Ordained to the Ministry - My Experience with Psalm 42:5.

In a John Piper message recently I heard one of his points on “How to Fight for Joy” So simple; so profound. “Learn to preach to yourself rather than listen to yourself” …and the chains fell off. Oh the freedom! In that short sentence Piper placed upon my shoulders the ephod of a self-preacher. He placed before me an ever-present audience upon which I can lavish the soul-dividing Truths that turn Sauls in the Pauls. I am a preacher to myself! No longer condemned to the fate of hearing myself all day, I am now ordained to the ministry of me. “Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him…” (Psalm 42:5) This is a biblical warrant to speak to my own soul! Granted, obedience isn’t gained from tough self-determination, and preaching to yourself will only bring condemnation if attempting works apart from faith, but don’t miss the beauty that the sword of the Spirit is part of the armor adorning us so we can answer back at apathy, guilt, temptation, confusion, fatigue, and hopelessness. “I beat my body and make it my slave…” (1 Corinthians 9:27)

When I wake up in the morning and my thoughts go to the lonely corners of useless thought, I can open the bible and tell words to my inner man. Left to unbridled wanderings my thoughts are scattered and boring. I am trapped inside myself with myself. It’s no mystery that the natural inclinations in the thoughts of man are to complain, harbor evil feelings, lust or however depravity takes form in a particular person. Without a preacher bringing the Word of God to this pitiable soul the self is ensnared in itself. Problems, questions, complaints, and demands all come from the rampant thoughts of innermost me. How am I to “be transformed by the renewal of [my] mind” (Romans 12:2) with that going on? How shall I “take every thought captive to obey Christ?” (2 Corinthians 10:5) My mind needs a perpetual preacher… that’s why I’m thankful for Psalm 42:5 and the biblical warrant for self preaching.