This is a home movie, personal property of Len and Angie Paxton.
One of my favorite Sidewalk Prophets songs from the concert last night.
Fremont MI 5-11-2012
An oldie but a goodie... We have enjoyed working with this band over the years.......
I'm often asked, “How can I know if I am called to pastoral
ministry?” Here is a very quick checklist of questions I would want to
ask in any discussion about a call to the ministry. 1. Do you have a holy desire (1 Tim. 3:1)?
There
is nothing wrong with wanting to be a pastor. In fact, when God calls a
man, he usually implants a strong desire for the work in his heart.
A holy desire for the pastoral ministry will be motivated by a
passion for the glory of Christ and the salvation of precious souls. To a
certain degree, every Christian should have these desires. But
potential pastors should have them to an unusually high degree.
Sadly, many want to be pastors for unholy reasons: these include a
love of books, an ambition to make a name for yourself, or wanting to
become a Seminary professor. On that last point, I know there are
exceptions, but I get quite worried when Seminary students start
expressing a desire to be a teacher of pastors without having spent even
a day in pastoral ministry. 2. Do you have a Christ-like character?
Do you have the fruits of the Spirit in your life (Gal. 5:22-24)?
Do those who know you say that you are being conformed to the image of
Christ? No one is strong in all areas of character. But if I was to give
a top three of non-negotiable character traits, they would be (i) love,
(ii) love, and (iii) love. Of course, holiness, integrity, patience,
and wisdom are all vitally important too. But without a love-filled
heart you will never be a shepherd of sheep. 3. Do you have spiritual maturity (1 Tim. 3:6)?
When young men are converted, they or others often start talking
about the ministry. There are exceptions to this rule, but in general it
is best that young men spend some time working as Christians “in the
world” before pursuing a call to the ministry. They will develop
spiritual maturity there in a way that they won't by going straight into
Seminary. Even a few years of working among unconverted people has a
rapid ripening effect on Christian character. It also helps to build
empathy with Christians who are called to be salt and light in
factories, offices, etc. 4. Do you have the necessary gifts (1 Tim. 3:1-7; Titus 1:6-9)?
One of the most useful exercises I've given in my class on the
Christian ministry was to ask the students to write up a job notice
based on the characteristics and gifts found in the passages above.
(Maybe I'll ask some of my students for permission to post their
responses in a future blog.) I noticed that one of the recurring gifts
in these lists is self-control, or self discipline. This is so utterly
indispensable for time-management in pastoral ministry, when we have no
boss or professor to keep us on track. If you have a record of being
late for work or appointments, or if you are regularly late in
submitting assignments, what reason is there to think that you are
suddenly going to change when you have to preach a sermon every Sunday
at 9.30 am?
Another vital gift is simplicity. Are you able to preach or teach
simply? I'm not talking here about “dumbing-down.” I'm talking about
taking profound truths and translating them into simple, clear language
(as Jesus did). Some men seem to have the opposite gift, the ability to
make the simple complicated and confusing. If that's your gift, then
please don't burden the church of Christ with it. 5. Proven track record
This is related to (3) above. However, I want to make this a separate
point to stress the importance of having proven oneself in “less
public” forms of Christian service. If a young Christian man will not
teach a children's Sunday school class, or won't join the “yard clean up
team,” or excuses himself from the congregation's evangelism program,
then he is not fit for the ministry of the Word. If he is not faithful
in the “little” things, he is not ready for the “bigger” things. 6. External confirmation
Before pursuing the ministry, or studies for the ministry, you should
seek input from your local church. You should ask your pastor and
elders to examine you in points 1-5 above and give you their own more
objective opinion of whether you have the marks of a man called to the
ministry. You should seek their prayerful and practical support in going
forward. If they express doubt or disapproval, you should usually view
that as the voice of God speaking through His Church. However this is not always the case but rather a general guideline.
This list is not exhaustive, but it is a useful starting point for
anyone wanting to examine and test their “call” to the pastoral
ministry.
Angie and I enjoyed our time at World Pulse Festival... Renewed old friendships and ministry relationships...
here is what I said after talking with Stefan.... "I have known my friend Stefan director of Feed The Hungry for over 23 years. A great ministry.. Looking forward to doing an interview with him for radio soon.. I love these guys.. A stable ministry with great hearts and attitudes.. Feels like going home.. Back in South Bend.. A full life feels good.. Jesus fill us all to overflowing and help us reach out to others.
