This morning, I was thinking about the need for churches to have shepherds rather than leaders.

I’ve noticed that in big churches, there is a man or a small group of men that have a “vision” for how the church can grow in numbers. But in all of the big churches I’ve attended, that man or men typically had no plan for individual members to grow in their relationship with Jesus.

I experienced too many leaders and too few shepherds.

But, as I read the Gospels, Jesus always had time for individuals and one has the sense that when he was talking to someone, that person got his full attention.

I’ve never tried, but I suspect that it is not easy to get on the calendar of a megachurch pastor. They look great on stage, are very articulate, and perhaps even helpful in their sermons, but are they truly shepherds?

This is, after all, what the word pastor means. A pastor is a shepherd, or at least, is supposed to be a shepherd. Shepherds care for their flock, not just as a group, but as individuals.

Jesus did it, we have no excuse to do otherwise.

I will leave a meek and humble people among you, and they will take refuge in the name of the Lord.

Zephaniah 3:12 (CSB)

The question that church leaders need to ask themselves and their elders is this, “Am I modeling humility and meekness as a leader?”

Maybe I’m a little bit cynical, but when I look at the worship service videos of many large churches, I don’t pick up a lot of humility. Or, at least, humility is not the first thing that pops in my head when I see them.

Polished, professional, groomed, smooth; these are words that come to me first.

Perhaps we need God to step in and reshape our expectations as to what church should be.

I am reminded of how the Apostle Paul described his own pulpit ministry:

“When I came to you, brothers and sisters, announcing the mystery of God to you, I did not come with brilliance of speech or wisdom. I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling. My speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of wisdom but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not be based on human wisdom but on God’s power.”

1 Corinthians 2:1–5, CSB

Can we please have a little bit more of the Apostle Paul and a little less of the flashy, hip, bringer of sermonettes? Can we have the humble servant instead of the CEO? Can we have a shepherd and not a vision caster?

Please!

A good friend recently gave me a copy of The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self by Carl R. Trueman. In the introduction, Trueman put words to something that I have thought for a while when he wrote:

“As for the notion of some lost golden age, it is truly very hard for any competent historian to be nostalgic. What past times were better than the present? An ere before antibiotics when childbirth or even minor cuts might lead to septicemia and death? The great days of the nineteenth century when the church was culturally powerful and marriage was between one man and one woman for life but little children worked in factories and swept chimneys? Perhaps the Great Depression? The Second World War? The era of Vietnam? Every age has had its darkness and its dangers. The task of the Christian is not to whine about the moment in which he or she lives but to understand its problems and respond appropriately to them.”

The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self by Carl R. Trueman

The words of Mordecai to Esther seem appropriate here when he said, “Who knows, perhaps you have come to your royal position for such a time as this” (Es 4:14).

Rather than be nostalgic for something that never was, we can participate with God in responding correctly to the time in which we find ourselves.

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