My staying away from church was meant to be time away from the church so that the new pastor of the English congregation could establish his leadership and bond with the people in peace. For me this has become a blessing partly because this separation was not painful or stressful. Not painful because I was unseen in church but present in spirit through the online services. I also did not have to plan in which church to hide myself. It has become a sabbatical of sorts for me. I could not travel out of the country. I stayed home most of the time, which suited me fine, as I am a homebody. Interestingly, while the ground was “fallow” during the past year, something was stirring deep within my soul – at least three stirrings I can discern thus far.
Writing
One was the stirring to write. Straight after my official retirement, it was prophesied over me that I should write. God has given me the enablement, inspiration and desire to write. I have organized ideas for two booklets, and I have more or less collated material for one and now have to learn how convert my material into an e-book. I have begun work on my second book idea but I can see it will take some time as I am working at a leisurely pace without any deadline pressures. Pray for me please.
Evangelistic Preaching
Another stirring has to do with an amazing shift in interest and desire from teaching God’s Word to preaching/proclaiming the Good News. During forty years of pastoral ministry my main focus was explaining and teaching scriptures to God’s people, making truths understood in clear, simple words and without jargon. I always shunned from evangelistic preaching. It was not my gift. Or so I thought. Now I found myself preaching with an evangelistic zeal and intention I never had before. Even though I knew that I was preaching to the saved and converted, I would include evangelistic content and appeals. God is stirring my heart to pray for an anointing for preaching the Gospel and for the salvation of souls. I saw this develop in my past few sermons. They all had an evangelistic thrust and passion. I believe God is up to something exciting because that is how I feel about this shift. I feel motivated to retool myself and I am praying for an anointing to do this work. Pray for me.
Spiritual Direction
The third stirring is a desire to be formed and trained for spiritual direction. Since it was in silent retreats and through the ministry of spiritual direction that I was saved after experiencing two burnouts, I feel indebted and enthusiastic about making this ministry available to more people. I have tried on two occasions to attend such formation courses but both timings were not right. Then during the recent months an opportunity arose with an ecumenical group of experienced spiritual directors feeling led of the Lord to run a course in Singapore. I nearly did not sign up, but for an anonymous donor who generously offered to pay for half of the fees of the course. I saw this as the Lord’s intervention and invitation to me. Starting in the new year, I begin my twenty one months formation course in spiritual direction. Pray for me please.
There are many challenges in the pastoral ministry. Like all challenges they can be overcome or lived with by grace through faith.
Inadequate Salary
Low salary was a challenge I faced in my first decade of ministry. I began with $300 a month without CPF. Living by faith was not a cliché. I lived it and I have many stories of God’s provision. A conviction grew over the decades of pastoral ministry that the right attitude towards this reality is to look to God as my Paymaster, and the church as merely one of his many instruments through which God pays me.
In the beginning, the church of 120 was financially stretched, with many being students, and having to support about four missionaries and as many local ministry staff, while at the same time pay for rental of worship space and office, and later on, loan repayments for a church property. Despite this, I remembered feeling indignant that a sales assistant’s salary was higher than mine. Thankfully, the salary improved when a committee was formed to look into the welfare of church workers and as more members joined the workforce.
Unstable Church Facilities
Second was the challenge of facilities. Securing a space that could be used for worship and church activities was difficult. Hotels welcomed us but the rental rates were high. Proper HDB sites went through open tenders among churches and that made it impossible for small churches to make a successful bid. Industrial sites were a risk because the rules for religious use were unclear. We had to move from residential properties, to YMCA, and from hotels to hotels, until after twenty years of existence, by God’s grace and miraculous provision, the church purchased a freehold property that allowed religious use.
Expectations and Comparisons
A third challenge was the high expectations and comparisons of church leaders. I felt pressures, through overt as well as subtle remarks, about the rate of growth of our church compared with other newer faster-growing churches. That was the period of the rise of the megachurches in Singapore – Victory Family Church, F.C.B.C., Trinity Christian Centre, Church of our Saviour, Lighthouse Evangelism Church, City Harvest Church and New Creation Church. Such comparisons were always ill-advised, unwise and sinful and exerted unnecessary pressures and discouragement on pastoral staff. Thankfully, the church growth movement, like the story of the Emperor’s new clothes, has been exposed for its theological and existential emptiness and nakedness.
Consumerism
The fourth challenge is related to the third: consumerism. Internet informed members looked for what benefitted them and their family: for what excited, glittered, and impressed. The size of the building and the congregation, the worship and preaching experience, the excitement of the children’s program, the big-budget events, the fame, influence and accolades that the church or pastor exuded. Over the last forty years of ministry, I have seen how the traditional loyalty to denomination, gratitude to the local church that gave you birth and nurture, and the eye of God, no longer had the same weight among young people in their decision-making process about where to worship. It has become, “Will it excite, benefit and bless me? Will it be convenient? Does it have the right kind of people that I can gel with, or will potentially advance my career, or give me a higher chance of finding a suitable life partner?”
The Slow Work of God
A fifth challenge in pastoral ministry for me is that building spiritual maturity is a slow work of God. I get impatient. It’s discouraging when you put in a lot of digging, weeding, fertilizing and the growth in character and love of God is so slow. Worse, for some, regression takes place or there is no evidence of spiritual growth even after many years of active church participation. A physical project has a start point and a finish point and evidence is clear for all to see. Not so with this slow spiritual work of God. When a spurt of growth shows up suddenly it was like a rare miracle. Sometimes this lack of spiritual progress led to discouragement and frustration.
