During the first missionary journey of Paul, he traveled to Asia Minor, which moved him into territory he could reach on foot. You could call that an obvious endeavor. You don't get into a boat until you have first tried the folks in walking distance. This relates to the concentric paradigm laid out in Acts 1:8: Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, uttermost parts of the earth.
At the same time, sometimes the mission stops when people say 'you can't come here' or 'we don't want to hear it,' If you read Luke 9:52 and following, you see Jesus come to a Samaritan city, that doesn't want to have Him, and He moves on to the next city. That's what you do. In a smaller way, you move on to the next door.
Did you notice that Jesus didn't pray that God's power would overcome the Samaritan city? If anyone could pray for power to overcome people, Jesus could do it. If anyone had irresistible grace, it would be Jesus, one might think, or at least have the greatest availability of it through the Holy Spirit, and yet He just moved to the next town. You don't have to talk to people who don't want to hear it. It's not God's will to talk to people who don't want to hear it.
On the second missionary journey, Paul goes into the same territory in Acts 16 and there he meets up with Timothy, what one would call a wonderful find, a tremendous result that wasn't a direct connection to something Paul had done. It was worth coming back there just to run into him.
In Acts 16:7, Paul and his companions were forbidden to preach in Asia. As they moved ahead, they continued to get the thumbs down from the Holy Spirit. In v. 9, Paul gets a vision from God from Macedonia. The Lord called Paul and his cohorts to preach the gospel in Macedonia.
Someone today might study that passage and then decide that he should look for a call to a field like Paul got there. Reader, Paul was an apostle. That is a big deal, a huge, huge deal that he mentions at the start of most of his epistles. He defends his apostleship in 2 Corinthians and Galatians, it's so big, so important. Paul got direct revelation from God, because He was an apostle. The era of the apostle is over, so God isn't speaking to us any more.
God today speaks through His Word, the Bible, which is completed revelation. You may say, "Then how do we know where to go?" I'd like to talk about that in the future, but as for right this moment, it isn't through direct revelation, a still small voice, a voice in the head, an intuition, an impression, a cloud formation, window shutters that move back and forth with the wind, the blowing of the Holy Spirit, or unusual circumstances. There is no laying out of the fleece or anything like that.
As I write the above to you, reader, I know that I hear this from a majority of independent Baptists. It is a common question for missionaries: "Have you been called?" I've never been asked that, but I know men who have. What's the answer to that? I would wonder what this call comes in the form of. How do you know it's God talking? What is the basis for believing it is God?
I'm saying this "call" is making the Macedonian call in Acts normative. It isn't normative. It was unique to Paul. It was unique to that day and age before the completion of the Word of God. I don't believe people who say they've gotten a call. They think they got something, because they are expecting to get something. They are supposed to get something, so they want it, very much like someone who wants to speak in tongues, and then he "does," because he expects it and wants it. He really doesn't, but he says he does and others authenticate it. People do the same thing with this call thing. They just take it as true, and if you questioned it, you're unloving, like someone who questions tongues.
For many Baptists, this call thing is the most important thing for a missionary. If he goes to the field, and he hasn't been called, then he may doubt that he should be there and then take off. If he has been called, then he stays there until he gets another call. It's very convenient to wait for a voice in your head, telling you that you need to go and do something. It can't be questioned. For these who see it with such great importance, this is what causes someone to serve with determination. If you've been called, even if people don't want to hear, you've got to stay too, and that's what keeps you from "quitting."
I'm telling you that I never had a call like that to come to California. I had principles, that I'll talk about perhaps in some future post, but I came because I wanted to. I had the liberty to come to California. If my church wants me to go, I can leave. My church could send me somewhere else. My church could also say, no. A lot of men think this call supersedes a church, that is, if God tells one of these men to do something, the church should just listen. The truth is opposite. Men should listen to the church, which is to endeavor to keep the unity of the Spirit.
The Macedonian call to a mission field is not all that I hear from Baptists. This is not why I'm writing this post, but I got something in an email, very close to another email I received about a week before, which was like another one a week before that. I had already deleted it, and if I knew I was going to write this, I would have cut and pasted the contents. The email came from someone who said that he knew that God had told us what to preach. He was sure of that. The Lord telling you what to preach is another way God speaks to men. As you know, it even goes to the extent of the content of the sermon too, but telling you that this is what you are supposed to preach. I've heard many sermons through the years from various ones to whom God gave the message, and it was not scriptural. Not. God couldn't have given it to a person, because it contradicted scripture.
I'm happy about the Macedonian call. It sent the gospel further West. I have it today partly because of that movement. I'm glad. It didn't make sense at that time, because not all of Asia Minor had been hit. This was part of the movement that God wanted. He told Paul. Paul could get that call as an apostle. We can't. That doesn't mean God isn't speaking. He is sufficiently speaking in the Word of God. We should spend our time knowing what that is saying and then applying it, all of it. Stop waiting for special extra-scriptural messages. Dig into scripture. Stay there.
