INTRODUCTION<\/p>\n\n\n\n
LIAR, LIAR<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n We all believe lies. Not only do we believe lies, but we lie to ourselves\nconstantly, endlessly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Perhaps\nthis affinity for lies is nowhere better demonstrated than the 1997 hit movie Liar Liar<\/em>. I remember watching this\nmovie at a friend\u2019s house using a filtering service that screened out morally\nquestionable scenes and vulgar language. Of course, watching Liar Liar<\/em> this way made it a very short\nmovie. Still, I managed to get the gist, and aside from the (fragmented) humor\nwhat struck me the most was its stunning portrayal of the human heart\u2019s love of\nlies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the\nmovie, a young boy makes a birthday wish that his dad, a chronic liar (played\nby Jim Carrey), would be forced to tell the truth. Miraculously, the wish comes\ntrue. The boy\u2019s father is forced to speak and act with total honesty at all\ntimes. What follows is a comedic montage showing the horror and pain of being\nforced to tell the truth\u2014and the utter misery of being regularly confronted\nwith the truth. While telling the truth is held up as a virtue, the film\nrightly observes that humans generally find life to be more comfortable when we\ncan tell and believe lies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Here\nHollywood got it right: Only a miracle stops us from being drawn to lies. As\nChristians, this shouldn\u2019t surprise us. Every time we sin, we believe lies: We\nbelieve that God is not good, he does not love us, and he has not met our\ngreatest need. Our hearts, apart from God\u2019s regenerating grace, are literally\nlie-producing and lie-believing machines (Jer 17:9<\/a>).\nAs sinners, you could say that lies are our native language.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is only\nthrough the Spirit\u2019s sanctifying work that we continually grow in\nChristlikeness, which includes increasing love for, belief in, and\ncommunication of truth. Yet as works in progress (Phil 1:6<\/a>),\nwe are still constantly tempted to deceive ourselves and others. You lied to\nyourself this morning, didn\u2019t you? You ate a Krispy Kreme doughnut for\nbreakfast, convincing yourself you will be walking a lot and burning off the\ncalories during the day. What are you doing right now? Sitting and reading this\nbook. Liar!<\/p>\n\n\n\n As each\nyear of ministry passes, I\u2019m amazed by the lies I have believed. As I\u2019ve\nmatured, I\u2019ve found that one of the best defenses against believing lies is\nknowing the kinds of lies that tempt me. I\u2019m on guard for them before I believe\nthem, and so the temptation to believe and speak things I know are untrue has\nincreasingly diminished. But still, even with greater awareness, I\u2019m\ncontinually identifying lies that I tell myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019ve also\nfound that other pastors are tempted to believe many of the same lies I have\naccepted. As a result I have concluded that pastors have a unique subset of\nlies they are tempted to believe. In this book, I want to lay bare these lies.\nWhile I cannot exhaustively address every lie that any individual pastor might\nbe drawn to, I\u2019m convinced that pastors are uniquely tempted to believe lies\nrelated to their identity as pastors<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One of the\ngreatest temptations for those in ministry is to tie our identity to what we\naccomplish rather than what Christ has accomplished. The danger in believing\nlies about our identity, even small ones, is that a seemingly inconsequential\ndeception always gives way to a larger deception. What begins as a small lie we\nbelieve about ourselves often leads to taking our eyes off Christ and ignoring\nour moral failures. There is no such thing as a harmless lie.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In\naddition to being a pastor, I\u2019m also a seminary professor tasked with equipping\nmen who want to be pastors.1<\/sup><\/a> One of the constant refrains of my\nlife in ministry has been \u201cWhy didn\u2019t anyone warn me that I would be constantly\nbattling self-deception?\u201d If you are a seminary student, my hope is that my\nopenness will help you guard against specific lies. These are lies I\u2019ve had to\nbattle and lies I\u2019ve seen many of my students believe, as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On the\nother hand, if you have been a pastor for a while, you are probably more aware\nof the lies you\u2019ve told yourself than you are willing to admit. I get it. It\u2019s\na humiliating thing to recognize how badly you have misled yourself. Still, as\nyou read each of the following chapters, be open to considering how you may\nhave been deceived by similar lies. Ignoring the lies you\u2019ve believed will not\nprotect you, your family, or your church from the eventual fallout. Therefore,\nyou must begin rooting out the idols of your heart that give rise to the\ndeceptions you so willingly embrace. You cannot be passive in the war against\nself-deception. Be on guard!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Whether\nyou are preparing for ministry or are serving in ministry now, consider inviting\na fellow seminary student or pastor to read this book with you, ask you the\nreflection questions at the end of each chapter, and give you honest feedback.\nThere is great freedom and true joy in facing the truth. However, merely\nidentifying the lies you\u2019ve believed does not resolve the problem. We must\nrespond to our self-deception with corrective actions. That is why I have\nsuggested a series of action steps to help you overcome the lies you\u2019ve\nbelieved.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pastors\n(and future pastors), the way to win the war on lies is to speak truth, believe\ntruth, and constantly be reminded of truth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 1<\/p>\n\n\n\n THE VISIONARY<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cJesus has called me to lead a movement\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n In seminary, I had a major ego problem (admittedly, I still do from time\nto time). I wasn\u2019t exactly the Kanye West or Justin Bieber of the Baptist\nclassroom, but I really thought I was being prepared to do something big for\nthe name of Jesus. I envisioned myself teaching large crowds, seeing\nhundreds\u2014no, wait\u2014thousands<\/em> come to\nChrist every time I preached. It was lunacy! Not because Jesus cannot do big\nthings, but because I can\u2019t. What I was imagining as my future was really more\nabout me than the kingdom of Christ.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It never\nstruck me how strange and self-aggrandizing this whole mindset was until I was\nsitting in class one day. Our professor asked us to apply a theological concept\nto local church ministry, and his question presupposed a church of about\n100\u2013300 people. A student raised his hand and gave an outlandish answer. When\nthe professor asked him to clarify what he was saying, he said something like\nthis: \u201cOh, I\u2019m sorry. The Lord has called me to lead and pastor a megachurch,\nso I was applying it to my<\/em> calling.\u201d The\nprofessor just stared, chuckled a little, and moved on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In that\nmoment, the Spirit began to cause me to see that I and many of my fellow\nseminarians were viewing the local church as a means to an end. In an age of\ncelebrity pastors, the conference circuit, and personality-driven ministry,\nmany of us were ready and willing to jump into the machine and become another\n\u201cproduct\u201d to be sold, marketed, and embraced by the Christian masses. (For the\nrecord, that student hasn\u2019t led a megachurch.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n As I\nemerged from the heady atmosphere of seminary, I just assumed that the longer I\nwas in ministry the more I would see the antithesis of this attitude among the\npastors I would serve alongside. While I believe most pastors are driven by a\ndesire to humbly serve their congregations, I am still shocked by how many\nthink they are destined to have the influence of men like John Piper, Tim\nKeller, and R. C. Sproul.<\/p>\n\n\n\n All of us\nare excited by the prospect of leaving a great legacy, of being used by God in\nways that will echo long beyond our lifetime. That\u2019s not a bad thing. The\nproblem is we misunderstand what it means to leave a legacy and be used by God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Mighty Have Fallen<\/p>\n\n\n\n Every time a\nwell-known or celebrity pastor1<\/sup><\/a> has to leave the ministry, people\nwant to know why. How could men of God, who seemingly have all the answers,\nfail? On the most obvious level, they fail because they are sinners, and\nsinners will sin. Nevertheless, the downfall of celebrity pastors is usually a\ndirect result of their pursuit of a platform, their desire to begin or lead a\nmovement, their drive to achieve big things for themselves. While all pastors\nare still sinners, the particular danger of this lie is that if you make your\nministry about you, the fallout of your sin will be even worse than it would\nhave been otherwise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At the\nheart of this lie is the desire for significance, relevance, recognition, and\ninfluence based on our own gifts. It is, in short, pride. It is the desire for\npower over others to bend them to our will. We see our congregations as a means\nto our own end rather than as people who are highly valued by God, and for whom\nChrist died.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sometimes\nbelieving this lie leads to an explicit moral failure. The evangelical church\nin the United States has seen too many well-known pastors leave their\nministries in disgrace. Constant attempts to increase numbers (of both people\nand dollars), to write books, to speak at conferences, and to cast one\u2019s own\nvision are exhausting. Even when things are going well, there is pressure to\nkeep expanding your platform. This pressure can drive some pastors to try to\ncope in unhealthy ways. One pastor may engage in adultery or inappropriate\nrelationships. Another may not commit adultery, but his marriage still\ncollapses under the pressure he puts on himself. Still other pastors may become\naddicted to alcohol or drugs. All this may come from a struggle to cope with\nthe extraordinary pressure of casting our own vision and leading a movement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At other\ntimes, however, there may be no hint of what we would usually call a moral\nfailure. Instead, there is simply the quiet swelling of the ego, the shifting\nto a more autocratic style of leadership, the manipulation of other people to\nbuild our own significance. While this is less shocking and less likely to make\nthe news, it is no less serious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Once a\npastor has left the ministry as a result of believing the lie of the achiever,\nthere is still hope. Some pastors accept responsibility for their sin. They\naccept the charges that their ego was out of control and that they had\nrelentlessly pursued the building of their platform. They acknowledge that\ntheir identity was wrapped up in their own name recognition, rather than in the\nname above all names. While the falls of these pastors send shockwaves, their\nrepentance can go on to provide comfort. When pastors own their sin and express\ntheir need for prayer and forgiveness, sometimes they may be restored to a\nhumbler and more faithful form of ministry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Shepherds Anonymous<\/p>\n\n\n\n While there\nis the possibility of repentance and restoration after believing this lie, it\nwould be better to not believe the lie in the first place. We can avoid it by\npaying closer attention to a biblical metaphor about pastors. The Bible talks\nabout pastoring in terms of shepherding (Acts\n20:28<\/a>; 1 Pet 5:1\u20133<\/a>), and shepherding isn\u2019t meant to be\nglamorous. The reason shepherding is such a perfect analogy for pastoral\nministry is that it is often hard, unrecognized work for the good of those who\nmay never thank you. The Bible mentions many shepherds, but it names only a\nfew.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On the\nfateful day Joseph becomes a slave, he is walking around the fields of Shechem,\nlooking for his brothers, when he encounters a man\u2014presumably a shepherd. This\nshepherd tells Joseph, \u201cI heard your brothers saying they were going to Dothan\u201d\n(see Gen\n37<\/a>). If this busybody shepherd doesn\u2019t run into Joseph wandering in\na pasture, Joseph is never betrayed by his brothers and sold into slavery. He\nnever goes to Egypt and never saves the nations. Instead, everyone dies of\nfamine and the bloodline of the Messiah is eradicated. So this shepherd is\npretty important to the history of salvation, yet he is nameless! It is the\nsame with the shepherds at the birth of Christ.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Even the\nfew shepherds whose names we know are most important for their role in the\nnarrative of redemption. Moses, the deliverer, was once a shepherd. Then Jesus\ncame along\u2014the true and better deliverer! David went from being a shepherd to\nbeing a king, and his bloodline carried the lineage of the Messiah. Then Jesus\ncame along as the Son of David who is the King of kings. The fame of these\nshepherds points to Jesus, the only Shepherd who saves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Who Is Pastor Steve?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Not enough\npastors desire to be Steve Lewis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The city\nwhere I pastor is full of people whose faith was shaped by \u201cPastor Steve.\u201d He\nwas a man who truly believed the gospel, faithfully served his church, and then\ndied. To my knowledge, Steve never wrote a book or spoke at a major conference.\nHe didn\u2019t have a blog or his own personal logo. He was simply a faithful pastor\nwhose gospel legacy has lived on well beyond his earthly life. He never became\nfamous, but he did make Jesus famous.<\/p>\n\n\n\n With so\nmany guys aiming to be the next great conference speaker, I fear few will ever\nbecome Steve Lewis. Not enough young pastors recognize that pastoral ministry\nisn\u2019t flashy; it is faithful service. It isn\u2019t about building a brand; it is\nabout pointing people to Jesus. It isn\u2019t about growing a platform; it is about\nadvancing the kingdom. In my own denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention,\nthere are roughly 46,000 active senior pastors. The work of those shepherds\nwhose name is never known by anyone outside their congregation is just as\ncentral to Christ\u2019s plan to build his church and save sinners as the work of\npastors with major name recognition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Now, it is\nnot a sin to have a large influence. The sin is when a pastor allows himself to\ntake a place that only Jesus can take. This is a real temptation, since it is\nnot uncommon for congregations to subconsciously place sinners in a position\nthat only the Savior can occupy. This happens in churches small and large.\nPeople associate a congregation with its pastor to such an extent that they\ncall it \u201cPastor so-and-so\u2019s\u201d church.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Faced with\nthis reality, pastors willingly allow themselves to take the seat that belongs\nonly to Jesus. But when we begin to believe that a church is our<\/em> church, we\u2019ve taken the place of\nChrist. When we allow the congregation to believe it\u2019s because of our clever\nand engaging sermons that sinners are being redeemed, rather than through\nChrist\u2019s work in the hearts of men and women, we are taking people\u2019s hopes and\nplacing them on our shoulders. We cannot be the hope for our congregations;\nonly Jesus can be their hope. Our job is not to cast our vision; our job is to\nannounce Jesus\u2019s promise to save sinners and change nations. The hope we give\npeople is not that we will lead them into an exciting future of gospel transformation,\nbut that Jesus has already purchased the guarantee of a world transformed by\nthe gospel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pastors\n(and future pastors) who presume that God is going to give them a large\nplatform are seeing the church, the bride of Christ, as something to use for\nselfish gain rather than a people to love and serve. If you use the church for\nyour own advantage, you\u2019ve begun abusing someone else\u2019s bride. The church\u2019s\nBridegroom spoke the universe into existence, died, and came back from the\ndead, and is returning with a mysterious name tattooed on his thigh and the\npower to strike down the nations with his words (Rev\n19:11\u201316<\/a>). As a general rule, don\u2019t mess with guys who have thigh\ntattoos. They are tougher than you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When we\nwillingly claim the role of hero, we will always become the villain. We can\navoid the lie of a super-sized ministry by reminding ourselves that Jesus is\nthe hero, not us. One of the ways I try to protect my heart from this lie is to\nconstantly remind myself that God has called pastors to a ministry of death to\nself: Death in me, life in the church family (2 Cor\n4:12<\/a>). The truth is, pastors don\u2019t have all the answers; we just\nknow the One who does. And he has two nail-pierced feet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So do not\nshirk your duties or despise your office because Christ has not given you a\nlarge platform. Your calling isn\u2019t to fame; it\u2019s to the difficult task of\nloving and caring for the sheep Jesus has sought and purchased. Augustine of\nHippo once summarized the responsibilities of a pastor this way (a quote I come\nback to often):<\/p>\n\n\n\n The turbulent\nhave to be corrected, the faint-hearted cheered up, the weary supported; the\ngospel\u2019s opponents need to be refuted, its insidious enemies guarded against;\nthe unlearned need to be taught, the indolent stirred up, the argumentative\nchecked; the proud must be put in their place, the desperate set on their feet,\nthose engaged in quarrels reconciled; the needy have to be helped, the\noppressed to be liberated, the good to be given your backing, the bad to be\ntolerated; all must be loved. (Sermon<\/em>\n340.1)<\/p>\n\n\n\n That\u2019s not\nglamorous, but it is our job.