Principles and Warnings

Dannah Gresh: In a consumer-minded society, it’s easy to play the comparison game, even with pastors. Here’s Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: We need to be careful not to exalt some spiritual leaders above others. Thank the Lord for the people that He has used in your life. Recognize and appreciate the value, the contribution that each one makes to the kingdom of God. They have different strengths and different callings. Thank the Lord for those, but don’t compare. 

Dannah: This is the Revive Our Hearts podcast with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, author of Let’s Go to Church!, for October 5, 2022. I’m Dannah Gresh.

Nancy’s continuing in a series called "Follow the Leaders."

Nancy: We’ve been talking about our responsibilities as church members to support our spiritual leadership. I know that in this series I’m kind of in a minefield; there are so many different church situations, and I’m not familiar with the details of yours. I can’t address each type of situation, and many of the things I’m saying will probably raise some question marks. It’s not in the scope of this particular series to address all of those issues, but I am trying to point out what I think are some clear biblical principles about respecting and supporting and appreciating and encouraging our pastors and spiritual leaders. We’re sharing that as we come into this Pastors’ Appreciation Month in the hope that it will encourage you to follow these exhortations from God’s Word and be an encouragement to your pastor and spiritual leaders.

Nancy: A pastor who’s a friend of mine showed me a letter recently that he received from another pastor, a pastor of a small church that is in a difficult situation right now. The small-church pastor was writing my friend to ask for some counsel about how to deal with a situation. I want to read you a portion, with permission from that pastor, of what was in that letter. He said,

One of my men believes every night of the week is family time, and he won’t bring his family to Wednesday night ministries but instead plays in a recreational bluegrass band with another man in our church, thereby resulting in his wife and five children not coming—family time. Another member believes that kids should never be away from their parents when at church, so they won’t let their kids go to Sunday school, nor will they come on Wednesday nights. Another man, although he is a very close friend, is so critical and gossipy that it often hurts to hang around him even after repeated friendly reproofs.

I have a hyper-reformed Presbyterian and his wife attending who believe that only hymns should be sung in church, with an organ. He and his wife sit in our Welcome Center with their two daughters while the music is playing and do not come in until I start preaching. I’ve got a brainy Latin/Greek scholar who loves the fellowship but hates me preaching past 12:00, and whose little five-year-old boy tells me each Sunday morning that I preach too long.

My heart grieves for that pastor and for the little boy. Then this pastor said,

I've got a hyper-reformed brother who won't join our church because there's too much wrong with it, although he's been coming for four months to enjoy the teaching. What’s so funny about all this is that I absolutely love all my people. I am so in love with them that I don’t know what to do. But I’m so ignorant about how to bring us all together that it’s driving me crazy. I’m losing sleep, constantly praying and thinking about it.”

As I read that letter, I don’t know this pastor but I thought, There’s a man with a shepherd’s heart. He loves his flock even though sheep can be messy, dirty and stupid. But he loves his flock! God, bless that pastor who just has a heart for his people.

It reminded me that you and I don’t realize the burden that so many pastors carry for their people—even when things aren't as they should be. Every pastor has to deal with difficult people, difficult situations. That's true in every home, in every church. To bring all kinds of different people together and try to mold them into one flock—that’s a tough thing. But we don’t realize how much so many of our pastors really do love their people and carry the burden for their flock on their heart.

So we’re talking during these days about the importance of appreciating our pastors and spiritual leaders and what are the biblical exhortations toward us as followers. Biblically, what are our responsibilities toward our spiritual leaders? I want to talk about one today that comes from 1 Timothy chapter 5, verse 19. I’m going to read only one part of this passage. We’re not going to get into the entire passage but just the first part of it.

The apostle Paul says, “Do not receive an accusation against an elder except from two or three witnesses” (NKJV). Let me say, your church may not have elders. But in the context of the New Testament, I believe this is talking about the spiritual leaders of the church. You may call them deacons; you may call them pastors, bishops, overseers, elders. What is in view here is the spiritual leadership of the church.

The apostle Paul says, “Do not receive an accusation against an elder except from two or three witnesses.” Now the passage goes on, and the part we’re not going to talk about today goes on to discuss the process of dealing with church leaders who sin. There is a process. It is important that sin in the church leadership be dealt with. It needs to be dealt with biblically. It needs to be dealt with God’s way. It has to be dealt with. It should not be swept under the carpet. That’s where we need to understand the fullness of the teaching of God’s Word on that subject. However, that’s not my point today. I want to just stick with the first part of that verse.

