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<\/p>\nWHY WE HAVE SUCH A HARD TIME SAYING, \u201cNO.\u201d<\/b><\/p>\n
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Last week, I wrote\u00a0about the most important word in ministry<\/a>.\u00a0 That word was, \u201cno.\u201d\u00a0 It is a freedom word that gives us energy to complete our most important tasks, depth to our character, and heightened presence with God and others.\u00a0 So if there is so much good that can come from using the word, \u201cno,\u201d why is it so tempting to keep saying, \u201cyes.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
I love having in depth conversations with people about what really matters in life.\u00a0 I love hearing people\u2019s pain and disappointment and providing timely encouragement.\u00a0 I love teaching people about God in a way that frees them to live without fear.\u00a0 Yet, it is precisely because I love doing all these things in ministry that prevents me from saying, \u201cno,\u201d to people when they need me.\u00a0 True confession: I love the feeling of being needed by others.\u00a0 This feeling of being needed is not unlike a drug.\u00a0 It\u2019s incredibly addicting.<\/p>\n
I bet that the reason why it\u2019s hard for you to use the word, \u201cno,\u201d in ministry is that you are like me.\u00a0 You too are addicted to being needed.\u00a0 Being needed is the drug of choice for most people in ministry.\u00a0 It feels good when others come to us for help.\u00a0 We feel important.\u00a0 We feel useful.\u00a0 We feel helpful.\u00a0 We feel indispensable.\u00a0 And if we are honest about our motivations in ministry, it is the pleasure of this feeling that fuels our ministry efforts.<\/p>\n
The danger of yielding to this addiction of saying, \u201cyes,\u201d all the time, is twofold.<\/p>\n
The first danger of not using the word, “no,” in ministry is that\u00a0we become self-inflated.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/h1>\n
We rationalize: How can our busyness and full schedule be wrong when what we are doing is helping people?\u00a0 The reality is that our souls fill with putrid pride when we are addicted to people needing us.\u00a0 We don\u2019t live into our calling to give glory to God when we say, \u201cyes,\u201d to everything.\u00a0 Instead, when we say, \u201cyes,\u201d to everything and everyone, we push God out of the way and take our seat on his throne.\u00a0 We fool ourselves into thinking that we are helping people, but we are really stealing glory from God.\u00a0 When this happens, our souls undergo decay at the same rate a meth addict\u2019s body decays. \u00a0Our work as leaders is not to fill ourselves up with glory, but to empty ourselves by giving glory to God.<\/p>\n
Our work as leaders is not to fill ourselves up with glory, but to empty ourselves by giving glory to God. <\/a><\/span>Share on X<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n
The second danger of not using the word, \u201cno,\u201d in ministry is that we turn those we serve from being dependent on God to being dependent on us.\u00a0<\/strong><\/h1>\n
Even if we have great wisdom and wonderful encouragement to offer, if the core of our leadership isn\u2019t pointing to Jesus we are causing people to stumble.\u00a0 In Matthew, Jesus\u2019 warning was clear about those who cause his children to stumble.\u00a0 Jesus said in Matt. 18:6, \u201cIf anyone causes one of these little ones\u2014those who believe in me\u2014to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.\u201d\u00a0 Our work as leaders is not to create a greater dependence of people on us, but rather a greater dependence on Jesus.<\/p>\n
Our work as leaders is not to create a greater dependence of people on us, but rather a greater dependence on Jesus. <\/a><\/span>Share on X<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n
The hard truth that we need to come to grips with is that we aren\u2019t needed in God\u2019s work.\u00a0 He is all powerful, all knowing and all capable.\u00a0 He is perfectly able to fulfill his plans all by himself.\u00a0 However, the gift he gives us is an invitation to follow him in his work.\u00a0 Our task is to discern what work God has called only us to do.\u00a0 Then we need to spend the rest of our lives getting in on that work.\u00a0 When we do what we are called to do, we bring God Glory.\u00a0 We also help others develop a greater dependency on God.\u00a0 Giving God glory and helping others develop a greater dependency on God is our most important work, and that can only be done by employing the word, \u201cno.\u201d<\/p>\n
The example for us to follow in learning to use the word, \u201cno,\u201d is Jesus. \u00a0During one of his busiest and most successful times in ministry, Jesus chose to say, \u201cno,\u201d to all the people who needed him to heal their ailments and bring hope to their broken bodies.<\/p>\n
Luke 4:42 \u00a0At daybreak, Jesus went out to a solitary place. The people were looking for him and when they came to where he was, they tried to keep him from leaving them.\u00a0 43 But he said, \u201cI must proclaim the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because that is why I was sent.\u201d 44 And he kept on preaching in the synagogues of Judea.<\/p>\n
As a recovering addict to the drug of wanting to be needed, it is hard for me to read this passage.\u00a0 People wanted Jesus.\u00a0 They needed him.\u00a0 He was amazingly successful at healing them.\u00a0 Yet, he said, \u201cno,\u201d when they tried to prevent him from leaving.\u00a0 He realized that working more in this capacity would not give glory to God, and it would not create a greater dependence on him.\u00a0 So, Jesus said, \u201cno,\u201d to the great ministry opportunity to stay.<\/p>\n
What ways is God calling you to say, \u201cno,\u201d to good ministry in order to give him glory and to help others create a greater dependency on the Lord?\u00a0<\/strong><\/h1>\n
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Do you need to ask others to preach or teach?<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
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Do you need to ask others to lead a ministry you are currently leading?<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
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What are you doing now (that might be great), that you need to stop doing in order to break your addiction to being needed?<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
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Do you need to leave your current post in ministry to go somewhere new?<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Next week, I will write about how how to get clear on what you are called to do in ministry in order to be more clear on what to say, \u201cno,\u201d to in ministry.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
WHY WE HAVE SUCH A HARD TIME SAYING, \u201cNO.\u201d Last week, I wrote\u00a0about the most important word in ministry.\u00a0 That word was, \u201cno.\u201d\u00a0 It is a freedom word that gives us energy to complete our most important tasks, depth to our character, and heightened presence with God and others.\u00a0 So if there is so much […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1967,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1966","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.theawakenministry.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/The-Most-Important-Word-in-Ministry-Part-2.001.jpg?fit=1920%2C1080&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1966","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1966"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1966\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1976,"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1966\/revisions\/1976"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1967"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1966"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1966"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theawakenministry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1966"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}