The Ministry: Work or Rest?
by Pastor Dag Heward-MIlls
I remember when I first started out in full-time ministry. People would often ask my wife at work, “Where is your husband? Is he at home?”
One lady, a lawyer friend of hers once said, “Oh, so your husband doesn’t work anymore!”
I remember when I first started out in full-time ministry. People would often ask my wife at work, “Where is your husband? Is he at home?”
One lady, a lawyer friend of hers once said, “Oh, so your husband doesn’t work anymore!”
My wife would answer, “You have no idea how hard he works.”
They thought that because I was no longer practicing medicine, I was no longer working. Many people think that all that the pastor does is to prepare one sermon a week and then deliver it on Sunday morning. Afterwards, he is free to sleep until the next Sunday.
Many times people have called either late in the morning or in the afternoon and have said, “Hullo, how are you pastor? Sorry to disturb your sleep.”
I would think, “This man thinks I sleep all day and all night as well.” Then I would politely answer, “I was not sleeping.”
I have never bothered to explain what I was doing. “It is a waste of time.” I thought to myself. These and other remarks have made me realize that some people think that the ministry is one long restful occupation––an easier alternative to real and difficult jobs. From both the Bible and my experience, I have seen that there is no work like ministry work.
Ministry Is Work!
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
This interpretation is a bit clearer in the New International Version:
…to prepare God’s people for works of service…
Ephesians 4:12 (NIV)
The saints are to be perfected for the work. This means that pastors are to perfect the saints so that they can join in the hard work of ministry. There was a man called Epaphras, a servant of Christ “always labouring fervently for you in prayers”. This man was labouring, he wasn’t resting.
Throughout the Bible, ministry has been described as work. When Jesus saw the multitudes who were fainting because of lack of a shepherd, He said, “The harvest is plenty but the labourers are few.”
The Greek word translated labourer is the word ergates, which means a toiler, teacher, laborer and a worker.
The ministry is toil and sweat. I have found that out practically. Anybody who wants to be a shepherd must realize that he is not embarking on a game but real work. He will soon realize that being a pastor is not in title alone, but is real toil and labour. If ministry is work, what does it involve? What type of work is ministry work?
Four Main Aspects of a Lay Minister’s Work
I have a simple code that will help every pastor and shepherd to remember what work he or she is supposed to do. I have simply titled it P – V – C – I.
P for PRAYER
V for VISITATION
C for COUNSELING
I for INTERACTION
1. Prayer
Prayer is the cardinal sustaining force of the church. I believe in praying for hours for the church.There is a correlation between the amount of prayer put into the church by the eldership of the church and the growth of the church.
In Korea, it is well known that the pastors pray for long hours. It is no surprise then that the largest churches in the world are found in that nation. It is the will of God to have large churches because there are many people who need to be saved.
I believe that every full-time pastor should try to pray for at least three hours every day. Shepherds should pray for at least one or two hours a day. I believe in long times of prayer. Shepherds should make it a point to get away from their busy schedules and wait on God for even longer periods. Jesus himself retreated to the wilderness and mountains to pray. Praying for whole days on retreats is a very important aspect of the shepherd’s schedule.
The ministry is spiritual from beginning to end. There is a difference between a pastor and an administrator. The fact that you are doing accounting work in the church office does not mean that you are in full-time ministry.
Full-time ministry is full-time prayer and ministry of the Word.
…It is not reason that we should leave the word of God, and serve tables…But we will give ourselves continually to prayer, and to the ministry of the word.
Acts 6:2-4
Peter made it clear that his work was not arranging tables nor organizing food for his church members. His duty was to pray and minister the Word. In this code PVCI, the ministry of the word comes under counseling.
2. Visitation
In Jeremiah 23:2, God makes it clear that one of the principal duties of pastors is to visit.
Therefore thus saith the Lord God of Israel against the pastors… Ye have scattered my flock..and have not VISITED them…
Jeremiah 23:2
It is quite clear from this, that shepherds are expected to visit their sheep in their homes. This is different from counselling in the office. It is also different from preaching and teaching from the pulpit. It is a special ministry. The greatest visitor on this earth was Jesus Christ. Since his visit, the world has never been the same again.
In my ministry, I have observed a difference between those members I have visited and those who have never been visited. Members who I have been able to visit have become very stable and hardly ever left the church.
