Qualifications for Serving Jesus

Acts 4:13-22

Introduction

You may or may not know that I took a number of years off pastoral ministry between my previous churches and coming to Queen Street Baptist Church. But of course we still needed to eat and so that meant I needed to get a job. 

At that point, I had been a pastor for fourteen years and had three theological degrees. You would be amazed at how many jobs that would make you unqualified for. There were plenty of job listings to look at. I got to the point that I pass over all of the interesting things like the pay and number of hours and go right to the qualifications. Many of them were not even an option for me.

One of the jobs I was able to get was as an associate editor at Faith Today. My marketing undergraduate degree plus my theological degrees helped. My experience as both a pastor and an editor helped. My writing experience, including in Faith Today, helped. Finally I found a job that I was qualified for.

That is great for the job market but what about for serving Jesus? What are the qualifications that are necessary? Are there any qualifications? Many people think so. I have heard many people claim that God couldn’t use someone like them. This is based on their lack of experience or knowledge or even because of mistakes made in the past. Sadly, the church has often reinforced these ideas, seeing certain people as more valuable than others, recognizing the potential of some more than others.

I would say that there are some qualifications for serving Jesus, but it is not what most people think. To understand this, we need to look to the Scriptures.

Normal People

The religious leaders who were interrogating Peter and John were surprised by them, not because they knew Jesus personally, but because of what they lacked: any formal training whatsoever. The word that is sometimes translated “unschooled” can have different meanings. It can mean someone who it illiterate, someone who is unable to do that basics of reading and writing. That would describe many people in the ancient world. In the context, it probably means something else, although Peter and John’s literary skills at the time would have been rudimentary.

It is more likely that they were being criticized for lacking any theological training. This is in contrast to the man we will eventually know as the Apostle Paul, who was trained by a famous rabbi before serving Jesus. Although trained by Jesus, Peter and John had not gone through any of the steps of a recognized education.

This brings us to the first qualification. Jesus is looking for normal people. Jesus is not just looking for PhDs in theology, although he can use them too. Jesus wants to use just normal, average people. 

I’m not saying that Bible college or seminary training is a bad thing. I am a strong advocate for formal theological training. But you do not have to wait for a certain piece of paper before you can start serving Jesus. God uses normal people.

You may have heard of Charles Haddon Spurgeon, one of the most famous of Baptist preachers. His conversion is described in this way:

“Spurgeon woke one January Sunday in 1850 with a deep sense of his need for deliverance.

Because of a snowstorm, the 15-year-old’s path to church was diverted down a side street. For shelter, he ducked into the Primitive Methodist Chapel on Artillery Street. An unknown substitute lay preacher stepped into the pulpit and read his text—Isaiah 45:22—“Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is none else.”

“He had not much to say, thank God, for that compelled him to keep on repeating his text, and there was nothing needed—by me, at any rate except his text.”

That man in the pulpit probably had no training was not a gifted speaker and yet it was through him that Jesus saved Spurgeon. By the way, Spurgeon became a pastor of what we would call a mega church today, all without attending seminary himself or being ordained.

But it is not just preachers that Jesus uses. We have been talking about the kingdom of God in past weeks. I don’t believe the kingdom grows primarily sermon by sermon but rather person by person or relationship by relationship. Many of the people who have been instrumental in our own spiritual journeys have been just those normal people Jesus uses.

It does not matter your age, gender, ethnicity, ability or education. Jesus is looking for normal regular people who will serve him.

Stubbornness

These normal people have been arrested. The religious leaders don’t want any more turmoil. The death of Jesus is still fresh in people’s minds. They just want Peter and John to shut their mouths and go about their business.

So the leaders tell Peter and John to just stop telling people about Jesus. But of course, they can’t agree to that. Peter and John know who they serve and it is not these religious leaders. Jesus has given them their orders and that is who they must believe. Jesus is Lord. Not one lord among many lords in their life but the Lord of lords who gets the final stay.

And that brings us back to the next qualification. And that is stubbornness. I was hesitant to call it stubbornness as we can all think of negative examples of stubbornness.

In fact we can see examples of pastors and churches in other communities during COVID-19 being stubborn in a bad way. They see it as obeying Jesus over obeying the government but that is not an accurate picture of what is going on. I see no government in North America targeting Christian churches for persecution, even if their decisions may sometimes make our ministry more difficult.

But there are times when we need to be stubborn. There are times that others attempt to lay their expectations on us, which may be incompatible with Jesus. At times, the pressure can be very great. Perhaps not threats of violence or imprisonment but pressure none the less. What was true for Peter and John is the same for us today: Jesus is Lord.

How do we know when to be stubborn and if it is good stubbornness? We need to ask the question: Does what I’m about to do reflect the fact that Jesus is Lord? It did for Peter and John. Does it for us?

Conclusion

I want you to imagine that you walk into Jesus’ office, applying for the position of one of his servants on Earth. He pushes a piece of paper across his desk with the list of qualifications. What does it say? The first is that you have to be just a normal, average person. No special skills or experience necessary. The second is that you have to be stubborn. Not just stubborn in general but stubborn in the way that communicates Jesus is Lord. 

There Jesus is sitting behind his desk, waiting to see if you will accept the offer. What will you do?