On Being A Servant Of God By Warren Wiersbe (pt4)

Perhaps the hardest lesson we learn from failure is that we aren’t as great as we thought we were.

Do your work by faith, and leave the results with the Lord.

It’s our job to prepare the younger generation to step in and take over.

Your heart grows by giving out, but your mind grows by taking in; and both are necessary to a happy and balanced life of service. 

Readers are leaders only if they turn their learning into living.

As we mature in Christ, we stop choosing between the good and the bad and start distinguishing the better and the best. 

Remember, the best thing you can do for your ministry is build a godly family; and the best thing you can do for your family is build a ministry that glorifies God. Home and ministry are friends, not enemies; and it’s your job to keep them that way.

No matter what kind of Christian service God has called you to, it’s a privilege to be in ministry and to serve Jesus Christ. 

First and foremost, I think, is the job of pleasing the Lord because you’re doing what He wants you to do.

The Word of God reveals the God of the Word; and the servants must know the Master if we are to serve Him acceptably. 

We read the Bible to get to know the heart and mind of God. The better we know God, the better we can enjoy Him and minster for Him. 

The Word of God reveals the character of God to us, and as it does, it also renews the mind so that we start to think the way God wants us to think.

What we think determines what we are and what we do.

I suggest you discipline yourself to spend time daily in a systematic reading of God’s Word. Make this “quiet time” a priority that nobody can change.

When God speaks, that word has power; and when we believe that word and act on it, the. power goes to work. 

Whether you’re cooking a dinner, cleaning the nursery, folding bulletins, or raking leaves on the church lawn, ask God to use your part of the ministry to reach lost people with the gospel. 

Many disagreements and divisions start when we focus on a minor detail and forget the big picture. 

Don’t focus on yourself or the people you serve; focus God and His glory.

In the economy of God, suffering and glory go together. 

What grace that God not only gives us work to do and the ability to do it, but He then rewards us for what He enabled us to accomplish!

You aren’t responsible for the way others treat you, but you are responsible for the way your respond.

As long as your enemies are on the outside, you’re safe; but when you let them get on the inside, you’re in for trouble. 

On Being A Servant Of God By Warren Wiersbe (pt3)

When you find yourself more corned about your “image” more than your character and your work, you have stopped glorifying God.

Whatever God calls us to do, we can do with His help; otherwise, He would never have called us. He who calls you is faithful, who also will do it. (1 Thessalonians 5:24)

If God has called you to minister, no matter what that ministry may be, He hasn’t made a mistake. He knows what He’s doing, and the best thing you can do is gratefully submit to His will and trust Him to work. 

God always prepares His servants before He calls them.

You are unique in what you are and what you can do, and God doesn’t want you to destroy that uniqueness by trying to be somebody else.

It’s not how much we have to start with that really counts but what we have to show for it at the end.

Those of us who minister must put others ahead of ourselves, but we must put the Lord ahead of others. 

Focusing on serving the Lord can make a big difference in your ministry.

I firmly believe that God has a specific plan for each of His children and that He wants to share His plan with us and help us to fulfill it.

The purpose of discipline is restoration, and the results of restoration ought to be fellowship and ministry.

God will get His work done either with you or without you (Esther 4:14), but you are the loser if you quit.

There’s no substitute for Christian character. No matter how much talent and training we may have, if we d on’t have character, we don’t have anything.

You can use all kinds of gimmicks and techniques to gather a crowd or build an organization, but that’s not the same as building His church.

Paul wasn’t always successful in helping people mature, nor will we be; but with the Lord’s help, he did his best. If people failed to mature, the failure was theirs and not Paul’s.

Believers who try to serve the Lord can expect to have problems with people.

Christian service is supposed to make us grow, and it will if we’re in the right place with the right attitude.

Discouragement and depression are two of Satan’s chief devices for getting Christians on detours.

If your only motive for service is to be recognized and thanked, you had better get prepared for a lot of disappointment.

When your service is the most difficult, God may be doing His deepest work in your life, so don’t run away.

No matter what you did wrong, confess it to the Lord and claim His forgiveness.

The future is our friend when Jesus is our Lord.