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Conclusion<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m aware of\nthe apparent irony in writing this chapter. A guy who has written books telling\nguys not to write books or speak at conferences? Well, not exactly. What I am\nsaying is that if you serve Christ as a faithful pastor and, in the midst of\nthis service, God gives you a larger platform, then use it well. But don\u2019t aim\nfor fame. Instead, work hard and pray that God will keep you faithful. C. S.\nLewis wrote, \u201cYou can\u2019t get second things by putting them first; you can get\nsecond things only by putting first things first.\u201d2<\/sup><\/a> If you aim for\nfame over faithfulness, you will end up frustrated and unfulfilled, always\nstriving to make a name for yourself. If you aim for faithfulness, it\u2019s\npossible that you may get fame thrown in\u2014but it won\u2019t control you. You\u2019ll be\nable to hold it lightly and recognize that it\u2019s fleeting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you\nthink Jesus has called you to create a brand and market yourself as a celebrity\npastor, here is what I can tell you for sure: No, he hasn\u2019t! Jesus has called\nyou to serve as an under-shepherd for him as he shepherds his church. It\u2019s not\nthat he needs you; it\u2019s just that, in his grace, he has given you a seat on the\nbench so you can be part of the team. Do not seek great things for yourself (Jer 45:5<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you\nbelieve the lie that Jesus has called you to lead a movement, then the only\nmovement you\u2019ve been called to is ushering yourself out of the pulpit and into\nthe pew. Stay humble, stay faithful, serve well\u2014and be forgotten.<\/p>\n\n\n\n REFLECTION QUESTIONS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. How often do I envision fame\nfor my name rather than the increased fame of Jesus\u2019 name?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. Do I shirk the difficult tasks\nof pastoral ministry because I feel they are beneath me?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. How drawn am I to a ministry\nthat will bring me notoriety versus a ministry that no one will ever know\nabout?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 4. How often do I feel like the\nchurch owes me something?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 5. Am I content to love the\npeople Christ has entrusted to me, or am I using them to gain opportunities for\nmyself?<\/p>\n\n\n\n ACTION STEPS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. Ask other elders or pastors in\nyour congregation for accountability regarding your motives and your opportunities\nfor recognition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. Build\ninto your weekly routine some kind of humbling form of service to the local\nchurch, and make it a point to not seek recognition for it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. At\nregular intervals, meet with a biblical counselor or other pastors who will ask\nprobing questions to ascertain the condition of your heart.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2<\/p>\n\n\n\n THE IRON CHEF<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNo one has ever fed them like me\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n One of my guilty pleasures in seminary was to binge-watch TV marathons of\nIron Chef<\/em>. No, not Iron Chef America<\/em>. I\u2019m talking about the\noriginal Japanese show, complete with voiceovers. The premise was simple: Two\nchefs, pitted against each other in a kitchen that looked like a gladiator\narena, were tasked with making several dishes that featured the same primary\ningredient. The difference between winning and losing, between success and\nfailure, was entirely up to the presentation and arrangement of the\ningredients. Watching someone make a three-course meal, along with a dessert,\nout of octopus is one of the most strangely satisfying things you could ever\nwitness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A few\nyears after seminary, the lessons I learned from all those hours watching Iron Chef<\/em> were still with me. In one of\nmy ministry assignments, I preached a sermon that elicited far more praise than\nit deserved. Numerous congregants approached me and told me things like, \u201cYou\nare so gifted! You need to preach here more often!\u201d Others said things like,\n\u201cNo one has ever fed my soul like you!\u201d I took it all in and believed every\nword of it. Just like on Iron Chef,<\/em>\nthe presentation makes all the difference. And I thought I was good at it!<\/p>\n\n\n\n As my\npreaching load increased, I heard more and more compliments. My self-confidence\nsoared, as did my ego. However, it all came crashing down because of two things\nI overheard. First, after a guest speaker finished his sermon, the same person\nwho told me I fed them like no one else said those exact words to our guest\npreacher. I felt betrayed. I mean, his sermon wasn\u2019t that<\/em> good. Second, I learned that one of those who acted as my\nbiggest cheerleader had a secret agenda: to use my preaching to try and drive a\nwedge between me and the primary teaching pastor. The goal was nefarious and\nthe plan was working masterfully. I was sickened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Empty Calories<\/p>\n\n\n\n One of the\nsaddest things I\u2019ve ever seen in ministry was the life of a pastor who had\nsuccessfully revitalized a church. Young and recently graduated from seminary,\nthis man became pastor of a congregation that had dwindled from 150\u2013200 people\non a Sunday morning to no more than a couple dozen. After about a year in the\npulpit, this very gifted communicator had led the church on a massive\nturnaround, and regular attendance grew by well over a hundred people. As a\nresult, this pastor attracted wider attention in our community. Yet, not two\nyears into his tenure, cracks began to form in his ministry. People were\nconstantly telling him that he was gifted and that God had big plans for him.\nMany of his congregants told him that they had never heard preaching like his\nbefore and that one day he would surely be famous. And he believed every single\nword of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He then\nbegan privately boasting about how he was the best preacher for at least a few\nhundred miles. Perhaps he was the best expositor in North Carolina. He even\nwent so far as to tell a group of pastors that he was on the verge of\ndeveloping a huge platform for ministry that would gain him national\nrecognition. About six months passed and nothing had happened. There was no big\nbreakthrough, no national recognition, no conference invitations. In his\nfrustration, he began seeking something, anything, to make him feel empowered.\nSo, he began having an affair with what he called \u201cthe most attractive woman in\nthe church.\u201d His rationale: If she wanted a relationship with him, then he must\nbe special, unique, and impressive. He was looking for a functional savior.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A few\nmonths into the affair, his wife found out. Their marriage collapsed. The\nchurch imploded, and the name of Jesus was marred. Now, five years later, that\nchurch is barely limping along as it attempts to rebuild its credibility in the\ncommunity. That pastor is now divorced. His ex-wife and children will forever\nbe scarred by what started as a seemingly innocent belief: \u201cNo one has ever fed\nus like you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Even if\nthis lie doesn\u2019t lead to a moral failure, it still causes great harm. Over the\npast few months, I\u2019ve started listening to the sermons of one of the most\nwell-known \u201ccelebrity pastors\u201d in the United States. This man is an\nunbelievably effective communicator. His command of language, his hold over an\naudience, and his ability to draw in listeners are almost without equal. Yet\nwhat I have found striking about this man\u2019s sermons is how empty they are.\nThere\u2019s almost no reading of Scripture, let alone exposition of the text.\nInstead, he tells his audience that God has given him a \u201cword.\u201d It\u2019s all very\npractical, all very helpful, and almost totally divorced from the Scriptures,\nthe work of Christ, and grace. Even more, there is no respect for the holiness\nof God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yet things\nhave not always been this way. I remember listening to this man\u2019s early sermons\n(many years ago) and they contained all the necessary ingredients of a\nChrist-honoring sermon. Nevertheless, as this pastor\u2019s platform grew, he began\ndropping the exposition of Scripture in favor of his masterful communication\nabilities and creative illustrations. Now, many years later, his sermons are\nfilled with attention-grabbing insights, but they lack the Scriptures. His\nmessages are full of good things, but devoid of Good News. I\u2019m convinced this\nis the natural progression when we assume that we ourselves, rather than\nScripture, are the necessary ingredient to good preaching. If you want empty\nsermons, make sure you and your personality take center stage. On the other\nhand, if you desire to serve your people a feast of truth, ensure that your\nsermons are full of Scripture, God-centered theology, and gospel grace. When we\nbecome focused primarily on what we<\/em>\nhave to say, we end up saying nothing at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Ingredient List<\/p>\n\n\n\n After the\nshock of finding out that people weren\u2019t complimenting my preaching out of pure\nmotives, I paid extra-close attention to every detail of the preaching pastor\u2019s\nsermons. They were good! They were quite different in style from my own, but\nthey were excellent sermons. This launched me into a months-long survey of\npreaching styles, as I took note of good and not-so-good sermons by well-known\npreachers. I listened to as much preaching as my ears could stand\u2014John Piper,\nLigon Duncan, Thabiti Anyabwile, Matt Chandler, Eric Mason, Tony Merida, J. D.\nGreear, Mark Dever, H. B. Charles Jr., and John MacArthur. My conclusion? They\nwere all very good preachers, and yet they were all very different<\/em> preachers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What made\ntheir sermons so good is that they all used the same ingredients:\nChrist-centered exposition, a high view of God, and a hearty helping of\nscandalous gospel grace. The only difference was in how they assembled and\npresented the ingredients. It turns out good sermons aren\u2019t like Iron Chef<\/em> after all. The key isn\u2019t the\nstyle or manner of presentation (although that is important); the key is the\ningredient list!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Let me\njust say this as straightforwardly as I can:<\/p>\n\n\n\n 1) You are not as good a preacher\nas you think you are.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2) Many\nof the compliments you\u2019ve received are likely meant to stroke your ego, further\nan agenda, or to simply be polite.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3) No\nmatter how convinced you are of your giftedness in the pulpit, you are not\nactually doing anything different from the many pastors who have come before\nyou. Sure, your specific presentation of the necessary ingredients of a good\nsermon may be nuanced by your personality, but you are serving up the same meal\nas everyone else who preaches the gospel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n True, someone\nin your church might have told you that you preach in a way that no pastor (or\nat least their last pastor) ever has. But unless this person has come from a\ngospel-less church, they\u2019re telling you a lie. All gospel-focused,\nChrist-honoring, expositional-sermon-preaching pastors are serving the same\nmeat and potatoes in their sermons. I\u2019m all for careful preparation and\nstriving for excellence, but the meals you\u2019re providing in your sermons are not<\/em> better than those of any other\nfaithful preacher. You may garnish the serving dish differently, but you didn\u2019t\nmake the meal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Listen Intently, Read Widely<\/p>\n\n\n\n Once you\nrealize that your ability to communicate Scripture isn\u2019t something to be\nprideful over\u2014and that you\u2019re not as good a preacher as you assume\u2014you\u2019re faced\nwith the following tension: \u201cHow do I continue to become a better preacher\nwhile at the same time growing in my sense of humility in the pulpit?\u201d I don\u2019t\nbelieve there is a one-size-fits-all answer, but two things I recommend are\nlistening intently and reading widely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n First,\nlisten intently. Observe good expositors and take note of how they highlight\nJesus or the gospel in any given text. Pay close attention to how they turn a\nphrase in a heart-grabbing moment of textual application. Emulate their\nfaithfulness to the text without emulating their style. Your unique personality\nhas been created by God and is used in your communication of his word. Be\nyourself in the pulpit, but be shaped by the faithful preaching of other\npastors. I also strongly recommend a steady diet of sermons from pastors of\nvarying traditions, ethnicities, and styles. Acquainted with a variety of\npreachers, you will be able to see how they relate the gospel to different\naudiences, and you will be less tempted to imitate any one of them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Second,\nread widely. One of the most useful and humbling resources I have found for my\nown development as a preacher has been church history. No matter how well I may\narticulate a doctrine, Jonathan Edwards (1703\u20131758) did it better. That\u2019s\nhumbling. Just when I think I\u2019ve waxed eloquent, I realize I\u2019m nothing more\nthan a poorly contextualized, everything-must-be-said-in-140-characters-or-less\necho of what Edwards said masterfully.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When I\nlook over the manuscripts of even my best sermons, they read like poorly\nwritten knock-offs of good sermons from men like John Chrysostom (349\u2013407).\nChrysostom\u2014whose name means literally, \u201cJohn with the golden tongue\u201d\u2014is one of\nthe greatest preachers in church history. I strongly encourage regular reading\nof his sermons and biblical commentaries. This is from one of his Easter sermons,\ntalking about the resurrection defeating hell:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hell was in an uproar because it was done away\nwith.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It was in an uproar because it is\nmocked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It was in an uproar, for it is\ndestroyed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is in an uproar, for it is\nannihilated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is in an uproar, for it is now\nmade captive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hell took a body, and discovered\nGod.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It took earth, and encountered\nHeaven.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It took what it saw, and was\novercome by what it did not see.<\/p>\n\n\n\n O death, where is thy sting?<\/p>\n\n\n\n O Hades, where is thy victory?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Christ is Risen, and you, O death, are\nannihilated!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Christ is Risen, and the evil ones\nare cast down!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Christ is Risen, and the angels\nrejoice!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Christ is Risen, and life is\nliberated!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Christ is Risen, and the tomb is\nemptied of its dead;<\/p>\n\n\n\n for Christ having risen from the\ndead,<\/p>\n\n\n\n is become the first-fruits of those\nwho have fallen asleep.<\/p>\n\n\n\n To Him be Glory and Power forever and ever.\nAmen!1<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n While the\nstyle is better suited to Chrysostom\u2019s fourth-century Constantinople than to\nmodern America, this is still better than your (and my) best Easter sermon. No\nwonder it is read aloud every year in Eastern Orthodox churches! Even though\nnone of us have ever preached something this good, reading great sermons from\nthe past constantly prompts me to think through this question: \u201cHow do I preach\nlike that in a twenty-first century context?\u201d Reading church history will\nhumble you and equip you to be a better pastor and a better preacher.