“Do not receive an accusation against an elder except from two or three witnesses.” Now it’s not assuming here that these leaders are perfect or sinless. They’re not. We know they’re sinful. We know they’re human. All men have feet of clay. They are not glorified. They are in process. They experience the same kinds of temptations that we do. In fact, they probably experience some additional temptations. They sometimes fail. They blow it it. They are fathers; they are men. They have real issues with how they think, and attitude, and actions. They blow it. They are sinners saved by God’s grace like we are. So it’s not assuming that they are perfect.

But it is saying that we are not to attack or confront spiritual leaders to make careless charges against them. “Do not receive an accusation against an elder except from two or three witnesses.” If there are serious charges, biblical charges to be made, they need to be done in a biblical way.

And for a woman or a man, a church member, to go through the church saying things we think about this pastor that are not biblically substantiated and that aren’t handled in a biblical process, is to sin.

(And let me just say parenthetically here—I’m not going to go into detail on this, but as a woman, if you believe there’s a biblical issue at stake. I would say first go to your husband. Then pray and seek the Lord together. Get your husband’s leadership about how this should be approached by going to the other church leaders.)

But here’s what we’re not to do. We’re not to plant seeds of disloyalty or dissension by giving evil reports to others about our spiritual leaders. And we are not to listen to others who want to give a negative report. It says, “Don’t receive an accusation.”

If you're the kind of person that people often come up to and feel free to share their concerns about the pastor, you better wonder if there is something wrong with you. Why do they feel so comfortable sharing all that with you?

If you let them know, "I'm not in a position, biblically, to listen to that. But I believe our pastor wants to be a man of God, and I believe he'd want to know about this. Would you like me to pick up the phone and ask him if he would like to meet with you?" 

Direct them back to the source. Don’t discuss it among yourselves. This creates in any group of people—a family, a workplace environment, and in a church in particular—it’s deadly to have people talking among themselves about things about the pastor or spiritual leaders that they don’t agree with.

Now as you think about the issues that do surface, that are concerns, let me just give you some thoughts, some suggestions. First of all, remember again that they’re humans, that they’re sinners. Give them room to fail. Now I’m not talking about failing to fulfill their biblical responsibilities, but give them room. You know, when you hear a pastor discipline his three-year-old publicly in a way that’s a little sharp, don’t jump all over him. You do the same thing, or you have. Give them room to grow as leaders.

I think about one ministry I was part of and at the time the pastor was a young pastor. Years later he had become so much more effective a communicator, a Bible expositors. He had grown. I'm so glad that the congregation in his early days didn't expect him to be this seasoned preacher that He became.  

Don’t place unreasonable expectations on your pastor to be this spiritual giant, this fabulous communicator. By the way, this applies to your husband too. Don't expect them to have everything strength, every gift, every qualification of evey kind of leadership. Some pastors are not great administrators. That’s not a sin. Some pastors are better communicators than others. It’s not a sin not to be a spellbinding communicator. It’s not a sin to not be as eloquent as Charles Swindoll or John MacArthur. Most pastors aren’t. To put expectations on your pastor to meet qualifications and expectations that are unrealistic is not a fair thing to do.

Ask yourself, “Does he love the Word? Does he teach the Word?” I want to tell you, I can get so much out of any sermon when the man opens the Word of God and all he does is read it and make a few comments about it. He doesn’t have to be scintillating as a communicator.

We’re such an entertainment era that we think pastors have to entertain us. They don’t have to be entertaining. Now I’m for pastors and communicators, myself included as a communicator, honing our skills, developing, becoming better communicators. And the pastors I know take that seriously and are wanting to develop in those areas. But we need to be sure not to put unrealistic expectations on them.

Distinguish between things that would disqualify them from being a pastor or a spiritual leader, biblical issues that would make them not qualified. If they’re not men of moral character, if they’re not beyond reproach, those are things that disqualify them from spiritual leadership. But distinguish between those things and things that are a matter of preference.

I've seen pastors sacked for reasons that reveal pride, pettiness, carnality on the part of the people that forced him out or made their lives miserable. I've seen it happen over and over again. Sometimes it does relate to the style of the preaching, the effectiveness of the preaching. Sometimes it relates to issues that the pastor's taking leadership in, or that the church leadership is making decisions related to maybe church programs or the church is going to two services or we are switching the Sunday school format, or (God forbid!) dropping Sunday school or changing an evening service, maybe the format of the services, things like how loud the music is.

