Appreciate Your Pastor

I have a great church, God has blessed me with people to shepherd that get it.

What is “IT”?

IT – Is – Jesus, and He is our true leader.  It is His kingdom not ours, His will not ours, His vision not ours.

and there is no “but” here…

Now I may or may not know the church you go to, but I know a few things about your pastor.

He carries more burdens than you realize.

You have burdens you carry, it could be sickness, it could be relational – marriage or other wise, it could be the parenting of your children “new or old”.   It could be financial and wondering how you are going to meet the needs of your family.  It could be the aging of your parents or a situation someone close to you has gotten themselves into.  If you were asked “Are the burdens you bear heavy?” you would more than likely respond with a…

YES…

they are.

Your pastor not only carries the normal burdens of life that are listed above…

His family…

His life issues…

His personal struggles.

He also carries yours and other peoples’ burdens in the church.  To say that his load is heaver than yours is an understatement… and he can’t talk to other people about those burdens he is caring because most of them are private in nature.   Keeping confidence with people enables them to get through their issues without the whole world knowing about it and that secrecy is extremely important.

In addition to these burdens people add to them needlessly when they  become openly critical of their pastor

He didn’t come see them…

He didn’t phone…

He didn’t text…

He didn’t respond to my message…

He didn’t ……

But did you ever consider that he is just one person?

Did you ever hold yourself to that same standard?

Have you visited the sick lately?

Have you made that phone call?

Do you really know what is going on in the people’s lives of your church? Things that are   below the surface that people have confided in their pastor about? (The answer to this question is no)

When people are openly critical like this it adds to his already heavy load…

… and to be honest a pastor is always operating close to his breaking point anyway.

Unless your pastor is involved in a sin – a pastor should not be involved with… use your words about him as modes of encouragement…

that way, when they get back to him, you have given him strength instead of pain so he can effectively carry not only his own burdens…

but the burdens of the rest of the sheep as well.