories.

Have you ever thought about the Book of Life being more than just a list of names? What if it is an actual “Book of Life”? What if it not only has our names written, but also has our stories written? Can you imagine God writing down Your story? Psalm 139:16-17 says, “Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they all were written, the days fashioned for me, when as yet there were none of them. How precious are Your thoughts to me, O God! How great is the sum of them!

God keeps tracks of every person on the planet. He knows about the little decisions we make for Him and He writes them down in His book.

When I look back over my life, I can see the amazing way God writes a story. Even in the most tragic of experiences, God can turn into something beautiful. He gives beauty for ashes and the oil of joy for mourning (Is. 61). God is an amazing Author. The bible even says that He keeps all of our tears in a bottle and writes them down in His book (Ps. 56:8). Psalm 69 says that the wicked will be blotted out of the book of the living that the names of the righteous are written in. In Malachi 3:16, a Book of Remembrance was written before the Lord of those who feared His name.

During the suspense, drama, waiting, and longing, we must remember that God is an amazing Author who is writing one of the best stories of all time. We must remember that He is the Author of our Faith and He will bring it to completion. Even through the ups-and-downs of a wild, thrilling story, we must learn to trust the Good Author and know that this story will have the happiest ending ever.

Lifestyle of Evangelism: Contagious Joy of Knowing God

When Jesus walked on the earth, He never had to advertise Himself. He never had to spend much time recruiting. Even when He did recruit, He would walk up to someone and say, “Follow me,” and they would leave everything immediately and follow Him.

Jesus was contagious. Everyone he came into contact with was never the same afterward. They would either be on one side of the fence or the other. When He came into a place, lines were drawn, decisions were made, and miracles happened. He never had to promote Himself. His life and works promoted themselves.

Jesus was one of the most joyful people who ever walked the planet. His joy, life, and vigor were attractive. For those who were hungry, they were drawn to Him like moths to a flame. For those who were broken, they reached out to Him in desperation. Anyone who heard of Him had to ponder where He was from and whose power He moved in.

Jesus promised that after He left the earth, He would not leave His followers as orphans, but He would send the Helper, the Holy Spirit, who would teach them all things and bring to remembrance all the things that He taught.

Now, believers have Jesus living on the inside of them through the power of the Holy Spirit. He is the same joyful, vivacious, alive, vibrant Jesus who walked the planet, shook the atmosphere, and shifted lives of thousands. Jesus now lives inside His sons and daughters who are meant to be salt and light to the world.

Knowing Jesus cannot be a stagnant concept. We are either moving forward or we are moving backward. However, Jesus promised that we have no idea what God has in store for believers, but those things have been revealed by the Spirit (I Cor. 2:7-10).

There is an absolute joy and pleasure involved in knowing God. It is available for us at any time. Psalm 16 says that at His right hand are pleasures ever more, and Ephesians 2 says that we are seated with Him in heavenly places. The pleasures at the throne of God are available for believers to walk in now.

There is such a rampant case of depression across the entire globe—and it is as alive in the church as in the secular world. There are many reasons for this, but I would say the top two reasons are: lack of righteous lifestyle, and lack of experiencing God’s love (which is due to a need for inner healing).

Most believers are just as depressed as the world—and more than that, they are DEPRESSING. Why would the lost want to join something that seems just as depressing as what they already have?

However, we must learn how to experience God and have that overwhelming joy bubble out of us so that we can learn to rightly express who God is to a lost and dying world. We have that same joyful, vibrant Jesus living in us. When we walk around, people should come up to us and ask about Jesus. Our lives should actually be attractive to the lost. Jesus was so contagious and what He had was so alive that the fish jumped into the boat without Him even making an effort.

This is available for us as believers. We must realize the power of the Holy Spirit living inside of us, and that joy is available to heal our hearts—then to be released to everyone around us. Knowing God is contagious, and there is a joy that no one can take away from us when we live in His presence. Jesus is waiting to break out of the inside of us and impact the world around us.

Lord, awaken a hunger for your Church to live and move like You!

Fine Line of Evangelism: Love & Repentance

People ask me all the time what I think about evangelism. Should we tell people they are going to hell and to turn from their sins or should would just preach the Love of Christ? The truth is that people are asking the wrong question.

This question comes from a wrong view of God and a wrong view of repentance. Telling someone to turn from their sin IS the Love of God, and preaching the Love of Christ IS repentance. It is two sides of the same coin.

The problem is that we do not understand the reason for the commandments of God. We do not believe that He is good and what He tells us to do is for our own benefit. To tell someone to turn from their sin is one of the most loving things you could ever do for a person. We also have a wrong view of correction. Gentle, loving correction is actually a good thing and one of the best indications that we are loved by God (Heb. 12).

God gave us commandments to follow so that we could be in relationship with Him. He also gave provision for the times when we fail. Furthermore, He also gave us a way to walk out His commandments called the grace of God and fellowshipping with the Holy Spirit. He set up the entire plan that would make it impossible for us to fail if we do what He says.

When people ask this question, they must first have this basic understanding before going further. Next, they need to realize the question they really want answered is a pragmatic one—how do I present the Gospel? For this question, there are several responses.

Number one, we must have God’s heart for people in order to properly convey His Word in a way that will draw them to Him. Even if you give a difficult word of correction and turning to someone, if you have God’s heart for them and have truly experienced the need for forgiveness in your own life, then you can deliver the difficult word in a way that the person feels loved, edified, and empowered to draw close to Jesus.

