Support Your Local Pastor

do want to take a moment and say my part of welcoming everybody to god's house on this wednesday night good to see mike morgan out there and back from his travels and all of you on the live stream thank you for tuning in we appreciate it and i was noticing at least two individuals our family are back from vacation so it must be tis the season but everybody's getting back in line so we're glad before we know it'll be the holiday season it is my honor to bring to you the word of the lord when i was seated in the front row i heard amber announcing the weekend speaker i thought we didn't think through this schedule too well you're getting overdosed by reavers but i think you'll be able to manage you'll get the better one this weekend but uh we've been laboring not laboring um yeah laboring under the theme of be the church throughout the course of this year and we have highlighted many aspects of what that means and even looked at ways that we can better be the church and chief among them has been the whole idea of connecting with people especially those that don't know this life-changing gospel and making disciples of them but we've also looked at some other i guess more insular or inside ways that

we can better serve one another and serve the community that kind of thing and tonight this message is under that heading i think to help us as a church family and i admit that it comes to you as a little bit of a lead-in to our special 40th anniversary pastoral services anniversary services that we're having this weekend i hope i don't know that i'll be able to do this completely but i hope to separate myself from my role here at apc and just present this as a fellow member of the church with you but in any case i'll say it this way if i were invited to any other apostolic congregation in the usa i'd be saying these same things same principles so therefore the church at large without question but that includes us here at apc ephesians 4 and 11 tells us that god has given gifts to the church and he lists several of them and on that list or in that list are what we know as a pastor and i think it's important that we not get away from the fact that having a pastor is a gift from god sometimes we don't think of that as the first thing or the it's the first thing that comes to our minds but it certainly is according to ephesians a gift that

we're given by god uh depending on your denomination you'll hear this word pastor used as an elder a bishop overseer uh shepherd i guess over across the pond it's a parson uh there in england uh i think my role would be a vicar if i got it straight over there but uh and of course in our fellowship we use the word pastor and what it is no matter which of those words you might use or even another it's a spiritual leader for a church and i would especially say a church family and the role of a pastor starts with being an example to the church the apostle peter is the one who wrote by inspiration that pastors should not be a lord over god's heritage that's king james but its meaning shouldn't be dictatorial or heavy-handed or iron-fisted if you will but should be an example and in that light i guess you could say that um if you want to know how you should behave or act in a given situation just do what your pastor would do and that's actually kind of freeing isn't it because if the pastor would cut someone off on the road in anger then you could do that right you could say wasn't me i'm just doing what my pastor said you don't do that do you okay

not all the time but just do what he does and you're in great shape and if he does something wrong you're off the hook right but uh being an example to the flock is the way the apostle peter put it and then i've pieced together different portions of scripture uh not citing references for you but a pastor will wash over our souls that's in hebrews with the authority that god has given and will even give an account for the congregation from the word of god he teaches exhorts preaches even reproves and rebukes based on principles of scripture equips equips the body of christ for the work of the ministry we're told that's in ephesians does counseling and guiding maybe not counseling in the classical sense but in terms of the scripture and what it has to say to our lives he's giving us counsel and wisdom and guidance in that way and the scripture directs us to honor our spiritual leaders and especially a pastor and this is my text it's so short i won't ask you to stand but first thessalonians chapter 5 and verses 12 13. if you want to look you're welcome to do that otherwise it will be on the screen but this is the apostle paul and of course he's writing to the church in thessalonica and says and we

urge you brethren and we know that that's indicating all people men and women we urge you to recognize those who labor among you and are over you in the lord and admonish you verse 13 and to esteem them very highly in love for their work's sake so that is a directive of scripture to us as believers with respect to our leaders and especially the pastor i don't have a solid title for this tonight and if those of you that like titles i apologize but i did think about calling it an assortment of pastoral gift ideas uh they would be non-monetary but things that we could do to bless our pastor and then i also thought of support your local pastor so you can choose the one you like or if you don't like any of them you're taking notes just leave it blank at the top or make up your own title i don't know you'll get the idea and what i did was take a look at this subject from a few various sources which i'll cite in a moment but i wanted to say by way of an introduction that in our a busy pace of life and even in the church life you might say um looks like adam chose that one huh support you didn't like the other one too long