Remember the Tuesday and Thursday radio broadcasts, one will be Len and one a guest speaker, and also we will be in South Bend again on August 4 for the Third Day/ Steven Curtis Chapman concert at Christian Center then Hamilton IN for the Brian Free and Assurance event on August 5th, Aug 6th and 7th back in South Bend.. A good friend of many years has offered to let us stay in their home while we visit the area and renew many old friendships and ministry relationships as well as making new ones... Other dates are coming for Lens meetings in MI, OH, and IN... I will be posting them as they are finalized.. We are putting together a camp meeting service for the Traverse City area and I will keep you updated on that as well.. One thing Len has been preaching on a lot lately is ""the Breaker Anointing is about to be taken to the next level… Millions will be released throughout the earth ; anointed to run the anchor lap of history, souls being ushered into the Kingdom." Its a powerful time to be alive here on earth.. Thanks for taking the journey with us..
Looking back over the past 23 years of our relationship with the Ministries of LeSea brings smiles and happy memories of so many great times... Looking forward with the eye of the Spirit to the next 20 plus years..... well that brings dreams; hope is the blueprint your faith operates on.. Dreams/ hopes will be activated by faith!! There is a massive revival that will usher in millions of souls into the Kingdom Of God before Jesus returns. We need not be worried in the least.. If we have Christ in us our hope of Glory, then everything He has deposited in us will manifest if we believe.. Angie and I are really looking forward to seeing many friends in South Bend and Hamilton August 4-7..... Lets see what God is cooking up.. send me a message if you are in the area and we will hook up...
Solemnly and slowly, with his index finger
extended, Napoleon Bonaparte outlined a great stretch of country on a
map of the world. "There," he growled, "is a sleeping giant. Let him
sleep! If he wakes, he will shake the world." That sleeping giant was
China. Today, Bonaparte's prophecy of some one hundred and fifty years
ago makes sense. Today Lucifer
is probably surveying the church just as Bonaparte did China. One can
almost behold the fear in his eyes as he thinks of the Church's
unmeasured potential and growls, "Let the Church sleep! If she wakes,
she will shake the world." Is not the Church the sleeping giant of
today? Some years ago the
newspaper headlines carried the story of a young Chinese student who
"flunked" his exams here in America. So humiliated was he and so
withered by anticipated scorn that for three years the youth hid in the
belfry of a church and became skin and bones. Because of his shame, he
froze in winter and blistered in summer under that church's thin roof.
As today's Church of Jesus Christ thinks about the day of reckoning that
is surely coming, oh that a holy fear would come upon her (even if it
drives her to extremes) in order to arouse her from her present
paralysis! Consider Samson's
fall. He didn't get drunk; he didn't commit murder; he didn't steal.
Samson fell simply because he succumbed to the natural, and fell asleep.
