LEADERSHIP | SELF
Rekindling the Fire When ministers lose sight of Jesus, they need personal revival By JAMIE MORGAN
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our heart has layers and layers of calluses.” This is what I sensed God saying to me after I brought my complaints to Him in the fall of 2020. For six months, I had led my church through the uncharted waters of a pandemic. Watching daily news updates about COVID19, holding hospital parking lot prayer meetings, and preaching online sermons from a pulpit in my living room had become my new normal. I had preached the funerals of several dear church members, but there had been little time for me to grieve. Through it all, I was frantically trying to hold our congregation together. I had been putting on a brave face, but I felt like I had been swept over Niagara Falls in a barrel, unable to tell which end was up. The most disorienting part of all was realizing I had let my fire for God go out. Even as I sought to minister to others, I was in desperate need of personal revival. Has this ever happened to you? Prayerlessness, indifference, numbness, cynicism, lingering doubt, and a loss of passion can be signs of an inner issue that requires attention.
Jesus Above All Else The apostle Paul was the picture of ministry zeal. He worked tirelessly to preach the gospel and advance the Kingdom. Yet he experienced challenges just as we do. In Philippians 3:4–14, Paul reveals the secret to success through all the ups and downs of life and ministry: knowing Christ (verse 8). Paul’s primary concern wasn’t his resume, his career trajectory, his ministry to-do list, or even his personal troubles (after all, he was writing from prison). For Paul, the main thing wasn’t meeting people’s expectations, overcoming budgetary
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constraints, or spinning countless ministry plates. It was knowing Christ. That became Paul’s focal point and goal, and it needs to be ours as well (verses 12–14).