On Being A Servant Of God By Warren Wiersbe (pt2

No matter how difficult the work or how many times we feel like quitting, we can keep going and growing if we minister the way God tells us to in His Word.

The trouble with too many of us is that we think God called us to be manufacturers when He really called us to be distributors. 

You don’t earn grace, and you don’t deserve grace; you simply receive it as God’s loving gift and then share it with others.

It’s a basic law of the kingdom of God that the servants who know how poor they are become the richest, and those who give the most receive the most and therefore have the most to give.

The best thing we can for for people is not to solve their problems for them but so relate them to God’s grace that they will be enabled to solve their problems and not repeat them.

Selfishness says, “What will I get?” Service says, “What I have I’ll give to you.”

If the motivation for our service is anything less than Christ’s love—His love for us and our love for Him—our ministry will not really meet human needs or glorify God.

God is as concerned about the servant as He is about the service.

God is glorified when people see the Lord and not the servant.

It takes more than a winning personality to influence people for Christ; it takes godly character.

We must put into our Christian living the same kind of discipline that athletes put into sports.

God makes us holy so that He can use us to do the work He want us to do.

God is at work making people more like His Son, and that’s what Christian service is all about.

We who are servants of God don’t deserve His grace any more than the ones we are serving deserve it, and who are we to limit God’s grace and mercy?

The love that we need for ministry is not a natural ability; it’s a supernatural quality that only God can provide. 

One of the best ways to discover the divine resources that others need is to need them yourself and trust God to supply them. 

If our motive for serving is anything other than the glory of God, what we do will be only religious activity and not true Christian ministry.

God is glorified when people see the Master and not the minister.

Build on your strengths, and ask God for helpers who can compensate for your weaknesses.

Obedience to the will of God give you wings, not chains!

What a tragedy it is when Christian leaders sell their character just to make more money or use devious means to get people to donate more money to their work. When money takes over, character goes—and so does ministry.

Brothers, We Are Not Professionals (Pt2) By John Piper

"The goal of spiritual leadership is to muster people to join God in living for God’s glory."

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"Good deeds do not pay back grace; they borrow more grace."

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"A pastor who feels competent in himself to produce eternal fruit—which is the only kind that matters—knows neither God nor himself."

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"The essence of the Christian ministry is that its success is not within our reach."

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"How do we serve so that God is glorified? We serve by the strength He supplies."

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"The difference between Uncle Sam and Jesus Christ is that Uncle Sam won’t enlist you in his service unless you are healthy and Jesus won’t enlist you unless you are sick."

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"The great threat to our prayer and our meditation on the Word of God is good ministry activity."

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"Our suffering is not in vain; God never wastes the gift of pain. (Philippians 1:29)"

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"God will gladly receive anything from us that shows our dependence and His all-sufficiency."

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"A pastor who does not know the rhythm of desperation and deliverance must have his sights only on what man can achieve."

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"God does all His gracious work in such a way “that no human being might boast in the presence of God” (1 Corinthians 1:29), which means He usually does it in answer to prayer."

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"God is the only sure and stable thing in the universe."

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"For in your working, God is working."

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"There is an infinite difference between the pastor whose heart is set on being a professional and the pastor whose heart is set on being the aroma of Christ, the fragrance of death to some and eternal life to others (2 Corinthians 2:15–16)."

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"If you want to be a conduit for God’s grace, you don’t have to be lined with gold. Copper will do."

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"God is not looking for people to work for Him but people who let Him work mightily in and through them."

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All quotes were from John Piper in his book: Brothers, We Are Not Professionals: A Plea to Pastors for Radical Ministry. You can purchase his book here.

Quotes on Suffering

“Christian hope does not rest in the denial of hard things, but in their redemption." -Tim Chaddick

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The big question is not, “Why do we suffer?” The question is “How do we suffer?” -Richard Cimino

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"Mountaintops are for views and inspiration, but fruit is grown in the valleys.” -Billy Graham

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”A rebuke is not so much punishment as it is illumination” -William Barclay

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"The best antidote for self-pity is to help someone else who is worse off than you." Corrie ten Boom

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“God's way of answering the Christian's prayer for more patience, experience, hope, and love often is to put him into the furnace of affliction.”  -Richard Cecil

