God's Never, Ever For Evangelists

Author: Michael Gott

We do not dare to classify or compare ourselves with some who commend themselves. When they measure themselves by themselves and compare themselves with themselves, they are not wise.  II Corinthians 10:12

So said Paul in II Corinthians 10:12.

Three young, gifted evangelists met regularly, and they did the forbidden - they compared the sizes of the churches they had been in, the numbers of decisions made, and even the amounts of the love offerings given. Through Paul the Lord says it’s a terrible mistake - it’s God’s never, ever!

The famous World War II general Omar Bradley once quipped, "We need to learn to set our course by the stars, not by the lights of every passing ship." Great wisdom in those words!

Quickly, I need to point out that not one of those promising young evangelists who regularly compared and competed with each other is today in evangelism. Did they fall victim to being consumed with comparing and competing with each other and even competing with themselves, so that they then lost sight of who they were and of God’s unique purpose for each of their lives?

Now let’s catch our breath and take a step back and admit we all have had role models, and other people have had a significant impact on our lives. The danger, however, lies in focusing on their great conquests instead of their godly character. We are not all equally gifted, and God has different purposes for each person, but we are all called to discover spiritual principles that make us all He planned us to be. We need to forget comparisons and concentrate on being the person God desires us to become.

We must come again to acknowledge God never clones - God makes only originals. We are to discover our God-given uniqueness.

Years ago I ran across the writings of G. D. Watson of Britain. I know little about him except he had great spiritual insight into true greatness. He wrote something called Living Words. What he wrote was in some ways antiquated and outdated so I rephrased and translated his thoughts into modern vernacular, placing it into the world we live in today as Christian servants. Here is what I wrote as a paraphrase:

Because God has called you to be really like Jesus, He will draw you into a life of crucifixion and humility and put upon you such demands of obedience that you will not be able to follow other people as a role model or measure yourself by others who serve the Lord, and in many ways He will seem to let other good people do things that He will not let you do. Be prepared for this!

Other Christians and ministers who seem very authentic and effective may skillfully use secular promotional methods, push themselves forward, manipulate, and use contacts to carry out their agenda, but you cannot do it; if you attempt it, you will meet with such failure and rebuke from the Lord as to make you totally miserable.

Others may congratulate themselves for their ministry and results, for their great success, and for their writings, but the Holy Spirit will not allow you to do any similar thing, and if you begin it, He will lead you into such a deep sense of guilt that will make you despise yourself and all that you have done.

The Lord may let others be honored, advanced, and forged ahead. He may choose to keep you hidden in obscurity because He wants you to produce some choice, fragrant fruit for His future glory, which can only be produced in the shade and out of sight. Be prepared; God may let others be recognized but decide to keep you overlooked. He may let others do a work for Him and get the credit for the work that you have done and thus make your reward ten times greater when Jesus comes to recognize His servants.

Settle it forever, then, that you are to deal directly with the Holy Spirit and that He is to have the privilege of tying your tongue, or chaining your hands, or closing your eyes, in ways that He does not seem to do with others. But when you are so possessed with the living God that you are, in your secret heart, pleased and delighted over this peculiar, personal, private, jealous guardianship and management of the Holy Spirit over your life, you will have found the vestibule of Heaven!

When I prepared this, I had no thoughts of ever making it available for print. Someone found my copy and asked for it, and it was printed in a book by the Navigators. So, it is no longer hidden away, and I am glad to make it available to you.

We must not compare or complain that others are more gifted or more notable or have greater name recognition.

. . . Who are you to criticize God? Should the thing made say to the one who made it, ‘Why have you made me like this?’ Romans 9:20, Living Bible

Jealousy and envy consist of busying ourselves counting God’s blessings on another person and forgetting what He has done for us. Comparisons create competition, and that often creates envy. Envy is a very hungry sin - it will totally eat your heart! It is also a deadly sin, and it’s first victim is the one guilty of it.

Envy makes normal people into dwarves. James 4:5 speaks of how the spirit which lives in us "envies intensely." For example, King Saul was galled, "They have credited David with tens of thousands," he thought,"but me with only thousands" (I Samuel 18:8). Saul was jealous of David and in time sought to murder him. An Old English proverb goes, "Jealousy is the raw material of murder." It is the bitter poisonous weed that easily grows in the flower garden of our souls, and it must be removed.

We must not compare ourselves with others. It would be easier to try to see without eyes or to attempt to live without breath than to try to be an anointed evangelist with a competitive, envious spirit. There are two probabilities at this point. He who compares himself with others will become either filled with pride or destroyed with self-pity. We must not allow either to happen. A Puritan preacher gave us a spiritual nugget. He said two things are very, very hard, "Tis very hard to behold our own gifts without pride, and the gifts of others without envy."

The Holy Spirit led Paul to write to each of us,

Examine yourselves . . . II Corinthians 13:5

Add to that the statement that

it is God which worketh in your both to will and to do of his good pleasure. Philippians 2:13

And what, we might ask, is His "good pleasure"? What is He actively working in us? He is arranging everything for this one purpose,

so that his life is at work in you. II Corinthians 4:11, NIV

so that Christ and Christ alone is to be our focus and pleasing Him, our fulfillment.

I am to conclude that without nervously comparing myself with other evangelists, I simply commit myself to God’s will and purpose for my life and to rest in it. Paul Rees said, "To understand the will of God is my problem; to undertake the will of God is my privilege; to undercut the will of God is my peril." Let us be the person God planned us to become, nothing more and nothing less.

And in the end, let every evangelist be able to say with Charles Spurgeon, "I stand in my own gate, whistle my own tune, and am quite content!"

Spurgeon then went on to triumphantly say, "The meanest [lowest] work for Jesus is a grander thing than the dignity of an emperor."

Our status in the eyes of people has no comparison to our standing near the heart of God. Let us never compare and never compete but rather join Spurgeon and say joyfully, "I stand in my own gate, whistle my own tune, and am quite content!"

Top of Page