Now I’ll just tell you, I have opinions on most things. People who know me know that I have strong opinions on most things. I have a lot of opinions about music, for example. But it would be wrong, I believe, to make preferences into issues that divide a church.

Give the leadership of the church room to lead. Some of these things are not right and wrong. We get stuck on how we've always done it or how we like it. It's not always issues of right and wrong. Some many of these issues are opinion or a matter of preference. Don't destroy your shephered or the flock over things that are secondary issues, that are not doctrinal issues, not biblical issues. They are secondar matters of preference.

If you come to the place where in your hearts you really cannot support the church leadership over things that are secondary issues, just a matter of preference. Maybe it's they way they do children's ministry, but for your family you don't feel comfortable with that, don't divide the church over it! don't divide the flock over it. Don't tear down the shepherd over it. God may lead you to quietly move your family to a different church where the preferences are more in line with where you think God wants your family. That may be okay. But don't become a point of contention in the church over secondary matters.

Listen, it’s a very serious thing to attack someone who is in a position of God-given authority. Scripture talks about this very clearly. Psalm 105, verse 15 warns us, “Do not touch My anointed ones, and do My prophets no harm” (NASB). Now again we’re not talking about cultic leadership here, blind obedience. But we’re saying there is a respect and an esteem that we’re to accord to those God has placed in positions of spiritual leadership.

I think about how David, when he was being chased by King Saul, had that opportunity to kill Saul. He cut a little piece of his robe off there in the cave. And the Scripture says in 1 Samuel 24:5, “It came about afterward that David’s conscience bothered him because he had cut off the edge of Saul’s robe” (NASB).

A little thing, but David said, “Saul is God’s anointed man at this time in this kingdom.” Saul had a lot of problems, he had a lot of issues, but David said, “I’m going to let God deal with him. I’m not going to take matters into my own hands. I’m going to let God deal with him in His way and in His time.”

Do not receive an accusation against an elder except by two or three witnesses. Don’t you be the person who destroys the oneness of the Body of Christ over issues that are secondary, that are matters of opinion or matters of preference.

 

Dannah: Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth has been warning us from 1 Timothy chapter 5 about the seriousness of being divisive. She’ll be back with more, in a minute, but I’d like you to take a moment and think through this on a personal level. Has God been speaking to your heart? Is there something you need to confess or repent of? Maybe you have been a critic, disloyal. Maybe you’ve sowed seeds of dissension and conflict, maybe in subtle ways. You’ve listened to gossip; perhaps you’ve passed it on. Would you just confess that to the Lord? Repent of it, and ask God to make you a godly follower and to help you support and encourage your leaders in such a way that they will be motivated to become the men of God that He wants them to be. In fact, let's pray right now.

Lord, I pray that You would help each of us see our situations clearly. Search our hearts. Know our thoughts and minds. Help us to know them. There are many situations represented among us, but Lord, show each of us how to deal with those issues in a biblical way with humility, with charity, following the principles of Scripture. Lord, we want to encourage the oneness of the body rather than contributing to conflict or dissension in the church of Jesus Christ. Please Lord, cleanse our hearts. In the name of Jesus Christ we pray, amen.

You’re listening to Revive Our Hearts with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth here in this first week of Pastors’ Appreciation Month. So, in the first part of this program, Nancy warned us to watch out for a critical, divisive spirit. Now, in part two of today’s program, Nancy shares two more important biblical principles. 

Nancy: The first is found in 1 Corinthians chapter 3, and it’s not explicitly stated; it’s just implied here, as one of our responsibilities toward spiritual leaders. Let me read the passage. In 1 Corinthians 3, verses 4–6. The apostle Paul is speaking to the Corinthian church, which, by the way, had all kinds of problems. In fact, when people talk about all the problems in their church and they want to go to a "New Testament church." You want to say, "You know what a New Testament church looks like? It's got carnality, people with problems. The Corinthian church was a New Testament church with very real issues. We have to deal with those issue.

