Why hasn’t God given you a very special ministry?

In the United States, the Marines and the Navy Seals are elite fighting groups. In the same way, if God calls you to do something special in His kingdom, He is choosing you to be one of His elite. It is a great honor to be enlisted by God for a special assignment in His kingdom.

How does God choose people for these assignments?

There are many tests that one has to pass to be chosen. In this article, I will talk about one particular test – the one regarding who you allow to give you money.

You see, God wants to build His kingdom without the help of any unbeliever. On the Day of Judgment, God doesn’t want any unbeliever to be able to say that he contributed towards the building of God’s kingdom. Like the disciples in John’s time, when you go out for the sake of the Name, you have to accept nothing from the Gentiles (i.e. the unbelievers).

3 Jn 1:7 For they went out for the sake of the Name, accepting nothing from the Gentiles.

I’m not talking merely about accepting money for ministry, but also about accepting personal gifts from unbelievers. Your life and your ministry blend together. In God’s eyes, there are no two bank accounts, one for your personal life, and one for your ministry. If you consider someone to be an unbeliever, and you accept gifts from them, whether they are strangers or friends or family, you are now contaminated with money that God cannot use to build His kingdom. What do you think God will do? Will be keep track of your money and only use the untainted money?

What did God do when angels took wives and contaminated the human race? God destroyed everyone, except Noah and his family. In the same way, if you have tainted money, God will not keep track of which of your accounts has tainted money. He will just stop using you to build His kingdom.

Now some people, after reading this, will suddenly change their minds about the people who give them gifts, and consider those people (who they once considered to be unbelievers) to be believers. Don’t be deceived! You may fool yourself, and quite possibly even those around you, but you certainly won’t be fooling God.

Do you remember the story of Abraham and Melchizedek (you will find it in Gen 14)? If so, have you ever wondered why God sent Melchizedek to Abraham?

God doesn’t send a unique person like Melchizedek to anyone for no reason at all. There has to be a good reason. What is that good reason? Something very important must have been afoot, and it is important to understand what was afoot because it gives us insight into how God thinks.

You see, God was going to use Abraham to create a nation from which the Messiah would come. It was a special assignment, like the ones I mentioned at the beginning of this article. However, God will never use someone financed by an unbeliever to be a part of His plan.

Abraham was in a situation where an unbeliever was willing to give him a lot of money. God wanted Abraham to refuse that offer. If Abraham took money from the unbeliever, he would become ineligible to be a part of God’s plan to build His kingdom. For this reason, God sent Melchizedek to tell Abraham to refuse the offer.

Melchizedek was a priest of God most high. A priest is someone who helps you solve your spiritual problems, just like how a plumber is someone who helps you solve your water problems.

Melchizedek delivered the message. He told Abraham that God owns everything and therefore not to worry about any financial loss due to not taking the huge gift from the king of Sodom. He also reminded Abraham that it was God who granted Abraham success in retrieving all the people and goods from the enemy (including what the king of Sodom lost).

Gen 14:18-20 18 And Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; now he was a priest of God Most High. 19 He blessed him and said, "Blessed be Abram of God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth; 20 And blessed be God Most High, Who has delivered your enemies into your hand." He gave him a tenth of all.

Abraham got the message. He realized what was at stake, and was so happy that Melchizedek gave him such great advice that he gave Melchizedek a tenth of everything. Then he told the king of Sodom that he wouldn’t take any of his gifts.

Gen 14:21-24 21 The king of Sodom said to Abram, “Give the people to me and take the goods for yourself.” 22 Abram said to the king of Sodom, “I have sworn to the LORD God Most High, possessor of heaven and earth, 23 that I will not take a thread or a sandal thong or anything that is yours, for fear you would say, ‘I have made Abram rich.’ 24 “I will take nothing except what the young men have eaten, and the share of the men who went with me, Aner, Eshcol, and Mamre; let them take their share.”

Today, pastors want a tenth of what you earn, and they point you to what Abraham did, but they don’t have a word from God for you, and they don’t give you such good advice, like Melchizedek gave Abraham. Don’t let them con you.

Do you know what happened next, after Abraham refused to take any money from an unbeliever? We read it in the beginning of the very next chapter – Gen 15.

Gen 15:1-5 1 After these things the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision, saying, "Do not fear, Abram, I am a shield to you; Your reward shall be very great." 2 Abram said, "O Lord GOD, what will You give me, since I am childless, and the heir * of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?" 3 And Abram said, "Since You have given no offspring to me, one born in my house is my heir." 4 Then behold, the word of the LORD came to him, saying, "This man will not be your heir; but one who will come forth from your own body, he shall be your heir." 5 And He took him outside and said, "Now look toward the heavens, and count the stars, if you are able to count them." And He said to him, "So shall your descendants be."

Gen 15:18-21 18 On that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, "To your descendants I have given this land, from the river of Egypt as far as the great river, the river Euphrates: 19 the Kenite and the Kenizzite and the Kadmonite 20 and the Hittite and the Perizzite and the Rephaim 21 and the Amorite and the Canaanite and the Girgashite and the Jebusite."

We see that God promised Abraham, not just what belonged to the king of Sodom, but all the land of (what would become) Israel, and descendants to populate it. Abraham had no child so far, and if he had taken money from the king of Sodom he might have remained childless. He would then never be the father of the nation of Israel – the nation from which the Messiah who would save mankind from their sins would come.

God had a special plan for Abraham – to be the father of the nation through which God would give His laws, and through which the Messiah would come. It was a very great honor, and Abraham would have missed it if he accepted that gift from the king of Sodom.

You can now see the great importance of what was going down, and why God sent Melchizedek to help Abraham to make the correct decision.

Consider Lk 16:10-12.

Lk 16:10-12 10 “He who is faithful in a very little thing is faithful also in much; and he who is unrighteous in a very little thing is unrighteous also in much. 11 “Therefore if you have not been faithful in the use of unrighteous wealth, who will entrust the true riches to you? 12 “And if you have not been faithful in the use of that which is another’s, who will give you that which is your own?

The true riches mentioned above refer to a ministry from God for the building of His kingdom. Before God can entrust you with that, He will test you to see whether you’ve been faithful with money. One aspect of that faithfulness is ensuring that no unbeliever can say that he made you rich.

Today, God is building His church. Let me be Melchizedek to you, and give you some good advice: for God to use you in a special way, your finances must be free from gifts from unbelievers. If it isn’t, you won’t get any awesome part in building God’s church.

I find it hard pressed to think that we will get any part in building God’s church if our finances are not free from gifts from unbelievers.

How do we ensure that we owe nothing to any unbeliever? What if we have done everything we can to pay every unbeliever we know we owe, but cannot be sure that we owe nothing to an unbeliever? If God sees in us a desire to keep our finances free from gifts of unbelievers, He will allow us to lose any money that came from unbelievers under our radar.