… ¹³so that He may establish your hearts without blame in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all His saints.

What is the ultimate end game of ministry? If we are all called to serve the Lord and His people using our various gifts and abilities, whether preaching, teaching, administration, helps, mercies, giving, leading—whether as an elder, deacon, Sunday school teacher, usher, church secretary, musician—what is the end game of our service?

The old illustration says it well. A man came across a construction site and asked four bricklayers what they were doing. The first man’s answer was, “I’m laying bricks.” The second man answered, “Building a wall.” The third replied, “I’m helping make a building.” Finally, the fourth couldn’t wait to give his answer: “I am constructing a temple for God’s people to come and worship.”

What is it that we as believers are trying to do when we serve others? There are many levels, but if we follow Paul’s example, we see that our acts of service at the end of the day are helping to prepare others for the coming of our Lord Jesus! No matter how menial our task might seem, no matter how unnoticed it might go, we are being used by God, if we keep in step with Him, to do a magnificent thing!

I think of a middle-aged woman who was confined to a wheelchair because of a congenital deformity in her legs. In addition, she was developmentally challenged and was quite limited in her abilities. Her ministry at the church was to fold the Sunday bulletins. Every week the secretary of the church would print this critical communiqué that kept the believers up to date on all the important information for the fellowship, and then trudge over to the assisted living facility where this dear member of that local body lived. Someone else, later in the week, would then pick up the folded dispatches of announcements, prayer requests, events, and special pronouncements by the leadership, and bring them to church in time for the first Sunday morning meeting. What did this dear woman do? Yes, she folded 150 pieces of paper, a task easily performed by an automatic folding machine, or by the able-bodied secretary. But she was an integral member of the body of Christ.

This woman’s labor together with that of other believers in the church worked together to “establish [their] hearts without blame in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all His saints.” May we all have the same attitude, the picture of our end game of ministry.

Lord Jesus, may my life serve to help prepare others for Your return.