Pastor, To Serve Well, Lose the Perfectionism

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“He Himself knows our frame; He is mindful that we are but dust.” (Psalm 103:14

God is under no illusions about you and me.

We’re not perfect and never will be in this life.

Get used to the idea.

So, whether you set out simply to live the Christian life as a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ or you have been called into His service as a minister (pastor, missionary, whatever), you will do well to shed all pretenses and aspirations of perfection in this life.

This means that you will…

–give your best and feel it is never enough. It’s not, but the Lord can feed a multitude with a child’s lunch, so get over it.

–feel good about something you did and find out later some people were disappointed in you. You will not go to pieces over it.

–make some people angry at you for no reason you can think of. You will accept it as how things are.

–have enemies you never wanted, face opposition you never bargained for, and deal with crises not of your making. You will constantly check to see if it was something you did or failed to do. At the end, you will not take it personally.

Even when (or if) you have done everything flawlessly in your service for the Lord, you will be criticized.  Someone will find fault with what you did, write you off as a failure, reject you for whatever they were considering, and you will not be given an opportunity to respond.

Get used to it. It’s the way of life in this fallen world.

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The Birmingham Baptist Youth Rally….Still At Work

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In 1959, I transferred to Birmingham-Southern College from a school in Georgia. For a brief time, I lived with my sister Patricia and her husband James, and we all joined West End Baptist Church. It was my introduction to Southern Baptists.

No sooner had we joined the church than I discovered the Baptists of Birmingham held a thriving twice-a-month gathering for their teens. On the first and third Saturday nights, upwards of 500 young people would gather in some Southern Baptist church for an inspirational program, followed by a fellowship time with refreshments.

I had grown up in rural Walker and Winston Counties of Alabama and although our little Free Will Baptist Church loved its young people, we had nothing like this.

I ate it up.

Soon, I was promoting the gathering among West End’s youth, encouraging ours to be the biggest group present. Some nights we would have 50 or more on the city buses which the church hired to transport us. (It was on one of those buses where I told the lovely Margaret Ann Henderson for the first time that I loved her. The date was December 3, 1960. She was 18 and I was 20.)

One evening, I was approached by Larry Andrews, our church’s music minister (and the father of best-selling inspirational author Andy Andrews). “Joe, I was talking to Bob Ford. He’s the associate pastor at Ensley Baptist and pastor advisor for the youth rally. Would you be interested in becoming program director for the rally?”

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When Resolving Conflicts, Try Not To Start New Ones.

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“Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.  And be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you” (Ephesians 4:31-32).

There is no problem-solving section of the Bible.

Sorry if that disappoints you.

What we do find across the New Testament are large servings of healthy food of the spiritual kind, instructions on how to serve God and live well and relate to one another in the close confines of the forever family. Imbedded throughout are insights on resolving collisions between the Lord’s children.

Hold on.

Do you mean to say that from the beginning Jesus expected clashes and collisions within His family? That His disciples would be torn apart by jealousies and competitions and divisions?

Not only did He anticipate such conflicts, He observed them firsthand among the twelve. Here are a couple of instances…

–A disciple said to Jesus, “Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to hinder him because he was not following us” (Mark 9:38). How modern is that? Our denomination is best; the rest of you are failing God.

Jesus was tolerant of a lot of things, but not this kind of spiritual snobbery.

–“And hearing (that the sons of Zebedee had tried to gain the advantage over the other apostles by asking for the best places in the Kingdom), the ten began to feel indignant with James and John” (Mark 10:41). The genes of competitiveness have been among us from the beginning.  “We shall now give our ranking of the top ten churches in our denomination.” “My church is better than your church.” “We may not be the biggest church in town, but we’re the best.”

Sometimes idealistic Christians want to drop out of church altogether because the congregations they’ve found all have problems of one kind or another. “Whatever happened to New Testament churches?” they ask.

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The closer you get to the end, the faster it goes

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“…seal up the book until the end of time; many will run to and fro, and knowledge will increase.” (Daniel 12:4)

The only constant, they say, is change.

