Pastor Joe McKeever

"Your words have stood men on their feet." Job 4:4

Pastor Joe McKeever

What pastors should not do about search committees

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Just to be safe, you may wish to go ahead and plant your tongue firmly in your cheek.  While the subject is serious, my treatment of it will be only somewhat so.

Let me begin by telling you that in a long ministry (I began pastoring in 1962 and I’m still preaching and ministering), I have literally talked to over a hundred pastor search committees.  In fact, during one three-year period, I counted up and realized I had dealt with an average of one search committee every month, thirty-six in all.

So, pastor, let’s say you’ve been invited to meet with the search committee from the First Church of Butterfly City, and you’re plenty excited.

You’ve been at your present church a number of years now and have about run out of ideas, patience, and energy.  A change would not only be good, it might save your life, your ministry, and even your marriage.

Now, pastor, simmer down.  Do not let yourself become too excited….

First, pastor, you must not assume anything.

–Do not assume the Butterfly committee has done its background checks.  It’s completely possible they may begin tonight’s meeting with, “And who are you again? And where are you serving?”  Assume they know very little about you.

–Do not assume that you are the only candidate the Butterflyians are interviewing.  Committees have been known to invite a series of preachers for interviews, after which they will decide which ones are worth the trouble of traveling to hear them preach.  Assume–until they say otherwise–you are one of several they are looking at.

–Do not assume you are their number one choice and start dreaming of moving to that wonderful church in Butterfly City. This is no time to be calling the chamber of commerce for information on the nearest schools.  This is not yet the time to start doing background checks on the church.  Assume this is just for your encouragement and their education until the Lord and events say otherwise.

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What Satan knows about you–and doesn’t want you to know

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“In order that no advantage be taken of us by Satan, for we are not ignorant of his devices.” (2 Corinthians 2:11)

First, Satan is a liar and a murderer (John 8:44).

Satan is a fallen angel who was banished to earth (Revelation 12:9).

Satan is one angry being (Revelation 12:12) since he knows that after his days here are ended, he goes straight into the lake of fire (Revelation 20:10).

Keep those things in mind.

You don’t want to trust that fellow. He is without the faintest hope of any future, big-time angry at God, and a liar of the first order.  That’s a terrible combination. Don’t ever go into partnership with someone like that.

Trust nothing he says. Accept no promises from this liar.

However, he’s smart.  Giving the devil his due, Martin Luther said of him, “On earth is not his equal.”  You and I are no match for him by ourselves.

Now, since Satan has been around for thousands of years, he has watched the human parade and taken copious notes on our foibles.  He knows how to pluck your strings, friend.  That’s why we have to be constantly on the alert and trust nothing he says.

He wants you to fail and will do anything to pull that off.  Limited the way he is, there is nothing Satan can do against God directly, so he strikes out at those whom the Lord loves: People. Humanity. You. Me. Them. Us.

All of that is leading up to this: The devil knows some things about you which he would just as soon you never find out.

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Things most pastors simply cannot do

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“One can’t believe impossible things,” said Alice to the White Queen.

“I daresay you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was younger, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”

–From Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland.

I write this mostly tongue in cheek.  But not completely.

Having pastored six churches over 42 years and having preached for over 55 years, I know that my fears, my failures, my successes, and my accomplishments all tend to work themselves into what I am preaching.

It seems to require the strength of Samson to keep these things out of our sermons….

–If a pastor jogs or works out, it is impossible for him not to work that into a sermon at least monthly.  “As I was jogging yesterday morning, I’d just completed my third mile….”

–If a pastor’s child has excelled in athletics or the band or in the classroom, he will find a way to allude to that in a sermon.  It’s what a proud dad does.  “My wife and I are so proud of Jayson who has just received ‘student of the month’ award for the third time.  We were telling our daughter who is working on her Master’s at Johns Hopkins…”

–If the pastor once took a course in Greek and can find his way around a Greek lexicon, he will find it impossible not to drop that into the occasional sermon. “When I was studying Greek” or “My Greek Bible says…”  I say this to our embarrassment.  If a real Greek scholar ever entered the service and challenged us, we would be mortified.

–If a pastor reads through the Bible annually–or has just done it the first time–not saying so in a sermon is asking more than he is able to give.  He just has to say so. “As you know, I read through the Bible annually–and have done so for the last 13 years.”

