Keeping it Real
Hi, my name is Melissa. I started MBoldenMinistries to embolden, empower, and impart into this generation. I’m an author and a speaker. I love Jesus, the Word of God and people. But I am not nor will I ever be on this earth perfect. So please remove that expectation from me.
Our pastors and those in leadership at our churches are not perfect. Neither are the people we may choose to listen to on TV or YouTube. A large audience does not improve one’s ability to hear God or their character. Everything that comes out of their mouths is not gospel. Yes, they hear from God but no one hears from God perfectly.
Love, honor, and respect the shepherds God has placed in your life. But please, pretty please, take them off the pedestal you have placed them on. They are not infallible. Most are men and women with their own backstories, with their own flaws, with their own insecurities being perfected by a flawless God. That is my story.
I encourage you to read the word for yourself and ask God for greater revelation. He will give it to you. I implore you to quiet yourself and ask God to speak to you. He will. We each have a Holy Spirit. And we should never ever allow anyone to speak louder than the Holy Spirit within us.
My prayer this morning is for all of us who shepherd. Weather we are the pastors in our home, our small group or we stand before thousands and minister, in this new decade, let us Shepherd well. Pray with me.
“Father, I thank you that I am holy and blameless in your sight. I thank you for the calling and the commission on my life to pastor. Teach me to me pastor well.
Teach me to love people well. Help me overcome my insecurities, my jealousy, so that I can empower others to walk in their destiny without being intimidated. Remind me daily there is enough room in this kingdom for everyone to shine brightly. Let me help others shine even brighter than me. Let me emboldened others to live free.
Father, I thank you for giving me fresh revelation. Show me new and exciting things in your word. But Father, correct me if that fresh revelation puffs me up. Teach me to share it with humility and love.
Father, I am thankful I hear your voice. But your word also says, in the multitude of counsel there is wisdom. Give me wisdom to surround myself with people who also hear from You. Let me be surrounded with people who love you first and foremost but also love me and are strong and bold enough to speak truth into my life. Make me teachable and correctable.
Father, I never want to use people as a means to an end. Let me love people sacrificially regardless if they have anything to offer back to me. Use me to help feed the poor, to reach out in my community, to be your hands and feet. Let me not love in words only. Teach me to love in deeds as well.
Let my words bring unity, encouragement, and love to the Body of Christ. Father, teach me to pastor well in this new decade. Amen.”
“Little children (believers, dear ones), let us not love [merely in theory] with word or with tongue [giving lip service to compassion], but in action and in truth [in practice and in sincerity, because practical acts of love are more than words].”
1 John 3:18 AMP
