You're a lot of the time. Welcome. If you're in
the right place and we're in the right place,
this is Manuel Calderon and we're glad to have
you Manuel. Yes, glad to be here. Manuel has
spent the last 16 years in full-time and
vocational ministry. He has planted a church
in South Fort Worth, right? He's also worked in
ministry in Puerto Rico, North Carolina,
and Louisiana. And he has full-time ministry to
his wife and three children. So welcome Manuel.
We're glad you're here and appreciate what you
have to say. Thank you. Well,
good morning everyone. Pleasure to be here with
you guys. The way I would like to approach this
topic is an interesting topic, but I would like
to approach it in two different ways.
So I would like to cover two different areas at
the same time, if you guys allow me to do so.
Basically, one area is going to be the vocation
that we're called as Christians to do ministry
in life. And then what is their need and what
is their role? What is the calling for us to serve
in the local church? The question I want to
explore with you guys this morning is,
how are we going to respond to our vocational
ministry in two aspects? Number one, as a vocation
because we're Christians, so how I'm going to
influence the people that is around me for the
Lord? And in my local church, how can I
contribute to the work that is going on on my
local church?
And of course, we're in a Christian university,
so I'm going to bring two passages of the Bible.
Ezekiel 37. This is what this passage basically
says, and it's called the valley of the
dry bones. And Ezekiel basically starts by
saying, the hand of the Lord was on me, and he
brought me
out by the spirit of the Lord and set me in the
middle of the valley. And the valley was full of
bones. I just want all of us to recognize that
the same thing is happening to us, and we're
here not
by coincidence, but by the will of God, and you
are in your community, in your church, in your
setting, because that's the will of God. The
hand of the Lord has been upon you, he placed
you there,
he brought you there by the spirit, and we all
are in the middle of the valley of the dry bones.
Surrounding us, there's a lot of people that
they look healthy on the outside, but on the inside,
they're probably just like dry bones, their
spirit is dry, they need hope, they need mercy,
they need grace. So I want all of us to kind of
put ourselves in that context, that we are
in this valley. Then verse number two, it says,
he led me back and forth among them, and I saw
great many bones on the floor of the valley,
bones that were very dry, and he asked me,
son of man, can these bones live? And I think
it's the same question we need to ask ourselves,
and probably the Lord asks of you every single
day, is the people surrounding you, can they
become alive again, can they get my spirit, can
they get my salvation, can they get my forgiveness?
And this is where our role in our local church
and in our community basically comes,
so the Bible continues to say in Ezekiel 37,
now verse three, and he asked me,
son of man, can these bones live? And I say,
sovereign Lord, you alone know. Then he said to
me, prophesy to these bones, and say to them,
dry bones, hear the Word of the Lord. This is
what the
sovereign Lord says to these bones, I will make
breath enter you, and you will become, and you
will come to life. I will attach the tendons to
you, and make flesh, and come upon you, and cover
you with the skin. I will put breath in you,
and you will come to life. Then you will know
that I am the Lord. So I prophesied, and I was
commanded, and as I was prophesying, there was a
noise, a rattling sound, and the bones came
together, bone to bone,
and I looked, and tendons and flesh appeared on
them, and skin covered them, but there was not
breath in them. So the work was not completed,
but the Lord was doing his work. Ezekiel was
put in
the middle of that valley, and he probably
asked himself, why you have me here? What you
want me to
do? Where? When? Probably he has the same five
W's of himself when he's basically standing there
in the middle of the valley of the dry bones.
Then it says, and then he said to me, so
prophesy to
them the breath, and prophesy son of man, and
said to it, this is what the sovereign Lord says,
come breath from the four winds, and breathe
into this lane, and they may live. So I prophesied,
and he commanded me, and the breath entered
them. They came to life, and stood up on their feet
as a vast army. So I guess the first question
we need to ask ourselves, is there a need out there
for us to have this calling, this vocational
ministry in my life, on whatever setting I'm on,
but in being involved in my local church by
putting my talents and my gifts to the service
of the Lord. And this is the calling, so that's
the need. The need is there's a big valley of dry
bones. Everybody agree with me? There is it.
