When the idol of ministry fails

It was the early hours of the morning, his alarm had gone off but he had not yet gotten out of bed to get ready for work.  I walked up to his side of the bed and work him up by telling him, “hey, I prayed for you this morning.”  His eyes not yet open, he turned over with a content smile on his face and said, “oh, thank you!”  But his smile quickly faded when I began to unload on him all of the frustrations, anger, anxiety, worries, fears and unmet expectations the fueled my prayer.  He sat up with a start when he realized my “prayer” was really a nagging, complaining wife in disguise.

This conversation occurred 2 to 3 years into our support raising process to become missionaries in the Philippines.  I can’t remember the exact numbers and stats, but after all of that time we had only about 10% of our monthly support raised.  We were both tired, frustrated and beginning to question if we should give up.  It was all too easy to compare ourselves to other missionaries and their numbers.  “So-and-so missionary raised all of their support in 1 year, oh and so did that other missionary…that must mean we are failures.”  Of course our lives and circumstances are very different than other missionaries, but all the same we’d compare and covet and wonder how our support raising stats reflected on our sanctification and holiness.  And such reflection and comparison only led us toward the spiral of despair.

But now, with only about a year’s time passing from that early morning conversation, our support levels are around 75%.  The most natural question to ask is “so, what changed?”  There have been a variety of small factors that have changed, but when it comes down to it my husband will tell you the biggest change was he repented from making ministry an idol, and then helped lead me in the correct thinking to have as his suitable helper.

Elyse Fitzpatrick, in her book Idols of the Heart, has this to say about idols:

“Idols aren’t just stone statues.  No, idols are the thoughts, desires, longings, and expectations that we worship in place of the true God.  Idols cause us to ignore the true God in search of what we think we need.” (page 23)

Idols are false gods, they are not real and they have no power to help us.  When our idols fail us that often leads us down a spiral of despair.  The result is often depression, frustration, anger and hopelessness.  The more my husband tried to please and honor the false god of ministry the more he failed. 

We thought we needed to have a certain personality in order to raise support.

We desired to raise support in a particular way, which would reflect on our righteousness.

We longed to be able to raise support in an exceptional manner, so that others would observe and praise “wow look at how the Lucianos did it!”.

We expected support raising to be easy because we were trusting in our strengths, personality and works.

But when it came down to it our strengths and personalities failed.  Not too long ago, my husband’s employer had all of it’s employees take a test to determine their strengths and abilities, to compare and analyze where they are best suited as employees.  The results of my husband’s test said, “whatever you do, don’t go into fundraising you are not suited for that line of work.”  Ha ha…. we both had a good laugh!  No wonder our stats in support raising are not impressive and nothing to boast about!

Once the idol of ministry was exposed my husband began to study the correct motivation for missions.  He’d used the opportunities that churches gave us to present our ministry to study a passage about the motivation of missions in order to change his own thinking.  The Word of God is powerful and able to change man.  My husband was reminded that God does not NEED us!  And that is exactly why his idol of ministry failed him.  We are merely redeemed sinners He uses to display His glory and power and grace. 

^“22 What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, ²³ in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory” (Romans 9:22-23)

Why would I take the time to explain how my husband repented?  Wouldn’t that reflect poorly on him? Aren’t I exposing his sinfulness?  Instead of boasting in his own ability, character and talent towards success in ministry he now boasts about God’s power, grace and mercy to lovingly forgive him, a sinner.  God was not obligated to change Allan’s thinking, but He did, and more than that He then calls him to service!  My husband’s motivation in missions has changed because he now can persevere during the hard times because of his knowledge of the Lord.  And it is exactly the humble leader God is using in my life, to show and demonstrate His grace to me!  I am the first hand, gracious recipient of God’s work in his life.  And because of that I am eager and willing to follow him across the globe.