20 LESSONS IN 20 YEARS: LESSON 4

I continue to learn lessons every day. God has been very good to me, allowing me to continue to learn as the years pile on. And, in many cases, it seems that my learning comes as a result of my flubs and failures. Nonetheless, learning takes place! Over 20 years of pastoral ministry, I certainly learned a lot; and I recount some of those lessons here. If for nothing else, these remind me of the privilege of being a pastor, and my faithful God who keeps teaching me about Him!

Lesson 4: I have learned to give people, and the hurtful things they say, to God
Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words have caused a lot more damage.
I think I was naïve going into ministry. Even though I am sure someone must have told me about some of the nasty things that are said to pastors, I don't remember hearing about it. It may have been that someone said something, but I thought what most think before they experience it: "oh, it probably wasn't that bad"; or, "you probably deserved it"; or, "what did you say first"?; or, "it will never happen to me!". I don't remember being prepared for it in any of my Bible college or seminary classes. I suppose it is one of those things that is hard to prepare you for; but it would have been nice to try!

My unrealistic expectation was that I would love the people and the people would love me. As long as I treated them kindly, they would treat me kindly. And I couldn't imagine any Christian being intentionally mean and nasty. Why would they? I don't know if this has every been answered satisfactorily. Any pastor I have ever spoken to, who has been honest, and has not spent his ministry days just pleasing people, has had some unimaginable things said to him, by his own congregation. And no matter how hard I tried to be nice and kind and have people like me, I also received comments that I would have never thought possible before I entered ministry. I mean, I imagined that there were damaging words spoken to leaders in all other fields of work; but not in ministry, not in the church, right?

I will not recount all the nastiness from my 20 years of ministry, but I can remember the 3 worst things I was ever called (that I can remember). They were all delivered in different ways: by anonymous note following a morning service; by phone call; and in a personal meeting. In all 3 cases, I was taken aback, and surprised. Even though these 3 people did not agree with me about something, I did not expect them to call names. Although I don't know who the anonymous writer was (I have my guesses), it was certainly someone from the church, who knew about our mailbox system, since it was put there during my message. These were involved members of my churches, and seen by others as very godly. But, as I can attest about myself, there are times when even godly people do ungodly things.

What did they call me? Hitler, Howard Stern, and the Devil. I'm pretty sure they meant these all in a negative way. I was called Hitler because of my leadership on a particular matter in missions. I was called Howard Stern because of a message illustration they disagreed with. And I was called the Devil, because the person believed I was using God's Word in a twisted, self-serving way. And although you might laugh about these, when they are aimed, seriously, at you, it is hard not to take them personal, and not to be hurt by them.

Here is what I learned through these and other similar circumstances, where people have called me names and said other nasty things: if I don't give those comments and the people who made the comments to God, then I will be full of discouragement, anger, bitterness, or some other negative emotion that will keep me from honoring God and growing through this. I am not saying I have perfected this, or am never hurt by other's words. But, what I have learned to do is summed up well in this verse of the Bible, which describes what Jesus did when He was unjustly criticized:

I Peter 2:23 - "When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly."