Acts Chapter 6:1-6

If you limit the way God can use you in small things, you're going to get burned out and cynical and all these things. But if you understand it's God you're serving, because occasionally people might not appreciate your ministry as much as you think they should. And if you're doing it just for people, you will lose that motivation.

But if you're doing it for God, you're always doing it knowing that God sees everything and it says here, you will receive the reward. Welcome to Cross the Bridge with David McGee. David is the senior pastor of the bridge in Kernersville, North Carolina.

Well, today in the studio, we have D.A. Brown, one of David McGee's associate pastors, and we're glad to have him bring us some insight right before David McGee teaches. Because of what God has done for us, we should be ready to do anything for him.

We should be willing and ready at any moment. Today, Pastor David explains how we've been chosen to serve as he continues in the book of Acts, chapter 6. So here's David McGee with his teaching, Chosen to Serve. In the last chapter we were covering, we saw that, you know, there were some pretty major setbacks, if you will, with Ananias and Sapphira. They actually, because of their hypocrisy, they fell over dead. And so, you know, the church though came through it. And once again, they brought the disciples in front of the Jewish leadership and they warned them not to speak about Jesus. And they, you know, threw them in prison. The Lord set them free from prison. They went right back to the temple. They didn't learn anything and started telling about Jesus again. And so that kind of brings us to where we are now in chapter 6, verse 1. It says, Now in those days, when the number of the disciples was multiplying, there arose a complaint against the Hebrews by the Hellenists, because their widows were neglected in the daily distribution.

Now, this takes a little explaining. I first noticed that there was a complaint in the church. That's incredible. I've never heard of such a thing happening in a church. I just can't believe that really happened. But I mean, it does happen sometimes. It does happen.

Why? Because, and see, oftentimes we look at the early church and go, Oh, I wish I could have been part of the early church, this perfect church. Well, no, it wasn't perfect church.

People were falling over dead and, you know, here they were complaining. We will have the perfect church when we go to heaven. But until then, we won't have it.

And here's the deal, guys. If this was the perfect church, or let's just say the perfect church or somebody else will do that. If the perfect church were somewhere else, you couldn't go because you're not perfect. I'm not perfect. Once we went, we'd mess it all up and it would no longer be the perfect church.

So we're not the perfect church. And I want you to notice it says complaint against the Hebrews by the Hellenists. Now, if you're in the King James, it says the Hebrews by the Grecians.

And let me explain what this is talking about. There were two main parties, if you will, of Jewish people at this point. There were those who spoke Hebrew and there were those who had been Hellenized. That's a term under Alexander the Great. He conquered Israel in about 323 B.C. And when he did that, you know, what he wanted to do is spread the Greek language, Greek philosophy and culture all over the world.

And he did the same thing in Israel. So many of the people ended up speaking Greek. Now, some of that was good. Some of it was bad. Some of it is stuff that we still deal with in the church as far as Greek philosophy as opposed to more Hebraic philosophy.

But that's what's going on. So it's interesting to me that they're all Jewish, and yet already you've got these factions happening. Well, I speak Greek. Well, I speak Hebrew. I don't speak Greek.

Well, I don't speak Hebrew. And you've got that going on. What a shame that is. But you realize, guys, there's no place in the body of Christ for this kind of garbage. And you know what? There's no place in this body of Christ for that kind of stuff. We need to love each other and realize, and especially, oh, it horrifies me when I hear of a church having racial discrimination. Guys, that's from the pit of hell. I mean, that has nothing to do with Jesus.

And let me go ahead and mention another one. There are people here, and we kind of have the opposite thing going on. You know, some churches you go to, if you don't wear a tie, you're kind of looked down upon and people look at you weird.

Well, let's be careful that we don't adopt the opposite thing. Because now and again, you know, somebody will come up and they'll go, hey, so and so is wearing a tie. What's up with that? You know, pay a minute now. Wait a minute.

Let's all love Jesus. Let me be honest with you. When I see a person with a tie, I like that.

And I'll tell you why. Because I know that other people are going to come in with ties. And if they come in and there's nobody else wearing a tie, they're going to feel weird. So, you know, if you got on a tie, praise God. I see you, bro.

