Ministry & Intimacy

The other night at a wedding I ran into an acquaintance, a longtime pastor of a large church. In the course of our conversation, I asked how I could pray for him. Without hesitation he said, "That I would actually spend time with Jesus and not be so caught up in being busy all the time.... You'd think after all these years I'd have that down, but I don't."

Isn't it interesting how the ministry always seems to creep its way between the minister and Jesus? My friend was so busy doing things for Jesus that he didn't have much time for Jesus.

Ministry flows from intimacy. The primary call on the minister is to be with Christ in an intimate love relationship. When Jesus called the twelve disciples, He appointed them "so that they would be with Him and that He could send them out to preach, and to have authority to cast out the demons" (emphasis mine). Note the order: Jesus ordained that his first leaders be with Him before they attempt to do work for Him. As Jesus would later teach, He is the source for life and ministry. Without deep connectivity to Him, their ability to live and lead well would crumble beneath the pressures they would soon face as leaders in His kingdom.

The same is true for the Christian leader today. We have been saved that we might have a meaningful love affair with Christ; everything else is subordinate and subsequent to that glorious truth. Tozer wrote, "We are called to an everlasting preoccupation with God." Yet Christians in general, and often leaders in particular, seem to succumb to busyness and struggle with practicing unhurried intimacy with Christ.

This is a dangerous compromise. Eugene Peterson asserts, "The word busy is the symptom not of commitment but of betrayal. It is not devotion but defection. The adjective busy set as a modifier to pastor should sound to our ears like adulterous to characterize a wife or embezzling to characterize a banker. It is an outrageous scandal, a blasphemous affront." "Ouch," says this busy pastor.

In the book of Jeremiah, the Lord was expressing His displeasure with the southern kingdom of Judah: "The priests did not say, ‘Where is the LORD?' And those who handle the law did not know Me" (emphasis mine). The word know used here is the word yada in Hebrew, and it means to know relationally and experientially. The Lord's complaint is that they did not know Him relationally, experientially, and intimately. His rebuke targeted the spiritual leaders who, of all in the kingdom, carried the privilege and responsibility of knowing Him. Though many other sins were prevalent in Judah at the time, the one that seemed to most upset God was their departure from intimate relationship with Him. They were still working for God, but they weren't really with God.

We sometimes get so caught up in doing good things for God that we don't have time for God. The danger is that in our zeal and passion for the ministry, we can easily lose the sine qua non (essential condition) of simply knowing Christ intimately. Recall the words of the risen Lord to the church at Ephesus: "I know your deeds and your toil.... But I have this against you, that you have left your first love." Their many good works were acknowledged by the Lord, but they were a pitiful substitute for relationally loving the Lord.

Our first love is to be our last love. All that would seek to place itself between us and our first love must be dealt with ruthlessly in the life of the leader, lest he or she become weary in the numerous responsibilities facing him or her. These responsibilities, apart from connection to the Object of our service, eventually grind us down to the very core of personal inadequacy. When busyness supplants with-ness we are in trouble.

Christ's suggested course of action for the church at Ephesus was to repent. This can mean only one thing-that the leader or minister or ministry or church that is engaged in good works while neglecting sincere relational nearness to Christ is on a perilous path and must change course immediately to avoid shipwreck. We all know that the reefs and shores of Christian work are strewn with the wrecks of busy and important, but not intimate, men and women.

The work will always seek to pry its way between Christ and the Christian. The passion of every pastor and leader must be to love and enjoy Jesus with every fiber of his or her being. Authentic and eternally impacting ministry can flow only from an intimate relationship with Christ.

2 Comments »

1. I agree with the overall aim of this post. Intimacy with Christ in prayer and Scripture meditation are essential to our Life in Christ and whatever “ministry” we do. Indeed, even Jesus Himself went apart to pray constantly.
   I think, however, we tend to forget that it’s not necessarily the doing that is the problem, but how we are doing it. If we go about heedless of Christ’s presence, then doing will feel like a betrayal. If, however, the doing is done mindful of the presence of our Lord, then we are doing our “ministry” intimately with Him. I think of the great little book The Practice of the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence. What a perfect example of every task being an intimate moment with our Savior. I will agree that today’s church leaders (be they laypersons or ordained) engage in so many superfluous activities, that it’s simply exhausting, leaving no energy for intimacy with Christ.
   We definitely need to slow down and spend more quiet time with the Savior, but I also think we need to remember He is with us amid the din of daily life as well.

   Comment by Jeremiah - Nov 16, 2011 @ 10:38 AM

2. “Our religious activities should be ordered in such a way as to have plenty of time for ...solitude and silence” (A. W. Tozer).

   I realize that I have a lot of the “Martha Syndrome” (doing); therefore, I try to cultivate the “Mary Cure” (being).  I want to sit at Jesus’ feet and allow Him to transform me from the inside out. I can then live a more balanced life. My “doing” then flows from my “being”: Jesus in me in Whom “[I] live, and move, and have [my] being” (rf Luke 10:40-42; Acts 17:28).

   Admittedly, I learned this the hard way.

   Comment by Sharon Cargill - Nov 18, 2011 @ 07:19 AM

Sorry, but commenting is no longer available for this post.