What Those in Chronic Pain Wished You Knew, Pt 2
If you missed the part 1 of this article that explains what isn’t helpful to those in chronic pain, be sure to go read it first! What We Actually Desire: A good friend of mine shared with me that she…
Tag Pastoral Ministry
A Personal Reflection on John MacArthur
I first met John MacArthur back in August 2018. I was beginning my second year working at The Master’s University. My mom was visiting to drop my sister off at her freshman year of college. We just had finished listening…
Expository Preaching—The New Golden Calf, Part 2
I wish to commend Rev.’s Todd Ruddel and Adam Brink on their engagement with my article, “Expository Preaching—The New Golden Calf.” They clearly took time to sift through my words and made a lengthy, albeit in places cumbersome, response. I…
A Fallen Pastor and His Restoration
A Tragic Reality in the Church – A Fallen Pastor: The Church of Jesus Christ is not perfect. While the invisible Church is perfect and flawless, awaiting its arrival in the New Heaven and the New Earth, the visible…
Hospitality: The Forgotten Qualification
When considering the qualifications for elders, “able to teach” is often recognized as the one qualification uniquely required for the office (1 Tim. 3:2, Tit. 1:9). Certainly, the unique role of elders centers on “the ministry of the word” (Acts…
He fell today; I may fall tomorrow
Steve Lawson has been removed from ministry at Trinity Bible Church of Dallas due to an inappropriate relationship with a woman who is not his wife. Other places he is affiliated with have acted swiftly to remove him from his…
Abraham’s Servant and Pastoral Ministry
For fifty years, Leonard Bernstein conducted the New York Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra. He is regarded as one of the most important musicians in American history. A reporter once asked him, “What is the most difficult instrument to play?” Bernstein reflexively…
Respectability and hospitality (and Friendship and Fidelity)
The qualifications for elders in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1 mention that for a man to be a minister he must be a one-woman man, be sober-minded, and be self-controlled. In my experience, these and other qualifications are commonly…
When A Pastor Falls
Strategically, Satan can do a great deal of harm to the church when he can play a role in the fall of a pastor. Pastors therefore should understand they are the special objects of attack (Zech. 13:7). But they should…
Lessons from My First Year of the Pastoral Ministry
It has been little over a year since I began to serve my first congregation in Grove City, PA. However, I feel as though it was only yesterday that I had led my first…