8 comments:
The "call" also serves as a useful tool to help a man (many times a pastor) insulate himself from godly Biblical scrutiny. After all, if I'm telling you God "called me," who are you, mere man/church member, to question that divine call? I've watched these "calls" used to justify the disorder that arises from God "calling me here" one year to God "calling me away from here" a year or two later, often leaving unfinished work and confusion, something that happens here in Canada with sad regularity. Then, when the "called" man is questioned about the contradiction, he shrugs with that "His-ways-are-not-our-ways" look and says, "I don't know what to say, but I can't ignore the call." This furnishes that insulation necessary to prevent the application of Biblical wisdom to his desire (since the "call" is the desire) to see whether it is the right desire.
Sometimes, I think we don't call out the "calls" for their contradiction and confusion enough. Thanks for the reinforcement.
God spoke to me, and assured me this was a very good article . . .
Since teaching through Acts 13 and considering fasting in the New Testament church, I've wondered if we even put too much mysticism into the "call" of Barnabas and Saul.
1. The church at Antioch was blessed with several prophets. Perhaps more than they needed now that they were an established congregation.
2. They were already fasting. Why? Because some of them had an idea to go beyond Antioch, namely Barnabas and Saul, who wanted to take the gospel to their homelands and further "sponsored" by the Antioch church. A decision of this magnitude called for fasting and prayer. While they fasted and prayed the Holy Spirit confirmed to them that he had put the desire in Barnabas and Saul's minds and hearts and was calling them to work (it appears he had already "called" them).
3. This view is more realistic and consistent, I believe, than the typical idea that they were in a fervent fasting and prayer meeting and all at once heard (or were mystically shown) that the Holy Spirit had in mind for Barnabas and Saul to leave for some unknown foreign field.
4. I conclude that the Holy Spirit can use godly men's desires, but those desires must be confirmed by "the church" before they can be validated as "a call."
5. In fact, I believe that most/all of the Holy Spirit's leading begins with godly desire. After all, even the "call" to the pastorate begins with desire. "If a man desire the office of a bishop, he desires a good work." Then the church confirms his "call" by checking out his qualifications and putting him into service.
I think I may have gone off topic and even forgotten all that your post brought to mind, so there could be more to my ramblings. All of these points have only been thoughts in my head up to this point. They are open to biblical correction and fine-tuning.
James,
Very good. I agree. I liked the word play at the end too.
Tyler,
Also used a word play, a different one, but thanks.
Jeff,
I agree with what you wrote. I read it once, so I didn't let it sink in maybe as much as I could, but I advocate our desire, which comes from the Word of God. The Holy Spirit working through the church. The convincing He does comes from His Word. Is it scriptural? Does someone fulfill the qualifications? I'll be writing more about the way God leads.
Kent,
If you look at the passages surrounding the Macedonian call especially prior to it, Paul was being lead by the Holy Spirit, you even admitted it above. We don't know how it was that the Holy Spirit was giving "thumbs down" to Paul, but he was leading him, which happens to be a characteristic of a child of God, being lead by the Holy Spirit. If Paul needed the Holy Spirits leading, how much more do we. He was an Apostle and if he needed leading then certainly we who are not Apostles would have a greater reason to seek God's leading. There are hundreds of places that need churches but certainly God can and will lead to a specific place, a place where he wants us. I agree with you that a church can help guide in discerning the Lord's will, but we are to be lead by the Holy Spirit and especially for big areas like where to plant a church or what mission field to go to. It more sense that way than just basing it ultimately on human logic.
Also, At which point would you conclude a place should be moved away from because of people rejecting the gospel? If over 99% of the people that you have witnessed to have rejected your gospel witness is it time to move somewhere else? Would Jesus have moved out of the Bay Area after 30 years? As far as preaching the gospel to those who don't want to hear it, a lot of people don't want to hear it at first but that's why soul winning is compared to farming because it takes time. You don't just preach once and then leave because people don't want to hear. You preach and build relationships and see God break through in hearts that you are shedding tears for. I must say that the way you approach soul winning seems cold hearted and merely duty oriented. To just say "you don't have to preach to people who don't want to hear you" seems cold and uncompassionate as well as unbiblical since Jesus "is not willing that any should perish..." The tears I am talking about are not worked up tears, but rather tears of compassion because God's love is so real and Hell is so real. John R Rice once said, "If you can preach on hell and not shed tears, you are backslidden." May this be a reminder to all to preach and witness with "tears" so we can "come again with rejoicing."
Ryan
Ryan,
I'm going to deal with your comment in depth, because I think it represents, respectfully, the problem I'm talking about.
Paragraph One
If you look at the passages surrounding the Macedonian call especially prior to it, Paul was being lead by the Holy Spirit, you even admitted it above.
First, the terminology "leading of the Spirit" or "led by the Spirit" are not found in Acts, so you are inserting that into this conversation, equating what Paul received with that terminology.