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Witnessing as Jesus Taught It

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Good evening.  I am standing before you tonight on behalf of your family members and friends.  They are going to be needing you to do two things–

–to live the Christian life before them.

–and then, in time, to explain to them how they can receive Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.  To be saved, born again.

You cannot do the second until you make a good effort toward the first.  No shortcuts.

Here is our text…

Go home to your people and report to them what great things the Lord has done for you and how He had mercy on you.  (Mark 5:19)

After the great Shantung revival in China a century ago, Missionary Bertha Smith returned to South Carolina and wrote the story, Go Home and Tell, the title based on Mark 5:19.

That’s our mandate.  Let’s talk about it.

The Lord wants no secret agents. No undercover man.  We are commanded to go public in our devotion to Him.  We confess Him as Lord, we are baptized, we love the brethren.

There are probably as many ways to bear a witness for Jesus as there are believers, millions.  Place a Bible on your desk.  Speak of Jesus in your conversation.  Give your testimony. Pray for those in need.  Befriend the strugglers.  Give literature.  Give food to the hungry.

I love the story of Al Braca.  Tuesday, September 11, 2001, Al was at his usual job on the 104th floor of One World Trade Center in New York City.  He was vice president for the Cantor Fitzgerald brokerage firm.  Al Braca was a born again believer, he had been saved 23 years earlier.  And since he freely shared his faith among the employees, they referred to him–mostly behind his back–as “The Rev.”  From time to time, those with personal problems sought out Al for counsel, usually when no one else could see them.  

Everyone knew Al Braca to be a born again Christian.  Everyone.  And from time to time over the years, Al had asked the Lord for permission to find other work where his co-workers were godly, were not obsessed with making money.  But no, the Lord said. He was where the Lord wanted him. 

That morning, the planes hit that tower around the 90th floor.  A few hours later everyone above that level died when the tower crashed to the ground.  Al Braca died along with all the others in his firm.  But the fascinating thing is what Al was doing before the towers fell.  

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A PARABLE YOU DID NOT KNOW WAS IN SCRIPTURE. With an amazing promise.

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First, before we get to that parable, I’d like to toss a few questions your way…

  1.  Have you gone to church all your life?  Most of us have.
  2. Have you noticed in Scripture than when our Lord taught, the people were amazed?  In Matthew’s gospel, check out 7:28-29; 8:27; 9:8,33; 12:23; 13:54; and on and on.  It’s all through the gospels.
  3. Question:  Why were they amazed?  There are several possibilities but the best answer comes in John 7 where the temple authorities sent their soldiers to arrest Jesus and bring Him to them.  The soldiers found our Lord teaching in the public square, but before arresting Him, decided to listen to what He was saying.  An hour later, they showed up at the temple empty-handed.  The authorities were livid.  “Where is he??? We sent you to arrest Him!”  The soldiers answered quietly, “No one ever spoke like this man.”   That’s why people who heard Jesus for the first time were amazed.  It was new.  They had never heard anything like this before.
  4. So, the big question is:Why aren’t we amazed? We read our Bibles and close them and go away saying “That was nice.”  We honored the Lord’s word, but we were not amazed by it.  The reason is: It’s not new.  We’ve heard it all our lives.

And that is our problem.

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Things I wonder about Heaven

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I think about Heaven a lot.  So many people whom I love with all my heart are there and I miss them every day.

I wonder what they are doing and if they think about us.  I wonder if my brothers are really playing rummy with our dad, the way we say they are.  Are they going fishing and is our mom visiting with her wonderful parents whom she had not seen in half a century?

What will Heaven be like? After all, in addition to loved ones in Heaven, there are also uncounted millions of brothers and sisters of all races and tribes whom we have yet to meet. There are “myriads” of angels, and best of all, our wonderful Lord and Savior Himself.

Who would not want to go to Heaven?

My friend Barbara Hardy used to say when she got to Heaven, she was going to ask for a size 10 body.

A pastor friend used to say that in Heaven, he would be able to eat all the lemon ice-box pie he wanted without gaining an ounce.

Joni Aereckson Tada has said that when she gets to Heaven, the first thing she plans to do is ask Jesus to dance. (She’s been a quadriplegic all her adult life.)