Secondly, we must tell people to turn from their sin. This is an absolute necessity for preaching the Gospel. In our humanistic culture, people do not realize their need for a savior. They believe that man is inherently good and that they will get to heaven for doing good things. This is a lie from the pit of hell, and we cannot passively allow it to permeate our lives and surroundings.

However, we also must be careful in how we speak to people. I was stopped by a young man in the grocery store last night who found out I was in ministry and asked me what I thought about the haunted houses happening downtown this month. I said, “Well, I believe that the people attending are longing to be fascinated with something, and they are being fascinated with fear. I believe there are much better things to be fascinated with.”

My answer stunned him. He said that when he asks believers that question, he hears something about them all going to hell, and he does not understand what the problem is with people going to a haunted house. I told him that people have longings in their heart that can only be filled by God, but they try to fill them with everything else. I said that the longing must be filled with God first, then the rest of your life will line up; however, if you try to fix the lifestyle before the longing, it will never work.

The young man was astonished and by the end of the conversation, he was asking me how to join our bible school—and I do not even think he was saved yet.

If we remember how God rescued us and forgave us, we can come to people with humility and love that will turn their hearts to God regardless of the words we have. We can have all the correct doctrine and theology in the world, but if we do not have the lifestyle God desires, then our words will fall to the ground empty. We also must not water down the truth of the gospel, trying to be culturally relevant. If we have His heart for His people, we will be able to speak what they need to hear, and there will be power to back it up. We can tell people to turn from their sin and they will feel so loved that they will run to Jesus.

 

Implementing the Five-Fold Ministry: Essential Life of Prayer

Everyone has been looking at the right strategy for church growth and development for centuries, but God will not just hand us a formula. With everything He designed, He built-in a necessary place for communication with Him. Prayer is absolutely essential to every part of life. God wants to have relationship with His people.

We can look at church structure, study the Scriptures, and come to the conclusion of how everything is supposed to work, but it will fall flat without the essential life of prayer. Every aspect of God’s design for life is for the development of relationship with God. He will even allow friction and strife into a situation to cause His people to turn to Him in prayer. God will allow suffering and hardship so that His people turn to Him as the only hope.

God will give us wisdom in leadership when we pray. He will also give us wisdom in direction. I heard Reinhardt Bonnke speak one time about how he seeks direction from God. He said, “I go into my room and I push all my thoughts aside. I don’t ask God should I do this or should I do that…I lay it all aside. Then, God will speak to me something that I never would have thought of before. It is usually something so far-fetched that I think it is impossible, but when I step out in faith, it turns out to be way better than I could possibly imagine…”

God’s wisdom is so contrary to our human wisdom, but He will lead us when we are in constant communication with Him. Not only that, but He will also change circumstances and situations through our prayers.

For the five-fold ministry to be truly implemented in a body of believers, prayer is absolutely vital. When we pray, our hearts are conformed to God’s will and desires rather than our own. This is the only way for a group of people to function together as a body that loves each other better than themselves. Prayer will break down walls in our hearts and in relationships with each other.

There is so much strife and division in the church, causing the body to fight with each other. In the human body, a response of the body fighting against itself is called an “auto-immune disease.” Unfortunately, there are rampant cases of auto-immune diseases with the body of Christ. Unless people become filled with the love of Christ and learn to care for one another, there will never be enough unity of direction to properly restore the five-fold ministry and see the church walk in the fullness of its destiny in Christ.

However, Jesus has promised that His Bride will be made ready. She will be pure and spotless before His return. She will walk in her inheritance as the child of God and she will move in the fullness of His power. God will bring it to pass, and we must partner with His plans. Prayer on both an individual and corporate level will bring us into unity with His purposes for His Bride.

Implementing the Five-Fold Ministry: Essential Life of Worship

There are so many valuable things learned from spending years serving at a House of Prayer. Watching a body of believers pursuing the Lord together as much as they can has made a lasting impact on my life. There are many reasons for a spirit of unity in the House of Prayer, and one of these elements is the centrality of worship.

When we see God for who He is, there are two responses that come. One, we realize our own lack in comparison to Him. Two, we express His worth and value back to Him. As we look at Him, we fall in love with who He is and we begin to take on portions of His attributes.

God has already told us what He is like through His Word. However, when we sing those truths back to Him, they become a part of our very identity. Facts that we knew in our head, now become realities in our hearts.

Thankfulness is absolutely essential to a life of worship, and it is difficult to be depressed when you sing. Remembering the goodness of God and allowing your heart to express gratitude will break off any yoke of oppression.

When a corporate body joins in unity to worship the beauty of Jesus, it is nearly impossible for their hearts to not become knit to one another. Praise from the upright is beautiful, and when we sing and worship God together, we cannot help but fall in love with one another.

True worship is not just song lyrics and melody lines, but it is an outward expression of an inward reality of adoration for the One who is glorious beyond words. Singing from our hearts to the Lord changes the atmosphere around us and changes our identity within us.

Worship will unite a group of believers to lay aside their differences and whole-heartedly pursue the Lord together. People will begin to care more about the glory of the Lord and about loving their brothers more than their own agenda. It is in this type of context that the five-fold ministry can find expression.

Being in a place for five years where the worship to Jesus never stops, I have been transformed by constantly singing truths of who God is. Also, I have seen the transformation of lives and the drawing together of hearts of believers. When a body of believers worships Jesus together continually, they cannot help but love God and love each other. For the five-fold ministry to truly function in a body, these elements are absolutely essential.

