One thing I wanted to share is that I've finally received my copy of The Adventures of a Chicken Evangelist: 40 Days of Evangelism: Can a Chicken Overcome His Fears?: by Steve L. Nelson. You may know that I bought it for my Mum a couple of weeks ago, as she had been given the calling of Evangelist around 20 years ago but never really did anything with it. When her book arrived I thought it looked interesting and I kind of wanted to keep it for myself!
Obviously I resisted the temptation and gave it to my Mum, inscribing Philippians 1:6 in the front cover, "He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ".
Even though I haven't been given the calling of Evangelist, I believe that it is our duty as Christians to evangelise anyway; to share the Good News with everyone we see! For me personally, I see it more as a fruit of the Spirit, rather than a particular gifting or calling. This is why I thought the book would be useful. I don't think the author has the calling of "Evangelist", in fact I think he's a pastor but he is embarrassingly scared of sharing the Gospel with strangers. This is very important to me. If a pastor can admit that he is scared and struggles with that which we have been commissioned to do by our Lord Jesus Himself, it makes me feel a little better that I'm not living up to the expectation either.
I'm not finished with the book yet, I'm only around halfway through, and I have to admit that it took me a while to get into it. Some things I wasn't sure about, but I'm glad I'm reading it.
It made me think, though, that it's not necessarily about what our title is or our qualifications are. It's more about what the Lord puts on our hearts; that's what's important. It reminded me of an incident which happened to me recently. I was on our church's Facebook page and our Pastor's wife was sharing some of the wonderful photographs from their work in Honduras. She referred to herself as a Pastor as well as her husband. I, in my infallible wisdom (note the sarcasm there!) said something along the lines of "I didn't know you were a pastor, too". I foolishly thought that one had to be educated and have some kind of theological qualification in order to be a pastor or minister (please don't misunderstand; I'm not saying she isn't educated - she was a nurse and Ward Sister for many years - very intelligent and highly educated - I simply meant "educated" in pastoring specifically)
She asked me what I thought she had been doing all these years and that she and her husband were a pastoring couple. Well, you could have knocked me over with a feather. I was so embarrassed! I'd never even thought about it!
Why would we need a qualification in order to do that which Jesus commanded and expected of all of us? He wouldn't expect it if there was even a slight possibility of it being inaccessible to anyone.
"Therefore go and make disciples of all nations"
Matthew 28:19
Surely gaining a qualification or master's degree is nothing in comparison to gaining the Master's education!
Our textbook is the Bible; our teachers, Jesus and the Holy Spirit; and our wise scholars of old, who we hold to highest esteem and quote/reference abundantly in our essays, they're Moses, Abraham, David, etc! It's just the same, when you think about it! The degree of the Holy Spirit is just as, if not more, important than any earthly qualification we can earn!
In John 21:15-17 Jesus commissions Peter to "feed my lambs", "take care of my sheep", and "feed my sheep" three times. If this isn't enough of a push into sharing the Gospel of love and grace, what is?
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