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The Pastor's Heart with Dominic Steele
Christian leaders join Dominic Steele for a deep end conversation about our hearts and different aspects of Christian ministry each Tuesday afternoon.
We share personally, pastorally and professionally about how we can best fulfill Jesus' mission to save the lost and serve the saints.
The discussion is broadcast live on Facebook then available in video on our website <u><b><a href="http://www.thepastorsheart.net">http://www.thepastorsheart.net</a></u></b> and via audio podcast.
The Pastor's Heart with Dominic Steele
Gary Millar: Godliness vs Effectiveness - the Both/And Dilemma
Godliness vs Effectiveness - the Both/And Ministry dilemma
- Godliness vs Effectiveness
- Theology vs Pragmatics
- People centered vs Organisationally minded
- Leading from the front vs Serving others
- Courage to take a stand vs Quick to submit
- Others know I am one of them vs I am set apart to lead
- I lead patiently vs I lead with a sense of urgency
Most Christians at some point do start to wonder if they are the real deal. What God asks of us is so far reaching, so all encompassing, that when we come up short, we start to ask ourselves “Am I an imposter?” “Should I really be a leader?” and perhaps/Am even a Christian at all?’
Gary Millar is the Principal of Queensland’s Theological College and author of a new book ‘Both/And Ministry.’
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Godliness versus effectiveness, the both and ministry dilemma, how to live and lead like Jesus. Gary Miller is our guest today on the Pastor's Heart. Dominic Steele is my name. Godliness versus effectiveness, theology versus pragmatics, People-centered or organizationally minded, Leading from the front versus serving others, Courage to take a stand versus quick to submit. Others know I'm one of them versus I'm set apart to lead. I lead patiently or I lead with a sense of urgency. They are just a few of the controversies of Christian ministry that we will solve in the next 28 minutes on the Pastor's Heart.
Speaker 1:Gary Miller is the principal of Queensland's Theological College. He's the author of this new book, Both and Ministry, and they're just some of the controversies that he deals with in this book. But, Gary, I wonder if we could start with your pastor's heart and just a super vulnerable little paragraph that I found well, it stopped me in my tracks on page 136, when you wrote most Christians at some point do start to wonder if they're the real deal. What God asks of us is so far-reaching, so all-encompassing, that when we come up short we start to ask ourselves am I an imposter? Should I really be a leader? And perhaps am I even a Christian? After all, you were hoping I wouldn't notice that paragraph.
Speaker 2:That's why it's on page 136. Yeah.
Speaker 2:I do think, to do any kind of public ministry, and it doesn't really matter which part of the Bible you're dealing with. As soon as we come to the demands of the gospel and the wholehearted response that you know that our magnificent God asks of us, requires, deserves, I think, to call people to that, certainly in our more vulnerable moments. There is something deeply exposing about that and I think you know, when we reflect on the parts of the New Testament that I think I honestly prefer to ignore, you know that we should. You know whoever loves the Lord Jesus, christ should walk as he did. You know that we're supposed to imitate Paul as he imitates Christ, even to say those words. You know, I feel like we should add a qualification. You know, but I'm doing that really poorly.
Speaker 2:And I think I suppose at the heart of the book is. I just want to encourage all of us, myself and everyone else, to actually step into that and own the fact that we are actually called to live and to lead like the Lord Jesus. Actually called to live and to lead like the Lord Jesus and that is both immensely humbling and immensely demanding, something that will by nature, require us to pour everything into it and to live a life of ongoing repentance and lifelong learning.
Speaker 1:So just help me get your thesis, because you're not saying just work harder.
Speaker 2:That's not what you're saying, no, I think one of the things about being the principal of a theological college and kind of constantly being involved in training people is that I think sometimes we notice, as we look out on the church landscape almost one step removed, we just notice that at some points we're emphasizing some parts of the gospel or the demands of the gospel and we're no longer emphasizing others, or we're starting to assume things.
Speaker 2:And I do think in Australia at the moment, I think over the last 10, 15 years, we work very hard at doing ministry effectively, organizing church, thinking strategically, seeking to plant churches, to reach into new communities. But I think we've assumed that character matters, we all agree on that, but we haven't actually championed Christ-like leadership or leading like the Lord Jesus in quite the same way or to quite the same degree as we've championed being effective, being strategic, even being fruitful, being effective, being strategic, even being fruitful. And I think the book is just hopefully a humble, gentle reminder to myself and everyone else that we actually do need to be strategic leaders, but we actually need to be gentle, humble, godly leaders as well. And just to take one of those things it won't do, it's not good enough, it's not what God asks us to do and it won't lead to the health of the church.
