The most needed ingredient in the Church today is dedication.
WHAT IS DEDICATION?
There is this story about the hen and the pig. The hen and the pig were walking together and they were meditating on the question "What is the meaning of commitment?". As they were walking and talking they got hungry. The hen said to the pig: "Let’s have breakfast and eat ham and eggs." But the pig answered: "To you this may be commitment but to me that means sacrifice."
Why is that so? Because to make ham and eggs, one needs a couple of eggs. And from the hen’s veiw it’s not a big sacrifice. However the pig has to sacrifice itself in order to give some ham for the ham and eggs. So this is what commitment really is: "Complete devotion to something."
This is what our commitment should be, indeed.
In order to please God we must completely commit ourselves to Him (2 Timothy 2:4):
No one serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs - he wants to please the one who has chosen him to be a soldier. (This text is a literal translation from the Bulgarian Bible.)
In what way this comparison between the Christian minister and the soldier shows us what our commitment to God should be? This comparison illustrates three basic reasons that lead us to full commitment to God:
* "No one serving as a soldier" is the expression that reveals the nature of our ministry. It is a ministry of a soldier.
* "He does not entangle in civilian affairs" speaks about the commitment that our ministry requires. We must be completely devoted to God, and do not involve ourselves in the worldly things.
* "He wants to please the one who has chosen him to be a soldier." This reveals our motivation to fulfil our ministry. We do it because we want to win the favour of the One Who has chosen us for our ministry.
WHAT ARE CHARACTERISTICS OF SOLDIER’S MINISTRY?
1. It’s a ministry that could be described as "complete separation from the world".
When a soldier joins the army he is completely separated from civilian life. When he steps over the threshold of the barracks, all his friends, family, home - everything that civilization means - remains behind his back. And there in the barracks his lifestyle changes completely. Every day he gets up early in the morning, his activities change, he finds new friends. So, there is great difference between civilization and the army. When a soldier joins the army his life completely changes and he is entirely separated from the civilian life.
When we join the army of God, we have to leave everything of this world behind our back. John 12:25-26 says:
The man who loves his life will lose it, while the man who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves Me must follow Me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves Me.
When we come to Jesus we leave the world behind us. We set ourselves apart from this world and we start to follow our new Lord completely.
In Luke 14:26,33 Jesus says,
If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brother and sisters - yes, even his own life - he can not be my disciple. In the same way, any of you who does not give up everything he can not be my disciple.
We must deny everything we have and we must leave the world behind us. This is the ministry of the soldier. His ministry is characterized with total separation from the world.
2. The soldier’s ministry is a ministry of one who has been called.
This is someone on whom a summons has been served. You know that when someone has to join the army, a summons is served on him. He receives a special card from the military authorities telling him to show up at a certain place and get ready for the army.
In the same way God has called us to serve Him. We are His soldiers because He has enrolled us in the list of His soldiers. He has called us by name. In 1 Peter 2:9,10 it says that we are a chosen generation. God has chosen us. He has called us “out of darkness into His wonderful light". God has enlisted us in His army of soldiers. John 15:16 says:
You did not chose Me, but I chose you. Hallelujah!
In 2 Timothy 1:9 we read:
God has saved us and called us to a holy life - not because of anything we have done, but because of His own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time.
3. God has chosen us, but the ministry of the soldier is a ministry that the soldier has accepted voluntarily.
Or at least this is the kind of a soldier that this verse is talking about. In Bulgaria, not all men join the army voluntarily, but as far as the Roman army is concerned those who wanted to join it were volunteers.
God calls us into the ministry but He does not do that by force. Whether we will respond to this calling or not after all depends entirely on us. In Joshua 24:15 we read that Joshua said to the people:
But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your forefathers served beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household we will serve the Lord.
This is a free choice. He said: "Make your choice today", and then he says what decision he made voluntarily.
The same requirements they had in the army of Israel. In Deuteronomy 20:5-8 we read what the officers were telling the soldiers when calling them to military service:
The officers shall say to the army: ‘Has anyone built a new house and not dedicated it? Let him go home, or he may die in battle and someone else may dedicate it. Has any one planted a vineyard and not begun to enjoy it? Let him go home, or he may die in battle or someone else may enjoy it. Has anyone become pledged to a woman and not married her, let him go home or he may die in battle and someone else marry her.’ Then the officers shall add, ‘Is any man afraid or fainthearted? Let him go home so that his brothers will not become disheartened too.’
