Pastor's Tenure

Depending on which reports you read, it is said that the average tenure for a pastor in America is about three (3) years. It's a widely discussed statistic in church and ministry circles. Even denominations wring their hands over it.

Another alarming pattern is the number of pastors who leave the ministry. In fact, the statistics here seem a bit horrifying. Let's take a look:

80% of seminary and Bible school graduates who enter full time ministry will leave the ministry (as a profession) within their first five (5) years.

About 1,600 ministers are fired or forced to resign from their posts every month in the U.S. More often than not, they've not done anything specifically wrong.

Only 1 out of 10 ministers today will actually retire from that profession. The rest will be one of the above statistics - and never finish the race they started.

Now lest you think that I'm taking pot shots at ministers, I'll just go ahead and confess that I'm in the above statistic. I belong to the ranks of people who felt called by God to be a full-time pastor ... and then flamed-out after serving on staff for a few years at a couple of churches. I wasn't fired or forced to resign. I left of my own free will - but nonetheless felt like a failure. I was devastated.

Several months later I consulted a trusted elder in our church (who is also a dear friend) and sincerely asked what I had done wrong or what I could have done more right. His answer? "Nothing. You did nothing wrong." Of course, that offered little solace at the time. But in time it has begun to make more sense.

My own experience, plus much observation, has taught me that a pastor doesn't have to do anything wrong to see his ministry go down in flames. It isn't necessarily a mark on his ability or his faithfulness to his calling from God. It also doesn't have to be a judgment on the people he was trying to pastor. Despite how it feels or how it looks, the whole phenomenon should not be a surprise to us.

So here's the deal. Jesus said that a prophet is never accepted in his home town. Basically the people tend not to respect a prophet that they know. So it seems that it takes about three years for the people to know the pastor - including his faults and flaws and weaknesses. If it is a growing and healthy church, the people will demand a turnover. Unfortunately the pastor gets caught in that dynamic.

But what of the pastors who are the exceptions. I think there are one of two things going on. First, if the pastor has long tenure with the same church, he or she has been able to reinvent themselves over and over again (like maybe every three years). Of course, the other option is that the church is dying. (And that is another alarming statistic in America.) Dying churches usually don't kick out their pastor.

So here's the deal for the new pastor in the church.

1. Reinvent yourself every three years or so.
2. Get kicked out of the church in about three years, on average.
3. Pastor a dying church.

Now when you are considering ministry as a profession, for yourself or someone else, do you know these dynamics are facing you or someone you care about? If you're already in ministry, have you become aware of these truths? Are you prepared to face them?

America is gasping for effective church leadership. We need church leaders who will go the distance, stay in the race, and of course stay in the ministry. Churches are dying all around us. People are dying all around us.

So let those of us who feel God's call count the cost and enter the race with eyes wide open. Let us be sold out enough to stick with it when the going gets difficult. And most importantly, let us not be deceived by the circumstances. If God called you to ministry, His call on your life is not revocable.

The only question is, when one assignment comes to a close, "Where will God send me next?"

Church Organization

Many years ago, I saw my calling from God in the Bible. It was the story of Aaron and Hur holding up Moses' arms in battle. As long as Moses, God's chosen leader for the Israelites, had his arms up - he won the battle. Since it was impossible for Moses to physically sustain that posture - Aaron and Hur stood on either side of him and held his arms in the air to ensure that he won the battle God had called him to. It crystallized for me and I realized I was created to hold up the arms of God's chosen leaders in battle.

Since my own personal epiphany, I've found myself naturally drawn to two different ministry endeavors. They are my ministry calling. The first is to support "broken pastors." Many pastors get wounded in the battles God calls them to. Some pastors are tempted beyond what they were prepared to endure and fall into sin. My calling is to help nurse them back to health and get them back into the game. The second is to train and coach pastors. Particularly in third world countries, men (and women) are called to lead Christian communities. Unfortunately most of them cannot afford any kind of training (such as seminary). So I work with accredited ministries to go and train them.

One of the things that often comes up in ministry is the hierarchy of the church. Who is in charge and why are they in charge? More than once I've found myself having to explain the difference between a Senior Pastor and a "Senior Preacher." They guy is a good preacher, a gifted teacher - but he finds himself failing miserably at leading his church. And he wonders why. The answer is that church leadership has an order ordained by God. If we don't follow that order, we're simply inviting trouble.

I Corinthians 12:28 explains it this way: "And in the church, God has appointed first of all apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then workers of miracles, also those having gifts of healing, those able to help others, those with gifts of administration, and those speaking in different kinds of tongues."

Did you catch that order for church hierarchy? Let's break it down like a modern cultural organization chart.

Jesus is of course the head of the church. Then the roles are as follows:

1 - Apostles (those who've seen Jesus personally and in the flesh)
2 - Prophets (those who speak for God)
3 - Teachers (those who instruct in God's ways and teach the lessons of life)
4 - Workers of Miracles & Gifts of Healing (those who can directly minister healing to others)
5 - Those Able To Help Others (servants to others thrive and achieve their potential)
6 - Those With Gifts of Administration (organizers, planners, coordinators, etc.)
7 - Those speaking in different kinds of tongues (including prayer languages)

There it is, God's order for church hierarchy. Now, where do you think most pastors fall? Let's be clear, most are not prophets. Few of us were chosen by Christ Himself to be His personal disciples. Few among us have had Damascus road experiences like Paul did. So for most of us, Apostle is off the table. So that takes us to Prophets and Teachers. I don't have statistics to support this, but my own personal experience and observation has been that most pastors are not prophets - but they are gifted teachers. Preaching and teaching is their love and passion.

