The Difference Between Pastors and Missionaries

Acts 1:8 “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come on you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”

Missions. Just the word alone put images in our minds. For many people it means that someone leaves their home in the United States and goes to live in a grass hut in a Third World undeveloped country and eats monkey brains for breakfast every day. For other people it means a person must learn a foreign language so they can communicate with some exotic people group. 

But when I think about the word “missions,” I think more about the focus of one’s ministry, not the location of that ministry. To me missions means that we are focused on reaching non-believers with the gospel of Jesus Christ regardless of where they live, what language they speak, or what they eat for breakfast. We need far more missionaries than we currently have if we are to impact both our local community and the farthest corners of the earth for Christ.

I think being a missionary is different than being a pastor. Pastors primarily serve believers in the local church by equipping them to do ministry effectively. It is important work. We need more healthy effective pastors doing the work that pastors are supposed to do. Good pastors strengthen their local church and then that church is able to send out missionaries. They might send them across the street, to the next town, the next state, or to other countries. 

Missionaries focus on reaching lost people for Christ. That does not mean they do not disciple people or strengthen churches, that is just not their focus. Pastors focus on discipling believers. That does not mean they do not engage in missions, of course they do, that is just not their focus. For example, while a pastor is thinking of how he will lead another small group Bible study, a missionary is thinking about how he will reach another community with the gospel. One is not better than the other, it is just different. And both are needed. 

Sometimes missionaries become pastors. And sometimes pastors become missionaries. But most often, they discover a calling from God and remain in that primary calling for most of their ministry. We need both pastors and missionaries working in partnership to fulfill the Great Commission. We need lay people to support their pastors and to support the missionary programs that their church has set up. Both are needed and both need prayers, volunteers and funding. They should not be in competition, but in partnership together so that they whole world might hear the glorious gospel of Christ.

Lord, raise up pastors and missionaries to help lead the church to be all that You want it to be. Amen.

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Dr. Terry W. Dorsett serves at the Executive Director of the Baptist Convention of New England. He has been a pastor, church planter, denominational leader and author in New England for more than 20 years. He is a happy husband, a proud father and adoring grandfather. He is a cancer survivor and believes that God works powerfully through times of suffering. He writes extensively and you can find all of his books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Dr.-Terry-W.-Dorsett/e/B00405U4NY

The Call to Ministry

Ezekiel 33:7 “Son of man, I have made you a watchman for the people of Israel; so hear the word I speak and give them warning from me.” (NIV)

I remember when I first began to feel a calling to ministry. I was in the eighth grade and attending a Christian school. In the chapel service they suggested that God would not have us in that school unless He wanted us to be involved in some kind of ministry. They challenged all the young men to be willing to surrender to the ministry if God should call them. I remember thinking that I wasn’t sure that I wanted to be a pastor. I wasn’t sure that God was calling to ministry. But I didn’t want to be disobedient to God either. Over the next few days I thought about it a lot and one night before I went to bed I prayed about it. I told the Lord that if He ever wanted me to be in ministry I do it. But I was also happy to just be a lay person in the church if that was what God wanted me to do.

Fast forward serval years and I found myself a counselor at a Christian camp. I was 16 years old. One evening in my personal devotions was reading a passage from the book of Ezekiel about becoming a watchman to the house of Israel. As I read that verse I sensed something happen in my spirit. It was as if it God had written that verse specifically to me. Somehow, deep in my inner being and I knew God was telling me that I was to be a watchman warning others to turn from their sin and to the Lord. 

From that point forward I altered all of my plans and goals in life to focus on training for ministry. During the years since, I have served a children’s pastor in a mega-church, a youth pastor in a medium sized church, as the pastor of a small church and as a church planter. I have also invested much of my time in ministry as an administrator in the denomination I am part of. My ministry to an entire geographical region gives me the opportunity to spread the Gospel much farther than I could if I was only serving a single church. Who would have thought that an 8th grader from a small Christian school in the Midwest would be called by God to impact New England, one of the most influential regions of our nation? But when a person is called to a certain ministry, that person cannot imagine doing anything else, and that definitely describes my life.

If you are thinking about ministry, you do not have to figure it all out at once. Like my experience, you may find yourself in a variety of ministry experiences that will work together to prepare you for the special ministry to which God has called you. And once you find it, you will be the most fulfilled you have ever been as you serve as one of God’s watchman turning others to the Lord and away from their sin.

Lord, please call many people into Your service, in a variety of different types of ministry, so that our nation might be turned from their sinful ways and follow You again. Amen.

