Christ The King Ministry International.org

By Rev. Michael Carl

Introduction

Do you remember coming to dinner as a kid and your mother asking you, ‘Did you wash your hands?’  Why did she ask that?  She wanted to make sure your hands were clean before you started to eat.

Why?  Because eating with dirty hands is well, dirty.  This is especially true if you’re eating finger food.

Numerous medical studies now show that washing our hands regularly and before meals can cut down on the number of possible infections by wide margins.  So, it makes sense to wash our hands.

Yet, we read in today’s passage that the Pharisees had the right idea, but for the wrong reason.  Their motivation is what made all the difference as Jesus confronted them about their complaints.

The Passage and Commentary

¹ Then the Pharisees and some of the scribes came together to Him, having come from Jerusalem.

It’s worth noting in this first verse that the word for came together is the Greek word, ??.??.???.??? which is the word from which we have the location for Jewish worship, synagogue.  So, synagogue means, to get together.

This concept transferred over to the words for the church, such as ekklesia, the word for God’s people getting together as the church.  From this we know that the community of faith has always been the people gathering together to worship—together.

What does this mean in practical terms?  It was always assumed that because of the words used to describe what it means to be a part of God’s people, and because of what it means to be the church, the Bible writers took it for granted that we would just know that we’re supposed to be getting together.

So don’t buy the bunk from someone who says, ‘The Bible doesn’t say “Go to church.”’  The reason the Bible never says, ‘You have to go to church,’ is because the writers wrote everything from the point of view that we would be assembling together.  It was a part of fabric of what it means to be God’s people!

² Now when^[a] they saw some of His disciples eat bread with defiled, that is, with unwashed hands, they found fault. ³ For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands in a special way, holding the tradition of the elders.
⁵ Then the Pharisees and scribes asked Him, “Why do Your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashed hands?”

This is a longer section of Scripture that we usually use, but the point of the passage is made really clear.  The Pharisees were complaining to Jesus about why the disciples didn’t wash their hands.

Yet, let’s take note of why they filed their complaint with Jesus.  They didn’t say, ‘Why don’t Your disciples wash their hands before they eat, because it’s unsanitary to eat with dirty hands?’

They didn’t say, ‘Eww, that’s nasty.  Look at those guys being so gross eating with dirty hands.’

They said, ‘”Why do Your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashed hands?”’

Remember that these men were Jews and they had the Law.  They had the background of understanding to know that eating without washing was ‘unclean.’

What was their concern?  Their concern was that the disciples were not following the rules set up by their predecessors in office.  Their concern was over things they thought were important, not the major issue.

⁶ He answered and said to them, “Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written:
‘ This people honors Me with their lips,
But their heart is far from Me.
⁷ And in vain they worship Me,
Teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’

Jesus responds by critiquing this very point.  He says that they’re not really worried about sanitation, nor are they concerned with real faith.  The Pharisees weren’t concerned with righteousness or issues of the heart. They were concerned with the truly ‘man-made’ rules.

This brings us to the vital question about those things that are the rules of men and those things that are from faith.

So many people dismiss liturgical worship and say that we’re following the rules of men.

That’s not quite right.  If we remember our very early church history, the Apostles were given the authority by Jesus to make decisions about doctrine, the real meaning of tradition, faith and practise.  In turn, they passed this authority on to others in what is called the principle of succession.

The Apostles appointed successors to their ministry, following the examples of a host of Biblical leaders.

The liturgies were developed very early in the church, and designed by those who could honestly trace their authority to do so to an actual Apostle.

The derision of the Sacraments and the liturgies didn’t take place until after the original wave of the Reformation.

If we also recall, Luther and Calvin never challenged the Roman church over the structure and the authority of the Bishops.  Neither Luther nor Calvin challenged the Sacraments or the liturgies.

Luther and Calvin denounced the Roman church’s belief in papal

infallibility and the Roman church’s practise of raising post-Apostolic era practises as equal to Scripture in authority.

It was only after Luther and Calvin passed from the scene that later leaders said, ‘I don’t need that,’ in relation to the liturgies.  They said, ‘What do we need this for?’

They did it on their own.

