17 Reflections on 17 Years of Pastoral Ministry
This month my wife and I celebrate 17 years of full-time pastoral ministry. In October 2009, five months after our wedding, I was called as Youth Minister at Pellville Baptist Church in Hawesville, KY. A year and a half later, on May 1, 2011, I was called as Pastor of Fordsville Baptist Church. A little less than two years after that I made my most recent, and what I pray will be my final, ministry transition. In February 2013, I was called as a Pastor of Christ Community Church. Considering 17 years of full-time vocational pastoral ministry, I offer 17 personal reflections:
1.) The gospel of Jesus Christ is everything. The good news of Jesus saved me at a very young age, and by God’s grace, it has been and will be my life’s work.
2.) I am eternally grateful for Pastor Kevin McGuire. I have a vivid memory from when I was a young pastor and seminary student of walking through Honeycutt Hall at Southern Seminary telling my college roommate, Brady, “I wish I had an older pastor, a mentor, a man I looked up to, and trusted, to help me in ministry.” Not long after that Pastor Kevin called me, asking me to come home. I could fill pages with what he means to me as a co-pastor, mentor, father figure, and friend.
3.) The ministry of the pastor is the preaching of the Word and the administration of the sacraments. Pastoral ministry includes other work too - counseling, administration, weddings, funerals, to name a few, but the most important work of the pastor is preaching the Word and administering the sacraments.
4.) Preach Christ, and then preach Christ some more, and after that, preach Christ. Every sermon must make clear how the passage reveals the good news of Jesus and the call to faith and repentance.
5.) Humility is the most important Christian discipline. The choice between humility and pride colors every thought, word, and deed. The pattern of Jesus is humility.
6.) Theology matters. Reformed theology makes the most sense of the Scripture and the world. More to the point, Reformed theology is intensely practical. A high view of God’s sovereignty, a sober confession of the insidious nature of sin, and utter trust in Christ will serve you well in sin and suffering.
7.) Elder rule is the healthiest and most biblical ecclesiology. Having solo pastored for a season in Kentucky, I cannot overstate how grateful I am for my fellow pastor/elders at CCC. I’m so thankful for all the men I’ve pastored with these last 13+ years - Kevin McGuire, my dad, Randy Loginow, Bobby Owens, Gerry Chapoux, Mike Champoux, my cousin, Dr. Brett Eckel, my brother, Andrew Loginow, Zack McGuire, and Shane Sluka. They are a gift to our church, and they are a gift to me.
8.) Shepherding people means being with people. Shepherds smell like sheep. If a man loves teaching, but doesn’t want to spend time with the laity, he should become a professor, or start a podcast, or do anything but pastor.
9.) Pastoring demands a thick skin and a tender heart. This dual disposition would serve any Christian well, but ministry will be impossible otherwise. Sheep bite. When you’re in the gospel trenches of sin and suffering, spiritual bullets are flying, and no minister exits unscathed. As a result, many quit the ministry. The only chance of perseverance is to pray for thick skin and a tender heart.
10.) I feel a distinct gratitude for those who came before, a fervent prayer to pass the church on to the next generation, and a desire for the discipline to be present in the here and now. The balance is hard, but to possess all 3 simultaneously (like I do with CCC) is a gift from God.
11.) You can’t make new old friends. God has been kind to allow me an unusual number of old friends at CCC. Our histories are rich and our trust is deep.
12.) Keep making new friends. Old friends are a gift and so are new friends.
13.) “Preach, pray, love, stay;” I once heard Dr. Mark Dever say such is the ambition of the pastor. What an ambition!
14.) Formal theological education has served me in pastoral ministry. I wouldn’t trade my time on campus at SBTS for anything. The 12 years I spent earning a Bachelor of Arts in Biblical and Theological Studies at Boyce College, the Master of Divinity, and the Doctor of Ministry in Expository Preaching at Southern Seminary has cultivated in me a love for Scripture, theology, Greek, research, writing, and teaching, to name a few. Not every pastor has the opportunity I did for formal theological study, but for those who do, it is an unmatched formative experience, and worth the investment.
15.) Pastoring my parents has been a blessing unlike many others. I served on the elder board with my dad. I pastored my mom for a decade before the Lord took her home. Every other Sunday after my sermon, my mom would embarrass me praising my preaching. I had the honor of officiating her funeral. I still get to pastor my father to this day. My parents taught me the gospel and God allowed me to teach them the gospel.
16.) I will not sacrifice my kids on the altar of ministry. So many pastors neglect their families for ministry - whether that is because they don’t know how to tell people, “No,” or they feel guilty about some modern corporate expectation of what ministry looks like, or any other arbitrary reason. I’m so grateful that such a foolish and wicked culture does not exist at CCC. The elasticity of my schedule has allowed me to spend time with my children, to be at all their events, to be around when they’re around. One of the biblical qualifications regard a pastor’s relationship to his children. Alex, Jr., Jack, Haddon, Sophia, Anastasia, and Evangeline are God’s gift to me and I will not trade a healthy relationship with them for anything, including the title of pastor.
17.) My wife Bethany is not only my partner in ministry, but she is also my ministry. A faithful marriage is among the qualifications for ministry - if we divorced, or if I committed adultery, I would be disqualified from pastoral ministry (1st Tim 3.2; Tit 1.6). But the disqualifying consequences are not the only motivation for tending the garden of our marriage. She is my wife, my one-flesh. She is the mother of my children. She is my best friend. She has long said that she experienced a call to the ministry of pastor’s wife separate from my own calling, before we were together. Those two separate callings and convictions have eased much tension for us that other couples in ministry face. I have no ministry without her.