There's a huge valley, and for you guys that
are here in
college, probably even here at Abilene
Christian University, you guys are in the
middle of the
valley, you know? And every one of us just out
there in our business world, or our ministries,
in our communities, there is a lot of dry bones
surrounding us. So that is the calling,
the need, I'm sorry. This is the calling to the
people of God. So Paul told the Ephesians,
so Christ himself gave the apostles, the
prophets, the evangelists, the pastors, and the teachers,
with one purpose, to equip his people for works
of service, so that the body of Christ may be
built up until we all reach the unity in the
faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God,
and become mature, attaining to the whole
measure of the fullness of Christ. And why I'm bringing
this up is one of those passages when Paul is
basically saying, hey, the Lord has given you
guys different talents, some of you were made
apostles, other prophets, other teachers, other
evangelists, and every one of us have different
gifts and talents. And the main reason we have
those, and we need to put those to work in the
middle of the valley of the dry bones,
and at the benefit, and for the benefit of the
kingdom and our local church,
is so we can equip the people of God for
service, and that the body of Christ,
the bride of Christ, can be built up. Amen?
That is the main calling. That's why the need
is there,
and the calling to every one of us is there.
Everyone has a gift and a role in God's plan.
Every one of us. What we need to make sure is
that we're assessing those gifts, those talents,
and that we clarify and pray to the Lord and
make sure that we are clear on what our
ministry is
based on our talents and our gifts, and then
put that at the disposal of the Lord and the kingdom.
So we're going to talk about the five Ws. So
I'm going to get you guys now into the five Ws.
I wanted to set the stage of Ezekiel. We are in
the middle of the dry bones, the valley of the
dry bones. There's a lot of need surrounding us.
There's a calling. The Lord basically has called
every one of us to some kind of ministry in our
lives. And now that we're going to talk about the
five Ws of vocational ministry, I want to start
with the negative and then bring it to the positive.
So some people ask, well, Brother Manuel, this
thing about vocational ministry means that I have
my job or I go to college, but I really get
involved and put my gifts and my talents at the
service of the Lord in my local church or in
whatever ministry I want to be involved. And
the answer is yes. What are the disadvantages?
And for some of us who have been in full-time ministry
and part-time ministry and in ministry all our
lives, involved in the church, I can find few
disadvantages. And at least the Good news is
there are only few. But there are basically two
disadvantages that I see to vocational
ministry, which is always comes down to time.
You know,
for all of us that we're running, we're going
to college or we're running a business or we're
basically raising a family or we're doing all
this kind of stuff that basically happens
outside of
the work of the kingdom, times becomes a
disadvantage. Is that true? It's always a
hard balance for us to balance. Okay, so how
much time do I need to dedicate to the Lord's work
or ministry? And then the other disadvantage
that I have encountered is self-esteem.
And let me confess that that's one of the
disadvantages that I have suffered for the
last year. I just came out of being a full-time
minister for three years. I was part of a church
plant in South Fort Worth. We planted a church
called Siempre Familia, Forever Family Church of
Christ in the South Fort Worth area. And so I
was there for three years full-time for different
circumstances. I need to go back to business.
So I went back to my IT career and during this year
I have been trying to figure out these five W's
myself. So that's what I thought it would be nice
to teach about it since it's been basically my
life in the last year. And something that I'm
finding myself struggling with is self-esteem.
For whatever reason there's probably this,
I don't know if it's a concept or I don't know
if it's a thought or I don't know if it's
probably an idea where, you know, if you are
not a full-time minister you're probably not a successful
minister in the Lord's Kingdom. And that's not
true. I think Satan uses that a lot. But the
concept of low self-esteem because we feel,
well I wish I can be there full-time. I wish I
can dedicate
100% of my time to the work. I think Satan uses
that a lot in a negative aspect. So the two
disadvantages that I want to make sure we're
aware on vocational ministry time. So we
struggle. We
just need to figure out how we manage our time
and dedicate and allocate the sufficient time
for ministry, vocational ministry, that we want
to get involved. And then let's make sure that
nobody takes our self-esteem on a down level.