Five-Fold Ministry in a House of Prayer Context

Living and working at a 24/7 House of Prayer for over five years has made a huge impact on my life. It is remarkable how this place runs and how everyone flips around into different roles multiple times throughout the years.

One of the most remarkable things about the House of Prayer structure is that everyone is in leadership in some capacity at some point. You may be the leader of the entire missions base, but if the usher comes up to you in the prayer room and asks you to stop talking, you are under their authority and need to do what they say.

On worship teams, you may be the most talented worship leader in the nation, but there are times when you have to be silent and let others have their turn to sing. The entire Harp & Bowl model (which is a model for mixing prayer and worship together) is based on allowing every person to have their own expression.

At the House of Prayer, titles are equated with lots of work, and they really do not mean much except for the fact that the “buck stops here” in that specific situation. One person may be in leadership in one department, but then they serve in another department where someone who is under them in one role is over them in another.

In this context, it is absolutely essential that pastoring and discipleship remain confidential, because everyone’s circles overlap in different ways throughout the missions base. It becomes difficult when multiple people come to talk to you about the same issue, and you know all the different facets of it, but you have to remain silent about all of the other sides and pretend that you had no previous knowledge.  

Those who have been here a long time have to practice humility when the rookie comes in and tells them what to do; yet, the oldie could do it ten times better, but they have to honor authority. The rookies have to overcome their insecurities and fear of man to be able to tell the seasoned leader what to do, and they meet God in the process as well.

At the House of Prayer, there are people from every denomination, every nation, and every ethnicity gathered in one room attempting to go somewhere together in prayer. This takes so much humility, integrity, and love between every person to make it work.

This upside-down, turn-it-all-over, constant cycle at the House of Prayer is one of the things that keeps everyone from thinking of themselves more highly than they ought. I believe the five-fold ministry is functioning here to some extent (not the fullness), but that it is not titled, pointed out, or completely identified, because God is creating an atmosphere of submitting to one another and loving one another; He is creating an atmosphere of respecting and honoring authority, so that the value is not placed on role, function, or title, but the value is place on character and love for one another.

Throughout thirteen years of this House of Prayer running 24/7, God has been cultivating a foundation for the five-fold ministry to be built. The foundation of prayer and mutual submission toward one another has developed a greater emphasis on character rather than gifting or function.

Implementing the Five-Fold Ministry: Preferring One Another

“For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith. For as we have many members in one body, but all the members do not have the same function, so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another. Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, let us use them…”
(Romans 12:3-6)

There is no way the five-fold ministry can function in a church body without the foundational principle of preferring one another.

All of the passages in Scripture concerning the gifts of the Spirit and the five-fold ministry are written in the context of the body functioning together as a whole and each person doing their part. It is absolutely essential for any kind of unity and mutual love to exist in a body.

The primary reason church leadership structure collapses is because of everyone seeking their own. People think more highly of themselves than they should for three primary reasons:

1.)    They have not seen God rightly or experienced His presence, so they do not realize how small and insignificant they are compared to Him.

2.)    They do not see other people the way God sees them, so they do not realize His overwhelming love and the remarkable value of that other person.

3.)    They do not see themselves rightly, and base their value on the works of the flesh rather than on the value that God has given them. This not only leads to pride, but also to insecurity and self-condemnation. This causes the drive to seek the praise of man.

This must be combatted in several ways: One, each person must seek to love God with their whole heart and seek His glory only. Secondly, they must seek to love each other as they love themselves. Also, they must be healed and able to receive the love of God so they can actually love God, love themselves, and love others.

It is necessary for every person in a body to have the humility to lift someone else above their own needs. Because of human nature, all of this talk of the five-fold ministry sounds good until you try to put it into practice. However, there are some practical ways that people can grow together in love and service as a body.

 

One of the most practical ways is to stir up prayer among a group of people. If people pray together, it becomes difficult to hold a grudge, because God will not answer prayers in the context of bitterness, and He will make each person so miserable until they repent. Also, when you pray for people you begin to love them the way that God loves them and can look past their faults and failures. There is a reason why Jesus told us to bless our enemies and pray for those who persecute us.

 

Another practical way to grow in preferring one another is to activate the gift of prophecy among believers. Prophecy is meant for edification, exhortation, and comfort. When you prophesy over someone, you feel God’s heart for them and learn to see them the way God sees them, rather than seeing them in the natural. God always calls forth the true identity of that person according to the spirit rather than how they are behaving in the flesh. If we begin to call people out according to the spirit instead of according to the flesh, then we will call them into the identity God has created for them, and they will become healed and secure in His love.

Satan’s main attacks against the body of Christ are division, isolation, and accusation. Prophecy is one of the best antidotes to thwart the enemies plans and bring love and unity among a group of believers. Both prayer and prophecy go hand-in-hand to change the heart and conform the mind to God’s purposes, so that we grow in preferring one another over ourselves.

Implementing the Five-Fold Ministry: Fathers Releasing Sons

Before looking at strategies and programs for implementing the five-fold ministry, it is necessary to implant foundational principles at the root of the process for the development to actually work. Another foundational principle that is necessary for the five-fold ministry to work is that of fathers releasing sons who become fathers.

One huge area lacking in our society is that of fathers who know how to call forth a younger generation and release them into what God has called them to do. Although God can come and transform the existing church structure, many people become set in their ways, making it difficult to make a new definition to old ways of doing things. However, the best way to transform a culture is for those fathers in the older generation who have seen the wrong ways of doing things, to impart their wisdom and anointing to the next generation and release them to go farther than they did.

