Characteristics of a Godly Watchman Pt. 1: Vigilance
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| Photo courtesy of grzswe |
In
Joel 2:1 the Lord commands the prophet to; Blow
a trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm on My holy mountain
because the day of the Lord is coming. That is, God’s judgment is coming
upon Israel for their sinfulness. Further along in the chapter, in verse 15,
Joel is again commanded to blow a trumpet but this time it is to call the
assembly of the people together so that they can, consecrate a fast. This tells us two important things about the
role, or the duty, of the prophet of God. First, it tells us that the prophet
is to act as an alarm to warn the people of God’s coming judgment. Secondly,
the prophet is also to be the mouthpiece of God in preparing the people for His
movement. Knowing
the role of the prophetic voice, or watchman as I will begin to call them is
vitally important. Furthermore, it is also crucial for us to understand some of the
characteristics that the Bible gives us of a godly watchman because this is no
small calling.
1. Vigilance
In Habakkuk 2:1 the prophet says this;
I will stand on my guard post and station myself on
the rampart; and I will keep watch to see what He will speak to me.
One of the most important
characteristics of a godly watchman is that he, or she, be vigilant and keep
watch over God’s people. When I was going through basic training we were
required to memorize the three general orders. The first, and perhaps most
important, was this;
I believe we can
extrapolate much truth about being a godly watchman from this general order. First
of all, along with the imagery from Habakkuk 2:1, we get the idea that the
watchman is standing guard over their people, over the things that they care
about. The watchmen of Israel stood guard on the walls of the city, a clear
vantage point, from which they could see the approach of invading armies. Their
concern and dedication to their duty came from a love and care for the people
inside the walls. That was where their homes may have been, their families and
their livelihoods. They would have been keeping a keen eye out for any form of
danger that could potentially affect the city. If
we are to be godly watchmen over God’s people then we must keep our eyes peeled
for any signs of danger or God’s approaching wrath due to the sins and
wickedness of His people. Habakkuk was not literally standing on the walls to
watch for an approaching army. He was standing on the spiritual ramparts of the
nation and trying to see things from a “God’s eye view” so that He could warn
the people to turn back to God.
Secondly, and I draw this from the first general
order, we are to quit our duty as watchmen only when God has told us that the
mission is finished. It may be that our mission is short like Habakkuk, Joel,
or Haggai. Alternatively, we could be standing on the walls keeping watch for
months, years or decades. Take Daniel for example. He was a watchman over the
house of Israel for most of his life and he outlived three kings in the
process. There are those who have waited and prayed that God would send revival
their entire lives and yet they maintained their station and refused to abandon
their post.
Finally,
as vigilant watchmen we must not only be on the lookout for signs of God’s
judgment but we also need to keep an eye out for His movement. As we saw in
Joel, the first trumpet was to sound the alarm while the second was the call
the people to preparation for a move of God. As watchmen we must be in-tune
with God enough to sense when His Spirit is beginning to move and then call His
people to prepare for what He is going to do. That means calling the Church to
repentance, prayer, brokenness, reconciliation, fasting, and a host of other
things we can do to prepare for a movement of God. This idea of being in-tune with God leads us directly into the next characteristic that we will explore, but you'll have to wait until next time!
Christian
Characteristics of a Godly Watchman Part 2
Characteristics of a Godly Watchman Part 3
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