I became minister of this church nearly twenty years ago. One thing I promised at my induction (terribly rainy night!) was to be a watchman. A watchman guards something. In my case, it’s people.
I try to guard you from false teaching. False teaching destroys spiritual life. False teaching disrupts and damages our effectiveness as ambassadors of Jesus. I protect you by ensuring the teaching at NAC is sound, biblical teaching.
I try also to guard you from falling away from Jesus. One of the most tragic experiences for ministers of the gospel is to see believers fall away from Christ. In my experience, no Christian ever wakes up one morning and decides to stop following Christ. It’s always a process. And the process is almost always imperceptible. No one notices until it’s too late.
So let me give you some warning signs. You owe it to yourself to check off this list fairly regularly. (Put a ü where you’re OK and a û where you’re not OK.)
q Money. Jesus taught that how you spend your money is the best indicator of where your heart is. I wrote about this two weeks ago. Check it out.
q Generosity. Are you generous with your money, time and energies? I wrote about this last week. Check it out.
q Hearing God. How much are you reading your Bible?
q Talking to God. How much are you praying?
q Ministry. Are you involved in a regular, weekly ministry that makes a difference to the kingdom?
q Witness. How often do you tell people about Jesus?
q Church. We all miss church sometimes, even me! But 2 out of 4 or 3 out of 4 at church is a good indicator that things need review.
q Small Group. Many of our small groups meet fortnightly. To miss one means you go a month without meeting with your group. To miss a few a year without really caring about it is another indicator. Does your small group help you be more accountable to Christ?
q Are you growing as a Christian? I think this is the hard one and perhaps the most important one. You can tick all the above and still not be growing as a believer. It’s possible for ministers not to grow and they don’t have many of the life pressures that most of you have. So how do I check that I’m growing? It’s a subtle thing but for me it’s working out that I’m doing what I can to maximise my kingdom effectiveness.
This is an up-and-down thing so it needs checking periodically. Are the things I’m doing the best things I can be doing to grow Christ’s kingdom? Are there things I could stop doing to make me more effective? I’m doing this now after failing to do it for too long. So I know at the moment I haven’t stopped growing spiritually.
What are the indicators of growth in your life? All of the above are involved but you can tick them all and still not be growing. Ask you Christian friends if they think you’re growing. For if you’re not growing then you might be in real trouble. Failure to thrive in infants is very important. Failure to thrive as a believer is equally important.
If you have put a cross against any then you are probably normal. If two, then you need to take note. If three, then you might have already started the slide. Repent now! Reverse the trend.
Neil
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