You see that the officers did not want people who were afraid or were thinking about something else, but they wanted people who would be completely devoted to the battle – people about whom they knew that they would sacrifice their lives if needed.
God does not want a service as an obligation or a service against our own will. He wants a volunteer service.
In 1 Corinthians 9:17 the apostle Paul says what his ministry is so that he could get reward,
If I preach voluntarily I have a reward; If not voluntarily, I am simply discharging the trust committed to me.
We are true volunteers in the army of God, because we have chosen to serve Him after our own will without any outside pressure. Is that right? No one has forced it on us. We have made our choice ourselves. God has called us but we have responded.
4. The ministry of the soldier is an appointed ministry.
As you know, everyone in the army has certain specific tasks to fulfill. He must strictly perform his duties. Some soldiers are told to drive tanks, others to load shells, and still others go spying. Everyone has his personal duties. In the same way our ministry to the Lord is specific one. There are certain things that we are supposed to do. In 1 Corinthians 12:18,28 it says:
But In fact God has arranged the parts in the body everyone of them, just as He wanted them to be.
Each part in the body has been placed where God wanted it to be. It has a particular function. It has a specific ministry - certain tasks, and it has its personal responsibility. When we know what exactly our ministry is we have personal responsibility before God to do the work of this ministry.
And in the Church God has appointed first of all apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then workers of miracles, also those having gifts of healing, those able to help others, those with gifts of administration and those speaking in different kind of tongues.
Every person in Christ’s body has his own specific ministry.
5. Besides that, the ministry of a soldier is a continual ministry.
The man joins the army and he is a soldier all the time. Apart from that a soldier needs to maintain a permanent contact with others in order to receive commands and deliver information. In the movies we see how snipers who are fulfilling certain tasks have special phones that help them to be in permanent contact with the one who gives the orders and he tells them what exactly to do, when and where. If they lose contact they become helpless. In the same way we have to be in the continual contact with our Lord. We can not be soldiers from time to time only.
The prophet Daniel was such a soldier to God. He was serving God all the time. Even though he was a Prime Minister of the Media-Persian Empire, and before that in the Babylonian one, he was a soldier of Jehovah. He was a minister who served God continually. Even king Darius had noticed this. In Daniel 6:20 we read:
When he (meaning king Darius) came near the den, he called to Daniel in an anguished voice, ‘Daniel, servant of the living God, has your God whom you serve continually been able to rescue you from the lions?’
And we know that God did rescue Daniel from the lions. Daniel served his God continually. The soldier must always be ready to act.
In the Book of Nehemiah there is another example. There we read how he returns from Israel’s captivity in Babylon, and he was rebuilding the city walls of Jerusalem. The people were at work and in war at the same time, and Nehemiah says in 4:21-23 of his book:
So, we continued the work with half the men holding spears, from the first light of dawn till the stars came out. At that time I also said to the people, ‘Have every man and his helper stay inside Jerusalem at night so they can serve as guards by night and workmen by day.’ Neither I nor my brothers nor my men nor the guards with me took off our clothes; each had his weapon, even when he went for water.
They even did not take off their clothes! They did not place the weapons aside because they were soldiers all the time.
This is the character of the soldier’s ministry. It is characterized with complete separation from the world. It is a ministry to which the soldier has been called. A ministry which he has accepted voluntarily. It is also a specific ministry and a continual ministry as well.
The character of the soldier’s ministry requires complete devotion to his task and service. Likewise our ministry of soldiers to God demands total dedication to Him. If we have chosen to serve Him voluntarily and if after our own will we have become his ministers let us not keep anything for ourselves!
COMMITED TO MINISTRY
In his earlier Epistles the apostle Paul was meditating upon the different parallel specifics between the soldier and the Christian. He had mentioned about the "battle with the authorities and powers" – they are our enemies. In Ephesians 6:10-18 he says:
Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.