You got on a tie. And so, you know, we want to welcome them people and those people. And again, the opposite. Don't look at people and go, oh, look at that guy. He's got tattoos and earrings and he's raising his hands during worship.

Put your hands down. You know, I mean, God, let's love Jesus. And God is always more concerned about what's in here than what's on the outside. And so we as a church need, you know, at that time, people didn't live average 72.3 years. You know, a lot of the guys, a lot of men would die early on and they would leave widows who never remarried. And at this time, culturally, the women could not enter the workplace. There just weren't jobs for them. So they were stuck. They were stuck.

They couldn't just, you know, look after the home and drive a livelihood through that. And sadly enough, some of them were actually forced into prostitution to support themselves. So it was an issue of how these widows would be looked after. And I think that there's an important thing in the Hebrew Scriptures in the Old Testament of looking after widows, orphans, and the fatherless. And I think the church still has a responsibility, especially to those folks.

Another one that's mentioned is the stranger. And we should look to minister to those folks. Now, one other thing before we move on. It says the disciples were multiplying. The church was growing. Two people in the last chapter died in the middle of the church service, and yet the church is growing. And there's a concept here that occasionally God will prune the body of Christ.

He will cut something out, he will remove something, and he'll also do the same thing in our lives. Now, when I say that, when even when I mentioned the word prune, you're like, prune my life, you know, and we read those scriptures and we're like, oh, that's bad. No, it's not bad. It's not bad. And we get some kind of weird picture that God runs through the garden with like power shears, you know, just lopping branches off.

That's not it at all. If you've ever seen somebody that really loves plants, maybe even an elderly person, sit there and tenderly prune a rosebush, that's more of the picture. And you know what always happens after a pruning?

The growth flourishes. Verse 2, it says, then the 12 summoned the multitude of the disciples and said, it is not desirable that we should leave the word of God and serve tables. Now, I want you to notice that they're not saying they didn't want to, but they're saying, you know what, if we do this, we're not going to be able to study and to prepare teachings and to feed the flock. And that's an important thing because, you know, often it's not just doing what's right or what's good.

Sometimes as a believer, it's having to choose between God's good and God's best. Verse 3, it says, therefore, brethren, seek out from among you seven men of good reputation full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom whom we may appoint over this business. Now look what they're looking for.

They're looking for good reputation and some versions that says honest, that's good. And it says filled with the Holy Spirit and wisdom. And it says, and they've never made a mistake and will never make a mistake, right? Your version doesn't say that? No.

It's not in there. See, a lot of times we think that our spiritual leaders are never supposed to make a mistake. Now, how unfair is that? Because you know, the only time that you won't make a mistake, the only people that don't make a mistake are the people that don't do anything. And if you're not doing anything, you're making the biggest mistake of all. So understand that spiritual leaders are going to make mistakes, but you know what? Their heart is towards the Lord or should be towards the Lord. They're not saying, well, this is a menial task or anything like that. They're just saying, you know what?

There's, we need to come up with a solution. And in verse three, they, they come up with a solution of, of delegating and DL Moody said it's much better to get 10 men to do work than to try to do the work of 10 men. So why saying DL Moody was a wise man or wise minister, wise pastor, and this is the thing that is a continual challenge here that, you know, to, to give away ministry is the term that I use. I love to see people raised up into ministry. And it's interesting because, you know, everybody on our staff has been raised up from this body.

You know, we didn't go to ministry jobs.com or something. These people were in this body. They serve the Lord. We recognize they were serving the Lord. We encourage them in serving the Lord.

And then they came on staff and that's a, that's an awesome thing now. And as we do this, there's a saying that we're also fond of blessed are the flexible. They shall not be broken. So as you step out to serve the Lord, be sure that you maintain that flexibility.

Now we're going to learn some more stuff about that as we continue on. Verse four says, but we will give ourselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the word. Oh, this verse, it's a powerful verse. And as I sat and thought about this verse, it's a special significance to me. And I'll tell you why, because every day now I have to make difficult decisions about what I do with my time. There's often, you know, like emails or phone calls or, or meetings that I would love to have that I can't.

