When examining whether certain men are called to the ministry, the greatest focus today is usually upon gifts. Does the man have communication skills? Is he good with people? Does he demonstrate leadership ability and administrative competence?
What’s rarely examined is the man’s experience of God.
In chapter 2 of The Holiness of God, R. C. Sproul makes the case that Isaiah’s call to the ministry provides a pattern for all calls to the ministry. While admitting that it was the most dramatic call in the Old Testament, Sproul says:
There is a pattern here, a pattern repeated in history. God appears, people quake in terror, God forgives and heals, God sends. From brokenness to mission is the human pattern.
From Brokenness to Mission
I agree with Sproul in principle, although in practice the experience of brokenness will vary from man to man. Isaiah was broken all at once; other men will be more gradually broken over a period of time. Isaiah was called to an exceptionally difficult ministry; other men are not and will not need such a deep experience of breaking and healing.
However, despite these qualifications, every called man of God must go through an Isaiah 6 experience to some degree. “From brokenness to mission is the human pattern.” And the key to that breaking and commissioning is a personal experience of the holiness of God. Notice the stages of this:
He saw: Isaiah saw the LORD. As Sproul says, this is not just a title of God but His personal name, and the supreme name given to Him in the Old Testament. “This is the unspeakable name, the ineffable name, the holy name” of God.
He heard: He heard the holy angels crying, “Holy, holy, holy!” Sproul says, “To mention something three times in succession is to elevate it to the superlative degree, to attach to it emphasis of superimportance.”
He shook: The holiness of God shook the whole temple and the whole Isaiah – his body and his soul.
He wailed: “Woe is me!” In prophetic vocabulary, “Woe!” is an announcement of divine doom. When Isaiah saw the holiness of God “he pronounced the judgment of God upon himself,” says Sproul.
He disintegrated: “I am undone.” The holiness of God undid him. He felt as if he was coming apart at the seams, disintegrating, unraveling.
He confessed: Sproul comments, “For the first time in his life, Isaiah really understood who God was. At the same instant, for the first time, Isaiah really understood who Isaiah was.”
He was cleansed: Any lips that speak for God must be purified, cauterized, the dirt burned away. His lips were refined by holy fire.
He was sent: “God took a shattered man and sent him into the ministry. He took a sinful man and made him a prophet.” Sproul highlights how God did not destroy Isaiah’s personality or identity, but redeemed it. “Isaiah’s personality was overhauled but not annihilated.”
A Vital Question
Given this biblical pattern of a divine call to the ministry, local churches, ministry boards, seminaries, presbyteries, etc., should be asking all candidates for the ministry, “What’s your experience of the holiness of God?”
No, we shouldn’t normally expect the same depth, degree, or suddenness as Isaiah’s call, but all these elements should be there, at least in seed form. And it’s an experience we should want repeated and deepened over time in the ministry.
I pray that candidates for the ministry and seminarians would know the essential elements of this call; and may existing ministers continually seek such life- and ministry-changing encounters with the holiness of God.
What a difference it would make to our prayers, our praises, our preaching, and our pastoring.
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