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Dr. Terry W. Dorsett serves at the Executive Director of the Baptist Convention of New England. He has been a pastor, church planter, denominational leader and author in New England for more than 20 years. He is a happy husband, a proud father and adoring grandfather. He is a cancer survivor and believes that God works powerfully through times of suffering. He writes extensively and you can find all of his books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Dr.-Terry-W.-Dorsett/e/B00405U4NY

Personality Types Impact Ministry

1 Corinthians 12:4 There are different kinds of spiritual gifts, but the same Spirit is the source of them all.

Imagine my surprise when I took a personality test and learned that only 4% of the population in the United States share my personality. My wife on the other hand, discovered she has the most common personality type in the nation. All these years I thought I was the "normal" one and she was the "weird" one. What a shock to learn I had it backwards. Of course, my wife was not at all surprised. She always knew I was the nut in the family! Though we often joke about our personality differences, the reality is that we are indeed two different people. The way God designed our personalities impacts how we view the world around us and how we relate to other people, situations and stimuli in our daily life experiences.

Our personalities impact us far more than we may realize. This is not only true in marriage, but it is also true in ministry. Some people are uniquely designed to be leaders of mega-churches. Others are uniquely designed to be Christian counselors. Some are uniquely designed to lead worship. There is no question in my mind that God has uniquely designed me to lead a denominational agency that is making a difference across New England. When we can discover how God has wired us, and then can function in that knowledge, it can make a real difference in our lives. When we try to be something that we are not, in only leads to frustration and confusion. And often it also leads to failure.

It is very tempting to look at others and try to imitate them. But that normally leads us to an emotional dead end. Even if we can fake it for a while, we know deep inside that it is just not who we are. At some point we burn out because we are not functioning in a way that God designed us. But when we can stop trying to be someone else, and rejoice in how God made us, and use that unique design to serve God faithfully, then we are energized and excited in whatever path that takes us. We must realize that no particular personality is "better" than another. Likewise, no specific ministry is more important than another. It takes all personality types, and all types of ministry, to make everything work out in a healthy and balanced way. So stop pretending to be someone else and rejoice in how God made you and serve in a way that is fulfilling and meaningful without comparing yourself to someone with a different personality. Be the best YOU that you can be knowing that the Spirit of God likes how He designed you.

Lord, help us to know ourselves and serve in ways that You designed us for. Amen.

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Dr. Terry W. Dorsett serves at the Executive Director of the Baptist Convention of New England. He has been a pastor, church planter, denominational leader and author in New England for more than 20 years. He is a happy husband, a proud father and adoring grandfather. He is a cancer survivor and believes that God works powerfully through times of suffering. He writes extensively and you can find all of his books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Dr.-Terry-W.-Dorsett/e/B00405U4NY

Nine Steps to End Your Ministry Prematurely

When I graduated from seminary I was looking forward to a long and happy life as a minister of the Gospel. God has been very gracious to me and has granted my desire and given me three decades of wonderful ministry. I’m looking forward to another two (maybe three???) decades of ministry. For me, ministry has been a wonderful and positive experience. Regretfully, this is not true for some ministers.

Though they may have started out with the same enthusiasm and sense of calling as their peers, far too many pastors are dropping out of the ministry. Others remain in the ministry, but their passion is gone and privately they confess they are just marking time until retirement.

There are many reasons for this. Some of it has to do with the brokenness of society that just wears pastors out emotionally. Some of it has to churches not treating pastors well, and we have all heard horror stories about that. But some of it has to do pastors themselves. Somewhere along the way these once excited and passionate pastors lost their zeal, lost their edge, got distracted from their calling, or were swayed by a host of other things, and as a result, either lost their ministry entirely or lost their effectiveness in ministry but remained in the role, because they needed a job, but were miserable. Some friends and I came up with this list of reasons why a pastor's ministry either ends earlier than it should or loses its effectiveness even though he stays in a ministry position. Let this list be a warning to those of us who are ministry.

1. The pastor refuses to depend on the power and leading of the Holy Spirit and instead depends mostly on his education or experience. We can do NOTHING apart from the Spirit of God. When we start trusting in our training or our experience instead of the Spirit, we quickly lose our edge.

2. The pastor refuses to change his methods, even when they clearly are not working. While the message of the Gospel is unchanging, the way we share that message changes with every generation. As hard as it is to "teach an old dog new tricks," those of us who are ministers of the Gospel MUST keep up with the changing ministry methods in order to keep our ministry effective.

3. The pastor refuses to listen to younger leaders, worse yet, he openly attacks them for not wanting to do things “his” way. This often follows closely on the heels of refusing to change methodology. When I was a younger leader, I was often frustrated that no one would listen to my ideas. Now that I am a middle aged leader, I am working hard to remember to listen to the younger voices around me. I need their ideas just as much as they need my maturity. Pastors who fail to listen to younger leaders will find their own effectiveness greatly diminished. In a growing number of situations, ministries are closing down because all the young people are gone. While we tend to blame younger leaders for leaving the church, in discussions with some of those leaders I learned one reason they left was because they did not feel the older church leaders wanted them there. The pastor must lead the way in engaging younger leaders in the overall life of the church, and that includes listening to their ideas and trying some of those ideas.

