Review: Praying For Your Pastor

May 31, 2017May 30, 2017 / rtrube54 / 1 Comment

Praying For Your Pastor, Eddie Byun (foreword by Chip Ingram). Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2016.

Summary: A practical guide both advocating for the importance of prayer for our pastors and offering a practical rubric in the form of the acronym PRAYERS.

“I often tell my congregation, “Your prayer support is my life support.” Someone who has been rescued from drowning or is recovering from a serious injury like a gunshot wound may need to be put on life support for a period of time. The injured person doesn’t have the strength to keep going by himself, so he needs the help of something outside of himself in order to allow his body to rest and to be strengthened to health again. In many ways, the pastor is under a wide range of attacks from the enemy. The attacks may come in various forms, such as gossip, criticism, slander, sickness, or even threats. There are days when your pastor feels emotionally burned out, physically exhausted, and spiritually weak. She feels she just can’t go on. These experiences are far too common and come far too frequently. These are the times when pastors need the life support of our prayers to keep them going. You may not know the struggles your pastors face today, but you can know that your prayers will make a difference in their lives” (pp. 22-23).

So writes pastor Eddie Byun in what is both an impassioned plea and practical guide to pray for our pastors. Throughout this book Byun uses both statistics and personal stories to describe the challenges pastors face that leads to so many dropping out of the ministry. He believes that one of the most important things churches can do is to mobilize teams of people to pray for their pastors.

Byun goes on to provide a simple rubric around the acronym PRAYERS to guide those praying for pastors. Each chapter in the book is organized around one letter in the acronym:

Protection: Against temptation, evil, and the enemy and praying through the armor of God (Ephesians 6:14-17).
Rest: For physical, emotional, and spiritual rest, for unhurried times with the Lord, against burnout and for times of refreshing.
Anointing: For growing intimacy with the Lord, greater consecration, and for power to be released in your pastor’s life and ministry.
Yielded heart: Daily transformation by the gospel, obedience out of love and gratitude for the cross, trust and obedience, growth in treasuring Christ.
Effectiveness: Wisdom, increased fruitfulness in life and ministry, in people being saved and discipled, and faithfulness to the end.
Righteousness and integrity: A strong foundation in one’s life, that all that one does is motivated out of love and honor for Christ.
Strong marriages and families: protection of marriage and family, support in the church to encourage pastor in marriage and family life, and strong discipleship of children with parents who live their faith.

Each chapter fleshes out these themes, provides discussion questions, prayer points, and action plans one may take to form and guide a prayer team. Reading this book challenged me with regard to how much (or little) I pray for my pastor and reminded me of the challenging character of his work as well as how thankful I am for him, and other pastors I’ve known who faithfully shepherd God’s flock.

It also reminded me again how important it is for all of us in ministry to have prayer teams. I am blessed with ten people who have committed to pray for me daily and I truly believe they have been instrumental in God’s work through the ministry in which I engage. Byun, in his concluding chapter quotes Deuteronomy 4:7 which says, “What other nation is so great as to have their gods near them the way the Lord our God is near us whenever we pray to him?” He observes that while God is always present, there is a special way he is present to people when we pray for them. I know I need this, and I know those who pastor our churches need this. Byun’s book makes this case and shows us how we may get started.

Review: The Pastor as Public Theologian

November 25, 2015August 25, 2025 / rtrube54 / 3 Comments

The Pastor as Public Theologian, Kevin J. Vanhoozer and Owen Strachan. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2015.

Summary: The authors contend that at the heart of the pastoral calling is a vision of doing theology with the people of God, pointing them to what God is doing in and through the Christ, and how they may participate in that work.

The central thesis of this book addresses something I’ve long thought–that there is a growing divide between those who teach and write theology, and those who teach and shepherd the people of God. Many theological works on issues that are actually important for the life of the people of God read as written only for the academic guild of theologians. Meanwhile, pastors increasingly are viewed as those who are church growth technicians, counselors, and inspirational worship leaders. The authors contend rather that pastors are public theologians, in that they communicate the truth that is in Christ to the people of God, who then bear witness to Christ in every sphere of public life.

The authors then develop this thesis using four of the disciplines that classically define the theological academy: biblical, historical, systematic, and practical theology. They seek to show that the core of what is taught in these disciplines is in fact not something to be confined to the academy but is vital to the life of the church.

