The common man

And the temple which I build will be great, for our God is greater than all gods. But who is able to build Him a temple, since heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain Him? Who am I then, that I should build Him a temple, except to burn sacrifice before Him? Therefore send me at once a man skillful to work in gold and silver, in bronze and iron, in purple and crimson and blue, who has skill to engrave with the skillful men who are with me in Judah and Jerusalem, whom David my father provided. Also send me cedar and cypress and algum logs from Lebanon, for I know that your servants have skill to cut timber in Lebanon; and indeed my servants will be with your servants, to prepare timber for me in abundance, for the temple which I am about to build shall be great and wonderful. - 2 Chronicles 2:5-9

I don’t even really like to use the phrase ‘common man’ because it can almost sound a little condescending, but I can’t think of another term to describe those vital people who serve God and minister for Him without being in what we normally call ‘the ministry.’

Here preparations were being made to build the great temple of God. It was a spiritual work. There were speeches and prayers and dedications, and those are good things.

But the reality is that someone had to cut the stones and chop down trees and plane the timber and hammer the nails and make the holy vessels and level the ground and all those other things that needed done.

The truth is that all God’s work is important and all work done by God’s people should be done God’s work. We can serve the Lord as pastors or missionaries or Christian school teachers or staff at a Christian organisation or any number of things like that.

But just like these temple workers we can also serve the Lord by cleaning toilets or sweeping floors or cutting wood or cutting hair working in an office or driving a truck or whatever the job. These temple workers were just as important as the prophets or priests.

The same is true in the church today. Sure, God calls some as pastors and teachers and all that, but their job is only to equip the saints to do the work of the ministry. As everyone goes out to their daily tasks we go out to minister to those around us. Those who are too often called ‘laity’ are actually the ministers and those who we call the ‘clergy’ are the equippers. Let's all be about the ministry God has called us to.