Our First Ministry

One of the main reasons for the "power failure" in the Christian Church today is our failure to "minister to the Lord". Biblically speaking, our ministry to the Lord must come BEFORE our ministry to people if we are to be effective.

Likewise if we come to receive ministry from men/clergy before we ourselves have ministered to the Lord and offered up our sacrifice of praise and worship then the ministry of man to us inappropriately attaches us to fleshy or earthly ministry which results in glory of man not Christ. The end result being, we will become what we behold.

When reading the account of early Church forming at Antioch in Acts 13:1-3 we discover that,
"as they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, "Now separate to Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them".  The Greek word for ministered is described as: the discharging of a function, officiating as a priest, performing religious or charitable acts, fulfilling an office.

I Peter 2:9 says: "But you are a chosen generation , a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people , that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you our of darkness into His marvelous light". 

The Lord has separated us to bring worship unto Him just as He did with the tribe of Levi in Deuteronomy 10:8 ; I Chronicles 5:11-14 and as He did with Samuel who was dedicated as a boy to minister unto the Lord in I Sam. 2:11,18 .

We need to be caught up in the wonder of the person of Jesus Christ and to worship Him deeply. When we become focused on our first ministry (vertical) as priesthood of believers we will discover a new freshness and power. This will translate into greater compassion for man (horizontal) because we have put Christ first and He now flows through us in love and power to the world.