This is not the final list. I’m still learning.<\/p>\n
Most of what\u00a0follows\u00a0about leading God’s church is counter-intuitive. Which is to say, it’s not what one might expect.<\/p>\n
In no particular order….<\/p>\n
One. Bigness is overrated.<\/strong><\/p>\n “It doesn’t matter to the Lord whether He saves by the few or the many” (I Samuel 14:6).<\/p>\n Most pastors, it would appear, have wanted to\u00a0lead big churches, wanted to grow their church to be huge, or wanted to move to a large church.\u00a0 Their motives may be pure; judging motives is outside my skill set. But pastoring a big church can be the hardest thing you will ever try, and far less satisfying than you would ever think.<\/p>\n Small churches can be healthy too; behold the hummingbird or the honeybee.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Trying to get\u00a0a huge church to change its\u00a0way of thinking\u00a0can be like turning around an ocean liner.\u00a0 Even so, the\u00a0Lord’s teachings about\u00a0the mustard seed (see Matthew 13:31-32 and Luke 17:6)\u00a0should forever disabuse us of the lust for bigness.<\/p>\n I will spare you the horror stories of pastors who have manipulated God’s people and lied about numbers in order to create the illusion of bigness.\u00a0\u00a0Forgive us, Father!<\/p>\n Two. Lack of formal education in the preacher is no excuse.<\/strong><\/p>\n The pastor of the small church often has far less formal training and education than he would like. As a result, he often feels inferior to his colleagues with seminary degrees. I have two thoughts on that…<\/p>\n One.\u00a0 It’s a mistake.\u00a0 He can be as smart as they are and more if he applies himself.\u00a0 Let the Lord’s preachers not be overly impressed by certificates on the wall or titles before their name.<\/p>\n Two.\u00a0 He can get more formal education if he’s willing.\u00a0 Some of our seminaries have online programs that make seminary education practical and affordable.<\/p>\n My dad, a coal miner, had to leave school after the 7th grade. But he never quit learning.\u00a0 He took courses and read constantly. When God took him to Heaven, Dad was almost 96. Our mom had to cancel four or five magazine subscriptions he was still taking and reading.<\/p>\n Some of the finest preachers of God’s word I’ve ever known have had little formal theological education.<\/p>\n Three.\u00a0 There are no lone rangers or solo acts on the Lord’s team.<\/strong><\/p>\n He sent them out two by two. (Mark 6:7; Luke 10:1)<\/p>\n The preacher who says pastors are not allowed to have friends and thus shuts\u00a0himself off from colleagues in ministry\u00a0has bought into a lie from hell\u00a0that causes him to deceive\u00a0himself and limit his ministry.\u00a0 While a pastor may choose not to have close friends among his own members, there is\u00a0every reason\u00a0for him to make friends with other pastors and ministers who serve the Lord well.\u00a0\u00a0Failing to do so limits himself and hurts the kingdom work.<\/p>\n Furthermore, he must have co-workers alongside him. Paul needed Barnabas, Silas, Timothy, and many others. Read the last chapter of I Corinthians and ask God to forgive you for trying to do this work alone.<\/p>\n Four. Doing a job by yourself is easier than enlisting and training someone else, but it’s violating your calling.<\/strong><\/p>\n “Make disciples,” said our Lord.\u00a0 That mandate calls for us to help people come into the kingdom, then nurture and grow them\u00a0to the point they will know the Word, can share the Word, and can make disciples of others.<\/p>\n Barnabas did not find it convenient to leave Antioch and travel to Tarsus “to seek Saul” (Acts 11:25).\u00a0 But in doing so, he connected the man called as an evangelist to the Gentiles with the opportunity of a lifetime.\u00a0 We are forever grateful to the best disciplemaker in Scripture, Barnabas!<\/p>\n Five. I cannot lead people to do what I’m not doing.<\/strong><\/p>\n God did not send me to be a talker, but a doer. Not as a coach only, but as a player-coach.\u00a0 It is enough for the disciple to become like the teacher, said our Lord.<\/p>\n So, as a pastor and church leader, my job is to show them how. Not just tell them.\u00a0 (James 1:22 and I John 3:18).<\/p>\n Six.\u00a0 Not only is it hard to get started tithing my income or sharing my faith (and a hundred other discipleship things), God\u00a0likes it that way.<\/strong><\/p>\n Watch the butterfly emerge from its chrysalis.\u00a0 The struggle, we are told, is a necessary part of its development.<\/p>\n Only people of faith and determination will\u00a0set out to learn to tithe and witness and understand the Bible, then stay with it \u00a0until they are able to do it well.