One day, I was engaging the work of a pastor – still, after 30 years or so, trying to figure it out week by week and sometimes day by day. Then, the next day, I was an expert. I moved from the parish ministry to the seminary classroom, the “Professor of Pastoral Leadership.” I pondered what I had learned over those years that might be of benefit to these young students.

One day, I was engaging the work of a pastor – still, after 30 years or so, trying to figure it out week by week and sometimes day by day.

Then, the next day, I was an expert. I moved from the parish ministry to the seminary classroom, the “Professor of Pastoral Leadership.”

I pondered what I had learned over those years that might be of benefit to these young students.

A few months into the new role, I was invited to address a group of pastors from a very different perspective – not about what I had learned in the pastorate, but what I was learning about the pastorate from being out of it.

It does all look different from the pew, to tell the truth. So, here are 10 things I’m learning about pastoral ministry by no longer being the pastor of a congregation.

1.  Community is not to be taken for granted.
I had no clue as to the challenge people are up against when they come to our churches. They find friendly people, but those friendly people already have friends.

Many Sundays we found ourselves staring at each other after worship. “Where do you want to go eat?”

“I don’t know; where do you want to go?”

The friendly people who smiled and shook our hands to welcome us had gone on to eat with their real friends.

How many times had I done the same thing as I met new people at our church? How hard had new members had to work to find their way into the warm fellowship that we took for granted? How many didn’t have the perseverance?

2.  The work done on preaching is time well-spent.
It is a comfort to know that when my pastor takes the pulpit, he comes prepared with something I need to hear from Scripture. It means a lot to me that such careful, prayerful work has been done.
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