What is a minister of God? A spokesman, that's all. One who speaks and expounds the word of God; one who has no authority of his own; one who reproduces and explains God's word. He has no inherent special place or office. He should never be applauded. He should never be made the object of hero worship. He must never be clothed in special gowns and robes denoting some superior being or status. He must be like the apostle Paul. No minister would ever claim to be anything like as instrumental as the apostle Paul, or as blessed. Well then he had better get in line behind the apostle Paul and present himself as a servant of God and a servant of the word and no more. That is our always aim today – or should be – as ministers of God and of his people.
When we go to heaven, maybe some preachers will get together, and there will be some preachers from the 21st-century, and they will find themselves speaking to some preachers from the 19th century; and maybe preachers in the great 1859 awakening, or preachers who were in the Welsh revival in 1905-1909. And perhaps the preachers who lived in the 21st-century will say, ‘What wonderful preachers you must have been, to attract such vast crowds.’ They will say, ‘It wasn’t like that at all. When we stood up to preach the Holy Spirit just worked; and the people crowded in as if from nowhere. We would go out into the fields on a wet, drizzly day, and we would set up a pulpit in a barn, and crowds would come from miles around. They would be everywhere, standing in the rain perhaps, and God the Holy Spirit somehow impelled them to come. It wasn’t us,’ those preachers would say. ‘God just did an amazing thing.’ That is what Paul is saying here. ‘I was not meet to be called an apostle; but wherever I preached, God sent the people.’ Paul had to suffer; he had to know great hardship and difficulty, and yet people would gather, and they would leave behind their idols, and wonderful things would happen. We live in a day of small things by comparison; but we pray constantly that God will be with our efforts and gather the people in, and many will be saved.