Even the minister, who has the privilege of handling the word of God, is just a foot soldier. His message is given to him. He does not have to have the wit to compose it, to invent it, to think about it. His message is provided and supplied. He only has to be faithful. The person who makes it effective in the heart is not him but the Holy Spirit of the living God, and it is for all of us. Integrity demands we have a realistic and a humble view of ourselves. We are thankful that we are not set aside and discarded by the Lord for all our falls and inconsistencies. We need to promote humility, and say I will accept my posting in life from the Lord. I will happily serve him wherever he has placed me. I will labour in that position for years. I will avoid the tempter when he comes to me and tempts me to want something else, somewhere else, something better, some greater recognition for the things I imagine I do. I will avoid those desires.
Again, we are in the internet age. There are pastors who were dear humble men, ruined by opening Twitter accounts, and they spend the rest of their days finding a way of boasting on Twitter as to what they are doing from day to day or where they are. You must know where they are travelling, and what they are doing, and who they are speaking to, and all this kind of thing. What people find for advertising what they are doing! Words like ‘delighted to see that such-and-such, so many thousands of people have bought my new book about so-and-so.’ Advertising themselves furiously. Well, we are to avoid that. Humility, realism, realistic view of ourselves.