And the reason I can't is I want to be sure that I'm studying and preparing myself to do, to do the teaching on Thursday night and the teaching on Sunday morning. Now perhaps you're sitting here and you think, well, pastor David, you just, you just kind of get up there and wing it. Don't you? Well, yeah, maybe a little bit, but, but we're some of it, but you know, I sit and I read the word of God and I study the word of God and I dig in the commentaries and the original languages and stuff, because see oftentimes in like that ninth and that 10th and that 11th hour, God will show me something to share with you guys. And I don't want to miss that. And if I wasn't diligent, would he still reveal it? I don't know.

I don't know. Now it's important that we all understand that and here's why if this goes well, if the teaching of the word goes well in here, every other ministry in this church benefits. If this doesn't go well, everything else suffers. As a matter of fact, every other ministry could be, you know, operating at peak efficiency.

But if you guys aren't getting fed in here, it doesn't matter. If people aren't getting saved in here, it doesn't matter. We can have the best children's ministry in the world, but if their parents aren't learning the word of God and learning what it is to be a Christian and a follower of Yeshua of Jesus, it's all for naught. You're listening to pastor David McGee on Cross the Bridge.

He'll be right back with more in just a moment, but I want to remind you of the free resources available to you on crossthebridge.com. There's a team of hundreds of people that will pray for somebody to be saved. If you have a loved one that needs to know Jesus as Savior, you need people to pray for them.

You need someone to present God's word to them. Every day, we're presenting God's word to them here on Cross the Bridge with Pastor David McGee. We can pray for them as well just by simply going to crossthebridge.com and click on the Pray for the Lost button. All you need to do is put in the first names of the people you love that need to know Jesus as Savior, click on submit, and immediately hundreds of people will begin praying for your lost loved ones.

What an awesome way to bring your loved ones to Jesus. Here's a word from associate pastor DA Brown. Hey guys, we want to take just a minute to pray for some cities in our listening audience, specifically Ashland, Oregon, and Baker City, Brookings, Canyonville, Cave Junction, Cloverdale, and Colton.

Lord, we thank you for these cities and everyone listening. Lord, we pray that you would pour out your Spirit on these broadcast audiences. Father, we pray that pastors would have wisdom in these cities on how to love their communities. Lord, I pray that people would put their trust in you.

God, I pray that you would give the governmental leaders wisdom and discernment, that you would protect these cities, Father, that there would be peace in these cities, and Lord, that your word would be high and lifted up in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen.

Thank you, brother. Let's get back to David McGee as he continues teaching verse by verse. Verse five. And the saying pleased the whole multitude.

That's pretty cool. Everybody thought that made sense, and hopefully most people here thought it made sense. I don't know if I'd say the whole multitude, but hopefully most of you. And they chose Stephen, a man full of faith in the Holy Spirit, and Philip, and Prochorus, Nicodora, Timon, Permanus, and Nicholas, a proselyte from Antioch. Now, what we're going to see is Stephen and Philip in the book of Acts, man, they're going to be very significant. They're going to be very significant. God is going to use them in a very special way. Let's see what happens. Verse six, it says, and whom they set before the apostles, and when they had prayed, they laid hands on them.

Now, let's talk about this a little bit. And notice first they prayed. They prayed first. It reminds me of the fact that Jesus went up to the mountain to pray before he came down and chose the disciples.

For a long time, I thought, oh, that's cool. He went up to the mountain to pray about who was going to be a disciple. And the more I've walked with the Lord and the longer I've walked with the Lord, I think he probably knew who he was going to choose, and that's why he went up to the mountain to pray because he's like, those guys, oh, I got to go pray. But this is an important part of delegating leadership and praying and asking, Lord, who do you want? And the laying on of hands, let's mention that quickly because that can bring up some bad memories or something. That's a scriptural term. Laying your hands on somebody is a scriptural term.

Now, let's say what it is and what it isn't. Laying hands on somebody can be simply me placing my hand on somebody's shoulder as I pray for them. That's laying my hands on them. You see that in Scripture. What you don't see, you never see one scriptural example of the laying on of hands being somebody smacking somebody on the forehead until they fall over. You don't see it.