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Write Sermons in Community<\/p>\n\n\n\n While\nlistening intently and reading widely are good ways to begin the process of\nstaying humble while improving your preaching, an even more effective practice\nfor me has been our church\u2019s practice of writing sermons in community. The\nfirst time I heard Mark Dever, pastor of Capitol Hill Baptist Church, explain\nthe value of performing a group sermon review after each Sunday\u2019s message, it seemed\ncrazy to me. How could you ever preach a sermon in front of people who are\nexamining every word with a critical ear? How do you preach to those who are\npreparing to give you verbal pushback?<\/p>\n\n\n\n This\nreminded me of the TV show American Idol<\/em>\n(which I never liked). While part of me took some sick pleasure in watching\npeople act like they\u2019re the next Adele while sounding more like Clint Eastwood,\nI found the premise of having a panel of judges publically critique people to\nbe terrifying. I thought doing a group sermon review would be like inviting my\nchurch\u2019s Simon Cowell to lambast me with harsh criticism for no good reason.\nYikes! But this is the kind of thing you need to help you stop believing the\nlie that the main ingredient in good preaching is you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Our church\nhas instituted weekly reviews of each Sunday\u2019s sermon, and it has produced\nexactly what Dever promised it would: clarity in gospel communication. Each\nThursday, our staff and interns meet to review the sermon manuscript for the\nmessage to be delivered on Sunday. Then, on the following Tuesday, we review\nthe message that was delivered. The benefits of this practice are numerous. Let\nme encourage you with a few of the most important:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sermon review increases gospel clarity.<\/strong> Having multiple eyes on your\nmanuscript and multiple, critical sets of ears listening to your sermon will\nincrease the care with which you communicate the gospel and exposit the text.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sermon review makes your sermons better.<\/strong> The Spirit draws us into community\nand gives each of us unique, complementary gifts. Nearly every week, our sermon\nreviews produce some of the best content found in each week\u2019s message. The\ncollective wisdom and insight of men who love Jesus and love your congregation\nwill help you better apply the text to the hearts of your people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sermon review produces humility.<\/strong> It is an incredibly humbling thing\nto invite criticism. Preaching is already a very \u201cexposing\u201d exercise as you\npour out your soul in front of your congregation. It leaves you feeling\nvulnerable. Thus, inviting critical feedback and comments seems like madness,\nbut it isn\u2019t. It only serves to encourage your heart and to produce increased\nhumility before your people and your leadership team. We all need more\nhumility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sermon review builds good preachers.<\/strong> A regular review process is\nimmensely beneficial for younger preachers on a teaching team. We\u2019ve seen the\nincredible value of this practice in equipping our interns (future pastors and\nchurch planters) as they are invited into the sermon prep, delivery, and\nfeedback process. If you want to build preachers, this process is a must.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This\nprocess is meant to ensure that we are doing the very thing Paul has commanded\nus to do: rightly handle the Scriptures (2 Tim 2:15<\/a>).\nJesus saved us and made us part of a people. All of the Christian life is meant\nto be lived in community. Why then would we assume that the central practice of\nthe Christian rhythm of life (the proclaiming and hearing of the Scriptures)\nought to be accomplished in isolation? No! The crafting of the sermon ought to\ntake place in the same way the hearing of the sermon occurs\u2014in community!<\/p>\n\n\n\n In short,\ninviting more cooks into the kitchen will produce a better meal of gospel\nclarity while reinforcing the awareness that you are simply presenting the same\ningredients as many other faithful expositors in your church and around the\nworld. The more we can be reminded that it\u2019s the ingredients of the sermon that\nmatter, the more we will work to make sure the ingredients are what take center\nstage. When we become consumed with our ability to present the ingredients, we\nwill abandon the ingredients in favor of our favorite garnishing techniques.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Conclusion<\/p>\n\n\n\n Those of us\nwho are faithful to the Scriptures must preach with a Christ-centered\nhermeneutic, a high view of God, and a celebration of grace. What matters is\nthat all those ingredients are present. As you work out the stylistic details\nof how you present the Scriptures in your preaching, keep in mind that some of\nthe praise you\u2019ve received for your ability to preach might be warranted. Some\npastors are genuinely gifted communicators. However, some praise might be tied\nto an agenda that involves stroking your ego, a desire to be polite, personal\npreferences, or someone wanting to encourage you simply because they like you\nas a person.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is\nequally true that some of the criticisms you\u2019ve received are valid. However,\nsome criticism is likely tied to your listener\u2019s personal preferences. So\ninstead of focusing on the praise or criticism you receive, remember that you\nare but one in a long line of gospel communicators. You are nothing more and\nnothing less than an instrument of grace in the hands of the only One who truly\npreaches with authority: Jesus. So, garnish the meal well with your own style,\nbut recognize that the meat and potatoes you serve are the same as what every\nother gospel communicator is offering. Don\u2019t get cocky. We all offer up the\nsame Bread of Life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n REFLECTION QUESTIONS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. When I write a sermon, is my\nfirst thought \u201cWhat does the text say?\u201d or \u201cWhat can I say about this text?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. Do I outline a passage looking\nfor how it points readers\/hearers to Christ, or how it can point to what I want\nto communicate?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. How do I respond when people\ncompliment my sermon (not just outwardly, but inwardly)? Am I humbled by the\nworking of the word or am I proud of my own communication abilities?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 4. How willing am I to be\ncritiqued, examined, and engaged by others over what I am or am not preaching?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 5. How often do I welcome\ncritical feedback on my sermon content or presentation?<\/p>\n\n\n\n ACTION STEPS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. Invite your church leaders\ninto your sermon writing and sermon review process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. Critically\nassess the motivations and goals of your heart as you think about your\npreaching.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. Consume\nChrist-honoring sermons from throughout church history and today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 4. Seek\nout constructive feedback. When you are corrected, receive it in a spirit of\nopenness and a desire to improve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3<\/p>\n\n\n\n THE ACHIEVER<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cJesus loves me, this I earn\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n A good friend of mine had been a pastor for a number of years and his\ncongregation adored him. He was folksy in a way that wasn\u2019t cheesy, but was\ntruly endearing\u2014think Hee-Haw<\/em>, minus\nthe Hee (and the Haw). He was kind and made time for everyone in the church. He\nnever missed a chance to encourage older saints in the twilight years of life.\nThen he offended the wrong family and a firestorm of rumors began to swirl\nabout him. Some of the charges were absurd and mean-spirited. After a few\nmonths of this \u201cliving nightmare,\u201d as he described it, he finally broke. His\nresponse to the church was angry, even vicious, almost enraged. He felt\nvalidated in attempting to deliver a heavy-handed \u201cknockout blow\u201d to those\nopposing and criticizing him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He reached\nout to me, and we began to talk through all that was going on. As I attempted\nto probe into his soul, I found that he was a deeply wounded man. He was\nconstantly criticized by his father, and years later he was still very angry\nabout it. As we talked through some of his sinful responses to the criticisms\nhe\u2019d received, he realized that his anger wasn\u2019t really at the people who spoke\nill of his sense of style (he couldn\u2019t match pants and a shirt to save his\nlife) or his folksy humor. Instead, he was angry at his hypercritical father.\nHe admitted that he never felt affirmed by his dad and it made him angry. Every\ncriticism would take him back to being ridiculed by the man who was meant to\nbuild him up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The more\nwe talked, the more he realized that much of his desire to serve as a pastor\nwas grounded in the hope that his ministry might elicit some degree of\naffirmation from his otherwise cold and distant father. He would hear stories\nabout how his \u201cold man\u201d would tell his coworkers that his boy was a \u201cdarn good\npreacher.\u201d Being a pastor made this man feel like he was able to finally earn\nhis dad\u2019s approval and love. Shortly after realizing that his primary goal in\nleading a church wasn\u2019t to shepherd souls but to earn approval, my friend\nrightly began a process of phasing out of ministry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Seeking Approval and Doing Penance<\/p>\n\n\n\n There is a\nnever-ending stream of research that details the stresses and emotional wounds\nendured by a pastor during his tenure in ministry. However, to my knowledge,\nthere has been no scientific study of the emotional wounds received prior to\nentering the ministry. In my experience, many pastors and aspiring pastors\nendured painful childhoods\u2014either a lack of approval or some level of\nabandonment by their fathers. As I get to know aspiring pastors and those\nalready in the pastorate, I now attempt to learn more about their family\nhistory. I ask about their background and inquire about its role in their\npursuit of ministry. Every man I\u2019ve pressed on this issue has admitted that his\nbackground, to varying degrees, played a role in his efforts to become a pastor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Becoming a\npastor because of your personal background is not wrong. God uses events and\nrelationships to guide and shape us. But I\u2019ve met a lot of men whose\nbackgrounds have led them to serve in pastoral ministry for all the wrong\nreasons. In more than a decade of pastoral ministry, and nearly a decade in\ntheological education, I\u2019ve met some deeply wounded men who pursued the\npastorate in order to achieve something \u201chonorable\u201d in life. Many men who\nbecome pastors do so because they are seeking validation and approval in\nresponse to a real or perceived lack of affirmation throughout their lives. The\napproval they experienced from older men in the church or from other pastors\nserves to soothe the ache of their hearts. Using the church to meet this kind\nof unmet emotional need is a soft form of spiritual abuse. If this is why you\nbecame a pastor, inevitably you will begin loving those who are meeting your\nneeds and subconsciously despising those who do not. You will prioritize care\nfor those from whom you feel you gain something and begin ignoring those who do\nnot acknowledge their love for or value of you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Similarly,\nthere seems to be an endless supply of aspiring pastors who lived a raucous\nlifestyle before coming to Christ and want to make up for it by becoming\npastors. This is less a zeal to let others know what grace has done in their\nlives and more a sense that they must atone for their past by \u201cserving God\u201d in\nfull-time ministry. Every semester, it seems, I meet at least one student who\nwas recently saved out of some kind of addiction or party-animal lifestyle and\nnow wants to make sure he doesn\u2019t waste the rest of his life working a\nmeaningless job. This impetus is largely based in a horribly na\u00efve\nunderstanding of the doctrine of vocation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At the\nheart of these motivations is the desire for validation, the belief that the\nrole of pastor will help you know somehow that you are worth something. This\nreason for becoming a pastor is rabidly anti-gospel. Men who preach a\nscandalous gospel of grace\u2014which declares we cannot earn God the Father\u2019s\napproval, and we shouldn\u2019t try, because Jesus has earned it for us in our\nplace\u2014are at the same time attempting to earn approval, whether it is from\ntheir earthly father or someone else. It\u2019s a sad and painful blind spot in\ntheir understanding of the gospel and its application to their own broken\nhearts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When Jesus\nsaves sinners, there is no disclaimer that they must make up for their sinful\npast. Rather, Jesus pays for our past and calls us to walk in obedience in the\nfuture. Far too many churches assume, and even teach, that men who have been\nradically converted should respond to grace by entering the ministry. On the\ncontrary, in response to grace we ought to give grace. Grace carries with it no\ndemand, but it does produce specific aspirations in life\u2014sometimes including an\naspiration toward pastoral ministry. Nevertheless, it is anti-gospel to assume\nthat your salvation necessitates atonement for wasted years or a sinful past.\nIt doesn\u2019t. Salvation is a work of grace.<\/p>\n\n\n\n My Struggle<\/p>\n\n\n\n My own\nbackground has led me to routinely wrestle through my motivations to discover\nif I am attempting to earn or prove anything by serving as a pastor. I can tell\nyou that, at different points, I was attempting to do both.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I grew up\nin a region where the cultural norm for friends and families was one of\nrestrained affirmation. That\u2019s not to say that every parent was unloving toward\ntheir children or that they always failed to provide encouragement. Mine\ncertainly told me they loved me and they cared for me. However, the normal\ncultural ethic was largely grounded in the Appalachian mountain culture that\npermeated the area where I was raised (a culture that prizes strength and\nresilience). In such an environment that encourages toughness and hard work,\ndispleasure is easily voiced and silence usually is meant to convey\naffirmation. Strangely, this regional approach to friendships and family life\nnever made sense to me, even as a young child (maybe it\u2019s because of all the\nhugging and unrelenting encouragement I witnessed on the TV show Full House<\/em> during my formative years).\nBut it naturally inspired me to pursue \u201crespectable achievements\u201d that would\ncause my friends and extended family members to voice their approval.\nAdditionally, for a variety of reasons, a few members of my family didn\u2019t carry\na great deal of respect in the community, while some of my relatives were\nhighly respected. I was driven by this \u201cline of respectability,\u201d and I\ndesperately wanted to be on the right side of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When Jesus\nredeemed me, I was burdened in that very moment to make his name known. I\nwasn\u2019t sure what that meant, but I assumed it meant some kind of pastoral\nministry. So, from eight years of age onward, I told everyone that I desired to\nbe a pastor. As soon as I entered my early teenage years, I realized that in my\nfamily\u2019s cultural milieu being a pastor guaranteed family pride. Therefore,\ndogmatic assertions of my \u201ccalling\u201d would, on occasion, bring my family and\nfriends to express pride and affirmation toward me. I liked it. Moreover, a\nyoung man who desired to pastor a church would certainly become part of the\nsocially respectable branch of his family tree, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n As I\nentered my adult years, I began to wonder what I was actually aspiring to.\nPastoral ministry? Something else? Thankfully, during my late teens and early\ntwenties, the Lord brought a number of mentors into my life who very bluntly\nconfronted me over my motivations. They pressed hard to help me determine\nwhether I was pursuing cultural and family affirmation or if I truly wanted to\nlay down my life for Christ\u2019s bride, the church. These men very directly called\nout some of my desires for approval and it changed my life. They told me that I\nhad nothing to prove to God the Father. He already fully approved of me in\nChrist. It was the most freeing thing I\u2019d heard in my young adult life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Once I\nbegan to see myself and the gospel rightly, I was struck by the words of the\nchildren\u2019s song, \u201cJesus loves me.\u201d Some of my yearning to serve as a pastor was\nreally an attempt to earn what I already had: Christ\u2019s love. The song that my\nheart was singing was not, \u201cJesus loves me, this I know,\u201d but rather \u201cJesus\nloves me, this I earn.