By Clayton Todd
Seasoned pastors usually get to write this article, simply because they’re no substitute for the time-tested real thing. Yet as I’ve reflected on the first year of shepherding my congregation, here are four confessions that in the Lord’s kindness may benefit every pastor, minister, leader, and lay person.
The Supremacy of the Word
Sitting in a seminary classroom, words such as “inerrancy,” “infallibility,” and “perspicuity” will bounce off the walls describing the Word of God. I’ll supply another one that may be easily overlooked — “living.” The Word of God is living. It is not stagnate, it’s doing something. Over a year’s time, inspecting all the various activities or new endeavors that I have undertaken, none have been as fruitful as the ministry of the Word.
This is not something to be frustrated by, for it is by the Word of God that the People of God are equipped to be the Church. Might I suggest the greatest, most potent, concentrated environment for equipping disciples of Jesus is on Sunday morning in your sanctuary at your worship hour as we all sit under the Word of God. I confess I found this so freeing.
If, then, this is true, my fellow pastors, the need for organized thought that clearly communicates the Bible to our congregants is needed more than ever. Let us cast aside opinion pieces, open our Bibles and say, “Thus saith the Lord.” For surely the Word is Living.
Pray More than You Want To
I confess, I have repented many times over this past year of “prayerlessness.” There’s always another lesson to be written, sermon to be outlined, home visit to be made, order of worship to be composed, etc. So it is with our lay people as well, is it not? Grocery shopping, running kids to practice, picking kids up from practice, work, dinner, laundry, oil change — when are we to pray? My answer: when you don’t want to. We pray far less than we want to, and the culprit might be we don’t want to. The demands of life delay our knees from bending and our eyes lifted to Heaven.
The busyness of life would tell us there is not time to pray. The truth is, we cannot afford not to. I preached a sermon entitled “Prayerless Believers: An Oxymoron” on Luke 3:21-38. Jesus, as He is in the Jordan, prays upon receiving the Holy Spirit. For what is Jesus praying? For power to accomplish the task before Him, and yet the Holy Spirit descended on Him as a dove.
Saint, pray when your heart is cluttered. Pray when you’re busy. Pray when you don’t want to. For as our Lord prayed for power, we too, need the Holy Spirit to enable our efforts as we seek daily to follow Jesus.
Convictional Leadership
I have said it dozens of times to my people, “I’m not divisive, but I am convictional to my core.” In an age where the culture seeks to define and form Church leaders and ministry practices to fit the mold of the day, we must be formed by the values and truths of Scripture and then stand firm.
We cannot apologize for the Scriptures. On the contrary, I have found that those leaders that stand firm amidst the crosswinds of the age are not rejected by the faithful, but all the more received. Jesus was full of grace and truth, yet one was not at the expense of the other. Let us pattern our beliefs and practices to the whole of Scripture and then keep course. Sunday school classes, D-Groups, congregations, and families will be the better for it.
Labor in Patience
“We urge you brethren, admonish the unruly, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with everyone” (1 Thess. 5:14). The age-old adage is “we overestimate what can be done in one year, and underestimate what can be done in five.” I confess I have adopted the new ministry philosophy, “slow is smooth, smooth is fast.” The Lord builds His Church. However, we must not forget He is doing it by orchestrating the individual lives of many, and that consists of a lot of moving parts. Thus, the call of shepherds, ministers, and leaders in the Church is to labor patiently. Keep the course for the long haul.
Jesus’s Church is a foretaste of the Kingdom to come. Let us then proclaim the Word, pray, and lead in all patience.
Todd is pastor of First Church, Belmont.
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