Now it came to pass upon a day, that Jonathan the son of Saul said unto the young man that bare his armour, Come, and let us go over to the Philistines' garrison, that is on the other side. But he told not his father.
And Saul tarried in the uttermost part of Gibeah under a pomegranate tree which is in Migron: and the people that were with him were about six hundred men;
And Ahiah, the son of Ahitub, I-chabod's brother, the son of Phinehas, the son of Eli, the LORD's priest in Shiloh, wearing an ephod. And the people knew not that Jonathan was gone.
And between the passages, by which Jonathan sought to go over unto the Philistines' garrison, there was a sharp rock on the one side and a sharp rock on the other side: and the name of the one was Bozez, and the name of the other Seneh.
The forefront of the one was situate northward over against Michmash, and the other southward over against Gibeah.
And Jonathan said to the young man that bare his armour, Come, and let us go over unto the garrison of these uncircumcised: it may be that the LORD will work for us: for there is no restraint to the LORD to save by many or by few.
And his armourbearer said unto him, Do all that is in thine heart: turn thee; behold, I am with thee according to thy heart.
Then said Jonathan, Behold, we will pass over unto these men, and we will discover ourselves unto them.
If they say thus unto us, Tarry until we come to you; then we will stand still in our place, and will not go up unto them.
But if they say thus, Come up unto us; then we will go up: for the LORD hath delivered them into our hand: and this shall be a sign unto us.
And both of them discovered themselves unto the garrison of the Philistines: and the Philistines said, Behold, the Hebrews come forth out of the holes where they had hid themselves.
And the men of the garrison answered Jonathan and his armourbearer, and said, Come up to us, and we will shew you a thing. And Jonathan said unto his armourbearer, Come up after me: for the LORD hath delivered them into the hand of Israel.
And Jonathan climbed up upon his hands and upon his feet, and his armourbearer after him: and they fell before Jonathan; and his armourbearer slew after him. 1 Samuel 14:1-13
We live in a world that is captivated by the latest wizardry in total nonsense. No matter if it is the latest style of fashion, or some idiot getting married in a black dress and thinking they have started a new fad, people like to stay "cutting-edge." From the latest news from Hollywood, to the newest diets, medicines, face creams, vehicles and computers, our society seeks after the newest, the most up to date, the trendiest of the latest and finest.
Even the lifestyles that were once well known by their Biblical terminology have been given a nip and tuck face-lift, to fit in with our modern era, as if changing the name of something will somehow lessen the impact of the stigma of the actions now being portrayed to society as lifestyle choices.
I'm sorry, but I believe the Word of God is just as up to date, just as relevant and cutting-edge as anything society can throw at us today. Why is it that we no longer call sin, SIN? Now it is only a lifestyle choice, pop culture, "extended family," a sexual preference. This type of thinking and philosophy has even spilled over into the church and is causing spiritual birth defects in those denizens of religious society we call the preacher and pew dweller.
Anyone with one eye and half sense can see that when you walk into an Apostolic church in this hour, we aren't the straight-laced, rock-solid, never changing church of our grandfathers. Our preaching has to be high-tech and relevant to the times, nothing wrong with that, but the attitudes of those sitting between the porch and the altar have experience a paradigm shift in the past 20 years. Things frowned on by minister and saint alike just two decades ago have become common place in our churches. Everything from the world's style of dress, grooming, adornment and philosophy can readily be found in about any church in the movement on a regular basis. It's no longer popular to be Apostolic, and that factor alone is what is going to make the church stand out.
My major point of contention is that our bible colleges have churned out young preachers and singers for the past 30-50 years, yet today they are slipping in attendance. Hello, Pentecost, but if we throw our cream of the crop through the preacher-mill of a college, where are they? 30 years of generating what we thought were our next generation of young ministers has vanished into the melting pot of church societal evolution, until we morphed from a body of believers with young men desiring to be used of God, to a generation of men and women seeking only the lime-light and who can be most popular, find a position in the biggest church around, or sell the greatest amount of CDs or preach the most conferences.
If our young men are really called, then why has bible college attendance dropped? Why must those who have completed their education head for the biggest, most well established works in our land to fade into the crowd and find secular work where there is safety in numbers? If that was a prerequisite for getting our best and brightest spun-up quickly for service in the great un-churched cities of America and the world, where are they today? Why is it that we still have a hard time finding more than one or two men or women to go be missionaries in most of our foreign countries, at least in those where we have an established presence?
Why is it that our metro churches struggle because we can't get enough of our young Pentecostal Peacocks to slip off the Armani suit and tie and Stacy Adams shoes long enough to set aside their aspirations of the glory of being the assistant pastor of any of the biggest churches in our movement and put on some work close and step out into our metro works where some of our great men of God and their wives are struggling alone to build churches in cities where the population ration to Apostolic preachers is astronomical?
Is there something wrong, young Apostolic Men and Women, with putting on work clothes and hitting the streets with a church that can't afford to pay you and accepting the "Call to be Second," and joining forces with already established home missions works and instead of leaving ministers and their wives laboring alone to do something, providing the support and assistance that some of our men of God greatly need? How do we expect them to build a work with new converts who may not be effectively shaped and equipped to really help in a harvest for a year or several years down the road?
Is there a problem, young men, with stepping out of your hiding places in the masses of mediocrity sitting in our mega-churches and large churches and setting aside the relative perceived safety of numbers and accepting the call to go out by twos as Jesus directed? How about more if need be?
We need to start pulling our concept of relative ministry straight out of the Word of God again and get away from new found traditions. Why should we support a bible college or several colleges if they will only send our young champions to already established works, instead of filling the shoes of laborers in cities where many of our metro missionaries and home mission pastors labor alone with just a spouse or no one at all? Does this concept fall on deaf ears? Where are our young men and women? Where are our armor bearers? Where are those called to be second?
Understand that in scripture there were rites of passage for the ministry. Service was a prerequisite, not just knowledge. There had to be training yes, but experience was a mandate in more than a few situations.
Where are our armor-bearers of Pentecost that will stand beside the ministry and go up against the garrisons of our metro regions and let the call resound once again? "Do all that is in thine heart: turn thee; behold, I am with thee according to thy heart."
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