I met a new pastor last week. He asked me what advice I’d give him as a more experienced pastor. I told him to never chase fads and to trust the ordinary means of grace. In Mark Dever’s words, preach, pray, love, and stay.
When I first started out as a pastor, the fads were a little bit different. We were at the beginning of the church growth movement, which would lead to other iterations like the seeker-sensitive movement. There were all kinds of pressures to chase best practices and adopt leadership philosophies from the world. The fads I was often tempted to chase were different than they are today.
As I look around, the pressure today isn’t as much about adopting the world’s business and marketing practices. The temptations come from a different direction: politics. On both the left and the right, we’re tempted to wade into political debates. I’ve seen a lot of this in the past years on all kinds of issues, and it doesn’t look like it will get better anytime soon.
I hear lots of reasons why we should do this. The gospel is political, I hear. We need to address the issues of the day. It makes some sense, just as the advice to chase church growth techniques made sense back in the day.
But as I read the New Testament, I don’t see an overarching concern with either techniques to spread the gospel or about the politics of the day. I see overwhelming belief in the power of the gospel and its power to transform everyone who believes.
My advice is the same, but the fads have changed. I’m no longer worried about young pastors chasing church growth trends. I’m worried about a lot of us getting distracted by the news cycles of the day, being consumed with current events, and using our pulpits as another form of political commentary in a world that already has enough.
It’s not that the news cycles don’t matter, or that we can’t have opinions. It’s just that, in the church, we have more important work to do. These words from Martyn Lloyd-Jones are as important today as they were in his day: “I believe the function of the church is to [exercise political and social influence] indirectly. It is not the business of the preacher to deal with social and political issues in the pulpit.” Individual Christians can play a role in politics, but the church has other work to do.
So what advice would I give a younger pastor? The same advice that I gave my friend last week: Don’t chase fads. Ignore the pressure to be distracted. Be faithful to the calling that God has given you.
Remember you have a charge, given to you in the presence of God and Christ himself. Preach the word. Be instant in season and out of season. Don’t get distracted with foolish controversies. Ignore the noise of those who criticize you for staying faithful to your task. The nature of fads will always change; don’t chase any of them.
Preach the gospel. Love your people. Pray for God’s work. Stay a long time and be faithful to your task. The fads have changed but the calling hasn’t. Don’t chase any kind of fad and trust the ordinary means of grace.