Chapter 5

True Leaders Serve In Three Major Ways

By Dr. Lester Hutson

Galatians 5:13

"For, brethren, ye have been called unto liberty; only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another."

We're talking here about the fact that service is a marked characteristic of all true church leaders. It's not the only thing that goes into making a leader, but it's a big, big factor, and without it, one is not going to ever be much of a church leader. I'm talking about a real heart to get involved and help people, doing the things necessary to meet their needs.

Now let's talk about how pastors and other good church leaders actually go about serving their people.

Feed the flock

I think there are three major ways in which good pastors and those who lead with them serve the people of a church. One way, especially the pastor, is to feed the flock well. This involves the pulpit ministry, and the importance of every sermon being of a good, top quality. Face it folks, too many sermons are too shallow and watered down. Pastors and teachers are too frequently unwilling to spend the time and effort doing the research and hard study necessary to produce sermons of a consistently high quality. An old guy in east Texas had an old poor horse. The old guy was as stingy as they come. His horse was starving to death. My dad told me about going with him to the barn to feed the horse. The old guy threw three small ears of corn in the trough and said to the horse, "now eat until you pop." That's the rationale of lots of preachers and teachers. They spend thirty minutes or an hour on a few skimpy notes, read a few sermons preached by some other pastor, or dig out an old outline and brush it up for a re-run, then wonder why their people are undernourished.

The fact is, it is the job of the pastors and teachers to serve the people of the church good, meaty, well-balanced meals. Listen to the Bible say so in Acts 20:28: "Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God which he hath purchased with his own blood."

Brethren, a pastor or teacher who is not preparing and serving top-notched, well-rounded sermons consistently is not serving his people like he should. Your people will tell it quickly when you start to cheat on them. They'll know when you haven't prepared. They can tell when your sermons are shallow. They'll sense when your heart is not in it and when the zeal is gone. They'll soon get tired of the same old clichés and worn out expressions. They can tell when sermons are fresh and full of substance and when they're not.

Real leaders serve, especially in the pulpit and classrooms. This is their chief way of meeting the spiritual needs of the people. As servants of the Lord, this is their first line of duty. "Feed the flock." Not just with sermons, but with good, meaty sermons that address the true needs of the people.

Provide places to serve

A second way leaders serve the church is by providing places of service for the people. A church is a great reserve of talents and abilities of all sorts. As Jesus' story of the talents in Matthew 25:14-30 proves, it is a terrible thing to hide and not use talents. Yet, most churches are a wealth of unused talents. That's partly because some to the people won't use their talents, but it's usually due to the failure of the leadership to provide places where the talents, abilities, and resources of the people can be put to work.

Pastors and other leaders provide very few places of clear cut service, yet they're notorious for "belly-aching" because "nobody will do anything." In a typical church, a member is touched by the admonition in the sermon from God's word to serve, to put his talents to work in a practical sense. At the invitation, he comes forward saying to the pastor, "I'm willing to serve God." The pastor says "Praise God, that's wonderful!" That's usually the end of it publicly. If it were pushed, it would go something like this:

"Pastor, where can I serve?"

"Anywhere."

"Pastor, be specific. Choose a place for me."

"Man, there are all kinds of things around here that need doing."

"But I'm having trouble seeing just how I can serve."

"Man, are you blind?"

The member goes off discouraged and disillusioned while the pastor goes off griping because nobody will do anything. In the future, that member is more and more cynical about appeals to serve God, thinking, "Yea, I tried that, and preacher made me feel like a heel and never helped me to serve anywhere." He doesn't budge, settles back into the status quo or eventually drifts away. Most churches are full of this type of people. No place to serve! Whose fault is it? I'll tell you, it's the leadership. You see, too many church leaders, especially pastors, have this tunnel-vision about their role and truth in the church. They see their role as basically to preach the truth to the church and little more. They perceive an abstract comprehension of the truth to be the ultimate thing, and almost the only thing. As long as the church is doctrinally sound, they perceive it as strong and spiritual. As long as the great doctrinal truths of the Bible are enunciated articulately and faithfully, the preacher feels he's doing a great job. The fact is, a church can be doctrinally sound, yet dead as a doornail. A preacher can be splitting every hair perfectly, and yet be as dry and lifeless as a tape recorder. A church is not just a place where cold, academic truth is to be maintained. Truth and doctrinal soundness must be maintained, and truth is of supreme importance, but, beloved brethren, truth applied to the daily lives of the people of the church is just as important as doctrinal soundness. James 2:12 says, "So speak ye, and so do." Not just those who hear the truth, but those who practically adhere to it in their daily lives, are blessed. "But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the word, this man shall be blessed in his deed," James says in 1:25. Churches are not to just preach academically sound doctrinal truth; they're to provide means of getting that truth to work practically in the daily lives of the people of the church. The church is not just a preaching station; it's also to be a training station. And, that requires leaders to provide ministries and places where the people can serve. That requires lots of time, effort and hard work. I'm talking about service. You have to work long and hard to set up and maintain a good choir and music program. It takes service to provide youth training, bus ministries, sound finances, effective missions work, a good nursery system, an effective Sunday school, care groups and other places where people can work. It's hard work to build character into people, and to teach them how to love, and how to forgive and how to care. A pastor or other leader can't just get it started and walk off and leave it in the hands of others. He has to stay with it. Serving doesn't end. Providing a church where the people can get the truth into their real lives and where they can use their talents to the glory of God is not easy, but true leaders serve their churches by providing places where the people can go to work, and they provide the means for their people to become as strong in character and true Christian graces as they are in doctrine.