In 2 Corinthians 10:3-5 apostle Paul speaks about the weapons we fight with. They are not of the flesh but before God they are powerful to bring down spiritual strongholds. But here, in 2 Timothy 2:4 Paul puts a strong emphasis on the commitment that the ministry of the soldier requires. And that refers to our ministry as well.
No one serving as a soldier entangles in civilian affairs.
1. The commitment requires that we should make difference between the affairs of the world and the affairs of the army. We must be able to discern what are these civilian affairs that we should not get involved in.
We said that while a man is serving in the army he is separated from the civilian world. The army and the civilization are two terms that are contrary to each another. "Civilization" is associated with things like family, home, a convenient bed, comfort, rest, peace, girl friends, business, money, independence and so forth. The army means living in the field, getting early in the morning, running back and forth, fulfilling of orders, labor, discipline, training, dangers, warring and so on.
Spiritually "civilization" to us represents the "world" - the life we had before we came to the Lord, while "the army" represents our new life under the Lordship of God the Father and his Son Jesus Christ.
In 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 we read,
Do you not know that our body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body.
May God give us the ability to discern between the affairs of the civil world and the affairs of the army. What are these things in our life that are committed to God? And which things in our life are not committed to Him? That is why in Philippians 1:9,10 we read that the apostle Paul asking for wisdom says:
And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern the things that are different, so that you may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ.
2. The commitment takes involvement in the affairs of the army and not in the affairs of the world.
"No one serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs."
We must know what civilian affairs are, so that we do not get involved in them.
What does it mean to be involved in something? The Greek for this word is "empleko". It consists of the preposition "em" which means "in" and the verb "pleko" which means "interweave, knit together, weave, interlace, intertwist, to be woven into". To be "entangled" means that we are completely bound and we can not set ourselves apart.
If a piece of thread is woven with other threads, whatever takes place with the others takes place with it as well. And if something is entangled in a certain object that object controls it and its movement. In the same manner we can not do any movement without being aware of the main thing that we are entangled in. This is why I said that we must be involved in the things of the Lord. Amen! If we are involved in them He and not the devil and his world will control our life!
Let us not be involved in the civilian affairs, but let the one who has been enlisted in the army of God be involved in the affairs of God and not in the affairs of the world.
The involvement into the earthly affairs may be a hindrance to our ministry and finally can lead us to failure. That is why we read in Deuteronomy 24:5 that when a man was sent to war he was told to think well before doing that.
If a man has recently married he must not be sent to war or have any other duty laid on him. For one year he is to be free, to stay at home and bring happiness to the wife he has married.
Since a man was involved or bound with the things of the world, things that are not connected with the army he was instructed to stay in the civilian world and enjoy it for a year, and then go to war.
Then in Deuteronomy 23:9 we read:
When you go forth against enemies and are in camp, you shall keep yourself from every evil thing.
We must not get involved in evil things when we are at war and when we serve God because involvement in worldly affairs takes away our power, makes us weary, drains our strength. This is like running with iron chains tied to your ankles. In Hebrews 12:1 the author says:
Therefore since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles us.
If we are entangled in evil works, if we are entangled in sin or we are involved in something that weakens us and drains the strength of us, it is like running with heavy iron balls around our ankles. And therefore the author of Hebrews says, "Let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us."
Involvement in the things of this world not only takes away our power but it can also completely destroy our ministry.
Remember Samson. We read in Judges 16 that he entangled in affair with Delilah. He was chosen to be warrior in the army of God and to bring deliverance to Israel but he fell in love with a Philistine woman, and slowly but surely she began to drain the strength out of him. First he said, "If I am tied with fresh thongs...". Samson was playing games and he became more and more entangled in them. Then he was tied with new ropes but he snapped the ropes off again. After that he said, "If you weave the braids of my head into the fabric I will become weak”. And so he was getting closer and closer to the secret of his great strengths.
In the first stages of his entanglement with Delilah he was able to release himself, but finally he fell in the trap. He revealed his secret and said: “If my head is shaved with a razor my strength would be taken away." So his hair was cut off. He was entangled and that led to his failure in the ministry.