Paul didn't tell the people to stop going to church or give up on the church. He said to deal with the issues as leaders and as people. Here was one of the principles because there was a lot of contention in that church, a lot of division, a lot of comparison. Paul said,

When one says, "I am of Paul," and another, "I am of Apollos," [two different spiritual leaders], are you not carnal [fleshly, spiritually immature]? Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers [servants] through whom you believed, as the Lord gave to each one? I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. (NKJV).

Now Paul is addressing here this issue of comparison, and I think there are a couple things it points out.

First of all we need to be careful not to exalt one spiritual leader over another. Thank the Lord for the people He has used in your life. They have different strengths, different callings. Thank the Lord for those, but don’t compare. Remember they have different gifts, different abilities, and that's okay. Don’t exalt one above the other.

Give God the glory for the spiritual growth and fruit in your life. That’s what Paul said. “I planted, Apollos watered, but it’s God who gave the increase.” It’s God who did the work. We’re just servants. So give God the glory. Be careful about putting your pastor or spiritual leader on a pedestal that is inappropriately high. If it is too high, it becomes idol worship to where you look at your pastor or this particular teacher or spiritual leader as, you know, God in your life. That’s dangerous. You’re setting him up for a fall; you’re setting yourself up for disappointment.

Give God the glory for how He has used these men as servants in your life. Realize that ultimately it’s God who’s working in your life and that those men who have most impacted you are merely servants. That’s how they view themselves as humble leaders.

Avoid a sectarian spirit, a divisive spirit. Refuse to take sides with one leader against another. Don’t join the fray. Those conflicts will happen. Don’t take sides. “I’m of Paul.” “I’m of Apollos.” “I follow this teaching.” “I follow that teaching.” Be humble. Learn what you can from each one of them.

Next I want to bring up a principle that I think is such a fun one, such an important one, about how we should minister to our pastors and spiritual leaders. Let me ask you to turn to 1 Timothy chapter 5. We’re going to look at a couple of different passages in relation to this principle.

 

This is so important, and your pastor probably does not feel the liberty to preach on this subject very often, so I’m going to say it for him. I’m going to put in a real plug here for ministering to the material and financial needs of those who are our pastors and spiritual leaders. What does the Scripture say?

Verse 17, 1 Timothy 5: “Let the elders . . .” and here we’re talking about all the spiritual overseers in the church. “Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor.” When you pay your pastor, you don’t do it out of obligation. This is something that they’re deserving of. This is something they’re worthy of, this honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching. That’s hard work. I know that. It’s a lot of preparation.

You know, I come here, and I have all these notes, and we do these sessions. But it’s hard work, and your pastor goes through that week after week after week. I honor these men who come up with messages, some of them Sunday morning, Sunday night, some of them Wednesday night—two or three different messages a week. They are studying. That is hard work, and the Scripture says they deserve to be compensated for doing that.

The Scripture says in verse 18, “You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain.” Are you calling my pastor an ox? No, God is using a principle here, first written in the Old Testament, to show us an important principle about how our leaders deserve to reap the reward of their ministry. The laborer deserves his wages.

In Deuteronomy 25, the Old Testament passage says that the oxen that threshed the grain were entitled to eat from it. That was their privilege. When Jesus sent out the seventy disciples to do ministry in different towns, He said to go into the towns and stay in people’s homes and “remain in the same house,” Luke 10 verse 7, “eating and drinking what they provide, for the laborer deserves his wages.” They deserve this honor, double honor, those who teach the Word and lead the flock of God.

That word "honor" has to do with respect and financial support. You know the word "honorarium"? If you go and sing somewhere for a special event or speak somewhere at a conference or a retreat, you might get an honorarium. That’s money that is given to honor someone, to express gratitude for how they have served.

Now the emphasis here is not on the money. That’s a part of it, but it’s the heart attitude. If you respect your pastors and spiritual leaders, you will want to provide for and minister to them in financial and material ways. You won’t begrudge it. “Now I guess we have to pay our pastor.” You will want to minister to his financial needs. You will want to support him financially. The Scripture says those who preach the Word should be paid for it.

Now Paul said, “This is a right that I’m not claiming.” (See 1 Cor. 9:12ff.) Paul went and made tents so he could serve people without putting any obligation on them. That’s Paul’s prerogative. That’s your pastor’s prerogative, if he wants to function that way. But God says to the people who are being ministered to, “You should minister to the material and the financial needs of those who minister to your spiritual needs.” Your church is responsible to provide for the financial needs of the pastoral staff.