3. Counselling
Counselling involves ministering the counsels of God to people. You can do this through teaching a congregation or an individual. Churches based on solid Bible teachings tend to grow. As the years go by, these churches grow larger and larger. It is like a flock that has been exposed to fields upon fields of green grass. The natural response is that the flock will be healthy, multiply and grow.
You will find greater growth in churches which have strong teaching and preaching than in churches which emphasize miracles.
I believe in miracles but I also believe in the ministration of the Word. Sheep don’t feed on miracles, they feed on the Word.
4. Interaction
A shepherd is supposed to interact with his sheep. How can he interact properly if he is detached and aloof? Pastors and shepherds must do what I call “Deep Sea Fishing”.
Deep Sea Fishing
What is the deep sea? The deep sea is the mass of church members who stream in and out of church every Sunday morning. Many people attend our churches and nobody knows them or even talks with them. Some come in and out for a while and then drop out.
It is the duty of shepherds and pastors to plunge into what I call the deep sea and conduct Deep Sea Fishing. They are to move into the crowd of unknown faces and interact with them. They must befriend unknown people, talk with them, find out where they live, and establish a line of friendship.
Everybody Wants to Feel Important!
Everybody wants to be known and to feel important. Without this, they would move to a place where they can be known and feel important. All human beings have a psychological need to be identified and recognized!
It is that need that we try to meet by doing “deep sea fishing”. How many people can the senior pastor talk to on a Sunday? Not many! But if several other shepherds join him to lovingly interact, a lot more of the work will be done!
After interacting, the pastors will get to know the people who do not belong to small groups within the church, but still need pastoral visits and care.
“Deep sea fishing” will lead to you knowing many of your members and to establishing floating visitors in the church. All shepherds and pastors are expected to do a certain amount of deep sea fishing every Sunday. That is why it is important for shepherds to be in church on Sunday and involve themselves in this all-important interaction––deep sea fishing. It is not only the senior pastor that is preaching who has work to do. All other ranks of shepherds have a lot to do––deep sea fishing.
Why should a pastor be ushered away from his congregation as though he were a Head of State. Why should I be ushered quickly into my car when I finish ministering? Am I a Head of-state or a pastor?
I love to linger on in the church for hours after the service, interacting with different people.
I am not a Prime Minister. I am a pastor. Pastors are not chief executives; they are shepherds who are supposed to mingle with their sheep. The Bible says that the sheep know the voice of the good shepherd. How can they know your voice if they don’t even see you?
Five Characteristics of Ministry Work
No shepherd can claim to have joined the ranks of ministry workers until his activities have gotten certain characteristics. They are what I call the Characteristics of Ministry Work.
An activity moves out of the realm of playing, joking and pleasure and into the realm of work when it has the following characteristics. If you are involved in ministry and your activity does not have these characteristics, you may be doing something related to the ministry but it has not yet become “work”.
1. Ministry work has “working hours”.
Every true job has its own working hours. The work of the ministry has its own peculiar working hours. This often confuses people. They think pastors
must be in the office from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. like everybody else. Those are the hours of most secular offices. But we are not bankers nor accountants, we are pastors. No more banking hours for pastors! Nobody asks pilots to work from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Everybody knows that their working hours are peculiar and everyone accepts that reality.
I rarely ever go to the office at 8 o’clock in the morning. Most of my work is in the evenings, that is when the sheep have come from their workplaces and are available. That is when I can interact with, pray for and minister to them. Anyone who wants to be a shepherd must fix some working hours. These working hours should be your weekends (especially Sundays) and some evenings.
Someone may say, “Then it means I won’t have anytime to rest at weekends.” Well, that is the reality of being a shepherd. It means a little extra sacrifice for the kingdom. You may not be prepared to do the greater sacrifice of leaving your job, so you have to give up some of your leisure and resting times.
Sometimes, pastors go to work at 6:00 a.m. on Sunday mornings and leave at midnight. Sunday is the busiest and most important day for a pastor. It should be the case for every church. Many people do not realize that the time when sheep will be available is the time when the shepherds must be at work.
Pastors must counsel, visit, and teach Bible school classes throughout Sundays. Different services, meetings and activities must continue until evening. Someone may ask, “When do you rest?” Pastors rest on Mondays.
2. Ministry work consumes a large amount of time.
When an activity consumes just a few minutes of your time in a week, it cannot be called your “work”. For instance, I drive my car for a few minutes every day but my work is not “driving” per se. It is something that I do on my way to work.
However, if driving a car, for example a taxi, were to become my work, I would not spend less than eight hours a day driving. Then, to me, driving would have become work!
