How Can I Revitalize My Church from the Pulpit?

00:00:00.000 | Well, today's episode zeroes in on pastoral leadership, but it's relevant for every Christian.

00:00:10.400 | How can a pastor revitalize a church from the pulpit?

00:00:14.880 | Question comes from Corey, an elder.

00:00:17.160 | Pastor John, hello and thank you for the podcast.

00:00:20.200 | This is admittedly a very broad leadership question and very open-ended, but if you were

00:00:25.200 | looking to refresh a church's vision and really set forth a compelling trajectory to inspire

00:00:30.500 | a whole local church forward in its work, what would you focus on?

00:00:35.000 | What would you preach on?

00:00:36.400 | How would you do it?

00:00:38.240 | First, let me clarify that I don't see this question relating to any particular season

00:00:47.540 | in the church, but relating to virtually every season in the church.

00:00:55.120 | I never thought, and I don't think now that we should think of seasons where a church

00:01:04.320 | doesn't need refreshment of its vision, picture of a compelling trajectory, strong inspiration

00:01:12.120 | of the whole church moving forward together.

00:01:15.840 | So I'm going to adjust the question in my mind and would encourage Corey to do the same.

00:01:23.920 | What the church needs every Sunday, every Sunday is fresh vision, compelling direction,

00:01:33.720 | deep and strong inspiration.

00:01:36.180 | If things are going to go well in the church and it's going to grow, this is going to be

00:01:42.960 | necessary.

00:01:43.960 | In fact, whether things are going well or going hard, if things are going well in the

00:01:49.880 | church, if it's growing, if people are coming under conviction of sin and repenting and

00:01:55.520 | being saved and being transformed into humble, godly mothers and fathers and children and

00:02:00.720 | single people and citizens and employees, and if missions are advancing and the budget

00:02:05.720 | is being met, what the church needs is the same thing in those moments that it needs

00:02:12.860 | when people are languishing and discouraged and growth is not happening and no one is

00:02:18.720 | getting saved.

00:02:20.280 | I never, in all my ministry, I don't think, I never took for granted that a moment of

00:02:28.800 | spiritual prosperity would last another week.

00:02:33.340 | It's just not the way people are.

00:02:36.120 | It's not the way institutions are.

00:02:38.880 | Our spiritual buckets can leak out in a week or be knocked over in a moment.

00:02:48.020 | Everything is fragile.

00:02:49.760 | From a human standpoint, if God withdraws His sustaining hand for one week, everyone

00:02:57.760 | will feel like things are falling apart.

00:03:00.960 | Everyone will be discouraged.

00:03:02.720 | Sin will take root.

00:03:05.020 | So when I answered the question about refreshing a church's vision and setting a compelling

00:03:13.280 | trajectory and inspiring everyone for the work ahead, I'm answering the question, "What

00:03:20.320 | is preaching?

00:03:22.120 | What is preaching?

00:03:23.760 | What do you do when you preach?"

00:03:27.080 | And my approach to vision and trajectory and inspiration was and is this.

00:03:36.440 | Week in and week out, stretch the mental and emotional capacities of your people with the

00:03:45.640 | greatness of God and the unsearchable riches of Christ and the grandeur of the work of

00:03:52.120 | salvation and the immeasurable glory of our eternal future at God's right hand with

00:03:57.680 | pleasures forevermore.

00:03:59.560 | That's my strategy.

00:04:00.960 | For example, back in the late 80s and 90s, we were turning the ship of our church in

00:04:07.480 | the area of global missions from a focus that was diffuse, say, toward a greater emphasis

00:04:15.960 | on unreached peoples and the concrete finishing of the Great Commission to get the gospel

00:04:22.880 | to all the peoples of the world.

00:04:25.320 | And I was doing a lot of speaking at missions conferences and to a lot of pastors, and they

00:04:31.760 | would ask me, "How do you get a church fired up for global missions, for evangelizing the

00:04:39.000 | whole world, for unreached peoples?"

00:04:42.480 | And it became clear to me pretty soon that my answer had to be this.

00:04:49.360 | You create vision and trajectory and inspiration for missions by not preaching about missions

00:04:59.200 | but about God, who happens to own the world, run the world, have a plan for the world that

00:05:07.520 | cannot fail, like, "This gospel will be preached as a witness to all the nations, and then

00:05:12.280 | the end will come," Matthew 24, 14.

00:05:14.800 | In other words, it seemed hopeless to me—still does—it seems hopeless to me to try to create

00:05:22.880 | a glorious vision for global missions on the back of a puny vision of God.

00:05:31.260 | And I would generalize that and say that's the problem in most programmatic churches.