Comfort

A third way true leaders serve the church is by comforting the people. Some of the best pastors are not great preachers, revivalists, or conference speakers. They don't have a lot of charisma or talent. Yet, they stay and build great churches. On the other hand, some of the "great" preachers never do. One of the main reasons why that is true is that some pastors comfort their people, and some don't.

The fact is, people in a church won't remember your sermons, they remember your comforting ministry. They won't even remember how well you slicked and greased the machinery of the church, but they do remember how you cared for them personally and helped them in their hour of need. I Cor. 14:16-18 calls Him Our Comforter. Acts 9:31 says He comforts whole churches. Yet, He often comforts us through another human as His instrument. A pastor should be the number one human instrument of God to comfort those within a church. Listen to II Corinthians 1:3-6,

"Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort; Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God. For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also aboundeth by Christ. And whether we be afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation, which is effectual in the enduring of the same sufferings which we also suffer; or whether we be comforted, it is for your consolation and salvation."

What an opportunity to serve people! When they're down and hurting, we can step forward and be such a servant to them. Many times comforting opens doors which would never open otherwise. There are at least three specific ways we can comfort people. First, by the way we live. Listen to I Thessalonians 2:10-11,

"Ye are witnesses, and God also, how holily and justly and unblamedly we behaved ourselves among you that believe: As ye know how we exhorted and comforted and charged every one of you, as a father doth his children."

When leaders live right, and God's people can respect and admire them, it's a great comfort. Live "holily." That means be kind and gracious with a Godly spirit and approach to life. Live "justly." Pay your bills. Don't treat people wrong. Don't be a hypocrite. Live "unblamedly." Be moral. Don't cheat. Don't gossip, lie or gamble. What a comfort to know your pastor lives right! Second, we can comfort by strengthening the faith of the saints. Nothing comforts more than the scriptures: at a grave side or in an emergency room, when bad news comes or disaster strikes. To be there and share scriptures and Biblical insight is a comfort and service people will not soon forget. I Thessalonians 4:13-18 is undeniable proof of what I am saying.

Third, we can also comfort by fellowship. Dear brother or sister, don't be embarrassed about feeling other's sorrows. Jesus went to the grave of Lazarus and "wept." People are comforted when they know your heart is touched with their need. It's a great service to know someone feels for you. Taking people into your confidence and under your wing is a great comfort as well as a service. Look at the case of Paul and Barnabas in Acts 9:26-27.

"And when Saul was come to Jerusalem, he assayed to join himself to the disciples; but they were all afraid of him, and believed not that he was a disciple. But Barnabas took him, and brought him to the apostles, and declared unto them how he had seen the Lord in the way, and that he had spoken to him, and how he had preached boldly at Damascus in the name of Jesus."

My, how we need more Barnabases! There are lots and lots of ways to serve the people, but all service by every church leader should be out of true heartfelt love. Galatians 5:13 demands it, "by love, serve one another." Paul said, "The love of Christ constraineth us," in II Corinthians 5:17. And he said in I Corinthians 13:1-3,

"Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing."

No church leader should serve because he has to serve. God forbid that our service ever be just "professional" or a job we have to do. Let it be from the heart. Yes, let our heart be a servant's heart. Some church leaders have really lost it. They've grown so cold and mechanical. They do so little, just what they have to to get by. They're looking at what they can get, not what they can give. Their focus is that the people ought to respect them and take care of them, not on their respecting God's people and giving their lives in service to those dear people. They have little, and often dying, churches, and very little allegiance and respect from the people.

Face it, they've lost their ministries, but they could get them back. They could do it by becoming servants instead of masters. The prodigal son of Luke 15:11-24 is a great parable of how a failing pastor can experience a measure of restoration. It's the story of one who changed from a master to a servant, and in so doing, moved from the hog pen of failure back into the blessings of the father. True church leaders are servants, and they find lots of ways to do it, always in love. This is one of the big reasons why they and their churches succeed where so many others fail. know the Holy Spirit is the true Comforter. John

"It Does Make a Difference What You Believe"