For as long as the son of Jesse liveth upon the ground, thou shalt not be established, nor thy kingdom. Wherefore now send and fetch him unto me, for he shall surely die. And Jonathan said to David, Go in peace, forasmuch as we have sworn both of us in the name of the LORD, saying, The LORD be between me and thee, and between my seed and thy seed for ever. And he arose and departed: and Jonathan went into the city. 1 Samuel 20: 31, 42
There are times when I get so wrapped around the axel with work, ministry and the business of busy-ness that I’ve often found myself wondering if I missed the will of God for my life. I look back over the years and it’s like looking back over some great battlefield of medieval warfare.
In the far distance of my mind’s-eye I can still see the bodies and faces of friends long- fallen to the attack of the enemy, their lives, ministries, homes, families devastated and destroyed by family troubles, divorce, bitterness, some sin of the flesh…and yet I see the high times, the good times, the revivals, the personal evangelism and ministry.
I also see my failures. There are no hiding these and God does not gloss it over, no matter how much He has forgotten, he still lets us remember, because just as stated by the infamous Mexican General Santa Anna, those who forget history are doomed to repeat it. We have to wear our scars, but if we are to read the word of God with clarity, we will see that the men and women most highly used of God were at one point in their lives, faced by the greatest glaring failures of any man or woman in the pages of Holy Writ.
While helping out at another Apostolic church recently where I once attended, the pastor, a friend of mine, spoke to me off to one side after the service. His congregation is all new converts and I saw only one or two familiar faces from years ago when I attended there. He told me that he had often asked God why I had chosen to leave the church there, but that after several years and hearing the report from my pastor and the things God was using me for, he told me point blank I was in the will of God. He had had his doubts at first, as had I, but after a few years, God had confirmed some things to him and even to me that let me know that I was laboring where he wanted me...nothing glamorous. No senior pastor position. Not even a church of my own which many of my friends thought I would have by now. I’m not getting any younger.
I was studying the lives of three kings recently, Saul, David…and Jonathan. I know, Jonathan was never crowned king, but he was supposed to be. Saul spoke to Jonathan harshly about this, asking him if he realized that if David was not stopped, Jonathan would never be king. This did not seem to affect Jonathan what-so-ever. His love according to King David exceeded the love of women. We’ve all heard ministers preach on the anointing of Saul and David, and their battle for the Kingdom, yet I’ve never heard anyone speak on the anointing of Jonathan. We see the love of Jonathan. We know his lineage, he was supposed to be king…yet he set aside his own calling, priorities, desires, hopes, dreams and plans and those of his father for the love of the true king and his plans for the KINGDOM!
I told my pastor I was preparing a message on exactly that subject. I’ve been given the green light and I will be working on it as God deals with me. There is something about the spirit of Kings. They don’t delve into the realm of bottom feeders, fighting and bickering over crumbs, insignificant paper-cuts, squabbles of children, the mundane affairs of the lower echelons of the king’s court, the villagers, the affairs of men. There is something in the spirits of kings that their thoughts, intents, goals, plans, missions, desires…the very fire of their existence is focused on one thing…the LOVE OF THE KINGDOM!
Jonathan took it a step forward, although the first born son of the king, the rightful heir to the throne, and next in line for the kingdom, he subordinated his desires, plans, goals and dreams for one thing…love of the KING and love of the KINGDOM. You don’t see jealousy here, no fighting and bickering over the pulpit, the pew or the parking place. You will not find the anointing of pettiness on Jonathan. He subordinated his own personal interests of leadership to the love of the kingdom, yet we see in him also the spirit of a warrior that when leadership strayed, he took up sword and spear, took his armor bearer to his side and he went up against the Philistine garrison and worked a miraculous victory for the kingdom. (For those of you who think you can’t rise above leadership, think again! While Saul was in hiding, refusing to feed the people, Jonathan stepped out of the crowd and worked a mighty work for God. We seriously need to revamp our concepts of what leadership is, based on this very situation!)
I say this, because the church I was helping out at I had been tapped by the previous pastor to take over, yet because of a spiritual battle, I chose to move on, ending a battle that had raged for over 5 years, risking my own aspirations in the ministry, and more or less putting my neck on the chopping block and setting myself up to be shot at by anyone who wanted to critique me. My friend took over as pastor after me, instead, and now the church is growing and seeing revival. Sometimes you have to do things you don’t want to do, go places you don’t want to go, and go against everything that seems reasonable to the flesh to accomplish the will of God. Now after several years sacrificing financially, emotionally, physically and mentally, as well as pouring water on the hands of ministry, I’ve found that I am growing in areas I never would have if I had been pushed into something that was not the will of God at the time.
There is an anointing in submission. Don’t fight to be a king, if God has positioned you to be the best “right hand man” of the king. Unity is like an anointing and when you can subdue your own desires of freedom, independence, goals, ambitions and dreams to the call of the Cross and the Kingdom of God, you will accomplish something you never dreamed possible. Like two ancient warriors, swords drawn, they go back to back as their enemies surround them. Alone, either would have been flanked and defeated. Together, they have each other’s back.
Who has yours?
What minister has God sent you to? What husband or wife has God called you to support and back, even through the fires of hell and against the onslaught of the enemy? So many times when things get rough, we tend to want to cut and run, salvage our own dignity, take off after our own fleeting desires, nurse our own wounds…yet a brother is born for adversity!
I had a friend tell me they wanted to leave their church and find another one recently. My question was, who is going to watch your pastor’s back when you go? They could not answer me. For a period of time, they left, then returned. All hell had broken lose in the church in his absence.
I also had several friends tell me they wanted to leave their spouses. They had had conflicts. There was right and wrong on both sides, yet when God joins two people, they are not there for just their own salvation but for each other’s. They saw only a carnal, cold, backslidden mate, seemingly uncaring, bitter, verbally abusive, a liar, a sinner, yet God’s plan for them was to call them out of that mess in a few months to a few years and launch their spouse into a ministry that the two of them would have been destined for in the Kingdom. One chose to jump ship because they wanted to go it on their own, leaving the other to face the wolves and the loneliness alone.
We don’t see everything. We don’t know the future, but God does. How embarrassed we will be when we stand before Him, and he says, “Yes, you went your own way, made a decision to do this instead of waiting on me. Now everything you did is burned up in the fire of testing and your works are destroyed because you were out of MY DIVINE WILL.”
The same test of fire that will apply to the works of the ministry will be applied to the saints. Every man’s works will be tried by fire.
I’ve learned that it is possible to sin against God and not sin against my brother or sister, but it is not possible to sin against my brother or sister and not sin against my God! That’s free. Put it in your think-tank and ruminate on it a bit. There’s more coming.
We all laud the mighty miracles of David’s life, but I’m sure there will be monuments unspoken of the loyalty of Jonathan, who sacrificed his own ambitions and desires to the cause of the King. His devotion to David cost him the kingdom and his own life, but the messenger became the message. He submitted himself to the will of God, despite his own lineage.
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