You cannot claim to be doing the “work” of the ministry until it actually consumes a reasonable amount of time in your week. Give your weekends and evenings to God.
3. Ministry work expends energy and money.
Everyone must realize that doing the work of the ministry involves spending a lot of energy. Do not be surprised if you get tired doing the work of a shepherd. It is only a sign that the activity has entered the realm of ‘work’. You have now begun to do the work of the ministry in Ephesians 4:11. Don’t most jobs leave their employees tired after several hours? This is because it is work.
Another thing that you will expend is money. Does it not cost you money to go to work everyday? Do you not spend money at work for lunch everyday?
It is the same thing with the work of ministry. You will spend some of your money in order to do the work. Someone may say, “In the case of secular work, we expend money but we get some back at the end of the month.” Dear friend, your rewards and treasures will come one day in Heaven!
But lay up for yourselves TREASURES IN HEAVEN…
Matthew 6:20
I do not believe in giving money to lay people to help them to pay for their transportation when visiting sheep. Do not give money to lay musicians, lay shepherds or lay pastors to help them come to church. When they were ordinary church members weren’t they spending money to come to church? If you start paying laymen, it will soon become as though you were hiring people to do a part-time job.
Very often when you pay people, their attitude changes and it becomes more of, “Is this all I get for my hard work?” I have decided to let the Lord pay those who work for Him. Make no mistake about this. Praying, visiting, counselling and interacting with people is hard work. As you do this work you will expend your energy and money. When you begin to feel tired, just remember it is a sign that you are really working for God.
4. Ministry work is repetitive and regular
By nature, all real work is repetitive and regular. If the ministry is “work”, then it will have features which make it repetitive and regular. Sometimes you may be bored but you just have to keep on doing the “work” – praying, visiting, counselling and interacting (PVCI).
Many pastors don’t pray much because they feel it’s repetitive and boring. But when prayer becomes your work you will have to repeat your prayers and you will have to pray regularly. When visiting becomes your work, you will have to visit repeatedly and regularly.
There is a difference between a social visit to a friend’s house and a pastoral visit. Pastoral visits must be conducted repeatedly by shepherds. Shepherds must intentionally go to the homes of their members on a regular basis.
No one ever told me what to do in ministry. I have naturally wanted to pray, to visit and to counsel my people. Now that our church is much larger I feel deprived when I am not able to know all of my sheep personally.
I struggle to know their names and to remember who they are. But it is almost an impossible task! I wish I knew all of their homes.
I wish I could attend all of their important family events. It is a natural desire. Anyone who is a true pastor has what I call ‘natural care’ and does not need to be supervised!
Don’t we all go to work when we don’t feel like it? Don’t we all go to the same work place repeatedly and regularly although we don’t feel like it? In the same way, anyone who claims to be doing the work of the ministry must rise up and repeatedly do the important tasks of a shepherd. We don’t pray just because we feel like it. We pray because we have to! We must rise up early and intercede for the people God has given us.
5. Ministry work is supervised or unsupervised work
Go to the ant… and BE WISE: Which HAVING NO GUIDE, OVERSEER, OR RULER, Provideth her meat…
Proverbs 6:6-8
All work falls into two categories: supervised work or unsupervised work. There are therefore two classes of working shepherds: those who need supervision and people who do not need supervision.
In every field, the supervised person is paid less than the unsupervised person! Decide to be a shepherd who does not need to be told what to do, when to pray, and whom to counsel. Your rewards in heaven will be even greater.
From today, decide that no one will ever have to supervise you to pray, read the Bible, study, visit or any such thing. Just do your work without supervision. Be a pastor who does not need supervision.
Nobody tells me that I have to pray. I know I have to pray, so I just pray. Become a shepherd who naturally (without supervision) cares about the work of God. Be like Timothy. Paul said that there was no one like him. He had a natural “care” for the sheep. He didn’t need to be told what to do. It just came naturally. I believe that is the heart of a true pastor.
But I trust in the Lord Jesus to send Timotheus… For I have no man likeminded, who will NATURALLY CARE for your state.
Philippians 2:19, 20
No one ever told me what to do in ministry. I have naturally wanted to pray, do visit and to counsel my people. Now that our church is much larger, I feel deprived when I am not able to know all my sheep personally.
I struggle to know their names and to remember who they are. But it is almost an impossible task! I wish I knew all their homes. I wish I could attend all their important family events. It is a natural desire. Anyone who is a true pastor has what I call natural care and does not need to be supervised.
