This is based on the paper I gave last Saturday
What qualifies me to
write on this subject? Simply the fact that I have been the pastor of
Childs Hill Baptist Church in London for the last 30 years.
How have I been able to
do that? Firstly, I was converted when I was still only about to turn
13. Then, by the time I was only 14 I knew that the Lord was calling
me to the pastoral ministry – not only that but I liked the idea
(partly from ignorance of what is involved). Thus I was only actually
24 when I became a pastor. That is relatively young, of course, but I
had been a Christian for 11 years and I had been preparing for the
pastorate over a period of eight or nine years. Then, there has been
little interest from other churches and I have felt it right to
continue in the same place all this time.
Before I go further with
the subject I will quote some words Geoff Thomas has written on the
subject.
I
am not sure that there are important differences between ministers
who have been in the ministry five years and those who have been in
the ministry for fifty. As one who is closer to fifty than five I
believe there is nothing that I need more than to have my mind taught
and my conscience aroused concerning the basics of ministry and
preaching, to read again Stuart Olyott’s Preaching
Pure and Simple,
to be exhorted concerning the work of the pastor, to hear messages on
the centrality of prayer, and urging me to repent of my sins, walk
closer with God, grow in evangelistic concern and trust more deeply
in the Saviour day by day.
I think it is important
to echo those words at the beginning for the last thing I want to do
is to come over as some sort of expert or to say “hey, I've been in
one place for 30 years”. That is not my intention.
It is also worth
reminding ourselves that we are all different. Not every pastor is
called to a long pastorate. Some have a pioneering gift. They can
start a work or revive a flagging one well. Bundles of energy they
can sustain a ministry for five or six years but then it is time for
them to move on and work elsewhere. That sort of apostolic gift is
perhaps rarer than some think but if it is your gift, brother, don't
let anything I say this morning deter you. Let's never forget what an
impact a short ministry can have. Robert Murray M'Cheyne was at St
Peters, Dundee for a matter of only five years – so tragically
brief but what an impact he had!
Long pastorates
Generally speaking, long
pastorates are rare these days. Geoff Thomas has been pastor in
Aberystwyth for 48 years. May be there are others we could mention.
John Marshall and Graham Harrison both served over 40 years. John
Piper has only just retired after being at the same church since 1980
(32 years) and John Macarthur has been at the same church even longer
- since 1969 (43 years) and has not yet retired.
Historically, several
18th century Particular Baptists served long pastorates, for example
John Gill in London (51 years); Benjamin Beddome in Bourton on the
Water (55 years) and John Rippon (an incredible 63 years). It's not
just Baptists, Charles Simeon was in Cambridge over 50 years and
William Jay in Bath some 62 years. Lloyd-Jones was at Westminster
Chapel 30 years. Spurgeon pastored the same church 38 years. In my
own church the first three pastors served for 25, 35 and 25 years.
Before we come to
positives and pitfalls, then, let's spend a little time thinking
about the idea of a long ministry.
A preliminary question is
“what is a long ministry?” Given that it is very rare for anyone
to enter the ministry under the age of 20 and that normal life
expectancy is around 70, anything from 20-25 years up ought to be
considered a long ministry.
Given that general rule,
it is clear that only men who are converted relatively young and who
live a relatively long life are likely to serve a long time in
leadership. We only have to think of the example of Moses, however,
who began to lead God's people at the age of 80 and lived until he
was 120, to see the danger of assuming too much.
Then we ought to note
some other factors here.
First, that a man may, of
course, be called to another sphere of labour. When I completed my
two years of study at the LTS there were four of us UK students.
We've all continued 30 years in ministry without a break but only I
and Ken Brownell at the East London Tabernacle have spent the bulk of
our time in one pastorate. John Palmer is in his second, Bernard
Lewis in his third. A man may not continue long in one place because
he is called elsewhere or if there is some serious breakdown of
relations between him and the congregation he serves. One reason I
have continued so long in Childs Hill is that it has been very rare
for any other church to show interest in having me come. In the only
serious case (a church in Wales, unsurprisingly) I brought the matter
to my church officers and they were quite unanimous in urging me not
to pursue it as they felt the church could not afford to lose our
family at that time (the family you note – not the pastor!).
There are wrong motives
for moving pastorate but there are right ones too. We want to resist
the idea that we must all start somewhere small and move on to a
bigger congregation as if bound by some law of the Medes and
Persians. However, there are times when God calls a man from
backwater to a strategic position in some large and influential
church.
A move may be necessary
because a man has come to a situation under a false apprehension. He
may have thought the situation was quite different to what it turns
out to be. Whereas he had expected a desire for the truth there is
firm resistance. In certain cases it is better to be out of that
situation than to continue to flog a dead horse, as it were. Paul
Beasley-Murray says
There
is no point, for instance, in remaining in a church where the members
as a whole refuse to follow the leadership offered. Nor is there any
point in remaining in a church where it quickly becomes apparent that
one is a square peg in a round hole.
Then
further, a man may not continue in ministry at all because of ill
health, mental or physical, or because of a doctrinal or ethical
fall. Other ministries just fizzle out. That is a good thing if the
man was never called in the first place. Geoff Thomas caricatures the
process with some “the
first year they preach all their favourite sermons; the second year
they scold the congregation for not inviting more people to church;
the third year they are candidating in pastorless churches hoping for
a call.” It can all happen in one year in some cases.
It is appropriate to say,
therefore, when talking about a prolonged ministry that it is only
possible by the grace and providence of God. Probably in most cases
it will not happen but when it does there are many positives as well
as pitfalls to be avoided.
I suppose we are really
talking about an attitude rather than a time frame. An early
twentieth century Lutheran writer, Newton Royer, gives an anecdote
where one of the
elders of a certain congregation rings the doorbell at the pastor's
home. The pastor's little boy comes to the door and the elder says
"Johnnie, where is your papa?" The boy answers, ''Papa is
in his study praying, asking God to guide him that he may rightly
answer his call to a larger city." ''Well," said the elder,
''where is your mother?" "Oh," said the boy, "she
is upstairs packing the trunks to move."!
To
quote Geoff Thomas yet again
Our
calling is not to abuse our freedom to choose to move when we desire
it, when, for example, things get difficult, or if there is
opposition, if temptations are strong, if there is little apparent
success, then those pressures alone are not sufficient reason to
exhort us to move on. When a man is experiencing difficulty and
opposition and asks for my advice then my initial response is to urge
him to stay, to fight, not to allow the pulpit to fall into the hands
of those with another gospel. I do not always appreciate how broken
my brother might be, sinking into a dark depression, barely able to
think coherently and to put one little sermon together. Sometimes the
man must take a break from the pastorate for six months; sometimes he
must resign, rethink and wait on God. He may need encouragement to
take that step without guilt.
We could frame the
question like this “Should I enter the pastorate intending to stay
in the same place or intending to move on after a few years?” It is
not an easy question to answer as there certainly ought to be a
willingness to move on if the Lord wills. Nevertheless, I would
suggest that the prevailing attitude should be that of intending to
stay for the long haul. Royer talks about the difference between a
renter and a home owner. The one deals with repairs on a short term
basis, the other on a long term basis. That can make all the
difference when things go wrong. He says, “recently,
I heard a farmer say that he could determine whether or not the man
whom he employed by the month intended to apply for work the next
year by the manner in which he performed his labour.” That is
something worth pondering at the outset.
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