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The Pastor and His Congregation, 2

Published November 12, 2014 Uncategorized Leave a Comment
Tags: Church Membership, Congregation, Pastor

What the Pastor Expects From His Congregation

In this series on stewardship, we’ve covered what God expects from all members of His Church. He wants them to be good stewards of the gifts – Spiritual gifts – He has given them. All members of the Church, from the top on down, have a responsibility to be faithful in this regard. We also covered what the congregation may expect from their pastor. The pastor has a responsibility to not only be a good steward of the gifts God has given him, but he must also be faithful to the souls God has put in his charge. Now it’s time to consider what the pastor expects from his congregation. Of course he expects each member to use their Spiritual gifts, but beyond that, he has certain expectations. These expectations are just as valid as those held by the congregation.

A job, yet not

Your pastor is in a different, sometimes difficult, situation. He has been called to your church by the Lord. It may seem otherwise. It may seem as though you and your congregation or your pastor search committee called him, but in reality, if your pastor is a man of God intent on being obedient to God, then he is your pastor because God placed him in your church. He is not your employee. Some churches treat their pastor like that, but he is not. In fact, his position is much higher than that of any employee.

Your pastor is God’s man. He stands between the living and the dead. He brings God’s message to you; in a sense he is a modern-day prophet. He brings your needs to God; in that sense he functions as a priest. And yet, he is neither a prophet nor a priest in the Old Testament sense of those offices. Every Christian may have complete, free and unfettered access to the very throne room of Heaven. Every child of God may enjoy the continual presence of God. However, it behooves every church member to recognize that God in His wisdom has placed certain officers in the church for their benefit. Elders and deacons serve both God and the church. The pastor is also in your church to serve God and you.

Dear brothers, honor the officers of your church who work hard among you and warn you against all that is wrong. (1 Thessalonians 5:12 TLB)

Mind you, your pastor has to keep this verse in his mind:

Don’t be tyrants, but lead them by your good example… (1 Peter 5:4 TLB)

God has placed the pastor over the congregation, but in the sense of a shepherd who is to care for his sheep. He is not the boss of the congregation and he shouldn’t treat those in his care like a tyrant. The relationship between pastor and congregation is a special, delicate one that can easily become unbalanced in either direction – pastors turn into dictators or congregations come to disrespect their pastor. A wrong spirit on either side of the equation will grieve the Holy Spirit and halt any work of God in that church.

To state the obvious, it takes a lot of grace for the pastor-member relationship to remain a healthy one.

A marriage analogy

In a sense, the relationship between the pastor and his congregation is like a marriage. When either a pastor or the people become dissatisfied with the other and attempt to take things into their own hands, you may be sure disaster will result. In the marriage ceremony, we say:

What God has joined together, let no man put asunder.

It is useless to tinker with or interfere with God’s plan, either in the marriage relationship or the pastor-member relationship. A third party often causes problems between husband and wife. And when any member or anybody else comes between the pastor and his congregation, problems will inevitably ensue.

The pastor expects you to be loyal

When the Lord leads your pastor to you; when after being interviewed and voted on and prayed over, all involved settle the issue and you as a congregation are duty-bound to support and stand behind your pastor in every way possible. Loyalty is not to be confused with lip service. While a congregation has every right to except certain things from him, no member of the church should criticize or persecute or demean and disrespect the pastor. If you have a problem with your pastor, talk to him about it, not to your neighbor. Talk to him, then shut up. Pray about the situation, if it remains unresolved. Never, ever belittle your pastor in front of your children or grand children or others. Those are future church members! Pastors come and go; over the life of your church, you’ll have good pastors, bad pastors, and mediocre pastors but – Lord willing – your church will remain and it looks bad when a church mistreats its pastor. Don’t taint the reputation of your church by treating a pastor badly out in the community. It may well be that particular pastor needs to go, but it needs to happen in an environment of love and mutual respect.

Your pastor is loyal to you. Many pastors are approached by other churches looking for a pastor “just like him.” Over your pastor’s tenure with you, he may have turned down and walked away from many other pastoral opportunities (some maybe very attractive!) to stay with you.

