I recently read Ancient Wisdom for the Care of Souls. It’s a wonderful book and should be widely read by Pastors and Elders in all kinds of churches.
The book is trying to plumb the wisdom of the Church Fathers for pastoral ministry, exploring what an elder in a church is and what they do with their time. It’s focused particularly on the ‘Pastor,’ which for those of us that don’t see a distinction between elders and pastors in the New Testament means ‘the elders that the other elders have set apart financially for ministry,’ or ‘staff elder’ in our usual parlance.
I won’t review it per se, though I thought it was superb, instead I want to write about some of my takeaways from reading it. The central idea is that of challenging our theological vision for ministry. While it’s inevitable that we have one—we all have a functional theology of everything—I don’t know that I’ve heard many people articulate theirs in this way. Essentially, we’re talking about the question of what you’re paid by the church to do and therefore what you should prioritise in your diary.
This is, I hope, also a helpful thing for the ‘average’ church member to think through too. You’re paying a portion of your Pastors’ wages and so might feel like you have a stake in their time, what should they be doing with it?
The way I’d answer that question, largely in alignment with Ancient Wisdom is this:
Elders are shepherds, there to care to for the souls of the congregation. Those who are paid are to prioritise activity that cares for souls.
I suspect that we all have an image of ‘soul care’ and it may not be what I mean. I was struck by Ford and Wilhite’s prioritisation of the Pastors’ own soul. The first plank is that your vocation as a paid Pastor becomes to care primarily for your own soul, if you don’t do so how will you learn to care for anyone else’s?
The distinction here is to not just see caring for yourself as an important thing that often gets forgotten, but as a cornerstone of caring for everyone else’s soul too. If you are happy in God, enjoying him, with godly character and maturing faith then you are positioned to help other people get there too. All churches should want elders who are that, not who keep the wheels turning.
What does that look like? It looks like devoted time to pray. It looks like careful study of the scriptures that others won’t have the time for; that’s what you’re being paid to do, there isn’t a scriptural argument for paying elders apart from this (1 Timothy 5). It looks like an attentiveness to your own heart, but also a laser-focus on dealing with, and maturing through, your personal challenges rather than wallowing in them. It looks like taking responsibility for yourself and repenting of your sin, including apologising as publicly as required.
Then after you’ve taken care of yourself, ministry includes developing the skills needed to care for people’s souls well. There are three angles here, all exemplified in the Fathers: reading the Bible, theological acumen, and knowledge of people. Pastors should be growing in their skills reading the Bible, not assuming that they basically know how to do that. Pastors should be staying theologically sharp, assuming that true theology is always practically useful because—at the very least—you want to say true things about God. Pastors should be students of people and of the human heart, this starts with your own and then extends into every interaction you have with others; you’re always reflecting and learning.
Then finally there’s actually caring for souls, what does that look like? It looks primarily like the ministry of word, sacrament, and prayer. You feed the people with Jesus—word and bread—week by week in gathered worship. You teach the word in other occasions as they arise. You minister the word to people individually as you talk over their challenges with them; pastoral ‘counselling’ is not what that word has come to mean but word ministry. And you pray, with people and for people.
That is, in essence, the job. Which is why it’s best not to think of it as a job. Different pastors will have different strengths and should lean into those strengths as God-given gifts, as well as ensuring that they build teams which let them do that by shoring up weaknesses and developing strengths.
None of it is anything you can ever have finished, and a lot of it is difficult to put in a calendar or devise a metric for. It doesn’t fit within a 9-5 but it also happens while you’re in ‘the office.’
But what about all the other stuff?
Staff it.
No, more seriously, there are a wide array of practical tasks that need to be done. The regulatory demand on churches from government is ever-increasing, while each piece individually seems reasonable enough the whole itself is becoming crippling. There’s not lots that can be done about that, but we should talk about it more. None of those things are things that a Pastor is necessarily going to be gifted at. How do you find time for the ‘real work’ of actually being a Pastor?
It’s not easy. The glib answer is, you do the things you’re good at, you hire people or find volunteers to do the things you’re not, and you keep focused on your priorities. It’s not that easy of course, but that’s the direction of travel we should aim for. Because the real ‘task’ isn’t task driven, tasks will creep in and capture you. Draw lines with your team, say no to some things, carefully examine which things absolutely must be done and which aren’t that important. Remember that you’re there to care for souls, to study the word and preach and teach it, to pray, and to administer the sacraments.
Realistically, some of the other stuff needs doing. Your church might not be in a position to build an administration and operations team that can help pastors be pastors, or you might be gifted at those areas and want to be involved. That’s reality, but structure your week and arrange your priorities so you remember what you’re there for. Your role isn’t to keep a charity running but to know God and speak about him to his people. The charity probably does need to keep running to allow that to happen. Get them the right way around in your head and heart and then start to find your way through.
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