Image via WikipediaJared C. Wilson's posts feed my soul. I love his words on "gospel wakefulness" and, frankly, sometimes I feel as if I'm so asleep to what God--the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and Jesus, and Mary, and Peter, and Paul--is saying to me.
And, I must also confess that sometimes this whole pastoring thing is a lonely job. I can feel like I have all of the answers and I have the one true vision for the church, and we'd get to God's preferred future for us if everyone would just get their own opinions out of the way and listen to me. It can be easy to get frustrated with congregations. After all, why won't more people step up to teach or to lead or to even attend? Where is the help when you need it? Why won't persons give more than a measly 2% or their income or 3% or whatever it is? In my own head, I can hold myself up as a an example of a saint that my congregation should aspire to become more like in their own lives--occasionally forgetting just how sinful this fallen pastor has been and remains.
But, I must also confess that the above is somewhat of an exaggeration right now. I have found more support among the people of Girdwood Chapel than I have at other places in my life. God oftentimes moves more slowly than I wish he would, but it has seemed like we've been moving forward. That "preferred reality" is still a long ways off, but step by step we're getting there. Perhaps some of this is not what God is doing through the congregation, but what God is doing through me. Perhaps, more than at the two other stops along my ministry journey, I am loving my people more fully, more completely, in a more godly way. Perhaps.
Jared Wilson writes about what it means to love a congregation, taking words from Ray Ortlund in The Gospel Coalition's Themelios Journal:
And, I must also confess that sometimes this whole pastoring thing is a lonely job. I can feel like I have all of the answers and I have the one true vision for the church, and we'd get to God's preferred future for us if everyone would just get their own opinions out of the way and listen to me. It can be easy to get frustrated with congregations. After all, why won't more people step up to teach or to lead or to even attend? Where is the help when you need it? Why won't persons give more than a measly 2% or their income or 3% or whatever it is? In my own head, I can hold myself up as a an example of a saint that my congregation should aspire to become more like in their own lives--occasionally forgetting just how sinful this fallen pastor has been and remains.
But, I must also confess that the above is somewhat of an exaggeration right now. I have found more support among the people of Girdwood Chapel than I have at other places in my life. God oftentimes moves more slowly than I wish he would, but it has seemed like we've been moving forward. That "preferred reality" is still a long ways off, but step by step we're getting there. Perhaps some of this is not what God is doing through the congregation, but what God is doing through me. Perhaps, more than at the two other stops along my ministry journey, I am loving my people more fully, more completely, in a more godly way. Perhaps.
Jared Wilson writes about what it means to love a congregation, taking words from Ray Ortlund in The Gospel Coalition's Themelios Journal:
When the risen Lord of the church sends you to a people as their pastor, he is not sending you to them as their critic but as their friend. They may be immature. They may be bogged down in tradition or dazzled by neomania. But they are yours by the gracious appointment of Christ, and you will know them forever. If you hope for the gospel to work in their hearts with power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction, as of course you do, then don’t just preach to them; desire them. Desire not what they can do for you but what you can do for them. Love them, enjoy them, delight in them, honor them. When other pastors gripe about their churches, you set another tone. Lift your people up. Be their champion and defender. They are your glory and joy at the Second Coming.I will continue, at Girdwood Chapel, to "love them, enjoy them, delight in them, honor them." I am and will continue to be "their champion and defender."
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