November 12, 2025 Show with John Yenchko on “What I Wish I Knew When I Started Ministry”

Live from historic downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, home of founding father James Wilson, 19th century hymn writer George Duffield, 19th century gospel minister George Norcross, and sports legend Jim Thorpe.

It's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors, Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today. Proverbs, chapter 27, verse 17, tells us iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed with whom we converse and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better. It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

And now, here's your host, Chris Arnzen.

Good afternoon, Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com. This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Wednesday on this 12th day of November 2025.

Those of you who are longtime listeners to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, dating back to the old days, starting in 2005, when I was broadcasting out of WNYG and WGBB radio in Babylon, Long Island, are sure to remember a guest that I would have on fairly often, who has become a very dear friend, and it's been a long time since he's been on the program.

In fact, I don't think he's been on since we relocated and relaunched the show in 2015 here in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. But I am speaking of John Yenchko, who retired after 45 years of pastoral ministry in Pennsylvania and Long Island, New York, in the Presbyterian Church in America, which is also known as the PCA denomination.

Christ, the Cross, and Personal Mission in Ministry

And today we are going to be addressing what I wish I knew when I started ministry. It's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, John Yenchko.

Chris, I'm so delighted to be with you again, and I treasure our friendship, and I thank God for the ministry of Iron Sharpens Iron, and I've been glad to follow it over these many years. Your listeners need to know that Long Island misses you, and, you know, we're always glad when you make your way back.

One of the reasons is Long Island has so many diners, and somebody has to keep them in business. Chris Armisen is known as a great foodie, and so the chefs just can't wait for him to set foot in those diners.

What happens in those diners is magical because Chris, he builds up the saints, he ministers to people, and by his love and friendship, really does edify the brethren. And so we're always glad when you come back to Long Island, Chris.

Well, I appreciate that, and I believe the last time I saw you face-to-face was when I was instrumental in having you invited to be the keynote speaker at a fundraising banquet for Grace Christian Academy, the school of Grace Reformed Baptist Church of Long Island in Merrick, New York, which was the church where I was a member for many years going back to the 80s, formerly Calvary Baptist Church of Amityville, which became Grace Reformed Baptist Church of Long Island after a merger with First Baptist in Merrick in 1995.

But I was there, I was part of that family of believers since my salvation. But I believe that's the last time I saw you is when I had you speak at that luncheon.

That's right. And, you know, again, not to be obsequious, but one of your gifts, Chris, is the ability to connect people and to connect ministries together. And now you're doing it, of course, how did you say in your introduction, to every living person on the planet?

But I really appreciate that about you. And that was a privilege for me to speak at that banquet.

And just out of curiosity, you probably have let me know this information years ago on the old Iron Trip and Zion Radio, but how did you come to enter into the Presbyterian Church in America? If I'm not mistaken, you before that were in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, correct?

That is correct, although before that, I was converted in an evangelical United Presbyterian Church where the pastor was of the old school and really loved the Lord. And he led me to Christ using Isaiah chapter six.

As we talked, here I was, not very bright, 17-year-old or 18-year-old, I forget exactly what, but as we talked, he said to me, John, you appreciate the power of God and the wisdom of God, but you don't understand the holiness of God.

And so he said to me, have you ever read Isaiah six? And I said, I never heard of it. So he opens his Bible and he starts reading. You know the story, your listeners know it. In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord high and lifted up.

And as Isaiah looks, the veil is pulled back and he sees the seraphim flying around the throne and day and night, they never stop crying, holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. And I'm sitting there as he's reading this.

And you know, there was no thunderbolts or anything, but the Holy Spirit just began to show me the purity and the power and the holiness, the transcendence and the perfection of the living God. And then he reads how the cry of Isaiah, woe is me, I am undone for I am a man of unclean lips and I dwell among a people of unclean lips.

And as he said that, the Lord graciously showed me all of my selfishness and my arrogance and my greed and lust. And again, that massive self-preoccupation that is the center of the fallen human nature.