right i know uh in the busy pace of church life we and even because of familiarity maybe over time forget that uh pastors and and uh we could make a few jokes about this but pastors are human right you are human pinch yourself absolutely and as humans we need the help and support of our fellow man or our fellow human beings on a personal level that gives a pastor encouragement and recognition some gauge of whether or not he's getting the job done but even in terms of the local church as a whole if you'll think about it if we don't help and support our leader then we're not going to accomplish the mission that god has given us are we because it takes a team for us to be able to do the will of god as it's directed in scripture and there's an old testament story i wanted to read it to you from exodus the 17th chapter this is when the israelites had been set free from egypt and they weren't yet into the promised land and one of their age-old enemies had come against them and verse 8 of exodus 17 and again these will be on the screen now amalek came and fought with israel in rephadim and moses said to joshua that was his assistant choose us some men and

go out and fight with amalek tomorrow i will stand on the top of the hill with the rod of god in my hand. so joshua did as moses said to him and fought with amalek and moses and aaron and her went to the top of the hill and so it was that when moses held up his hand that israel prevailed and when he let down his hand amalek prevailed but moses's hands became heavy so they took a stone and put it under him and he sat on it and aaron and her supported his hands one on one side and the other on the other side and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun verse 13 so joshua defeated amalek and his people with the edge of the sword and in this passage there is some very meaningful imagery and symbolism for us of the idea of supporting the leader that god has placed over us and of course we're not literally holding up the hands of a pastor but we are uh supporting and helping and i think it's important as we see here in this account that uh it was in israel's best interest to keep moses's hands in the air right as long as his hands were in the air they were winning it was when they started drooping

with weariness and understandably so that they were losing and so it really was in their best interest to keep those hands up in the air so they could win victories and figuratively speaking the same is true for us it's in our best interest to do our best to support and help the pastor that god has given us so that we can benefit and maybe that's a little bit selfish but i don't mind admitting it it blesses me when i'm supporting my pastor i get benefit from that because when he's in tune with the lord doing his work and has the freedom to do that then that's ultimately going to reach to me and my family and so there really is an important aspect of that for us to remember what i've done is i've gleaned from a variety of sources i'll just give them to you up front rather than cite each of them but a long-term denominational pastor by the name of h.b london uh terry shock from our own united pentecostal church international a man named don dietrich and then even an article that was written uh some time ago in what was then called the pentecostal herald i think we have a new name for it now but from those sources i put together a few things here and the following is

an admixture of them they could be considered pastoral gifts if you will things that we could do or ministries ways to support or hold up the hands of our pastor and let's look at these together one we as a congregation should let our pastor uh hear from god and discover what god is saying to our local church here at apc our community as well as how we are to go about fulfilling the great commission and you might think on the surface well what's that got to do with me i'm not in the standing in the way of him hearing from god uh god's going to talk to him god's going to talk to you what can i do well there are a couple of things i believe we can at least do one is prayer and you can just imagine that having the spiritual impact of prayer behind you what that will do for your ministry and that's not only true of a pastor that's true for a mom and dad if kids are praying for them or young people are praying for their youth pastor or it goes all across the board when you've got the impact of prayer behind you people lifting you up before god that's a channel and that's an environment where god can do great things and so praying for

our leader can certainly facilitate him hearing from god and then also just allowing the time and the space if you will to do that to get along with god as needed and not always placing so many demands that he can't focus concentrate and get to that place where god can speak to his heart so in that sense we need to let our pastor hear from god and communicate to us what god is saying to the church secondly let your pastor lead and by that i'm thinking encourage him to declare what god is saying what god is showing to him i think i'm with a host of witnesses that agree here i want to know what god has to say don't you i don't want to be in the dark if he's got a message for us as a church please tell us pastor and so encourage him to do that and then when messages are preached and directives are given certainly we want to heed them the effectiveness of a pastor is greatly diminished maybe even destroyed if we as a congregation have a testy critical dismissive spirit and i'll just i don't know anybody that does this so i feel at liberty to kind of you know make up the example but if a message comes across the pulpit and our attitude is ah

that's just pastor going off uh he just wound up about something he'll get over he'll calm down if that's our attitude we're missing the message we're not getting what god has for us and again i think i'm with people that want to know what god is saying so having a testy critical dismissive spirit will greatly diminish the effect of a leader the effectiveness of a leader maybe even destroy it and then also along with this we need to cooperate when vision is cast plans are laid out uh when events are scheduled we may not always fully understand what we're hearing or every little piece i thought maybe a good analogy is you know a soldier doesn't always understand the orders that come down from the officer but he he has the general idea that this is where we need to be going and what we should be doing and maybe i'll understand how every little piece fits but i've got enough confidence to know he's given me this order for a reason and and i want to cooperate with that and so maybe that's too uh stringent of an example but i think you get the idea cooperating with the vision the plans the events the things that are laid out for us will certainly uh allow our pastor to lead in the way that