From today, decide that no one will ever have to supervise you to pray, read the Bible, study, visit or any such thing. Just do your work without supervision. Be a pastor who does not need supervision.
My wife would answer, “You have no idea how hard he works.”
They thought that because I was no longer practicing medicine, I was no longer working. Many people think that all that the pastor does is to prepare one sermon a week and then deliver it on Sunday morning. Afterwards, he is free to sleep until the next Sunday.
Many times people have called either late in the morning or in the afternoon and have said, “Hullo, how are you pastor? Sorry to disturb your sleep.”
I would think, “This man thinks I sleep all day and all night as well.” Then I would politely answer, “I was not sleeping.”
I have never bothered to explain what I was doing. “It is a waste of time.” I thought to myself. These and other remarks have made me realize that some people think that the ministry is one long restful occupation––an easier alternative to real and difficult jobs. From both the Bible and my experience, I have seen that there is no work like ministry work.
Ministry Is Work!
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
This interpretation is a bit clearer in the New International Version:
…to prepare God’s people for works of service…
Ephesians 4:12 (NIV)
The saints are to be perfected for the work. This means that pastors are to perfect the saints so that they can join in the hard work of ministry. There was a man called Epaphras, a servant of Christ “always labouring fervently for you in prayers”. This man was labouring, he wasn’t resting.
Throughout the Bible, ministry has been described as work. When Jesus saw the multitudes who were fainting because of lack of a shepherd, He said, “The harvest is plenty but the labourers are few.”
The Greek word translated labourer is the word ergates, which means a toiler, teacher, laborer and a worker.
The ministry is toil and sweat. I have found that out practically. Anybody who wants to be a shepherd must realize that he is not embarking on a game but real work. He will soon realize that being a pastor is not in title alone, but is real toil and labour. If ministry is work, what does it involve? What type of work is ministry work?
Four Main Aspects of a Lay Minister’s Work
I have a simple code that will help every pastor and shepherd to remember what work he or she is supposed to do. I have simply titled it P – V – C – I.
P for PRAYER
V for VISITATION
C for COUNSELING
I for INTERACTION
1. Prayer
Prayer is the cardinal sustaining force of the church. I believe in praying for hours for the church.There is a correlation between the amount of prayer put into the church by the eldership of the church and the growth of the church.
In Korea, it is well known that the pastors pray for long hours. It is no surprise then that the largest churches in the world are found in that nation. It is the will of God to have large churches because there are many people who need to be saved.
I believe that every full-time pastor should try to pray for at least three hours every day. Shepherds should pray for at least one or two hours a day. I believe in long times of prayer. Shepherds should make it a point to get away from their busy schedules and wait on God for even longer periods. Jesus himself retreated to the wilderness and mountains to pray. Praying for whole days on retreats is a very important aspect of the shepherd’s schedule.
The ministry is spiritual from beginning to end. There is a difference between a pastor and an administrator. The fact that you are doing accounting work in the church office does not mean that you are in full-time ministry.
Full-time ministry is full-time prayer and ministry of the Word.
…It is not reason that we should leave the word of God, and serve tables…But we will give ourselves continually to prayer, and to the ministry of the word.
Acts 6:2-4
Peter made it clear that his work was not arranging tables nor organizing food for his church members. His duty was to pray and minister the Word. In this code PVCI, the ministry of the word comes under counseling.
2. Visitation
In Jeremiah 23:2, God makes it clear that one of the principal duties of pastors is to visit.
Therefore thus saith the Lord God of Israel against the pastors… Ye have scattered my flock..and have not VISITED them…
Jeremiah 23:2
It is quite clear from this, that shepherds are expected to visit their sheep in their homes. This is different from counselling in the office. It is also different from preaching and teaching from the pulpit. It is a special ministry. The greatest visitor on this earth was Jesus Christ. Since his visit, the world has never been the same again.
In my ministry, I have observed a difference between those members I have visited and those who have never been visited. Members who I have been able to visit have become very stable and hardly ever left the church.
3. Counselling
Counselling involves ministering the counsels of God to people. You can do this through teaching a congregation or an individual. Churches based on solid Bible teachings tend to grow. As the years go by, these churches grow larger and larger. It is like a flock that has been exposed to fields upon fields of green grass. The natural response is that the flock will be healthy, multiply and grow.
You will find greater growth in churches which have strong teaching and preaching than in churches which emphasize miracles.
