13.08 | Verbs

Acts 13:1-12

‘While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, “Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.”’

Acts 13:2

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Look at the verbs.

The Holy Spirit said.

As you read through the book of Acts, you don’t have to get too far to realise that the Church of Jesus is flooded with the Spirit of Jesus. As we read through the pages of Acts, the Holy Spirit comes, fills, speaks, witnesses, directs, comforts, foretells, sends, forbids, constrains, and appoints. People are baptised with the Spirit, receive power from the Spirit, speak in other languages through the Spirit. They prophesy, see visions, and dream through the Spirit, are given boldness through the Spirit, have wisdom through the Spirit, joy through the Spirit, see into heaven through the Spirit, and are geographically relocated by the Spirit.

While the book has been traditionally known as ‘The Acts of the Apostles’, truly it could be known as ‘The Acts of the Holy Spirit.’ 

This is important for us, because the book of Acts is not there for nostalgia. Rather, it is there for us to set our expectations and our hunger. It is there to show us what Christianity is like when it is functioning normally. The tepid Christianity, powerless Christianity, cultural Christianity, and religious Christianity that we are often more accustomed to is the imposter on the scene of the dynamic faith community that Acts presents us with. Acts resets our norms, recalibrates our prayers, and dispatches every assumption of a Christianity that is benign or boring.

And this Christianity that we are presented with is animated by an ever-speaking, filling, directing, comforting, sending, constraining and appointing Spirit of God, filling and leading His Church.

But the question is, how do we prepare ourselves for living this way? 

Today we find a directive in a simple observation.

The believers in Antioch are worshiping and fasting. 

More literally, they were ministering to the Lord¹ and fasting.

We don’t know how long they were doing this for. But we do know that Luke chose the grammatical form known as the present participle to describe these actions. The present participle is used to describe something that is continually being done, giving the sense of an ongoing process rather than a one-off event. 

In other words, the church in Antioch is living a rhythm of continual worship and fasting. 

This confronts me. Because it is so easy to rush forwards with the kind of activity—ministry, projects, initiatives, courses, programmes and causes—that we are convinced are good.

And yet those early believers are found, before they are doing anything else, ministering to the Lord.

We can get this subtly wrong in our Christianity. We can mistake busy churches for beautiful ones, and church activity with church maturity. We can assume that the desire of the Father is a task list, and we can rush ourselves into endless doing, because it medicates our desire to be in control, active, and useful.

And yet the Spirit of God is pleased to work with a community that, before they do anything else, will minister to the Lord.

Before they start projects, they will minister to the Lord.

Before they write books, they will minister to the Lord.

Before they form teams and set vision and start justice initiatives, they will minister to the Lord.

Who, when they get up in the morning, have one great priority above and within every other task: To minister to the Lord.

For here is where we begin. Here is where Antioch rooted their ministry. 

And from here, the first great missionary endeavour into Gentile regions—of Paul and Barnabas—was commissioned. 

Because Kingdom activity comes out of worshipful intimacy. Because devotion precedes doing. Because loving God comes before loving our neighbour. Because sitting with Jesus is the better portion.² Because the Church that Jesus has begun is obsessed not primarily with accomplishment, but obedience to the lead of the ever-acting Spirit.

And so, my friends, comes our number one priority this day, and every day.

To minister to the Lord.

For it is such a Church as this that is ready for a life led by the endless verbs of the Spirit of God.

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Reflect:

Reframe your day.

What if your number one priority, in all that you are and do, was to minister to the Lord today. How might each task look different? What tasks might you abandon? Which might be reframed?

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Pray:

Father in heaven,

Let my life firstly be

A ministering unto you.

Let the direction of my hidden life,

Be your pleasure;

Let the purpose of my work,

Be your delight;

And let all my doing and being,

Be unto you—

A ministering unto the Lord.

And Father,

As I offer you this simple way,

Would you continually lead me by your Spirit,

That I may be 

Sent by you,

Stopped by you,

Challenged, changed and channelled by you,

That I may find boldness in you,

Joy in you,

Love and peace and power in you;

That this life become an agent

In the paths of your plans,

That the life of the Kingdom of life

May overflow from me

Into new territory

And unto the glory 

Of Jesus.

In His Name,

Amen

Old Testament: 

For those also reading the Old Testament this year, your additional readings are here:

Jeremiah 49 | Proverbs 21:9-19

1. The word for ‘minister’ here is leitourgeō. It has connotations of serving the state, or ministering to God, as priests would have done. It is connected to our word, ‘liturgy’, which, at heart, finds its definition here: to minister to the Lord.

2. Luke 10:42