Under biblical theology, they consider the prophet, priest, and king roles as they find fulfillment in Christ and are expressed in pastorates that are prophetic, telling forth the word of God; priestly as those who minister grace in the message of the gospel; and kingly in both speaking wisdom and serving diligently as did the servant King.

With regard to historical theology Owen Strachan traces the pastorate from the earliest days, through monasticism and scholasticism, into the reformation and the Puritan and Edwardsian expressions in early America, to the professionalization of the pastorate, and an Evangelical recovery in the twentieth century. In this section, it seems the reformers, Puritans, and Jonathan Edwards are held in highest esteem as approaching the model of public theologians the writers envision.

Then Kevin Vanhoozer turns to systematic theology. He makes a startling contention here: that pastor-theologians both cultivate life and cope with death and that much of their work is helping people who inevitably will die understand how to live in light of this. It is a ministry of teaching the indicatives of theology: what is already reality for us through new life in Christ. It is ministry of the word: cultivating both biblical literacy and a biblically-informed cultural literacy. And it is the ministry of the imperative: how we should then live in light of the realities true of us in Christ.

Finally, Vanhoozer discusses practical theology, and the work of pastors as artisans in the house of God through the work of Evangelist, proclaiming what is in Christ in counsel, visitation, and sermon; the work of Catechist, as teaching what is in Christ through careful instruction of new converts and all of God’s people; the work of Liturgist in worship, prayer, and communion; and the work of Apologist, demonstrating what is in Christ against the alternatives that are in error.

Each section of the book is concluded with testimony from one of twelve practicing pastor-theologians. These are a highlight of the book in many ways in practically translating theory into theological practice. It was striking how many emphasized the priority of study and wide reading as essential to the life of the pastor-theologian. Lastly, the book concludes with fifty-five theses that essentially are a summary of the main points of the book.

If I were to have any reservation with this book, it would be that it should more accurately be titled “The Male Reformed Pastor as Public Theologian”. Both authors and all twelve contributors are men writing and, in the case of the twelve, pastoring churches in the Reformed tradition. Yet I would contend that this theological perspective is not central to the contention the book makes, with which I would heartily agree, but it may serve to limit the book’s audience. I would contend that Martin Luther King, Jr. was just as much a public theologian as Harold John Ockenga, and King’s leadership in the civil rights movement is perhaps the signature example in the twentieth century of the impact public theology can have both upon the people of God and the public square. The contention these authors are making for the noble role of pastor as public theologian, indeed public intellectual, is vital both for the equipping of a people of God saturated by a secular culture, and for the engagement of that culture. I hope it can contribute to a wider conversation throughout the church of the vital role pastor-theologians can play in equipping the church for a witness both cogent and charitable in a world that desperately needs it.

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Review: People-Pleasing Pastors: Avoiding the Pitfalls of Approval-Motivated Leadership

July 28, 2014July 28, 2014 / rtrube54 / 3 Comments

People-Pleasing Pastors: Avoiding the Pitfalls of Approval-Motivated Leadership by Charles Stone
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

No well-adjusted person likes to displease people. But allowing the approval of others to unduly shape what we do and why we do it can be harmful both to our sense of self and to the life of the organizations and groups of which we are a part. This is a particular danger for pastors of churches. In many cases, pastors are hired by the local congregation, and as a volunteer organization, the effectiveness of pastors rests on the goodwill and support of church members. In addition, church boards may be peopled by those who view their position as a personal fiefdom of power and influence that pastors may be reluctant to challenge.

Charles Stone’s book is based on research conducted by Lifeway Ministries with thousands of pastors. He integrates research findings, biblical material and knowledge from the world of neuroscience to help pastors understand the dangers of people-pleasing, the tendencies in one’s own life to do so, and strategies to deal with these tendencies. He contends that our tendencies to people please are driven by the emotional parts of our brains and that when we grow in emotional maturity, we are less apt to fall into this pitfall.

