If you believe, as I do, that the goal of ministry is the all-satisfying gladness of your people’s hearts in the glory of Christ, or in all that God is for them in Christ, then it will follow that your joy in Christ is an essential foundation for that ministry. If that’s true, that your joy in Christ is essential for leading others to an all-satisfying joy in Christ, then it follows that a hunger for Christ, a hunger for God, is an essential foundation for Christian ministry that’s effective and faithful.
FOUNDATIONS OF MARRIAGE
Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.