I HAD a very deep fulfilling conversation with Bishop Tudor Bismark, cofounder of Jabula New Life Ministries & New Life Covenant Church in 2010 where I asked a question on vision in ministry.
By Erasmus Makarimayi
Thank you bishop for your kindness. He made a remark that has reined me in for years.
He said: “You may know where you want to go, but not how.”
It’s quite a loaded answer. However in simple terms, you may be so gifted or talented, called and anointed, flow in gifts such as healing or prophecy, but doing it wrongly.
You may even say that you are getting results but still with your application wrong. Wow!
You then appreciate the importance of the subject I have been dealing with on this platform since May 19, 2018 and closing today, five weeks in a row.
By the way, tomorrow, Sunday 17, June, is Father’s Day. Best thoughts. With due respect to our mothers and women in general, we hear so much more about Mother’s Day!
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Talking of equal rights. That said, on this side of eternity, every day is a day for the good of humanity, everyone included.
Please don’t miss your copy of NewsDay Weekender next week as I start dealing with voting from a Christian perspective.
We recap that a spiritual father is a helper, supplier, succorer and teacher. As you grow in the things of the Spirit you will discover your spiritual father.
He has always been there all along. You do not go around looking for one. Many have been blackmailed into manipulative associations.
You may feel that you do not want to have a spiritual father saying that you want to be independent.
The basis is for a believer to be accountable to other believers, which is so primary in the local assembly.
Apostle Paul teaches in Ephesians 5:21: “Submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God.”
We also assemble with other believers as we are advised in Hebrews 10:25.
It reads: “Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is, but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.”
You would also want to appreciate that Apostle Paul submitted to other believers (ministers) even though they did not teach similar things.
He reveals to the Galatians in Galatians 2:2: “And I went up by revelation, and communicated unto them that gospel, which I preach among the Gentiles, but privately to them which were of reputation, lest by any means I should run, or had run, in vain.”
He was open.
Be active and submissive in your local church. You may also want to study a piece I wrote on this platform on April 28, 2018 titled, Which church should I attend and belong to?
While no one removes you from your place in Christ, get yourself a pastor, ministers with whom you relate with and are accountable to.
If along the way you discover who your spiritual father is, thanks be to God.
God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ and your Father and my Father, our Father, remains so.
He is the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. He begat us all in Christ.
Jesus states in John 20:17: “Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.”
We respect His order in heaven and also His instructions to the church. We are both independent and responsible. We remain obedient, submissive and accountable.
While we are running in our individual lanes and working on our individual God-given assignments, we learn from those who already know what are yet to grasp.
Some years ago I was listening to some preacher of then a ministry in infancy. He made a somewhat very bold stance that Shona was their only language of instruction.
If you were to see him privately for counselling and spoke English that would be seen as trying to appear important and learned.
Years down the line, the ministry grew and attracted various ethnicities and nationalities and they switched to preaching in English with interpretation into Shona.
Wow!
Respectfully there were ministries already preaching in English with interpretation to vernacular to mainly people who understood vernacular or the mother tongue.
A simple counsel or inquiry would have advised that diverse backgrounds sit in our pews.
I trust that you will learn fruitfully by wisdom of the sages rather than painfully through experience.
A teachable spirit will always preserve you. Grace and peace be multiplied to you through knowledgel All Bible quotations are from the King James Version unless otherwise stated.
Feedback: [email protected] Fellowship with Pastor Makarimayi on Facebook and on www.twitter.com/PEMAKARIMAYI. Telephone +263 712 332 632
