Ministry Matters

Beloved, it is a loyal thing you do when you render any service to the brethren, especially to strangers, who have testified to your love before the church. You will do well to send them on their journey as befits God’s service. For they have set out for his sake and have accepted nothing from the heathen. So we ought to support such men, that we may be fellow workers in the truth.

3 John 1:5-8

We should all strive to help our fellow man—not just as Christians, but simply as decent human beings.

We know this, even if we do not always answer the call as much as we could.

Yet when we look at the needs of the world, at the many cases of mass human suffering just within the United States, how much can one person hope to accomplish? One person, with limited resources, can only do so much, and the needs of the world are so much more.

How can one person hope to do anything to help in the wake of natural disaster? What difference can one person make in the wake of last winter’s wildfires near Los Angeles? What impact can one person have after the floods which spilled across central Texas just last month?

One person, with little actual capacity for rendering aid, can only do a little. That seems like cold comfort when people are suffering a lot.

Yet there is a solution: ministry

While all people are called to help their fellow man, some are called to help others help their fellow man. They are called to not merely be of service to others, but to organize and marshal resources, to address larger needs, more complex needs, even more persistent needs. They are called to ministry.

Ministry is by definition organized aid, and structured service. Ministry is not simply attending upon the needs of one’s fellow man. Ministry is not simply sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ. Ministry is crafting organizations and gathering resources to attend upon the needs of entire communities, and sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ far and wide, utilizing all the many communications channels that are available. Ministry ultimately is a path of building up Christ’s Church as an institution among men, that it might do good works among men and magnify God’s Light into the world.

Ministry is thus not one path but many. As many ways as it is possible for Christ’s Church to do good works among men, as many modes of expression are available for sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ, that is how many paths to ministry there are.

People committed to a particular ministry choose to focus on specific tasks, specific goals, and even specific communities in need. They may focus on preaching the Word of God. They may focus on organizing efforts to aid the homeless or care for the sick. They may focus on teaching. They may engage in other efforts designed to build up our communities and make this world a little bit better.

I have for many years been suspicious of organizations. As a committed libertarian I am decidedly opposed to organized government, and want as little of it as humanly possible. I am ill at ease with many of the organized Christian denominations over how they choose to represent—and in many cases misrepresent—God’s Word to the world. Recognizing the imperfection and fallen nature that is the essence of the human condition, I understand only too well how human organizations can magnify our imperfections and amplify our sins.

Yet I also recognize that without organization, without the infrastructure and capacity for gathering resources that organizations bring to bear on anything, our ability to love our neighbors as we love ourselves is constrained.

Without organization—without ministry—we are able to do only that little bit of good we can do ourselves as individuals.

With ministry, we have the power to do more. While there is always the risk that such power will not be used wisely or well, there is also the hope that it will be used wisely and well.

What is certain is that ministry is essential if we are to maximize the good we want to do in this world.

One person might have ten dollars to spare, and so could plausibly hope to feed one homeless person one meager meal.

If ten people, each with ten dollars to spare, pooled their money and then shopped effectively, very likely they could feed more than ten homeless people one meager meal each, or perhaps even one meal not so meager.

When it comes to helping others, scale can be useful. Ministry matters.

For the average person, very likely the single best thing one can do when there is a natural disaster somewhere in the world is to donate to a trusted charity, which is itself another path of ministry. Very often donations are more impactful than acting by oneself to help those caught up in calamity. The reason is a simple one: logistics.

One thousand people each acting separately would be able to be of service to perhaps one thousand other people. One thousand people providing donations of food might be able to feed perhaps a few thousand other people.

One thousand people pooling their resources have the potential to be of service to tens of thousands of people—feeding them, clothing them, even sheltering them.

One thousand people supporting an aid ministry to obtain the food, the clothing, the blankets, and other necessaries for dealing with calamity have the potential to provide more food, more clothing, more blankets, more of just about any necessary item for dealing with calamity than could be acquired by one thousand people acting separately. That support allows the aid ministry to not only marshal needed resources but also address the transportation challenges of getting those resources to where they are needed.

When it comes to helping others, scale can be useful. Ministry matters.

The early Christian church learned this lesson the hard way in Acts 6. As the church community grew, ensuring that the needs of that community were adequately met became a task larger than the original Twelve Apostles could achieve while still preaching the Gospel to the wider world. Their solution was to grow the organizational structure of the early church, appointing other virtuous and well-esteemed individuals to attend to certain tasks, so that all needs could be well met.

Moses was taught this lesson by his father-in-law Jethro in Exodus 18. In teaching the statutes of God handed down on Mount Sinai, Moses at first sought to do it all himself. Jethro saw the folly of this, and counseled Moses to recruit other good men to help adjudicate matters among the Israelites, delegating the more minor matters to them, thus freeing Moses to address the weightier and more significant questions.

When it comes to helping others, scale can be useful. Ministry matters.

No one person can ever hope to do all that is needed. One person cannot hope to build a school. One pastor cannot hope to build a church. One person cannot hope to provide all the relief needed when natural disasters ravage communities.

One person can organize and lead a school. One pastor can organize and lead a church. One person can organize and lead relief efforts when natural disasters ravage communities.

One person can organize and lead—provided others are willing to contribute in whatever ways they are able, giving whatever resources they have to provide.

Lending a helping hand to a person in need is always a good and righteous thing to do, but it is not always a possible thing to do. We are finite creatures with finite resources.

If we donate some of our resources to those who have dedicated themselves to ministry, who have committed themselves to helping others, we can amplify their efforts and ours. We can help them lend their helping hand to people in need.

When it comes to helping others, scale can be useful. Ministry matters.

We are all called to help our fellow man. We are all called to help feed the hungry and clothe the naked. We are all called to comfort the sick.

We do well to recognize that we can greatly extend the scope of our help if we help others who are committed to helping our fellow man. We can amplify our efforts if we support the ministry efforts of those committed to particular service. Our small efforts can have great impact when combined with the small efforts of others.

My prayer this day is that I will be mindful not merely of my own efforts to help others, but of the efforts of those around me. My prayer this day is that I will pay heed to the good and righteous people around me who are sincere in their ministry efforts. My prayer this day is that I will open my heart to their efforts, and support them however I can.

My prayer for you this day is that you also will be mindful not merely of your own efforts to help others, but of the efforts of those around you. My prayer for you this day is that you also will pay heed to the good and righteous people around you who are sincere in their ministry efforts. My prayer for you this day is that you will open your heart to their efforts, and support them however you can.

We are all called to help our fellow man. We are all called to help feed the hungry and clothe the naked. We are all called to comfort the sick.

We are therefore called to help those dedicated to helping our fellow man. We are called to amplify our efforts and theirs by our contributions of whatever resources we have to offer.

When it comes to helping others, scale can be useful. Ministry matters.