That one small act put him into captivity, made a false god popular, and scattered the forces of the true and living God. If
even yet you feel a hangover of the old interpretation that the Samson
of the Bible is a distant relative of Hercules or Atlas (famed in
mythology for carrying the world on his back), then think again. Samson
was no human monstrosity. He was no super-edition of a Goliath. If
Samson had been a colossus, then why did Delilah ask the question,
"Wherein lieth thy great strength?" Let
the final word be from the Word of God itself, for in telling the story
of men mighty in faith, the writer to the Hebrews says: Time would fail
me to tell of Gideon, and of Barak, and of Samson,... who through faith
... stopped the mouths of lions" (Heb. 11:32-33). Only two men in
Scripture stopped the mouths of lions--Daniel and Samson. But no giant
could single-handedly, as Samson, "put to flight the armies of the
aliens," or toy with opposing armies. Here, Samson slays a thousand men with the jawbone of an ass; there, he kills another thirty men. Here, he takes the gates of Gaza for a ride; there, he tears a lion like paper. To add insult to injury, the Spirit's comment is "he had nothing in his hand." Note
well, yea, read for yourself the whole story of the secret of this
mighty exploiter, this more-than-conquering believer: "The Spirit of the
Lord rested mightily upon him. " Everything in the story adds up to
this staggering fact: Supernatural power was upon Samson. Now
turn back ten chapters in this wonder book of Judges and have a little
peep into the life of Gideon. Surely as a boy, Gideon had heard from his
father the hair-raising stories of a mighty Deity. In Judges 6, Gideon
is older, and while threshing corn, is fearing an attack of the
Midianites. For seven years, the once liberated slaves of Pharaoh had
again become captives. Dens and caves were their homes. No longer were
they able to sing the Lord's song. It
must have sounded like a fairy tale when that angel appeared to Gideon
and informed him, "God is with thee, thou mighty man of valor." Yet he
shot back the answer, "If God be with us, where be all his miracles
which our fathers told us of?" This answer makes clear that Gideon was
expecting some supernatural evidence. To him, the seal of the Lord's
presence would be something that could not be rationalized. Alas that today there is more evidence of
religious sensation before our eyes than evidence of spiritual
regeneration and supernatural phenomenon! Not many Christians today can
forget the fact that the devil goeth about as a roaring lion, but we
seem to have lost sight of the fact that the Lion of the tribe of Judah
has defeated the roaring lion of hell, and therefore every anointed
Samson or Gideon or church can also slay the lion of hell. Though wicked
men are doing wickedly, God's promise to us is that "the people that do
know their God shall be strong and do exploits" (Daniel 11:32). This much is sure: If we could merit revival by fasting, there would be many martyred by starving. If we could organize revival, we would pool our thinking to outwit the powers of darkness. If
we could buy this elusive revival with the mammon of unrighteousness,
we could get a score of what we call Christian millionaires to
underwrite the thing for us. If we could blast the devil from this present world, we would pledge the politicians for an atom bomb. God
pity us that after years of writing, using mountains of paper and
rivers of ink, exhausting flashy terminology about the biggest revival
meetings in history, we are still faced with gross corruption in every
nation, as well as with the most prayerless church age since Pentecost. This
is a plea for the return of the supernatural; but I must also give this
a word of explanation. For a decade, all over this land there has been a
ministry of the miraculous (more or less), and thank God for all who
honor Him and remain faithful. But having said that, here is a plea for
sane thinking and a spiritual evaluation of the evangelistic field. To a
large degree, have we not substituted seeing for hearing? In Acts,
Philip the evangelist could have transferred the Ethiopian eunuch to a
city seething with revival fever where the eunuch could have seen "the
lame leap like an hart and the tongue of the dumb sing." Instead, he
pitched right into the Word of the living God, and beginning at the same
Scripture preached unto him Jesus. We need the miraculous but we also
need Christ-centered teaching. Our crucified, exalted Christ must have
preeminence over all other slants of truth, for while the Church is
languishing, the world is perishing. "Awake, awake, put on strength, 0
arm of the Lord..." (Isaiah 51:9) Again
let me say, Samson's size was not the secret of his strength. The fact
that he was the same size after he backslid negates the idea that he was
a giant. His only external peculiarity was his long locks, uncut
because he was a Nazarite. Nor had his long hair in itself any abnormal
power. Samson's secret was obedience. As long as Samson trod the
straight and narrow path of obedience, he was invincible. Let
us remember, too, that Samson, who began in the Spirit, fell into the
flesh, and so had a prison term to bring him to his senses. Finally, by
one last mighty miracle, he finished in the Spirit. Backslider, this is a
word for your recovery, for God can restore the years that the
cankerworm and the caterpillar have eaten. He who is able delights in
mercy. Samson's final act of
power was the crowning achievement of a spectacular life s work. After
he had slipped out from under the harness of obedience, he was forced
into separation from the world in a prison. Once an army trembled at his
very sight; later a single boy came to lead the blinded Samson into the
temple of Dragon, the fish-god. How the mighty had fallen! Yet now, God
took this "weak thing" into a temple full of lords of the Philistines
and set him between the pillars. "Samson took hold of the pillars ...