So, who is actually establishing the ‘commandments of men’?  Is it the worship developed under the umbrella of Apostolic authority or is it the folks acting on their own after the Reformation?  And incidentally, much of the effort to dispose of the liturgies began following the Enlightenment, a purely humanistic movement that denounced Scripture and questioned the existence of God.

¹⁴ When He had called all the multitude to Himself, He said to them, “Hear Me, everyone, and understand: ¹⁵ There is nothing that enters a man from outside which can defile him; but the things which come out of him, those are the things that defile a man.

²¹ For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, ²² thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lewdness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. ²³ All these evil things come from within and defile a man.”

Jesus is clearly telling us that the most damaging force in our lives is what’s in the heart.  Folks, those thoughts we nurture and those ideas to which we give counsel are the ideas and concepts that can bring destruction on us.

The Lord’s half brother James zeroes in on this in the first chapter of his letter where he writes, ‘Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God’; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone. ¹⁴ But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. ¹⁵ Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death.

Note the progression.  We have the thought; then we nurture it.  After nurturing it, it brings about an action.

This is Jesus’ warning.  Guard your heart and control your mind.  Bring the mind under the authority of the Holy Spirit and fill your minds with God’s Word.

When your mind is saturated with God’s Word, then you have the edge to bring the thoughts under control.  Then, those things that come out of you will be tempered with God’s Word by His Spirit.

The Conclusion

Thus, we have again the need to place ourselves under the Lordship of Christ.

Let’s feed on the Word of God and come to the Lord’s Table.  It’s in worship and in praise that our minds are Cleaned Up.

How do we respond?  Let’s pray together and agree together with this prayer.

Let’s pray.

A Sermon by Rev. Michael Carl

Introduction

            We talked a bit last week about critics.  There are plenty of them and they normally have plenty to say. 

            Yet, how many of them are in your position?  Benjamin Franklin is supposed to have said at one time, “Decisions are always easy for those who don’t have to make them.”

            We remember Teddy Roosevelt’s quote from last week, “The credit goes to the one who is in the arena.”

            This was true in Jesus’ time as well.  In fact, the Pharisees and Sadducees had a team of people following Jesus from place to place so they could find some basis for accusing Jesus of heresy.

            The Pharisees were the self-appointed critics of Jesus.

            They really had no intention of adding anything positive to the discussion; they simply wanted to accuse Jesus of wrongdoing.

            Folks, let me be blunt about one major fact.  If you are trying to live a godly life, you’re going to have plenty of critics.

The Passage and Application

            Yet, in our Gospel passage for this week, the people were harshly denouncing Jesus’ teaching about the meaning of His ministry.

50 This is the bread which comes down from heaven, that one may eat of it and not die. 51 I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread that I shall give is My flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world.”

52 The Jews therefore quarreled among themselves, saying, “How can this Man give us His flesh to eat?”

53 Then Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you. 54 Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. 55 For My flesh is food indeed,^[h] and My blood is drink indeed. 56 He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him. 57 As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who feeds on Me will live because of Me. 58 This is the bread which came down from heaven—not as your fathers ate the manna, and are dead. He who eats this bread will live forever.”

59 These things He said in the synagogue as He taught in Capernaum.

            Yes, if you read John 6. 50-60, you will see that He was giving us a word picture for what we would come to know as the Eucharist or Holy Communion.  Yet, there was more.

            Jesus firmly told the people that a relationship with Him was essential for life.  Even thought the people bitterly objected to the illustrations Jesus used, He was attempting to take them to their next level of understanding of what it meant to have a relationship with the Lord.

            Jesus was inviting them into a deeper level of intimacy and fellowship with the Father.  Jesus was trying to get the people to see the priceless value of a deeply intimate relationship with God.  On this level, every moment of the day can be spent in the sweetest communion with Him.

            How do we know that’s what He was doing?  In Matthew 13, Jesus quotes from Isaiah 6.9-10…

             “‘ Hearing you will hear and shall not understand,

      And seeing you will see and not perceive;

       15 For the hearts of this people have grown dull.

      Their ears are hard of hearing,

      And their eyes they have closed,

      Lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears,

      Lest they should understand with their hearts and turn,

      So that I should heal them.’”

What Jesus Wants

            We’re tempted to say, “Isn’t that mean?  I mean, doesn’t Jesus want the people to understand?”

            Of course He does.  Yet, He wants us to want to understand.  There’s a keen difference. 