\u201d What a horrible thing to believe, even if\nsubconsciously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I had\nsuperimposed on the Creator the hard-to-impress nature of some members of my\nfamily and our friends. I was attempting to earn the approval of my peers as\nwell as my Heavenly Father. I was operating with an anti-gospel mindset. Here\nis the scandalous truth of the gospel: Jesus doesn\u2019t redeem achievers; he only\nredeems failures. God the Father doesn\u2019t exclusively love winners but losers.\nThat\u2019s good news, because all that really exists are losers and failures. Yet\nbecause of my own sin and my background, my heart lied to me and made demands\non me that Jesus never made.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Even now,\nmy motivations are not always pure. In fact, I routinely expose the motivations\nof my heart to others in order to keep those motivations in check. I hope that\nif my reasons for serving as a pastor should ever become disqualifying that I\nwould be told I need to step down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What Are You Trying to Prove?<\/p>\n\n\n\n If I could\nsit down with every seminary student and aspiring pastor for one conversation,\nI would ask them: What do you want to achieve in ministry? Is there anything\nyou are trying to prove to yourself or anyone else? Is there some sin from your\npast that you still experience guilt for\u2014something that causes you to take on\nministry tasks as an attempt to make atonement? If you never pastor a church\nthat grows, how will you feel? What if you attempt to plant a church and it\nfails? What will your response be if your ministry is largely anonymous,\nwithout any books, blogs, conference invites, or respected titles? How you\nanswer those questions will reveal a lot about why you are aspiring to be a\npastor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I think\nmost guys know how they ought<\/em> to\nanswer those questions. But if you\u2019re honest with yourself and others, what\nwould you really say? I\u2019ve pastored churches that didn\u2019t really grow. It can be\nfrustrating. Now I\u2019m the pastor of a church that has grown steadily since we\nplanted it a few years ago. If you think pastoring a growing church will make\nyou feel like you\u2019ve achieved enough to be satisfied, it won\u2019t. If you believe\nwriting something that gains a wide audience will cause you to feel\naccomplished, you will be sorely disappointed. If you are convinced that\nearning a lot of degrees will enable you to look in the mirror and think, \u201cI\u2019m\na respectable person,\u201d you\u2019ll wake up one day and realize you\u2019re still a bum.\nJust a bum with lots of student debt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Whatever\nyou are attempting to achieve for your own satisfaction or to earn the approval\nof others, pastoral ministry will not supply it. Whatever you may be attempting\nto atone for from your past, Jesus already paid for it. He doesn\u2019t need your\npittance. At its core, all attempts to achieve in order to earn approval are\ngrounded in anti-gospel assumptions. In Christ, you already have the only\napproval that matters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Conclusion<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you enter\nthe pastorate with a bent toward achievement for the sake of approval or\naccomplishments as a means of atonement, you will find neither. Furthermore,\nyou will end up using and abusing the people under your care as you seek things\nyou already have: approval and atonement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n My\nencouragement to all those in the pastorate is this: If you find yourself\nendlessly offended by the people in your church and continually dissatisfied by\na lack of growth, notoriety, and so on, then you must check your motivations\nfor being a pastor. The last thing the church needs is more men seeking to use\nthe church to fulfill unmet emotional needs. Moreover, we only do damage to the\nfame of the name of Jesus when we stand in the pulpit and proclaim a gospel\nthat we are not living.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For some,\nexposing the need to achieve will mean that you should stop aspiring to\npastoral ministry (or resign from the ministry you are in). For others, as was\nthe case with me, staring your own self-delusion in the face and seeing it for\nwhat it is will bring a renewed and rightly motivated desire to serve Christ as\na pastor in the local church.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Regardless\nof the outcome of your wrestling with this lie, know this fact: If you have\nbelieved the gospel, you are already approved by the Father and your sins are\natoned for by the Son. You don\u2019t have to be a pastor. You can do literally\nanything else and be just as approved by the Father and just as atoned for by\nthe Son. Nothing changes that!<\/p>\n\n\n\n REFLECTION QUESTIONS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. Is there some unmet emotional\nneed that I am attempting to meet by being a pastor?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. Do I assume that Christ will\nlove me more if I\u2019m a pastor?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. Whose approval do I regularly\nseek with my pursuit of ministry or my accomplishments in ministry?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 4. When am I most tempted to\nbelieve that God\u2019s approval of me is dictated by my position in the local\nchurch?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 5. How does the work of Christ\nprovide the remedy for my need to seek approval through achievement?<\/p>\n\n\n\n ACTION STEPS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. Ask those closest to you to\nhelp you uncover any anti-gospel motivations for approval and achievement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. Make\nsure that you are regularly consuming books and sermons that remind you of the\nscandalous nature of the gospel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. Annually\ndiscuss your pursuit of achievement and approval with a biblical counselor who\ncan help you see yourself rightly, through a gospel lens.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 4<\/p>\n\n\n\n THE CALLED<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI\u2019m called to be a pastor\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n I was a fresh graduate from seminary, with a number of years of ministry\nalready under my belt and an extremely high view of myself. I approached the\nsenior pastor of the church where I had been hired recently and requested that\nI be ordained. He was excited and put together a council of pastors to oversee\nthe process. We gathered across two meetings. The first was more or less a\nmeet-and-greet, where I got to know the guys and they got to know me. The second\nwas the formal interrogation that made me feel like I was being cross-examined\nin a military courtroom like Jack Nicholson\u2019s character in A Few Good Men<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Questions\nwere coming my way left and right. Some were theological and others were more\nabout ministry philosophy. I wish I could say that all my responses reflected\nwisdom and theological reflection. No, instead, I handled the barrage of\ninquiries with all the precision of a toddler attempting to put together a\njigsaw puzzle. Still, I could sense that the room was on my side and that\napproval for my ordination was inevitable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then came\nthe final question: \u201cWhat if we say no?\u201d My response was \u201cI\u2019ll keep doing what\nI\u2019m doing. Who are you to tell me what God has or hasn\u2019t called me to do?\u201d I\nwish I had stopped there, but I didn\u2019t. I continued by pontificating about how\nthe entire ordination process was meaningless. I was thoroughly convinced that\none\u2019s calling was personal, subjective, and ultimately between that person and\nGod. Additionally, I was convinced that the qualifications laid out in\nScripture for elders were easily met the moment one experienced a subjective\ncalling from God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I was also\nsure the guys on my council felt the same way, and that they each would\nappreciate my response to their question. I was right. They affirmed my \u201ccall\u201d\nto ministry and moved to ordain me as a pastor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cCalling,\u201d the Bigfoot of the Bible<\/p>\n\n\n\n The problem\nfor all of us gathered in that room that day was our unified conviction\u2014no, our\nshared delusion\u2014that a call to ministry is subjective, untestable, and comes\nfrom God himself. Sadly, once you embrace that lie, the next step is to utterly\ndisregard what the Scriptures teach about biblical qualifications for elders.\nTo be clear, I am not arguing that there is no such thing as a calling to\npastoral ministry.1<\/sup><\/a> What I am saying is that much of the Protestant world\nhas redefined \u201ccalling\u201d to mean something it shouldn\u2019t: an unfalsifiable sense\nthat one has an irrevocable, God-given mandate for pastoral ministry. This\nnotion of a subjective, private calling to ministry is like the mythology of\nBigfoot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Harry and the Hendersons<\/em> was my introduction to the Bigfoot\nmyth as a child. After watching the VHS movie we rented from the local\nBlockbuster store, I was convinced that I needed to find a Bigfoot of my own.\nEvery time our family drove near a wooded area, I was on the lookout for my\nvery own Sasquatch. Each time, I came up empty\u2014until I at last found him! Not\njust any Bigfoot; I located Harry himself! I was walking through Kmart with my\nparents and I saw him. As we got closer, I found it odd that Harry was hanging\nout in the section with all the music cassette tapes. The moment we turned the\ncorner I ran over to Harry only to find out that he was a cardboard cutout, and\na bad one at that. They even got his name wrong: The bottom of the cutout said\n\u201cKenny Rogers.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n How was I\nso convinced that something that doesn\u2019t exist must<\/em> exist? Because I was five years old, and the lack of evidence\nwas no obstacle for me. I wanted to believe, so I found evidence all over the\nplace. I could not be convinced otherwise. As I matured, I came to realize that\nHarry and the Hendersons<\/em> was a\nfantasy based on a popular and shared mythology. I\u2019ve never seen Bigfoot. For\nthe record, I have numerous friends who live in the Pacific Northwest, and\nthey\u2019ve never seen him either. Since I stopped looking for evidence, I realized\nthat the evidence I had \u201cseen\u201d was subjective. It was no indication of the\nreality outside my own head, and it could have been interpreted in other, more\naccurate ways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As soon as\nwe make one\u2019s \u201ccall\u201d to ministry subjective and remove serious consideration of\nthe biblical qualifications for elders from the ordination process, madness\nensues. It is this kind of mentality that provides platforms for heretics\nwithin gospel-preaching churches. It is this type of thinking that has\ndestroyed the Protestant doctrine of vocation (because now ministry is a\ncalling and every other job isn\u2019t). This approach to installing and affirming\nelders has led to the proliferation of unhealthy and unbiblical churches\nthroughout the United States and the world. In the past two years, I have had\nthe following three conversations with men who (along with their churches) had\nfallen victim to the calling mythology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Conversation #1:<\/strong> A young pastor sat across the table from me,\nweeping. \u201cWhy is pastoral ministry so hard? I just want to quit! I hate it! I\u2019m\nmiserable!\u201d He was in a less-than-healthy church, but I was still at a loss for\nwhy the situation he described was so crushing. I told him: \u201cIt is hard. It\nwill be hard\u2014and then you die and are forgotten.\u201d (My nickname should be\nBarnabas, the \u201cson of encouragement.\u201d) I could have responded with something\nmore uplifting, but I didn\u2019t want him to assume that merely changing his\nscenery would make pastoral ministry easier. He looked at me and said, \u201cI know.\nIt\u2019s just too much. Which is why I have to find comfort somewhere.\u201d He then\nwent on to explain to me a series of secret sins he was indulging in to provide\nsome release from the mounting stress and strain he was experiencing. These\nwere not sins that simply needed to be fought so he could be faithful to his\nfamily and to his church. These were habitual, biblically disqualifying sins.\nAs I pressed further and even encouraged him to quit, he fired back at me: \u201cNO!\nI know I was called by God, and if I\u2019m called by him I can\u2019t quit and nobody\ncan tell me I must quit!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Result:<\/strong> Soon after our discussion, his sin found him\nout and destroyed his family and left his church in shock. He was eventually\nfired and, even worse, the name of Jesus was marred. Sadly, just a few months\nlater he began trying to re-enter the ministry because he was \u201ccalled.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Conversation #2:<\/strong> I was catching up with a pastor I had known\nfor years who played a huge role in my life. We hadn\u2019t talked much in a long\ntime, and I could tell something was on his mind. I asked him how he was really<\/em> doing. He confessed, \u201cTerrible!\nThe church is thriving, but things at home are bad. I\u2019m not leading my family\nwell at all.\u201d After about an hour of him detailing his family struggles, he\nsaid to me: \u201cWhat would you do if you were me?\u201d I told him I\u2019d quit. I\u2019d walk\naway from the ministry. If it was really destroying my marriage, harming my\nkids, and if I could no longer fulfill the scriptural qualification of managing\nmy household well, I\u2019d do something else with my life. His response: \u201cI can\u2019t\ndo that! God called me. This is my burden to carry.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Result:<\/strong> Now, almost two years later, he is desperate\nto leave the ministry to try and save his family. Still, he won\u2019t because he\nbelieves he must honor his \u201ccall\u201d by God before honoring his calling to his\nfamily.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Conversation #3:<\/strong> As a professor, I have the privilege of\nmeeting and investing in lots of students. It\u2019s one of the greatest joys of my\nlife. Still, I hate conversations like this one. A zealous young man began\nmeeting with me about his next steps in ministry. He was nearing the end of his\ndegree program and was looking forward to his first opportunity in full-time\nministry. I asked him if he was confident that he was ready for the pastorate.\nLooking incredibly perplexed, he said, \u201cI mean, yeah. Why wouldn\u2019t I be? I have\nmy degree. So I\u2019m ready!\u201d I quickly rephrased the question, \u201cNo, I\u2019m not asking\nif you are prepared. Your degree tells the world that you\u2019ve received training\nand you appear to be adequately prepared for the functional demands of pastoral\nministry. What I mean is, do you believe you are biblically qualified or soon\nwill be?\u201d He had no clue what I was talking about. We opened the Bible and I\nshowed him what I meant. I directed him to excellent resources like Biblical Eldership<\/em><\/a>\nby Alexander Strauch and Finding Faithful\nElders and Deacons<\/em><\/a> by Thabiti Anyabwile. He willingly read them\nand then returned to meet me for coffee again. This time, his countenance was\ndown and he was smoldering with rage. When I asked him, \u201cNow, in light of what\nyou\u2019ve read, do you think you are qualified to pursue eldership right now? With\nanger and heartache in his eyes he said, \u201cNo! What is worse, I don\u2019t know if I\ncan even trust pastors anymore. I\u2019m years away from this. Years! But my pastor\nback home told me I was called. That I needed to be a pastor right away. That\nthe Lord told him to tell me.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Result:<\/strong> Quite some time has passed and this young graduate\nis still struggling with the fact that he based several years of his life on\nwhat a pastor told him was a subjective calling from God. His confidence in the\nchurch is shaken, and he feels betrayed. It\u2019s truly a terrible thing, but he\nfigured it out well before he assumed the pastorate in a church. Had he entered\nthe ministry, the damage to his congregation would have been immense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In order\nfor churches to mature and guarantee they call biblically qualified men to\nserve as elders, we must move beyond this myth and embrace what the Scripture\nactually teaches. Rather than a subjective calling, the Scripture uses a\ndifferent category and specific criteria.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Aspiring Men Wanted<\/p>\n\n\n\n I can\u2019t tell\nyou how many pastors I\u2019ve heard apply Psalm\n105:15<\/a> to themselves (in the KJV: \u201cTouch not mine anointed, and do\nmy prophets no harm\u201d). However, in context this verse is talking about the\npatriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, calling them prophets as in Genesis\n20:7<\/a>. The trouble with applying this verse to pastors is that\nprophets and pastors are not the same thing. In his first letter to the young\npastor Timothy, the Apostle Paul explains how a church ought to identify future\noverseers (elders, pastors): \u201cThe saying is trustworthy: If anyone aspires to\nthe office of overseer, he desires a noble task\u201d (1 Tim 3:1<\/a>).