If we are entangled in the things of the world that would mean that we refuse to be separated from the world. In 2 Peter 2:20 the apostle uses the same word for "entangled", which is "empleko", and there it is said:
If they have escaped the corruption of the world by knowing our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and are again entangled in it and overcome, then they are worse off at the end than they were at the beginning."
If we had escaped the world and we have been set free from the things of the world and then we have been entangled in sinful affairs and the impurity of the world, then our second state has become worse than the first one. That means spiritual death!
3. I would like to point out that when we say, "not to be entangled" in civilian affairs we do not mean that we should escape completely from our daily duties at home and in the family, at work and in the society.
We live in this world. Jesus Himself told us "to go into the world" which means that we should not become hermits. We can be in the world but not of the world. We can live in the world but not be entangled in the affairs of the world. We must not lift up the things of the world as our purpose or to make them priorities in our lives. We must perform our duties conscientiously and seriously.
We are not forbidden to take part in secular activities. In 1 Timothy 4:4 the apostle Paul says,
For everything God created is good and nothing is to be rejected, because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer.
And in 1 Timothy 6:17 it says that God, "richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment" - but not for our entanglement! The things of this world should not hinder us from fulfilling our ministry to God.
In 1 Corinthians 7:29-31 the apostle Paul says what our attitudes to the things of this world should be:
What I mean brothers is that the time is short. From now on those who have wives should live as if they had none; those who mourn, as if they did not; those who are happy, as if they were not; those who buy something as if it were not theirs to keep; those who use the things of the world as if not engrossed in them. For this world in its present form is passing away.
That is why we should not be entangled in the things of the world - because as 1 John 2:17 says:
The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever.
Therefore we should not get entangled in the things of the world because the world will pass away and if we are involved in it we will pass away as well. But if we do the will of God, though we live into this world we will endure forever.
The apostle Paul applied this principle in his own life. He was establishing churches and still he was living in this world, working and earning his living by making tents. In the Acts 18 we read how he met Aqua and Priscilla and "because he was a tent-maker as they were, he stayed and worked with them" because this was their activity and their skill. But tent making was not the only thing he did. "Every Sabbath he reasoned in the Synagogue, trying to persuade Jews and Greeks." The secular life of the apostle was not a hindrance to him to serve God.
And what was the result of this. Although Paul was working hard his sweat had such an anointing that his handkerchiefs and aprons which were taken to the sick drove evil spirits out. We read in Acts 19:11,12 that:
God did extraordinary miracles through Paul, so that even handkerchiefs and aprons that had touched him were taken to the sick and their illnesses were cured and the evil spirits left them.
Can you imagine what it is like to have such an anointing?! Although he was in the world he was not of the world. He was a minister of the Lord Jesus Christ.
4. Whether we will be entangled in worldly things or we will be free from them does not depend on God but it depends on us. It says that, "No one serving as a soldier gets involved in civilian affairs...". That means that the involvement depends on the soldier. It is a personal matter.
When we entangle ourselves in worldly affairs we turn into spiritual deserters. What does the word deserter mean? Deserter is someone who voluntarily leaves his military service. All army deserters are given death sentence because they have become betrayers. In other words if we are called into the army of God but later entangle in civilian affairs, we leave the army and we become spiritual deserters and betrayers of God.
God’s will is clear but He does not force it on us. We decide what we will be! Whether we will be faithful to the calling and the rank or spiritual deserters. It depends on us whether we will stay entangled in the civilian affairs or we will set ourselves free from them.
Let me give you an illustration. Satan is like a spider. For example there was a dancing place in the city of Bourgas that is called "Satan". Some time ago its owners had placed above its entrance the skull of a goat. Later they have replaced it with a huge spider. So, we can compare Satan with a spider.
You see, the spider does not chase the insects. He can not fly but he is very clever and patient. He chooses an appropriate place, sets his web and begins to wait. His web is sticky. It consists of thin almost invisible threads, which the spider weaves together with the sticky substance that he produces.
I love to go jogging early in the morning and in the area where I usually run there are many spiders and spider webs. And when the sunrays touch the spider webs that are covered with dewdrops they look like very beautiful necklaces. But in fact those same threads of web are the spider’s deadly weapons.