            So many of us want to be spoon-fed the truth.  We don’t want to be stretched or challenged.  Yet, if we take that position, then we’re essentially telling the Lord, “I don’t want Your best.  I just want to be left alone right where I am.”

Yet, out of His abundant love for us, He constantly invites and cajoles us into seeking after the finest and most precious thing possible:  He’s drawing us into the gift of fellowship with Him.  He’s drawing us to the place where we live in constant fellowship with Him.

The truth is, we can grow to a point where we live a life where we enjoy His presence throughout the day.

How We Get It

            Truthfully, there are no secrets to living a faithful life in Christ.  Remember there are two parts to this:  Word and Sacrament.

The truth is, you pray to start out, “Lord, I want to live faithfully as a disciple.  Lord, I want to walk with You; I want to know You more.”

            Then you begin to read the Bible.  You read it systematically.  Find a place and start out.  Ask the Lord to show you what the passage means when you read.

            As you study the Word, and the more you read it, the more you begin to see how the passages apply to your situation.

            When you have one of these revelations, it’s the Lord speaking to you. 

“Wow, this Bible passage looks just like the world today,” or, “Oh, this looks like

what’s happening in church,” or something like that.  The parallels begin to be really sharp, clear and profound.

            The rest of the package includes the Sacrament.  A couple of days ago I was watching a well-known TV preacher and he was talking about Holy Communion.  He was talking about how Holy Communion gives us power for living.

            Because we’re receiving the living Body of Christ and the Blood of Christ, we’re taking Jesus to ourselves and growing in grace to the place where the sacrament feeds our faith.

            When we get to this point, we begin to have faith enough to walk in the fullness of faith and in the power of being a disciple.

            This means that Holy Communion brings healing to our bodies.  This means that Holy Communion gives faith.  Holy Communion gives more grace.

            Remember we’re receiving the Body of Christ.  This  means we receive the power for life.  We have new life; we have the fullness of life given to servants of the Lord.

            Remember we’re receiving the Blood of Christ.  Do you remember the things Scripture says about the power of the Blood.  We have forgiveness.  We have power for living.  We live a life with a clean heart and mind. 

Conclusion

            So the power for living starts here.

            Yes, you’ll take some heat.  Yet, let us resolve not to be like the critics, but to draw so near to God that we will be disciples. 

            The answer to gaining courage enough to walk with Christ is to feed on His Word and Sacraments.  Through His Word and the Sacrament, we find the strength to do new and innovative things for Him.

A Sermon by Rev. Michael Carl, Pastor of Christ the King

Introduction

            In his epic Sorbonne speech in Paris on April 23, 1910, former President Theodore Roosevelt gave us the famous ‘Man in the Arena.’  TR said:

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

            Mr. Roosevelt’s point was that it’s easy to criticize those who take a step of faith and attempt to do something great, new and different.

            Somewhere along the line, another wise observer said, ‘The only one who never makes mistakes is the one who isn’t doing anything.’

The Passage and Commentary

            We’ve already read our passage for today, but we’re at a disadvantage if we dive right in to the passage without going back to catch at least one or two of the verses that led to this reaction.

            In verses 54-56, Jesus says what many think of as the unthinkable: 

54 Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. 55 For My flesh is food indeed, and My blood is drink indeed. 56 He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him.

            Now this sounds totally disgusting unless you know what Jesus is doing here.  He is challenging their understanding of what it means to have a relationship with Him.  In one sense, I think He put the most dismal picture possible to this to shake them up.

The point here is that Jesus is calling for such a deep level of intimacy with Him that He’s talking about a serious level of oneness with Him.  So He says, ‘”Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.  For My flesh is food indeed, and My blood is drink indeed.”’

            We’ve come to understand this as a forerunner to the Holy Eucharist.  It’s at His table where we come and discover a level of fellowship with Jesus that is above and beyond our normal ability to comprehend.

            Indeed we come to dine with Him.  And in the process, as Henri Nouwen says so beautifully, ‘The guest becomes the Host.’  We’re at the table with Hm, but He becomes the One in whom we feast, fellowship and draw near all at the same time.

            The sad thing is that many of those hearing Him didn’t get it.  They didn’t see or hear in His words an invitation to the beauty of intimacy with the Living Saviour.