00:05:38.680 | They desperately want to mobilize people with a vision for something like evangelism, small

00:05:45.760 | groups, justice issues, godly parenting, vibrant worship, and on and on.

00:05:54.200 | And these trajectories, these visions, are pursued prematurely.

00:06:00.240 | Whatever energy a pastor with a personality can stir up, it won't last.

00:06:05.760 | It just won't last.

00:06:07.640 | If it doesn't rest on a great, ever-growing vision of God, the greatness of God, the beauty

00:06:14.880 | of God, the worth of God, the wonder of God, the power and wisdom and justice and wrath

00:06:20.800 | and grace and patience and goodness and sovereignty of God.

00:06:26.040 | And this vision must be clarified every week, brightened in the eyes of our people every

00:06:33.160 | week.

00:06:34.160 | And if you ask, "So, Piper, you think we should preach on the doctrine of God every

00:06:42.600 | Sunday?"

00:06:43.600 | Well, actually, here's the way I would say it.

00:06:47.760 | No, preach on everything that is in the Bible, every imaginable, practical, nitty-gritty

00:06:56.920 | problem of your people.

00:06:59.960 | But every Sunday, trace this issue down to its deepest root and up into its highest branches.

00:07:11.240 | Preach about televisions and tennis shoes and sore throats and tattoos and football

00:07:18.560 | concussions and public schools and private schools and gluttony and laziness and workaholism

00:07:26.240 | and on and on and on.

00:07:27.840 | Christ relates to everything, absolutely everything.

00:07:30.760 | He's Lord of the universe.

00:07:33.480 | He's Lord of everything in your life, whether you eat pizza or drink Diet Coke, do all to

00:07:38.320 | the glory of God.

00:07:39.320 | That's an actual quote from 1 Corinthians 10:31.

00:07:44.040 | But when you take up these ordinary daily things, take them all the way up, all the

00:07:52.760 | way up.

00:07:53.760 | Here's the problem.

00:07:54.760 | If you don't take those up, it'll take them anywhere.

00:07:58.040 | They just become moralistic and practical, and they don't take them up, up, and become

00:08:03.360 | uniquely God-centered, all the way up into God.

00:08:08.200 | Make people see the greatness of God.

00:08:11.500 | If you're going to talk about tattoos or $300 tennis shoes or overeating, bring these things

00:08:18.400 | and bring your people up into a whole new world, a whole new world of vision about how

00:08:25.640 | to live and how to think and how to feel everything in relation to the greatness and the glory

00:08:31.520 | and the grandeur of God.

00:08:35.160 | Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised, greatly to be known, greatly to be loved,

00:08:42.600 | greatly to be served, greatly to be desired and enjoyed.

00:08:47.180 | And that's true all the time, all the time, in every relationship, in every issue, in

00:08:52.480 | every sermon.

00:08:54.280 | Nobody comes into the world with this experience.

00:08:58.800 | It is a miracle, a gift of the Holy Spirit, and one of the ways, one of the ways—and

00:09:05.960 | oh, I love this because God's called me to it—one of the ways, the great ways of

00:09:13.200 | wakening people to the greatness of God and the greatness of His praise is preaching.

00:09:20.160 | So that's my approach.

00:09:21.860 | Take up every issue, every vision, every trajectory, and take it all the way up into the greatness

00:09:29.080 | of God every week.

00:09:31.500 | All the way up.

00:09:32.500 | That's great, Pastor John.

00:09:33.800 | Thank you for this incredible reminder.

00:09:35.520 | And Corey, thanks for the email question.

00:09:37.560 | Do you have a question for Pastor John?

00:09:39.960 | Send it our way.

00:09:40.960 | It's at DesiringGod.org/AskPastorJohn.

00:09:45.360 | And thank you for listening along.

00:09:46.520 | Be sure to subscribe to Ask Pastor John in your favorite podcast app or in YouTube to

00:09:51.440 | listen to episodes as we release them.

00:09:54.360 | And the weekend meets us once again.

00:09:56.160 | We return next week with—I'm not quite sure, but I think we're going to have an

00:10:00.440 | episode on Monday.

00:10:01.440 | My guess is we will, but I don't know what the topic will be.

00:10:05.120 | So we'll all be surprised on Monday.

00:10:06.840 | I'm your host, Tony Reinke.

00:10:07.840 | We'll see you then.

00:10:08.840 | Lord willing.

00:10:09.520 | Amen.

00:10:10.020 | [end]

00:10:12.020 | [music]

00:10:14.020 | [music]

00:10:16.020 | [BLANK_AUDIO]

How Can I Revitalize My Church from the Pulpit?

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