First off this being October; Happy Pastor Appreciation month to all those pastors out there. Paul tells us in Philippians to "honor men like this", I want to honor you. Thank you for serving Christ, washing feet, leading sheep and building the kingdom. I know we don't do this for the words of man, but we are flesh and blood and it is nice to hear those words of appreciation. Whether you heard it a million times this month or not at all; you are seen and appreciated.
And because we serve; as unto Christ, there will be times that our words will cause offense. In John 6 Jesus was teaching some deeper, more difficult messages. And although there were crowds of people following him, these messages were stretching, too stretching for some. The passage tells us that people started turning away; leaving. We read about the rich young ruler; come on pastors, we all would have loved that guy in our church. But when Jesus laid down truth the guy was unwilling to accept it. In both instances would there have been something in us that would want to run after those people and say; "hey. What happened? Can we talk about this?" In hopes of having those people return?
We as pastors will stand before God one day to give an account; did we teach his word or did we tickle ears? Did we speak the truth or did we speak what was popular? I literally was talking about pleasing God or pleasing man just recently. I was looking at Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego and how they chose to follow God rather than man (King Nebuchadnezzar) and as a result they ended up in the furnace. I was trying to convey to our church that when we don't bow to the world, the world has a tendency to get angry with you. Daniel 3 actually says; "Then Nebuchadnezzar was furious". The world might get angry, furious, mean and ugly when we don't bow to their belief system. We need to be prepared for that. It is not always popular to preach, speak or live out truth; especially when it goes against the message the world is preaching. But who are we attempting to please; God or man?
In that sermon I started giving examples of messages what the world says that contradicts what God says. What the world says about abortion and what God says, along with a couple of other examples. Right in the middle of me making that point a husband and wife stood up and walked out. I didn't recognize the couple (assuming they were visitors).
Holy Spirit later was dealing with me; first off reminding me of the sermon I was preaching. I love people, I want to see them come to Christ and grow into everything Father has in store for them. But people will not become that with a watered down message. There is that desire to hear people say; "great message. That spoke to my heart. Well done!" But even greater I have to teach the truth in a way that I hear God say; "Well done!" Do I fear God, do I fear man? King Saul fell because he had a greater concern of what man thought of him than what God thought of him;
"I have indeed transgressed the command of the Lord and your word, because I feared the people and listened to their voice." 1 Samuel 15:24
Steve Jobs is noted for saying; “If you want to make everyone happy, don’t be a leader, sell ice cream”.
Our job is not to draw a crowd. Our job is to speak the truth in love.
Happy Pastor Appreciation Month.