Stone advocates a seven step approach to this growth, summarized in the idea of becoming a PRESENT leader. This consists first of “Probing your past”–discovering the past patterns in your life, your family and your church that shape your emotional responses. This is followed by “Revisiting your values”, so that these serve as the basis of responses when you are tempted to people-please. Third, he advocates “Exposing your triangles” so that we understand both the normal triangles of relationships in our lives and avoid being triangled, a situation in which we become tempted to fix an unhealthy relationship between two others. “Search your gaps” involves recognizing the particular kinds of people-pleasing patterns to which you are most prone. This is followed by learning to “Engage your critics” by learning calm presence with anxious others. Sixth, you “Nurture your soul through mindfulness”, which involves becoming fully attentive to God and one’s situations through biblical meditation and practices of mindful attentiveness. Finally, he urges “Taming your reactivity”, the ways one might keep their cool under pressure, avoiding the disastrous outbursts that make conflict resolution more difficult.

The book concludes with an interesting exploration of the danger of being a placebo pastor, looking at the early use of “Placebo” in Chaucer as a “yes man” who made others feel better. Stone advocates for living to please God in faithfulness to one’s call.

Three appendices include a seven day devotional resource to included biblical mindfulness, a study guide for using this book with a board or leadership team, and a description of the research methodology undergirding the book.

This book is part of the InterVarsity Press Praxis series and is indeed a very practical resource for pastoral practice. It asks but does not answer the important question of one’s values in pastoral work, something hopefully shaped by one’s sense of calling. In this regard, I might commend Eugene Peterson’s many books, but especially his Working the Angles: The Shape of Pastoral Integrity and his Five Smooth Stones for Pastoral Work. These might be helpful if one struggles to “revisit one’s values” as Stone recommends.

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Review: Resilient Ministry: What Pastors Told Us About Surviving and Thriving

February 16, 2014February 16, 2014 / rtrube54 / 1 Comment

Resilient Ministry: What Pastors Told Us About Surviving and Thriving by Bob Burns
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I’ve watched pastors burn out and drop out. While it is a privilege to shepherd God’s people, it is also just plain hard and demanding work. You don’t do pastoral work, you are a pastor. In some sense, you are always on. The project of this book is to explore what is necessary for pastors to burn on, not burn out. And it is pastors in fact who developed the content of this book as part of a Lilly research project in which pastors were gathered in Summits that explored the keys to sustaining pastoral excellence. Out of these summits five key factors emerged:

1. Spiritual formation: resisting the temptation of workaholism by building rituals, maintaining accountability, growing through hardship, and practicing spiritual disciplines.

2. Self-care: resisting the pressures of work and fostering spiritual growth, emotional self-awareness, relational depth (particularly helpful here was identifying who can pastors share with), and intellectual and physical self-care. Self-care, the authors point out can actually be self-denial as one refuses to heed the siren calls of ministry to tend to the self in a way where you are able to bring the best to those you serve.

3. Emotional and cultural intelligence. Does one understand one’s own emotions and is one aware of the emotions others are manifesting? Likewise, they explore how we all work out of a cultural context and a growing awareness of both one’s own cultural identity and the cultural differences we encounter among those we minister is critical to ministry success in a culturally diverse world.

4. Healthy marriage and family life. Normal life stresses marriages. The ministry lifestyle means one may never feel off the clock and spouse and children get the leftovers or are often the dumping ground for pressures of ministry. Sometimes this may lead to conflicting loyalties or even abandonment of one’s family to ministry. There is the question of who ministers to the spouse. There were a number of practical recommendations in this section ranging from setting aside intentional time together and pursuing shared hobbies to annual marriage “check-ups” with a therapist.

5. Leadership and Management. The authors described leadership as “poetry”, that which captures the imaginations and has systems in place to channel the energies of people. Administration is “plumbing”–modeling, shepherding, managing expectations, supervising conflict, and planning.

The book concludes that it isn’t enough to have summits that recognize these themes or even to make resolves to change. Negotiating these changes with spouses and church leadership and finding continuing support from cohort participants is necessary to consolidate these insights. It seems to me that this may be the most critical insight in terms of pastoral transformation in the whole book.

The book includes appendices with various tools, the most helpful of which may be the emotions checklist, which helps one give a name to the emotions one feels (especially helpful for men). I would recommend this book as a resource to pastors, others in ministry, and to church or ministry leadership, who need to understand the stressors and key factors to pastoral success in order to support their pastors.

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