Video Transcript: Lesson 20 Pastoral Identity

Welcome back as we continue to talk about church revitalization, and  specifically as we talk about you, and how you are the kind of a starting point  here for revitalization that has to happen in your church and in your ministry. So  hopefully you were encouraged by our last lecture to press into your own  relationship with the Lord Jesus. Today, we're going to talk about something that  is, I think, equally a temptation that inhibits us from being the effective leaders  that God has called us to be. And so today, we're going to be talking about  pastoral identity, the identity, the calling of a leader in the kingdom of God,  especially within the church context, and church ministry context. So as always,  let me pray for our time together. And we are going to then jump right in and  hear what, what what the Lord would have for us, Father in heaven, thanks,  again for our lecture today. And we thank You, Lord, that you do have a  wonderful design for those that you've called to lead. Lord, we confess that you  have chosen us not because of our merit, because we are talented enough and  smart enough and clever enough that Lord, we only have a calling because of  your gracious hand that's been laid upon us. And that, Lord, you equip us to do  the task at hand. And again, it's not about us, Lord, it's about the way you equip  us to your spirit, and your spiritual gifts. And so, Lord, we thank you for this great calling, and the equipping that comes with it. May we all Lord be profitable? In  your kingdom, we pray this in Your name, amen. Okay, I want to start off with a  story that I had heard years ago. And it was when I was actually a chaplain in  the United States Army. And I was going through the training to be a chaplain  and the instructors, one of the instructors told us a story. And the story was  about a chaplain who had gotten sent out in out into the jungle with a small  group of soldiers and the soldiers were going to have a really hard time they  were seeing all kinds of combat, there was deaths, and there were casualties.  They were separated, they were far from home, they were living under constant  fear of death. And it was hot, it was just miserable. And the morale was really,  really low. And so the, the commander of this company that was way out in the  in the jungle, had asked his senior officer, could you please send us a chaplain?  We really need someone to come here. And our morale was terrible. We're  dealing with all kinds of issues, could you please send somebody so a Chaplain  got sent out into the deep into the jungle to, to work with this company of  soldiers who was out there, and the soldiers loved the chaplain. He was funny,  he would tell hilarious stories. He he was just like their buddy. He was, you  know, having meals with them and all this stuff. And he would play cards with  them. And he found some movies he could show to them. And this had gone on  for, you know, a month or two. And then the company commander, who was  again, the head of the jungle, he called up his senior officer, and he says, Sir,  could you send us somebody else? And to comment? Can you send us another  chaplain? And the senior officer was, was confused. He said, Well, don't they  like the guy? And he says, they love them. And is morale improving? Yeah, you 

know, morale is improving. And, and does he get along with everyone? Oh,  sure. He gets along with everyone. He's great. And the senior commander then  says, Well, what's, what's the problem? And he said, You didn't send a chaplain  we need a chaplain. What the point of the story are, our instructor was telling us  is our first role is not to just be everybody's buddy, and to be everybody's friend,  that that we we fill a holy and sacred role that we are holy men or holy women.  We're members of you know, clergy, whether you have a degree or not, or  whether you have a formal title or not. People see you as a spiritual leader. And  that's what those soldiers deep In the jungle needed, they needed a spiritual  leader, they just didn't need a funny guy, or a friend, or a morale officer. They  needed a spiritual leader. That's what they needed in a chaplain. And so, I share that story, because I think there's some parallels that go on in churches, not so  much being the body. But I think we may be becoming or trying to be something  else that God has never intended us to be. I believe that over time pastors and  ministry leaders, we can morph into a role we can take on roles other than what  God has intended for us. So that even though it might say Pastor on our door,  or, you know, whatever, that we're actually doing something other than that. So  one of my favorite guys on this subject, who talks a lot about this, reclaiming a  pastoral identity is, is Eugene Peterson. He's an American author, and pastor  and seminary professor, and a lot of his books and you might be familiar with his paraphrase of the Bible called the message. Well, Eugene Peterson wrote a ton  on what does it mean to be a pastor? And what, what does God call us to do as  a pastor? So one of the books he wrote, was called the contemplative pastor,  and that's one of his classic books. And in the contemplative pastor, he says,  that, modern day pastors, when we're thinking about what is God calling us to  be in, what should we do? He says that we don't look to a pastoral model. He's  like, you know, instead of looking for like Martin Luther, or John Calvin, or  Richard Baxter, or Jonathan Edwards, or kind of like, or Charles Spurgeon, or a  ton of the spiritual giants of the past, who filled pulpits and were church pastors,  he says, we are more inclined to try to emulate top business leaders, and then  to employ corporate models of management into our churches. Ain't that the  gospel brothers and sisters, that instead of looking to spiritual leaders, we look  to business leaders. And instead of applying, you know, looking God's design for the church, we're just so quick and easy to apply corporate models of  management and structuring and leadership. So, I believe that pastors really  need to reclaim the position of spiritual leader, as a key component of  revitalization that we need to say, This is who we are that God has called us to  be the holy men and holy women of this community, you know, we're the we're  the watch keepers out, you know, we're, we're on the walls, you know, protecting and teaching and guiding our community rather than just, you know, effective,  streamlined systems, kind of leaders. Now, Eugene Peterson, in another book  that he wrote about this, it's called working the angles, the shape of pastoral 

