Ministry Does Not Equal to Intimacy with God

By Jack Chui

Today (or yesterday if I this gets posted on Monday) was the probably the busiest day in ministry I have ever been involved in. Pushing off from home at 9am, I was coordinating a BBQ at church, stopped for a coffee with friends for an hour before leading a group out to the detention centre for Outreach in the afternoon, then finished with evening mass and helping Jean out in her music ministry. That last one was optional and I got home at 10pm not exhausted but with enough energy to start writing this post.

I entered today having read this short article which a good friend sent me the day before:
http://lp.willowcreek.com/WCA-Blog/August-2012/Craig-Groeschel-on-Investing-in-Your-Personal-Deve

And I believe he's right - Ministry does not equal intimacy with God. I had known this for some time now being in active ministry for a few years and having experienced it first hand but the article made me stop and think about it without quickly pressing the 'Archive' button in gmail. Initially like others, I entered ministry as a seemingly good way to grow my faith in God. So why then do I put myself under so much stress and trouble in so many ministries? (I'm a leader in STAY, a leader in Outreach, a leader for a Tuesday cell group and help out with almost everything during mass and around mass for St. Augustine's)

I think its a combination of my love for the Church and that I love to give. The Church has given me so much - most importantly my faith, and I want to share that faith and joy with more people. Its almost like I don't really care about myself so much because its more important to me that others are better than me. But still, I should care about myself, because I have to be able to love myself first to be able to love others well.

My personal relationship with God is virtually non-existent. Its scary admitting this because I'm in active ministry but I think its kind of true. A lot of what I know about God is in my head, and not so much in my heart. God seems really real and present when I really need him in tough times, but when tough times are over, He fades away - or more that I make Him fade away. Before I started being active in ministry, my prayer life was a lot better than what it is now, and its a struggle at the moment.

For me, its seems to be the right time in my life to give a lot of my time to ministry. I have a stable job, financially well off, study commitments are finished, live on my own near the church and am single/uncommitted. I'm in the right place and time for this sort of work and I should make the most of it before things come around in my life to make it more complicated. This season in my life may not last so long adding to the desire of doing what I can while I can.

I was big receiver of ministry in the past and continue to receive it but in a distant way - so I'm still being fed spiritually. In those times I have been formed and I would say not quite enough because other people in those groups are spiritually much stronger than me and yet I've been thrown into quite active ministry. I am actually quite unqualified especially with the weak prayer life and relationship with God that I have to be able to lead church ministries. Yet I still do...

Sometimes, I/we could be the only person by which another person that we meet could experience God. Today at the detention centre, the refugees wanted some prayer and few of the visitors want to pray over a refugee let alone know how to actually do one. I'm not that experienced at doing it and its not exactly a task which everyone's going to put their hands up to do so its the choice of saying an 'incompetent' prayer or not praying for them at all. I have learnt to just do it, even though I'm not qualified.

I don't think anyone is ever ready for big things in life - like a new job, dating, getting married and having kids. Its hard to be fully prepared for these things - many times what ends up happening is so different to our expectations. I think its like that with ministry as well. Who is ever qualified to lead ministry? Its something that's learned by just doing, observing and just being involved. I guess I'm a very slow learner... I give what little I have, and hope that God will multiply it like Jesus did with the 5 loaves and 2 fish.

I think its amazing that God can still work wonders as He did today through my failures and insufficient qualification. I'm always looking out for the seemingly weak people who seem to have nothing to offer and seeing God do amazing things through them. So while I haven't really grown so much personally having been so involved in ministry, what I have witness is the awesome power of God to still work through me. I pray that those around me, can continue to minister to me - even though they don't think they are qualified, God is so much greater that He thinks otherwise =)