The problem is two-fold. First, many older people where never fathered themselves, and do not know how to properly be fathers. Second, many young people are rebellious against authority and want to usurp the authority of the older generation rather than learn from them.

However, God’s design was for the older generation to pave the way for the younger generation and create a new, higher foundation for the young ones to walk on than what they had when they were young. Furthermore, His design is for the young ones to walk on that old foundation and build on it, rather than tear it down and move to another place to build.

In the previous teaching on Love & Service, we looked at the verse where Paul was speaking of Timothy as being the only one who was like-minded and served as a son serves a Father (Phil. 2:19-22). Even in Paul’s day, he was looking to raise up sons who would care for the Church as much as he did—and even in his day, it was lacking.

Not only did Paul raise up a son in Timothy who would serve and love the Church, but he raised up a son who also became a father in the church (I Cor. 4:14-17). God is not looking for sons who drain the life out of the older generation to take what they need for themselves. He is looking for sons who are so thankful for being called sons that they—in turn—call forth others as sons.

Also, God is looking for fathers who call their “children” into the identity and callings that are over their lives. A father who is secure in the love of His heavenly Father can see the God-given destiny on a person and call them forth into what God has called them to do.

Implementing the five-fold ministry cannot be a sterile process learned from a book or manual. It must be birthed. It must be birthed in prayer and birthed in lives. This takes labor and it takes trying and failing. It also takes learning from the mistakes of the older generations—and also learning from their successes. We must have the hearts of fathers turned to children and children to the fathers in order for the five-fold ministry to work in the Church.

Implementing the Five-Fold Ministry: Love & Service

As the Lord begins to stir a hunger in our hearts for the release of the five-fold ministry, we will begin asking the questions of how to practically apply this in our church and ministry contexts. As we learn to apply this practically, there are some foundational principles that are essential for this system to work.

The most essential element for the five-fold ministry to work is love. The second is the knowledge that the functional role is given for the sole purpose of serving the Bride.

There is a passage in Philippians that breaks my heart. Paul says in Philippians 2:19-22, “But I trust the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you shortly, that I also may be encouraged when I know your state. For I have no one like-minded, who will sincerely care for your state. For all seek their own, not the things which are of Christ Jesus. But you know his proven character, that as a son with his father he served with me in the gospel. Therefore, I hope to send him at once…”

It is remarkable to me that out of all the people serving with Paul, he had no one who was like-minded except Timothy. There was only one person he could send who cared more about the state of the church and the glory of Christ Jesus than his own success and well-being. This breaks my heart.

Even in the early church, there was so much disorder and confusion about the functioning of the body. Paul wrote numerous times to correct their conduct—and many times, the problem was the lack of mutual love and service (humility) toward each other.

In I Corinthians 12-15, Paul wrote the church and he spent a lot of time telling them how the gifts should function in the body and how one person should sit down and let the other speak. The list of the gifts of the Spirit and one of the five-fold ministry passages were actually given in the context of a rebuke to the church for not working together in love and preferring one another.

Right in the middle of this rebuke and instruction concerning the gifts, Paul places the famous chapter on love. He said even if you prophesied or gave all you had to the poor, if you were lacking in love, then you were nothing.

Even if we are all filling our positions and doing our jobs correctly, if we are lacking in love, then we are nothing. If we are following all the procedures and manuals to the utmost degree, but we are seeking our own, then we are nothing. Love does not seek its own.

God is looking for bondservants who will lay down their lives for His Bride. He is looking for team ministry in His body, where each person lays down their life to love and serve the other. Without this foundational principle, you could implement every system, program, and structure in the world, and it will not work.

So much of the damage done in the body of Christ by leadership structures has been because of the lack of humility, service, and love. This has caused the need for so much structure and systems being put in place, that may not have been necessary if people were actually caring for others more than themselves.

 

Even though we are working with real people in a real world, believers in the body of Christ no longer have to live according to the standards of the world. It is possible for us to do what Jesus told His disciples, “They will know you are my disciples because of your love for one another.” If each of us live as individuals who learn to love and obey God, then love and serve each other, we will become the growing body God desires for us to be.

 

Five-Fold Ministry: Role of Prophet

All parts of the body function under the Head, who is Christ. They function in relation to one another for the benefit of the body as a whole. Although each part is designed to work alongside the other, they rarely do. However, as the Lord prepares His bride for His return, He will restore the five-fold ministry, and the Bride will begin to prefer one another in love and humility.

One of the most controversial and misunderstood roles in the body of Christ today is the role of the prophet. In the five-fold ministry, the office of a prophet has been vastly misused, misunderstood, and even neglected in many cases.

There are different types of prophetic ministry and prophetic roles. Every believer who has the Holy Spirit living in them is called to prophesy according to the description in I Corinthians 14:3, where it says that prophecy is for the edification, exhortation, and comfort of the body. Every person is called to prophesy through the power of the Holy Spirit who lives inside them. In addition to this, there are also believers who have a gift of prophecy (I Cor. 12). However, within God’s plan for the structure of the church, there is also a specific place designed for those called to the office of prophet.

 

Someone must be called of God to be a prophet. There is literally a time when God calls them as a prophet or even a history of times when God spoke concerning this. Even after the call though, it may take years and decades for that person to grow, be trained, and develop the maturity to step into that role. After many years of going through this process, the person must then be acknowledged by the church as  a prophet. This is not something the prophetic person requests or seeks. It is something God ordains, brings to pass, and everyone around acknowledges it.

