Bro. Wesley | Preach the Word!

I can still remember vividly the service where Bro. Wesley spoke this over me. I can’t remember his first name. That’s pretty common for that era. Everyone was brother and sister.

Bro. Wesley was preaching at my grandparents church in Santa Rosa, California, where I was the youth pastor. Sometimes, it would take him a little while to get warmed up. I don’t know if he used notes, or if he simply got up and opened his mouth and started prophesying so to speak.

This Sunday evening service, when he took the mic, he started speaking about me. I was rather embarrassed, but he was indeed operating in the Gifts of the Spirit. I probably have much of what he spoke written down in a journal somewhere.

Bro. Wesley took this verse and begin to hammer it.

Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering and doctrine.
2 Timothy 4.2

The verse came back to me the other day in prayer. I am in a season of life when I am questioning how much I can do, or rather how much should I do?

I have been asked to teach an eight week course at our church. Given my life circumstances, the task seems daunting. But the Holy Spirit brought this verse back to my memory.

I have thought about doing a proper exegesis of this verse.

I have thought about consulting with the Early Church Fathers. I certainly have plenty of material from them. I’m sure they have something to say about this verse.

But then this morning in prayer, I remembered how Bro. Wesley prophesied over me from this Passage.

As he spoke into my life and preached on this verse, he had much to say, probably best suited for the pages of a journal. However, I will never forget the way he hammered the first phrase over and over again.

“Preach the Word!”

“Preach the Word!”

He repeated it again and again just like a Pentecostal preacher that’s received fresh fire from Heaven.

I can still see him in my mind’s eye, yelling it out from the pulpit.

I can still almost feel the rush of power as his words filled the sanctuary like an electric current.

“Preach the Word!”

“Preach the Word!”

I was called to preach when I was 15. I was now 20. This was something altogether different. At times I have felt inadequate. However, I often remember the night Bro. Wesley got in my business.

“Preach the Word!”

“Preach the Word!”

I remembered it again this morning, when I was thinking about how to properly exegete this verse.

I think it is enough to share the story.

So today I arise
With a fiery commission
A fresh desire to please God
Despite my circumstances
May I be a vessel fit to…

“Preach the Word!”

“Preach the Word!”