Speaker 1:So I mean, I'm just opening up page 116 here and what do I think about leadership? And we'll put it up on the screen so that people can see this page. But you're asking me to rate myself from five through to one on how do I think about leadership. I prioritise godliness, and then five through to one, I prioritise effectiveness. Yes, and what are you wanting me to do? Here's the dilemma godliness and effectiveness.
Speaker 2:Well, I think what I really want, what I want you to do, is to think about, like, naturally, where do I land?
Speaker 2:You know, naturally am I someone who just thinks about leadership, thinks about strategy, and then focuses on that, whilst living with the fact that I'm really not as godly as I'd like to be, but it's kind of okay because, look, I'm a strategic leader, whereas I think what Jesus calls us to is actually to be both strategic and godly.
Speaker 2:And so identifying that then allows me to say I need to be very careful, because my instinct will be to think about strategy, to think about the next church we're planting, to think about how I can organize the team better and to say that almost compensates for the fact that I'm not really growing in godliness myself. And I think that goes back to the kind of imposter syndrome, because I know for me, you know, if I'm faced with something that I'm really not very good at, or an area where I'm convicted that I'm not being gentle with people, I'm not lovingly investing in people, the great temptation is to say fact that I'm not all that godly or I'm not loving people. Well, and I think that's a recipe for disaster both for me and for the church, because I've basically said I can focus on 50% of what Jesus asks us to do, of what it means to be a leader in the church of the Lord Jesus, when actually what we need to do is press into both of those things at the same time.
Speaker 1:Every time I talk to David O'Mara, the minister of the church next door. Yes. I wish I could pray like him, and I'm just reminded that he's such a prayerful guy.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:And I feel like, oh, I want to be like you, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think that's. I think we need to be humble enough to relate to each other like that, and it's not that we're saying, okay, I'm going to shut down everything in church and all we're going to do in our churches, you know, teach the bible and pray. But I think we we do have to be humble enough that when we meet others, we're we're looking to them and allowing others to spur us on to be more like the lord jesus and also, you know, in the kindness of god for them, you know to to the kindness of God for them, to expose some of the growth areas that there are for all of us.
Speaker 1:I mean I'll go to the next one. You've gone. I think theologically versus, I think practically. Yes, now where are we coming?
Speaker 2:a cropper at both ends there, yeah of the air and yeah, yeah, well I I think that the danger is that when we pursue, when we pursue growth, for example, as we must, it's. It's very easy to start off, you know, with that being a thoroughly theological thing, but at the end of the day we put ourselves under pressure. You know the the church must grow, so we will do whatever it takes to allow us to grow. So we'll just keep tweaking our practice without ever thinking about what the theological ramifications or undergirdings of that are. We always need to think both practically and theologically.
Speaker 2:Now, of course, at the other end, it's possible just to be so concerned with orthodoxy that we never do anything. But the answer isn't this kind of middle ground which is kind of part theological, part pragmatic. Everything we do should be the result of theological you know, solid theological thinking, but also be deeply practical and pragmatic in the middle of the community we're in, in the church that we're part of, as we seek to reach the lost. So I think all of us kind of tend to kind of lean in one direction, but often it's the theological thinkers who are saying no, we probably shouldn't do that, we need to think about it more. And the practical thinkers are going oh you know, let's just get on and do it. But I think both of those are actually not good for the health of the church. We actually need to be rigorously theological and we need to be deeply practical, constantly thinking about both ends of the line, in order that what we do is both honouring to God, it's richly gospel-shaped, christ-centred, and practically sensible and effective.
Speaker 1:So, as you say that, I think I'm analysing myself, as you say this, and I'm thinking I think I'm trying to be deeply theological, yes, but I'm also thinking if we don't grow, then we won't be able to afford to give people pay rises next year and we'll drop in staff and all those kind of things. And so I've got those kind of things and I feel like my friends, who are kind of by nature right up the theological end, would look at me and think I'm a complete sellout pragmatist. Do you know that?
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah. And I think there is a sense in which, if you're doing both of these people at both ends won't be all that happy with you because you won't that at one level you won't be. The pragmatist will be impatient because they're saying get on with it, just do it. And the theological people will say you're far too pragmatic. But we actually don't have an option to let go. And I think if you do let go of either of those poles, you know, even I mean I'm not saying any of us would say oh, I'm not going to think theologically anymore, but I think it's worthwhile just stopping and saying is my practice actually theological or have I just sort of abandoned the theological hard thinking to just run with effective ministry? And I think we just need to hold on to both of them, I am people-centered versus I am organizationally minded.