\nNotice Paul doesn\u2019t say \u201cif someone is called\u201d; he says if they \u201caspire.\u201d I\nfear we have taken Old Testament language that refers to the calling of\nprophets and superimposed it on the office of elder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bobby\nJamieson has said that a subjective call to ministry assumes two things. I\nreally appreciate the way he explains these assumptions and their necessary\nconclusion:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Saying you\u2019re\ncalled to ministry presumes you think these two things about yourself: (1) you\nare, or soon will be, qualified to be an elder; (2) you are, or soon will be,\nsufficiently gifted in ministry that a church should pay you to do it. Unless\nyou\u2019re talking non-sense, claiming a divine \u201ccall\u201d has to imply both of these\nthings\u2014and it can\u2019t contradict either. But this reveals one potential problem\nwith calling language right off the bat: if I say I\u2019m called, who are you to\ncontradict?2<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n The modern church has placed itself in a dangerous and unbiblical\nposition by allowing the language of subjective calling to go unchecked.\nInstead, we must reclaim the biblical category of \u201caspiring.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n When Paul\nrefers to men aspiring to be elders, he is talking about their desire to serve\nthe church in such a capacity. In 1\nTimothy 3:1\u20137<\/a>, Paul calls on Timothy (and the church) to examine and\ntest the one aspiring, and he provides a similar test in Titus\n1:5\u20139<\/a>. Virtually every qualification that Paul supplies for the\nexamination of a man aspiring to the pastorate has to do with character. Paul\ncalls on Timothy to observe the man\u2019s moral restraint, his faithfulness to his\nwife, his conduct (both public and private), his treatment of his children, his\nhandling of personal finances, and how he interacts with those around him.\nNowhere does Paul mention a man\u2019s subjective calling. Nowhere! Additionally, he\nmentions gifting only once: \u201cHe must be able to teach.\u201d But note that this does\nnot say a pastor must be a gifted and winsome communicator. Rather, Paul\u2019s\nconcern is that he accurately communicates the content of Scripture.3<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Gifting\nfor teaching can be assessed rather quickly, even in one sermon. However, which\nof the other qualifications can be assessed quickly? None of them. In fact,\nthis list assumes a long period of examination. How long? I think that depends.\nOur church has an examination period of twelve to twenty-four months before we\npresent an elder candidate to our congregation for affirmation. We have a very\nintentional process of assessment that simply cannot be expedited. While we may\nhire someone on our ministry staff while in the midst of this examination\nperiod, we will not vest them with pastoral authority until they have been\nthoroughly vetted and affirmed by our church body. We are convinced that the\nNew Testament presents the pursuit of pastoral ministry not as a calling but as\na process that leads to qualified and faithful shepherds caring for our church.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Conclusion<\/p>\n\n\n\n If the notion\nthat a subjective calling is all you need to be a pastor is unbiblical, then\nthere are many pastors who should quit. That may seem like an overstatement,\nbut it isn\u2019t. We have far too many unqualified, untested men filling our\npulpits and being vested with pastoral authority because they are gifted and\nbelieve they have been called to the ministry. We don\u2019t need more men who are\ngifted; we need more men who are qualified. We don\u2019t need more men who think\nthey are called; we need more men who know they must patiently aspire while\nbeing tested and examined.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You may\nhave entered the ministry believing God called you, and now you are desperate\nto get out. Can I tell you something scandalous? You can quit and it will not\nchange your standing before God. If you\u2019re in Christ, your standing is secure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I will\ntake this a step further. If you take seriously what the Scripture says about\nqualifications and you realize that your ministry is built on a subjective\nsense of calling and that you are biblically unqualified to serve, then you\nshould quit as soon as possible. You are attempting to undertake a work that\nwill simply destroy you even as you destroy the congregation under your care.\nThat doesn\u2019t mean you cannot aspire to pastoral ministry at a later time. It\njust means that you should be obedient to Scripture now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Seminary\nstudents, do not believe for one moment that your degree qualifies you for\npastoral ministry. It doesn\u2019t. It prepares you for the functional demands of\npastoral ministry. Additionally, do not assume that a well-intended word of\nencouragement from a pastor or member of your home church is sufficient to\nqualify you for ministry. It doesn\u2019t matter what the oldest member of the\nchurch, the chair of deacons, or the senior pastor has said about your\n\u201ccalling.\u201d It matters what the Scriptures say about your qualifications. So,\nwhile in seminary, find a church that takes seriously what God has said and ask\nthem to watch, test, examine, and assess your qualifications for eldership.\nHere is a pro tip: Virtually every qualification can be attainted through\nserious spiritual discipline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Biblically\nqualified pastors, you are tired and worn out. I get it. I am too. You are growing\ntired of the mantra \u201clife in them and death in me\u201d as you sacrifice your life\nfor a church that will rarely thank you. Rough stuff, isn\u2019t it? Listen to me:\nGet some rest. Take a vacation. Have brothers who are constantly encouraging\nyou while pressing you to remain qualified, but don\u2019t quit. We need faithful,\nqualified shepherds. Still, if you find yourself just undone, know that there\nis no sin, no disobedience, and no harm in stepping down for a season. In fact,\nif you think you need to do so, then you probably do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n REFLECTION QUESTIONS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. How have I been influenced by\nthe idea that the call to ministry is a subjective feeling from God?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. How thoroughly has my\naspiration for ministry been tested?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. How willing am I to have my\nsense of calling tested against the qualifications in Scripture?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 4. For pastors: How do I evaluate\npotential pastors and elders?<\/p>\n\n\n\n ACTION STEPS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. If you\u2019re already a pastor,\nput yourself under the scrutiny of other godly men to evaluate why you believe\nyou are \u201ccalled\u201d to the pastorate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. If\nyou are not a pastor, place yourself in a church that takes your aspiration\nseriously and that will hold you to what the Scriptures teach regarding\nbiblical qualifications.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. Be\nsubmissive to those to whom you\u2019ve subjected yourself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 4. Seek\nthe wisdom of biblical counselors as you assess the motives of your heart.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 5<\/p>\n\n\n\n THE HOLY MAN<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMy perceived holiness is more important than my\npursuit of holiness\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n I remind my congregation regularly that they are a collection of sinners.\nEven worse, their pastors are sinners. These reminders don\u2019t mean that any of\nus are free to wallow in our sinful inclinations, but we do have freedom to be\nopen about our sin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Most\npeople who are visiting our worship gatherings, after reflecting on it for a\nmoment, feel themselves put at ease by this admission. They begin to think, \u201cIf\nthe pastor is broken, messed up, and sinful, then I can admit that I am too.\u201d\nThey do not need to defend themselves or uphold a fa\u00e7ade of sinlessness. In\nfact, this rhythm of honesty and confession has aided us in engaging ardent\natheists, committed agnostics, and others who are visiting our worship\ngatherings with family or friends. They expect to hear a man who portrays\nhimself as sinless railing against the sin of \u201cyou people\u201d or the \u201csinners all\naround us,\u201d and they are put at ease when they discover this is not the case.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But for\nsome newcomers to our church body, the introduction \u201cHey, I\u2019m Dayton, I serve\nas lead pastor, and I\u2019m a sinner redeemed solely because of Jesus in my place\u201d\nis uncomfortable. Periodically I and other staff members will have someone\napproach us with a comment like, \u201cI don\u2019t know if I could settle in here. I\ndon\u2019t think I could be at a church where the pastor is a sinner.\u201d This is a\ncomplete misunderstanding of the gospel and of what Scripture teaches about\nhuman nature, yet it is widespread because of the myth of the pastor as holy\nman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Dangers of the Holy Man Myth<\/p>\n\n\n\n Many\nChristians want to assume their pastor has a special connection to God,\nsupernatural restraint, and a level of purity that makes him seem otherworldly.\nMany pastors (young and old) are not only willing to allow this holy man myth\nto continue, but even use it to their advantage. The constant pull in many\nChristian circles is for pastors to embrace the holy man mystique. Throughout\nmy younger years, I knew only one pastor who admitted he was a sinful man\nrather than a holy man.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What is\nthe danger in this? After all, at least in my tradition, most pastors who\nportray themselves as holy men attempt to make Jesus look big at the same time.\nYet one problem is that when you portray yourself as sinless, or nearly\nsinless, you are inevitably bumping Jesus out of his rightful position as the\nMessiah (capital M) in order for you to play the role of quasi-messiah. If you\ndesire for your church to envision you as largely sinless, you want them to\nview you in a way they should only view Jesus. As we fake our holiness, we are\nattempting to lay hold of glory that is not ours. In the end, a congregation\nthat sees the pastor as a holy man who never (or rarely) sins will fail to\nrealize that they really want Jesus. Instead, they will be willing for the\npastor to serve as a cheap knock-off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A second\ndanger is that we begin to perpetuate inauthenticity regarding the confession\nof sin. The theologically minded and biblically literate members of your church\nknow that you are a sinner. Still, if you present yourself as someone who\ndoesn\u2019t struggle with sin, you are subtly modeling for the congregation a\npractice of hiding, concealing, or masking sin through a lack of transparency.\nThe longer this continues in your public ministry, the greater decline you will\nsee in genuine confession and repentance in your church body. When I meet a man\nin ministry who has difficulty with honesty regarding his sin, his struggles,\nand his failures, I know that his heart is yearning for the position that only\nJesus can hold.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Last, when\nwe allow the holy man myth to persist, we begin training our hearts to value\nperceived holiness more than the actual pursuit of holiness. As I prepared for\nministry, I was told to make sure I exhibited the holiness of Christ before the\nwatching eyes of a congregation. As a result, at different moments early in my\nministry life, I found myself working hard to uphold my holy public image while\ngiving no regard to the killing of sin in my private life. This was not only\ndishonest; it bordered on wickedness. When I became convicted over my embrace\nof this myth, I purposed to never again let myself fall into such a deception.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Disbelieving the Gospel<\/p>\n\n\n\n If being open\nabout our sin is so beneficial for the life of our churches, why do so many\npastors have such a hard time publically acknowledging their own sinfulness?\nI\u2019ve found this hesitation to be grounded largely in pride and fear. We all\nwant to be respected, and our pride leads us to wrongly assume that people will\nhave less respect for a pastor who has to fight sin just like they do. Since\nwe\u2019ve so neglected the public confession of sin in the life of the local\nchurch, we are afraid it would be outright jarring to hear a pastor confess\nsin. Being aware of how fickle some congregations are, many men are afraid that\nbreaking the ice by confessing their own sin will not just be uncomfortable; it\nwill be career suicide.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On an even\ndeeper level, what makes us susceptible to this pride and fear is our\nmisunderstanding or perhaps momentary disbelief of the gospel. The gospel is\nthe good news that God declares us righteous, his holy ones, not because of our\nperformance but because of Jesus\u2019 performance in our place. The gospel frees us\nto fail because it tells us we already have failed and are accepted in spite of\nour failures. When we embrace the holy man myth, it\u2019s as if we forget the\nscandalous nature of the gospel. We wrongly assume that God has redeemed us by\nthe work of his Son because he was unaware of our truly sinful hearts. We\nconvince ourselves that admitting our struggles with sin may cause God to\nrespond with, \u201cWait, what!? When I declared you righteous, I had no idea you would\ndo that!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Every time\nI\u2019m tempted to conceal my sin, I\u2019m comforted in my failures by a sermon that\nCharles Spurgeon preached on Jeremiah 32<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n There can be\nno reason in the faultiness of the believer why the Lord should cease to do him\ngood, seeing that he foresaw all the evil\nthat would be in us<\/em>. No wandering child of God surprises his heavenly\nFather. He foreknew every sin we should commit: he proposed to do us good\nnotwithstanding all this foreknown iniquity. If, then, he entered into a\ncovenant with us, and began to bless us with all our sin before his mind,\nnothing new can spring up which can alter the covenant once made with all these\ndrawbacks known and taken into account. There is no scarlet sin which has been\nomitted; for the Lord has said, \u201cCome now, and let us reason together: though\nyour sins be as scarlet.\u201d He entered into a covenant that he would not turn\naway from us, to do us good; and no circumstance has arisen, or can arise,\nwhich was unknown to him when he thus pledged his word of grace.\u201d1<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Pastor,\npreach the gospel to your own heart so that you have the freedom to confess sin\nto your people. Do not let your church assume that Jesus and you are near\nequals in possession of genuine holiness. You only bear the righteousness of\nChrist by imputation, not through your own actions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n How to Pursue Real Holiness<\/p>\n\n\n\n In addition\nto believing the gospel, pursuing genuine holiness (rather than its appearance)\nis the way to combat the holy man myth. There are many excellent resources on\nwhat it means to pursue holiness, and what I have to say will not replace them.\nInstead, here are practical steps I take in my life, as a pastor, that I\u2019ve\nfound helpful in pursuing holiness and fighting the myth of the pastor as holy\nman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n First, I\nidentify specific sins, the idols of my heart that I want to see die. One of\nthe most amazing things to me is the initially evasive response I receive when\nI ask fellow pastors or seminary students, \u201cWhat are some of the sins you are\nbattling?\u201d I don\u2019t think their evasion is intentional. Instead, it seems that\nmany pastors and students are not in the habit of taking inventory of the sins\nthey should be actively seeking to put to death. Yet I am confident that if I\nasked them about their spiritual gifts, the answers would come more quickly.\nAll of us have taken one, two, or thirty questionnaires about spiritual gifts.\nWhy the disparity? We would much rather celebrate the gifts we\u2019ve been given\nthan kill the sins we live in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Second, I\nregularly confess sin to my wife and to other pastors. Confession isn\u2019t just\nthe big stuff. It\u2019s not just when you\u2019re tempted to cheat on your spouse,\nembezzle money, or create a meth lab in the back of an RV. No, you and I must\nconfess anger that no one knew about but us. Any hint of sexual sin should be\nconfessed. A momentary flirtation with greed must be brought into the light.