(Matters Arising)
– Pastor Bimbo Animashaun
Dear Minister, learn to pursue your calling without fear or intimidation. While it is important to HONOUR ALL MEN – 1 Pet.2:17, let no man however despise your calling.
If you allow people to despise or make light of your calling by their words or attitude, it is your “FAULT”.
You owe no man under Heaven any apology accepting and pursuing the call of God upon your life.
You didn’t call yourself. You didn’t determine your calling or placement. Your calling is a product of divine ordination, so it is beyond your power of volition.
Your calling is God’s prerogative. God determines your PLACEMENT; but you determine your OBEDIENCE.
Don’t let any man or woman intimidate you. Don’t be cowed or blackmailed into what God didn’t send you to do.
It is common in ministry to see some ministers make light of other people’s calling because that’s not their own area of calling.
From ministry experience, I discovered that if you truly see a minister who CELEBRATES the Grace of God upon another minister (which he himself doesn’t flow in), that minister must be A SOUND CHRISTIAN.
A minister who CELEBRATES the Grace of God upon other ministers which he currently doesn’t flow in must have had a genuine encounter with Christ in terms of divine dealing in his heart.
What is common is to see people speak less of another flow because it isn’t their kind of flow – it’s really a work of the flesh.
No single minister can build the Body of Christ. God is a God of diversity. You always administer the dimension of His Grace He makes available to you.
As a matter of principle, I HONOUR ALL MEN, but the moment anyone despises my calling and makes it look insignificant, I CUT OFF IMMEDIATELY.
Nobody has all the time in the world to pursue destiny. We’re all racing against time, and we need to be conscious of it.
You see, in life and ministry, if you’re not PRINCIPLED, you’ll be RIDICULED.
Now, in ministry, IT IS UNSCRIPTURAL TO MAGNIFY YOURSELF but it’s perfectly in line to MAGNIFY YOUR OFFICE.
Paul says in the Book of Romans:
ROMANS 11:13
For I speak to you Gentiles, inasmuch as I am the APOSTLE of the Gentiles, I MAGNIFY MINE OFFICE:
Notice he didn’t say, “I MAGNIFY MYSELF”. No, he said, “I MAGNIFY MINE OFFICE”.
If it is right to magnify your OFFICE, then it is right to magnify your CALLING, your GRACE, your FLOW, and the OPERATION of the Holy Spirit in your ministry.
You’re not being humble speaking low of your calling. Magnify your office. Speak highly of it.
Affirm the peculiarity of your ministry office without sounding immodest or arrogant.
In most of his letters to the New Testament churches, Paul always referred to himself as AN APOSTLE in the opening.
Today, even when most people who are non-pentecostals want to refer to Paul, they always refer to him as “APOSTLE PAUL”, not “EVANGELIST PAUL” – Paul indeed MAGNIFIED HIS APOSTOLIC OFFICE!
Paul honoured the apostles before him but he also RECOGNIZED and CELEBRATED the working of God’s Grace in his own life and ministry.
GALATIANS 2:8-9
8 For he that wrought effectually in Peter to the apostleship of the circumcision, THE SAME WAS MIGHTY IN ME TOWARD THE GENTILES:)
9 And when James, Cephas, and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that was given unto me, they gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship; that we should go unto the heathen, and they unto the circumcision.
Paul said that the same God Who worked effectually in Peter was MIGHTY IN HIM. What a sense of security in his calling!
It is not your fault that you’re called into deliverance ministry, so why do you want anyone to intimidate you and tell you that you lack depth in the Word?
While I agree that all of us must keep growing in the Word and in intimacy with the Holy Spirit, we shouldn’t however allow anyone to make light of our calling.
It is in ministry that I see ministers discourage each other instead of strengthening and encouraging one other.
I want to humbly submit the following Sirs and Mas:
* That you’re a Prophet doesn’t mean you lack depth in the Word, therefore don’t let anyone blackmail or intimidate you.
* That you’re a teacher doesn’t mean you’re powerless or you lack power flows, therefore don’t let anyone blackmail or intimidate you.
* That you’re given to visions doesn’t mean you’re a spiritual babe, therefore don’t let anyone blackmail or intimidate you.
* That you’re an itinerant minister doesn’t mean you’re unstable, therefore don’t let anyone blackmail or intimidate you.
* That you’re pastoring doesn’t mean you’re not exposed in terms of the outside world, therefore don’t let anyone blackmail or intimidate you.
* That you’re doing ministry in the village doesn’t make you an inferior minister, therefore don’t let anyone blackmail or intimidate you.
* That you don’t belong to certain “ministry cliques” doesn’t make you irrelevant, therefore don’t let anyone blackmail or intimidate you.
Plus Much More!!!
You see, if you can overcome the fear of blackmail and intimidation in ministry, then you’re free indeed, and your best will be unleashed.
You’re not obligated to stay connected with people who don’t believe in your calling; there are thousands and millions of people out there who believe and accept your ministry.
Don’t try to please people by despising your own calling or dragging it in the mud.
If you do that, God Almighty will judge you because you didn’t call yourself, and His calling upon your life is AN HOLY CALLING – 2 Tim.1:9.
In the course of ministry, by God’s Grace, I have seen some people say stuffs and tried to despise my calling, but I can’t really see anyone of them today while I KEEP WALKING IN LOVE.
As I close, I leave us with the words of Dr. Frederick K. C. Price, “IF YOU FAIL, IT IS YOUR FAULT. IF YOU SUCCEED, IT IS YOUR FAULT, NOT GOD’S FAULT”.
I trust this meets us well Sirs and Mas?
Blessings!!!
Aphorism CITY 