And I was so convicted. And so he keeps on reading. And, you know, the Lord, Isaiah is undone, I'm just sitting there slowly being undone, and then the Lord sends the angel to get a coal from the altar.

And he reads, and with it, he came and touched my lips and says, behold, your sin is atoned for. And I stopped, my heart was racing, and then it stopped. And my friend, this pastor, wonderful man named Hubert Brom, he said, do you know what that coal is?

And I said, what? He said, in the Old Testament, the whole Old Testament points forward to the work of Christ and there are types and shadows, there are prefigurings of the work of Christ. And that coal is the cross of Jesus Christ, where the justice of God and the mercy of God came together and sin is atoned for.

For you, John, and you are called today to cast yourself upon him and to receive him. If that is the desire of your heart, it shows that God's word is effectual in its call of you. And he said, would you like to acknowledge Jesus as your Lord and Savior and claim the cross as your vehicle of salvation before God?

And, you know, like I said, there were no trumpets or lightning bolts, but I just know that that was when I passed from death to life and, you know, I was converted, came into that church and even came under the care of the Presbytery until I received the Left Foot of Fellowship, when, you know, I was then, long story short, I was by then a student several years later at Westminster Theological Seminary, and the Pittsburgh Presbytery of the PCUSA was very liberal, and they asked me to leave there.

I said, I think not. And so now, actually, I'm ahead of myself, a student at the University of Virginia, having been accepted to Westminster Theological Seminary, and they asked me not to go there, to go to one of some other seminary.

And so I became a member of the PCA in Charlottesville, Virginia, and then while I was at Westminster, I joined New Life Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, and it was there that I came under care of their presbytery and was ordained at New Life Presbyterian Church in the OPC.

Oh, what a great, great days those were, such a wonderful, wonderful Christian denomination, realigned into the PCA, and that was wonderful as well. We had hoped there would be a joining in the two denominations, but in God's providence, that did not come to pass.

But we had many great friends, still do to this day, in the OPC, and I'm now honorably retired decades later, and my credentials are with the Tidewater Presbytery Green Church in America because I relocated to the Virginia Beach area.

Well, one of the things that I want to discuss with you today is a personal mission to know Christ and make him known, as we read in 1 Corinthians 2, verse 2. Tell us about that.

Sure. You know, when I spend time with younger pastors, I often get asked, when you first started in ministry, one of the first things I say to them is how crucial it is to have a sense of a personal mission that goes deep into your ministry, a personal mission, and to make him known.

That's not original with me, of course. Many Christian organizations have had that, but as a young believer, I remember reading, somebody quoting, and then I took to heart 9, verse 24, and it says this, let him who boasts, no, it starts out in verse 23, let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, but let him who boasts, boast in this, and no, that was taken, you know, great intellectuals, healthy people, relatively speaking, in the United States of America, and strong people, and the Lord says, that's not what I value.

What I value is someone who understands and knows me. And then the New Testament fulfillment of that, of course, comes in 1 Corinthians, chapter 2, verse 2, where the apostle Paul, one of the most beautiful missionary figures, church planters, preachers, theologians that we know, the apostle Paul said, for I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.

And the Lord took that and put that in my heart so deeply. And I came to discover, and it's my deep desire for all young pastors, I came to discover that you can know information about any subject in particular, but you can know the information, but that's not the same, like you could know my dad.

My dad, who's now passed away, my dad was 5 '10", and he was an engineer, and he was an inventor, and he was married. You could know things about him, but you couldn't know my father the way I knew him personally and intimately.

And I came to discover that what Jeremiah 9 was saying, what the apostle Paul was saying, is that you have to have more than just information about Jesus Christ and his work, but you have to move from taking that information to meditation on that information.