Unclear Leadership Roles
A sixth challenge was when the roles of Board and pastoral leadership were not clear or agreed by all. Who had the final say, and on which issues (programs, finances, policies, vision and strategy)? This of course had led to misunderstanding and friction. Vested interests and entrenched beliefs made it difficult to sort matters out. In addition, the government has its set of recommendations that did not agree with the biblical view of leadership as some pastors and denominations would see it.
My Lack of Inner Growth and Freedom
For me the biggest challenge was that the demands and expectations of pastoral leadership outstripped the rate of my inner growth. Even with Tung Ling Bible School, and seminary training, there were many faults, blind spots and disordered affections (idols) present in my life that were like viruses in my operating system, influencing my behaviour and decisions, and blocking me from leading, feeding and caring for the church effectively. It was in the last decade of pastoral ministry that I became more aware of the soul-care and freedom that I badly needed to in my life. It was in the spiritual desert and in silent retreats that God invited me to tread this path towards freedom. I am glad I said Yes to him. Praise the Lord.
What About You?
These were my main challenges. They were frustrating but they were interestingly the means of growth. They stretched me, tested me, exposed my weaknesses, and drove me to my knees, closer to God; they made me wiser, tougher and drew me closer to God. It was good I had no idea at the beginning of my call that it would be this challenging. The coward in me would have responded to God’s call this way, “No Master, this is not for me. I won’t be able to cope”. The good news that I have learned is that when God calls, his rhema word has packed within it the grace, poise and resources to overcome or endure all hardships and challenges we would face in the assignment he gave us. I have experienced this. We need to believe this.
What about you? What are some of your personal challenges you face in pastoral ministry? Why not take some time to reflect and list them down, label your feelings about them, and have a coffee chat of the Lord about the list. After your chat with God, notice and reflect what you were feeling and thinking? Were there any new perspectives, Scriptures, images and emotions that moved or gently arose in your consciousness during prayer. Journal them. If you found that helpful, repeat the process. God bless you and be with you.
Equipping the saints is not a cliché for me but a major reference point for pastoral ministry. It is therefore not surprising that teaching God’s Word through sermons and Christian education courses was something I found great joy in. I loved teaching the Bible and every year I devoured books on preaching, and experimented and incorporated new homiletical insights, ideas and styles into my preparation and delivery. I found satisfaction when I received feedback that the adaptations were effective, and concerned when they fell flat. I also enjoyed the development and execution of Christian education curriculum. I enjoyed running Life in the Spirit seminars to help members receive the baptism of the Spirit, and conducting membership and foundational courses for new believers.
Pastoral Care and Mentoring
Another facet of ministry that I enjoyed was meeting with leaders and members individually and giving them pastoral care, personal counsel or coaching. Patient listening to members’ concerns and struggles is a powerful way of equipping and helping them move towards wholeness. When I first began pastoral ministry in the 1980s, visiting families in their homes was the norm, but gradually I noticed that with the formation of home cell groups, the pastoral care that came through cell groups lessened the need for pastoral home visits unless there were special needs or circumstances involved. Still, it was the one on one sharing and sharpening of life that I found fulfilling.
Blogging as Ministry
Halfway in my forty years of pastoral ministry, I stumbled into blogging through my son Joshua’s suggestion. At that time around AD 2000 I began blogging on Xanga to reach out to the youth in church, and later moved my blog to my own website. Somehow this blogpastor.net website was blessed by the Lord to influence its readers. Readers from around the world read the blog. The blog was cited in the Asia Wall Street Journal, the Straits Times, and in books and articles. The discussion was very active and beyond my ability to monitor and I saw that blogging allowed for conversation/discussion and thus was a good platform for teaching and influencing thought and attitudes. I enjoyed this thoroughly as it also led me to see my writing as an extension of my teaching and pastoral ministry.
Soul Care
Later in the last decade of my pastoral ministry, I was more interested in spiritual formation and spiritual direction. I saw how waiting on God in silence in a retreat setting with a spiritual director to guide helped me recover from a burnout, and I became convinced this kind of ministry to be vital for the spiritual health and vitality of pastors, church leaders and members. I completed a Master’s program on Christian Education and Spiritual Formation with AGST Alliance, went for annual silent retreats, and searched for spiritual director formation training. The whole area of spiritual formation of the soul became a focus for me.
Coaching
During the last five years of my role as senior pastor, I also became more engaged with issues of pastoral succession and sought to equip a team of new ministry staff so that when I retired, the church would have a leadership team able to feed, care for and lead the church. My main concern was to equip them to do what would be a major means of equipping the saints – the Sunday sermon. As this was my main strength, I designed a simple program to give them opportunities to develop their preaching ministry. They have all been trained in Bible Schools but I wanted them to apply what they have learned in a systematic way and with peer group supervision and encouragement. I enjoyed this coaching role in the last five years of pastoral work.
If leading, feeding and caring are the main roles of a pastor, then I would rank the roles in order of personal fulfilment this way: 1) feeding, 2) caring and lastly 3) leading.