Speaker 1:And again, I hear some of people who are, I would say, deeply people centred, critical of anything that resembles a structure in a church.
Speaker 2:Yeah, again, there is a sense, dominic, in which I feel this book is just, you know, 150 pages of a statement of the obvious. But we really do need to be both and I think there's something in the water just now that we do tend to say. I am like this Please don't ask me to do anything else or be anything else and I'll just ply on in my. You know, I'll ply my own furrow here.
Speaker 2:So the organisers just get on with planning the church and people are almost treated, if we're not careful, like an obstacle. You know they're disrupting the organization and those who naturally love people can very easily oppose organization to being loving, when actually we all know in church, if you're going to love people, well, that does include making sure that the church is running in a way which facilitates that. But in the same way that you can't just say I'm never going to think about organization, I'm just going to kind of be warm towards people. It will be chaotic, disruptive, you'll not be serving people, well, you know, and this. But the same thing works the other direction. You can have the slickest ship you know that has ever sailed the sea because you're so well organized, but actually people are people and we need to be relational and I think for all of us I do think we tend to one or the other- but we don't get to choose.
Speaker 1:I take it you've got a church in mind in Brisbane that falls one way and a church in mind that falls the other way.
Speaker 2:I actually don't, but I think most churches will tend. I think most churches will tend. I can think of examples of churches where the past was immensely warm and but they ended up being quite a cold, quite a cold place to be because, you know we, you know the, the system was prioritized, actually, over the people, whereas you've, you've got to think of both at the same time.
Speaker 1:And how do you do it? Well, it's like you know you're the principal, you write the book.
Speaker 2:How do you do it?
Speaker 2:You get up in the morning and you throw yourself in the Lord Jesus and you say Lord Jesus, this is too hard, but please help me to do both of these things today.
Speaker 2:And I think that if we have that kind of vision of the community of the people of God, one of the things it does is that it reminds all of us that we genuinely need each other. You know we need other leaders to lead with us and you know, I mean, I think at some level you know there has to be a plurality of leadership in the church. But also it does just underline that as a community, you know we need to work on these things together. It tells me also none of us has it right, none of us has everything that we need, so we actually need to keep working. I think the other thing, dominic, for me, I think what it does is it takes away my right to say look, you know, I'm really more of an A person. Don't ask me to do any of that B stuff, even when it's kind of clearly asked of us by the Lord Jesus himself.
Speaker 1:I mean while I'm on the roll of personally revealing paragraphs from you, page 37, unfortunately in my case, I've always been labelled as some variation of the power-crazed dictator for life and informed that I share a personality type with the lack of Genghis Khan, much to the amusement of my family and coworkers.
Speaker 2:Yes, those personality type tests that never shed a beautiful light on me Well.
Speaker 1:I only know you from a distance, but I hadn't thought of that. But the people who know you say you're like Genghis Khan.
Speaker 2:Well, I think instinctively I am a okay, there's a mountain Like okay, let's plant a flag on top of that. You know, my innate leadership style is this is a brilliant idea. Let's go, come on, everybody follow me. Yeah, and I want everyone to follow me. And to me it seems the most obvious thing in the world to take that hill and there's no one else going up there. So, okay, I'll go. Let's go everyone.
Speaker 1:I mean I watched you last year by a theological college, you know, and I mean I just stood in awe as you climbed that mountain.
Speaker 2:Well, I mean God was incredibly generous to us and, you know, did something that none of us could do on our own. But you know that is an example. I mean, I knew I couldn't do that, but I wasn't actually lying awake at night kind of worrying about it because it was beyond me, but just the way God has made me, I was going. Okay, I'm in this position, we have to give this a go, let's go. But there are other times when I kind of operate in the same mold and what I have needed to learn and I think still need to learn is, for example, there are other people on our team at college and people I work with and staff and people in church People who teach pastoral counseling?
Speaker 2:Yes, they don't, and things like that they don't necessarily respond to that. You know they actually need someone to sit down with them and patiently take them through the process and give them time. Give them time to reflect, give them time to, you know, to get on board, whereas instinctively, you know, what I want to do is just go. It's really obvious why are we sitting here? Let's go. But I think what Jesus asks of us is we actually learn to do both. You know that we lead people in the way that they need to be led, rather than simply the thing that is most comfortable for me. And you know we hear this in different ways. I think the most common is I hear people say, you know, quite often not necessarily leaders oh, I'm an extra, you know I'm an extrovert, and the subtext is so don't, don't ask me to be sensitive to anyone. You know I'm just, I'm just being me.