You may have seen that on television. You don't see that in this book. So we don't do that here. But we do lay hands. You see, there's a couple instances when you're ordaining somebody or putting an elder or a deacon in office, you lay hands on them. When you pray for the sick, you lay hands on them. Maybe you take anointing oil, symbolic of the Holy Spirit, anoint their forehead and pray for them.

All biblical, biblical things, okay? So that's the laying on of hands. Notice what you don't see here. You don't see these guys standing off to the side going, I don't really feel like taking the widows. I don't need something else. You don't see that.

Well, Pastor David, what's your point? These guys are like, God, you want to use me? Awesome. You want to use me to feed the widows? I'm all for it. I'm gung ho. I'm all over it.

Let's go for it. That's important. Let me share. You know, I try to be very transparent.

Let me be a transparent moment with you. I went on staff as a worship leader at a church and understand, you know, I had a musical history and studied music in school and all this stuff. So I was hired as a worship leader. So I figured I'd be doing worship. And so I sat down for a staff meeting and the pastor of the community said, okay, that and he said, hey, and David, why don't you clean the men's and women's bathroom twice a week? Yeah, okay. I have to confess, I'm being open.

It didn't sit well with me. I thought, I'm not here to clean bathrooms. I'm here to do worship. Well, I'm cleaning the bathrooms and, you know, I'm in there and I'm, I mean, I got the major two, grumbling and murmuring. Not that you guys have ever done that, but just play along with me as if you have. So I'm in there grumbling and murmuring and, and you know, I begin this conversation with God.

That's still a small voice. And, uh, you know, and the Lord's like, what are you doing? Clean the bathroom. Who do you clean the bathroom for? Clean the bathroom for you, God. God said, well, you can stop.

So I'm not very impressed. What, what, what? He said, you know what, what'd I call you to do? Call me play music.

No, I didn't. I called you to serve me, to serve me and serve me well. I was so convicted. Cleaning the bathrooms took on a whole nother meaning. I started enjoying it. I would go in there and sing while I scrub the potties and clean the floors. God did such a neat work in my heart that like a few weeks or a few months later or whatever it was at a staff, at another staff meeting, you know, and somebody else got added on staff and they said, and you'll be cleaning the men and women's bathroom. I was like, oh man, it's my job.

I clean the bathroom. See here's the thing, the life lesson. We should be willing to serve the Lord in any and all ways.

We should be willing to serve the Lord in any and all ways. It was just a few years ago. We've moved into this small office on the other side of Kernersville and, and I mean, I wasn't even a paid staff member. I worked at the church, but I didn't get paid for a while and, and, but I did everything. I mean, I was, you know, the, the, the pastor, the worship leader, the, uh, youth leader, the receptionist, uh, you know, uh, children's ministry director, uh, clean, clean the floors.

I did everything that needed to be done. I didn't know anybody and I, you know, we were still raising up leadership and, and that's okay. And, and, and I never in that and being honest, I never during that time thought, well God, why am I emptying the trash can? I'm supposed to be teaching the word of God.

No, no, no. And because I was willing to do that in part. Look what God has done now. Now I had to relearn the lesson to be honest, because when I was in the home Bible study, there was a season where it was just me and the family. And then there was a season where there was like the family, my three kids, and then there was five other neighborhood kids. There was two coming from a house down the street. And then there was a family that would drop their three kids off and they would go out to date night.

And it was good. Praise God. So, but you know, so there I am, I'm teaching eight kids. We're in Genesis and it's kind of interesting. And you know, I'm going, Oh Lord, I don't, what are you doing Lord?

That's still small voice again. Why call you do? Well, you tell me I need to teach the word of God. There they are. Teach them. Okay. Okay. So I taught them the book of Genesis verse by verse, chapter by chapter. And um, it was an awesome time.

I mean, after teaching for an hour, these kids would ask questions. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. What about this? What about that?

See? And here's an interesting thing. Cause every now and again, somebody will pop up and go, well, I'm supposed to teach adults. I'm called to teach adults. Oh, that's great.

