Contentment was a huge test in Paul’s life. After all, God said he would use him mightily: “He is a chosen vessel unto me, to bear my name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel” (Acts 9:15). When Paul first received this commission, “straightway he preached Christ in the synagogues, that he is the Son of God” (9:20).
Paul was in no hurry to see everything fulfilled in his lifetime. He knew he had an ironclad promise from God, and he clung to it. For the present moment, he was content to minister wherever he was: witnessing to a jailer, to a sailor, to a few women on a riverbank. This man had a worldwide commission, yet he was faithful to testify one-on-one.
Nor was Paul jealous of younger men who seemed to pass him by. While they traveled the world winning Jews and Gentiles to Christ, Paul sat in prison. He had to listen to reports of great crowds being converted by men he’d battled with over the gospel of grace. Yet Paul didn’t envy those men. He knew that a Christ-surrendered man knows how to abase as well as abound: “Godliness with contentment is great gain…and having food and raiment [clothing] let us be therewith content” (1 Timothy 6:6, 8).
The world today might say to Paul, “You are at the end of your life now. Yet you have no savings, no investments. All you have is a change of clothes.” I know what Paul’s answer would be: “Oh, but I’ve won Christ. I tell you, I’m the winner. I’ve found the pearl of great price. Jesus granted me the power to lay down everything, and take it up again myself. Well, I laid it all down, and now a crown awaits me. I have only one goal in this life: to see my Jesus, face to face. All the sufferings of this present time can’t be compared with the joy that awaits me.”
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David Wilkerson (1931 – 2011)
Founder of Times Square Church in New York City with over 100 different languages spoken in the congregation. Wilkerson wrote many powerful books such as: The Vision and Cross and the Switchblade. His ministry was prophetic as God called him to be a watchman to the Church in North America. He gave clear messages on repentance to the Church.Wilkerson also founded Teen Challenge where there are hundreds of centres for Christ-centered drug recovery and addiction recovery. He also organized and spoke at pastors gatherings in many countries where he gave prophetic strong messages to encourage pastors and leaders.
Recommends these books by David Wilkerson:
The Vision and Beyond, Prophecies Fulfilled and Still to Come by David Wilkerson
Knowing God by Name: Names of God That Bring Hope and Healing by David Wilkerson
God's Plan to Protect His People in the Coming Depression by David Wilkerson
David Wilkerson is an American Christian evangelist, most well-known for his book The Cross and the Switchblade. He is also the founder of Times Square Church in New York, an interdenominational church.
Wilkerson is well-known for these early years of his ministry to young drug addicts and gang members in New York City in the 1950s and 1960s. He co-authored a book about his work with the New York drug addicts, The Cross and the Switchblade, which became a best-seller, selling over 50 million copies in over thirty languages since it was published in 1963. The book was included among the 100 most important Christian books of the 20th century.
For over four decades, Wilkerson's ministry has included preaching, teaching and writing. He has authored over 30 books.
David Wilkerson is the founder and president of World Challenge, Inc., a nonprofit organization incorporated on September 22, 1971. Reverend Wilkerson, the author of over thirty inspirational books, is perhaps best known for his early days of ministry to young drug addicts and gang members in Manhattan, the Bronx, and Brooklyn. His story is told in The Cross and the Switchblade, a book he co-authored which became a best-seller. (The story has been read by over 50 million people in some thirty languages and 150 countries since 1963. In 1969, a motion picture of the same title was released.)
For over four decades, Reverend Wilkerson's evangelistic ministry has included preaching, teaching and writing. Throughout that time a distinctive characteristic of his work has been his direct efforts to reach the neediest members of the population with help for both body and soul. Even now, the almost 70 year-old minister often goes out alone or sometimes with an assistant to walk through the streets of New York City, along Broadway and Eighth Avenue or down 42nd Street and nearby "Crack Alley" on 41st Street. His mission is always to seek out the lost, the disoriented, and the addicted , to tell them of the power of the risen Christ to set them free.
David Wilkerson, born in Hammond, Indiana on May 19, 1931, was married in 1953 to Gwen Carosso. The Wilkersons' two sons are ministers, and their two daughters are married to ministers. They have 11 grandchildren. The Wilkersons served small pastorates in Scottsdale and Philipsburg, Pennsylvania, until Reverend Wilkerson saw a photograph in Life magazine of several New York City teenagers charged with murder. Moved with compassion he was drawn to the city in February 1959. It was at that time he began his street ministry to what one writer called "desperate, bewildered, addicted, often violent youth.