Some more serious things I wonder about Heaven include…

Who specifically will be there?  So many people are borderline, it seems to me, and I would find it impossible to decide whether they are true believers or not.  (I’m eternally grateful it’s not up to me to decide!)   I hope everyone is in Heaven, even though I know that’s not going to happen.  No one wants anyone to go to hell.

Will we have the option of seeing a replay of our lives here on earth? (And why would we want to?!)  The point of allowing us to see the replay would be to show us a) what God was doing behind the scenes, b) how He used the tiniest deeds and words and gifts to achieve His purposes, c) how even the sufferings and pain were instruments in His hand, and d) a thousand other things we cannot even imagine.

Or would He not do that out of love and mercy? It’s impossible to know.

Will we have classes where the apostles fill us in on “the rest of the story?”  I’d like that.

Surely, the ministry of our Lord Jesus on earth is the story of the ages, and nothing rivals it in heaven or earth.  Wouldn’t we like to have been there, and wouldn’t it be almost as good to hear it from the lips of those who were?

I’ve told how at one of our family reunions in rural Alabama, about 50 or 60 of us sat around a bonfire in the dark (no electricity at the old home place) and talked about an incident from 1951 when an elderly neighbor was murdered one mile up the road.  I brought the subject up, and was enthralled as one after another told what they knew of the incident: my dad participated in the Sunday manhunt for the man eventually caught and convicted, mom told of seeing that man the day before walking up the road with the walking stick which turned out to have been the instrument of death, and my brother Glenn told of skipping school to sit in the courtroom and watch the trial. Perhaps Heaven will be a time of sitting around discussing events from Scripture with the actual characters and hearing their stories. 

And will there be history classes where the saints of the ages give their personal stories? Oh, sign me up for as many of those as you can!

I want to hear the Lord’s people of the early days, the Middle Ages, from the Black Plague years, those who came through the Inquisition and experienced the Reformation.  I’d love to sit at the feet of the godly ones who came through the fires of Hitler’s extermination camps and revel in their stories.  I want to hear from Reverend and Mrs. Covell, missionaries to Japan and beheaded by the Japanese soldiers early in World War 2, and from Dr. Bill Wallace, martyred by the Red Chinese around 1950.

I reflect on this and think, “All of this and Jesus too!”

No wonder they call it Heaven.

And through it all, I wonder how eternity will feel.

As a child, I would lie awake at night trying to imagine endless time and limitless space.  How could this be? What would that feel like to know time has no end but this just goes on and on and on….?  It was almost frightening. The answer of course is that all of this will be on another plane, another dimension perhaps, and the constraints we know here will not be present there.

Imagine trying to explain the operation of computers to an ant.  Imagine trying to tell your favorite lapdog how to build a house.  Imagine you and me in the presence of the Creator of the vast reaches of the universe.

Just because the ant cannot understand computers, the dog cannot “get” home construction and we cannot imagine being in the presence of God, does not mean this is not so.  Some matters are so grand they exceed the capacity of small minds to grasp.

In  these and so many spiritual matters, we are stumble along with the understanding of infants.  We see through the glass darkly. We do things we do not want to do and fail to do what we should.  We throw ourselves on His mercy out of sheer desperation.

Of such celestial matters, the Singer of Israel exclaimed, “This extraordinary knowledge is beyond me; It is lofty; I am unable to reach it” (Psalm 139:6).  I know the feeling.

We defer to the Lord Jesus on all things Heavenly.

As He told Nicodemus, “No one has been to Heaven except the One who came from there,” referring to Himself (John 3:13).  Jesus is a native of Heaven and thus the Authority on all things celestial.

We defer, as I say, to the Lord Jesus but also to the inspired writers of Scripture, who left us mind-boggling and thought-provoking insights about Heaven….

Heaven is “the Father’s House” which David mentioned (Psalm 23:6) and the Lord Jesus promised (John 14:1-6).  That sounds like the soul’s real home, doesn’t it?

Heaven is “the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world” (Matthew 25:34). Every house I’ve ever lived in has been generic, but my heavenly home is a) a kingdom–if you can imagine! and b) prepared with me in mind.  That, I confess, is way beyond my poor ability to conceive of.

Heaven is “the city which hath foundations,” promised in Hebrews 11:10 and described in Revelation 21. Heaven knows no vagabonds and has no nomads. Everyone is settled.

