Video Transcript: The Pastor's Heart

One is that sense of, God have empowered me to be his servant, I am able, not in my own strength, but by God himself, to be on to do something. So in other words, in a pastor's heart, it's not to just go around and please people tell them what they want to hear. So that, therefore they will like you more. But that sense of power is that sense of God has called me to do something. Now that's in your heart, if you're just playing a people pleaser, and that's all you're about. And in that people pleasing mode, you say save things, what happens is, it is, it will actually hurt people, I'll give you some concrete examples. Let's say you notice as a pastor, that someone has an addiction to alcohol. And this person, you know, is someone maybe connected in the church and what not. But this is really hurting others. In your own strength in your people pleasing strength, you're not going to somehow walk up to them or talk to them and pray for them, and bring gentle confronting or even more harder confronting, you're going to be like, Oh, I really can't talk or I don't know what this might do to me. But a pastor is the one who sees his slot, and sees a hurting sheep, or heat or hurting person and there's something about that, that power by God, that ability to go there into safe, not judge, I've been noticing that you've been drinking, and I noticed that this is going to hurt you and hurt your family. Or even then some, you know, that's kind of one sort of intense example. But it's simple other examples. 

Let's say you have somebody who's an elder in your church, and, and they do not have a walk with God. You know it, a pastor, even there has to have that power by God, to ask, how's your walk going? Can I help you open up the word? Can I help you succeed. And in sometimes, you might be younger, and there might be somebody 20 years older, and in a respectful way, to lead and pastor in a walk with God. This passage talks about love. So we have a spirit of power of love. In a pastor's heart is love. It's about people. It's about loving people. It's about taking that interest in someone's life. And this could be at different ages, and maybe somebody has a softball game, and you're not in the softball, but you make a note to yourself, and you just show up at that game because you love people. Maybe there is somebody who is out of a job right now. And the fact that you as a pastor, notice that struggle is very important. Do you call that person up and have it gone? Have you found a job? Can I do something? Can I help you? Sometimes Pastors have some interesting situations come up into their life. And it just comes on that noticing that love that listening to other people, where you will be loving your people, so to speak appropriately as a pastor, and the Lord just lays on your heart, a need. And again, those are things that that can't be trumped up that can't be figured out. There's something very spiritual and godly about this, where the Lord will then just open the door to help someone else. Open the door to see that hurting person. And in your people notice people notice, are you doing this? Because it's your job? Or are you doing this? Because you love them? Do you care you are called to love them, because God loves them. And God has sent you as a pastor to show that agape love, and think about their best interests. Sometimes too, when you love someone, as a pastor, you won't be popular, we talked about the power, the ability to make hard decisions or to face things, or to face sin. But just as important is, if that's motivate out of love, that you're not trying to get them to be some perfect person, that you really love them and care about their relationship. 

The third thing is a pastor's heart, and Paul talks about the spirit of self discipline. The fact of the matter is, is as a pastor, you need to be disciplined. You need to have good boundaries in your own life. And that's in your heart. You need to look at your life and say, you know, I will not allow myself to be put into that situation. I'll give you an example. For counseling, I strongly recommend that you do not meet with the opposite sex alone. And I would almost say under mostly any circumstance, now people say, Oh, that sounds really old fashioned that you know that you have put that self discipline there. What's it gonna hurt. And in here, here is this the evil one and his schemes that does so many things to try to knock leaders down. And even if you yourself, are very careful in the in the discipline is there you've got a great marriage with your spouse. Satan can find a way to get in between that, or even the perception that something might be going on. self discipline is about your personal life, it's about getting time with God and setting that time. It's about your time for study, it's about time for getting your job done. You know, I've met Pastors to where they're just kind of, they're just about people. And they're about, you know, making the difference. That's good, you know, power and in love. But the self discipline is not there, the work ethic, the arms, saying up the proper boundaries, getting something done and sticking to task. 

I've noticed that as a pastor, all three of these convictions need to be in your heart, then when you have these three convictions, what happened is that God multiplies your efforts. I want to talk about one other thing, in that these three things need to be imbalanced. If you are a person who you know is all about, you know, the answered man, that telling people the way it is, and I'm gonna be there for truth and, and I'm gonna face all kinds of situations and, and yet, love is not there. So you're out of balance with with the power, and then that loving hard or the self discipline is there, where you often get them in if you just have that power, is what you have is the tenant answer, man, hard to reproduce, Pastor, that people will fear. Now, on the other hand, if you have love, but you don't have the power, and the self discipline, what happens so often is, is that you can just see everybody's situation. And, you know, I just gotta love people. I've heard, I've heard Pastors over the I'm just gonna love people, say love people. But people don't really change. And they're, and what, what happens so often is that, that when truth needs to be told, the pastor doesn't want to say it because they don't want to offend. It's like that it's kind of strange to say love can be out of balance. But what I'm talking about is a manifestation of love, out of balance, can create some situations that bring harm to people. 

Or here's the other thing, or you're out of balance in the area of sub discipline, you study, study, study, study, study, study, you study, and you study more, and you work hard, and you do all these things and, and you have good, crisp boundaries, and never are you going to break your boundaries and you have this pattern in this schedule. And if someone interrupts you while you're doing the message right now, you say, I'm sorry, I can't talk to you right now because I'm doing this message, that too, goes out of balance. And what happens to people they start seeing that oh, well, we have here the hard work. The guy that doesn't really love me. You see, when it comes to being a pastor, the pastor's heart is the heart of calling. It's from that calling, and walk with God that we talked about last time. It's about leading people, it's about ministry to people. It's about making a difference in somebody's life. If that's you, if you live that in are called to be a pastor, what you'll find is that people will see what your heart is all about. 

If you're a person of truth, if you have power, you're a person of love, who's just debt, your motivation, if you're a person who has good boundaries, and works hard, that's a powerful combination. And that's the combination that the Apostle Paul said to Pat to Timothy, this pastor, that God has given you the spirit of power and of love, and a self discipline. What I would ask of you to do and reflect on in your own life is, where are you at? Where do you at in these things? How balanced are they? Are you maybe an answer man who has all other one answers, and people look at you in that and looking for answers? Are you someone who just loves people, but doesn't want to tell them means the truth? Are you someone who, you know, worked very, very hard. But your calling is more based on the tasks than about the people you're called to serve. And most importantly, the Lord calls you. 

Those are things to evaluate yourself. Now. I want to reassure you, we all struggle with that balance. And different times in our life, we might be more in the love section, so to speak, or more in the self discipline, or maybe in more in the power section. And all those things are part of that wonderful, and the delicious walk of being a pastor, and yet together to the power of the Holy Spirit, with your elders and overseers with your spouse and family. Those are the dynamics that speak greatly to the heart of the pastor. So my prayer for you is that God gives you that heart and that you will be a blessing to those God has put into your charge.