\nWhy? If you are in the habit of confessing everything, you will be less tempted\nto hide issues that could cost you your marriage or ministry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Third,\nmake sure the church knows you are a sinner and regularly confess your sin to\nthe church. I mentioned above one of my biggest safeguards against the holy man\nmyth is regularly referring to myself, publicly, as a sinner. And I do not\nmerely tell my church family, \u201cI\u2019m a sinner\u201d; I aim to make them aware of\nspecific areas of sin I\u2019m battling. For example, recently I\u2019ve been transparent\nover my lack of confidence in God\u2019s sovereign plan. Since the day after our\nthird son, Ransom, was born, we\u2019ve experienced a pretty nasty car accident (and\nthe ensuing medical issues for me and my children), a stream of unforeseen\nexpenses (that would have financially drowned our family were it not for people\njumping in to keep our heads above water), and a number of difficult ministry\nsituations (including enacting church discipline). For nearly ninety days, we\ndidn\u2019t go more than a week without a crushing expense, such as multiple\nappliances failing, or some kind of emotional hit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It could\nbe so much worse, and many people would call a difficult stretch like this a\nrespite from their otherwise painful lives. But while I\u2019m convinced that God is\ngood and he is sovereign over all things, I have found myself battling anxiety\nand frustration over God\u2019s plan for and through this rough time. In the midst\nof this, a number of Scripture passages in our church\u2019s preaching schedule spoke\ndirectly to my heart issue. Thus, I made sure I told our church body of my\nmomentary disbelief or lack of trust in God\u2019s plan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The more I\nshare about particular sins like this, the less I appear to be a holy man who\nis somehow beyond struggling with sin. In fact, if I ever adopted that persona,\nI would be immediately confronted. Also, when I preach of the scandalous nature\nof grace and how desperately we all need Jesus in our place, my church family\nknows I mean it\u2014because they know how desperately I need it too. Finally,\ntransparency from the pastor fosters a culture of confession where it\u2019s OK to\nadmit your sin, but it is not OK to conceal your sin. A gospel culture demands\na practice of confession.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Here I\nneed to supply a word of caution. You should not confess sin to the church with\nthe same level of detail with which you confess it to other pastors or your\nspouse. Without a mutual understanding of the purpose of confession, your\npublic openness could actually move from an encouraging and helpful practice to\na destructive and distracting problem. Often, the only difference is how<\/em> you publicly acknowledge your sin\nand the amount of detail you provide. We should never inadvertently glorify our\nsin or turn it into salacious fodder for lunch table discussions after the\nchurch service. There is a difference between confessing sin and purposefully\naiming for the shock factor. So be open about your battles with sin, but be\nmindful of how you speak about them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Conclusion<\/p>\n\n\n\n Any holiness\nthat can be attributed to your name is only there because of imputation. You\ndidn\u2019t earn it. You haven\u2019t been holy. You are not a holy man. Do not lie to\nthe people in your care; tell them the truth! Tell them that you are a sinner.\nMake it a natural part of your pastoral prayer on Sunday mornings: \u201cLord, be\nwith me, a sinner, as I preach your Word.\u201d The only holy man we want our\nchurches to look to is the only Holy Man to ever live: Jesus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n REFLECTION QUESTIONS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. Why is the notion of appearing\nto be a holy man so attractive?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. How might I be allowing my\ncongregation to assume that I do not struggle with the same temptations as they\ndo?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. What are some day-to-day\nrhythms I can adopt for confessing and addressing sin?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 4. Is there an area of my life\nwhere I am more concerned with appearing holy than being holy? What changes can\nI make in this area to focus less on appearance and more on what is going on in\nmy heart?<\/p>\n\n\n\n ACTION STEPS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. Take an inventory of sin that\nyou know is present in your life and that you desire to kill.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. Establish\na regular practice of confessing specific sins to your spouse and other pastors\nor elders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. Make\nit a regular habit to preach the gospel of grace to yourself, and seek out\nfriends who will preach it to you as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 4. In\nyour next sermon, make clear that the only holy man you and your church should\nhope in is Jesus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 6<\/p>\n\n\n\n THE ANTI-FAMILY MAN<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI must sacrifice my home life for my ministry life\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n I once had the pleasure of visiting one of the pastors I\u2019ve most admired\nover the past decade or so. He is fairly well known in our area, and even\nthough he is no longer in the pastorate, his reputation is one of an\naccomplished pastor and an excellent leader.<\/p>\n\n\n\n During our\nconversation in his study, I decided to peruse his library as he stepped away\nto make a phone call. On his shelves I noticed some pictures of him with his\nadult children, so when he returned I asked about his family life. His demeanor\nshowed heartache, in contrast to the joyous way he had been answering my\nministry questions. He shared with me how one of his children no longer\nprofessed faith in Jesus and how the others seemingly despised church life.\nWhen I asked him why, he said something like this: \u201cFor years, I prioritized\nthe church family over my family. If I could do it all over again, I\u2019d change\neverything. I became a successful pastor, but I was an unsuccessful husband and\nfather.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m not\nsure where we ever got the notion that we must offer up our families on the\naltar of vocational ministry, but somewhere along the line this became a\ncommonly held belief. At one point in my ministry life, I too believed that\nbeing faithful to Jesus in ministry meant sacrificing my family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The\nexchange with that pastor has haunted me. The lesson I learned is that it is\nfar too easy to put family life on autopilot while trying to achieve ministry\nsuccess. In fact, it\u2019s even easy to rationalize sacrificing your family for the\nchurch because you\u2019re pursuing the redemption and sanctification of souls. This\nis utter foolishness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Lure of Busyness<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pastor, you\nare far busier than you ought to be. Maybe the church you shepherd has placed\nunrealistic expectations on you and your time, or maybe you\u2019ve placed those\nexpectations on yourself. It is possible that the people under your care want\nyou to take the place of Jesus\u2014and maybe you like taking the place of Jesus.\nUnlike the lie of the holy man, if you believe the lie of the anti-family man\nyou may recognize your sinfulness, but it still feels good for people to demand\nfrom you what only Christ can provide. It feels good to have people look at you\nwith the same needy eyes with which they should look toward Christ. It makes\nyou feel important, needed, and valuable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Perhaps\nyou\u2019ve also grown tired of ungratefulness from your wife or children. There is\nlittle thanks for how you serve them. Maybe your children have the audacity to\nact as if they don\u2019t need you. Maybe your wife doesn\u2019t sing songs of your\npraise as she once did; maybe she no longer responds to your preaching as\nthough you were on par with George Whitefield, Billy Graham, and other great\nevangelists. In periods when you feel unappreciated, the lure toward busyness\nwill be strongest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Regardless\nof the root cause, if you are spending so much time on church matters that you\nare neglecting your home life, you are choosing the bride of Christ over your\nown bride. Hearing the demands of the church and responding to them with\nanything other than a humble appeal to your inability to take the place of\nChrist will leave your church disappointed, you exhausted, and your family in\ntrouble.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Someone Else\u2019s Bride<\/p>\n\n\n\n Choosing the\nbride of Christ over your own bride might sound very high-minded, but the truth\nis that if you are married, your highest calling is not to be a pastor. Your\nhighest calling is to be a pastor-husband and pastor-dad. If you are favoring\nthe church over your family, the collateral damage from this dereliction will\nresult in abandoning your shepherding duties to the most important flock you\nwill ever shepherd. This flock will never number in the hundreds and they will\nnever pay your salary, but they are your primary responsibility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is OK\nto resist the lure of spending all your time on church matters, because the\nchurch already has a groom and he is far better than you. Jesus gave his life\nto ransom his bride. He will take good care of her. He, not you, redeemed her.\nHe, not you, is the guarantee of her salvation. It is not up to you to make\nsure everything gets done. Pastor, if you find yourself loving Christ\u2019s bride\nmore than your own, or if you dedicate more time to discipling other people\u2019s\nchildren than to your own, you must repent and correct your course today.\nImmediately. Not tomorrow. Not next week. It needs to happen now! If not, then\nyou are biblically disqualified from eldership and you need to resign, today.\nAny elder who places a higher priority on shepherding the church than on\nshepherding his family has disqualified himself from the pastorate (1 Tim 3:5<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you are\nnot a pastor yet and your highest romantic thoughts revolve around the church\nyou will one day pastor rather than your future bride, disaster awaits you. In\nfact, you need to stay on the bench a while longer. Charles Spurgeon once\nadvised a group of future pastors, \u201cWe ought to be such husbands that every\nhusband in the parish may safely be such as we are. Is it so? We ought to be\nthe best of fathers. Alas! Some ministers, to my knowledge, are far from this,\nfor as to their families, they have kept the vineyards of others, but their own\nvineyards they have not kept.\u201d1<\/sup><\/a> In the short term, prioritizing the\nchurch may appear more urgent and more rewarding. But in the long term,\nprioritizing our families will produce greater fruit\u2014both in our own families\nand, through our example, in others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For those\nwho are willing to admit their failure and who want to change course, let me\nencourage you that reprioritizing your life is not as huge of a task as it may\nseem. Instead, it\u2019s a matter of changing your rhythms and habits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pastor-Husband<\/p>\n\n\n\n The gospel is\nthe key to a happy and healthy marriage. For this reason, you and your spouse\nmust regularly participate together in corporate worship, and you must engage\nin private worship\/devotion as a couple. These are bedrock practices of\ngospel-driven obedience, and if they are not yet part of your life I suggest\nyou adopt them immediately.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Still,\neven such spiritual disciplines are not enough to cause your wife to feel that\nshe is loved and cherished with the same tenderness that Jesus cherishes his\nbride, the church (Eph 5:25\u201328<\/a>). There are other habits and healthy\nrhythms that husbands and wives can adopt to cultivate stronger marriages.\nWhile I am not an expert on marriage, I am an expert on my<\/em> marriage. Take my words as exhortations based on my limited\nexperience and apply what is useful to your own situation. Here are just a few\nof the habits that have been beneficial in my own marriage:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Go to bed at the same time.<\/strong> I\u2019m surprised by how many couples\ngo to bed at different hours (though this is sometimes unavoidable due to\noutside factors like work schedules, if both spouses are employed). One of the\nbest things you can do to encourage a \u201cone flesh\u201d mindset in your marriage is\nto go to bed when your wife goes to bed. When wives go to sleep and husbands\nstay awake watching TV or cruising the Internet, only trouble awaits. In a\nsmall way, routinely going to bed at different times creates the sense that\neach spouse is living a separate life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Get the TV, smartphones, and computers out of\nyour bedroom.<\/strong> I\nlove technology more than most, so I understand how hard it can be to leave\nyour iPhone in a different room. But if you find yourself needing to connect\nwith other people on social media while laying next to your wife, something is\noff. You are missing out on valuable time to connect, talk, and pray together.\nThe marriage bed should be a place of bonding, not a place to \u201cveg out.\u201d One of\nthe best rules we ever established in our home was to keep electronics out of\nour bedroom. The bedroom ought to be a sanctuary, a place for husbands and\nwives to shut the world out and focus on one another.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Assume the best about your wife.<\/strong> I regularly talk to ministry\ncouples that are at odds. Too often, the heart of the problem is a lack of\ntrust. Sometimes this battle with mistrust is related to sins from their past,\nbut most of the time it is rooted in narcissism and self-centered attitudes. I\nhave talked with couples who believe the other person purposefully leaves the\ntoilet seat up or forgets to deadbolt the front door! If you assume the best\nabout your spouse, you are far less likely to be in conflict. Your schedule is\nalready so busy; don\u2019t waste valuable time with your wife by being in conflict.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sacrificially serve your wife so she can assume\nthe best about you.<\/strong>\nMake every effort to out-serve one another. Make it apparent that you die to\nyourself every day, for the good of your wife. Give grace and mercy as you\npursue speaking only words of truth, love, and affirmation. Live a life that\nwould cause your wife to assume the best about you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Meet with a biblical counselor.<\/strong> If you commit to doing this at\nleast yearly, it will do wonders for your marriage. You and your wife carry far\nmore ministry baggage than you realize, and even just a few hours a year with a\nbiblical counselor can help you keep your marriage healthy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Speak only of your wife as beautiful.<\/strong> There ought to be some level of\nsacredness concerning the way you recognize your bride\u2019s beauty. This doesn\u2019t\nmean you never call your daughter(s) beautiful, or that when performing a\nwedding ceremony you cannot speak of the \u201chappy groom and beautiful bride.\u201d But\nthere will be periods in your marriage when your schedule will cause your wife to\nfeel neglected. One way to affirm and privilege her place in your life is by\nrefusing to speak of another woman as beautiful. Reserve this word solely for\nyour wife. Cars are not beautiful. A jump shot is not beautiful. Your wife is\nbeautiful, and that is the end of the matter. Also, memo to some pastors:\nCalling your wife \u201csmoking hot\u201d on social media (or from the pulpit!) is lame.\nReferring to her as \u201csmoking hot\u201d can be seen as objectifying her, while\ncalling her beautiful honors her. As much as you can, reinforce her unique\nbeauty by what you do or do not say.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Beyond\nadjusting your habits, you may find it necessary to change what you say to your\nwife. In the back of the popular book The\nFive Love Languages<\/em> is a little quiz that helps you identify your love\nlanguage.2<\/sup><\/a> Mine is \u201cwords of affirmation.\u201d When my wife tells me\nI\u2019m a great husband and a good father, I feel loved. My wife is all about \u201cacts\nof service.\u201d When I serve her, she feels loved.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If your\nwife\u2019s primary language is acts of service (or gifts, or quality time, or\nphysical touch), don\u2019t lie to yourself and say, \u201cWell, my wife\u2019s love language\nhas nothing to do with words, so I\u2019m good.\u201d Even though her primary form of\ncommunication for love is centered on something else, there are things she\nneeds to hear. In thinking about this, I\u2019ve concluded that all wives\u2014regardless\nof their primary love language\u2014need to hear their husband say these five things:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2022 \u201cI love you.