And mainly ourselves. Okay? Mainly ourselves.
So the good thing is those are the only two
disadvantages that I found so far. In the Bible
there were several examples of people that
basically did vocational ministry all through
the Old Testament to the New Testament. And we
can see the prophet Amos. We can see Daniel. We can
see Nehemiah. We can see Luke who was a doctor.
We can see Priscilla and Achila. We can see Paul.
And it says that Paul sometimes basically went
into all these mission trips and when he was not
in full-time ministry he was building tents.
But he continued the work of the Lord. He had a
call for
ministry and he knew that he needed to use his
gifts and his talents for the benefit of the kingdom.
We probably agree that Paul did a pretty good
job. He did a pretty good job by basically putting
himself out there and whatever time he had he
basically gave his talents and his gifts to the
kingdom. So we already talked about the
negative. What about the many advantages of vocational
ministry? And a lot of this comes from,
especially at the local church level, there is
a huge need
for people to work in the kingdom. You know
full-time staff cannot do it all. So here are some
many advantages of people that will dedicate
themselves as vocational ministers. First of all
it enables some churches to have some staff
that otherwise they won't be able to afford.
You know
it may be that the local church can only afford
a good preacher and with all the other vocational
ministers surrounding that church they're able
to do so it's very valuable that the work
that these vocational ministers basically bring
into the church. It enables churches and ministers
to launch with qualified leaders as well.
Something that I have found myself is like all
of the
sudden when you try to combine your business
knowledge with the kingdom knowledge and ministry
knowledge, if it's used for the in a good way
it can definitely bring benefits to the kingdom.
You know the way you as a businessman or
businesswoman will establish or do a strategy,
set mission and vision and basically execute
plans. All those aspects brought into ministry
really bring a lot of benefit to the kingdom
for well-planned churches and projects and ministries
and so forth. Another advantage of vocational
ministry is that enable vocational ministers to
be able to relate to church people and
understand what it's like to work in a secular place.
And let me tell you that was one of the
criticisms that I got from church members when
I was full
time. They were like well you really don't
understand my side of the equation and I always thought
that's not true. But so now that I'm back in
the business world and I'm still served there
and I
teach and preach and and I'm a member on that
congregation the story is a little bit different
you know. And I guess the benefit of all of us
in vocational ministry and again this has nothing
against the full-time ministers but the benefit
is we're there we know what it takes we know how
difficult is the struggles of balancing our
time but at the same time serving the kingdom. So
for a lot of churches a lot of people this will
be very attractive because we can relate and we
can have other connections with people in the
secular world through our workplace and so forth.
Another advantage it enables ministers to
remain more connected with the un-church people
so we
every one of us as ministers in the world we
are basically connected to a lot of un-church people
and we have unique opportunities for outreach.
You know we're in a workplace we're surrounded
by friends by co-workers and that is that is
our church that is the local work that the Lord has
put on us Monday through Friday whatever your
work itinerary may be. So let's start something
we need
to do smart and basically always ask the Lord
for that vision is Lord allow me to be a vocational
minister not only in my local church for
whatever they need me but at work with my
friends with my
neighbors with my with my co-workers. Another
advantage it enabled church workers to serve more
with a greater level of commitment and
sacrifice. So people in vocational ministry
again knows how
hard it is to balance these two sides of the
equation. Something I want to make sure everybody
goes home today is that we're all needed in the
work of the kingdom. Every one of us is part of
this body and we're all needed in the kingdom.
So God will call some people to work in full-time
ministry while also he will call many others to
work in vocational ministry and that's probably
the many out there you know. There are very few
that have the privilege to be full-time and
and nurture us and nourish us and and teach and
preach to us and equip us but for all of us on
the outside we're probably the big majority the
Lord has a plan for every one of us in vocational
ministry. So let's go through the five W's.