So what's the difference between a Prophet and a Teacher? Why can't a good preacher be a solid Prophet? Here's the thing about that. Look at how God speaks in the Old Testament. Often God is angry; often He has to say some things that are difficult to say. Sometimes God's words are confrontational. They're more than exhortation. You see, the Prophet often has to say things that nobody wants to hear (even though they know it's true).

Few people delight in the works of a good Prophet (at least while he's alive). On the other hand, people are drawn to good teachers. In fact, they get great pleasure from sitting at the feet of a good teacher. Good teachers are celebrated. But what happens when a good teacher tries to execute the duties of a good prophet ... without having the giftedness to do so? Well, this is where we get pastor burn-out. This is where we get congregations that are fed up with their pastors. This is where pastors get immersed in such intense pain that they can hardly function.

If I were designing the "perfect church" structure, I would look closely at 1 Corinthians 12:28. Then I would make sure there is a prophet in charge. But I would rarely let him teach! Instead, I would get a good teacher - to work under the prophet. And under that teacher we would begin to organize and build our church.

The Apostle Paul had one more thing to say about this model for the gifts. In 1 Corinthians 12:31, he said, "But eagerly desire the greater gifts. And now I will show you the most excellent way." In the original translations, the word "greater" means something like "span of impact or influence." In other words, Paul is telling us to desire the gifts that can influence or impact the most people.

Ironically, the further down the hierarchy you go - the greater those gifts become. Gifts of service, for example, can impact and influence more people than teaching gifts; so they are the greater gifts that we should all aspire to. And if we will do as Paul says, he promises to show us a "most excellent way!"

Prophecy? Or heresy?

Have you ever thought about the spiritual gift of prophesy? What is it? What does it mean? What is its purpose? Who were the prophets? Are there any real prophets now?

I think many of us can too readily remember an image of some crackpot purporting to be a prophet. He or she may have "had a word for us from the Lord." More often than not, he or she was not in a position of credibility - and we disregard them entirely (and not just what they have to say).

But the Bible tells us the prophecy is a true gift. It tells us that prophets are real. So what are we to make of this? How should we regard the prophets? What should we know about false prophecy (a term most of us are more familiar with)?

One of the things that has helped me get peace with the whole idea of prophecy was to simply look at the examples of prophets in the Bible. They are found in both the Old and New Testaments. I noticed something about them that I thought was revealing. Their primary role was to present God’s will to the people and to instruct them in God’s Word. This is what they did most of the time. Sometimes, they also had the gift of predicting the future. But this was much less common.

1 Corinthians 14:1-25 provides further valuable insight into prophecy. Look at some of the statements contained in these few verses:

· Everyone who prophesies speaks to men for their strengthening, encouragement and comfort.

· He who prophesies edifies the church.

· Since you are eager to have spiritual gifts, try to excel in gifts that build up the church.

· I would rather speak five intelligible words to instruct others …

· … prophecy, however, is for believers, not unbelievers.

· But if an unbeliever or someone who does not understand comes in while everybody is prophesying, he will be convinced ... that he is a sinner and … the secrets of his heart will be laid bare. So he will fall down and worship God …

So from these points, I came to some conclusions:

1. God is far more likely to use prophecy to call me to repentance or exhort me to action than to give a prediction of the future. (It is the character and nature of God – exhibited in the Bible.)

2. Prophecy, even that which predicts the future, has a Biblical defined purpose: strengthening, encouraging, comforting, building up the church, convincing sinners, etc.

3. Someone who doesn’t know God or isn’t seeking God won’t listen to a prophet anyway (it’s not for unbelievers).

4. There are probably prophets among us, but we don’t usually recognize them. Jesus said that a prophet is not accepted in his home town. (I think it’s hard for us to imagine that someone we know and are familiar with is receiving an anointed word from God!)

5. True prophesy will always line up with Scripture and never contradict Scripture – since it is impossible for God to contradict Himself.

So if someone gave you a so-called prophetic word, or a word of knowledge, I’d run it through the above filters, especially those in 1 Corinthians 14. Honestly, in the last 10 years probably 20 people have come to me and told me they “had a word for me from the Lord.” There was only one instance where it passed all of these filters. It turned out to be a word of encouragement that gave me confidence to do something I’d felt God was calling me to do. The other 19? I discarded them.

And here’s my final point. Satan can predict the future. So if it doesn’t pass the above filters or tests, then it’s not from God. Who else could be behind it? Fortune tellers, for example, can predict the future. Sometimes they are amazingly accurate. But they are never of God.

The prophets were real. And prophecy is divine. But we need to not be ignorant about either one. Otherwise, we're in danger of being deceived - or of overlooking that which is valuable!