Shepherd Or Ceo — E.A. Johnston

The pastor's role is critically important to the spiritual welfare of the flock under his care. The Puritan Richard Baxter had a charge of 800 families in his church in England, and each year he made it a point to visit each house personally and examine the spiritual condition of each sheep committed to his care, listen to his words taken from his book, The Reformed Pastor.

The Pastor’s Duty to Know His Flock

Take heed to all the flock. To this end, it is necessary that we should know every person that belongeth to our charge, for how can we take heed to them if we do not know them? We must labor to be acquainted not only with the persons, but with the state of all our people with their inclinations and conversations.

What are the sins of which they are most in danger, and what duties they are most apt to neglect, and what temptations they are most liable to, for if we know not their temperament or disease, we are not likely to prove successful physicians.

I agree with Baxter's statement. I have had the pleasure of knowing many good pastors who care deeply about the spiritual condition of their members, but I've seen a disturbing trend develop in the church in America, and it concerns me greatly.

The CEO Mentality in American Churches

It's been going on now for a little more than a decade, but somehow in the church in America, many a pastor is trading in his shepherd robe for a three-piece business suit of the CEO. Many churches are run more like a secular business today than a house of prayer.

I've been a member in churches where the pastor never even met my family or knew us, the pastor didn't even know we left his church until he received our membership, that we had moved it to a new church.

He never visited our home and never got to know us on a personal basis, and unfortunately for many people, this is becoming the norm. Church growth mentality and the megachurch movement in America has made many church members feel all alone and ignored.

One of the biggest megachurches in the land had a famous pastor with a big television ministry, but this man didn't know his congregation. He didn't even meet with his staff members on a regular basis.

When Business Models Neglect Individual Souls

When a church is run like a big business, then individuals fall to the wayside and are overlooked. I vividly remember hearing Richon Roberts make the following comment to a group of pastors. He said, You are a poor shepherd indeed if you do not know the spiritual condition of each member of your congregation.

But you know friends, today the pastor for the most part has inherited a church campus with the demands of a big business and he's overwhelmed, worn out, and just plain tired. Jay Sidlow Baxter's wife, Iza, shared the following story with me.

She said that when she and Dr. Baxter first landed on the big campus of Bellevue Baptist Church in Memphis, Tennessee, whose congregation had over 30 ,000 members, Sidlow was observing the huge buildings, and he leaned over to his wife, Iza, and commented, Adrian must be watchful lest his kingdom get too heavy.

The Shepherd’s Intimate Care for the Flock

If you're a pastor, you know what Sidlow Baxter was talking about. An eastern shepherd would, at the end of each day, examine the physical condition of his sheep. He would run his hand over their wool to see if there were any briars stuck there.

He would examine the skin for cuts and then pour oil into them. He knew his flock intimately and cared for it. He would fetch them out of danger and fight off wild animals that would threaten them. Well, how can a man call himself a shepherd if he's not deeply familiar with the spiritual condition of his flock?

I've had lunch with various pastors and have listened to them talk about church growth, but some of these men were more concerned over growing their church than over the spiritual condition of their members.

They had traded in their divinity robes for a three-piece business suit of a CEO. They approached their church as a CEO would run a business. They even chose their deacons, not for their walk with God, but for their business prominence within their community.

But is this a true church? Should a church be run like a country club or a business? Should a church not be any different than any other secular institution? Listen to the wise words of Richard Baxter again as he comments on the role of a pastor.

Every Individual Member Matters to Christ

Doth not a careful shepherd look after every individual sheep, and a good schoolmaster after every individual scholar, and a good physician after every particular patient, and a good commander after every individual soldier?

Why then should not the shepherds, the teachers, the physicians, the guides of the churches of Christ take heed to every individual member of their charge? Christ himself, the great and good shepherd that hath to hold or look after, doth yet take care of every individual.

Then Richard Baxter addresses the pastor who objects with the following comment. The congregation that I have set over is so great that it is impossible for me to know them all, much more to take heed to all individually.

To this, Baxter replies, how durst you undertake that which you knew yourself unable to perform? It's a stinging observation, but it's easy to fall into the trap of the church growth movement. I remember years ago I helped a brother pastor plant a church in a large city.

