Confession: the biggest barrier to my ministering

I had just finished up preaching out at the prison and something dawned on me. I had noticed it plenty of times before but this was the first time I had ever actually admitted it to someone.

I told a fellow prison preacher (who was also a seminary student of mine) that "when I preach, I feel His pleasure." We both thought back to the movie 'Chariots of Fire' when I said that. It was a line in the movie Eric Liddell had uttered to his sister.

But then I said to the friend, "before I preach, getting ready to leave the house and come out to this place, I don't feel his pleasure."

We both laughed. He admitted the same feelings just the hour before coming out with us to the facility.

Getting ready to go and minister in difficult places is not very fun. The actual act of ministry is great. Now...why is that? Is it our selfish self that has yet to bend to the beauty of reaching out to the disenfranchised and won't feel good about it until the time for grumbling has dissolved away at last?

Or is it - can we say it? - the devil.

I am not apt to blame the Evil One for much, to be honest, although I do think he exists and thwarts much good. I didn't grow up in a theological tradition that pondered much about Satan.

But in the case of my ministering to the 'least of these' I have to wonder.

Ministry is enjoyable. I actually love it, particularly the preaching and teaching aspects of it. The preliminaries are not so pleasureable, for whatever reason. The painful thought for me is wondering how much life-changing ministry I missed out on because of the supposed discomfort of those preliminaries...getting out of the easy chair, tying the shoes on, traveling to the location, flashing the badge to get by the guards, the slight anxiety of what might go wrong, etc.

But the actual communicating for changed lives? Priceless.