\u201d<\/strong> Too often, a husband (me included) assumes that his\nwife knows she is loved. She doesn\u2019t. Over the years, I\u2019ve sat with couple\nafter couple who are in the midst of a difficult patch in their marriage. When\nI ask, \u201cTell me the last time you said \u2018I love you\u2019 to the other person,\u201d you\u2019d\nbe amazed at how many people cannot remember. Tell your wife you love\nher\u2014regularly, daily, hourly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2022 \u201cThank you.\u201d<\/strong> Being a wife and mother is\nhard work. If your wife is a homemaker, thank her for the hard and\noften-overlooked work of caring for your family. If you don\u2019t thank her, who\nwill? If your wife works outside the home, thank her for the hard work of\ntrying to accomplish two difficult tasks: earning an income and caring for you\nand the family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2022 \u201cI\u2019m not going anywhere.\u201d<\/strong> One of the\ndeepest needs every man can meet for his wife is providing a sense of security.\nYou don\u2019t have to always say, \u201cHey, for the record, I\u2019m not going to leave\nyou.\u201d That could get weird and seem suspicious. Instead, periodically comment\nabout the things you look forward to in future stages of life. On occasion,\nremind her that you are here to stay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2022 \u201cI\u2019m praying for you.\u201d<\/strong> Even if I am\npraying for someone, I\u2019m horrible when it comes to letting people know,\nincluding my wife. Pray for your wife and tell her you do. Let her know that\nwhen you talk to the most important Being that will ever exist (God), you\nmention the most important person in your life (your wife).<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2022 \u201cYou can have the remote.\u201d<\/strong> I love my\nwife, but she loves some shows I don\u2019t. Downton\nAbbey<\/em> nearly sent me into a depression; nothing about that show intrigued\nme. Still, she loved it, and it made her feel valued that I would endure each\nepisode with her. Saying words like \u201cwe can watch what you want\u201d isn\u2019t so much\nabout the remote as it is about giving up your preferences for the sake of\nmaking her feel loved.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I encourage you to have an open and honest conversation with your wife.\nAsk her if she feels neglected, and how she would gauge the health of your\nmarriage. Invite her to identify some things you can do to better cherish her\nand express love for her. It\u2019s not complicated! Simple, gospel-reflecting\nhabits, along with some robustly masculine intentionality, are at the core of\nloving your wife well. Once you have ensured that you are shepherding your wife\nwell, direct your attention to your children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pastor-Dad<\/p>\n\n\n\n Many pastors\nfail at being the pastor of their family. We may be ashamed to admit it, but often\nwhen we pontificate from the pulpit about how parents shouldn\u2019t outsource the\ndiscipleship of their children to the church, we aren\u2019t even discipling our own\nchildren.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Before you\nfeel a heavy hand of condemnation, let me remind you that no man wakes up one\nday and instantly becomes the pastor of his home. It takes years of\nexperience\u2014and many awkward face-plants\u2014to grow into that role. From my limited\nexperience as a father and husband, here are a few simple habits that will get\nyou on the trajectory to being a healthy \u201cpastor-dad.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pray for your family and with your family.<\/strong> It should be the most natural thing\nfor a man to pray for his family, but it isn\u2019t. It takes intentionality. My\nwife is a praying woman, and her prayer life pushes me to have a healthier\nprayer life of my own. It is now part of my daily routine to pray for Rebekah\nand my boys. If you develop the habit of privately praying for your family,\nthen publicly praying for them will come naturally. Your family needs to hear\nyou pray for them. Your children need to hear their father praying for their\nsalvation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Turn off the TV, put down the phone, and\nengage.<\/strong> I\u2019ve gone\nthrough periods when I struggled to come home from the office and simply be\npastor-dad, not Pastor Dayton. Our culture calls us to take pride in\nmaintaining a slammed schedule, but our culture also celebrates and encourages\na million other things that starve our spiritual vitality and destroy our\nfamilies. Don\u2019t come home from a long day and shut down. When you are with your\nfamily, turn off the TV unless you are watching it together. You also don\u2019t\nneed to be checking sports scores or your email on your phone. I know it\u2019s\nhard, since many of us have rewired our brains to \u201cneed\u201d to check our phones\nevery few minutes. But it can wait.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Talk about Jesus with your family.<\/strong> What you talk about most often is\nwhat your kids think is most important to Dad. If you can\u2019t remember the last\ntime you had a meaningful exchange with your family about the person and work\nof Jesus, then your kids have no idea that Jesus matters to you. You don\u2019t have\nto drop theology bombs on their little minds. Just talk to them about Jesus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Read Scripture with your kids every night.<\/strong> There is no easier way to make sure\nyou talk about Jesus than to read the book that\u2019s by Jesus and about Jesus.\nThere are a number of great resources for families, and most of them can be\nused in increments of 10 or 15 minutes. For instance, if you have small\nchildren you can use resources such as The\nGospel Project Bible<\/em> or The Jesus Storybook\nBible<\/em>. Reading a chapter or two takes no time at all. The next day, come\nhome from the office and ask your kids what they remember about the previous\nnight\u2019s family devotion. Ask them how they applied the gospel truth from last\nnight during their day. Tell them how you applied that truth to your heart and\nlife. It\u2019s simple; it just takes intentionality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Practice discipline that reveals the gospel.<\/strong> The vast majority of parenting\nadvice from our culture is horrible. Why? Our nation has become post-Christian\nand is quickly moving toward being anti-Christian. Even for many who believe in\nGod, the default worldview has become something akin to what sociologists\nChristian Smith and Melinda Lundquist Denton have called \u201cmoralistic\ntherepeutic deism.\u201d3<\/sup><\/a> \u201cMoralistic\u201d means someone thinks\nGod just wants them to be a good person; \u201ctherapeutic\u201d means they think God\nwants them to be happy (according to their own definition of happiness); and\n\u201cdeism\u201d is a way of saying God isn\u2019t personally involved in their life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You do not\nwant to tell your kids that Jesus matters and then parent them through a filter\nthat encourages moralism. That duality is how you create little religious\nhearts that try to earn God\u2019s favor by being good. This may be the most\ndifficult aspect of being a father and a pastor. We face all kinds of real and\nperceived pressure to have children who behave properly, who obey, who do not\nbecome the stereotype of the wild and crazy pastor\u2019s kids. Our default wiring,\nwith its natural inclination toward religion, will cause us to apply this\npressure when disciplining our children, and in doing so will turn them into legalists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you\nbelieve the gospel, you will not be shocked by your child\u2019s sinfulness. You do\nnot need to lament that your eighteen-month-old is a viper in a diaper the\nfirst time he disobeys, but you should remember that Scripture says we are\nsinners by nature. When we respond to our children\u2019s sin with shock, we\ncommunicate to them: \u201cDo better, try harder, make yourself righteous.\u201d Our goal\nas fathers must not be mere behavior modification. Our aim is to see our\nchildren repent and believe the gospel. Therefore, do not respond to their sin\nin a way that simply calls for a change in behavior; respond in a way that\ncalls for heartfelt repentance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The\nmoments when we discipline our children are of incredible value for pointing\nthem to Jesus. I\u2019ve found that asking my oldest son a few pointed questions\nkeeps me calm and helps draw his attention to the Perfect Father in Heaven. I\nask my son, \u201cWho am I?\u201d He says, \u201cDaddy.\u201d That\u2019s right! \u201cDo I love you, son?\u201d\nHe replies, \u201cYes!\u201d I then tell him, \u201cBecause I love you, just as you are,\nplease obey me.\u201d Sometimes it makes a huge difference. Many times, he doesn\u2019t\nget it. However, I\u2019m trying to lay gospel groundwork, and that doesn\u2019t happen\novernight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n None of\nthis is hard. It just requires intentionality, yet we are often far too\npassive. This passivity is hurting your family. Begin implementing these basics\nhabits now! As you pursue being the pastor of your home, you will fail. It\u2019s\nOK! We all fail, but we cannot allow failure to become defeat. The stakes are\ntoo high and your family is far too valuable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Conclusion<\/p>\n\n\n\n I recognize\nthat many pastors serve in churches where the culture is not very conducive to\na healthy family life. There are programs every night of the week, and the\npastor is expected to be at each one. It\u2019s hard. Therefore, I\u2019ve tried to\nsuggest rhythms that are doable for pastors who face crushing demands on their\ntime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But even\nthough the rhythms of pastoring your family may require less time than you\nthink, you need to fight against the lie that your family only gets what\u2019s left\nover after you\u2019ve given your all to the church. Be clear in your own mind that\nyour first priority is the flock that bears your name. If your church has\nexpectations of you that are crippling to your family life, you need to speak\nup. If it falls on deaf ears, bring it up again. In the end, if the church\nculture demands a superman pastor who must attend every event on every night of\nthe week, then you may need to serve elsewhere. The church may be looking to\nyou as a Jesus substitute, and it may be necessary to leave for the sake of the\nchurch\u2019s health and yours. That\u2019s a decision you and your wife must make\ntogether, with wise counsel from others. It\u2019s a hard conversation to have, but\nfor the sake of your highest callings (pastor-husband and pastor-dad), you must\nhave it!<\/p>\n\n\n\n You fight\nagainst this lie by being faithful to your wife, by making her your priority\ninstead of chasing Christ\u2019s bride. Shepherd the bride he gave you before you\never shepherd the bride he gave himself for, knowing that Jesus has called you\nto love her the way he loves the church. Shepherd your children. Tend to their\nsouls. Make your discipleship ministry in your home the priority over the\ndiscipleship ministry in your church. The most important flock you will ever\nshepherd sleeps under your roof, sits on your lap, and has your eyes. Shepherd\nthem first, even to the detriment of your ministry dreams and goals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n REFLECTION QUESTIONS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. How am I tempted to prioritize\nthe church over my family?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. When was the last time I\nprioritized my bride over the bride of Christ?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. Why am I tempted to tend to\nthe needs of the church over the needs of my family? Is it rooted in my pride\nor my desire to be liked?<\/p>\n\n\n\n ACTION STEPS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. Ask your wife to help you see\nyour blind spots in shepherding your family. Specifically ask her when you are\nmost prone to ignore the needs of your family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. When\nyou get home from the office, put your phone away and just be with your family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. Have\na direct and hard conversation with your church leadership about the need to\nprioritize your family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 7<\/p>\n\n\n\n THE CASTAWAY<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI\u2019m the only one on this island\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Once upon a time, Tom Hanks was in seemingly every movie. Even if he\nwasn\u2019t the star of a film, he was in it! During that stretch, Hanks starred in Cast Away<\/em> (2000), in which he survived a\nplane crash and was stranded on a remote island somewhere in the Pacific. One\nof the most memorable elements of the film was Hanks drawing a face on a\nWilson-brand volleyball that had survived the crash. He befriended the\nvolleyball and had conversations with it throughout the movie, aptly naming it\n\u201cWilson.\u201d1<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Hanks\u2019s\nfriendship with this inanimate object serves as a reminder that all human\nbeings desire relationships. In fact, one of the ways we most clearly reflect\nthe image of God is our innate longing for relationships. God is<\/em> a perfect community of divine\nrelationships within his triune nature of Father, Son, and Spirit. Thus, the\nhuman desire to have meaningful relationships reflects our longing to be like\nour Creator.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Since\nrelational desires and interactions are intrinsic to human nature, it ought to\nstrike us as odd that so many pastors are relatively friendless. That\u2019s not to\nsay that pastors are disliked or uncared for. On the contrary, pastors are\ngenerally loved and well-known. However, most pastors I know suffer from\nextreme feelings of loneliness. Many believe that outside of their ministry\nacquaintances who pastor other churches, they are truly friendless. Now, I\ndoubt there are many pastors turning to volleyballs for friendship (although I\ndid know a pastor who called his KJV Bible \u201cJames\u201d). However, few feel they\nhave someone who knows them intimately.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As I\u2019ve\ntalked with other pastors and asked about their sense of loneliness, I\u2019ve found\na common denominator: We had all been given the terrible advice that we should\nkeep our distance from the congregation. That\u2019s not to say we shouldn\u2019t know\nabout their lives, but it means they shouldn\u2019t see us as one of them;\notherwise, we risk losing their respect. After all, if people know how\noverwhelmingly normal their pastor is in everyday life, how can they can view\nhim as an authority figure who communicates the word of God? Moreover, sheep\nbite if you get too close. Therefore, longevity in the ministry of shepherding\nnecessitates avoiding too many wounds from the flock.<\/p>\n\n\n\n During my\nfirst few years in ministry, I followed this advice and it made me miserable.\nThe pastors I know who struggle with finding meaningful friendships have all\ntold me the same thing. We each pursued living our lives on an island. We were\nproverbial castaways, and we did it to ourselves on purpose. We told ourselves\nthat common Christians need community, relationships, and friends, but pastors\ndo not. This is a lie that denies our own humanity, God\u2019s triune nature, and\nour bearing of the image of God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n With Friends Like These \u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Living your\nlife on an island is dangerous. It\u2019s destructive. It is deadly to your soul.\nWhen you have no friends, you have no accountability. When there is no\naccountability, even the most spiritually mature will fall into deep sin. It\u2019s\ninevitable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You also\nneed friends in the church to avoid sinning against the church. If you never\ndevelop emotional bonds in the church, you will never love the church. If you\ndo not love the church, you will be more inclined to use and abuse the church\nfor selfish gain (e.g., purely for a paycheck or for building your own\nplatform).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Additionally,\nas pastors we ought to constantly call our church family to meaningful\nengagement in the kind of community created by the gospel. In the early\nchapters of Acts, we find the believers living life together. How can we call\nthe church to eat, work, and play together if we are not doing the same?\nThroughout Acts you never see the apostles and early church leaders separating\nthemselves from the everyday lives of the believers. Rather, they lived in\nconstant relationship with one another. For instance, Paul lived with and\nworked alongside Priscilla and Aquila (Acts 18<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s hard\nto be more relationally intimate with someone than living in their home,\nworking with them each day, and shepherding their soul. Yet this is exactly the\nkind of pastor-to-congregant relationship we find in the New Testament. Is it\nmessy? Yes! Does it lead to potentially hurt feelings? Just ask Paul how he\nfelt about John Mark when he left him hanging (Acts\n15:37\u201339<\/a>). There were some deep wounds there and relationships that\ntook years to mend (Col 4:10<\/a>; 2 Tim\n4:11<\/a>). Still, time and again we find Paul planting churches and\nliving his life, intimately, with those he pastored.