integrity. And really what what Eugene Peterson calls for is like a reformation of  the vocation of pastor that it's really drifted to, you know, business leaders so  that you're, you know, you're, you're doing meetings about the building and the  budget and staffing, and, you know, the roof getting fixed, and, you know, all  these things, and you're, you're building the website for your church and you're  trying to come up with a marketing plan for your church, and, you know, all these kinds of things that, you know, and we're busy doing staff evaluations and, you  know, Peterson says, you know, we've really lost the the nature of the the  identity of what it means to be a pastoral leader. And so this is a little bit of a  longer quote, but man, I love it. It is hard hitting, and I relate to it. So listen to this was from Eugene Peterson, working the angles, the shape of pastoral integrity.  American pastors are abandoning their posts, left and right, and at an alarming  rate. They are not leaving their churches and getting other jobs. Congregations  still pay their salaries. Their names remain on the church stationery, and they  continue to appear in pulpits on Sundays. But they are abandoning their posts  They're calling they have done whoring after other gods. What they do with their  time under the guise of pastoral ministry hasn't the remotest connection with the  churches pastors have done for most of 20 centuries. The pastors of America  has Metamorpho metamorphosis into a company of shopkeepers. And the  shops they keep are churches. They are preoccupied with shopkeepers  concerns, how to keep the customer happy, how to lure customers away from  competitors down the street, how to package the goods, so consumers will lay  out more money. Some of them are very good shopkeepers. They attract a lot of customers. Bring in great sums of money, developed splendid reputations, yet, it is still shopkeeping, religious shopkeeping To be sure, but shopkeeping All the  same. Well, I completely identify with Eugene Peterson's dissatisfaction with the  present identity of the pastor. And to be honest, more often than not, as I look  back over my time in ministry, I have felt more like the manager of a religious  goods and services operation than a holy man who has been divinely sent to  cultivate grace and faith among God's people. And isn't that the reason like the  first calling we had as we felt that God was calling us apart to do something of a  supernatural nature to work in the kingdom of God? I don't think that God called  me just to be a religious businessman that wasn't even on my my mind, as I first  heard a call to ministry and as I went through seminary, but slowly as I worked in church is like it kind of as Eugene Peterson says, like kind of the  metamorphosis, like you, you kind of enter into this, because we're working with  all these people who are in the business world, and they project all of their  knowledge and expectations onto us. And they're looking us to be like the  manager or the CEO, or the, you know, the religious professional who oversees  the operations of the church. Now, of course, there needs to be some kind of  organizational and administrative leadership that goes on, I'm not trying to pass  the buck, you know, the, you know, as the shepherd, there should be some 

