Pastoral Principles
A Life Testifying to God

Understand your life to be testifying to the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. You are a son, brother, husband, father, pastor and fellow pilgrim. The call the Lord has placed in your life is to be a minister of the Word and the Sacraments. Paul says his life was about testifying to the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. You must make that your life not just in title but in practice. Being a pastor is not just you life’s work, it must be the passion of your life. Paul speaks to his passion in Phil 3. Always keep a marker in your Bible there. When you feel drained, discouraged, put upon, rejected and generally useless as a pastor, read Phil 3. I know, I know, there are those who say oh Paul was probably not married, he did not have “my 3 daughters”, he did not live in this pressure cooker we call now. Pulezzeeee! Put a marker in 2 Cor 11 so you can be reminded of Paul’s sufferings. The trials and pressures of your life are nothing like those of Paul. Remember this rock; your girls do. It is from Lystra. It is the kind of rock used to stone Paul on his first visit to Lystra [He returned twice!] when he was taken to the outskirts of town and left for dead. So, unless I hear the folks in Butler stone you and drag you out of town to be left to die, I don’t want to hear that you life as a pastor is more difficult than Paul’s was. Remember, the priority in your life is testifying to the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ and if you do, you will also be an outstanding son, brother, husband, father, pastor and fellow pilgrim.