Pastor

What man of you, having an hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he find it? (Luke 15:4)

Allow me to wade into the ecclesiastical realm, if I may call it so.

How many sheep can a single shepherd handle?

How many people can a single pastor effectively serve?

What is a person’s relationship quotient? What is a person’s relational capacity?

How many friends can you consistently maintain?

How many children can a parent effectively raise?

Just flip through your phone book (and all other contacts).

How many of those people can you accurately account for? How many can you say without doubt that they are doing as they tell you? How many can you say that they are your confidants or vice versa? How many run to you without a second thought when they have the slightest issue?

Why am I asking all those questions?

The pastoral ministry is a relational responsibility, akin to that of a parent. No wonder the Roman Catholics call theirs, father.

But the Bible calls them shepherds, which is the actual meaning of the word pastor.

There is nothing wholesale about the pastoral ministry. There is no copy and paste in the pastoral ministry.

Just like a parent with many children never does anything in a wholesale manner with his children, a pastor should also never do it with his flock.

A parent treats each child, even if he has twenty of them, individually, though they all come from him.

As I have written earlier, God took me to the farms to teach me ministry.

And even with animals you will find that in a flock each animal will be different from the rest in its own unique way. It is your close relationship that will enable you to maximise on your care and their output.

My goats have died when I got tired of that individual attention and resorted to the wholesale treatment and was thus unable to see the unique distress signals each gave. And it was because I became busy elsewhere and thought I was too tired to focus.

Do you think it is different with people? Is it not even more serious due to its eternal consequences?

A pastor is entrusted with a flock by God, the owner of that flock. He is therefore accountable to God for the way he handles that flock, being rewarded when his stewardship pleases God and eating sand when it doesn’t.

Bread of deceit is sweet to a man; but afterwards his mouth shall be filled with gravel. (Proverbs 20:17)

I have intentionally chosen that verse because the said pastor or his flock might be using the wrong yardstick to measure his success.

For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables. (2Timothy 4: 3, 4)

I am dealing here with the pastor who wants to receive the, ‘well done, good and faithful servant’, from his Master and not from his flock.

Pleasing people is not in any way pleasing God. In fact, the voice of the people is not the voice of God, otherwise God would not be holy.

What makes this pastor stand out? What drives him? How does he function?

Helping this pastor function and maximising his ministry is the purpose of this message.

Forget the hireling. Forget the paid shepherd. Forget the motivational shepherd.

Allow us to focus on the pastor who is unashamedly answerable to his calling authority, Jesus Christ.

He must be so tuned to God that any other voice is just a hum of interfering noise.

That pastor will be sacked by a church because the goats running the show can not handle God’s releases. And that because his love for his people is subject to his relationship with his calling authority.

He looks at the job description given by the church hiring him with the lens of Christ’s calling on him and so can comfortably opt for joblessness if that job description is not flexible enough for Christ to break through.

The thing that makes him stand out, however, is that he will never agree to be the prime pastor, or the only pastor. He will fight the urge to be the reference, the ultimate, the pinnacle of pastoral excellence, though he will be excellent through his submission and obedience to Christ.

He will seek to raise other pastors since I believe that is the prime responsibility of pastoral leadership.

And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: (Ephesians 4: 11, 12)

We love those verses though very few have ever sought to follow up with the purpose of that five-fold ministry, which is preparing and raising another generation of ministers.

If truth be told, it is difficult to pastor ten normal families effectively. The demands would be crippling.

How then does one pastor handle hundreds?

The only way he can do it is by raising several under shepherds and equipping them to function effectively.

If Jesus walked with twelve, one of whom was lost from the beginning, is it possible to do the same with a hundred?

What I am trying to say is that the model we have for the pastor is not effective at all and accomplishes very little since a majority of the flock not only feel left out, but they are actually neglected, their usefulness being the monies they bring. Unless the pastor has a hundred-hour day and a fifty-day week.

This is the reason a conscientious pastor very easily sinks into depression, suicide, adultery, drugs and many other vices due to or to cope with the demands of the pastorate.

But it doesn’t have to end up like that.

The Bible has the clearest guidance for the pastoral office, if we are brave enough to agree with and follow it.

The first thing I will say is that he is first and foremost accountable to Christ, even before being answerable to the church board. That accountability to the church board is subject to what Christ is saying concerning his ministry and roles.

He will preach what Christ is saying and not what his employers are asking for because he is ultimately answerable to God whose call led to his invitation to pastor that flock, many who have goats at the top.

I have been kicked out of ministry when the demands of the bosses went directly opposite what God was ordering me to do. And it was OK. Because God continued and still continues using me.

Probably that is the main point I should be sharing because everything else must build on that single point.

Doing everything else perfectly and missing this point means that you will have lost the plot big time.

That does not absolve you from accountability to that church board. Only that they should know that their expectation should be tempered by what God is saying.

What that does is making that board prayerful to be able to accurately improve your performance since they will then be able to help you hear more clearly and perform better because they are the ones on the ground as we may say.

Moses heard from God. But he needed Jethro to handle his responsibilities more effectively.

A prayerful church board will enable you to maximise your effectiveness and impact because they will become part of what God has called you in that congregation.

The second thing an effective pastor will do is multiply himself.

And he does this by growing other ministers through discipleship.

I know many do not understand Biblical discipleship and so will just give a simple method of doing it.

Have a few young people around you and as much as possible let them accompany you wherever you are ministering (except of course those confidential meetings).

Let them see up close how you minister, how you live and who you are.

Then slowly by slowly give them opportunities to do what they have seen you do; lead a devotion, pray, comfort etc.

As you see them grow, have them to do some of those ministries as you watch, then send them to do them on their own.

In that time, you are growing with them as you spend time with them.

As they serve, you can be sure (and I am saying this out of experience) most of them will very clearly hear the call to join ministry.

Support them. Fight for them. Have the church sponsor them to equipping institutions.

Finally, have the church then enjoin them in her ministry.

Let that be a continuous process.

Or isn’t that how Christ did it? Isn’t this how his disciples did it?

Let me say what I started with. It is impossible to pastor fifty people effectively; however capable you may think you are.

Christ, who was with His 24/7 chose 12. Can you do better that Him?