god wants him to lead us and that's true again in the church of jesus christ across the board but also here at apc a third thing that we can give a gift if you will is to offer our encouragement and even our public support for our pastor uh you know serving as a pastor in this post-modern 21st century has its challenges um i imagine i didn't talk to him about this but our pastor has been serving us 40 years i have a feeling things are a little different today than when they were when he started out 40 years ago and probably when he started out they were a little different from his predecessors as well it's just uh you you know everything going on in our world and it has its challenges and so the need to affirm and reaffirm is certainly there for us as members and some practical ways you can do that when a message speaks to your heart let him know when something really helps you or benefits you uh pass that along i i found out secondhand that at least two or three people who are here sunday felt like the message they heard was especially for them and we know how god can do that right a congregation this size he can talk to people individually and i don't

know that pastor was told directly by those folks but indirectly he got the word that those individuals really felt that the message was just for them so just something simple like that encouragement uh that he's offered to you thanking him for that whether it's in person or an email a note ways he's helped you sharing good news positive reports all those are ways that we can offer encouragement and public support for our pastor and then uh fourthly we can give this and that is to communicate communicate with our leader openly and often i'll use these practical examples but you know if you're going to be in the hospital get a surgery scheduled or something or maybe your family's going through a difficult situation let your pastor know and maybe god's supposed to give him a word of wisdom but usually if he knows you're going to the hospital it's because you told him and if you don't tell him how can he help how can he do that i assure you our pastor cares and wants to help but if he isn't aware he can't always be there or do what might be helpful so being willing to communicate in those kinds of ways uh and i would even this is very practical but i would even say uh if you have something you want

him to know and remember write it down or send an email or a text or something but because you know let's just i'll use myself an example let's just say i'm telling the pastor that you know two weeks from tomorrow i'm going to have outpatient surgery and i'm telling you this right before church and he's greeting people and and trying to touch base with guests and all that the likelihood that he's going to remember nathan told me something but i can't remember that date how much better would it be if i write it down and say on this date i'll be here at this time and then he's got a reference to that and i know that's super practical but i hope you're getting the idea that uh communication is important it really is to help in that regard and uh i would throw this in too this might be a little bit off this subject as far as the subpoint but if you've got information that can wait don't offload that on the pastor or any service leader or minister for that matter just before service it can be draining and distracting now if it's an emergency in a dire situation we all understand that it's got to be told and shared and so on and so forth but if it can wait you

know offloading all kinds of information right before a service it just especially if it's something kind of you know depressing you're up there in church trying to get your mind on god thinking oh no what are we going to do about this situation so if it can wait down again if it can't we understand but if it can that might not be a bad thing to do and that's just river i'll say chapter 13 verse 13. how's that but communicate and then another thing that we can do is uh and again i've gleaned from these different sources but this is strict directly from the scripture live at peace within the local church i didn't read the last part of first thessalonians 5 13 when i gave you my text but paul ended that particular verse by saying be at peace among yourselves be at peace among yourselves and you can imagine that it's discouraging uh to any of us but particularly our leader if there's contention uh if if people are at each other for any reason and scripture instructs us in many places that were to put away discord put away bitterness were to put away anger one of my favorite verses in the bible is ephesians 4 32 and it says be kind one to another tender hearted forgiving one another even as

god for christ's sake forgave you and and that's a directive of scripture and so the more we can be in harmony and if there is disagreements and they they arise let's not put our head in the sand they arise but the times that they do if we can work them out and get past them and forgive and move on all of that's going to help the all of us in the church family but especially our leader and we do know that romans tells us that as much as lieth in us we should live peaceably with all people and so we certainly want to undertake that living in harmony and then uh six sixth thing that we can offer is the benefit of a doubt anybody like getting that yourself benefit of a doubt uh when there are questions or maybe things that you hear uh that you don't fully understand do bear in mind this that a pastor can't always explain every decision or action and you say well why not well i can give you an answer because of confidentiality if he stood up here and explained every little decision every little action uh he would be betraying confidences in some instances and i don't think you want that i don't want that if i talk to him in confidence i know he'll keep

