He came up to me tentatively and asked: “Would you mind if a novice prayed for you?” He was young and young in the faith. A college student, he couldn’t have been a Christian for more than a year.
It was the first Sunday at church. Every first Sunday the church celebrated Holy Communion and invited those who needed prayer to be prayed for by a prayer team standing near the communion table. I had asked for prayer from the pastor and was making my way back to my seat when the novice ambushed me.
Maybe it was the cough mixture. Or maybe the inspiration came from higher up. I replied: “There are no novices in the Kingdom of God. We are all equidistant from the heart of God.” He prayed for me. I was deeply touched. It was powerful stuff. The novice did good.
I figured it must have been tough for the novice to volunteer to pray for an old ministry war-horse like me. He had bumped into me at the mall a few days earlier and knew I was under the weather. I probably looked worse on Sunday. I felt it.
Something or someone must have told the novice I needed extra prayer. Heck, I had just been prayed for by the pastor. Who was he to think that he could top that? I am glad he didn’t let thoughts like that stop him. He followed his promptings. And was used by God to bless a brother who needed a lot of encouragement.
As I reflected on that exchange I decided my reply to the ‘novice’ was more cough mixture-inspired than Spirit-inspired. No novices in the Kingdom of God? That was an answer that would have made me the ‘weakest link’. In truth we are all novices in the Kingdom of God.
After all didn’t Jesus say: “Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of God belongs to such as these.” Mark 10:14b. NLT
Those of us who have spent any amount of time with kids will know that they provide evidence for the doctrine of original sin very early in life! Yet there is a certain lack of self-consciousness, an insatiable appetite to learn, a certain wonder at life and a joyful playfulness that is soon lost with the demands of growing up. This is also true of life in the Kingdom. The brother who had prayed for me had not learnt better. I’m glad.
As we grow older, and older in Christ, there is a danger that we begin to take ourselves too seriously. Maybe that is one of the reasons titles like Senior Pastor, Doctor, Reverend, Prophet, Evangelist, Bishop, etc. are much sought after. I am sure that for some these are purely descriptive titles assigned by the church. Still, I can’t help but wonder if these titles soon become indicators of our self-importance.
I think we out to take God and His purposes with utmost seriousness. But we shouldn’t take ourselves too seriously. The apostle Paul saw himself as a ‘fool’ for God, living by God’s standards in a fallen world (2Corinthians 3:18). I suspect many of us need to recover the liberation of being children again in the family of God. We need to recover more child-like spontaneity in our life in Christ.
Paradoxically, when we do that, we may find ourselves more effective for the serious business of the Kingdom. Like the dear brother who prayed for me last Sunday.
Your brother, SooInn – novice