No question about it! Effective Christian ministry is rooted deep in the grace of God. To begin anywhere else is to begin at the wrong place.
God’s grace has been “lavished upon us.” (Ephesians 1:7-8) No wonder we sing about the “amazing” grace of our God! Has God’s abundant grace touched your life? Do you know-really know-the power and peace of grace? Does grace have meaning for you emotionally as well as intellectually?
God’s grace is like a deep, wide river that flows from a divine source that is inexhaustible. Always full. Always flowing. Always giving. Always feeding and supplying other streams and tributaries. Perpetual movement and motion.
Once these healing waters flow into your life, you can never be the same. Never! Once blind, now you see. Once lost, now you are found. Once dead, now you are alive. (Ephesians 2:4-5) All because of amazing grace!
The inflow of grace must lead to…outflow! The grace that has flowed to us must now flow to others. This is the essence of Christian ministry. We must “keep the flow…flowing.” Restricted and unreleased grace which no longer flows is no longer grace. This river can never become a stale, stagnant pool and still be the river of grace. Inflow must generate outflow. Receiving must result in a natural process of giving.
Receive…give…receive…give…receive…give! This is the dynamic that explains the vigor and vitality that keeps the Body of Christ involved in unselfish ministry to others. Lose this dynamic and the church becomes a private club where everyone loves everyone else in a suffocating circle of self-interest.
Receiving love from God and sharing the love of God is to be a very natural process for the people of God. At the heart of effective Christian ministry is an understanding that we are the channels through which God’s love and grace are to flow into the lives of others.
For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith–and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God–not by works, so that no one can boast.
For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. (Ephesians 2:8-10)