I believe in miracles but I also believe in the ministration of the Word. Sheep don’t feed on miracles, they feed on the Word.
4. Interaction
A shepherd is supposed to interact with his sheep. How can he interact properly if he is detached and aloof? Pastors and shepherds must do what I call “Deep Sea Fishing”.
Deep Sea Fishing
What is the deep sea? The deep sea is the mass of church members who stream in and out of church every Sunday morning. Many people attend our churches and nobody knows them or even talks with them. Some come in and out for a while and then drop out.
It is the duty of shepherds and pastors to plunge into what I call the deep sea and conduct Deep Sea Fishing. They are to move into the crowd of unknown faces and interact with them. They must befriend unknown people, talk with them, find out where they live, and establish a line of friendship.
Everybody Wants to Feel Important!
Everybody wants to be known and to feel important. Without this, they would move to a place where they can be known and feel important. All human beings have a psychological need to be identified and recognized!
It is that need that we try to meet by doing “deep sea fishing”. How many people can the senior pastor talk to on a Sunday? Not many! But if several other shepherds join him to lovingly interact, a lot more of the work will be done!
After interacting, the pastors will get to know the people who do not belong to small groups within the church, but still need pastoral visits and care.
“Deep sea fishing” will lead to you knowing many of your members and to establishing floating visitors in the church. All shepherds and pastors are expected to do a certain amount of deep sea fishing every Sunday. That is why it is important for shepherds to be in church on Sunday and involve themselves in this all-important interaction––deep sea fishing. It is not only the senior pastor that is preaching who has work to do. All other ranks of shepherds have a lot to do––deep sea fishing.
Why should a pastor be ushered away from his congregation as though he were a Head of State. Why should I be ushered quickly into my car when I finish ministering? Am I a Head of-state or a pastor?
I love to linger on in the church for hours after the service, interacting with different people.
I am not a Prime Minister. I am a pastor. Pastors are not chief executives; they are shepherds who are supposed to mingle with their sheep. The Bible says that the sheep know the voice of the good shepherd. How can they know your voice if they don’t even see you?
Five Characteristics of Ministry Work
No shepherd can claim to have joined the ranks of ministry workers until his activities have gotten certain characteristics. They are what I call the Characteristics of Ministry Work.
An activity moves out of the realm of playing, joking and pleasure and into the realm of work when it has the following characteristics. If you are involved in ministry and your activity does not have these characteristics, you may be doing something related to the ministry but it has not yet become “work”.
1. Ministry work has “working hours”.
Every true job has its own working hours. The work of the ministry has its own peculiar working hours. This often confuses people. They think pastors
must be in the office from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. like everybody else. Those are the hours of most secular offices. But we are not bankers nor accountants, we are pastors. No more banking hours for pastors! Nobody asks pilots to work from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Everybody knows that their working hours are peculiar and everyone accepts that reality.
I rarely ever go to the office at 8 o’clock in the morning. Most of my work is in the evenings, that is when the sheep have come from their workplaces and are available. That is when I can interact with, pray for and minister to them. Anyone who wants to be a shepherd must fix some working hours. These working hours should be your weekends (especially Sundays) and some evenings.
Someone may say, “Then it means I won’t have anytime to rest at weekends.” Well, that is the reality of being a shepherd. It means a little extra sacrifice for the kingdom. You may not be prepared to do the greater sacrifice of leaving your job, so you have to give up some of your leisure and resting times.
Sometimes, pastors go to work at 6:00 a.m. on Sunday mornings and leave at midnight. Sunday is the busiest and most important day for a pastor. It should be the case for every church. Many people do not realize that the time when sheep will be available is the time when the shepherds must be at work.
Pastors must counsel, visit, and teach Bible school classes throughout Sundays. Different services, meetings and activities must continue until evening. Someone may ask, “When do you rest?” Pastors rest on Mondays.
2. Ministry work consumes a large amount of time.
When an activity consumes just a few minutes of your time in a week, it cannot be called your “work”. For instance, I drive my car for a few minutes every day but my work is not “driving” per se. It is something that I do on my way to work.
However, if driving a car, for example a taxi, were to become my work, I would not spend less than eight hours a day driving. Then, to me, driving would have become work!
You cannot claim to be doing the “work” of the ministry until it actually consumes a reasonable amount of time in your week. Give your weekends and evenings to God.
