Pastors Are Only Matchmakers: The Humble Heart of Faithful Ministry

In his ebook The Total Christ, Sinclair Ferguson notes that numerous Scottish pulpits after bore the phrases of John 12:21 on the within, so that only the preacher could see them. Every time a pastor stood in such a pulpit, he would uncover himself confronted with the exact same words some Greek guests once spoke to the apostle Philip:

Sir, we desire to see Jesus.

We desire to see Jesus. Deep in their souls, all God’s persons would like the exact same from their pastors. “Sir, would you explain to me of Jesus? Would you present me once again my King in his splendor? Would you heat my coronary heart with another glimpse of his glory? Would you uncloud the heavens and give me a sight of him?”

And deep in their souls, God’s faithful pastors would like to say indeed. Their hearts beat with the famed words and phrases of John the Baptist, that prophet of the lifted voice and pointed finger: “He need to increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30). At their most effective, pastors are matchmakers among the bride of Christ and her wonderful Groom.

Yes, at their very best. But of training course, pastors are not often at their best. From time to time, a small interior voice indicates, “He will have to boost, and I should way too.”

By itself in the Jordan

Even as a younger pastor — with months, not yrs, of official ministry guiding me — I experience this split ambition. At situations, the words “he have to maximize, but I have to decrease” burn up like holy hearth in my bones. And at other times, they just burn up.

Probably, my flesh at times proposes, I can demonstrate other individuals Jesus even though also exhibiting anything of myself. It’s possible I can win others’ hearts to Christ while also successful their hearts to me. It’s possible some of the glory I preach can fall upon my shoulders. But then I just take a closer appear at the context of John’s terms, and I locate the rebuke, and the help, I require.

Potentially you bear in mind the circumstance. God had supplied surprising fruit to the ministry of the Baptist, that desert-dwelling, locust-ingesting prophet. His sermons about the Christ experienced drawn hundreds to his river pulpit in the Jordan. Some Jews wondered if John himself could be the Christ (John 1:19–28).

And then, at the peak of the awakening, the crowds go away as immediately as they came, for the Lord, whose way John had been planning, abruptly appears on the way (John 1:29–31 3:22). John finds himself knee-deep in the progressively obscure Jordan of his ministry, the banks at the time so comprehensive of men and women now practically bare. His disciples draw the humbling conclusion: “Rabbi, he who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you bore witness — appear, he is baptizing, and all are heading to him” (John 3:26).

All are going to him. Moments like these reveal a man’s heart. Has he preached Christ for Christ’s sake, or for the sake of a bustling ministry? Has he counted baptisms for Christ’s kingdom, or for his own? Has he rejoiced to hear other folks praise Jesus, or praise John?

In text that furthermore should have a place on each individual pulpit, John leaves no doubt: “He should maximize, but I have to decrease” (John 3:30).

Heart of the Baptist

To be absolutely sure, John spoke these well known terms at a exclusive second in redemptive historical past. The age of the Christ experienced come hence, the age of previous-covenant prophecy experienced finished. And when the sun rises, all candles can be blown out (to paraphrase Karl Barth). For John, then, “I ought to decrease” intended “my ministry of getting ready the way will have to conclusion.”

Nevertheless God calls for the exact same “decrease,” on a non secular stage, from all who have been billed to proclaim “not ourselves but Jesus Christ as Lord” (2 Corinthians 4:5). And in the verses previous John’s declaration, he opens up his humble, Christ-loving coronary heart to demonstrate us in which phrases like his occur from.

‘All I Have Is from Above’

A man or woman simply cannot acquire even 1 detail unless of course it is supplied him from heaven. (John 3:27)

John’s 1st reaction sounds a observe of non secular realism. The crowds, the baptisms, the confessions of sin, the repentance, the astonishing religious fruit — all of these have been, in John’s eyes, not acquired, but “given.” From the start out, John knew his ministry was a been given ministry, a bestowed ministry, a offered ministry. And so, anywhere he seemed, he could see no good factor that did not bear the label “Gift.”

