Pastoral ministry – Page 35

Category: Pastoral ministry

Sermon with story, personality and a journey

28 December 2014 blogpastor 1 Comment

I was enjoying an article in SundayLife about two Singaporean poets. One of them is Aaron Lee, a Facebook friend and a Christian elder in a Brethren Church. It was an interesting interview but a line he quoted from his mentor caught my attention. He talked about some verses he had captured on his cellphone, lines inspired by daily life and social commentary that never got birthed as poems. He recalled how his mentor had given him some advice long ago. Aaron said: “She told me: ‘It’s got to have a story, a personality, so people can go on this journey with you.‘” The sentence held me captive and I was reminded of the several books that talked about the importance of the sermon being structured like a story, a narrative, a homiletical plot. It was such a good reminder as I tend towards the tired three pointer didactic sermon. Perhaps I should look for texts and themes that can be put on a story board and bring the congregation from tension to truth, from problem to promise, from conflict to resolution, from suspense to conclusion. I have to think and order things more like a short film director than like a teacher or textbook author.

Lord help me. It’s so easy for me to fall back into that didactic three points sermon structure. It’s a rut I so easily fall into. Set me in front of a story board, and if there is no plot let there be no sermon. Amen.

JOSEPH PRINCE THE RICH PASTOR: MUCH TALKING ABOUT NOTHING?

27 October 2014 blogpastor 8 Comments

Joseph Prince founder of non-profit JP ministries

This may be hard for people to receive.

Why can’t a pastor earn millions of dollars?

If a Christian layperson is allowed to earn millions of dollars, why can’t his pastor? Is there one standard for Christians and another for pastors? Don’t we all follow the same Lord? We haven’t even got rid of the clergy-laity divide, and the sacred-secular divide shows itself.

Anyway the online articles have not furnished evidence that he really earned $500,000 annually and has net worth of $5 million. In fact the article was not backed by adequate or updated data. Quoting an online post that is sensational and is trying to get more hits, is not a good way to look for facts but this is what today’s online journalism gives us.

In fact the New Creation Church leadership council has reiterated what most Singaporean Christians already know. Joseph Prince has stopped receiving a salary from the church since 2009.

What is to stop a rich attendee from donating $100,000 dollars to Joseph Prince on any given day?

Why can’t Prince benefit from the royalties of his preaching and writing?

Who is to say he has not generously and secretly been giving large sums of money to the poor?

There are pastors who are bi-vocational and very rich.

There are pastors who inherited vast sums.

Or pastors whose wives bring home the millions?

What if a pastor bought a few Apple stocks decades ago and is now a very rich man?

Why do these pastors seem more acceptable than the pastor who earned them by preaching or writing?

By the way, Billy Graham is not a pastor. And neither is Benny Hinn. They are evangelists.

Maybe now more parents will encourage their children to be a megachurch pastor – adding this profession to the list of common ones.

What is your opinion?

Concentrated on the ministry of the Word

12 October 2014 blogpastor Leave a comment

The church today needs the word and men set apart for prayer and preaching the word. Too often the pastor is distracted by other urgent tasks that draws attending to prayer and word. This temptation and pressure is of course not new to modern times. It happened then too.

The infant church of the first century grew through the apostles’ preaching of the good news of Jesus Christ. However, after some time an internal problem arose that could have derailed the momentum of the infant church. The Greek-speaking widows were not being well cared for by the church. Pastoral help and administrative distribution of welfare fell short. It was a glaring gap in the Spirit-filled church.

There was pressure on the apostles to set aside their prayer and preaching times and made time for distributing food. However by the grace of God, spiritual wisdom and order prevailed. The apostles declared, “It is not right that we should give up preaching the word of God to serve tables….. (pick out reliable men we can entrust with this task –italics mine)…….But we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word.” (Act 6:2-4 ESV). So other spiritual men, all Greek speaking, were appointed to the task of serving the pastoral and administrative need. It proved to be a wise move for the next verse described the outcome: “The word of God continued to increase, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests became obedient to the faith” (verse 7).

Why is the ministry of the word so vital? Well for one thing, it builds faith, hope and love. For another, “All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16,17). Pray that the ministry of the Word will prosper and be given prominence in WRPF, and anointed people will be set apart to focus on this work of grace.