3. Ministry work expends energy and money.
Everyone must realize that doing the work of the ministry involves spending a lot of energy. Do not be surprised if you get tired doing the work of a shepherd. It is only a sign that the activity has entered the realm of ‘work’. You have now begun to do the work of the ministry in Ephesians 4:11. Don’t most jobs leave their employees tired after several hours? This is because it is work.
Another thing that you will expend is money. Does it not cost you money to go to work everyday? Do you not spend money at work for lunch everyday?
It is the same thing with the work of ministry. You will spend some of your money in order to do the work. Someone may say, “In the case of secular work, we expend money but we get some back at the end of the month.” Dear friend, your rewards and treasures will come one day in Heaven!
But lay up for yourselves TREASURES IN HEAVEN…
Matthew 6:20
I do not believe in giving money to lay people to help them to pay for their transportation when visiting sheep. Do not give money to lay musicians, lay shepherds or lay pastors to help them come to church. When they were ordinary church members weren’t they spending money to come to church? If you start paying laymen, it will soon become as though you were hiring people to do a part-time job.
Very often when you pay people, their attitude changes and it becomes more of, “Is this all I get for my hard work?” I have decided to let the Lord pay those who work for Him. Make no mistake about this. Praying, visiting, counselling and interacting with people is hard work. As you do this work you will expend your energy and money. When you begin to feel tired, just remember it is a sign that you are really working for God.
4. Ministry work is repetitive and regular
By nature, all real work is repetitive and regular. If the ministry is “work”, then it will have features which make it repetitive and regular. Sometimes you may be bored but you just have to keep on doing the “work” – praying, visiting, counselling and interacting (PVCI).
Many pastors don’t pray much because they feel it’s repetitive and boring. But when prayer becomes your work you will have to repeat your prayers and you will have to pray regularly. When visiting becomes your work, you will have to visit repeatedly and regularly.
There is a difference between a social visit to a friend’s house and a pastoral visit. Pastoral visits must be conducted repeatedly by shepherds. Shepherds must intentionally go to the homes of their members on a regular basis.
No one ever told me what to do in ministry. I have naturally wanted to pray, to visit and to counsel my people. Now that our church is much larger I feel deprived when I am not able to know all of my sheep personally.
I struggle to know their names and to remember who they are. But it is almost an impossible task! I wish I knew all of their homes.
I wish I could attend all of their important family events. It is a natural desire. Anyone who is a true pastor has what I call ‘natural care’ and does not need to be supervised!
Don’t we all go to work when we don’t feel like it? Don’t we all go to the same work place repeatedly and regularly although we don’t feel like it? In the same way, anyone who claims to be doing the work of the ministry must rise up and repeatedly do the important tasks of a shepherd. We don’t pray just because we feel like it. We pray because we have to! We must rise up early and intercede for the people God has given us.
5. Ministry work is supervised or unsupervised work
Go to the ant… and BE WISE: Which HAVING NO GUIDE, OVERSEER, OR RULER, Provideth her meat…
Proverbs 6:6-8
All work falls into two categories: supervised work or unsupervised work. There are therefore two classes of working shepherds: those who need supervision and people who do not need supervision.
In every field, the supervised person is paid less than the unsupervised person! Decide to be a shepherd who does not need to be told what to do, when to pray, and whom to counsel. Your rewards in heaven will be even greater.
From today, decide that no one will ever have to supervise you to pray, read the Bible, study, visit or any such thing. Just do your work without supervision. Be a pastor who does not need supervision.
Nobody tells me that I have to pray. I know I have to pray, so I just pray. Become a shepherd who naturally (without supervision) cares about the work of God. Be like Timothy. Paul said that there was no one like him. He had a natural “care” for the sheep. He didn’t need to be told what to do. It just came naturally. I believe that is the heart of a true pastor.
But I trust in the Lord Jesus to send Timotheus… For I have no man likeminded, who will NATURALLY CARE for your state.
Philippians 2:19, 20
No one ever told me what to do in ministry. I have naturally wanted to pray, do visit and to counsel my people. Now that our church is much larger, I feel deprived when I am not able to know all my sheep personally.
I struggle to know their names and to remember who they are. But it is almost an impossible task! I wish I knew all their homes. I wish I could attend all their important family events. It is a natural desire. Anyone who is a true pastor has what I call natural care and does not need to be supervised.
From today, decide that no one will ever have to supervise you to pray, read the Bible, study, visit or any such thing. Just do your work without supervision. Be a pastor who does not need supervision.