it in confidence and so can't always explain and so that's not to say a leader is not accountable because he is and we have mechanisms especially in our organization for that but it just means that if there's a question give him the benefit of a doubt especially with a track record like we have here at apc and so do keep that in mind that we can give that gift we can support our local pastor in that way by giving the benefit of a doubt and then seventh if i'm counting right here be willing to do what you can do to serve your local church we talk a whole lot about getting involved and i guess for years and years we've talked about ministries and volunteering raising your hand and doing that no matter how many years we may have been around if there's a way that we can still be involved or continue being involved doing that is going to help our leader because again it takes a team to get the job done and i'll add this that taking initiative to do something when you see something needs to be done you know there are things we're smart enough to know we got enough common sense that you don't necessarily have to have permission to to do certain things even in a practical way

uh if you've got the skills and the time to help out in some way around the church do that i um i don't think brother zavala is here i don't mean to inter uh embarrass him if he's watching online but housto zavala some years ago he worked maintenance and uh had those types of skills and uh he pointed out that our exterior doors here at the church needed some fresh paint and just to tell you the kind of handyman i am i didn't even know that so i does i don't i don't look at stuff like that my wife she's very much she catches all that stuff but i don't and so he said they need a fresh coat of point paint and he had the skills he said i'd like to do that for the church so yeah he saw a need and filled it and went ahead and did that and that's just one example of how it has happened and how it can happen if there's ways that you can take initiative and volunteer to do things and it might not even be something practical if you see somebody who needs encouragement you don't have to have permission to to give encouragement to somebody or somebody needs a ride to church make a way for that to happen those are all kinds

of ways that we can take initiative to do something that might need to be done instead of saying you know go see the leaders type thing and sometimes you have to do that i know but there are also times that we don't have to uh eighth we can and i think this is extremely important support his family the pastor is our leader of course but support his family without undue pressure or unrealistic expectations we know that the pastor any pastor's family in any church anywhere usa is not perfect and guess what your family is not perfect either and so not putting pressure and unrealistic realistic expectations on children you know if they're toddlers let them be toddlers if they're teens let them be teens if they're young adults let them be young adults and i was reflecting on this a little bit allowing families just to be themselves not compare them with other ministers families you know you might know other minister family well you're not like that well who cares let them be themselves uh and and that kind of thing and i was thinking here at apc we have done a pretty good job letting the the girls of the willafords grow up here uh andy dawn oh i shouldn't say that andrea almost an ambida i can't say envy i can't amber

diane and elisa danae and they've done pretty well growing up to be well-adjusted adults well we're still a little worried about that youngest one elisa but um pray for her if you're watching i love you i'm going to pay for that she's coming into town this weekend so she'll hear about that but but we do we worry about elisa no i'm kidding she's it's one of those things i can pick on her but you can't okay but uh seriously they're all this church has done a great job i'm patting you on the back collectively here uh for what you've done with this church family and we do appreciate that so very much and i can even throw in my girls too in that as well and then uh ninth i've got roman numerals here so i'm getting to the high ones that's a one and an x uh respect private time and that could be with family and again as we said earlier for prayer and study that certainly allows our pastor to recharge and get refreshed and not always be pulled and tugged on as it were 10 remember special days and again this church has done very well with that christmas and birthdays anniversary that kind of thing so thank you for that and then the last thing i have and i'll add

a few points with that with the time i have remaining and that is this is probably i don't know if i can say greatest gift but certainly one of them the gift of loyalty the gift of faithfulness the gift of consistency uh we know that those things bring rewards to the individual when we're loyal and faithful and consistent and over the long haul there's success but that's also a way that we can bless our pastor our minister to our pastor when we're loyal faithful and consistent my american government high school teacher mr turlington in one of his lectures this was last century at roosevelt high school my senior year he pointed me to the importance and value of consistency i forget really what we were on in terms of american government but somehow he got on the subject of consistency and i even ended up writing a little essay and i think making a youth week speech on it it stayed with me all these years and another word for consistency might be plotting now that's not plotting p l o t t i n g it's plotting p l o d d ing and if i could say it this way plotting pays off when you just kind of plot along faithfully loyally consistently it does pay off that's not the most exciting thing

