When I was entering into this calling as a pastor, one of my pastors told me that one of the main maxims he had always heard about that role was this:
"A Pastor's job is to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable."
Opportunities to comfort seem to abound. People in the hospital, teens going through something, people who just need to talk to someone always seem to be coming along one behind the other. In those times the pastor can not only exercise the ministry of presence - just being there, but we get the opportunity to encourage people with the Word and with prayer. In today's world, we get even more opportunities to do that through technology. I'll send out requests for prayer almost every day, and receive a couple a week from someone he just dashes off a note that says "please pray for me or for us."
The chances to "afflict the comfortable" are fewer and farther between.
And yet, pastor/preachers probably get more of those than most other professions do. The person sitting out in front of us on Sunday has made a choice to be in the presence of the Holy Spirit and under the ministry of the Word of God. So they really shouldn't be surprised when God uses that Word to bring the light of conviction on them.
I've lost track of how many times someone told me after a sermon "I felt like you were preaching just for me." Every preacher hears that. People wonder if we've listened at their window, or been a fly on the wall in their home. No, we've prayed and asked the Holy Spirit to use our pitiful words for His glory. People's lives can be changed in an instant and stay changed forever as the Lord moves into their heart and makes them a new creation.
But apathy... sigh
It is like nailing jello to the wall.
Personally, I'd much rather deal with someone who denies God, who lives as if there is no God than face off against an apathetic Christian. A functional atheist, the apathetic Christian carries their "faith" like a woman might wear a charm bracelet. It's an ornament to be "worn" at certain times and at certain places. This type of Christianity is cultural at best. And the epicenter of it seems to be in the South.
I remember years ago talking to a man on a search team from California. He had called out of the blue and wanted to talk to me about becoming their pastor. In his explanation about the church, he told me about their prison ministry, about their community ministry, and then said "You know pastor, we're all first generation Christians. Every single one of us needed saving bad."
If we're not careful, we can allow the churches we love to become centers of apathy. It's easy. In those cases, it is definitely the pastor's role to upset the status quo and break the church out of its rut. Maybe that means beginning the worship gathering with the sermon instead of with music, or being more interactive in the way you preach. Maybe it is working through a series directly tied to areas in people's lives that they struggle with. Maybe if you are a topical preacher, it might mean preaching expository sermons through a book.
DO WHATEVER IT TAKES
The first sign of leprosy is the absence of pain.
The first sign a dying church presents is apathy.
Pray, pray, pray, pray, pray for the FIRE to be a part of regeneration.
And don't let them...
change you.
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