4. The pastor refuses to embrace emerging technologies and becomes less and less effective in how he communicates with others or how he accomplishes his day to day tasks. Just as methods change, so does technology. Email used to be a great way to communicate. But it is less effective today. Some researchers say only about one-third of emails get read. That means two thirds of the people we think we are communicating with through an email are not hearing the message. There was a day when a rotating slide projector was a valuable tool, but now digital projectors are popular. Radio programs used to be a great tool for community outreach, now podcasts seems to be more effective. Using various video applications such as Facebook live, have become a key way to communicate ideas. To be honest, I'm not very comfortable with all those video apps, but I'm trying to learn. Those of us who are on the mature side of the age bracket just have to take the time to learn how to embrace these technologies so we can keep the message of Christ going out loud and strong. Otherwise the message of the Gospel that we love so much will be getting to fewer and fewer people each year and that will cause our ministry to either end early or lose its effectiveness.

‪5. The pastor takes credit for everything and fails to give the glory to God or to give credit to other leaders on the team. It takes a Spirit-filled team to make anything of significance happen. Since it takes a team, that is Spirit focused and Spirit filled, why would the pastor take all the credit? That is both spiritually and practically unhealthy and can lead to the diminishing of a ministry quickly.

6. ‪ The pastor refuses to keep his soul clean and fit for service to the Lord through focused prayer, daily confession of sin, and healthy self-examination of motives and attitudes. Just because we are men of God does not mean we are perfect. All of us have some sin or issue that we struggle with. We must keep our soul clean before God. We must regularly seek the filling of His Holy Spirit. We might be able to fake it for a while, but eventually what is deep inside of us will work its way to the surface So let's make sure it is Jesus that is deep inside of us.

7. The pastor loses his love for people and begins to find service to them a burden instead of a joy. I think when we have not kept our soul clean and fit for God, it is easy to focus on the problems in our ministry. And since most problems start with people, a dirty soul leads to a lack of love for people. When that happens, our body language, our tone of voice, our facial expressions and our actions speak, both in our sermons and in our personal interactions with others. People know if we really love them or not. And if we don't really love them, our ministry will soon be over.

8. The pastor refuses to serve and love his community when it changes ethnically or economically. Pastors often accept a particular ministry position because they think they can relate to the people and make a real difference. But sometimes the situation changes. The people they related to so well when they first arrived are no longer the ones who are there. God has brought a different group of people to the community. If the pastor does not learn how to relate to that new people group, his ministry will slowly erode away and come to an end instead of remaining strong and vibrant.

9. The pastor fails to realize when the time comes to turn the reigns over to the next generation. We must remember that David had the vision of the temple, but Solomon was the one who actually built it. Moses was first given the mission to lead the people into the promise land, but Joshua was the one who completed the journey. ‪Knowing when it is time to move to a new ministry, or perhaps to retire, is important. Far too many pastors hang on to their position long past the time they should have brought it to a close. This actually ends their ministry sooner than it should. Why? Because people tend to sense when it is time for the pastor to leave, but when they realize he is not planning to leave, they begin to attend less and less, volunteer less and less and give less and less. Eventually this forces the pastor out, but often only after a long period of ineffectiveness. If the pastor had realized it was time to move on, he could have ended his ministry strong instead of watching it slowly erode away. This is not only true in regard to when it is time to move to a new ministry, but also when it is time to retire from full-time ministry. Most ministers I know do not want to really retire, they love serving too much. But there comes a time when full-time ministry is too much and shifting to a part-time ministry, or perhaps just doing pulpit supply, can extend a man's ministry many more years. But when a pastor refuses to retire, and instead clings to his full-time position, he will eventually burn out. And once that happens, it is harder for him to have a part-time ministry because no one wants to hire a burned out pastor who does not know when it is time to move on. In the words of the song writer, "Know when to hold 'em and know when to fold 'em."

There are no guarantees in ministry but thinking through these nine steps will help a pastor stay in ministry longer and keep that ministry more effective.

What ideas do you have to help a minister keep his ministry strong and healthy?

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Dr. Terry W. Dorsett has been a pastor, church planter, denominational leader and author in New England for more than 20 years. He is a happy husband, a proud father and adoring grandfather. He is a cancer survivor and believes that God works powerfully through times of suffering. He writes extensively and you can find all of his books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Dr.-Terry-W.-Dorsett/e/B00405U4NY