Heaven is to be “at home” and “with the Lord” (2 Corinthians 5:6-9).  There are no homeless in glory.

Heaven means “resting from our labors,” with “our works following us” (Revelation 14:13).  While Scripture promises “His servants shall serve Him” (Revelation 22:3), this is merely a joyful response to the blessings of the Lord. What a privilege this will be.

Heaven is a land with all new realities, new everything, where nothing is the same and “all things have become new.”  (Start with 2 Corinthians 5:17 and end up with Revelation 21:5. In between, pause to consider Matthew 22:30-32, where Jesus says, “In the resurrection, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven.”)  No one in Heaven will live by earthly rules and be bound by manmade regulations. Gloryland has no licensing bureaus, no code enforcement offices, and no department to see that we all obey the rules.

Heaven is the culmination of everything we have hoped for and dreamed of.  “We shall know as also we are known” (I Corinthians 13:12) when we shall “see face to face.”  “We shall be like Him for we shall see Him as He is” (I John 3:1-3). :We shall be changed” (I Corinthians 15:51-52). No one is deformed, unformed, partial or incomplete in Heaven. No one in Glory has self-esteem problems.

Heaven is the end of all the grief and pain we have known in this lifetime. No tears, no pain, no darkness, no wickedness, no devil, no death, and no bullying or competition. (Revelation 21:1-8). There are no counseling services in Heaven.

Heaven is your inheritance for all who are born again. “An inheritance that is imperishable, uncorrupted, and unfading, reserved in heaven for you” (I Peter 1:4). No one can take Heaven away from you. (See Luke 10:20 and John 10:28-29).

Heaven is a place of reward. “You will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous” (Luke 14:14) and “Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness…and not to me only, but also to all who have loved His appearing” (2 Timothy 4:8).  No one in Heaven gets the short end of the stick. Gloryland has no complaints department.

Heaven is “a building of God, not made with hands” (2 Corinthians 5:1), in contrast with “our earthly tent.”  Comparing the incomparable!  No one camps out in Heaven. The fellow who asked the Lord to “build me a cabin in the corner of Gloryland” wanted what God has no intention of giving.

Heaven is a place of music, singing, praise, and harmony as we have never heard it done. “The voice I heard was like the sound of harpists playing on their harps” (Revelation 14:2).   “They sang a new song before the throne” (Revelation 14:3). “And they sang the song of Moses…and the song of the Lamb, saying ‘Great and marvelous are Thy works, O Lord God, the Almighty….” (Revelation 15:3).  No one is tone-deaf in Heaven. No one “sits this one out.”

I  wonder what else is true about heaven but was left unsaid.  Clearly, human language throws in the towel and admits that these things are indescribable.

But we still wonder. We cannot help ourselves.

What I do not wonder about however—just so you will know–is whether I’m going. I have the word of the Lord Jesus Christ on that. “He who believes in the Son has eternal life, but he who does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him” (John 3:36).

I believe, Lord Jesus.

Now, help me to take as many people with me as possible.

That’s why it’s so necessary to keep reminding people of certain truths: 1) Not everyone is going to Heaven. Oh, that they were!  2) Jesus Christ and He alone is the door–the way, the entrance–to Heaven. We come by Him or we miss Heaven altogether. 3) Entering the door which is the Lord Jesus is a matter of repenting of our sin of self-trust and rebellion, humbling ourselves before Him in prayer, inviting Jesus into our lives as Lord and Master, and then living for Him thereafter.

I worry about people who think because they have just prayed a little prayer they’re going to Heaven. I worry about those who think because they belong to this church or that denomination they are automatically in.  I worry about some who have no personal inner witness of God’s Spirit that they are saved but go forward in the blind assurance that they are because some preacher or priest said they were.

Get into the Word of God and read it. Start with the first page of the New Testament and read it all.  Then come back to the Gospel of John and camp out there until you’ve read it several times. Obey what you read (see John 13:17). Live for Christ.  Serve Him. Get with His people in a Bible-believing church, be baptized, read your Bible and pray.

Do this and upon the authority of the Lord’s Word, I will guarantee you two big things:

1) You will go to Heaven.

2) You will be right at home there.

I wonder if you will start on this journey with us today. And I wonder why anyone would choose to delay.

Lord, forgive us for our word-congestion!