to hear and i certainly don't mean to downplay or disregard fervency enthusiasm passion because we need those things in our lives those characteristics we need spiritual highs we need major victories from time to time we need breakthroughs and uh thank god we get them but i would offer that even those spiritual highs and breakthroughs they seem to stem from having just been plodding along and faithfully doing what we're supposed to do i'll give an example or two uh one moses when he was on the back side of a desert he was for 40 years just kind of plodding along tending sheep he knew god had called him to deliver israel but here he was he had left egypt in fear for his life and really just didn't know what to do so he did what he could do and it was in the midst of just plodding along that suddenly has this supernatural experience seeing a bush on fire that wasn't consumed and that was god's call or commission to him to go back to egypt and i thought of elisha likewise he was just plodding along plowing the field doing what he was supposed to do and elijah comes and drapes the mantle on him which was an indication that he was being called to be the next prophet after elijah so even those

major breakthroughs or those epiphanies those uh things that that come to us spiritual highs they seem to kind of stem from you know you've been faithful doing what you're supposed to do day by day by day and then just suddenly in god's timing he opens a door he does something supernatural in your midst and certainly plodding along is a key uh to success in every dimension of life if you think about it with finances if you save steadily may not even be a lot but just steadily consistently save as the adage goes pay yourself first over time it builds up doesn't it in terms of a diet whether you're wanting to lose weight or just eat more nutritiously if you monitor your calories you know day in day out your carbs your i don't know about all that stuff proteins whatever uh over time you get there right same thing with exercise you're not going to be an olympian if you wake up in the morning and say i want to be an olympic athlete you got to work at it day by day consistently a little bit here a little bit there and just plod along and then over time that builds up and spiritually the same thing is true i would say that the triumphant christian life is really live one day at

a time you know you just don't go from one service high to the next service high but day by day by day by day by day by day by day and again i'm offering that in the midst of that day by day by day by day god can step in and he can do supernatural things and perform miracles and call you to ministries all kinds of great things can happen because you have been faithful so plotting does pay off and it just speaks of perseverance it speaks of patience and if you and i make it from here to heaven i think it'll likely be the reward for us just having plotted along doing the will of god faithfully doing the right things in the right way with the right spirit and just by doing that consistently god will reward us so plotting might not be a popular thing in our culture it's kind of slow kind of boring and time-consuming ours is that instant gratification culture you know but we want to eat fast food and speed read and ride in the fast lane and accelerate just about anything we can accelerate but just a steady pace for the long haul is what wins the race and if you'll pardon the reference to the aesop's fable you know that fable tortoise in the hair and

that's i know that's not scripture or anything but it makes a moral a good point uh the tortoise who shouldn't have won the race just by steadily moving along and the hair got distracted and started and stopped and did other things and thought he had the race won and ended up losing it just with the tortoise not stopping moving along and certainly a steady pace can do that for us in the spiritual realm and so in closing this uh we can easily see i think how plotting along pays off uh being faithful consistent uh for us as individuals but it can also pay off for a pastor and here's where i'm tying this in for the point about being loyal faithful and consistent when we are those things it is key to the stability of a church you know when we show up like we've showed up tonight uh when we're faithful when we're consistent and that kind of thing it contributes to the stability of the church as well as the growth and so thank god that we can offer that gift and it will pay off or make a difference not only for us as individuals but for the leader that god has given us and i invite you if you would in wrapping this up just to take a moment or two

and i'd like for us to thank god uh for the church the spiritual leadership that he's given us and then even and i know this is something you probably can't do in a moment or two of prayer but as opportunities come along just ask the lord to help you to put these principles to work i know i didn't give you a list of them but if you were keeping notes or it probably would be archived for you if you wanted to go back and revisit any of these but just asking god to help you as opportunities arise to put these principles into work because in doing this and i you know i'm ripping my hand i want to just present this as a member of the church we've got to work together and as we do that we're going to see success as god defines success so i invite you to stand and once you've done that uh if you don't mind lifting your hands and your voice and let's just ask god in conclusion here lord jesus we thank you so much for the church of the living god this is all your idea as you tell us in the gospel of matthew you have built the church you're the founder of it and you have set into place all of the things that

we have and enjoy our leadership as well as believers or one in you and supporting one another we thank you for that and just ask that you would remember us as a church family here at apc bless your body throughout the world i pray oh god help us to be found doing your will when you come again but especially here at apc let that be true that when you come back that you'll find us doing the things we're supposed to do supporting one another and serving as we're supposed to serve and declaring this glorious gospel use us lord in these ways i pray and give us your help and strength i ask for the glory of god in jesus name and everyone with faith said amen amen