To All Younger Pastors

In 1 Kings 12 the story of Rehoboam is one that interests me as I seek to understand the direction we find ourselves headed in the SBC.   The Bible tells us about Rehoboam coming to the throne after the death of King Solomon.  By this time Solomon, while a very wise king, had allowed his wisdom to be overshadowed by his fleshly desires.  King Solomon implemented pagan worship and Rehoboam promoted the continuance of this ungodly worship when he ascended to the throne.  The people came to Rehoboam and asked if he would relieve them of the tax burden that King Solomon imposed.  Rehoboam consulted with his advisers of which were two groups.  Rehoboam consulted with the group of advisers his father had and was told that it would be the most popular move for him to relieve the tax burden.  However, Rehoboam refused to listen to the elders and listened to the men that grew up with him.  The kingdom split and Jeroboam, one who was prophesied to take the ten tribes became king of the southern tribes and set his capital in the mountains of Ephraim.

This brings me to the point of my post.  I received a private email from a young pastor that expressed to me the reason my last post could be used to further divide an already suspicious group of young pastors.  In his email it was expressed to me that I painted with too broad a brush referencing the voices of the young pastors that I did.  I want to address some of these things and then express my commitment to listen to younger pastors.  I also want them to understand where I will refuse to back down but still love them and express my support for them to reach their Jerusalem.

Allow me to address the issues I covered in my last post.  I do not believe that all younger pastors partake in the social function of sipping the beverage alcohol in moderation.  I do understand that one can hold to a biblical view of moderation but hold to a personal view of abstinence.  Also, I do understand that many young pastors do not hold to the view of homosexual acceptance as advocated in the USA Today article I referenced and neither do the majority hold to the ecological views of the author of that article as expressed in the Southern Baptist Environmental and Climate Initiative.  The roles of women in ministry is another area that I understand the majority of the younger pastors clearly hold to the views as expressed in the Danvers Statement of the Council of Biblical Manhood and Womanhood.  I want to say that I also understand that many of the younger pastors in the Southern Baptist Convention have not made up their minds concerning the combining of the mission boards and they are seeking more information both in favor of these boards combing and in opposition.

Having said that, allow me to proceed to express my commitment to younger pastors.  I preached on the Church at Ephesus this past Sunday and one of the points I made was that Jesus commended that church in their hatred toward the deeds of the Nicolatians.  The point I was trying to make was that Jesus just revealed to the church a fatal flaw and that was they left their first love.  Now he commends them on their hatred.  What does it say to a church when they are known more for what they are against than for what they stand?  I certainly do not want to be seen as one that is against everything that comes down the line, but I certainly am not going to keep silent when I know there is something out there that our Lord is against either.  So, allow me to encourage all you younger pastors out there.

My pulpit is open and will always be open to encourage younger pastors to fulfill their calling. You can ask any of my pastor friends and they will tell you that I am known as one that will allow young pastors to fill the pulpit in my absence.  I have allowed young pastors to preach for me to my detriment when I returned.  It has not been just one time that I was greeted by one of our Deacons with; “I know you are trying to help this young man, but he preached something that I do not agree with.”  I can take that heat because I had to start someplace.  I remember the older pastors that allowed me to preach in their pulpits.  I remember my first sermon.  I preached it at the church that later ordained me.  In that sermon I used the pulpit furniture as an illustration of the subtle ways Satan can destroy your life before you realize it.  Not exactly an expository message, but one that I preached.  At the end of the message the communion table was out in the isle, the communion chairs were over by one end of the pews and…well you get the picture.  I never heard anything from that message but I know that my pastor probably heard from some scaly back deacons that week.   It did not bother my home church pastor because it was about three after my ordination that he called me and asked me to do a revival for him.

My counsel is available and will always be available to encourage younger pastors to fulfill their calling. I remember one older pastor that would allow me and two other young pastors to travel to his church in Goldsboro, NC and he would purchase lunch and we would sit and discuss theology.  It was in those discussions that I was able to hammer out my theology on the local church.  I remember sitting for hours and discussing various theological matters with older pastors in a local restaurant on Friday mornings. It is a result of those discussions that I was able to set some parameters in my ministry.  For example, Dr. Bill Tomlinson a retired pastor from a church in Rocky Mount, NC was one whose advice enforced the advice already given me about keeping one’s ministry above reproach.  He told me of an accusation of womanizing against a pastor he knew that was false.  However, the pastor’s ministry succumbed to the accusation because the pastor would go to lunch with women that were not his wife.  Not only would he have lunch with them, but he would drive them there also.  As a result of that word from an older pastor, I have a set standard that I do not take ladies, that are not my wife, to lunch without someone else going with me.  It was this type of counsel that helped me in my early ministry and I desire to pass on to other younger pastors.

My resources are available and will always be available to be used to encourage younger pastors to fulfill their calling. When I first started preaching I had a Matthew Henry Commentary in One Volume, a Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, and a Schofield Study Bible.  If Schofield and Henry didn’t say anything about, I would not preach it.   However, over the years I began to build my library.  I would look for books anywhere.  Early in my educational training in Wake Forest I would peruse Stephens Book Shop for books.  I found that one could find conservative scholars writings in that place for a very reasonable price.  I would look through there for hours.  After I got married my wife could not understand why I would purchase a book and never completely read it.  I explained to her that my books were tools much like mechanics have various tools.  When a mechanic needs a tool it may be only once or twice a year he would use that tool, but when he needed it he would be able to place his hand on it.  Thus, she allowed me to continue a budget for building my library.  Today I have approximately 1400 volumes in print with another 500 volumes in digital format.  Many of the tapes and videos I do not count but I have a large library.  I tell you all of this because over the years I was challenged by Dr. Paige Patterson to invest in a library.  I have done so and it has benefited me greatly.  I will share my library with young pastors (those I know will return my books) in order to help them in the ministry.  It is this encouragement I want to pass on because I remember what it was like to need a book and not be able to get my hands on it.  I remember how I longed for a set of AT Robertson’s Word Pictures of the New Testament.  I could not afford to purchase the set and watched for it to get to a price I could afford.  I remember the day I found it in Christian Book Distributors at a price I could afford.  I was like a kid at Christmas when UPS delivered that package.