\u00a0 Everyone else drops by the wayside, intending to wait until it’s easy.\u00a0 In doing so, they’re asking for and expecting what never was and never shall be.\u00a0 “Without faith, it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6).<\/p>\n The\u00a0members of\u00a0your church need to be reminded that God does not need their money.\u00a0 He is not suffering from a cash flow problem. God is trying to grow disciples.\u00a0 That accounts for the hundreds of teachings on money in the Word. When are we ever going to understand this? When are preachers going to quit fearing criticism and teach stewardship until people do it!<\/p>\n Seven.\u00a0 God makes His leaders servants, not bosses or lords or bigshots.<\/strong><\/p>\n I keep running into husbands who want to lord it over their wives because “God made me the head of the home and told you to submit!” Such men may call themselves believers, but they are pagan to the heart and have probably never been saved. They certainly don’t know the first thing about God’s word or Jesus’ heart.\u00a0 If they did, they would know that they are sent as servants. “Even so, Christ loved the church and gave Himself for it.”<\/p>\n Bullies on the playground or dictators\u00a0in the pulpit are cancers on the body, and must not be tolerated.\u00a0 The parable of all parables on this subject is Luke 17:7-10.\u00a0 We must keep saying to ourselves–even when we have done everything Jesus required– “I am only an unworthy servant; just doing my duty.”<\/p>\n Eight.\u00a0 The more righteous we are, the less we will be aware of it.\u00a0 “Moses knew not that his face did shine” (Exodus 34:29).<\/strong><\/p>\n I said to the 75-year-old saint in our church, “Marguerite, you are the most Christ-like person I know.”\u00a0 She didn’t flinch.\u00a0 “Oh honey,” she said to her young minister, “if you only knew.”\u00a0 I did know, in a way, but have learned a hundred times since:\u00a0 Those closest to the Lord are the last to know it. The nearer to the light we get, the more imperfections and blemishes we will see.<\/p>\n Beware of ever thinking you have arrived. “Let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall.”<\/p>\n Nine. The Lord’s servants who serve well are going to run into the buzz saw of opposition from the nay-sayers, do-nothings, status-quo lovers, and carnal.\u00a0That’s\u00a0no fun, but it’s\u00a0not all bad.<\/strong><\/p>\n Reading the mandate of the disciples in Matthew 10:16ff, we cannot say we were not warned.\u00a0 But it has ever been this way.\u00a0 We are swimming upstream in a downstream world.<\/p>\n Jesus prepared us for this by saying that whoever receives us is receiving Him, whoever listens to us is listening to Him, and whoever rejects us is rejecting Him. (See Matthew 10:40 and Luke 10:16.).\u00a0 If being treated like Jesus is not enough for us, we’re in the wrong calling.<\/p>\n Ten.\u00a0 Not only does the Lord allow His\u00a0choice servants to suffer sometimes, He even plans for that to happen. See\u00a0Matthew 10:16ff.<\/strong><\/p>\n Caesar ain’t coming to\u00a0 your revival, preacher. So, the Lord is going to be needing someone to get arrested for preaching. Then, when the high and mighty ruler has to decide on this case, he will order the saint in chains to “tell us what you’ve been preaching.” That’s how it worked with Paul (see 2 Timothy 4:16-17), and how it has\u00a0been with\u00a0His choice servants ever since.<\/p>\n When Paul and Silas were falsely charged, then beaten and jailed, even though their backs were open wounds and they were hungry, tired, and hurting, “about midnight, they began praying and singing hymns of praise to God. And the other prisoners were listening to them.<\/em>” (Acts 16:25)\u00a0 They’re always listening and watching when God’s people suffer unjustly.\u00a0 That’s a fact\u00a0which God\u00a0uses to reach many for Himself.<\/p>\n No one wants to suffer.\u00a0 No one volunteers to hurt. But sometimes it’s the only way.<\/p>\n What God’s faithful must never do is groan and bellyache and say, “Why me, Lord?”\u00a0 Your suffering may turn out to be the highest compliment the Father ever gave\u00a0 you.\u00a0 Early believers rejoiced they were counted worthy to suffer.\u00a0 (See Acts 5:41).<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" This is not the final list. I’m still learning. Most of what\u00a0follows\u00a0about leading God’s church is counter-intuitive. Which is to say, it’s not what one might expect. In no particular order…. One. Bigness is overrated. “It doesn’t matter to the … Continue reading