Your pastor expects you to pray for him (and his family)

This hardly needs to be expanded upon. Nothing happens unless somebody, somewhere is praying about it. What would happen if every member of a congregation felt as much responsibility to pray for the pastor and his work as they expect him to pray for them? Pray every day for your pastor. He needs it. His family needs it. There are stresses and pressures in the ministry unknown in any other profession.

The pastor expects you to encourage, not discourage him

Encouragement is not the same thing as flattery. Your pastor has more than enough to discourage him in the ministry; a word of encouragement is always welcome. Most members are very quick to “constructively criticize” him or tell him how to do his job, but what your pastor needs are your prayers and your encouragement. Don’t wait until your pastor has resigned to tell him what a blessing his ministry has been. Many a pastor has left a church never knowing how effective his ministry has been. Contrary to what some think, your pastor is human just like you are. You like to be appreciated, and so does he.

Your pastor expects you attend services

This may well be the most important expectation any pastor has of his people. No preacher is at his best preaching to empty pews. Nothing discourages a pastor more and nothing makes him feel like a failure more than when his people can’t be bothered to show up on a Sunday morning. There is an urgent spiritual reason for being dedicated to your church, but here’s a practical one! You can turn a poor preacher into a good one by just showing up and supporting him with your prayerful presence. And not just on a Sunday. Mid-week Bible studies and prayer meetings and church-wide dinners are all opportunities you have to not only have fellowship with one another and with the Lord, but it’s also an opportunity to encourage you pastor and his family.

Let us not neglect our church meetings, as some people do, but encourage and warn each other, especially now that the day of his coming back again is drawing near. (Hebrews 10:25 TLB)

Your pastor expects you to be a worker, not a shirker

Closely linked to church attendance is this expectation. The work of the Lord needs more workers. A church doesn’t build itself. Children don’t teach themselves. The pastor and his wife shouldn’t be the only workers or soul winners in your church. Use your spiritual gifts without being coerced. Use your talents in church, if you have them. See something your church lacks? Don’t whine and complain, do something about it! If there’s a ministry lacking, just do it yourself, if you can. But check with your pastor first.

There’s no such thing as retirement in the kingdom of God. There’s always something you can do in your church, regardless of your age.

Your pastor expects decent financial support

If every member gave as he is able to do – as the Lord has blessed them – this would be a simple need to fill. Many church members think their pastor is overpaid. He works one day a week, after all. Consider some facts of life. The average pastor is in his profession, not necessarily because he wants to be, but because God has called him to be. Most preachers have natural talents that could earn them a much better income doing something else. God doesn’t call weaklings, but strong, capable men to do the work of His ministry. Think about Paul and Peter, men who were strong in character and conviction. One an intellectual powerhouse, the other a rugged fishermen, yet both doing pastoral work. How about men like John Wesley, Martin Luther, John Calvin, John Knox, David Lingstsone, Billy Sunday and Billy Graham. All men with single-minded devotion to the work of God, yet all men with differing talents, gifts, and vision, and all men who changed the world because they chose to be faithful to God. God chooses strong individuals to do His work. Your pastor deserves the best salary you can manage to pay him. He often has as much education as a doctor or lawyer has. He has to have reliable transportation. He has to attend conferences. He has bills to pay just like you do. And if he is a career pastor, YOU are his only source of income.

If the congregation has a right to expect the sacrifices of their pastor, which he gladly gives, then he has a right to expect the members to give as they are able to. Your pastor has given his life in service to God and others. Should the pastor sacrifice more for God financially than his people? No, he shouldn’t.

The pastor expects you to be people of vision

The pastor expects members of his church to be devoted to the church. He expects them to pray for the church. He expects them to support the church financially. He expects them to care about the future of the church. He expects them to have a vision for the church. He expects them to be soul-winners; people who share their faith with the lost, building both the Kingdom and their church, one soul at a time. Without this, the pastor is helpless. Members should be willing and enthusiastic evangelists for God and their church, out in the community, witnessing to the lost, and talking up the church.

Your church exists today because generations long ago cared about it, planned for its future, prayed for its future, sacrificed so that it would be around in the years to come, and had a vision for a church that would be here for future generations. This is significant, because without a vision for the future, a church merely treads water; it doesn’t really go anywhere. Part of that vision must be for members; new blood. The church of Jesus Christ must be always growing, reaching out into the community, drawing in new people who need what you have. What kind of person doesn’t want to be a part of a loving, caring community of believers? If you love your church, you’ll want others to experience what you experience every week.