Speaker 2:I'm out there or you know, I'm an introvert. Don't don't ask me to kind of step out of my comfort zone and go and welcome the outsider. Now we are who we are, you know. However, we define personality types. Whatever you know, we know what they're, roughly what they're saying. Some of us are more outgoing, some of us are less.
Speaker 2:Some of us are more conscientious, some of us are less, but but if I'm more, outgoing, some of us are less, some of us are more conscientious, some of us are less Absolutely. But if I'm more outgoing, you know I do need to deny myself, take up my cross and kind of shut up sometimes and listen to other people.
Speaker 2:Similarly, you know, even those of us who are perhaps gentler, quieter at times, what God asks of us is that we step out of our comfort zone. We love other people, we initiate the conversation, and I think what we can't do is go. This is me, therefore. I'm off the hook and I think we do that quite a lot.
Speaker 1:Really. Yeah, really. Keep pushing into that, yeah.
Speaker 2:I think, if we go back to pastors, I think it's very easy to say I'm a strategic thinker. You know I'm kind of I'm a leader. You know I love new things, I love initiative. I I'm a leader. You know I love new things, I love initiative, I love breaking new ground. So therefore, if people won't get on board with me, kind of not my job to put my arm around their shoulder to care for them, to listen to them, to bring them along or even to go and sit with them.
Speaker 1:Now I mean, you might be privileged in a big church where you can say not my job. But in a smaller church, surely you can't say that.
Speaker 2:No, I don't think you can. But even in a big church, I think sometimes we mix up what my role is and the church may. You know, the church may allocate very specific roles, so it's not necessarily the senior pastor job to visit everyone in hospital. I think it's quite easy, though, to go from that to. You know, it's not the role for which I'm employed to be to, it's not my responsibility to be caring you know that that, irrespective of what our job description says, there are, there are things that that Christ asks of us.
Speaker 2:You know we still need to grow in godliness. You know we still need to be loving, we still need to be strategic. You know it's not the. The pastoral care person doesn't, you know, doesn't get to to say, okay, all I ever have to do is care for people, I don't need to think about how we do this most effectively for the benefit of most people in church. And similarly, you know the, you know the pastor for vision or strategy doesn't get to say, well, I get to trample over everybody in the interest of, you know, future growth.
Speaker 1:I have the courage to take a stand versus I'm quick to submit to others.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's got like proverbs really. Yeah, I think again.
Speaker 2:You know, there are some of us who are wired in a way where we I don't want to overstate this, but we almost enjoy conflict in a strange way. We don't mind, you know, when battle lines are drawn and we have to stand for the truth. But I think it's very easy for leaders to get into the kind of rut where that's just how they relate, Whereas there are other times, even for those of us who sort of thrive in conflict situations in some ways. But we also have to be very quick, ready to admit that we're wrong when we are wrong, and not just license ourselves to relate constantly as if everything is a hill to die on. And I think we need to work against the grain a little bit.
Speaker 1:Whatever our grind is yeah yeah, in a little bit.
Speaker 2:Whatever? Our grind is.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. So you know I mean I am instinctively, you know I am more prone, you know I'm more prone to be oppositional You're from Northern Ireland, yeah, I play my national genetic heritage, yeah than to be, you know, consensual all the time. So I know that about myself and whilst I always want to be faithful where standing firm is required, I also know that for me, sometimes I'm more likely to go into that oppositional mode when really what I should do is be quiet, listen to other people and realise that they're right and I've got something to learn from them. And in this situation, what I need to do is to be quiet and submit, or to thank someone for correction, or to realise, yeah, I think we are going in slightly the wrong direction.
Speaker 1:Let's talk about the sin of Christian leaders and some of the disqualifying sin of Christian leaders and you've said that, while individual circumstances have been different, they all have this in common the individual overlooked, ignored or excused themselves from living for Jesus in one or more key areas of the Christian life as described plainly in the Bible.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think, just reflecting a little bit on some of this kind of spectacular failures in the evangelical world across the world, whether the Mars Hill stuff or others, and even just again seeing some of my peers trying to reflect, was there anything to learn? What do I need to take to heart? And I do think there is a common thread in many of the situations which made I think many of us ask how could they keep behaving in the way in which they did for so long?
Speaker 1:Excusing clearly sinful behavior for a long time.
