One Thing: Digest The Message
In keeping with the theme of making the gospel central to our calling and ministry, I offer this second idea as a follow up to Discerning the Message. We must first be able to train our minds and hearts to see and hear what God is telling us to say to the people. But that is not enough. We must move forward in order to eventually deliver it. The second thing we must do is…
2. DIGEST THE MESSAGE
After we have discerned something from God, a word for us, through us, to the people, our next step is to digest it (i.e. own it, let it become a part of us, wrestle with it, be offended by it, feel the conviction personally, let it saturate our spirit). It is never enough to know what we are supposed to preach or say to the people. We have to actually be able to say it clearly, and unless we digest the message before we proclaim it, the message will be void of power and conviction.
Most folks can tell if a minister actually means what they say or if they are just regurgitating warmed up sermon material. No more pathetic indictment can be leveled against a minister than for someone to be uninspired by their message because the minister himself came across as uninspired (or fake, phony, plastic, rehearsed).
When I get a word from God, I have to yield to it myself before I ask others to yield to it. The Holy Spirit must preach it to me before I preach it to others. I need a familiarity with the text and the Spirit behind the meaning of the text so that I can know what I am talking about when I take it public. It is imperative that we digest the message because after all, we will soon be asking others to take our word for it that the message we preach is true and sent from God.
I know more about the Zanskar Valley of Ladakh than most people because I spent 2 months there, eating the food and smelling the air and walking the mountain trails along the Himalayas. I digested that place until it was a part of me. For a month, we trekked along goat trails living out of a tent and a backpack in order to reach Tibetan Buddhist villages with the gospel. So now when I see a book about Ladakh or a show on Discovery about the Zanskar region, I am dialed in because I know that place well. The same is true with our message, the gospel of Jesus Christ. It must affect us emotionally, we must know it well, it must be refined over time until there is a warm and honest familiarity with it. A minister must chew on the gospel, be offended and humiliated and surprised and energized by it. This takes a lifetime. We have to own what we sell or no one will believe it’s true because they can tell we don’t really believe it.
December 19th, 2007 at 9:52 am
Hi Clayton,
You are really hitting the nail on the head. With myself, I lead in the business (secular) world and also lead in our ministry. I see it in both realms with leaders who limit their ability because they take something they read and immediately try to communicate it out before they wrestle with it (I refer to it as looking in the mirror first before looking out the window). The message that we speak is really different to each person that has it delivered to them from the Holy Spirit, therefore the passion has to start the inspiration for them to open up their hearts and let the Holy Spirit work God’s magic. You are an awesome inspiration for me as I move forward in learning how to lead in a ministry. Have a Great CHRISTmas season.
Sean