Pastoral Leadership

A man pastors a church which is part of a Baptist Association. He involves himself in this organization until one day, he realizes that he has had an inappropriate motivation: a desire to become the president of the group. He also becomes increasingly aware of things in the organization he believes are wrong.

One of the most seductive traps into fleshly ministry is the belief that we must gain God’s acceptance by our accomplishments. The accomplishments might even be spiritual goals—winning souls, building a Sunday school class, raising godly children. But if we undertake them to gain the Father’s acceptance, we’re working in the flesh and missing the joy of the acceptance provided through Christ.

On a scorching hot Monday in July of 1958, Louis Johnson and his family arrived in Tucson, Arizona. By the following Sunday, Pastor Johnson had reserved a room for the first church service in the Pueblo Garden Elementary School. Pastor Johnson and his oldest son knocked on eight hundred doors the following week, inviting everyone that was home to attend a new church plant. Twenty-eight people attended the first service in 1958.

Growing up in the average Australian household means a life void of religion, God, or faith. By the time Robert Bakss of Sydney, Australia, was eight years old, his parents had divorced, and he found himself in not one, but two of these average Aussie households. “I went through a bit of an ordeal then,” Robert recalls, “I was going back and forth between two homes, a dysfunctional sort of home life.”

Neither I nor any other human being is the source of your liberty. I cannot extend liberty to you, and I cannot determine whether or not you have a clear conscience. We have liberty in Christ.

As a part of my work as a chaplain for the Saginaw County Sheriff’s Department, I took a course in critical incident stress debriefing. While I did not look forward to this investment of time and did not expect to learn much, I found it very practical and quite helpful. One of the things they said was that in an immediate crisis, you would not do a complete debriefing, but you could do a defusing. I have found that, as a pastor, there are many times and circumstances that can benefit from “defusing.”

Leading in ministry is like walking a tightrope. Not only does it require delicate balance, but the stakes are high if we slip. As spiritual leaders, it is our responsibility to walk with balance. Ephesians 5:15 puts it succinctly—“walk circumspectly.” But if we were to get off balance, what would it look like?

I believe in checklists. Actually, I believe in lists, period. They help me keep focused on completing projects, and they keep me from forgetting important details. In Philippians 2, we have a checklist of a different sort—qualities of a productive Christian servant. The first several verses of this chapter describe a servant leader as they reveal the mind of Christ and His humility.

Michael Kinsley, a liberal news commentator, once said that the difference between liberals and conservatives was that liberals were looking for heretics while conservatives were looking for converts. In other words, the liberals were eager to criticize others liberals for not being liberal enough, while the conservatives were trying to bring people to their way of thinking and convert them to their philosophy.

If there was ever a time that Christians and local churches needed to strive together for the faith of the gospel (Philippians 1:27), it’s now! This is not the time for independent Baptists to divide and splinter; it is the time to reach out and turn the world upside down once again.

Every spiritual leader, including the pastor (actually, especially the pastor) needs personal and spiritual accountability. I have gathered a team of godly men with whom I meet (sometimes on the phone, but often in person) on a regular basis for accountability.

Each year, as a part of our stewardship campaign, we have men from our church give stewardship testimonies. We generally have a testimony every Sunday morning, Sunday night and Wednesday night for a month, and two or three additional testimonies at our stewardship banquet.

Preaching of the Word of God has been central for us. The Bible reminds us in 2 Timothy 4:2, “Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.” God has chosen to change lives through the preaching of His Word. God uses His Word to build the lives of His people.

It seems obvious that whenever we take a step of faith we are going to be attacked. The devil hates it when men obey God and live by faith. I have seen those who are faithful to God go through great tests, but gold must be tried and purified. When we face the trials, we must remember that we are to count it all joy (James 1:2).

Written communication always carries more weight than spoken communication. And once that weight is attached to the wings of social media, it easily spreads far and wide. If you let a snide remark out in personal conversation, that’s too bad. But if you post it to Twitter, that’s like saying it over a worldwide PA system.

According to a popular Christian magazine, only approximately 20% of evangelical churches in America have a missions conference. I seriously doubt that the percentage in independent Baptist churches is much larger. I have had the opportunity to participate in over 1,300 missions conferences in the past 30 years.

As I look at my responsibilities right now, aside from preaching, my biggest emphasis is placed on encouraging the growth of new leaders. I often tell our staff and deacons, who are core leaders in the church, there are three main things to remember as the focal points in our church.

Part of the joy of ministry is that of enjoying it with fellow laborers in the work. In the secular workplace, friendship with coworkers is often a corny topic. When your expected ambition at work is to support your family and perhaps also further your career, who cares if you enjoy time with your coworkers? But the work of the ministry isn’t the same as the work of factory.

Have you noticed that there seems to be less unity in fundamentalism than there used to be? It has often been bemoaned that fundamentalism is fragmenting. We have been cut into “camps,” fragmented into factions, and separated into splinters.

Every few months I have the privilege to teach a three-week newcomers class at our church. I relish this time with our new and prospective members, and I’ve found that they thoroughly enjoy it as well.