Hebrews 12; Hebrews 13; Jude 1
Why We Should Obey and Follow Our Senior Pastor?
Scripture
Hebrews 13
17 Obey your spiritual leaders, and do what they say. Their work is to watch over your souls, and they are accountable to God. Give them reason to do this with joy and not with sorrow. That would certainly not be for your benefit.
Observation
Could you just read this verse over and over about 20 times so you make sure that you grasp the importance of obeying those who are spiritual leaders over you! I was senior pastor of Tampa Baptist Church for 8 years until a year ago when we gave birth to our new church Christ Fellowship and Pastor Bruce Moore assumed leadership. I can’t emphasize enough the importance of obeying our spiritual leader.
During those eight years that I was pastor of the church we modified the way we did worship and we modified the way we taught our children, youth, and adults. This past week I learned from my brother in law that the word “modify” is a lot better sounding word than the word “change”. I wish he had told me that 9 years ago. As we made these modifications (changes) I had quite a few people leave our church. These were people that I had known many for over 30 years and you don’t know how it broke my heart. They couldn’t go along with my spiritual leadership and they thought it best to go to another fellowship. It was the right thing for them to do if they could not obey their pastor and follow his spiritual leadership. I still consider them my friends today and I want God’s best for them.
Pastor Bruce Moore is now our spiritual leader. If you understand the significance of this verse it would do you well to follow his leadership. He is my pastor. He is my leader. He is also my friend. One day he will give an account to God for how he watches over my soul and how he takes care of all of my family. He is accountable to God for how he takes care of us at Christ Fellowship.
I tried quite a few things during my 8 years as pastor that didn’t work very well. But the church stuck with me and almost everyone supported my leadership. Pastor Bruce will try lots of things to help our church grow and become the church God wants it to be. They are probably not all going to be super successful, but I hope that we can jump in and support him as he leads us. We will always be “modifying” the way we do things at Christ Fellowship and that is just the way it ought to be if we are going to reach our city for Christ!
Application
I totally support our senior pastor and I will pray for he and his family daily. How about you?
Prayer
Heavenly Father, we have a wonderful exciting church. I am amazed at what You are doing at Christ Fellowship. I praise You for allowing us to have Pastor Bruce serve as our senior pastor. I pray that Your Hand would remain on our gathering and that You would continue to bless us. I am so excited about all of the men and women that have said “yes” to serving and are making a huge difference every Sunday. I pray for Pastor Bruce and Heather and their daughter Gwen. I pray that You give them the desires of their hearts. I pray that You answer their prayers and I pray that You make their plans successful. (Psalm 20) Amen
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