Have you ever felt that there were those who knew how to do your job better than you? Or better yet, has anyone ever tried to give you advice about your job? Even if it is one that you have been doing for years and yet they do not have one minute of experience doing it? I know as a pastor there are many times when clergy feel as if many try to let them know, “this is how you are supposed to preach and pastor.”
You see, so many who sit in the church’s congregation really do not know the pressures and the challenges their pastor may go through or deal with, some due in part to the fact that so much must be kept confidential. I am not just talking about the calls in the middle of the night or visits to the hospitals; I am talking about the heartache and the pain pastors deal with each and every day when they hear a mother crying about her child being on drugs or alcohol, or even how a couple has fallen on difficult times and their marriage is about to split apart. The church’s congregation does not see the individual sitting in the bed looking death straight in the eye while the pastor is there trying to make sure the person is right with Jesus before they step out into eternity. Perhaps, all some may see is that “we pay the pastor to do like we tell him to do; visit the sick, sit by the phone, and be at all the baby showers, wedding showers, and everything else as we see fit.”
There are two phrases I believe that people always use when talking about the pastor. “People talk about the pastor, Brother Barry?” Oh yes, he is usually the main course at Sunday dinner! Ha-ha. No, but seriously. Two phrases I have heard in the past are “What does he do all day” and “I know he has not come to see me!” That last one has to be a worldwide phrase of the Christian church. But yet what they forget is that biblically God set forth deacons to take care of the widows and daily administration so that the apostles could give themselves over to the Word of God. But we have allowed modern day church politics and even money dictate to how we run God’s House it seems, and it’s time we “let go and let God,” as my wife once told me. Let us remember that we are stewards of God and He has entrusted us to look after His church until He comes back, and may He find us doing so upon His return.