What is the goal for adult ministry in the Church? Yes, we need to provide instruction because Scripture teaches about God and equips them to live meaningful lives. And, yes, we need to be intentional in implementing strategies that meet people where they are and spur them on. Yet, those objectives will only take adults so far if it isn’t rooted in their hearts. Hence, we also need to set a goal to make adult ministry internally impacting.
How Psalm 90:12 Leads to the Goal of Making Adult Ministry Internally Impacting
Notice the reason for instruction and intentionality — “that we may gain a heart of wisdom” (Ps. 90:12).
Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.
God wants us to not only “act” wisely but to “be” wise to the very core of our being. Elsewhere in Scripture we read the following:
Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it. (Prov. 4:23)
A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of. (Lk. 6:45)
A “heart of wisdom” leads to the ability to make the most of every opportunity (Eph. 5:15-17) for the right reasons and with the right attitudes, implementing the best course of action.
How to Gain a Heart of Wisdom
To truly impact adults’ lives, we must show them how to gain that heart of wisdom. God’s Word makes it clear: The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. (Prov. 9:10)
We must always point people toward a God who is great enough and most awesome in power and glory, the One of whom there is none greater. An anemic god fails to affect the heart. — Why should we come under the instruction of One whose authority we don’t accept? Why should we live life intentionally to the glory of Someone we don’t truly deem worthy?
Implications for Leaders and Teachers in Adult Ministries
Watch for setting external conformity as the end goal. Making it about doing all the right things often leads to extra stress and feelings of condemnation when they fail which is rather demotivating. Aim at making ministry internally impacting, heart transformation, for when we are who we should be, we’ll tend to do what we should do. That doesn’t mean we never teach or counsel people about what they should do but rather that we emphasize getting there by relying on God and His power and grace.
Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. (Prov. 3:5-6)
Continually pray for the people in your sphere of ministry. God, by His Spirit, enables us to “gain a heart of wisdom” so prayer needs to be an integral part of any adult ministry.
For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives, so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God … (Col. 1:9-10)