the one with his right hand and the other with his left ... and he bowed
himself with all His might" (judges 16:29-30) Holy jealousy gripped
him. Mighty as he had been in other things, Samson now proved mightiest
in prayer: "Lord, strengthen me ... this once!' (vs. 28) Would to God
that every professed believer in the whole of Christendom would borrow
this prayer and mean it. Then with dramatic conclusion, Samson sealed
the doom of many more of the enemies of God in his dying than in his
living. Is this the dying hour
of this dispensation? Many say it is. Some Christians have already hung
their harps on the willows, and yet others seem to delight in speaking
of the Church's present lapse as a proof of divine inspiration. But I
myself believe that if the Church will only obey the conditions, she can
have a revival any time she wants it. The problem of the Church is the
problem in the garden of Gethsemane-sleep! For while men sleep, the
enemy, sows his seed through his cults. Lest men sleep the sleep of
eternal death, 0h arm of the Lord, 0h Church of the living God, awake! If
the church is going to attain to her potential in this last hour, it is
apparent that we are going to have to dust off an old word that many of
us have forgotten is in the English language -- DISCIPLINE! To some,
this word discipline will have a monastic flavor, for it smells of the
Middle Ages or throws onto the screen of the mind a picture of an
unwashed hermit or a hollow-eyed anchorite. Be not deceived. Every smart
"top brass military expert has arrived there because he wore the
harness of discipline. Leonard Bernstein in his music-talks holds his
baton like a magic wand over mesmerized million because of discipline.
This brings to mind the words of the poet: The heights by great men reached and kept were not attained by sudden flight, But they, while their companions slept, were toiling upward through the night! If
any man wants to write a bestseller, let him attempt a book on How to
be a Saint in Six Easy Lessons. Such a writer would be fishing with bait
that this generation of believers wants; but I, for one, would not
swallow it. In a brilliant
sermon called "Discipleship," G. Cambell Morgan says, "Jesus Christ
could speak to the sorrow-burdened heart of humanity words so full of
mother-love and father-love as to make men crowd and press round Him. On
the other hand, He could suddenly speak words that flashed and scorched
and burned until men drew back in astonishment." Bracketed in the last
group would be these two commands: "Take my yoke upon you" and "My
disciple, take up your cross and follow me." Both of these words imply
discipline. When we sing in a
sunlit church "Oh to be like Thee; Oh to be like Thee," we get weepy and
feel an emotional lift. But permit this simple challenge: Do we really mean 'Oh to be like Thee' -- like the Christ of God, who was a man of discipline? Do we really mean 'Oh to be like Thee' -- fasting alone in the desert? Do we mean 'Oh to be like Thee' to touch the depths of prayer that make us cry, 'All Thy billows are gone over me.' Do we mean 'Oh to be like Thee' -- to become habituates of the fastness of the prayer chamber? Do we mean 'Oh to be like Thee' -- in a will like His, for He said, "I always do the will of my Father." Is that not discipline? The
religious sentimentalist who sings "Just a closer walk with Thee" but
walks close to the ungodly and sits with the blasphemers, is not taken
seriously in either heaven or hell. Be very sure, friend, that this vile
world is not "a friend to grace to help on to God." We need to pray the
Father to put some blood into this "water" that runs through our veins.
Our Simon-like natures need the Upper Room fire to clean us out and the
discipline of the Spirit to shape us into soldiers. Twenty-five
years of discipline in a crow's nest of an office up behind his church
in Chicago brought about a Dr. A. W. Tozer, who produced a book, The
Pursuit of God. This in turn produced on the ocean of spiritual teaching
waves that lap their way to the ends of the earth. After
I spoke at a session in the Bible School of Wales, Mrs. Rees Howells
called me for a private talk. We stood on the veranda of her home
overlooking beautiful Swansea Bay I can see her finger upheld as she
said, "Many talk of my husband's buying this place with a shilling
(fourteen cents) in his pocket. What they forget is that he prayed
twelve hours a day for eleven months to know the mind of God." Brethren,
that's discipline! Today,
immediately when one gets out of step with a nearby Christian, he is
considered a legalist. Just remember, in "that great day of Judgment"
when we must an stand before His throne, no man will be ashamed he was
dubbed over-spiritual, though many will weep, groan, and "suffer loss"
because of lack of discipline. Discipline is a harness by which we
enable the Spirit to get the best out of our frail humanity. The Apostle