            These were Jews, so they knew the theology of coming to ‘the banqueting table.’  What they heard was a stridently demanding level of service and commitment to the Lord.

            So now we go to verses 60-61…

60 Therefore many of His disciples, when they heard this, said, “This is a hard saying; who can understand it?”

61 When Jesus knew in Himself that His disciples complained about this, He said to them, “Does this offend you?

            So, they said, ‘It’s too hard.’

            Then verse sixty-six says, ‘Many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more.’

            Think about this.  Have you ever heard what it sounds like for someone to consciously choose to go to hell?  If you thought you hadn’t, you have now.

            You see, the truth is, we don’t really have to make some grandiose statement or commit some awful deed to get sent there.  All we have to do is do as these folks did.  We simply walk away from the Lord.

            We’ve been sold this bill of goods about what you have to do to go to hell.  The truth is, you don’t have to do anything to go there. 

            I remember growing up back in Texas someone would say, ‘Hey, you can go to hell for lying.’  This statement is the product of the mistaken notion that God is up in heaven with a tally board adding marks beside our name for every good and bad deed.  And at the end, if our goods outweigh the bads, we get into heaven.

            Not so.  The reason we go to hell is to choose not to walk with Jesus.  That’s why we can say those folks in this passage who said, ‘It’s too hard,’ and who ‘went back and walked with Him no more,’ are turning from the Lord and walking away from eternal life.

            Jesus ups the ante when He says…

62 What then if you should see the Son of Man ascend where He was before? 63 It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life. 64 But there are some of you who do not believe.” For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe, and who would betray Him. 65 And He said, “Therefore I have said to you that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted to him by My Father.”

            Jesus says in another chapter that the Father is always working.  So here the Lord Jesus says that the Father is the One who is constantly, by His Holy Spirit, tweaking hearts and prompting us to follow Jesus.

            This is pretty awesome, for God is always at work drawing people to Himself.

            We heard Him.

            So God bless Peter here…

67 Then Jesus said to the twelve, “Do you also want to go away?”

68 But Simon Peter answered Him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. 69 Also we have come to believe and know that You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”

            Peter declares the truth of Who Jesus is.  He’s the Christ, the Anointed One who is the only One who has the words of eternal life.  Jesus is the One who feeds His lambs.

            Yet our purpose is to be about the business of being sensitive so the Lord can use us as His instruments to draw others to Him.

            Yes, it may present some difficulties.  We may take some heat.  We may get criticized for being different or doing things differently.  We may take some heat for being innovative in our approach to ministry. 

            There are probably those who caught our TV program and thought the opening was awful because it had a Christian rock song in the introduction.  Remember what TR had to say.  The critics can sit there and say all sorts of stuff against us. 

            It’s easy for those who sit on the sidelines to criticize those who are on the field.

            Remember our holy task.  The Lord Jesus is the only One who has the words of eternal life.

Conclusion

            So for us, and for all who will follow Him, the answer to gaining courage enough to walk with Christ is to feed on His Word and Sacraments.  Through His Word and the Sacrament of the Lord’s Table, we find the strength to do new and innovative things for Him.

            We also find the strength so we will never have to say, ‘It’s too hard.’

God is doing something great at Christ the King Church!  Check out these photos of Christ the King’s congregation!

Join us at Christ the King Church Sunday morning at 11:30 am for an awesome time of praise and worship!

Come join us and worship our Lord and be blessed by coming to His table in the freedom and warmth of a wonderfully loving, Christ-centred environment.

The service begins at 11:30 and we worship at the Methodist Church, 273 Vernon Street in Wakefield, MA.

If you’re on Boston’s North Shore and receive WCAT, Wakefield’s cable access channel, be sure and catch Christ the King Church’s program Powerline at 6:00 pm Wednesday evenings and 5:30 pm Thursdays.

Producer Daniel Carl has done an awesome opening and closing for the show and it looks great!

Blessings to you!

Pastor Mike

Today is Tuesday and it’s time for us to join in a chorus of prayer with people from across the U. S. to pray for a massive revival and awakening.

All of America’s great revivals have come about through a move of extraordinary prayer, from the First Great Awakening to the Welsh/Azusa Street/Appalachian Awakenings in 1904-1906 and the several awakenings in between.