Who is this Jesus of Nazareth, and what did he do for us, particularly on the cross, and you could know that a man died and was unjustly murdered and hung on a cross at the hands of the Romans with the displeasure on his head from the Sanhedrin, you could know those things, those facts, but you need to meditate on them, and you need to come to understand, well, this is the fulfillment of the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

Oh, my, this is the place where justice and mercy meet, and though the wages of sin is death, since Jesus never sinned, death could not hold him, and he rose again from the dead, and you could meditate on those things, and it could even thrill your soul that they are true, but it's not until you contemplate those things, and you say, Jesus died for me, that Jesus died for those that he came to save, atonement, it's not until you come to the place where you know that he lived, should have lived, and died the death you deserve to die, place, when you're, just because we met in a few of those diners, Chris Arms in the foodie, he could go to that diner in Massapequa, and he could see the picture of the Reuben sandwich, right, that is piled high with pastrami, and there's the sauerkraut on top, and there's two layers of Swiss cheese, melted, bubbling hot on top with Russian dressing, and well-marbled rye bread, you could see the picture of it, and read about it in the menu, but when do you know that it's the best Reuben sandwich on Long Island?

When you've taken that bite, when you have tasted, and wasn't it Jonathan Edwards, I think, who said, you can know that honey is sweet, right, you can understand the chemistry of sugar, and you can understand the biology of taste buds, you can know that honey is sweet, but you don't really know that honey is sweet until you taste honey, and King David, what do we have recorded of his in Psalm 27 verse four, your listeners all, I'm sure, know that verse where he says, taste and see that the Lord is good, and I fear that many young men have sometimes not spent enough time, oh, they get the information, and they even do the meditation, but have they come to that place where they have tasted and seen that the Lord is good, that Jesus is the man of the King down from heaven that gives life to the world, have they drunk deeply from the river of life that Jesus speaks of, where he says, he who believes in me, from him shall flow rivers of living water, and we need pastors who not only can slice up the bread, but they have tasted the bread, and they have drunk deeply from the wells of salvation, and out of that, that is then their mission, to know Christ, and you can't help but then make him known, and your life is catapulted forward to tell others about Jesus, and to mobilize evangelism, and to participate in the mission of Christ and the expansion of his kingdom, because you have come to know him intimately.

Does that make sense, Chris?

Yes, it does. In fact, I'm going to go to our first commercial break, because I don't want to cut you off mid-sentence when that time comes, and so if anybody would like to join us with a question, especially if you're a man considering the ministry, or you're already in it, and you do have some questions for a learned brother who has spent 45 years in the pastoral ministry, send us an email to chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

Chrisarnsen at gmail .com. As always, give us your first name at least, city and state, and country of residence, only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter, and we'll be right back after these messages, so do not go away.

I'm Simon O'Mahony, pastor of Trinity Reformed Baptist Church in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. Originally from Cork, Ireland, the Lord in his sovereign providence has called me to shepherd this new and growing congregation here in Cumberland County.

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That's royaldiadem .com. Mention Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. We're now back with John Janczko, and he is providing pastoral counsel and advice as a man who has retired after 45 years in pastoral ministry, starting with the Orthodox Presbyterian Church and spending most of his time with the Presbyterian Church in America.

And if you do have a question, send it to chrislorenzen at gmail .com. Give us your first name, at least. City and state and country of residence. Only remain anonymous if your question is personal and private.

And I know, Pastor John, that you believe that prayer is an extremely important aspect of entering into pastoral ministry and maintaining a life of pastoral ministry. And if you could pick up on that.

Chris, I'd be glad to do that, because it's so interesting that when you read in the book of Acts chapter 6, verse 4, you have the apostles saying, we really need deacons to help us out. And then they say something fascinating.

They say, and we will devote ourselves to prayer and the ministry of the word. And as men go into the ministry, we love to devote ourselves to the ministry of the word. And we spend great effort and energy learning hermeneutics, learning the original languages, learning and memorizing large portions of the English Bible.

And we love to craft messages and instruction to people so that they can take God's word into their hearts. And learn it so well. And boy, isn't that a wonderful, wonderful part of being set apart for the gospel ministry.

But notice, the apostles said, we will devote ourselves to prayer and the ministry of the word. And which comes first? And in my experience, having been alongside many pastors, it is the prayer life that flags, that suffers.