No pastor these days is a prophet like John, but our ministries — compact or massive — bear the identical gracious character they are all “given . . . from heaven” (see Functions 20:28). All our successes are little Isaacs, small children past the electricity of flesh and blood, pointing to the God who “calls into existence the items that do not exist” (Romans 4:17) through the ministries of frail adult men. And so, Christ need to boost.

‘I Am Not the Christ’

You yourselves bear me witness, that I claimed, “I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before him.” (John 3:28)

During the peak of his ministry, John discovered will need to explain rumors circling on the banking companies of the Jordan. “He confessed, and did not deny, but confessed, ‘I am not the Christ’” (John 1:20). And now once more, he tends to make the identical confession to his disciples, whose phrases efficiently urged him to act like he, not Jesus, was Israel’s Christ.

“In a odd irony, we who preach Christ at times can act like we ourselves are the Christ.”

In a weird irony, we who preach Christ in some cases can act like we ourselves are the Christ. In some cases we take into account ourselves indispensable to the mission. In some cases we starvation for others’ praise as if we ourselves could satisfy a soul. In some cases we rise early and go late to rest, not from holy zeal, but from a feeling that, until we establish the home, the other folks labor in vain (Psalm 127:1–2).

We might do nicely, foolish as it appears, to frequently repeat the Baptist’s phrases to the rumors circling within: “I am not the Christ.” And consequently, I must decrease.

‘The Bridegroom Is My Joy’

The just one who has the bride is the bridegroom. The mate of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices enormously at the bridegroom’s voice. Thus this joy of mine is now comprehensive. (John 3:29)

There is more than just one kind of need to. There is the have to of responsibility: “I ought to lessen, due to the fact Christ deserves prominence.” But there is also the must of delight: “I will have to reduce, since joy in Christ compels me.” And right here we attain the inner chamber of John’s coronary heart, the mystery spring of his humility: pleasure — and not just any joy, but the pleasure of the bridegroom’s mate.

“Here we get to the internal chamber of John’s heart, the key spring of his humility: pleasure.”

The bridegroom’s close friend, John tells us, enjoys a peculiar form of pleasure: not the pleasure of attention, but the pleasure of attention supplying. He would somewhat “stand and hear” the bridegroom’s voice than have 10 thousand stand and listen to his personal. He would instead are living unseen in the Jordan, and watch all Galilee, Judea, and Jerusalem stream to Jesus, than attract the crowds to himself. He would relatively see the bride’s eyes from the aspect, as she stares into her Groom’s, than to see them head-on.

“He has obtained the height of his needs,” John Calvin writes. “He has practically nothing additional to motivation, for he sees Christ reigning and individuals listening to him as he deserves” (Calvin’s New Testament Commentaries, 4:81). To be observed as Christ’s minister, to be heard preaching Christ — these are partial joys, and usually tinged with self. But to see other individuals loving Christ, and to listen to them worship him — these are whole joys, full joys, the initially bells of the coming marriage.

He Have to Maximize

We would be mistaken, of program, to deny that devoted pastors ought to have the adore and regard of their folks. “Esteem them incredibly very in love because of their work,” Paul tells the Thessalonians (1 Thessalonians 5:13). But a pastor’s “work” is the very same as John’s: not the do the job of winning many others to ourselves, but the perform of profitable them to Jesus. In other terms, pastors should have their people’s esteem only as they enable their men and women esteem Jesus a lot more.

We can not give some others pleasure in ourselves. We can’t offer them peace. We are not able to offer you them forgiveness or hope or relaxation of coronary heart. But we can present them Christ. We can preach from the aisle, as it had been, leaving the altar crystal clear for the presence of their bridegroom.

And to that deep request in every Christian’s soul — “Sir, we wish to see Jesus” — we can respond, “With all my coronary heart.”