Paul was a disciplinarian like his Master: He disciplined his body: "I keep my body under." He disciplined himself to loneliness: "All men forsook me." He disciplined himself to scorn: "We are fools for Christ's sake." He disciplined himself to poverty: "We suffered need." He disciplined himself to rejection: "We are despised." He disciplined himself to death: "I die daily." He disciplined himself to suffering: "Persecuted, but not forsaken." May this be our prayer, "Oh Lord, I bow my neck to Thy yoke!" Since
the hour Adam first rose to his feet, man has not stood, as today,
between such potential and such peril. America is still the richest
nation in the world. It is a mighty crucible into which refugees of
almost all modern nations are poured. It has far more Bible schools than
any other nation. In these Bible schools is dedicated manpower. Here,
too, is wealth to get this manpower to the ends of the earth, and here
is linguistic ability unmatched in the annals of time. Even
the gathering at Pentecost had not the potential, humanly speaking,
that this vast nation has. Do you wonder, then, that from every angle,
hell has America under cross fire? This mighty land is cursed with
blessings . I fear that unless she awakens, repents, and puts on the
whole armor, of God, she will be blessed with cursings. Already other
nations are in the slavery of oppression. Can America and Britain long
remain free? Unless we are to have the war of wars that will usher us
into the night Of nights and the judgment of judgments, we must have the
revival of revivals. Pale, pathetic, palliating preaching must be
driven from the church like the idols it promotes. It is time for the
church to cry again, "Where is the God of Elijah?" Ambrose
Fleming called the resurrection of Jesus Christ "the best attested fact
in history" Yet at Easter time, vain effort is made to rationalize the
stupendous event of the Resurrection in order to try to save face before
pseudo-intellectualism, which boggles at the fact that the Lord of
glory died and rose again, triumphant over death, over hell, and over
the grave. Who, then, can dispute the following biting statements of
Murdo MacDonald in his book, The Vitality of Faith: "Ever since the
Renaissance, men have been trying to water down the Christian creed.
Give us a religion purged of everything that defies logic, a religion
stripped of the supernatural and emptied of miracle, a religion that is
smooth and palatable and rationally acceptable-this has been the popular
cry" Surely the church, weak in heart and courage, has gone out of the
way to oblige. The doom of
this decaying civilization is spelled out in our crowded divorce courts,
our all-time high of alcoholics and drug addicts, the number of
illegitimate births or the number of abortions. A Gallup poll shows that
these days most people accept lying as part of everyday business.
Virtue is scorned. Truth lies fallen in the street! Somewhere
in the archives of the British Admiralty at Whitehall, London, they
have the record of a fine piece of maritime strategy. Ships of five
nations were anchored in a bay in the South Pacific. A fierce storm was
gathering offshore. The British captain decided to run, not away from
the storm but into it. Everything available was battened down. Out
crashed the ship into the boiling seas-pitching, tossing, rolling, and
shuddering. Indeed, she did everything but go down. A couple of days
later, buffeted but not broken, she returned to the port to find the
ships of the other nations piled up on the beach. The
storm of the ages is about to break. Let the church call its crew to a
new dedication. Remembering that Christ is at the helm, and with
Christ's Crest as our ensign, let us run into the storm. After the
storm, we, too, shall return-to see upon the shores of time the
battered, piled, wrecked, hell-inspired ideologies of the hour.
Q: What wisdom can you suggest for a 20-year-old man who wonders if he’s been “called” to full-time ministry?
I’m looking for things related both to determining if one is called, as well as to preparation for ministry.
Asked by: Mike
A: Well Mike, I think it’s wonderful that you, as a 20-year-old, are beginning to think about these things.
And let me simply say that the call of God that you refer to has several elements.
First of all, it has an inward compulsion. There is something within
you, if you are called to the ministry, that tells you that your destiny
lies beyond other vocations, at least I felt that. But along with that,
and this is very critical, it has to be confirmed by the body
of Christ.
You know, there’s that old line that says that there are some people
called to preach, but apparently nobody is called to listen. They simply
don’t have the gifts for ministry; God didn’t cut them out for
ministry, but they want to do ministry and they think that they are
called. Or, perhaps, they want to do ministry because they see it as an
opportunity for self-growth and self-aggrandizement. Sometimes ministers
get an awful lot of attention, and so because of that, they may not be
called at all, but they’re doing ministry for the attention.