Conclusion

Having expressed my desire not to alienate younger pastors, allow me to conclude by expressing where we must begin.

First, do not be like Rehoboam.  Look around you and identify from whom you are receiving  advice.  Are those leaders you are following listening to wise older leaders, or are they surrounding themselves and following the advice of others your age and with little or no experience in the pastoral ministry?  Many times young pastors are following other young pastors without realizing they are doing so.  How?  By heeding advice from older leaders who are getting advice from their children and their friends children who are young in age and without experience. Sometimes these very leaders have little to no pastoral experience.  (Interim pastorates while serving as professors is not true pastoral experience.) Many times these older leaders are listening to the younger pastors exclusively because there seems to be a desire to maintain some semblance of control over their own turf.

Second, understand that older pastors are not living and longing for the 1950′s to return. I was born in the 1950′s so I can tell you that I do not want them to return.  However, neither am I going to throw out the principles that brought about the greatest era of evangelism and church growth seen in the history of the SBC.  I truly do not know anyone that is arguing for all churches to go to a unified envelope system.  I also do not know anyone that is calling for the SBC to require all of her churches to have a RA and GA program.  Whenever some of our leaders say things like this they are only setting up straw man in order to make those of us who are calling for the principles of the 1950′s look as if we are trying to hinder growth in the SBC.  Also, if I hear; “If we ever go back to the 50′s our convention will be ready”, one more time I will be sick on my stomach.  No one is calling for a return to the 1950′s.  As an older pastor I will be the first to admit that there needs to be changes.  No one in the convention can look at ourselves realistically and not say there needs to be changes.  However, what we are trying to say is the system for change is already in place.  If the GCRTF wants to implement something of importance in the SBC in order to generate more funds going to the mission field there is one place for them to start–TRUSTEES.   It is the trustee system that needs to be reformed and held accountable.  If the GCRTF desire to make recommendations I believe they should begin with clearly identifying the weakness in our Trustee system and shoring up that weakness.  One other thing about the GCR.  Those calling for a GCR are trying to have a GCR in one year.  Changes will probably come and after Orlando we will hear all kinds of statements about the SBC is in the throes of a GCR.  One needs to remember that the Conservative Resurgence took nine years before we saw any visible fruit in the first conservative majority trustees seated at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary.  The messengers of 1979 did not go to Dallas under the banner of beginning a Conservative Resurgence.  They went to Dallas to vote for Adrian Rogers because they wanted a conservative president.  What am I saying? I am saying that we are not going to see evidence of a GCR in one year.  We will see changes and then we will hear others tell us these changes is evidence of a GCR.  But what happens when the changes do not produce the fruit the young pastors desire at the rate they desire it?  Do you pack up and leave only to leave us older pastors with the ruined entities and the dismantled ship that resembles more of a tug boat than the great aircraft carrier she is now?

Third, older pastors are able to warn against those Isaiah 56:10 tells us about. As you look around  and hear all of the sounds coming at you from all of the different directions remember this point.  Isaiah was warning Israel about the false prophets that were in their leadership. (I am not calling any of our leaders false prophets so do not take this point to that extent.)  Notice what Isaiah said about these false prophets in verse 11.  He said these leaders, could not understand and he then gives the reason they cannot understand.  They are looking for their own way for their own gain for their own territory.  As I said earlier I do not believe our current leaders are false prophets but there is a principle here that we must heed.  False prophet or not, we all have the tendency to look for gain in our own territory.  As a young pastor ask yourself this question concerning our current state of the SBC.  Who is subject to gain the most if the GCRTF recommends combining agencies?  From the voices that are calling for changes along with the voices that are calling for restrained patience; which voices are set to gain the most?  In other words, if the rumored changes become a reality who will gain from that combination?  Remember, the combining of mission boards was not something started in the blog world–see here and here.  The bloggers are only speaking about the suggestions that we see those intimately involved in the GCRTF speaking publicly.  Certainly the missions will gain, but do you not see that Seminaries will gain an increase in their funding?  Why?  If a combined missions board is something that comes to be reality then that one board will retain 85% of CP funds.  I am certain that % will mean something then.  Look at the various entities and tell me which ones you see that have no voice in this GCRTF?  The only entity heads you hear pushing a GCR are those that will probably gain the most.

I say all of this to help you understand where I am sitting and the cards I am holding.  Kenny Rogers wrote a country song some years back about a gambler.  His famous line was “You’ve got to know when to hold them and know when to fold them”.  It is the same for you as younger pastors as it is for me as an older pastor.  You have to know when to speak out and you have to know when to keep quiet.  (My wife tells me that I have not learned well the second part of this advice. ) If voices from other younger pastors that are being heard in the SBC are not what you believe, then by all means speak out.  If these same voices are saying what you believe, then keep silent and allow them to continue speaking.  But please do not blame me when I paint with a broad brush because there are no young pastors speaking out saying they do not agree with these young pastors voices.