The following is the manuscript from a sermon I preached in my homiletics class. It was not written for others to read, and was aimed at future ministry leaders. That said, I think others might be interested in some of the insights so I decided to post it.
Principles of Ministry: 1 Thessalonians 2:1-12
By Taylor Lamb
So imagine you graduate from Ouachita, work in several small ministries for a couple years. Then you decide become the pastor of a small Baptist Church. The church is made up of less than 200 people. Once you become the pastor, what do you do now? What can you expect? You might ask, what can God do with a church like this? Depending on who you ask, you could get a number of answers. If, however, you decided to ask Matt Chandler, he might surprise you. Straight out of a Bible college very similar to Ouachita, Chandler participated in several ministries before coming the Pastor of First Baptist Church of Highland Village. The church consisted of 160 people when he began his pastorship. Following Christ’s direction, Matt and his team began implementing ministry strategies and changing the theological culture in the Church. God blessed this ministry, and several years later the church now has over 5000 members and two satellite campuses, and is known as The Village. Now I am not saying that numbers mean everything, nor do I think that every ministry that God blesses will blow up to the proportion of the Village. However, as someone who wants to go into ministry, I can’t help but look at them and wonder what it is that makes the church so successful. I want to know what it is that makes that ministry so fruitful. Now obviously, God is the source of this growth, and he led the leaders of the Village as they made decisions, just as he leads other church leaders at other churches. However, there seems to be something different about the village. When I go there I just feel the community, the faith, and the spirit of God working.
Has this sort of thing ever happened to you? Have you ever encountered a ministry or seen the results of a ministry and thought, “man, they are doing something right”? When you see disciples being made and people growing in Christ you see that whatever ministry that they are plugged into is being led with wisdom and is being a very effective tool of the kingdom. Paul’s (and his crew’s) first letter to the Thessalonians has this sort of feel to it. Paul sees that the Church in Thessalonica is doing very well. They are bearing fruit, withstanding tribulation, and they are flourishing. Paul is taking notice of the tremendous faith he sees in the Thessalonian Church. In chapter two, we see Paul reminding the Thessalonians of the nature of his ministry to them, for it was actually he who started the church in Thessalonica. Now as we look into this description, we can see several of Paul’s ministry principles. These principles, having been part of the foundation of a very successful ministry, can give us a good insight as to how to go about ministry. Now please hear me when I say this: I am not giving a formula for a good or successful ministry, and I am not excluding God’s leading. I am simply observing several aspects of Paul’s ministry to the Thessalonians, and I, knowing that this was a very fruitful ministry, want to see if maybe we can get an insight as to how we might go about things as we ourselves go into ministry.
So let’s look at what Paul ways in Chapter two.
2 For you yourselves know, brothers, that our coming to you was not in vain. 2 But though we had already suffered and been shamefully treated at Philippi, as you know, we had boldness in our God to declare to you the gospel of God in the midst of much conflict. 3 For our appeal does not spring from error or impurity or any attempt to deceive, 4 but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak, not to please man, but to please God who tests our hearts. 5 For we never came with words of flattery, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed—God is witness. 6 Nor did we seek glory from people, whether from you or from others, though we could have made demands as apostles of Christ. 7 But we were gentle among you, like a nursing mother taking care of her own children. 8 So, being affectionately desirous of you, we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you had become very dear to us.
9 For you remember, brothers, our labor and toil: we worked night and day, that we might not be a burden to any of you, while we proclaimed to you the gospel of God. 10 You are witnesses, and God also, how holy and righteous and blameless was our conduct toward you believers. 11 For you know how, like a father with his children, 12 we exhorted each one of you and encouraged you and charged you to walk in a manner worthy of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory.
So Paul starts out in verse one by stating that his trip to Thessalonica was not in vain. It was a fruitful and successful journey, despite the fact that he was forced to leave earlier than he had planned. This might be why Paul seems so excited and surprised throughout the letter – he probably didn’t expect to hear that the church was flourishing because he had to leave before he felt his work was done.
So after showing us that this ministry was not in vain, Paul goes on to discuss some aspects of his ministry to the Thessalonians, and I think we can, without formulizing, get several tips and insights into how Paul was able to present the gospel and nurture his disciples in Thessalonica in a way that honored God and produced fruit.
First of all, Paul did not let previous setbacks and failures affect his ministry. We see in verse 2 that Paul refers to an ordeal in Philippi just previous to his coming to preach to the Thessalonians. “But though we had already suffered and been shamefully treated at Philippi, as you know, we had boldness in our God to declare to you the gospel of God in the midst of much conflict.” This episode in Philippi is described in Acts 16. Paul and Silas had just cast a spirit out of a slave girl who had a spirit of divination. Her owners, who profited from her abilities, were not very happy about this, so they took Paul and Silas and had them beaten and imprisoned. This would have been very humiliating, not to mention painful, for Paul and Silas because, as Roman citizens, they were exempt from this sort of treatment. After being imprisoned, however, they were later miraculously freed from the prison, but then met even more opposition. The leaders of the city basically kicked them out of town so they wouldn’t cause anymore trouble. And in verse two Paul describes this ordeal as shameful and suffering, so we know that he was by no means happy about it. However, he goes onto say that he had “boldness” in God to declare the gospel to the Thessalonians despite the conflict which had arisen. Paul didn’t let his previous setbacks affect his ministry to the Thessalonians. That’s not to say he didn’t learn anything from his past ordeals. But the point is that with boldness from God, not of himself, he persevered, and had faith in God enough to move on to what God had for him to do next.