awareness of those kinds of things, those kinds of things. But it must not be the  defining characteristic of the pastor. Even if that is what the congregation  expects, or demands, that cannot be are that we are the, the the lead  administrator. And it is what a lot of congregations expect or demand when I was taking the call to the church I'm at now the the number of years ago, I had a  stack of profiles from other churches. And one of the questions that these  churches had to answer was, what are the top characteristics you're looking for,  and abilities you're looking for in your next pastor, and there was, you know, 25  things and they could rank like the top six or eight. And more often than not,  number one was administrative oversight. So people were really looking for  somebody to you know, oversee the church but not lead the church, they were  looking for someone who would make sure that there were orderly meetings,  and that the meetings would not be more than an hour that the bills all got paid,  and they weren't looking for somebody who was like going to be a spiritual  leader in their midst. And I found that just so disheartening at the time and I was  like, why would I ever want to go to a church that was really looking for an  administrative leader? Well, you don't hire a staff person to do that, but not not  your pastor. Right. So in this book, working the angles that I just quoted from  Eugene Peterson, says there's really three responsibilities that a pastor has the  three main responsibilities. One is prayer. And this is, again, talking to God your  personal relationship with Christ is a first and foremost that we're praying for  ourselves. We're praying for our people, that we are standing in the gap  between our churches and the God of heaven. That we are regularly in  communication like an ongoing dialogue called sense of like praying without  ceasing. We're speaking to the Lord constantly, we've talked about that we're  gonna talk about it some more, I don't need to really push too much into it. The  other second one he talks about is scripture, that we need to be able to  understand what God has done throughout the course of history, and the  significance of it, and then be able to communicate it to our people today, that  we need to make Scripture come alive and be able to speak to it. And actually,  as an aside, that was Eugene Peterson's motivation for doing the message  paraphrase, was he wanted to write it in such a way that would reflect kind of  the thoughts and the attitudes of the people at the time. But it would be done in  a way that his people could access scripture, they could, they could get into it,  they could hear it a new and fresh ways. And so whether you like the Message  version or not, you have to commend Eugene Peterson for doing the entire, you  know, re kind of re envisioning the entire Bible, so his congregation would be  able to enter into scripture in a meaningful way. So those are really the main  response two of the main responsibility he's has. And then the third, he says is  that we are to offer them spiritual direction to them. Now the first two we are  very, very familiar with. So I'm going to just spend a little bit of time talking about  the third in this lecture, because it's probably the least understood. And in my, 

my experience, and what I know of other pastors, it's probably the most  neglected this role of like, you know, giving people direction, helping them make  sense of their life, kind of, you know, personally discipling people, shepherding  them towards growth and maturity. That's going all the way back again, to  Richard Baxter, which is just a little under 400 years ago. He said, this was the  same issue for pastors and this is a he wrote in 1656. So, you know, 360 years  ago, he diagnosed this. And he says, Baxter bases, a whole book, or his whole  conferences, it's not a thin book, it's pretty dense. He bases the whole role of  the pastor on Acts 20:28, where Paul is preaching to the Ephesian elders, it's  their final goodbye, and he's telling them what to do. So he's not preaching, he's  kind of commanding them. And he says, keep watch over yourself, and the flock  that God has given you. And he says, Baxter says that probably the one of the  primary ways that the pastor's of his day had failed to discharge their duties as  pastor was, they weren't keeping watch over their flock, the way they they  needed to. It was kind of like they were a shepherd. But the sheep were over  there kind of wandering around getting lost, falling in ditches, they were hungry,  they were thirsty. And then he wasn't giving them direction. He wasn't leading  them to, you know, quiet waters and green pastures. He wasn't giving them rest. He wasn't, you know, leading them away from dangerous places. And so where  Baxter writes as a minister is not merely is not to be merely a public preacher,  but to be known as a counselor for their souls, as a physician is for their bodies  and a lawyer for their estates. So Baxter is really calling in discharging these  duties of keeping watch over your flock that Paul says the Ephesian elders, the  the challenge is to be a counselor to their souls. So it doesn't mean like  counseling, like necessarily the way we think so today, but like, who can teach  who can guide who can instruct, but who really does soul work, who tend to the  souls of his people or her people. And so, again, for Baxter, like Peterson, the  work of the pastor is providing spiritual direction for people to assist them in this  spiritual formation process. So one of the things that Baxter says, and rightly so  is that if you're going to be in the realm of spiritual direction, the first thing you  need to know is your congregation. You need to know your people on a personal level, right? So you have to know them in a way so that you can lead them. So  some of the things Baxter says, you know, you need to know them well enough.  So you know, so that you would know, what sins are the most in danger of  committing. He says, you need to get down on that level. So you know, what,  what temptations they're facing, what's tripping them up, obviously. So you can  encourage them, you could preach on that you could do whatever. But you need to know that you need so you can steer them, you can lead them, you can guide them, he said, You need to know what duties they are most apt to neglect. So  you need to know them well enough so that you, you see all the blind spots in  their lives and the things that they are not doing to honor Christ, all the things  they're forgetting about neglecting. And then he says again, what temptations 