S0 let’s take at least fifteen minutes this evening, from 8:45 to 9:00 pm Eastern Time.  (It’s 7:45 to 8:00 pm Central, as so on.)  Let’s pray that the Lord will move in a great way.  Let’s pray that the church in the U. S. will awaken from its slumber and lethargy to become the great force for the Lord’s Kingdom.  Let’s pray for a fresh move of His Holy Spirit.

If there was ever a time this nation needed an awakening, it’s now!

By Rev. Michael Carl

Introduction

Have you ever gone somewhere and felt, ‘I’ve got a bad feeling about this’?

That’s normal really, because the Lord has given us a conscience and if we’ve received the deeper infilling of the Holy Spirit, we might even have the Holy Spirit’s gift of discernment.

On another level, we all have a range of emotions that take us from exaltation and rejoicing to worry, fear or despair.

Today’s Bible readings amazingly take us to Christ and His being the ‘Bread of Life.’

To explain a bit, the lectionary was developed over a period of a couple of hundred years beginning in the second century.  The Bishops, who were the successors to the Apostles, knew that any public worship in the churches should present the whole counsel of God.

What’s interesting is that the Bishops such as Polycarp, who actually knew the Apostle John, and others like him saw these verses as all being connected to Jesus being the ‘Bread of Life.’  That’s why these readings are together on this particular Lord’s Day.

Now, the Old Testament reading about Elijah, the angel and the Bread from Heaven teaches us about the subject discussed at the beginning.  It’s the range of emotions that we all have.

Addressing the Topic

A colleague once told me, ‘Ministry isn’t for wimps.’  That’s certainly true, but we ought to be able to add that growing old, indeed, life itself isn’t for wimps. 

During the course of our lives we’re going to be challenged.  We’re going to run up against some monumental tasks and situations that will push us to the very limits of our being.

The colleague who told me that was a ministry veteran.  I thought it was so strange that he would say something like that.  ‘Doesn’t he remember all the times that he’s ministered to people and helped them through difficult situations?’ I wondered.

‘Doesn’t he know the ministry highs when someone gets saved or has a problem resolved?’

Since I was a serious rookie I didn’t bother to think that the obvious answer to that question was ‘Yes.’

It’s true that people are delightful, wonderful, affirming, and full of love and warmth.  People can bring joy to your heart and by their words, make you feel like you’re on top of the world.

My colleague was referring to those in between times.  There are those moments when people aren’t so nice.

Let’s try to be clear here.  There is this totally nasty thing called sin.  We’re all fallen because of that little incident in the Garden of Eden.

I’m using ministry here because it’s an easy way to frame the situation.  Yet, we all have occupations, careers or life situations that place us in situations where we have to work with people.

And every one of us knows someone who has been a pain, a thorn in the side, a constant irritant or just an absolutely miserable person.

About a dozen or so years ago, Gary Larson did a Far Side featuring God creating the earth.  As God came up with the dynamic mix that would comprise His prized creation, He took a jar from the shelf marked ‘Jerks.’  As He added a few of them to the mix, God said, ‘This ought to make things interesting.’

The Passage

In 1 Kings 18, Elijah was on top of the world.  He was confident and had a great victory over a host of pagan religious leaders. When the people finally listened to him and no longer paid attention to the prophets of Baal, we all know that Elijah must have felt a sense of triumph. 

 1 And Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, also how he had executed all the prophets with the sword. 2 Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, “So let the gods do to me, and more also, if I do not make your life as the life of one of them by tomorrow about this time.” 3 And when he saw that, he arose and ran for his life, and went to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah, and left his servant there.

4 But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a broom tree. And he prayed that he might die, and said, “It is enough! Now, LORD, take my life, for I am no better than my fathers!”

5 Then as he lay and slept under a broom tree, suddenly an angel touched him, and said to him, “Arise and eat.” 6 Then he looked, and there by his head was a cake baked on coals, and a jar of water. So he ate and drank, and lay down again. 7 And the angel of the LORD came back the second time, and touched him, and said, “Arise and eat, because the journey is too great for you.” 8 So he arose, and ate and drank; and he went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights as far as Horeb, the mountain of God.