The pastor expects his congregation to be as interested in, excited about, and devoted to the church as much as he is. Without that, his job is just a job.

The Pastor and His Congregation

Published November 4, 2014 Uncategorized Leave a Comment
Tags: Congregation, expectations, Pastor, Stewardship

The church of Jesus Christ is not just an organization; it’s an organism. It is always growing and maturing, reaching out replicating itself all over the world. But it is also an organization made up of a leadership structure and members. During this Stewardship Emphasis Month, we’ve considered what causes a church to grow: the Gifts of the Holy Spirit. As each member learns how to submit himself to the Holy Spirit within him, he will learn what gift or gifts he has been endowed with, and he will learn how to use those gifts in the most effective way within his church to the benefit of his congregation. All members of the church, from the pastor on down, have a responsibility to be faithful to the moving and direction of the Spirit in this regard.

Beyond this purely spiritual dimension, lies another aspect of a healthy church. It involves the pastor and his congregation, each recognizing their respective roles within the dynamic of the local church. The Bible doesn’t say a lot about the roles of the pastor and his congregation, but what it does say is very significant. God’s people are described as “sheep” in the Bible and our Lord as the “Shepherd,” or if you will, the “Head Shepherd,” with pastors functioning as His “under-shepherds.”

Peter wrote about the pastor and his responsibilities:

And now, a word to you elders of the church. I, too, am an elder; with my own eyes I saw Christ dying on the cross; and I, too, will share his glory and his honor when he returns. Fellow elders, this is my plea to you: Feed the flock of God; care for it willingly, not grudgingly; not for what you will get out of it but because you are eager to serve the Lord. Don’t be tyrants, but lead them by your good example, and when the Head Shepherd comes, your reward will be a never-ending share in his glory and honor. (1 Peter 5:1 – 4 TLB)

And Paul, not to be outdone by Peter, penned this about the congregation:

Dear brothers, honor the officers of your church who work hard among you and warn you against all that is wrong. Think highly of them and give them your wholehearted love because they are straining to help you. And remember, no quarreling among yourselves. (1 Thessalonians 5:12, 13 TLB)

In considering the roles of pastor and congregation, we’ll take these passages as jumping off points.

Part One: What the church may expect of their pastor

Believe it or not, your pastor is God’s gift to you, assuming he is in your church by the will of God. Don’t believe me? Feast your eyes on this:

It was he who “gave gifts”; he appointed some to be apostles, others to be prophets, others to be evangelists, others to be pastors and teachers. He did this to prepare all God’s people for the work of Christian service, in order to build up the body of Christ. (Ephesians 4:11, 12 GNB)

Yes, the pastor is a gift to a congregation, but he has his hands full. He has a job to do: to prepare you, his congregation, to serve the Lord with an eye to building the church.

To that end, what can you, as a member of a church, expect from your pastor?

Your pastor should be called by God

Any pastor who is not behind the pulpit God wants him to be behind shouldn’t be there. Natural talent notwithstanding, the pastoral ministry is a calling first and a profession second. All believers are called to serve the Lord, or course, but only a select few are called to stand behind a pulpit. This was something the apostle Paul understood:

For when I preach the gospel, I cannot boast, since I am compelled to preach. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel! If I preach voluntarily, I have a reward; if not voluntarily, I am simply discharging the trust committed to me. (1 Corinthians 9:16, 17 NIV)

Like Paul, we whom God has chosen, feel compelled to preach. Preaching is something your pastor must do. Verse 17 is a bit difficult to understand, but turning to The Living Bible, it’s paraphrase clears Paul’s meaning up:

If I were volunteering my services of my own free will, then the Lord would give me a special reward; but that is not the situation, for God has picked me out and given me this sacred trust and I have no choice.

If your pastor is truly called of God, he’ll feel the same way.

Your pastor should be in your church only because that’s where God wants him to be

You, as a member of a congregation, have every right to expect that your pastor is in your church because your church is where God wants him to be. A pastor should never leave a church or accept a position in a church because of the money or the benefits. And he should leave a church only after a lot of prayer and clear direction from the Lord to do so; after the Lord has taken the burden for that particular congregation away.

