God Qualifies the Unqualified

Notes:

God Qualifies The Unqualified    See Session Slides Here

There are many reasons why God should never use us. But He does. Moses stuttered and was a murderer. Miriam was a gossip. John Mark was rejected by Paul. David had an affair. Solomon was filthy rich. Jesus was poor. Gideon and Thomas were doubters. Elijah was suicidal. Martha was a worrier. Noah got drunk. Jeremiah was too young; Abraham was too old. Peter was afraid of death. Lazarus was dead! Yet God used them all. God qualifies the unqualified. It is not God who disqualifies us. Then who is it?

 1) Self-disqualification. We live in a very success-orientated world. People measure their self-esteem by their success. Success is something we dream of in our youth, strive for in our adult years and, if we haven’t achieved it, live in regret and bitterness in our old age. We have made an idol of success. This mentality has crept into the church. We teach people how to succeed but not how to handle their failures. There is a self-imposed shame in having a failed marriage, kids that have gone off the rails, businesses that have crashed, ministries that appear to be going nowhere. ‘Failure is our unforgivable sin.’ Often, our response to failure is self-disqualification. But consider Peter’s failure:

  • Did Peter fail? God is more concerned with who we are than what we do; what we become more than what we achieve. E.g. If success makes us proud, self-sufficient, uncaring, etc., and failure makes us less selfish, less independent and more sympathetic, etc., which is better? Being the person God wants you to be is more a true measure for success than achieving the goals you have set for yourself.
  • Prov. 24:16. Peter shows us God rebuilds lives out of failure. Jer.18:4. We are His success story. Jonah 3:1.

2) Disqualified by Others. ‘Qualifications for ministry’. Under the OC to be a priest you had to be male, a Levite, healthy (no physical disability, deformity, skin rash or bodily discharge); a direct descendent of Aaron, 25-50 years of age. Some have spiritualized this list and made it a list of disqualifications for ministry.

  • We are not Levitical priests, Rev.1:5-6. We have been qualified by Him! Rev.5:9-10;  1 Peter 2:9.
  • Bible characters are never portrayed as people without blemish, Rom.7:18. Paul also said, ‘We have this treasure in earthen vessels that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us…’ (2 Cor.4:7).
  • 1 Cor.1:26-29. We could paraphrase these words this way: God says, ‘I don’t do champions; I don’t do superstars; I just do weak and foolish’.

3) Culture. Are we influenced by our culture and the way of the world, when we regard people as being less useful the older they get? We almost idolize the young ones and sometimes cast aside the seniors. Consider:

  • Caleb, at 85 said: ‘Give me this mountain!’
  • Psa. 92:13-15; Joel 2:28.
  • Paul told Titus to instruct ‘… the aged women, that they be … teachers of good things’ (Titus 2:2&3).
  • Lois, even in her older years, was still finishing well by teaching her young grandson.
  • Contrary to the thought that the effectiveness of our lives diminish as we get older.

Of course as people get older they can’t physically do some of the things they could do when they were younger. Our health may not be what it used to be. But regardless of age we still have so much to give. Maybe our best days are still ahead? Why shouldn’t they be? We’re wiser, closer to God. The Holy Spirit, who lives in us, never gets old, never wears out, and never goes off duty.

‘For we are His workmanship (poema), created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them’ (Eph.2:10). He is working on this piece of art, each day adding more paint in just the right places producing a masterpiece that will one day go on display.