The Four Faces of a Minister

by Jean Easley

    Of all people, the Christian minister is one of the most multi-faceted in the world.  He or she is viewed as possessing a variety of personalities, holding different positions, carrying diverse responsibilities.  Beloved Paul said of his own ministry, “…I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some” (I Cor. 9:22).  For a few moments we shall consider several descriptions of the preacher.  We shall consider who he really is from the viewpoints of the world, his best friend, himself, and God.

 The World’s View

     To a world seeking solace behind the doors of the church, the preacher is sometimes a popular man.  The fact that he is well liked in his community could indicate one of two things.  First, he has found his way into the hearts of the people by his pleasant helpfulness, offering them promises of good things to come, lives of ease and prosperity, and Christian fellowship.  Secondly, a lack of persecution and any kind of suffering for his beliefs might point to a lack of genuine godliness and the kind of conviction that provokes persecution.  We know that II Timothy 3:12 says, “Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.”

     The disciples on the road to Emmaus failed to recognize the Lord, and in a similar way the world fails to recognize the true minister of the Gospel.  What the world sees is a public servant, not given to brawling with his neighbors, a professional individual whose duty it is to answer the needs of all those who call upon him.

     The world sees a person “with Heavenly connections” in his time of need and whose gift of oratory naturally fits him for the pulpit.  He is uniquely qualified to pray the invocations and benedictions at community events, and he is of utmost necessity for marrying and burying.  “For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness, but unto us which are saved it is the power of God” (I Cor. 1:18).

     To the world, the minister is useful, but greatly unrecognized as an apostle sent from God for the purpose of calling sinners to repentance.  Instead of a prophet, he is thought of as a standard-bearer of some good code of ethics, not necessarily sent from God.

     But the prophet Ezekiel was warned by God of his duty as a watchman for the people:  “When I say unto the wicked, O wicked man, thou shalt surely die; if thou dost not speak to warm the wicked from his way, that wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at thine hand” (Ezekiel 33:8).  In reality, the man or woman of God bears an awesome responsibility!

The Best Friend’s View

     The best friend, that most intimate companion of his, knows the “person” of the minister perhaps better than anyone else.  He seems to have a seventh sense about qualities and characteristics of the minister, some of which even he is not aware.

     The intimacy of these special friends wouldn’t last long if the friend didn’t first see in the minister an “urgency” of his Divine call.  Foremost in his life is a heart throbbing with a desire to please God.  All other desires, hopes, dreams, ambitions are subservient to His call.  And the real cement of the friendship is a mutual desire for a God-centered, God-motivated, and God-pleasing life.

     The friend is acquainted with the humanity of the minister—a man subject to like passions as other men.  Yet he lives an exemplary life before his people, though his “flesh” requires the same crucifixion as all flesh.  “And they that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts.  If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit” (Gal. 5:24-25).  It is not possible for the minister to live a blameless life without a daily crucifixion.  Like Paul, he must “die daily.”

     The understanding friend sees the minister facing many obstacles in his life that need to be overcome:  providing for his family, emotional trials, persecutions for his faith, attacks upon his integrity, personal failures, pressure that seems beyond what a mortal man could stand—from his friends as well as from his enemies—physical limitations and mental and educational handicaps.

     But, the minister’s response to this challenge is different from the average man.  He is compelled by a burden...driven by a burden for the lost and dying sheep that Christ left in his charge.  It is a burden to one day hear the Master say, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.”  Truly, his burden is the burden of the heart of God.  And it is the strength of God’s heart dwelling in His own that motivates his ministry when the fleshly “man” would have given up long ago.  He is first and last God’s man.

The Minister’s View

     The minister, asked how he views himself, may have to pass by the mirror a second time to refresh his memory of the images both of what he set out to be and what he really is.  Man finds it easy to forget his own image:  “For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was” (James 1:24).

     In looking at his own image, if the minister sees in himself an image that looks progressively more like what he started out to be, he can be encouraged to continue on this pathway; somewhere up the road he took a right turn.  But, if what he set out to be is only a shadow now, at some turn he chose the wrong way.

     The main element of his ministry and his life and character that will keep him striving to fulfill his first aim in the ministry is his sense of indebtedness.  He is a debtor.  And he owes a debt that can never be fully paid…a debt that demands a loyalty and diligence rarely found in one who is able to know the date of the last installment payment.  Thank God the debt cannot be fully paid, for if it could, one would soon use up, wear out, or give away the goods, tear up the agreement, and the debtor would forget the creditor.

     The minister considers himself a debtor, not only because of what he has received, but also because of what he is able to give.  The doctor who discovers a new cure for a disease is in debt to mankind to share his discovery.  The ethics of his profession demand it.  If he has an answer, he must give it.  The debtor to Christ has the only answer to man’s state of hopelessness: the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.  He becomes, also, a debtor to everyone who does not know Christ.  He owes what he has to those who have not.

     Just before His ascension, five times (in the Gospels and Acts), the Lord emphasized the importance of the program of spreading the Gospel of Christ to all the world, to every creature, and all nations.  And He named these chosen ones “witnesses.”  “But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: And ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem , and in all Judea, and in Samaria , and unto the uttermost part of the earth” (Acts 1:8).

     Obligated to testify to, to act as a legal witness, to furnish proof of, to see or know by personal presence, to constitute the scene of—obligated to all of these, the minister of the Gospel of Jesus Christ has a large job wrapped up in the Great Commission for his disciples.  Eventually, he must pass on his vision and burden to others who come up under his ministry.

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