 

A prophet receives revelation from the Lord and is meant to give vision or restore vision to the people. Many times, a prophet is used to call someone into apostolic ministry and implant or confirm a vision in that person for the beginning of a new task or direction. However, the primary role of a prophetic voice is to call the people to return back to the original vision, and turn back to what God intended for them (repentance).

 

A prophetic voice restores holiness and the fear of the Lord element back into the church, calling them to turn when they are heading the wrong way, and encouraging them forward when they are headed the right way. Like Haggai and Zechariah in the days of Joshua and Zerubabbel, they are to encourage believers for the building of the Lord’s house (Ezra 5).

 

The prophet gives vision by helping the apostles and teachers understand the times and seasons. They also encourage and strengthen them behind the scenes. A prophet also works hand-in-hand with the teacher, who establishes sound doctrine. These two roles bring balance to each other even though they are typically the most opposite personalities.

 

Most people whose primary gifting is the prophetic are good at receiving revelation and seeing what is happening, but are not always as good at interpreting and applying the revelation. This is how team ministry comes into play where the apostles and teachers help interpret and apply the revelation. Teachers are also typically better communicators than prophets and can more clearly break-down the message for the average person to understand.

 

It is necessary that the prophet must not only grow in accuracy with what they prophesy, but they must also have the heart of the Lord behind the correct knowledge. An extremely accurate prophetic person who is cocky and arrogant is one of the most dangerous entities alive. On the contrary, an extremely accurate prophetic person who is a friend of God, knows His heart, and weeps when He weeps is one of the most valuable blessings to the body of Christ.

 

It is important that the prophetic person stays under submission to authority. This tends to be a weakness in prophetic people, because they can typically see things that other people cannot see. However, a prophetic person who properly submits words to leadership and goes to the Lord in prayer over those words is absolutely precious in the sight of the Lord.

 

We need to value the role of prophet in the body of Christ and learn how to properly cultivate the heart of a prophetic person. They must not be exalted above any other person in the body, but they must also not be neglected and shoved aside because no one knows what to do with them.

 

As leaders in the body of Christ, we must seek God’s heart on the restoration of the role of the prophet back into the church today. We need to ask him what this looks like in our current culture and learn to appreciate the way God has set-up systems of checks and balances within the structure of the five-fold ministry.

Five-Fold Ministry: The Teaching Role

We have already looked some at the five-fold ministry role of a teacher and their ability to equip the saints with discernment. However, we will now look at a broad overview of a teaching role.

An apostle primarily preaches the apostolic gospel of the death, burial, resurrection, and return of Christ. An evangelist preaches the salvation message, and a pastor focuses more on matters of an individual's heart and personal life. A teacher, however, systematically teaches the whole of Scripture to ensure that sound doctrine is established to balance all of the messages. The message of the teacher typically works hand-in-hand to balance the prophetic ministry which we have mentioned before and will look at more in the next session.

The attributes of God are like a multi-faceted diamond. There are so many different aspects of His nature that we cannot see all of the facets at once. Each time we look at Him, the light will reflect in a different way where we will notice something we have never seen before. As human beings, we cannot typically focus on more than one attribute of God at a time. This is why we need the body of Christ, because each person will see a different viewpoint of God at a different time. Each person has a message of how God has revealed Himself to them personally—this is called a testimony.

Because every person has a specific focus on who God is, a leader or even a small group of leaders cannot fully cover every attribute of Him. This is actually a gift from God to us, but sometimes it becomes dangerous when a group of people are hearing one message only and not seeing the full picture. This is where the role of the teacher becomes critical.

A teacher will systematically teach the whole of Scripture to walk through every part of the bible—rather than just picking topical themes. They will actually systematically walk through an entire book of the Bible and teach it in such a way that the whole picture of God is presented from that book. Then, they will incorporate other passages that help to balance and qualify the message.

Teachers are detail-oriented and can really fill in the gaps on many things that an apostle, prophet, or evangelist may leave out due to their gift-mix. Many times, a pastor will have a gift of teaching, but their teaching will be more based on addressing life-issues rather than systematically teaching scripture. In western culture, a teacher will usually teach deductively by stating the points first, then explaining them afterward. However, someone gifted in exhortation, preaching, prophetic, or evangelistic messages may preach more inductively (telling stories that eventually get to the point at the end or that reveal the point over and over throughout).

There are two things that teachers need to be aware of when in a regular teaching role over a body of believers. One, they need to make sure they spend an equal or greater amount of time systematically teaching through books and chapters of the Bible rather than only topical themes. This is so that all the facets of God’s nature are revealed rather than only one.

Second, they need to make sure that the body is getting a healthy dose of the big picture often—rather than only staring at the details. This is one reason that it is so important for the apostolic to partner with the teaching role; the apostolic person will constantly give the broad picture, and the teacher will break the picture down into little parts and details. Both roles are necessary.

Not only are there those called to the teaching role, but there are also many in the body of Christ who are gifted in teaching. It is important to call them into that gifting and allow them to use it, because many different perspectives and voices allow for a more thorough view of God. There are so many different aspects of the nature of God & each of us has a tiny picture, but the more voices released means a greater view of the whole nature of God. A teacher would fill the role of teaching, but they would also equip and release the saints in the body to teach as well.

Five-Fold Ministry: Role of Evangelist

Another five-fold ministry role in Ephesians 4 is that of an evangelist. An evangelist is a person with a God-given gift for winning people to Jesus Christ. Evangelists tend to be able to engage in conversations with total strangers easily and find natural in-roads to preaching the gospel.