Salary may be important. Working conditions may be important, especially when the pastor’s family is taken into consideration. As Paul wrote:

Pastors who do their work well should be paid well and should be highly appreciated, especially those who work hard at both preaching and teaching. For the Scriptures say, “Never tie up the mouth of an ox when it is treading out the grain—let him eat as he goes along!” And in another place, “Those who work deserve their pay!” (1 Timothy 5:17, 18 TLB)

Pastors are not oxen, but Paul’s point is well taken. But do you know what your pastor’s real reward is? It isn’t his paycheck. Again, Paul wrote:

What pay do I get, then? It is the privilege of preaching the Good News without charging for it, without claiming my rights in my work for the gospel. (1 Corinthians 9:18 GNB)

You see, Paul knew it was his right as a Christian preacher to expect to be paid, but he said his real reward was in the ministry of the Word itself. That’s the attitude you may expect from your pastor, if he is called by God to be filling the pulpit in your church.

Your pastor should be an example of godliness

A congregation rises or falls to the spiritual example set by its pastor. Your pastor may or may not be an accomplished preacher or teacher. But if he is a godly man, that will make all the difference in the world. A godly pastor doesn’t mean a perfect pastor. Your pastor may make his fair share of mistakes. But if he is a man of God, he will always make things right; he will always be learning and growing and going back to God for direction, inspiration, and forgiveness.

You can expect your pastor to be a man of prayer. Behind every sermon or Bible study should be hours of prayer. It takes time to pray, but faithful prayer always pays off. But the pastor doesn’t only pray for his work; he prays for his flock. Mind you, you and your problems are not the reason God has called your pastor to your church; he is there because God put him there, sometimes for reasons known only to Him. But you are his responsibility while he is there. And a good pastor will feel the burden of what’s burdening members of his congregation. The only way to deal with that is through time spent in prayer.

Sometimes church members wonder what the pastor does all day. If your pastor is a contentious man, he will be a man of prayer and prayer will take up much of his day.

Your pastor should be faithful in his ministry

Some of the laziest people I know are in the ministry. It’s easy to be lazy in the ministry. Pastors get a month or more off every year. They don’t work Monday’s. They take long lunches. They go to conferences umpteen times a year. They “work from home.” Right. And congregations in all likelihood have been conditioned to maybe criticize his long sermons but to never do more than that. How many times have you been told this verse applies to so-called men of God:

Touch not mine anointed, and do my prophets no harm. (Psalm 105:15 KJV)

Fact is, that verse has nothing to do with your pastor. You have the right to expect your pastor to be faithful in his ministry while he is in your church. He should prepare and preach sermons he himself has written with you in mind. He should visit the sick when needed and pray for them. He should make the time to listen and advise when called upon. He should be honest with how he spends his time. He doesn’t punch a time clock and most pastors don’t answer to anybody. It takes a lot of discipline to be faithful in the ministry. It’s not easy. But if a pastor will honor both his God and his congregation, he will be found faithfully discharging his call.

Your pastor should take his job seriously, but with a spirit of good cheer

The pastorate is great profession for men who like to work as little as possible. Or for men who like a sense of power. Or for men who like lord it over other men. But for those of us who take the calling seriously, we understand that the responsibility of shepherding God’s flock is heavy indeed.

Obey your spiritual leaders and be willing to do what they say. For their work is to watch over your souls, and God will judge them on how well they do this. Give them reason to report joyfully about you to the Lord and not with sorrow, for then you will suffer for it too. (Hebrews 13:17 TLB)

As a pastor, I can tell you that there isn’t a day that I don’t think about this verse. Every night I replay what I did that day, hoping it was enough for the souls in my charge.

That’s not to say I don’t have a good time doing what I do. There is great satisfaction – personal and spiritual – in the pastorate. No other profession allows a person to be involved in and to watch the spiritual growth of people like pulpit ministry affords. It’s an honor to preach and teach a congregation the Word of God. But it is a dreadful responsibility. There will come a day when I and others in my profession will be called to give an account. The writer to the Hebrews pleads with his readers, as I plead with my congregation, to live lives that will cause me, their pastor, to give a positive report to the Chief Shepherd.