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"I am no longer anxious about anything, as I realize the Lord is able to carry out His will, and His will is mine. It makes no matter where He places me, or how. That is rather for Him to consider than for me; for in the easiest positions He must give me His grace, and in the most difficult, His grace is sufficient.” - Hudson Taylor

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“Hard times are a passport that gives you permission to go places you wouldn’t get to any other way.” -Levi Lusko

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“God's plans for you are better than any plans you have for yourself. So don't be afraid of God's will, even if it's different from yours.” -Greg Laurie

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“Refuse to let your situation determine your attitude.” -Charles R. Swindoll

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“Leadership is pain. When your leadership grows, your tolerance for pain has to grow.” – Dr. Sam Chand

Quotes on Prayer

“Prayer is the vital breath of Christians. Not the thing that makes us alive, but the evidence we are alive.” - Oswald Chambers 

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“As it is the business of tailors to make clothes and of cobblers to mend shoes, so it is the business of Christians to pray.” - Martin Luther”

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“Talking to men for God is a great thing, but talking to God for men is greater still.” - E.M. Bounds

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“Through prayer, our hearts are aligned with God’s heart so that we gain spiritual insight.”  - Bruce Zachary

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“When we depend upon organizations, we get what organizations can do; when we depend upon education, we get what education can do; when we depend upon man, we get what man can do; but when we depend upon prayer, we get what God can do.” -A.C. Dixon

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“Reading a book about prayer, listening to lectures and talking about it is very good, but it won’t teach you to pray. You get nothing without exercise, without practice. I might listen for a year to a professor of music playing the most beautiful music, but that won’t teach me to play an instrument.” -Andrew Murray”

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"If you are strangers to prayer you are strangers to power." - Billy Sunday

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“Most of the great movements of God can be traced to a small group of people He called together to begin praying.” - Donald Whitney

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“Little prayer, little power. Much prayer, much power.” - Rick Warren

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"He who kneels the most, stands the best.” -Dwight L. Moody

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“Any concern too small to be turned into a prayer is too small to be made into a burden” -Corrie Ten Boom

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“It is possible to move men, through God, by prayer alone.” -Hudson Taylor

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“Prayer is the way you defeat the devil, reach the lost, restore a backslider, strengthen the saints, send missionaries out, cure the sick, accomplish the impossible, and know the will of God.” -David Jeremiah

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“There are more battles won through prayer than by any other means.” -Chuck Smith

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”Prayer is the great engine to overthrow and rout my spiritual enemies, the great means to procure the graces of which I stand in hourly need.” - John Newton

Quotes on The Bible

“Christians who neglect the Bible simply do not mature.” -John Stott

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"The Bible is the Constitution of Christianity” -Billy Graham

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“The Bible will keep you from sin, or sin will keep you from the Bible”. -Dwight L. Moody

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“Christians cannot live victoriously when disconnected from the Word of God” - Brian Brodersen

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"Nothing less than a whole Bible can make a whole Christian." -A. W. Tozer

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”The bible is a mine that can never be exhausted of all of it's treasures." - Levi Lusko

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“A Bible that’s falling apart usually belongs to someone who isn’t.” -Charles H. Spurgeon

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"The Bible is the book of my life. It's the book I live with, the book I live by, the book I want to die by." -N. T. Wright

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“The Bible is to me the most precious thing in the world just because it tells me the story of Jesus.” -George MacDonald

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"Nobody ever outgrows Scriptures;  the Book widens and deepens with our years” -Charles H Spurgeon

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“Just as you must eat, drink, and breathe to live, you must read the Bible, pray, and be involved in a church to stay spiritually alive and vital. You never will outgrow these things.” -Greg Laurie

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“The Bible is not an end in itself, but a means to bring men to an intimate and satisfying knowledge of God, that they may enter into Him, that they may delight in His Presence, may taste and know the inner sweetness of the very God Himself in the core and center of their hearts.” - A. W. Tozer

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“We must allow the Word of God to confront us, to disturb our security, to undermine our complacency and to overthrow our patterns of thought and behavior.” -John Stott

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“Biblical orthodoxy without compassion is surely the ugliest thing in the world.” -Francis Schaeffer

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“There's no better book with which to defend the Bible than the Bible itself.” -Dwight L. Moody