Praying for Your Shepherd

“To speak evil of no one, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle, and to show perfect courtesy toward all people.” Titus 3:2

Yesterday we started to unpack this little zinger from the Apostle Paul. I made a comment about encouraging your Pastor, and I am sure it wasn’t a coincidence, I am reading a new book compiled by Dr. John Piper — The Power of Words and the Wonder of God. It is published by Crossway, and I will be sure to get it on the Keswick Bookstore site.

In a chapter written by Pastor Mark Driscoll, he exhorts us to pray for our shepherds. Here is what Mark shares:

Sheep need to be fed, swine need to be rebuked, wolves need to be shot and dogs need to be beaten. Most of this work is to be done by the shepherds. So the shepherds need prayer.

If you are a shepherd, you know that you need prayer. If you are a sheep, please do pray for your shepherd so that your heart would be tender toward him, and his heart would be tender toward God and God’s sheep. It would be most helpful to your shepherd if, before you rush to criticize him, you would spend time in prayer for him. In fact, you should pray for your shepherd more than you criticize him.

Seven Ways to Pray for Your Shepherd

1. Pray that God would give your shepherd a discerning mind. Your shepherd need to discern who the sheep, swine, wolves and dogs are so that he know how he and the church should respond.

2. Pray that God would give your shepherd thick skin. Critics can be merciless, and Judas-like friends can be even crueler. Your shepherd receives mean-spirited emails from the people he cares for, suffers from constant gossip and rumors about him and his family, and spends hours every day simply turning the other cheek. When he fails, he is criticized for being a poor leader. And when he succeeds, he is criticized by those who are jealous. When he is young,m he is criticized for being inexperienced and arrogant. And when he is old, he is criticized for not being as energetic, passionate, and innovative as when he was young. Pray that your shepherd would have thick skin and selective hearing to ignore people and comments he should — and yet to receive the people and comment he should.

3. Pray that your shepherd would have a good sense of humor. With a good sense of humor, shepherds will be overcome with anxiety and stress and will miss wonderful opportunities to laugh deeply from the gut as an act of faith. Shepherds are imperfect as are their individual sheep (sorry, but it’s true!) and their collective flock.

Ministry is pressure, and humors is a good release valve that helps to relieve the pressure. Without the release valve of humor, the pressure on a shepherd increases until he simply breaks. This break will be spiritual, emotional, mental, or physical depending upon the weakest cracks in his life. Too many shepherd break. Some leave ministry altogether, while others limp along as their outlook grows bleaker, darker and more somber.