{"id":31137,"date":"2022-09-10T15:18:21","date_gmt":"2022-09-10T20:18:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/do-you-feel-overshadowed-in-ministry\/"},"modified":"2022-09-10T15:18:21","modified_gmt":"2022-09-10T20:18:21","slug":"do-you-feel-overshadowed-in-ministry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/do-you-feel-overshadowed-in-ministry\/","title":{"rendered":"Do You Feel Overshadowed in Ministry?"},"content":{"rendered":"
Daniel Polo photo – Unsplash <\/p>\n

By Luke Holmes<\/em><\/p>\n

When we were newly married my wife and I moved to Texas to serve at a church that had a difficult past.<\/p>\n

They had split several times, but I was sure I was the man to lead them toward a stable future. I was young enough (and dumb enough) to think that I could be the one to straighten them out.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s sufficient to sum up that time of my life by saying things didn\u2019t really go well.<\/p>\n

There were fights, pressures, and even vandalism of the parsonage. It only got worse from there.<\/p>\n

While we were going through those trials, I had someone in the church tell me \u201cYou\u2019ve really taught me how to suffer well.\u201d I had been praying for God to use me in that place, but that\u2019s not really what I had in mind.<\/p>\n

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I appreciate the sentiment of my friend but that\u2019s not really what I want to be known for. It\u2019s easier to be known for handling big budgets well or being down to earth despite being incredibly famous.<\/p>\n

Teaching people to suffer well was pretty far down my list. I learned hard lessons during that time.<\/p>\n

But looking back at it almost 20 years later I\u2019m reminded of a critical truth: We don\u2019t get to pick the time and the place God plans for us to leave a mark.<\/p>\n

The words of advice that Mordecai gave to his niece in the book of Esther are well known. As the Jewish race faces annihilation he tells her that God has put her in that palace for a reason.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance will arise for the Jews from another place and you and your father\u2019s house will perish. And who knows whether you have not attained royalty for such a time as this?\u201d Esther 4:14<\/p>\n

As we stand in the middle of a momentous time in history those words are a good reminder that God always has a plan for our lives.<\/p>\n

But it\u2019s also good to remember the lesson I had to learn at a difficult church. We don\u2019t get to choose the time and place that God will use us.<\/p>\n

Anyone who has served as a leader of group or church\u2014big or small\u2014has been faced with all types of choices that were unfathomable a year ago.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s tempting to think we would like to lead during a less contentious time. But God is the one who chooses when and where He will use us.<\/p>\n

We all want to be someone important. We might be that person who stands like Esther and make a dramatic mark in history. But most of us won\u2019t.<\/p>\n

Most of us are called by God to live in this moment just like Esther, but our calling might be to the small moments and not the grand gestures.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re drawn to the well known people in the Bible\u2014like Moses, David, Paul, Peter, Jeremiah, and Isaiah. But we can\u2019t forget that God has called us to this<\/em> moment, not theirs.<\/p>\n

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It\u2019s tempting for preachers and church leaders to look at Esther and then say, \u201cGod will elevate you to just the place you need to be.\u201d<\/p>\n

The main point of Esther is not the elevation to status but the glory of God displayed through even pagan nations.<\/p>\n

Yes, God has plans for queens and kings, presidents and senators. But the rest of the story of Esther\u2014and the rest of the Bible\u2014reminds us that this promise is not just for kings and queens, but simply for everyone.<\/p>\n

We are drawn to the big characters in the story: The young queen thrust into the spotlight, the shepherd boy who becomes king, the reluctant recluse who stands up to Pharaoh.<\/p>\n

We tell ourselves that that will be us someday. Someday we will be asked to do something big for God, and in that moment we will be ready. We\u2019re all willing\u2014hoping\u2014to do something big for God.<\/p>\n

But are we willing to do something small<\/em> for God? Are we willing to daily put ourselves into the will of God to be used wherever we find ourselves?<\/p>\n

We might not stand before kings to speak the truth, but we\u2019ll have to stand before our families and churches.<\/p>\n

Is God any less in those small moments than in the big ones?<\/p>\n

Our \u201cfor such a time as this\u201d is not just for big grand moments when life is on the line. It\u2019s for a mother changing diapers, a father teaching his son to be a man.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor such a time as this\u201d is for grandparents who raise grandkids as their own, for a Sunday School teacher in a class with one kid, and for a prayer meeting with two people.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor such a time as this\u201d is true for giant gleaming churches in the big cities where titans of industry have Bible studies with politicians and influencers.<\/p>\n

And it\u2019s true for small, rural churches on dirt roads where farmers teach Sunday School. It\u2019s true for all of us.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor such a time as this\u201d applies to the famous and the forgotten, for the important and the insignificant, the noble and the normal.<\/p>\n

No matter what level of importance you perceive yourself to be, you\u2019re here for such a time as this.<\/p>\n

LUKE HOLMES (@lukeholmes)<\/strong> is husband to Sara, father to three young girls, and pastor at First Baptist Church Tishomingo, Oklahoma, since 2011. He\u2019s a graduate of Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and can be found online at LukeAHolmes.com.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Daniel Polo photo – Unsplash By Luke Holmes When we were newly married my wife and I moved to Texas to serve at a church that had a difficult past. They had split several times, but I was sure I was the man to lead them toward a stable future. I was young enough (and … Continue reading “Do You Feel Overshadowed in Ministry?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31137"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31137\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}