When the insect is trapped in the web it can not set itself free. The spider does not attack the insect immediately. He is concerned about his web staying intact. As the insect writhes in agony it tries to escape, but every next move make the insect more and more worn out, and drains his strength. The spider waits until the insect is exhausted completely, and when the insect finally gives up then he comes and eats it up.
This is what the devil does as well. He does not run after us. He spreads his web of earthly affairs, and waits for us to get entangled in it, to be worn out completely, and to stop resisting him. Finally he comes and “eats us up” – destroys us.
However we can set ourselves free. We are not like these insects. God is on our side. In Romans 8:31 we read, "If God is for us who can be against us?” In Isaiah 54:17 it says, "no weapon formed against you shall prosper”!
It depends on us whether we will be involved in civilian affairs and become spiritual deserters or we will set ourselves free from these things. It depends on us! The devil wants to see us in his web. God is for us, but we need to exercise our will. It takes faith to be able to get free from the worldly affairs. In 1 John 5:4,5 we read,
For everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world? Only he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.
MOTIVATION FOR OUR DEDICATION
What motivates us not to be entangled in world affairs? What makes us get rid of them? What urges us to commit ourselves completely to God? What is our motive?
We said that,
No one serving as a soldier gets involved in civilian affairs - he wants to please his commanding officer.
There are several reasons for our motivation to fulfil our ministry to the Lord.
1. The first reason for our motive is love.
There are soldiers who respect and love their officers, no matter how demanding they can be. So our motive to serve God wholeheartedly is in first place our love to God. In John 14:15 it is said:
If you love me you will keep my commandments.
Our love to God is stirred up by His love towards us because God first loved us. In 1 John 4:19 we read,
We love him because God first loved us.
The soldier does his best to please his commanding officer because the soldier loves him. God is such a loving God. He is so good, He loves us so much that, and if we truly love Him we would love and want to commit ourselves completely to Him. He is worthy of our complete devotion to Him.
Love seeks to please the loved one by all means, at any cost. It may be hard but if you really love someone you are ready to pay any price in order to please that person. Am I right? So, love is the first ground for our motivation.
2. The second reason for our motive is faith.
The soldier believes in the cause of his army. If he does not believe in it he would not go into the battle. We are not mercenaries but volunteers. That means that we have joined the army we believe in. And no other cause is worthier than ours. Our goal is the salvation of men and the victory over Satan, over the world, sin and death. Our goal is eternal life. In 2 Corinthians 13:8 the Scripture says:
For we can not do anything against the truth, but only for the truth.
Do you believe in our cause? If so, let this be our motive - our love for our commanding officer, and the power of our cause we are fighting for. We must win the victory no matter what price we must pay for it!
If these are the grounds for our motivation its outward expression will be our burning desire to please God. Therefore it is said in 2 Corinthians 5:9,
So we make it our goal to please Him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it." Amen! Let us be pleasing to Him!
THE FRUIT OF OUR MOTIVE
What is the fruit of our motive? - complete devotion to God! The apostle Peter says in Mark 10:28:
"Look. We have left everything to follow you!"
If we truly love God we will put everything aside and we will follow Him. We will put Him in the first place in our lives. We will live in this world, but not be entangled in it. We will be completely set apart for the Lord. We will be totally dedicated to Him. We will not get involved in civilian affairs! And if we had been entangled in the web of Satan we must not stay there but through sincere repentance we must release ourselves.
The truth is that the character of our ministry demands complete commitment. But our motive to devote ourselves entirely to God - which is based on our love to Him and the faith in our cause - is so strong, that to please our commanding officer Lord Jesus Christ is no longer a burden for us, but it is a privilege and joy!
Is it a burden for us not to get involved in civilian affairs? Then we have to look into our hearts, check our motive and see if we truly love Him. Do we really believe the cause we are serving? If we have a genuine motive it will not be difficult for us to stay away from the worldly affairs and we will be completely committed to God.
And yet, if Satan has succeeded to deceive us that the worldly things are more important than our ministry and the One we are serving, then let us make a turnaround! Let us set ourselves free from the web of the world and let us stop involving in worldly affairs! Then we will be pleasing to God; we will be faithful to the high calling which the Lord has given to us and not spiritual deserters. Amen!!!
Last updated 10.7.2004
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