Evangelists typically move around all the time. They usually travel, meet people, and lead them to the Lord everywhere. This is a blessing and also presents a problem at the same time. These people are very gifted at leading people to the Lord, but are not as gifted at discipleship and follow-up.

Many people tell the evangelist that they should disciple the people they lead to the Lord, but actually an evangelist should partner with someone who is pastoral and have them oversee the discipleship aspect. We should not put an unnecessary weight on the evangelist to thoroughly disciple people, but we should teach them how to properly incorporate new believers into the body.

If someone with a gift of evangelism leads people to the Lord in the midst of their work or school, then they should disciple them out of relationship. However, if that person is an evangelist and leads people to the Lord everywhere, they need to plug them in with people who are gifted at discipleship and follow-up. This is where the evangelistic person teams up with those who are pastoral.

An apostolic person sees the evangelistic gifting on a person and sees the need for a church to be established because of new converts. Then, the apostolic person also identifies those who have a pastoral calling and plugs the new believers into discipleship groups led by the pastoral-type people. The evangelist should keep evangelizing and utilize team ministry for the discipleship process.

Evangelists—along with apostolic people—have a tendency to get busy doing too many different things at once, and constantly have a need to focus and not become overly committed in too many areas. They are constantly seeing new horizons and new people to lead to the Lord—this is both a wonderful gift in one respect, and an area that needs to constantly be called back to focus on the other hand. Many evangelists will have many ideas of how to mobilize mass works of evangelism.

Although an evangelist's primary role is to evangelize, they should also call the body of Christ as a whole into the task of evangelism. An evangelist must exhort, train, and teach others in the body to evangelize—even those who are not gifted in that area. Also, they should equip and encourage the body to receive the new believers and disciple them.

Furthermore, an evangelist who lives a life of prayer and weeping for the lost will not only equip others in evangelism, but can also impart a burden of intercession for lost souls and bringing in the harvest. It is necessary for an evangelist to have a life of prayer, not only to impart burdens for souls, but also to release an open atmosphere over those who are being evangelized.

 

Also, once the seed is planted, the evangelist should pray for that seed to not be robbed, but to grow and bear fruit. An evangelist who has a life of prayer will be able to stayed focused on God’s heart and do only what he sees the Father doing rather than being scattered in many different directions.

Five-Fold Ministry: The Pastoral Role

In Ephesians 4, Paul begins by exhorting the body to walk worthy of the calling that God has over their lives by walking "with all lowliness & gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace..." He goes on in that chapter to speak of the five-fold ministry after stating that Christ first descended before He ascended, which is reminiscent of the humility in Philippians 2 and the seemingly foolish leadership of the Cross in I Corinthians 1-2.

Paul was teaching that those operating in the five-fold ministry must walk in love, meekness, & humility in order to prefer one another & keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

The pastoral role is one of the five-fold ministry callings. The role of the pastor is to make disciples of Christ and to oversee the overall wholeness and well-being of those who have been brought into the church through salvation. Typically, the evangelist will bring the lost souls into the church, and after salvation, the pastor looks after the overall well-being of the person.

This may involve teaching & some of the deacon-type ministry (diakonos, see Acts 6:1-5), which is serving and ministering to their needs—not only spiritually, but physically as well. It also includes counseling, inner-healing, and life instruction. Pastors help develop fellowship between believers and literally make disciples AND those who disciple.

Where a teacher would primarily teach biblical doctrine, a pastor would help apply the bible to practical life. It is important that any messenger help apply the message to practical life, but some are called to cast a vision, and others called to help apply the vision. Pastors help with the application process.

For example, if someone preaches and casts vision for a corporate fast, then the pastor would come and give practical ways to fast and would be involved in their people’s lives enough to know who has an eating disorder and really should not completely fast food altogether. Or if someone preaches on giving to the poor, the pastor would actually come and highlight a family to give to and make sure the needs of that family are met. Pastors are the ones who are at the hospital beds, performing the weddings, counseling, and meeting with people. This is why it is so important to have more than one person with a pastoral heart operating in the church, because there is so much to do. Also, it is important for the pastor to relinquish other responsibilities that are meant for the other five-fold ministry roles and focus on pastoring only.

The Lord has created a five-fold ministry to balance the needs of the people over several different leaders so that one person is not burned out or trying to fill a role that they are not fully gifted in. The problem is that with the current model of church in America, there is usually one person over the church who tries to fill all five roles in the five-fold ministry. As a result, many pastors are over-worked and burnt out. Also, the body is not complete and functioning as it should. The church was designed to be a body where each part is working together in submission to the Head, which is Christ. Not only should there be a five-fold ministry present in leadership, but also each member of the body should be activated in their giftings and contribute to the body as a whole. This takes humility and meekness between each person involved—especially those in leadership, for this goal to be accomplished.

Five-Fold Ministry: Leadership & Man's Freewill to Choose

God created human beings with a freewill to make their own decisions in life. He went to painstaking lengths to ensure that humans had the ability to choose to love him or choose to serve him.

Why else would He put two trees in the garden? He did not only put the tree of life in the Garden, but He also put the tree of the knowledge of good & evil. He then told Adam not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, but that he could eat from any other tree in the garden—including the tree of life.

God allowed Adam to choose to obey and He allowed him to sin. He even had a plan for man’s sin from the foundation of the world—otherwise, Jesus would not be called “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world” (Rev. 13:8). Jesus was not an afterthought. He was a predestined plan for the allowance of man to have the freedom to choose God or to choose sin.

