Jesus welcomed the people, taught them about the Kingdom of God and healed those in need. Luke 9:11

Seeds of the Kingdom

Fathering

by Roger Pook

For though you have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet you do not have many fathers; for I have begotten you in Christ Jesus through the gospel.
1 Corinthians 4:15, NKJV

I find good Christian teaching all around me. It’s on radio and TV, the internet, on CD and DVD. There are whole bookshops dedicated to nothing but Christian books covering every conceivable aspect of life. There are seminars, conferences, Bible schools, ministry schools, training courses, rallies and meetings, enough to fill my every waking moment. In the churches there are sermons, homilies, exhortations, with Bible studies, meetings and discussion groups for people of every age and inclination. For Christian teaching I think we must be the best-instructed generation that there has ever been, and I praise God for this.

But I wonder how many of us have ever had a godly father-figure (or mother-figure), as the Corinthian Christians had in the Apostle Paul? Did we have a mentor who trained us in faith and in godly character? Did we have someone we could turn to with the most personal questions and confessions? Did we have someone who had the right to ask us the closest details about our Christian walk, with all its victories and defeats?

I believe all of us as Christians need this kind of spiritual parenting or mentoring. And once we’re mature enough in the faith God will call us to be that kind of spiritual parent to someone else. It’s an awesome role to fulfil, and one which does place heavy demands upon our time, but it brings the great reward of seeing the next generation of Christians grow to take their place in God’s Kingdom.

Prayer: Heavenly Father, I love to hear Your voice as You speak into my life, but I love to hear wise and loving counsel from others as well. Please bring into my life a mentor, a parent-figure who can guide me in Your ways. Show me too if You want to use me this way for somebody else. Amen.

Roger Pook For 21 years Roger Pook and his wife Christine served in Central and Eastern Europe, based in Hungary at the Úr Rétje centre of Ellel Ministries. From there they travelled and ministered across the length and breadth of the former communist world. In 2018 Roger retired as Regional Director and they now live back in the UK, where Roger still serves on the Executive Leadership and as a trustee of The Christian Trust. They still travel for the Kingdom!

 

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