He leads me …

Last time we started to look at what Charles Stanley has to say about the benefits of adversity based on what we see about Paul throughout the New Testament. We will now look at another way that we are better off, after which I will add a comment or two of my own.

12 LESSONS FROM ADVERSITY - Growing Closer to God Through Trials and Troubles[1]

Through tribulation and difficulty, Paul learned:

1. God would give him supernatural strength in his weakness. He explained that his weakness allowed the Holy Spirit’s power to work through his life: “I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ’s sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Cor. 12:9-10).

“Ministers of the Gospel especially should banish all thoughts of their own cleverness, intellectual ability, culture, sufficiency for their work, and learn that only when they are emptied can they be filled, and only when they know themselves to be nothing are they ready for God to work through them.” (Alexander Maclaren[2])

Some of us have learnt this the hard way. Maybe we took a Bible study for the first time, and the feedback afterwards was really positive. However, following studies did not seem to have the same impact. How did this happen? After all, we followed the same model each time.

The difference was that the first time we trusted God to be with us. We had not done it before, so we probably had prayed beforehand, committed the study to the Lord, and everything went well. Then on the next occasion we thought that we knew what to do, so we would just follow along the same lines as the first time. But this time it was not as good and we could not see why.

It was all our own effort and God was not really a part of it. No one understood this better than Paul. In Paul’s case it was not just about his teaching – it was about his whole ministry. The impact of his teaching and the signs and wonders that followed were all from the Holy Spirit – in His time and in His way. Paul was the vessel that He worked through. The less of Paul that was involved, the more the Holy Spirit was able to minister.

This is something to think about if we want a dynamic ministry. It does not matter if it is preaching, arranging the flowers in the church for Sunday, or setting up an outreach into the community, unless it is the Holy Spirit who gives the work its direction, it will never be the best that it can be.

[1] https://www.intouch.org/Read/Blog/12-lessons-from-adveristy

[2] Maclaren was twice president of the Baptist Union of Great Britain, and he was president of the Baptist World Congress in London in 1905 He received honorary degrees of divinity from both Edinburgh and Glasgow Universities