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Forming\nfriendships in the church does not make you immune from problems. The first\ntime I broke with the advice to live on an island, I developed a strong\nfriendship with a man in a church where I served as one of the pastors. This\nguy was older than me, accomplished in life, and yet he wanted me not only to\nbe his friend but to disciple him. I\u2019d like to say it was the best thing to\never happen to me in ministry, but it wasn\u2019t. I befriended this man. Loved him.\nWe kept up with one another after I moved away to serve another church. Still,\nhe ended up concealing from me secret sin that eventually led to the\ndissolution of his marriage. I felt betrayed, like I never knew him at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I wish\nthat was the only sad story I had to share, but it isn\u2019t. Since that first\nattempt, I\u2019ve made many, many friends in the churches I\u2019ve pastored. And I\u2019ve\nbeen lied to, betrayed, gossiped about, maligned, and offended. But the very\nworst experience was having to oversee the formal church discipline of people\nI\u2019ve called my friends. That involved a deep pain I cannot even begin to\nprepare other pastors for. It is the horrible, grisly, terrible side of\nbefriending church members\u2014the danger I was warned about.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In fact,\none of the objections to pastors befriending a church members is that they will\nbe unable to pursue church discipline for friends who fall into unrepentant\nsin. However, I believe my friendship caused me to pursue this person with even\nmore intentionality than I otherwise would have. Yes, it made discipline more\npainful. But I\u2019ve found that, even with this kind of pain, the blessings, joys,\nand gifts of grace inherent to friendship within the local church far surpass\nthe liabilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Joy of Friendship<\/p>\n\n\n\n In contrast\nto the lie that you need to keep your distance to be a pastor, some of my best\nfriends are in the church I pastor, and their friendship has made me not just a\nbetter pastor, but a better man. Many of my friends are very different from me.\nSome of them are hunters; I prefer to hunt in the meat aisle of my local Harris\nTeeter. Some of them are motor heads; I get my oil changed at WalMart. One of\nmy friends is even a Hollywood stuntman; I don\u2019t like climbing up anything\nhigher than a stepladder. Yet these relationships have shown me three insights\nabout pastoring I would\u2019ve missed if I had stayed a castaway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n First,\npastoring is more than catechizing a group of people with good doctrine.2<\/sup><\/a>\nIt\u2019s about exemplifying the implications of good doctrine for all of life. Most\nof the time I spend with my friends in the church is not spent talking doctrine\nand books. Instead, we are doing seemingly \u201cunspiritual\u201d things and talking\nabout everyday life. Nevertheless, as all good theologians know, everything for\nthe believer is a spiritual activity, no matter how \u201cunspiritual\u201d it may seem.\nTherefore, some of my most important shepherding involves living life alongside\nthese men and helping them see gospel implications in routine areas of life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Second,\nyou cannot shepherd people you do not know. My preaching and teaching are light\nyears better than they used to be, primarily because I know where the hearts of\nthe people are in terms of obedience to Scripture, temptation, and the\npressures of culture. And it\u2019s not just that I can speak with greater\nspecificity about things that I know are affecting people; it\u2019s that I can\nspeak more naturally. I used to have a very strong \u201cpreacher voice.\u201d We\u2019ve all\nseen and heard the pastors who sound like Jim Gaffigan in casual conversation,\nbut the moment they step behind the pulpit their voices and speaking rhythms\nmirror those of the late Adrian Rogers\u2014booming and authoritative, with a dash\nof Southern sing-song rhythm. I can truly say I don\u2019t do that anymore. I know\nmy church intimately, and I approach the pulpit that way. I know these people.\nThey know me. So I talk to them on Sunday mornings in the same way I speak to\nthem during the week\u2014just louder and with more hand gestures. (I\u2019m an extreme\nhand-talker; it looks like I\u2019m directing air traffic when I preach.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n Third,\nfriends in the church keep you from quitting. After a brutal Sunday, a long\nweek, repeated confrontations of someone\u2019s sin, or a streak of shepherding\nthrough tragedy after tragedy, it\u2019s only natural to want to quit. If you don\u2019t\nhave meaningful relationships within the church body, you probably will quit.\nIt\u2019s hard to continually lay down your life for the good of people you aren\u2019t\nemotionally invested in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One of the\nbest encouragements for me is my small group. When I\u2019ve been going through a\ndifficult period of shepherding\u2014whether it be because of biting or wandering\nsheep, or fighting too many wolves at once\u2014I know that my group will remind me\nwhy I do what I do. The reason is that these are my friends. They are family.\nYes, it\u2019s hard, painful, and sometimes thankless service, but I am regularly\nreminded that I\u2019m doing it for people I know and love\u2014and I am serving people\nwho know and love me in return. I can\u2019t quit just because I\u2019m beat up or worn\ndown. In fact, because they know me and we are friends, I can tell them I\u2019m beat\nup and worn down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A Word of Caution<\/p>\n\n\n\n Having close\nfriends in the local church is biblical, affirming, and freeing. Still, there\nare some significant dangers that come with seeking out friendships in a church\nyou pastor. As you seek to move away from the lie of the castaway, you must be\nas discerning with your friendships in the local church as you would be\nanywhere else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n First,\nrecognize that there are people in the church who will want to be your friend\nfor purely selfish reasons. You should not engage in a deep friendship with\neveryone who pursues one with you. On many occasions, I\u2019ve met men who\ndesperately wanted a friendship with me not because of who I am as a man, but\nbecause of what I do as a shepherd. Their assumption was that by befriending me\nthey would have a seat at the table of influence. Others pursued me because\nthey wrongly believed that by being friends with the pastor they would have a\nspecial connection to Jesus. They didn\u2019t know that I have no more of a direct\nline to the Messiah than any other believer. Be on guard for attempts at\nrelational extortion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Second, be\naware of your human tendency to play favorites. You will want to give your best\nfriends preferential treatment. Don\u2019t do it. If you do and you are called out\nfor it, repent and apologize. Even though you will naturally be closer to some\nthan others, always remember that you are the pastor of the entire\ncongregation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Finally,\nwhile in this chapter I have countered the lie of the castaway by telling you\nto cultivate friendships in your church, you may need to do more. In addition\nto seeking friendships in your congregation, you should also seek meaningful\nfriendships with other local pastors. Those who are actively shepherding\nchurches can immediately identify with the unique challenges of a pastor\u2019s\nlifestyle. In his memoir The Pastor,<\/em>\nEugene Peterson writes about the importance of a regular gathering called the\nCompany of Pastors that he met with for twenty-six years while pastoring a\nchurch in Maryland. Each week, a member of the group would take a passage from\nthe Bible and give \u201can exegetical orientation in the text, along with\nhomiletical suggestions that then led into conversations on ways of being a\npastor in sanctuary and homes and community throughout the week.\u2026 Our agenda\nwas our vocation as pastor in the actual conditions of our workplaces, our\ncongregations.\u201d3<\/sup><\/a> Meeting with pastors of other churches can help you\nfeel less alone, and it can foster greater cooperation between churches.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Conclusion<\/p>\n\n\n\n You were\ncreated for relationships, and your office as a pastor doesn\u2019t change that\nfact, nor should it. The job you have before you is to point your people to\nChrist and exemplify the character of Christ. Jesus was universally recognized\nnot just as friendly, but as having friends (John\n15:15<\/a>). You cannot shepherd in a way that mirrors the Good Shepherd\nunless you are a shepherd with friends. You will not leave the ninety-nine to\npursue the one if you do not know the name or care about the life of the one\nlost sheep. You will not stare into the face of wolves and be willing to shed\nyour own blood to protect sheep you do not love. You cannot survive as a\nshepherd if you\u2019re afraid the sheep will bite, and you cannot survive on an\nisland if you\u2019re a castaway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n REFLECTION QUESTIONS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. How have I been influenced by\nthe idea that pastors must not get too close to their congregations?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. How can I cultivate more\nmeaningful relationships within my congregation while avoiding the dangers of\nfalse motives or favoritism?<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. A shepherd who knows the\nmembers of his congregation will easily be able to recount their needs based on\nmeaningful interaction with them. What pressing needs am I aware of because of\nthe intimacy in my relationships? (Take a moment and list some of the needs.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n 4. How many recent conversations,\nmarked by vulnerability, have I had with members of my church?<\/p>\n\n\n\n ACTION STEPS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n 1. Begin building a genuine\nfriendship with a man (or men) in your church.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2. Avoid\nmaking every exchange with your church members about the \u201cformal\u201d business of\nthe church. Instead, go fishing, go to a game, have them over for dinner. Just\nbe a friend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3. Identify\nareas where you are unwilling to be vulnerable and make a conscious decision to\npursue vulnerability.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 4. Designate\na monthly block of time to meet and be open with another pastor in your\ncommunity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 8<\/p>\n\n\n\n CONCLUSION<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The Invention of Lying<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pastor, you believe lies. You tell lies. You tell yourself lies. Like\nevery human being, you are quick to recognize lies that others are believing\nand telling themselves, but you are slow to recognize the lies you tell\nyourself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You preach\nand teach Scripture, so you know the story of how lies began. In Genesis 3<\/a>,\nthe serpent slithers into the garden and begins tempting Eve through a series\nof questions. He asks her what God said about the trees of the garden, and she\nreplies with this: \u201cWe may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God\nsaid, \u2018You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the\ngarden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die\u2019 \u201d (Gen 3:2\u20133<\/a>).\nIn response, Eve is told that God\u2019s command about the tree isn\u2019t meant to protect\nher, but to protect God from her and her husband. So the fall begins with a lie\nabout God\u2014that he does not love Eve or have her best interests in mind. Eve\nthen believes a lie about herself\u2014that she can take God\u2019s throne if she just\neats from the tree (Gen 3:4\u20135<\/a>). Human pride leads us to believe lies\nabout God, which in turn leads us to believe lies about ourselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The\ndeception in the garden becomes even worse when Adam refuses to counter the\nserpent\u2019s lie with the truth. He knows that all of this is untrue, yet the\nmoment Eve is deceived and eats the fruit, Adam joins in. While Eve is misled,\nAdam chooses<\/em> to believe what he knows\nis a lie\u2014and his decision ends up being the match that lights the world on\nfire. The world\u2019s first spiritual leader\u2014the man whose God-given role in the\ngarden is described using the same Hebrew words that define the work of\nIsrael\u2019s priests (spiritual leaders)\u2014completely blows it through his refusal to\ncounter a lie with the truth. You and I are still suffering from the wreckage\nhe caused. Our world is still on fire. Our hearts our still aching, and our\nbodies are still failing. When those responsible for the souls of others choose\nto believe lies, they cause widespread damage that echoes through the ages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We all\nneed to hear the story of the first sin again, because we\u2019re prone to forget\nwhat it means. We recognize that every lie we\u2019ve discussed in this book is, in\nfact, a lie. Yet we find it easier to embrace lies than to resist and expose\nthem. Adam\u2019s willful embrace of what he knew to be a lie ruined God\u2019s good\ncreation. And your willful embrace of lies will ruin your family and the church\nyou shepherd.<\/p>\n\n\n\n How do we\navoid falling prey to the lies pastors believe? By acknowledging that we are\nAdam: We sin like Adam, and we need the same remedy that Adam needed. We need\nto tell the truth to ourselves about who God is, who we are, and what we need.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The remedy\nis foreshadowed and promised in Genesis 3<\/a>. After our first parents throw the\ncreation into a cycle of sin and death, they run and hide from God (Gen 3:8<\/a>).\nThey hide behind the trees in an attempt to protect themselves from the wrath\nof God against their cosmic treason. Pastor, we run to the same place today to\nbe saved from God\u2019s righteous wrath against our sin\u2014a tree. The tree we run to\nis the tree where Jesus died in our place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Action Step #1:<\/strong> Acknowledge, once again, your desperate need\nfor Jesus in your place. Preach the gospel to yourself. Remind the man you see\nin the mirror every morning that you too are a liar who loves to believe lies,\nand it\u2019s only Jesus in your place, on a tree, that saves you from wrath.<\/p>\n\n\n\n God calls\nto Adam and Eve in the garden, and Adam steps out from behind the trees. Here\nis his moment. God knows what has happened, yet he gives Adam the opportunity\nto own it, to plead for forgiveness. Instead, Adam blames Eve and blames God\nfor creating Eve (Gen 3:12<\/a>). Pastor, throughout Scripture, one of\nthe markers of biblical manhood is that a man is willing to take\nresponsibility, even for his sin. Adam passes the buck and shifts the blame.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Action Step #2:<\/strong> Acknowledge that you believe lies and that\nyour lies (whether told or believed) have done incredible damage to you, your\nfamily, and your church. Take responsibility for any wreckage your lies have\ncaused.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We expect\nGod to respond to Adam with crushing ferocity, but he doesn\u2019t. Instead, God\ncurses the serpent and gives Adam and Eve the hope of the gospel. God promises\nthat a son will be born who will crush our enemy (Gen 3:15<\/a>).1<\/sup><\/a>\nA hero will come and fix what we\u2019ve broken through our lies (both told and\nbelieved).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Action Step #3:<\/strong> Rest in grace. Make Jesus the hero of your\nlife and the hero of your ministry. Point your family and your church toward\nJesus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Our entire\nministry, to our family and to our church, must be pursued in light of the fact\nthat we are Adam, and we are pointing the world to the second Adam promised in Genesis\n3:15<\/a>. We need to remind ourselves daily of this. Too often we think\nof ourselves as teachers who have heard it all before. Yes, we are teachers,\nbut we are learners first and must remain learners. We are leaders who point\nothers to Christ, but we ourselves must first be followers of Christ. If we are\nnot constantly reminding ourselves why we need Christ, it can be easy to forget\nwhy others need him too. The moment we lose sight of who we really are\u2014sinners\nin need of Christ\u2014is the moment we begin believing lies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n APPENDIX 1<\/p>\n\n\n\n ELDER QUALIFICATIONS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n If anyone aspires to the office of overseer [elder\/pastor], he desires a\nnoble task\u201d (1 Tim 3:1<\/a>). This means that anyone serving as an\nelder must desire<\/em> to serve as an\nelder. By implication, this means his wife must affirm this desire and share in\nhis burden to shepherd the church body. She must be open to him serving in a\ncapacity that could lead to pain and suffering, great demands on his time, and\nintense levels of scrutiny and criticism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n