Since God went to such painstaking lengths to ensure man’s ability to make their own choices, those in any kind of leadership or place of authority should also allow for those under them the freedom to make their own choices.

Whether we are parents or in church leadership or working at an office, we should not use control, manipulation, or intimidation to warrant a certain outcome from those under our authority.

This does not mean, however, that we do not lay down definite rules and guidelines that we expect to be followed. We must have rules and systems in place for order and structure in life together as communities. However, we must realize that those under us have the freedom to obey or disobey. There are always consequences for disobedience, and there are greater levels of severity to consequences given the maturity or age of the person (a child or an adult), or given the frequency and severity of the offense.

However, one of the reasons that there has been so much conflict over the restoration of the five-fold ministry is because of the frequent abuse of those in leadership throughout the history of the church. Not only in the church, but in the world and in the family as well. So many people have suffered abuse where someone has taken away their ability to say no and has violated their will and freedom to make choices.

Because of the rampant abuse in our society, many people have extensive wounds regarding authority figures in their lives. As pastors and leaders in the church, we must learn how to shepherd their hearts and allow their shut-down voice to be released while still being firm in our leadership and direction.

It is important to have those in authority so that there is a unified sense of direction. Because of fallen humanity, anarchism is not an option. Systems and government are a necessary evil. However, in the church, God is restoring back the value of true leadership that loves and prefers those under them. We must learn to hold people with a loose hand, and not be possessive with those under us.

Even when giving guidance or counsel, we must be careful to allow those receiving it to weigh it and make decisions for themselves. When giving a prophetic word, we must allow for the person receiving it to test it and discern the true parts and throw away the extra. It must not be delivered in such a way that the person thinks they must believe it and do it or else they are denying God’s will. Also, giving directional words should be done with great care that the person’s freewill to choose is not infringed upon. Likewise, when anything is brought in the way of correction, it should be submitted with love and great prayer, and even anguish from those in leadership.

When James and John asked Jesus if they could sit with him in a place of authority, Jesus first addressed the issue of fellowshipping in His sufferings (Mt. 20, Mk 10). Then as the others were angry over James and John trying to get ahead, Jesus told them all, “You know that those who are considered rulers over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you shall be your servant. And whoever of you desires to be first shall be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many” (Mark 10:41-45).

Jesus’ example of leadership was one of servant hood and laying down His life. Even though He did such an awesome act of love, He still allows people the freedom to choose Him or to deny the power of the Cross. He came with such acts of service and humility that we should learn to follow His model in the way of loving those that we are appointed to serve.

Call of God: The People God Picks

For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty… (I Corinthians 1:26-27)

Think about the people God picked in the Bible. Moses who could not talk very well. David who killed a man and had an affair with his wife. Elijah who ran and hid in a cave. Gideon who hid in a winepress. Paul who persecuted believers. James and John who were a bit on the cocky side, and of course, we all know about the many flaws of Peter. Jesus even picked Judas to follow Him! How wild is that?

It is so amazing that God seems to pick people with so many flaws. And yet, the truth is that every single human being is flawed (besides Jesus), so He really does not have that many to choose from.

In some strange way, this should bring comfort to us. One of Satan’s main attacks against believers is lying to them about how they are so disqualified. He makes accusations day and night to get us to back away from the call of God on our lives.

However, the most amazing reason that God chooses the weak things and not many noble is so that no flesh should glory in His presence (I Cor. 1:29). God chooses the weak ones (which is all of us) so that He is the one who receives the glory for all that we do.

There are two things we can learn from this fact. Number one, give God the glory. Do not take God’s glory for yourself. Number two, God is the one who gives you the ability to do it in the first place. Anything we achieve that matters in eternity happened because of His hand on our lives in the first place.

If God has called you and given you an assignment, then He is the one who is going to bring it to pass. He is the one who will accomplish it in your life anyway.

Of course, we must partner with the Lord and be obedient to His Word and plan. However, Satan’s lies of accusation should have no effect on us, because the blood of Jesus qualifies us. We could never qualify ourselves. When Satan says that we are failures, he is right. In our own strength, we fail. But when we are hidden in Christ and identified as His child—we are more than conquerors in Christ Jesus!

Not only that, but the opinions of man should not sway us either. Most of the people throughout history who did anything great, did it in spite of opposition from everyone around them. Anytime something great is accomplished through a person, there will always be other people telling them it cannot be done.

Again, God does not need the most talented or the most intelligent; He just needs the most willing.

Call of God: Tension of Waiting & Going

When there is a true call of God on someone’s life, there is a tension at times between the promises and the fulfillment. Throughout all the great stories of the Bible and even more contemporary ones, a great call may be given at one point, but the full fruition of that call may take decades upon decades to be seen.

In all the great stories of history, there is usually a great vision at the onset and then many years of trial, perseverance, hardship, and seeming failure before even a glimpse of the vision begins to happen.

Many people lose hope after years turn into decades and some lay down the promises altogether. Sometimes, that is even a necessary part of the process—the seed falling to the ground and dying so that it can bring forth fruit. Many times, God uses the seeming death of a promise to ground us in our identity in Him—apart from the call or assignment.

Some people say that we need to launch out and make things happen. Others say that we should wait, pray, and watch. For someone who is truly seeking the will of God, they may get tossed around a bit trying to decide whether they need to sit back and receive more training or go out and start working.