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“Let thy words be few” (Ecclesiastes 5:2).

We preachers know how to “multiply words without end.”

It’s our occupation, and it’s an occupational hazard.

They call on us for a few words and half an hour later, they wish we would sit down and shut up.

When one preacher asked why his hosts had not called on him to say grace throughout the entire week they’d been together, the man replied, “Because we want to eat tonight!”  (I was there and I heard it. It was not well-received.)

“Words from the mouth of a wise man are gracious, while the lips of a fool consume him…. Yet the fool multiplies words” (Ecclesiastes 10:12-13)

We fill the silence with words, fill the air with our thoughts, try the patience of everyone around us with our wordiness.  Long prayers, wordy introductions, repetitive announcements, the list is unending.

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What we know about how God works

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“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways” (Isaiah 55:8).

“When the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on earth?” (Luke 18:8)

On the farm, after we killed the hog, someone had to make cracklings, known otherwise as “cooking the lard.”  (They were never pronounced “cracklings;” the ‘g’ was always dropped.)

A fire was built under a black iron pot into which cut-up portions of the less-desirable fatty hog meat was thrown.  As a worker stood by stirring, the contents boiled and bubbled and gradually released the lard, leaving behind a crisp rind (called the cracklin’), sometimes carrying a streak of lean.  The lard went into gallon containers for household cooking throughout the year. Cracklins became snack-foods for relaxing times, and can be bought commercially even today.

Now, in a similar (but very different!) way, the messages I have preached over six decades of  ministry have been boiled down to their essence. (No greasy rinds left, however!)  Mostly, the result–that is, the gist of my preaching these days–may end up looking something like this….

When God begins to act, He loves to start small, use ordinary people, employ the most surprising methods, and take His own good time about it. Only people of faith will still be standing by at the end, watching to see what God has done, on hand to bask in the glory He is revealing.

Or, more concisely, “Our God is in the Heavens; He does whatever He pleases.”  That happens to be Psalm 115:3.

Our Lord, being God, can do this any way He pleases. But what I have noticed and what I preach is that His way most often seems to involve the following:

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What would make the Lord happy today?

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“Well, I know there’s a lot of big preachers that know a lot more than I do, but it could be that the good Lord likes a little pickin’ too.”  –Tom T. Hall, “The Year That Clayton Delaney Died”

Yogi Berra watched as the batter approached the plate.  The Yankee catcher had seen it all, and this guy was like so many: eager to get a hit, but needing all the help he could find.  The batter stood at the plate and made the sign of the cross, then pointed toward the skies, both symbols of prayer as he summoned the Almighty to his aid.

“Hey buddy,” said Yogi from behind his mask, “Why don’t we just let the Lord enjoy the game?”

I’m with Yogi.

That begs the question of course.  We wonder if the Lord enjoys a baseball game occasionally.

Does God smile at the antics of a small child?  Revel at the cuteness of puppies?  Does He ever sit back and enjoy the music of an orchestra or choir?  Did God like that rainbow I saw yesterday?

Does the Lord ever summon an angel in and say, “Look at that waterfall! And take a gander at those butterflies. Didn’t we do good?”

I wouldn’t be surprised.

He has been known to enjoy His own work.

Natural scientists cut paths deep into jungles where no human has ever walked.  They see wildlife in profusion, plants and animal life in varieties unknown before that moment, all of it carrying on through the ages without one thought to humans, the self-appointed kings of the planet.

Clearly, God made these things for His own pleasure.

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Things a pastor does not know

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As a born-again believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, we know a great many things.  “We know that we have passed from death unto life because we love the brethren” (I John 3:14).  “We know love” (3:16). “We know that we are of the truth” (3:19). “We know that He abides in us” (3:24).

But–concerning those of us called as pastors–there remains so much we do not know.  Here are some things that come to mind which we do not know.

1) Pastors do not know what their people are going through.

True, we know some of what several are experiencing. But even with those closest to you, so much of their personal lives is hidden from all but God.

2) Pastors do not know what God is doing in each life.

It’s like the wind which blows, said our Lord to Nicodemus. “It blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes” (John 3:8).

3) No pastor knows the plans the Lord has for each one.

“What about him?” said Peter to the Lord, pointing to John.  “What is that to you?” said Jesus. “You follow me” (John 21:21-22).

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