Being led by the Spirit is not synonymous with the Holy Spirit speaking to you directly by a voice, by a dream or vision, or the like. He received direct communication. We do not. Leadership of the Spirit today is not that. You are blurring those two to the confusion of people who might listen to you. I've noticed people such as yourself doing this on purpose, where it is ambiguous to people today whether God is directly speaking to people. People like yourself give them that impression and seem to be fine with it.
We don't know how it was that the Holy Spirit was giving "thumbs down" to Paul, but he was leading him, which happens to be a characteristic of a child of God, being lead by the Holy Spirit.
Acts 16 uses the terminology, "were forbidden by the Holy Ghost" and "suffered them not." Then in v. 9, He directly revealed in a vision for them to go to Macedonia. This is plain communication from the Spirit. He was telling them. You are saying that we don't know how they knew, that this could just be the leading of the Spirit, something different than something apostolic, but normative for today, since it isn't revelation or inspiration.
Paul went immediately upon getting that vision. It's interesting that today people say that God has called them to go somewhere, essentially use the Macedonian call as their model, and they take three years to get there. Paul went immediately.
If Paul needed the Holy Spirits leading, how much more do we. He was an Apostle and if he needed leading then certainly we who are not Apostles would have a greater reason to seek God's leading.
Every believer already has the leading of the Holy Spirit, because in Romans 8:14, Paul writes, "For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God." We know that the Holy Spirit leads us by means of the already completed Word of God.
There are hundreds of places that need churches but certainly God can and will lead to a specific place, a place where he wants us.
Again, aside from making the Macedonian call normative, what basis do you have for this? How do you know this is the leading of the Spirit? You don't know. It is the opposite. We know God is not revealing us anything more. We know it. This isn't what leading is.
I agree with you that a church can help guide in discerning the Lord's will, but we are to be lead by the Holy Spirit and especially for big areas like where to plant a church or what mission field to go to.
This is typical thinking of so many revivalist, independent Baptists, but there is zero biblical basis for it. A church can "help," but this is separate and different than the leading of the Spirit. This is wrong. And only in the big areas? Where does that come from?
It more sense that way than just basing it ultimately on human logic.
You are calling scripture, human logic. If you someone just obeys scripture, he's relying on human logic. However, if he is led by the Spirit, he gets the superior voice in the head, which is higher and better than human logic, i.e., relying on what scripture teaches. Many think that way and it is in error.
Second Paragraph.
Also, At which point would you conclude a place should be moved away from because of people rejecting the gospel?
A church can decide this. There is objective criteria from scripture. Has the gospel been demonstratively preached to everyone there without anyone listening? Can you not preach there at all? This will be developed further in future posts.
If over 99% of the people that you have witnessed to have rejected your gospel witness is it time to move somewhere else?
Ditto my previous paragraph.
Would Jesus have moved out of the Bay Area after 30 years?
He moved out of Israel after 3 years. A certain town He moved on from. Paul moved on from Athens, didn't stay there at all. I've been here thirty years, but we haven't come close to getting to everyone and I'm pastoring the people here. If no one was listening, I wouldn't stay. I think you should judge compassion more on persistence. Are people doing it? I notice most aren't today.
As far as preaching the gospel to those who don't want to hear it, a lot of people don't want to hear it at first but that's why soul winning is compared to farming because it takes time.
The farming analogy has to be followed though as given in scripture. If you know you've got hard ground, you don't keep sowing seed on it. It's hard. Jesus didn't keep preaching to those who wouldn't hear (Mt 13).
You don't just preach once and then leave because people don't want to hear. You preach and build relationships and see God break through in hearts that you are shedding tears for.
There is no biblical basis for building a relationship for the sake of evangelism, actually the opposite. You sow and you water with those willing to listen, but there is nothing about building a relationship with lost people to see them saved.
I must say that the way you approach soul winning seems cold hearted and merely duty oriented. To just say "you don't have to preach to people who don't want to hear you" seems cold and uncompassionate as well as unbiblical since Jesus "is not willing that any should perish..."
I keep talking to whoever will listen and not close themselves off. I don't keep preaching to people who don't want to hear. That's what Jesus did too. He is love. I would say yours is sentimentalism, not love. No one can be more loving than Jesus and you don't follow His example. It's unloving to Him not to.
The tears I am talking about are not worked up tears, but rather tears of compassion because God's love is so real and Hell is so real. John R Rice once said, "If you can preach on hell and not shed tears, you are backslidden." May this be a reminder to all to preach and witness with "tears" so we can "come again with rejoicing."
Scripture talks about tears. Paul warned with tears. I'm teary, crying kind of person, but I can't say that the number of tears relates to whether more listen or more are saved. Nothing teaches that in the Bible. I think someone should be affected to tears. I think it's a problem if they don't ever shed a tear. It's easy for me to say, because I cry all the time. However, I don't think my tears add one iota to the gospel.
The "precious seed" of Psalm 126 is actual seed, as in plants. You really have no basis for allegorizing this. It's speaking to those in exile being repentant and desirous for a future where God blesses the land. I've heard this allegorized many times to make it apply to evangelism, making the seed the Word of God, but it's eisogesis.
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