Let's go through the through the five W's. So
the why
the first W is the why and I always ask myself
so why me but then I need to ask myself why not
you know again every one of us you have gifts
you have talents why you but why not so I guess it's
kind of an interesting question we need to ask
ourselves so God has given everyone a gift to use
with his people and on his kingdom why has God
given you that gift or that talent have you asked
yourself that question have you asked yourself
why why me why now probably we have asked ourselves
well now that I'm you know getting ready to
retire I probably should not be doing a lot of
church work why not well now that I'm just
starting my career in college you know I'm not
going to have time to ministry well why not my
gifts I'm my talents put at the disposal of the
Lord there is a need there's a calling the
second W is the who and and something
that happens with that W that second W the who
is that we tend to look around and point at others
and we can see that we consider more talented
or more gifted than us and and we need to be very
careful on doing that you know we're we're
called we have gifts we there's a big need
you've been put in the middle of that valley
for a reason and the Lord wants to use you so
the who is basically well I am that person I am
the one that the Lord has called to be in my
environment to influence others for the kingdom
and something we try to do as well we try to point
at the full-time staff to do all the work so at
the local church okay if somebody needs to go and
teach the widow or take care of the widow let's
call the preacher or let's call the priest
or let's call the preacher or let's call the
youth minister or let's call the family minister
or whatever or let's send that instead of me
and no every one of us is is call for the need
and for the for the calling that the God has
put based on your talents so I guess an interesting
question we can ask ourselves this morning is
have we assessed our gifts and our talents and
probably a lot of us we haven't we haven't done
that you know on what kind of stuff I'm good at
that I can put to work for the benefit of the
kingdom have we assessed the needs of our church
you know a lot of us come from small churches
some of us come from big churches and
probably will never think about this kind of
stuff is there a need on my local church
you know and on my neighborhood that I can with
my gifts I can basically serve
and be Christ and that community be Christ for
the needy be Christ and basically help build the
kingdom of my local church you know like
Ezekiel you and I I want to make sure everybody
goes home
with this one if there's nothing else you learn
in this lesson let's go home with this one like
you and I we were brought out and set in the
middle of the valley this is not coincidence
this is God's plan the third W is the what and
the question there is like so
what I'm what I'm good at is there something
I'm really good at that I can put at the
the as a vocational minister at the disposal of
the Lord
what do people need to hear about about Christ
about his message about his grace about his mercy
what are the needs of those surrounding me
again this is not difficult stuff these are
just important
questions for us to ask ourselves if we're
called to be the ministers that the Lord has
called us
to be what are the needs in the kingdom in my
local church when I can serve so by asking these
five w's into vocational ministry we can
probably get some traction and some direction
as to where
the Lord probably wants us to be and to serve
in the local church in our community and with the
people that is surrounding us and yes go ahead
are you just making some notes yeah yeah okay
so what I'm good at what do people need to hear
about about Christ about his message about his
message about his grace and mercy what are the
needs of those surrounding me and what are the
needs of the kingdom and again I keep I keep
telling local church local church local church
and let me tell you why I keep saying that to
me I'm convinced that the local church is the best
entity that the Lord has put in place to
transform every single community the local
church has the
local influence the local resources the people
that will know people the needs of that community
that can transform that community so sometimes
we dream about you know works in other places and
all of that is fine the Lord says we need to go
and we need to preach the world the word into all
the world but we need to be called to our local
church and the local church will transform that
community and if every local church will do the
local work the different the kingdom will be
a big different kingdom so the local church is
the hope of the world
and then the why so to do what we just read
Ephesians 4
basically to equip others so with my gifts and
my talents I'm going to put them at the
disposal of
the local church to help build the kingdom to
help equip others to participate and assist on
building the body of Christ what a privilege
that is an extremely marvelous privilege that
you and I
have that the Lord has basically opted out he
opted to basically use the human being the man
and the woman to be part of his plan and to be