And in my own life, over the decades, there have been seasons where my prayer life was somehow thin and had devolved into a kind of checklist of spiritual words. And, you know, I don't say that with pride, but rather with shame that as the old song goes, my eyes become dry and my heart becomes cold.

My prayers become old. So I learned fairly early on that I was to go beyond mere maintenance praying and develop a commitment over the next several decades to be engaged personally and to lead the church in what we call kingdom-centered, frontline, prevailing prayer.

And of many young men that I've helped disciple in ministry, and I don't take credit for all the good things that they've done, God gets all the glory. I've always wanted to teach men to engage in kingdom-centered, frontline, prevailing prayer.

And when we say kingdom-centered, again, it's praying for God's agenda in this world and for God's purposes for the church and to say, as Jesus taught us, thy kingdom come. You know, what does it look like?

Well, it looks like we pray for the lost. We pray for those who seem to be headed to a Christless eternity. We pray that God would expand his kingdom by reaching people that are like us and unlike us.

And so there's this kingdom agenda. We pray for missionaries all over the world. And we pray for our children, that the circle in our families would be unbroken, right? And we pray for the fulfillment of the great commission around the world, that God would be glorified.

It's a kingdom-centered praying. You know, I've been in prayer meetings where somebody says, well, you know, we need to pray for my barber's niece's husband who has a bunion on his foot that's going to have surgery.

Well, okay, that's nice. And I will remember him. But we need to pray for, you know, just regular maintenance things. And those are maintenance prayer meeting. We want kingdom-centered prayer meetings where at least what we pray for is catapulted forward by the agenda of God's word for his kingdom to come.

And then it's frontline praying. And by that, you know, Paul the apostle would pray for people who were far away from him as if he was right alongside them. Now, Chris, do you actually expect your listeners in South Africa to pray all the way across the Atlantic Ocean and deep into the North American continent to Carlisle, Pennsylvania, to be alongside you in the ministry of Iron Sharpens Iron?

Can somebody really do that in South Africa?

Yes, and they do do that. They let me know that.

I know. And that's beautiful. That's frontline praying. And when we in our church, and even though I'm retired, I'm involved in helping a church plant, and I help lead the prayer meeting, when we hear of persecution breaking out in China, for example, and some wonderful reformed pastors, men trained at Westminster Seminary, when we hear of them being arrested and sent to labor camps and their churches are under the heel of the Communist Party of China, what do we do?

We pray for them and we come alongside them in prayer. Oh, God, have mercy upon them and give them strength. It's as though we're on the frontline. And maybe some of your listeners have prodigal children who have walked away, have moved away.

What do we do? We come alongside those parents, say their child has migrated to California. Well, we go to California in prayer and we pray for their prodigal children. You see, that's frontline praying.

We pray for people in hospitals, people going through trials, and you stay informed. So anyway, that's frontline praying. And then prevailing prayer. And I think about the prayer meetings of the church.

We keep our lists. I have a friend, his name is Bob, and he was in the Westminster Seminary community. Bob had dozens of books of prayer journals, and he would write down all his prayer requests, which is great.

But guess what Bob did? What he did was when those prayers were answered a month later, a year later, a decade later, Bob would go back and write down the answer to the prayer, expressing thanks to the Lord.

And he was engaged in prevailing prayer. And that, you know, the story of Jesus telling us about that widow, right? And she knocked and she knocked and she knocked. And so we must prevail in prayer with people.

And there needs to be faith and expectancy. I fear that there are people who go to prayer meetings, but they don't really believe that God is going to answer. Now, I'm not talking about that sort of nonsensical name it and claim it kind of thing where you boss God around and call that faith.

I'm not talking about, Chris, you know what I'm talking.

About.

I'm not talking about that kind of prayer. But Jesus says in Matthew 18, I think it's verse 19 or 20, where he says, if two or three are gathered in my name, there I am with them. And young pastor, when you pray.

You should pray, believing and knowing that Christ is at your side. Christ is somehow brought you all to the throne room and is interceding in his great work of session on your behalf. And you believe as Revelation chapter five is at verse eight.

