Ministry is Service

Have you ever wondered how exactly to live as a full-time Christian even though you are not a full-time minister? After all, you have responsibilities: a mortgage, a family, and a job that helps you support your family. You can’t serve other believers one hundred percent of the time, so how do you balance the tug to always be on mission for God as a minister with the reality that you are in the marketplace full-time?

You may feel that even if God hasn’t called you to full-time ministry, he must at least want you to be a part-time minister. However, this isn’t the truth. As believers, we can do the full-time work of ministry even in the marketplace. The marketplace is where we spend the most time and have the most influence. It only makes sense to do God’s will right where we are.

The work of ministry is performed through our service to others. When Jesus talks about his mandate to serve in Mark 10:45, we know that the word serve in that context can also be translated to mean minister. Ministers are called to serve, just as Jesus served us when he gave his life for us.

We spend the most time with our coworkers, bosses, and work friends, which means we have a lot of opportunities to serve. Marketplace ministry allows us to openly and regularly serve others, at times serving at work even more than we do in our church or Christian-based organization. No matter what you do in the workplace, you are a marketplace minister, so you work for Jesus and receive instructions from him.

Our responsibility to go out into the world and preach extends even to those in our backyard, those we encounter everyday. Choosing to pray for others, choosing to set aside our own self-interests to be of service to others, helps us move them one notch closer to Jesus. This is ministry.

Who can you serve today? Think about everyone you will interact with and begin planning how you can serve or minister. Watch how Jesus uses you simply because you're ready to serve.