Speaker 2:Yes, Well, even you know, when you think of the Mars Hill thing, that's highly documented. I mean, you know Mark Driscoll treated people appallingly for a very long time. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I'm not, you know. Know, obviously there were people who tried to try to speak into that, but, but the reality was people were effectively saying, but look at how fruitful he's been. And I think he himself, you know, would have said at points, look at how big my church is, yeah, but I think, I think we can all do that, know, and it actually comes back to the imposter syndrome that often when we feel there's some weakness in our life, in our ministry, what we tend to do is focus on the strength, and I think that is a long-term recipe for disaster and what it can do is it leads us to live a double life, but it points it also. It also leads us as the church or as peers, to excuse ungodly behavior in the lives of, of leaders by saying but they are immensely fruitful, or look at how able they are. Or, you know, and I'm not saying this to kind of start a witch hunt, but I think together we do actually need to to look for integrity and even christ-likeness.
Speaker 2:And I think you know I've been, I think I'm persuaded that in our circles, how do we, how do we evaluate each other? You know, how do we allocate respect? And often it's on the basis of ministry effectiveness, not necessarily godliness. When I say faithfulness, I don't mean opposed to fruitfulness, but people who quite clearly are living humbly and authentically for the Lord Jesus and seeking to be godly in everything they do and seeking to be effective ministers. I think we're prone to seeing the particularly gifted people and at points then saying but they are massively gifted, they're massively fruitful. Yeah, they don't treat people very well, but you know, look at what God is doing through them. And I think we have a defective way of seeing what God asks of us, what God wants for his church, when we do that.
Speaker 1:Now not thinking, if you like, about the superstar like Driscoll but, the average pastor that has been trained at your place? Do you know, yes, yeah, and they're now 20 years out, but they've got a secret sin. Yeah, what do you want to say to that guy who might be listening now?
Speaker 2:Oh, come into the light. I mean this is we're called to a life of repentance and faith. And you know it's funny. I was looking at Luther's 95 Theses the other day. You know, the first one is you know, the whole life to which we're called is a life of repentance. We all have things that we need to repent of and collapse onto Jesus again. And you know, whether we're pastors or not, or leaders or not, we fall foul of the great lie that you're better to hide that stuff, to suppress it. You know, to live with the guilt rather than bring it into the light, and no forgiveness and cleansing and restoration and re-energization. So you know, I think that's where we just have to be. I think we could be much better at encouraging each other to live lives of repentance and faith together. That that's the norm, that almost having to repent it's just the normal Christian life, rather than this enormous burden of shame that leaders shouldn't have to repent. They really should.
Speaker 1:So you want the conversation to change?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think I don't want to overstate it. I think, as I said, the great strength is that we have been talking a lot about how do we get the gospel out effectively. But I do think we've kind of assumed, you know that the character piece of, you know character, competency, you know convictions, I just think the character thing we all want to see people grow in Christ-like character. But I think for those of us who are kind of in ministry, I think we've often assumed that piece because we've gone, it's the competency that I'm really. I'm feeling a lack of competency here.
Speaker 2:So I will work really hard to grow in my competency and we need to, but we actually need to continually grow in christ-like character as well and and so to slightly change the conversation. But you know, as you know, I mean, in a way there's there's nothing new under the sun. You know that probably our generation, you know, the generation before us, were probably, you know, strong in character and godliness, not always, not always so great on competence, and so the conversation changes a bit and our generation comes and you know, along with those behind us, we've said no, we need to, we need to do this better, which is true. And we need to think about running teams, we need to think about organizing church, we need to think about effective evangelism I just want to say yes and we also need to think about Christlikeness for a lifetime, for the long haul.
Speaker 2:And I think often, you know, we've had some very kind of godly leaders all of us, you know like, speaking into our lives and going ahead of us. I think every generation tends to assume some things, but the problem is they assume them, maybe they are godly, but they don't necessarily pass on that to the next generation. They say this needs to change, but then our generation comes along and we have a completely different set of strengths and weaknesses, you know, and issues, and I just suspect that christ-likeness is one of the things that tends to have been assumed and, as a result, ends up being a bit neglected, and we need to take hold of it again, without letting go of the competent stuff that we've we've spent so much time thinking about thanks so much for coming in.
Speaker 1:Thanks for having me. As always, dominic gary miller has been my guest on the pastor's heart. His new book is out both and ministry Living and Leading Like Jesus. My name's Dominic Steele. You've been with us on the Pastor's Heart and we will look forward to your company next Tuesday afternoon.