Paul says it this way in 1 Corinthians chapter 9: “Who serves as a soldier at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard without eating any of its fruit? Or who tends a flock without getting some of the milk? . . . If we have sown spiritual things among you, is it too much if we reap material things from you? . . . In the same way,” he says, “the Lord commanded that those who proclaim the gospel get their living by the gospel.” It’s pretty clear, isn’t it?

Galatians 6:6 says it this way. I love this verse. “Let him who is taught the Word share in all good things with him who teaches” (NKJV). I was meditating on these verses the other night and just thinking about some of the people who have taught me spiritually and the people who have ministered the Word to me. Everything I’m teaching on Revive Our Hearts, these are things that I’ve learned from my own study of the Word but also from pastors and teachers who have invested in my life.

I was thinking of some of those people who have ministered in my life, and I stopped right while I was working on this study and wrote notes to four of those people, three pastors and a Bible teacher, people who have taught me. I said, “I can’t teach on this passage without taking this opportunity to write a note and thank you for your ministry of teaching the Word in my life.” And I enclosed a check and said, “I just want to bless you.”

I don’t know if they need it. That’s not the point. The point is I need to give it. I need to minister materially. That’s what Paul said: “Let him who is taught the Word share in all good things with him who teaches.” We need to give and minister to the material needs and financial needs of those who minister to us spiritually.

So ask God to show you how you can express honor to your pastor, to the youth director, to the children’s workers, Sunday school teachers, nursery workers, people who minister to you and your family. And you might include in this also Christian school teachers. You can broaden this: the people who are investing in your life, the elders, the deacons who provide leadership for your church. Ask the Lord how you can express honor in a tangible, practical way to those individuals.

Look for opportunities to minister to the practical needs of your spiritual leaders. It may be just writing a check for your pastor and his wife to go out to dinner. I was recently with a pastor; he’s not my pastor, but he serves in the community where I live. He and his wife are a young couple, and they’re in a little church. I know that they don’t make a large salary in that church, and they have such a heart for the Lord, and they love their people and they love ministering the Word, and they’re doing a great job in our community.

I ran into them at a restaurant not too long ago. I just took out my checkbook and wrote a little check, found a piece of paper and just wrote a little note on it that said, “Thank you for your ministry in our community. I want to bless you and thank the Lord for how you’re serving God’s people and the flock in this community.”

Sometimes it may be appropriate to say to your pastor and his family or the music minister and his family, “Could our family have you over for dinner? We’d like to take you out for lunch.” Just minister to them in that practical way. Birthday cards, anniversary cards—and don’t forget their mates when you’re doing this.

Maybe help with their kids’ Christian school tuition. Maybe God has blessed you financially and you can say, “I’d like to help. Our family would like to help with your kids’ Christian schooling this year.” Maybe offer free babysitting so the pastor and his wife can have a date to themselves without having to minister to others at that time. Give to minister to the material, practical needs of your pastor, of those who’ve discipled you, of those who’ve helped you and your children grow in your walk with God.

Invest materially in the lives of those who teach you the Word—pastors, elders, deacons, Sunday School teachers, youth workers, AWANA workers. Ask the Lord, “How can I bless them materially as they have ministered spiritually to me and to my family?”

Dannah: That’s Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth with some simple ways—tangible ways—we can bless our spiritual leaders.

Nancy has more ideas and suggestions in a booklet she wrote specifically for us here in Pastors’ Appreciation Month. It’s called Let’s Go to Church!: How to Be Blessed and Be a Blessing in God’s House. It’s an interactive resource that will help you think through your participation in the services of your church—things like: how to prepare for church, how to get the most out of a sermon. There’s also a section for those who are involved in teaching the Word to others and a thirty-day guide for praying for your pastor.

This monthas a thank-you for your financial support of the ministry of Revive Our Hearts, we’ll send you a copy of Let’s Go to Church! You can make a donation and request the booklet by Nancy at ReviveOurHearts.com. Just find the “Donate” button and follow the instructions. Or if you’d rather give over the phone you can do that when you call us at 1-800-569-5959, and make sure to ask for Nancy’s booklet. 

Do you pray for your pastor? Tomorrow we’ll hear about a church member who has taken prayer for his pastor to a whole new level. I hope you’ll join us for that, right here on Revive Our Hearts. 

Revive Our Hearts with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth is inspiring you to bless others with your freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

All Scripture is taken from the English Standard Version unless otherwise noted.

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