So, first of all, you have to have that inward sense that God might
be leading you in this direction. Secondly, it has to be confirmed by
the body of Jesus Christ, and third, it has to be confirmed by His Word.
Because when you get to qualifications for ministry, character is
absolutely essential. And so the spiritual leaders around you will help
you determine that.
But you know Mike, one of the things that I’ve discovered is that God
calls people differently. Sometimes He calls them in their youth; I
felt that way when I was growing up. But there are others who perhaps
are 30 or 40 years old and suddenly they have this compulsion, this
desire that they are called to preach, that they are called to minister.
And God is very creative. He speaks to us in different ways, and in
different circumstances, but the bottom line is always that there is a
growing conviction and this is what we should follow.
Finally, you also ask about how you can prepare for ministry. Well
there are others who can give you much better counsel than I can, but
make sure you get a good education, attend a good seminary, if God is
leading you in that direction. I trust that in 10 or 15 years from now,
the blessing of God, the benediction and anointing of God, will be
upon you.
This was a question and answer by Pastor Erwin Lutzer of Moody Church. I personally think he nailed it..
EXTRA: Every Christian IS called to serve in a body of Christ...
Remember the Tuesday and Thursday radio broadcasts, one will be Len and one a guest speaker, and also we will be in South Bend again on August 4 for the Third Day/ Steven Curtis Chapman concert at Christian Center then Hamilton IN for the Brian Free and Assurance event on August 5th, Aug 6th and 7th back in South Bend.. A good friend of many years has offered to let us stay in their home while we visit the area and renew many old friendships and ministry relationships as well as making new ones... Other dates are coming for Lens meetings in MI, OH, and IN... I will be posting them as they are finalized.. We are putting together a camp meeting service for the Traverse City area and I will keep you updated on that as well.. One thing Len has been preaching on a lot lately is ""the Breaker Anointing is about to be taken to the next level… Millions will be released throughout the earth ; anointed to run the anchor lap of history, souls being ushered into the Kingdom." Its a powerful time to be alive here on earth.. Thanks for taking the journey with us..
Looking back over the past 23 years of our relationship with the Ministries of LeSea brings smiles and happy memories of so many great times... Looking forward with the eye of the Spirit to the next 20 plus years..... well that brings dreams; hope is the blueprint your faith operates on.. Dreams/ hopes will be activated by faith!! There is a massive revival that will usher in millions of souls into the Kingdom Of God before Jesus returns. We need not be worried in the least.. If we have Christ in us our hope of Glory, then everything He has deposited in us will manifest if we believe.. Angie and I are really looking forward to seeing many friends in South Bend and Hamilton August 4-7..... Lets see what God is cooking up.. send me a message if you are in the area and we will hook up...
Remember the Tuesday and Thursday radio broadcasts, one will be Len and one a guest speaker, and also we will be in South Bend again on August 4 for the Third Day/ Steven Curtis Chapman concert at Christian Center then Hamilton IN for the Brian Free and Assurance event on August 5th, Aug 6th and 7th back in South Bend.. A good friend of many years has offered to let us stay in their home while we visit the area and renew many old friendships and ministry relationships as well as making new ones... Other dates are coming for Lens meetings in MI, OH, and IN... I will be posting them as they are finalized.. We are putting together a camp meeting service for the Traverse City area and I will keep you updated on that as well.. One thing Len has been preaching on a lot lately is ""the Breaker Anointing is about to be taken to the next level… Millions will be released throughout the earth ; anointed to run the anchor lap of history, souls being ushered into the Kingdom." Its a powerful time to be alive here on earth.. Thanks for taking the journey with us..
Looking back over the past 23 years of our relationship with the Ministries of LeSea brings smiles and happy memories of so many great times... Looking forward with the eye of the Spirit to the next 20 plus years..... well that brings dreams; hope is the blueprint your faith operates on.. Dreams/ hopes will be activated by faith!! There is a massive revival that will usher in millions of souls into the Kingdom Of God before Jesus returns. We need not be worried in the least.. If we have Christ in us our hope of Glory, then everything He has deposited in us will manifest if we believe.. Angie and I are really looking forward to seeing many friends in South Bend and Hamilton August 4-7..... Lets see what God is cooking up.. send me a message if you are in the area and we will hook up...
