The Fear of the Lord and Health XIII - Living Grace Fellowship

Wednesday 10/02/13

Topic: The Fear of the Lord & Healing

Series – And He Healed them all:

The Fear of the Lord and Health XIII.mp3

Key Text:

Prov. 3:7-8

Eph. 4:1-16

The Fear of the Lord and Healing…

Tonight we continued from my suggestion to our church last week, that our giftedness will separate us all by itself. It will establish you in your place if only you will follow your natural inclinations.

The difficulty comes when, we become self-aware. Like those grade school children, something happens over summer break for most 5th/6th graders and when they return, they have two competing hierarchies. One taught to them by “the world” and one that always came naturally all the way up to last year. However, something about puberty brings all logic into question. Something about growing taller (or failing to do so) developing muscles or curves begins to create a superficial hierarchy of its own to which nearly everyone falls prey. It is here that we “learn” our unnatural and newly assumed roles which break our spirits and curb our behavior. This new awareness of the external self has caused more people to miss their gifts and their callings than perhaps any one single thing in their lives.

In order to honor God, truly fearing Him in regards to our giftings we MUST take our eyes off of ourselves and those external, superficial labels of value and onto our Father for our identity and self-worth. Being free enough to walk in your gifting requires that you die to any method of self-actualization outside of Christ. He alone defines you, owns you and gives you worth. Even what you do in the kingdom and for the kingdom has no impact on your value. You are His, THAT is you value! People who look to their giftings for identity and self-worth are drawing from an empty well and using the gift God gave for the benefit of others and are spending it on themselves.

God both gives gifts to people and gives people as gifts…

One of the huge mistakes we’ve made, especially in the western world, is we have capitalized on ONE gift to the almost total abandonment of the others.

Those given as Pastor-teachers to the body have been placed in such untouchable esteem that we’ve made the local assembly THE END GAME of all ministry. The sad thing in addition to this is that Pastoring is MOST often unbiblical to begin with so even THAT gift is distorted, out of balance and ultimately destructive. Pastors were intended to shepherd in groups of equal authority. Their job is to create a safe environment for the sheep to gather, feed, grown and mature on a regular basis SO AS to be sent out into the work of the ministry. Let’s look at a key verse illustrating this fact:

“And He Himself gave some apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastor-teachers, for…

the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry,

for the edifying of the body of Christ,

till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man,

to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ;

THAT we should no longer be children,

tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting,

BUT, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ—from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies,

according to the effective working by which every part does its share,

causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.” ~ Eph. 4:11-16

As you can see, God gave some people AS gifts to the body in order to grow them personally and equip them ministerially. It is the SAINTS who are to do the work of the ministry, NOT the Pastors. The pastors (along with Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Teachers) equip the saints for THEIR work WHICH IS the ministry!

What ministry? The building up and edifying of the body of Christ.

In this way, with EVERY PART doing its share, every part will be honor God with the gifting they have received FROM Him. This is just one of many areas in our lives where we must learn to actively walk in the fear of the Lord, doing His will and fulfilling His purpose.

We covered this MUCH more clearly and thoroughly in the audio. To learn more about the Fear of the Lord and Health: Our Stewardship, please listen to the above recording.

Pastor Mark

View posts by Pastor Mark

Hi my name is Mark and though I am opposed to titles, I am currently the only Pastor (shepherd/elder) serving our assembly right now.

I have been Pastoring in one capacity or another for nearly 30 years now, though never quite like I am today.

Early in 2009 the Lord revealed to me that the way we had structured our assembly (church) was not scriptural in that it was out of sync with what Paul modeled for us in the New Testament. In truth, I (like many pastors I am sure) never even gave this fundamental issue of church structure the first thought. I had always assumed that church structure was largely the same everywhere and had been so from the beginning. While I knew Paul had some very stringent things to say about the local assembly of believers, the point of our gatherings together and who may or may not lead, I never even considered studying these issues but assumed we were all pretty much doing it right...safety in numbers right?! Boy, I couldn't have been more wrong!

So needless to say, my discovery that we had been doing it wrong for nearly two decades was a bit of a shock to me! Now, this "revelation" did not come about all at once but over the course of a few weeks. We were a traditional single pastor led congregation. It was a top-bottom model of ministry which is in part biblical, but not in the form of a monarchy.

The needed change did not come into focus until following 9 very intense months of study and discussions with those who were leaders in our church at the time.

We now understand and believe that the Bible teaches co-leadership with equal authority in each local assembly. Having multiple shepherds with God's heart and equal authority protects both Shepherds and sheep. Equal accountability keeps authority and doctrine in check. Multiple shepherds also provide teaching with various styles and giftings with leadership skills which are both different and complementary.

For a while we had two co-pastors (elders) (myself and one other man) who led the church with equal authority, but different giftings. We both taught in our own ways and styles, and our leadership skills were quite different, but complimentary. We were in complete submission to each other and worked side-by-side in the labor of shepherding the flock.

Our other Pastor has since moved on to other ministry which has left us with just myself. While we currently only have one Pastor/Elder, it is our desire that God, in His faithfulness and timing, may bring us more as we grow in maturity and even in numbers.

As to my home, I have been married since 1995 to my wonderful wife Terissa Woodson who is my closest friend and most trusted ally.

As far as my education goes, I grew up in a Christian home, but questioned everything I was ever taught.

I graduated from Bible college in 1990 and continued to question everything I was ever taught (I do not mention my college in order to avoid being labeled).

Perhaps my greatest preparation for ministry has been life and ministry itself. To quote an author I have come to enjoy namely Fredrick Buechner in his writing entitled, Now and Then, "If God speaks to us at all other than through such official channels as the Bible and the church, then I think that He speaks to us largely through what happens to us...if we keep our hearts open as well as our ears, if we listen with patience and hope, if we remember at all deeply and honestly, then I think we come to recognize beyond all doubt, that, however faintly we may hear Him, He is indeed speaking to us, and that, however little we may understand of it, His word to each of us is both recoverable and precious beyond telling." ~ Fredrick Buechner

Well that is about all there is of interest to tell you about me.

I hope our ministry here is a blessing to you and your family. I also hope that it is only a supplement to a local church where you are committed to other believers in a community of grace.

~God Bless!