If you keep up with college football at all, you know all about the Alabama Crimson Tide. Don’t you dare tell Jesse Pruett that I am using an Alabama illustration. But they are a power house in football. Earlier this year they were championship bound, with an undefeated season. However, they lost a heartbreaker against L.S.U. by three points. Now many teams would have a hard time recovering from this. However, they didn’t let this affect the rest of the games they were to play. They have continued to persevere in the toughest conference in football and have won out. Now, after some crazy turns of events, they have another chance to play for the National Championship. But they never would have had that chance if they had let that loss affect the rest of their games. But they moved on, put it in the past, and persevered. In the same way, Paul could have been hesitant to preach again after being beaten, jailed and kicked out of town, but he didn’t. His faith gave him the boldness he needed to preach in “his next game” which was Thessalonica. In the same way, as ministers, we will, at some point, be put in tough situations. Maybe they don’t lead to us getting kicked out of town, but they sure might. It may be as miniscule as an unsuccessful VBS or as big as being fired for saying something that bothered the Deacons. It could even be discouragement from preaching. L.J., have you ever been discouraged after speaking? Have you ever thought that you just didn’t do as good as you could? Yes? We could count that as a bad experience. Now if L.J. had assumed that he shouldn’t preach anymore after that then we would be missing out on some dang good preaching at Refuge. Now we see that whatever the case, we should move on to what God has for us next with boldness. If we are faithful in following his will, then we are in the right place. We cannot let past ministry experiences hinder our future ones. That is not to say we shouldn’t learn from those experiences, just that we should not let them keep us from doing what God wants us to do next. Moving on, we see that once Paul moved from his past bad experiences in Philippi into his ministry at Thessalonica, there were several ideas that he was very intentional about implementing in his ministry.
In verses 3 through 6 we see that Paul emphasizes that he did not speak to please men, but to please God. “For our appeal does not spring from error or impurity or any attempt to deceive, but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak, not to please man, but to please God who tests our hearts. For we never came with words of flattery, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed – God is witness. Nor did we seek glory from people whether from you or from others though we could have made demands as apostles of Christ.”
Paul was often accused of preaching to please men. This is partly because of his commitment to become all things to all men, which he explains in 1 Corinthians 9. The idea is that he becomes what he needs to become in order to relate to people and thus share the gospel with them. Often times this method is misinterpreted and seen simply as people pleasing. Paul insists in verses 3 and 4, however, that he had no intention to deceive or trick anyone into the gospel. He says he has been approved by God, who knows his heart, and that his heart was pure. As evidence he gives verses 5 and 6: “For we never came with words of flattery, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed – God is witness. Nor did we seek glory from people, whether from you or from others, though we could have made demands as apostles of Christ.” Paul says that the Thessalonians themselves know, because they have seen with their own eyes, that he never spoke to flatter people or in order for him to gain anything for himself.
How many times in our churches do we hear complaining about the youth program or the worship music or a new outreach program? I specifically remember a friend of mine critiquing the youth ministry at his church for getting a popcorn machine to convince kids to come to church. He said that it was getting away from the heart of the gospel. It was a slippery slope, which would lead to more and more attractions. He didn’t want to trick kids into coming and then ask them to get saved on the side. He thought that the motive behind the means was wrong. Contemporary music was at one time, and in more conservative churches still is, a huge ordeal. Is our music becoming modern in order to let the people worship better and bring glory to God? Or is it being modern to be seen as the cool modern church. Is our old music to worship God or to please the older people in the church, who are the ones who give the most money? Is it for our glory or for God’s glory?
These are things we will have to think through throughout our lives. We have to find the balance between becoming all things, and not deceiving or flattering, or bringing glory to ourselves. So how do we determine this? Paul says that the heart is the key. So when we do different outreaches or programs, what is our heart? Often times we can be blurred by the allure of drawing numbers just to draw numbers. We get caught up in competing with the size of other churches. Or sometimes we present half of the gospel in order to get more kids to pray a prayer and say they are saved. When we think we might be borderline here, we must ask if we are trying to please men or trying to please God. When we draw numbers, are we planning on preaching the hard truth which might in fact upset some people, or are we preaching a fun whim so that they come back again next week, though they never really change. When we present the gospel, are we presenting what God wants us to present, or are we telling half truths about salvation so we can tell the deacons we saved a bunch of kids? As ministers, we must make sure that every time we step before people to speak we do not speak to increase our glory. Our motive cannot be to be to make people think that we are smart, or holy, or likeable. Our motive must be to glorify God. That being said, we must ask ourselves: Does what we do and say glorify God, or does it glorify ourselves?
