Evotional.com - Mark Batterson

I read a fascinating article this week about frogs and lizards. It was titled Frogs, Lizards, and the Mission of Christ by Stephen Seamands. It likened the way we approach ministry to the way frogs and lizards get their food. Frogs wait for an an insect to come into their domain then they stick out their sticky tongue and catch it. Lizards can't afford to sit and wait. They have to go hunting to find their food.

Stephen Seamands said that most ministers are "frogs." The article is a challenge to become "retooled lizards."

The article cites John Wesley as an example of a ministerial lizard. For what it's worth, John Wesley was 5 feet 3 inches tall. Wesley was trained to be a frog. He was ordained into the Anglican priesthood in 1728. Preaching was to take place indoors, behind a pulpit, inside the four walls of a church sanctuary. Many in the church of England considered preaching outdoors a violation of civil and canon law.

Wesley preached his first outdoor sermon on April 2, 1739. He called it "field preaching." He wrote about his unorthodox sermon in his journal: "At four in the afternoon, I submitted to be more vile and proclaimed in the highways the glad tidings of salvation."

To make a long story short, Wesley traveled some 225,000 miles, preached 40,000 sermons, and won nearly 150,000 converts to Christ. All because he was willing to "get out of the boat" of tradition. As late as 1772 he admitted, "To this day field preaching is a cross to me."

Wesley was reprimanded by conventional thinkers who were concerned about him crossing parish boundaries. Wesley wouldn't have anything to do with territorialism. He said, "I look upon all the world as my parish."

Seamands makes a great distinction. He said that for most ministers, their parish is their world. They are "keepers of aquariums" rather than fishers of men. Instead of seeing our parish as our world we need to see the world as our parish!