Matthew 28:18-20
And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen.
We have been given the green light by Jesus to spread the good news to everyone. Sometimes we spend too much time wondering if a ministry opportunity is from God. We are waiting for a sign, something like three doves flying backwards while a cat sings the national anthem… We wait and we wait and in the end we do nothing!
Let’s look at an example from the Apostle Paul’s life to see how he decided on ministry opportunities.
Acts 16:6-10
Now when they had gone through Phrygia and the region of Galatia, they were forbidden by the Holy Spirit to preach the word in Asia. After they had come to Mysia, they tried to go into Bithynia, but the Spirit did not permit them. So passing by Mysia, they came down to Troas. And a vision appeared to Paul in the night. A man of Macedonia stood and pleaded with him, saying, “Come over to Macedonia and help us.” Now after he had seen the vision, immediately we sought to go to Macedonia, concluding that the Lord had called us to preach the gospel to them.
We see here that Paul was pushing on every “door”, looking for an opportunity to minister. He took Jesus’ green light in Matthew 28 seriously. He did not sit at home waiting for the name of a city to be written on his bedroom wall by an invisible hand. He went out and moved towards locations as he could and the Holy Spirit then guided Paul to the place he needed to be. It’s easier to steer a moving ship than one that is stationary. (We are not all called to go to another place but we all have an area where we have influence.)
While signs can help us know we are headed in the right direction, we need to be careful about relying on them too much. We have the Word of God (His Bible) and the witness of the Holy Spirit in our spirits. Let’s not be a people who are paralysed unless we see a sign.
Mark 16:15-18
And He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will follow those who believe: In My name they will cast out demons; they will speak with new tongues; the will take up serpents; and if they drink anything deadly, it will by no means hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.”
Signs will in fact follow us as believers as we go out and preach the gospel of Jesus! Notice these signs follow all believers, all Christians, not just a select few who are “extra” gifted. Let’s not be like the pharisees of Jesus’ day, who were so bound up in their man made beliefs and so far from the truth of God’s Word that they refused to believe anything without first seeing a sign.
Matthew 12:38-40
Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered, saying, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from You.” But He answered and said to them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
Jesus rebuked the Pharisees, telling them that the only sign they would get would be His death, burial and resurrection. Let that be enough for us too!
If you are a Christian, born-again by the Spirit of Jesus, then God would have put His desires in your heart. If you feel a prompting to do something that spreads the good news of Jesus, then do it. You have a green light until the Holy Spirit says otherwise. He will redirect you if needed.
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