they're most liable to. So he says this, quote, if we are, if we know not, their  temperament or disease, kind of the things that are ailing them, we are not likely to prove successful physicians. So if you don't know what's making them sick,  you're not going to be a very good doctor. And if you if you don't know what is  making people spiritually sick, or the disease of their soul, you're not going to be a very good spiritual leader, or very good spiritual director. So isn't that so  important? You know, we talked about leading in terms of revitalization. And it's  not about getting this big giant thing of by big giant, I didn't mean like 20 people,  right? It's not about moving this nameless, faceless group of people to become  closer to Christ are more in love with Christ. It's about working with specific  individual people and getting them to move, right. It's about the accumulation of  individual people who are moving in the right direction, that revitalization takes  place, right? It's not just a corporate thing that just kind of happens on its own.  It's something that builds as each individual person begins moving towards  Christ in a healthy way. And you can only see that happen as a pastoral leader,  as you know them and what they need, how they can be encouraged how they  can be affirmed how they can be challenged, and how to do that effectively.  Right, where they're at? What are the circumstances in their life? What are they  struggling with? What are the things that are holding them back? All of those  kinds of things, okay. So talking about, you know, reclaim, again, the role of the  pastoral leader, I would say this, your church does not need a strategist to help it get to the place of renewal. Okay. And for some of you, that's like a sigh of relief, since you're like, I am terrible. Like, I am not a strategic planner, I happen to be  the kind of person who really gets into strategic planning. So that's why this stuff is super important for me. So if you're like a person like me, and you like  planning and organizing, and you know, coming up with charts and all this kind  of stuff, here's what we're gonna, you know, long range plan. That's good. And it  has its place it does, it has its value. But that's not first and foremost, what we  have, the biblical witness calls us to be, right, that that's not what it is, that's a  gift that God has given you, you can use it for his good, you can also let it  become an idol. So you're not called to be the senior strategist, right? That's a  very corporate business world kind of term. You're called to tend to the souls of  the people under your charge. The word pastor itself is the Greek word for  Shepherd, leading and guiding, right? So let's talk just one minute kind of here  kind of in conclusion, what does? What does it then mean to be this, they don't  need to strategist, what they what they need. More than that is someone who  will help them explore what it means to be made in God's image, to be fallen,  and then to be redeemed by Jesus Christ, to have them see their whole life  through a biblical worldview or through the lens of the gospel, that they are  created for God's glory, that they are fearfully and wonderfully made, that they  are broken by sin nature, yet redeemed by the gracious work of Jesus Christ  and that they are moving on to an eternal glory and helping them figure out what

that means not just like, they're like a problem that you have to solve and, you  know, but that you're helping them understand their very identity and who God  has made them and who they are okay? That's what people need and as they  become awakened to that is to become aware of that, they begin to, to move,  

they begin to see themselves differently not just as a businessman or as a  husband, or as a father or as a homemaker, or whatever it is, but begin to see  themselves as a redeemed child of the great king of heaven. And, and to begin  moving in that way and changing how they, how they see the world. Okay, so  that's one. And kind of, along the same lines, what they need more than the  strategist is someone who will help them make sense of daily life, see God's  presence in it and find\ the sacredness in it. So your task is really to help them  open their eyes so that they can see God, you know, that God isn't just someone who appeared 2000 years ago and died on the cross, but all the ways that God  is in our midst, and he's working, and he's alive and active in here, right now that God is here at work and in, whether they're at home or at work, or at play, or in  community, in relationships and circumstances, seeing just the very hand of God moving in that and appreciating it and praising God for it and worshiping Him for  it, and just, and what does it mean, and just living in this reality, that's kind of the sacred reality that I'm swimming in God's glory all the time. And to give people  that kind of a mental framework to see their life, that's what they need. Not just a really sharp business leader/strategic consultant. And again, that has its place.  But if we're going to help people grow in their love for the Lord, we have to do a  lot more I think focus and emphasis on Soul care and tending to people. And  there's a lot of different ways we can do that one on one counseling, small  groups, you know, triad discipling, in threes, there's just, there's a million forms,  you can do this, but we don't want to lose the substance of what God has called  us to do as pastoral leaders, okay, so we need to reclaim that. We want to get  our relationship with Jesus Christ in a good place. And we want to be good  shepherds of other people, and so they can get where we are. Okay, let me pray for you. And we're going to hit our last lecture right after this. You and helping  you be in a position to be the most effective leader that God has created you to  be. So let's pray. Lord, thank you so much for this great call to ministry, Lord, for  myself, and I know for many others, I do pray a prayer of confession that we  have lost the biblical purpose of pastoring we have made it into something else,  that we have let the values and models of the world creep into the church. So  Lord, we just we confess that we know that we are forgiven by the blood of  Jesus Christ. Lord, I pray though, that you would call us back to a greater sense  of what it means to be pastoral leaders, in our ministries and in our churches,  and Lord, that that fresh vision vision that you Lord would just empower us and  make us more and more effective. Oh, Lord, thank you so much for everyone  listening and may they Lord just perfectly fill the shoes that you've laid out for 

them to walk in, in this wonderful, wonderful call to ministry, Lord thank you so  much for being faithful to this prayer. Amen.