To illustrate our last point, I want to explain part of a movie to you. Now I know that this class is mainly guys, but I am going to have to use a chick-flick. The movie How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days is the story of a guy and a girl starting a relationship. The catch is that they both secretly have impure motives. The girl is in the relationship simply to write a story in her magazine column about how a girl can get a guy she doesn’t like to dump her. She is dating him simply so they can break up in 10 days. The guy is in the relationship to prove he can get a girl to fall in love with him -- a bet he made, which, if he wins, will result in some serious financial gains. The funny part is, when they each find out that the other is using them for selfish gain, they are each furious with the other. They realized that everything they had experienced was all just a play so that the other could benefit. Now, of course, in the movie they end up falling in love, but that’s not how it happens in real life. When someone does something for us, we are generally thankful. But if we know that they had a selfish reason to do this then we do not think of it as generous, but as selfish. When Tiger Woods used Nike Golf clubs in commercials, golfers might think: “I want to use those!” But when he realizes that Tiger doesn’t actually use them, but only did in commercials in order to get sponsorship money, Tiger’s example is now void. His ulterior motives ruin the advice he gives.
For this reason, Paul makes it clear that he did not preach for his own financial gain, which is our last point. Verses 5 and 6 have already stated Paul’s insistence that his motives were not from greed. And in verse 9 he shows the believers that he “worked day and night, that we might not be a burden to any of you.” Now this is interesting because, as he states in verse 6, Paul had the authority, as an apostle of Christ, to “make demands,” or to be supported financially by the church in Thessalonica. He goes into more detail on this in 1 Corinthians 9, basically saying that ministers have the right to be supported by their congregations. However, it is interesting that, throughout his missionary journeys, Paul insists on not taking money from the people which he is ministering to. He is either supported by other churches, or by his own labor, as in Thessalonica. By accepting support from other churches though (and 1 Cor. 9), we see that he is certainly not against accepting money from his congregations. So why does Paul not accept money from the Thessalonians? Simple. To be absolutely clear sure that his motive was not financial gain. To show that he was not benefiting financially by preaching to them. There were many religious “teachers” who traveled around speaking and basically mooched off of their followers. They expected to be paid and supported by their followers, and thus did not receive much respect. For the sake of the integrity of the gospel, Paul did not want there to even be a chance of that suspicion, so he decided to be above reproach while he was with them. Instead of accepting money, he worked day and night, most likely making tents or working leather in order to support himself. In 2 Thessalonians he mentions that he never took a piece of bread without paying for it. Paul was extremely intentional about making it clear that his goal was not financial gain, but the advancement of the gospel.
So how can we apply this principle today? Pastors generally have much more long term jobs than Paul did. Are they to not accept money from the churches they work at? After reading 1 Corinthians 9, that is probably not the case. What about when we work a DNow or lead worship? In all of these cases, we should without doubt apply the principle, which is being crystal clear about our motives, which are in no way financial gain.
As college students we should definitely check our hearts when entering a ministry. If one of your first concerns with doing a ministry is how much you are getting paid, you might be seeking financial gain. It is one thing to be unable to perform the task without being paid for gas or the like, but it is another to be completely capable without being paid, but still requiring payment.
When we enter pastorship roles, we must be very intentional about the way we discuss our salaries with churches, if it is in fact a discussion. We should, as Paul says, be supported by our congregations. But as Paul also says, financial gain should not be our motive. And not only that, we must go as far as it takes and give up as much as we have to in order to make it clear to our congregation that money is not our motive. It is not enough to simply have a pure heart. If the purest pastor in the world has a bad reputation he will have a hard time convincing a congregation that he is genuine. The congregation must know to their core that we are of pure motive. What might this mean? It might mean not arguing for that raise in order to make sure that people realize that it isn’t your biggest concern. Maybe it means accepting a pay cut happily, and doing what you can on the side to make ends meet. I have heard few financial quotes better than this one: “You don’t get paid for doing ministry; You get paid so that you can do ministry.” We must be happy with just enough if we are serious about not tainting the gospel. That is not to say that we should insist on near poverty as ministers. If our church can give us a very comfortable salary then that is great, granted we use it wisely. We just can’t require it. As ministers, our attitude can not be “I’m a pastor who works hard so I should make plenty of money.” Our attitude should be “I’m a pastor and God (granted it is in his will) will provide enough for me to continue to do that.”
So as we mentioned at the beginning, we should learn from fruitful ministries. We should be eager to glean wisdom and direction from those who know more than we do. When we look at fruitful ministries like Paul’s in Thessalonica, or the Village Church in Dallas, we see that the leaders are very intentional about several things. Their main goal is to glorify God. They will do whatever it takes to glorify God. Through that lens, they do not let their past experiences hinder their next assignment. They move on from mistakes or bad times and have faith that God is strong enough to over come them. They act and speak to please God, not men. The teaching is not shallow, for they know that God will test their hearts. And finally they do not minister out of greed for praise or financial benefit. As ministers we must be willing to sacrifice approval and money for the sake of the gospel. As we go out into ministry, I think these are three of the most important principles we can have.