part of the building of his kingdom he could have
probably done it any other way he's God he has
all the power all the resources but he basically
selected you and selected me to be the ones
that help him build his kingdom here on earth
here on earth the fourth W is the where so a
lot of us again we and and when we're
young we're dreaming and that's great and you
need to dream and you need to pursue your dreams
and for all of us that in middle age and for
some others that are a little bit more mature than
others and you know the where and this is
pretty simple ministry starts at home
so let's start with our vocational ministry
where at home with my family with my wife my
kids with my grandkids where at work you know
that video was just great because it brought in
that lady who was a scientist and she felt well
I just went and did my postgraduate degree in science
and you know she probably went into her
doctorate degree and she's just not a scientist
she's a
Christian influencing all all of those
surrounding her the same thing with the doctor
and the guy
who became a pastor and so forth so the where
ministry starts at home so there are a lot of
ministry opportunities for us starting at home
at work at school at college in the community at
church again the opportunities are infinitive
and that's what's called vocation for some of
us that
are sensible to the calling and the need of the
Lord we will figure this out we'll say okay I have
a vocation and let me just in my setting put
myself to the benefit of the kingdom to the
benefit of
others to bring others to Christ and the last
but not least is the fifth W is the when so
when do we
start doing this work and a lot of us have
probably done it forever and I I'm so thankful
for you guys
who have been involved in church work and
kingdom work and vocational ministry for
probably all your
life that's great I just want you to know
you're needed if you're still breathing you're needed
so let's continue and the time is now the need
exists now we are in the middle of the valley
of the dry bones so the needs is the need is
surrounding us the call from God is now
again we're in the middle of the valley that
needs the breath of God never forget that
and the Lord said to Ezekiel and the Lord says
to us and we can read back in the great commission
in Matthew 28 but the but when basically our
Lord Jesus Christ says to his disciples now
it's time
for you guys to want to go it's go time we are
all ministers I want you guys to know that
please go
home with that in mind as well we're all
ministers of this of the world we're all
ministers of the kingdom every one of us has a
different gift and talent that needs to be used
in ministry so we are all called to minister
the Good News and here's a passage and we're
going to
look at three passages and we're going to be
done we're almost done with our class this morning
we're all called to minister the Good News and
this is what Paul says to the Romans
in Romans 15:16 Paul basically was saying I was
made so to be a minister of Christ
Jesus Christ to the gentiles Paul was basically
saying yes I was put in the middle of the valley
of all these dry bones and I became a minister
of Jesus Christ I put my talents and my gifts
to the benefit of the kingdom and then but he
gave me something else he gave me the priestly
duty of proclaiming the gospel of God so that
the gentiles so that the dry bones surrounding me
might become an offering acceptable to God
sanctified by the Holy Spirit can we identify
by the Holy Spirit can we identify with Paul I
hope we can every one of us has a ministry
every one of us is called there's a need we're
ministers of Jesus Christ to the dry bones
surrounding us to the gentiles surrounding us
and he gave us this priestly duty of proclaiming
the gospel of God so my encouragement to all of
you guys this morning
is to let us all be fearless ministers of the
kingdom Paul wrote to the philippians
in Philippians 1:14 the Bible says most of the
brothers and sisters have become
confident in the Lord and they're all the more
to proclaim the gospel without fear and that is my
hope that every one of us the day that we go in
front of the throne of Christ that we will tell
him father I was one of these I was confident I
became confident in you and I dare all the more
to proclaim the gospel of your son Jesus Christ
and I did it without fear amen and to finish
this morning let's do this until so every one
of us let's commit this morning to do to be
vocational ministers let's continue to ask the
five w's to ourselves and until until we all reach
the unity in the faith and in the knowledge of
the Son of God and we become mature and we
attain the
whole measure of the fullness of Christ any
questions I hope every one of you guys just
walk out of here more convinced whatever your
ministry is whatever your gift and talents and
talents are that there's a big need and that
you have a calling and that we will put everything
every ounce of sweat that we can we can until
every one of us and the kingdom reach unity in
the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God
until we become mature and until we attain the
whole measure of the fullness of Christ may God
bless you guys thank you