What a difference a day makes.  The very next day, 1 Kings 19 tells us that Jezebel sent him a message that more or less said, ‘I’m going to kill you.’  In panic, that great warrior for the Lord ran away in fear.  He even went into a fit of despair.

People will put us in states of mind where we are depressed, angry, resentful, hate-filled or betrayed.  By their words and actions people can make us feel satisfaction or betrayal and anger.

What do we do?  We can allow those folks to have control over us by dwelling on their words and actions or we can choose to be free.

I remember the times in the army when we would go on a road march.  We would have to have a rucksack that weighed at least 25 pounds.  That was the minimum to qualify.  Most cases when we really had to pack, the rucksacks weighed more than that.

Still, on a nice hot day, those twenty-five to thirty pound packs felt like they weighed a ton.  And the longer the march and the hotter it got, the heavier those things started to get.

If you can’t relate to the rucksack, imagine carrying a suitcase or any other heavy thing when it’s 90 degrees outside.

The point here is that we can carry around the bitterness like a rucksack.  And the longer we carry it, the heavier and the hotter it seems.  And we can keep carrying it around until it makes us so weary and drained that we feel like we’re going to collapse under the weight of it.

Yet, on our own, sometimes it seems like the only thing we’re capable of doing is continuing to lug around those heavy loads.

Yet, at the end of the march, the platoon sergeant or our commanding officer would say, ‘OK, drop your rucksacks.’

This is when the relief comes.

This is where the relief came for Elijah too.

The Answer

To comfort him, the Lord sent an angel to minister to Elijah’s need for strength and confidence.  The angel says, ‘The journey is too much for you.’

To gain strength for his journey, Elijah had to be fed by the Lord.

The answer to our interior battles is to feed on the Word of God and the sacrament of the Lord’s Table, the Eucharist.  It is only through the Word and Sacrament that we can find the strength we need to keep our head straight.

You see, the Lord knows that we need His food to have the strength to let go of those heavy loads and to have the strength to forgive those who have done us harm.

This is why we need the Lord, His Word and His Sacrament.  We come to the altar and feed on the Bread From Heaven and we gain strength.

Indeed, we gain strength to forgive—to let go of our heavy load and to be free.

A colleague once told me, ‘Ministry isn’t for wimps.’

The man was a ministry veteran and I thought it was weird that he would say something like that.  ‘Doesn’t he remember all the times that he’s ministered to people and helped them through difficult situations?’ I wondered.

People are delightful, wonderful, affirming, and full of love and warmth.  People can bring joy to your heart and by their words, make you feel like you’re on top of the world.

Yet, there is this tacky thing called sin and because people are fallen as a result of that little incident in the Garden of Eden a long time ago, people can also be prickly.

About a dozen or so years ago, Gary Larson did a Far Side featuring God creating the earth.  As God came up with the dynamic mix that would comprise His prized creation, He took a jar from the shelf marked ‘Jerks.’  As He added a few of them to the mix, God said, ‘This ought to make things interesting.’

We’ve all had to deal with our share of jerks.  It wasn’t until recently that I understood that he wasn’t referring to our relationships with others.  He was speaking with the conflicting emotions we experience on the inside.  Pastors, evangelists and other ministry people are subject to an incredible range of emotions.

In 1 Kings 18, Elijah was on top of the world.  He was confident and had a great victory over a host of pagan religious leaders. When the people finally listened to him and no longer paid attention to the prophets of Baal, we all know that Elijah must have felt a sense of triumph.

That was one day.  The next day, 1 Kings 19 tells us that Jezebel sent him a message that more or less said, ‘I’m going to kill you.’  In panic, that great warrior for the Lord ran away in fear.  He even went into a fit of despair.

To comfort him, the Lord sent an angel to minister to Elijah’s need for strength and confidence.  The angel says, ‘The journey is too much for you.’

To gain strength for his journey, Elijah had to be fed by the Lord. 

The answer to our interior battles is to feed on the Word of God and the sacrament of the Lord’s Table, the Eucharist.  It is only through the Word and Sacrament that we can find the strength we need to keep our head straight.

One church where you will hear the answer proclaimed without apology is a new one in town.  It’s Christ the King Church.  We’re meeting at 11:30 am at the Wakefield-Lynnfield United Methodist Church at 237 Vernon Street in Wakefield. 

If you need information on how to find us, call 781-640-9450.