That's great. But you know what? You never in this book, do you see a distinction of an age group that somebody is supposed to teach? So if you have the gift of teaching, let me promise you something. Seven and eight year olds will sit and listen to you. If you don't, they're going to know it. They're going to know it. And that's a great way to find out if you can teach kids, you may indeed have the gift of teaching.

Here's the thing. And the Bible speaks to this a lot. And we really need to understand this as a church and as individual believers understand servant leadership, Matthew 25, 21, and I'm going to go through several verses fairly quickly. Jesus is talking and said, his Lord said to him, well done, good and faithful servant. You were faithful over a few things. I will make you ruler over many things enter into the joy of the Lord, of your Lord. A couple of verses later, his Lord said to him, well done, good and faithful servant.

You've been faithful over a few things. I will make you ruler over many things enter into the joy of your Lord. Luke 16, 10 tells us he who is faithful and what is least is also faithful also in much. And he was unjust and what is least is unjust also in much Luke 19, 17. And he said to him, well done, good servant, because you were faithful and a very little have authority over 10 cities. So there's a biblical concept of starting small and God blessing that and God being the one that raises you up now in first Corinthians four, one and two, it says, let us let a man so consider us a servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God.

Moreover, it is required in stewards that one be found faithful. Again, we have this faithful concept. We even its way through us and weaving its way through scripture.

First Timothy one 12 and I thank Christ Jesus, our Lord who has enabled me because he counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry because there's a lesson in there for each and every one of us. Now here's the thing. If you limit the way God can use you in small things, you limit the way God will use you in large things.

Let me say that again. If you limit the way God can use you in small things, you limit the way God will use you in large things. A couple more verses. Colossians three 17 says, and whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, given thanks to God, the father through him. Colossians three 23 says, and whatever you do, do it heartily as to the Lord, not to men, knowing from the Lord, you will receive the reward of the inheritance for you serve the Lord Christ. That is such a key in ministry because if you start out in ministry to serve other people, you're going to find yourself a crispy critter. You're going to get burned out and, and cynical and all these things. But if you understand it's God you're serving, see, cause occasionally people might not appreciate your ministry as much as you think they should.

And if you're doing it just for people, you will lose that motivation. But if you're doing it for God, you're always doing it, knowing that God sees everything and it says here, you will receive the reward from God. Friend, do you know for sure that your sins have been forgiven?

You can know right now. I want to lead you in a short, simple prayer, simply telling God you're sorry and asking him to help you to live for him. Now, God wants you to pray this prayer so much that he died to give you the opportunity and the ability to ask him to forgive you. Please pray this prayer with me out loud right now, dear Jesus, I believe you died for me that I could be forgiven. And I believe you were raised from the dead that I could have a new life and I've done wrong things, I have sinned and I'm sorry. Please forgive me of all those things. Please give me the power to live for you all of my days. In Jesus name.

Amen. Friend, if you prayed that prayer, according to the Bible, you've been forgiven. You've been born again. Jesus said he would not turn anybody away who comes to him and he came for those people who knew they needed forgiveness, those who were sick, not the righteous.

So congratulations, friend, you just made the greatest decision that you will ever make. God bless you. If you prayed that prayer with David for the first time, we'd love to hear from you. You can visit crossthebridge.com to receive our First Steps package with helpful resources to help you begin your walk with Christ.

Or you can write to Cross the Bridge at P.O. Box 12515, Winston-Salem, North Carolina 27117, and share how God is working in your life. You know, the Bible tells us that the free gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord. But it does cost for us to come and bring that message to you and to others in your neighborhood, through radio, through the internet, and through the mobile technologies that God has gifted us to be able to use. So if you'd like to support this ministry, please go to crossthebridge.com, click on the donate button, and ask God how much he would have you give, either on a one-time basis or a continuing basis each month to help ensure that the teaching of God's Word continues to go out through Cross the Bridge. Thank you so much. Well, DA, before we go, what are some ways that we can bless our listeners? Those are terrific, and it's easy and it's free, so folks, sign up today at crossthebridge.com. Thanks again for listening, and join us next time as David McGee continues teaching verse by verse in the book of Acts.