Beloved,
I am going to keep this short today because I started coming down with a flu bug yesterday afternoon, and I am quite under the weather. This morning I was laying in bed, aching all over and head pounding, and found myself unable to read. So I turned on my ESV Bible app and had Kristin Getty, in her lovely Irish accent, read the beginning chapters of Acts to me (what an amazing gift we have in modern technology!). I was particularly struck by Peter’s explanation of how the paralyzed man at the temple gate had been healed. Actually, what struck me was Peter’s explanation of what didn’t cause the healing. “Men of Israel, why do you wonder at this, or why do you stare at us, as though by our own power or piety we have made him walk?” (Acts 3:12). Peter deflects the attention away from himself. It wasn’t his power that caused this miracle. And it wasn’t his piety, either. I spent quite a while meditating upon the second.
You see, I believe the key to ministerial fruitfulness is faithfulness. Piety is vital if I am going to be a useful instrument in the Lord’s hands! And it is vital if you are going to be a useful instrument in the Lord’s hands as well. The problem, at least for me, is that I have the tendency to attribute the miraculous fruit (i.e., salvation and sanctification in others) to my piety. Because piety is necessary, it must be instrumental in bringing these things about. Right? Wrong.
Piety is the precondition for being a fit instrument in the Lord’s hands, but it is He who must wield that instrument to do what only He can! And He is free in HIs sovereignty to wield us in whatever way He sees fit. We ought to desire to be the sharpest instruments we possibly can be and we ought to desire the Lord to take us up in His omnipotent hands and put us to kingdom use. But at the end of the day, it is not our sharpness that explains the in-breaking of the age to come. It is His powerful grace.
Oh friends, how weak and inconsistent we are. But how strong our Lord Jesus is! Let us be looking to Him to work His saving and sanctifying power in our midst as we anticipate gathering this coming Lord’s Day!
Yours in Christ,
Pastor Nick