{"id":11263,"date":"2016-09-14T05:33:12","date_gmt":"2016-09-14T10:33:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/?p=11263"},"modified":"2016-09-14T05:36:52","modified_gmt":"2016-09-14T10:36:52","slug":"happen-pastor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/happen-pastor\/","title":{"rendered":"The light-hearted pastor is an oxymoron"},"content":{"rendered":"

“…the daily pressure upon me of concern for all the churches” (2 Corinthians 11:28).<\/strong><\/p>\n

After pastoring\u00a0three churches for nearly nine\u00a0years, I joined the staff of a large Southern Baptist church in our state and suddenly found myself attending Sunday services\u00a0without having to preach.<\/p>\n

Now, I loved to preach, don’t get me wrong. But for\u00a0almost a decade, I hardly knew what it was like to attend church the way normal people do.<\/p>\n

I recall sitting on the platform during the early part of the service feeling\u00a0as light as a bird, carrying\u00a0none of the burden I had grown accustomed to when I was pastoring.\u00a0 I would\u00a0sing the hymns and enjoy the worship, and then at the appointed time in the service, get up and make my announcement or extend the welcome or offer a prayer.\u00a0 When I finished,\u00a0I walked off the platform and joined my family in a pew.\u00a0 It was a wonderful feeling.<\/p>\n

One day something occurred to me. Before long, I will be re-entering the pastorate.\u00a0 I’ll be\u00a0the person bringing the sermon each Sunday.\u00a0 Wouldn’t it be wonderful if I could be as free and light-hearted, as burden-free, as I feel now?<\/em><\/p>\n

Not going to happen.<\/p>\n

I knew that.\u00a0 But I longed for it, nevertheless.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The clear fact is the pastor is the point man for the Lord’s church.\u00a0\u00a0The reins come to his hand, even if he has a large team of assistants and helpers.\u00a0 No one has the care and responsibility for every area of\u00a0the church the way he does.\u00a0 When he\u00a0arrives at the church building on Sunday, he is the only one there\u00a0carrying the divine burden of a message God has given him to deliver.<\/p>\n

To expect to carry that message without feeling the weight is asking a little much.<\/p>\n

The Old Testament prophets would sometimes preface their sermons with this: “The burden of the Lord.”<\/p>\n

The Lord’s servant was carrying a heavy burden, one that he had to discharge.<\/p>\n

Paul wrote the Corinthians, “I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling” (I Corinthians 2:3).\u00a0 Every preacher knows the feeling.<\/p>\n

–I am not adequate for this responsibility.<\/p>\n

–I do not live up to such high and lofty standards as to be able to preach this.<\/p>\n

–I’m not wise enough about this Word;\u00a0 there is so much more here that I’ve not grasped yet.<\/p>\n

–These people know what a poor representative I am of the Living God.<\/p>\n

–This message is far beyond my poor ability to proclaim.<\/p>\n

–People’s eternity hangs in the balance.\u00a0 If I do this poorly, some may pay an awful price.<\/p>\n

–Some are making decisions about the Lord today based on what they hear from me. That is frightening!<\/p>\n

“Not that we are adequate for these things,” said Paul.\u00a0 “But our adequacy is of God, who has also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant….” (2 Corinthians 3:5-6).<\/p>\n

And so, the servant of the Lord grasps His Bible and walks into church.\u00a0 The constant prayer of his heart is, “Help me, Lord!\u00a0 If You do not go with me, if You do not empower this, we are lost.”<\/p>\n

But, it’s more than a prayer. It’s a plea, a heart-cry, an SOS.\u00a0 We sound a lot like Peter attempting to walk on the Galilee. “Help me, Lord, lest I drown!”<\/p>\n

O Lord, help your minister.\u00a0 He’s trying to\u00a0walk\u00a0on water over his head.\u00a0 He is attempting to do something which would be the height of presumption were it not for\u00a0Thy call upon him: to speak for the living God.<\/p>\n

Forgive him when he tries to preach Thy message in a light-hearted way.\u00a0 He’s struggling with the assignment Thou hast placed upon him, to walk with one foot in Heaven and the other on earth. Sometimes he leans more one way and sometimes more the other.\u00a0 Help him find his balance, Lord.<\/p>\n

Amen.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“…the daily pressure upon me of concern for all the churches” (2 Corinthians 11:28). After pastoring\u00a0three churches for nearly nine\u00a0years, I joined the staff of a large Southern Baptist church in our state and suddenly found myself attending Sunday services\u00a0without … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11263","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pastors"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11263","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11263"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11263\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11268,"href":"http:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11263\/revisions\/11268"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11263"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/joemckeever.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}