I remember this so vividly. I was seated in a meeting alongside the president of the local college.  Jim Strobel was always perfectly dressed, and today I noticed how sharp and crisp were the cuffs on his white dress shirts.

I said, “How do you get your cuffs like that?”

He said, “Like what?”

I pointed out the starched stiffness and white brilliance of his cuffs. And then showed him mine.

My cuffs were soft and looked as though they had hardly seen an iron.

Jim said, “I don’t know. They come back from the cleaners this way.”

The cleaners! Of course. He sends his shirts to the cleaners!

For years–ever since Margaret had started back to college and everyone had to pitch in on household chores–I had done my own dress shirts. Not that it was that big a deal: spray something around the necks, toss them in the washer with detergent, move them to the dryer, and run an iron over them later and put them on hangers in the closet.

Anyone could do that.

For the past quarter-century, I have sent my shirts to the cleaners. Even the ones I wear around town have those stiff cuffs I once admired so much.

These days, I rarely give the cuffs a thought.

In just so tiny ways, life changes.

I’m 72 years old. That’s hard to say and harder to believe.  Last year I hit 30.  And the week before that, I was in college.

Life moves on.

I bought a car last week–a Honda CR-V, which is some kind of an SUV or hatchback or something.  Nothing about it was intended to be lavish or luxurious but something occurred to me.

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Young Pastors, 7 “Outside Women” to Watch Out For

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A few weeks ago, we posted an article here on 7 women inside the church which pastors should be wary of. With the scandal in the news involving a couple of prominent generals and a Florida socialite, we recently followed that up with an article saying “if it can happen there, it can happen to you.”

Here is what will probably be the third and final segment on this trilogy in which we are cautioning pastors–of all ages, but particularly young ones who could be blind-sided–to watch out for certain types of women.  I am very aware of the sexist nature of these writings. And, as we have noted, sometimes the predator is the man in the pulpit and the victim the unsuspecting one who comes to him seeking pastoral counsel and guidance.

That said, here is my list of seven “types” of women outside the pastor’s own immediate congregation of whom he must be careful.

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If it can happen to General Petraeus, it can happen to you!

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“There is a sense in which sexual sin destroys a person like no other, because it is so intimate and entangling, corrupting on the deepest human level.” –John MacArthur

We all agree that adultery is wrong. The problem is once you get caught in its grip, you find yourself so drunk with its intoxication, you start humming the Debbie Boone hit, “This can’t be wrong, it feels so right.”

A pastor friend whose wife left him and the children for another man in the church–who had also abandoned his family–told me some women from his congregation drove to the nearby state to try to reason with her.  She rebuffed them. “You are interfering with the will of God for my life!” (She came to see the severity of her mistake, but only after it was too late to repair her marriage. She lives in regret.)

It can happen to you, friend.

If you question everything else that follows, do not doubt that. Adultery can happen anywhere, to anyone. You do not have to be debonair, suave, handsome, articulate, successful, muscular, and every woman’s dream.  You can be dull and overweight, unattractive and without a shred of a personality, and still be caught up in this firestorm we call an affair.

And, you can be mighty in the Lord, successful beyond your biggest dreams, and a warrior for Christ of the first dimension, and still be brought down by adultery.

“Flee fornication.” (I Corinthians 6:18)

Don’t argue with it, reason with it, discuss its ramifications with the object of your delight, and do not underestimate it. Just run as fast as your little legs will carry you. Get away, quick.

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Do You Always Speak Without Notes?

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“So, as much as is in me, I am ready to preach the gospel to you….” (Romans 1:15)

I am loving preaching more these days than in all the half-century I’ve been at it.

Recently, when a pastor invited me to supply in his church for a Sunday, he made an unusual request. “Give me some choices as to what you will preach.”

I loved the request, and quickly wrote him back, sending summaries of a half-dozen messages.  He picked two, specifying one for morning and the other for Sunday evening.

When I brought the messages to his people, everything about the experience was wonderful. He was a gracious host, attentive to every detail, and his people were so responsive. I can’t wait to go back.

Later, in a quiet conversation, he asked if I always preach without notes as I had done that day. “And,” he added, “when you were pastoring and having to come up with two new sermons for each Sunday, did you preach the same way you do now?”