It says that the prayers of the saints rise up as incense before the throne of God and then believe that the answers are hurled back on the earth, because that's what the book of Revelation says happens to your prayers.

So offered to the throne through Jesus faith and expectancy. So I hope that makes sense to you, Chris.

O.

Halsby, the Norwegian writer, pastor, he says, prayer is the breath of the soul. And so I would say to myself as a young pastor, and I would say to my colleagues who are young and just beginning in ministry, your soul needs to breathe in the daily rhythms of prayer and your church needs to breathe in the weekly repetitive vision, not mission of prayer.

Every church needs a praying pastor and every pastor needs a praying church. Isn't that true?

Amen. And that's beautifully said. There are two twin evils who are polar opposite evils that play tug of war with pastors. They play tug of war with Christians in general, but the twin evils are being crazy busy and being lazy.

And tell us, and especially to the young ministers or those contemplating prayerfully entering into ministry, how to ward off those dual temptations.

Well, that's very insightful, Chris. I do know from being alongside pastors, you talk to a guy, how you doing? And he says, oh, I'm overwhelmed. I'm just so busy. I'm running around like a chicken with my head cut off, which, by the way, is very interesting.

I don't know if you've ever seen that.

No, I haven't.

Have you ever seen it?

I've heard about it, but I've never seen it.

Yeah, somehow the kinetic energy, you chop off the chicken's head and he runs around the yard for a little bit. And you hear him and all that he's doing, and then you meet the guy and you know him. You know he goes to the coffee shop and Starbucks and he hangs out at Starbucks and he reads magazines and he listens to podcasts and he has one or two appointments a week.

He goes to the gym, works out and, you know, basically lazy. And the problem for both of them is the same. Neither one knows what they're supposed to be doing. Neither one of them has that deep sense of gospel-driven ministry that moves them forward in their ministry so that they can say no to the things they don't need to be doing, and they get energized to get off their keister and to get going, making appointments and going out to do evangelism or engage in discipleship or in preparation for Sunday worship and the delivery of the word and to engaging in prayer.

And you understand they need that center of gospel-centered ministry. And I don't want to reiterate all that I said about knowing Christ, but unless there is this sweet compulsion inside you of the joy of knowing Jesus and wanting him to get glory both in your life and in your church, then you're just going to engage in all kinds of busyness and traditions and maintenance stuff or you're going to flatten out.

Jack Miller, who was a mentor to me, he says, the gospel of the cross and the resurrection must do more than just sit on the surface of our minds. He says it must have control of our character and our emotions and get into the depths of our souls until it is the dominant power in our lives.

And he quotes Charles Spurgeon. Have you heard of Charles Spurgeon, Chris?

Yes, of course.

And Spurgeon wrote this. Spurgeon wrote, personally, to me, the gospel is something more than just a matter of faith. It has so mingled with my being as to be a part of my consciousness, an integral part of my mind, never to be removed from me.

And some young men in the ministry, you know, they study the life of Spurgeon and Whitefield, and they say things like, wow, those men really mastered the gospel. And I shake my head and I say to them, no, Whitefield and Spurgeon did not master the gospel.

They were mastered by the gospel.

Amen.

Amen. And I have to ask, does that describe us? Because it's only when the gospel burns into our souls that our fears begin to dissipate. Listen, I was a pastor long enough to know there's a lot of fear in ministry.

But what am I talking about? Fear of man, the opinions of man, fear of the future, fear of failure. And I think those are fiery, terrible, fiery darts that the devil shoots at men in the ministry. And we have the shield of faith, but it's not a kind of thin shield.

The shield of faith is faith that unites us to Christ deeply in our hearts so that it burns away our self-centered fears and we become, yeah, we're weak in ourselves, but we become strong in the gospel.

You see, Spurgeon and Whitefield, we would say, they would say they were weak in and of themselves, but strong in the Lord, weak, strong men in the gospel. And that then frees you up from just busyness, and it catapults you out of laziness.

Does that make sense? That's what I try and help to do to orient young men in the ministry.