Different voices all say different things making it hard to decipher the right path. However, the truth is that life happens in seasons, and we must be faithful to the season we are in at the time we are in it. God is not looking for the most intelligent people or the most talented—He is looking for the most obedient.

If we learn to hear God’s voice for our own lives, and obey it no matter the cost, then we will find that everything will turn out right in the end. If God says to sit in a prayer room and pray, then do it. If He says to get out on the streets and go, then do it. We have to realize that there are different seasons in life for everything.

Many times, there is a tension between waiting for God to move and God waiting for us to move. There is also a reality of us moving without God. Either extreme is dangerous. Launching out on our own strength making the promises happen is how Abraham got Ishmael. We must learn to allow God to lead our lives so that we get the Isaacs and not the Ishmaels.

However, there is also a reality that we have God living on the inside of us and He is waiting to break out at any moment. He is not waiting for us to become the perfect vessel for Him to use us—because that is never going to happen.

God can use the tension between waiting and going in our lives to create a friction that sparks into the fires of refinement. He will have vessels for His glory that are completely surrendered to Him. We must learn to listen to His voice and give our all to Him in every season—in the time of waiting or the time of sending.

Mark of True Call of God: Perseverance

Many people say that they want great experiences from God—encounters in the throne room, angelic visitations, burning bush experiences—but they do not realize the responsibility that comes along with these types of encounters.

Yes, God wants us to be captivated with Him and truly experience Him not just with head knowledge, but with actual revelation. However, many of the dramatic encounters we see in the Word of God were a commissioning to do a great work of God. These commissionings were given to strengthen the person to do great exploits in the face of grave danger and hardship over long periods of time where it seemed the promise would never come to pass.

Any believer can go preach the gospel—the Lord calls us all to do this, but there are certain assignments set aside that are so difficult that the Lord will grant specific experiences to sustain that person over the long-haul.

Most people so covet the experience, but they do not realize that God gives those encounters, because He knows that person is going to have so many difficulties that they will want to quit over and over again.

The world, Satan, and even our own human nature are constantly pushing us to give up and quit. However, God will come strengthen us with His grace so that we can persevere.

I have heard Mike Bickle say, “Perseverance is the mark of a true minister of God.” Everything in us and around us says, “Quit, give up, you’re a failure anyway.” However, God’s Word says that we have already won. We are more than conquerors in Christ Jesus, and the God of peace will soon crush Satan under our feet.

Encounters into the realm of heaven give us a glimpse into eternity, and pull us out of our present circumstances into the vast expanse of God’s redeeming plan. When life gets mundane, difficult, or we are in danger of losing our very lives, we can remember those times when God met us in such a way that we will never forget it. Those times strengthen our hearts to persevere.

I can imagine that when things got hard for Moses, he remembered the bush that burned with fire, but was not consumed. He remembered the voice that came from the bush and sent him to deliver Israel from the land of Egypt. An encounter like that is difficult to forget no matter the circumstances. I am sure that encounter sustained him in the journey.

Even Paul had a dramatic encounter on the road to Damascus. He met Jesus and was blinded by His glory. Meeting the risen Christ sustained Paul through beatings, shipwrecks, stonings, scourges, hunger, thirst, and miles and miles of endless road. He had been captivated and could never turn away.

God comes to strengthen the weak hands and the feeble knees. He comes to tell us, “Do not grow weary in doing good, for in due season, you will reap a harvest, if you do not lose heart!”

Releasing a Prophetic Voice: Prophesying the King of Glory

Who may ascend into the hill of the Lord? Or who may stand in His holy place?  He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who has not lifted up his soul to an idol, nor sworn deceitfully...Lift up your heads, O you gates! And be lifted up, you everlasting doors! And the King of glory shall come in. (Psalm 24:3-4, 7)

 

Psalm 24 is one of my favorite psalms. It speaks of the majesty of God and the one who ascends the hill of the Lord to seek His face. The one who ascends His holy hill must have clean hands and a pure heart. They must encounter Him and know His beauty.

The next part of this psalm is amazing. The writer then prophesies to the gates of a city concerning the King of Glory. Out of the place of encounter with the face of God, the writer prophesies for a place to open up to the King of Glory.

The ultimate fulfillment of this psalm is when Jesus returns to Jerusalem and splits the Mount of Olives. The Eastern gate of Jerusalem will open up for the King of Glory—Jesus to enter the city.

However, even though the ultimate fulfillment of this psalm is with the return of Jesus, God wants messengers who do the same thing over cities, regions, and nations now as a token of His coming reign.

God wants prophetic messengers who come before the Lord with clean hands and a pure heart—those who seek His face and His glory alone, and do not lift their souls to idols. As they ascend the hill of the Lord and encounter His beauty in their time with Him, they are captured by His beauty and cannot help but prophesy. These messengers become like Jeremiah who had a fire shut up in his bones. He could not hold it in.

From the place of encounter with the beauty of God, these messengers prophesy the nature of reality of who the King of Glory is in such a way that the gates of cities tremble. They prophesy in songs, in prayers, in preaching, and demonstrations of power, and literally bring glimpses of the coming kingdom down to earth.

The Word of God and the true revelation of the King of Glory shakes an atmosphere and shifts things in the spiritual realm where prophesying not only becomes words—but a prophetic decree. As the decree is released, the very words themselves cause the thing to happen.

God wants messengers who see into the realm of the Spirit and call things forth as though they are—actually releasing heaven on earth in a realm of faith and pointing to the King of glory who now is and is also to come.

Who is this King of Glory? He is the Lord strong and mighty.