The Danger of Pursuing Church Growth Above Faithful Ministry

We worked hard together. We met on Tuesday evenings in campus neighborhoods handing out church brochures. We knocked on a lot of doors. This pastor was doing everything right, but the time came when he wanted a bigger church.

He wasn't satisfied with the group that God had given him. He wanted a big megachurch under him. So he lost his focus, and he eventually lost his church. I've seen many a good man lose his focus and fall in with the mentality that you always have to be growing your campus or you're not successful in ministry.

But there's an old saying that states, one cannot see the forest for the trees. I believe churches can get this way. They can get so engrossed with growing their membership and expanding their campus that they end up overlooking the individuals that make up the church.

People get overlooked and discouraged and end up leaving, and people don't even miss them when they leave. They don't even get a call or a letter to follow up on them. That's how bad the state of the church in America has become.

Building Individuals Rather Than Institutions

It was a sad day when pastors traded in their divinity robes for a pinstripe suit of a CEO. Allow me to quote Richard Baxter one more time. It's not more reasonable that you should pinch your flesh and your family than undertake a work that you cannot perform and neglect the souls of so many of your flock.

What? Do you call yourselves ministers of the gospel? And yet are the souls of men so base in your eyes that you'd rather they should eternally perish? Listen friends, it seems like nowadays everybody's in a mad rush to build bigger campuses and expand their ministry by building on.

But we must look at things from the eyes of a crucified redeemer. Jesus was into building individuals, not institutions. The church is comprised of blood-bought sinners who have found grace and who live to bring others to Christ and to bring God glory.

But when our focus is on numbers and bodies rather than souls and eternity, we miss the mark. I remember when I was a Sunday school teacher with 80 people under my charge, I made it a point to contact every man in that class and invite them to my home each week to disciple them one-on-one.

One-on-One Discipleship and Spiritual Investment

Those who took me up on it met at my home on Tuesday evenings or early Friday mornings at 6 a .m. I made it a point to pour my life into them by discipling them one-on-one and helping them grow spiritually.

I found out about their struggles with sin, their hopes and desires, and we prayed together and we prayed corporately. I made it a point to meet with my members of my class each week, have lunch with them, help them to memorize scripture verses, and at the time I had a full-time job as a businessman, but I took the time to have a personal interest in the spiritual welfare of those souls that got entrusted to me each Sunday morning as their Sunday school teacher.

If a Sunday school teacher with a full-time secular job can do that, why can't a pastor do the same? Why would a man call himself a shepherd and spend time on a golf course working on his handicap over the spiritual condition of the souls placed under his charge?

Why would a man call himself a pastor and sit in front of a television set for hours on end watching ball games to the neglect of the spiritual welfare of his flock? There will come a day when every minister of the gospel will stand before the judgment seat of Christ and give an account for the stewardship given him.

Accountability Before the Chief Shepherd

What will be our excuses then when we stand before the chief shepherd who cares for each individual sheep? What will be our excuses for neglecting to get to know our congregation on a personal basis? Why do some pastors only get to know a family when it comes time to bury one of them?

I wonder how many ministries are focused on mortar and bricks rather than perishing souls. I wonder how many men have fallen in with the times and traded in their divinity robes for a three-piece suit of a CEO.

Baxter’s Practical Counsel for Visiting Families

Let me close with the following comments again from Richard Baxter on the need to know each of your flock intimately. Get information how each family is ordered that you may know how to proceed in your endeavors for their further good.

Go occasionally among them when they are most likely to be at leisure and ask the master of the family whether he prays with them and reads the scripture or what he doeth labor to convince such as neglect this of their sin and if you have opportunity pray with them before you go and give them an example of what you would have them do.

A Call to Faithful Shepherding for God’s Glory

We need more men in the pulpits today like Richard Baxter who take the time to get to know their people on a one-on-one basis and instruct them in the ways of the Lord. I have been to Baxter's church in Kidderminster.

I took a photo of his statue which stands in front of the old edifice. His figure stands solemnly as both an example and a warning to fellow ministers to do what is needed in our day for the spiritual welfare of those souls entrusted to our care.

Heaven help us to be better shepherds as we live for the glory of God.