By way of explanation, the “way I do now” is this. I take my Bible into the pulpit, but only to read the scripture. Thereafter, every scripture mentioned in the sermon I have memorized. The sermon is an open-hearted time of sharing. All the “notes” are in my head and heart.

What my sermon is not, I admit, is a well-crafted, finely honed specimen of hermeneutical art.

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What Pressure Does

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“…you have set my feet in a spacious place.” (Psalm 31:8)

Last week, during our revival, I had spent the morning with my host pastor. We visited the local middle school and I spoke with the children in several classes about drawing and then sketched each one.  Afterwards, we went to lunch. Then, around 1 o’clock, I returned to the hotel room, ready for a little nap.

That’s when I saw it.

Opening the door to my room, I stood there stunned.

It looked like a bomb had gone off in the room. Trash was scattered around the floor, and bits and pieces of glass were everywhere. On top of the chest of drawers, larger bits of glass were strewn.  Nothing seemed out of place and nothing had fallen from the ceiling.

I went in search of the maid. Kristen was as shocked as I was. “I came in at 10 o’clock to get your towels,” she said. “I’ve not been back since.”

She went for her supervisor, and she in turn called for the hotel manager.

And then, we saw what had happened.

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The 10 Best Things in II Corinthians (Part 2)

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(On November 1, we published the first 5 of the “ten best things in Second Corinthians.” Today, we complete the list.This ranking, of course, is purely arbitrary and personal, nothing official.)

6) II Corinthians 8:1-5 —  A great example of giving.

The Lord’s churches in the region of Macedonia (which took in Philippi, Thessalonica, and Berea) were something to brag about.  Paul used them as examples: “This is how it’s done!”

Denominational publications will highlight an individual church for its outstanding record in ministry, growth, or evangelism. Critics will often take exception to doing so, suggesting that to single out one church for its accomplishment is to encourage pride and makes other churches feel inferior.  Maybe so, but there is good scriptural precedent for using the heroics of one congregation to inspire others.

You have to love the way Paul adds layer upon layer in lauding the giving of the Macedonians:

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Broken Pastor, Broken Church

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(This is our account of a difficult three years in our lives–‘ours’ referring to my wife and me–when we pastored a divided church in North Carolina. The article ran in the Winter 2001 issue of “Leadership,” a publication of Christianity Today.  At the conclusion, we have a few postscripts which may be of interest to some.)

How could I lead a congregation that was as hurt as I was?

My calendar for the summer and beyond was blank. I usually planned my preaching schedule for a full year, but beyond the second Sunday in June–nothing. I had no ideas. I sensed no leading from the Spirit. But it was only January, so I decided to try again in a couple of months. Again, nothing. By then, I suspected the Lord was up to something.

A member of my church had told me the year before, “Don’t die in this town.” I knew what she meant. She didn’t envision Columbus as the peak of my ministry. Columbus was a county-seat town with three universities nearby, and, for Mississippi, cosmopolitan. I felt Columbus, First Baptist, and I were a good match. The church grew. We were comfortable together. My family was settled. Our sons and daughter had completed most of their schooling, and after twelve years, they called Columbus home. My wife, Margaret, and I had weathered a few squalls, but life was good–a little quiet, perhaps even stagnant, but good.

And suddenly I could hear the clock ticking. Did God have something more for me?

First Baptist Church of Charlotte, North Carolina, called in March. I ended my ministry at Columbus the second Sunday of June and began in Charlotte one month later.

After I’d been in Charlotte about a month, the man who chaired their search committee phoned. “I have some people I want you to talk with,” he told me. He picked me up and drove me to the impressive home of one of our members. In the living room were a dozen men, all leaders in the church and in the city. Another man appeared in charge.

“We want to offer you some guidance in pastoring the church,” he said. “There are several issues we feel are important, and we want you to know where we stand.” He outlined their position on the battle between conservatives and moderates for control of our denomination and on the role of women in the church. He wanted women elected as deacons, one item in a full slate of changes he wanted made at the church.

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