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Hello, fellow wayfarers … What 30 years of ministry have taught me, in a list of 30 disconnected thoughts … Why a reader thought I should listen to a Canadian singer-songwriter I’d never encountered before … How a retired general taught me about character in leadership … A Buckeye State Desert Island Bookshelf … This is this week’s Moore to the Point. |
30 Things I’ve Learned in 30 Years of Ministry |
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Last week on August 6 marked the 30th (!) anniversary of my ordination to ministry by the Bay Vista Baptist Church in my hometown of Biloxi, Mississippi. I’m recognizing the milestone this week by offering you 30 things I’ve learned in 30 years in ministry. |
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I do not claim that these are the 30 most important things I’ve learned. If I tried to do that, I would procrastinate forever, weighing how one thing is more important than something else. So instead, I am tricking myself by forcing myself to do it randomly, not allowing myself time to think between each of these bullet points. |
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Some of the points are ones I’ve made before; some have never occurred to me until right now. They are in no particular order except in how they occurred to me as I wrote them down. Here they are. |
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1.) In preparing to preach, teach, and in everything else I’ve done, immersion since childhood in the Scriptures was more important than graduate and postgraduate education in systematic theology. |
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2.) Hymnody is more important than “vision statements” or “mission statements” or almost anything else. The hymns are what seep into the broken places and the hidden places. Replacing them with ephemeral, forgettable, and always-changing music is insane. |
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3.) That said, alongside the hymns, I realize how much of my theology and sense of the world was formed by the contemporary Christian music I listened to as a teenager. Michael Card songs taught me hermeneutics. Rich Mullins and Amy Grant songs taught me to pray. Petra songs taught me a “happy warrior” approach to spiritual battle. |
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4.) After years of teaching preaching at the seminary level, I ultimately concluded that I could help people to shape and form and get better at a gift they already have, but I couldn’t teach it. Preaching is about a way of seeing, a way of inhabiting a text, and it’s more about affection for and obsession with the Bible than it is about communication ability. That has to just be there; it can’t be taught. |
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5.) Most of the theological errors I’ve found in myself or in others can usually be boiled down to confusing an “either/or” with a “both/and” statement or vice versa. The distinction is important. To put a “both/and” on the question of “the Lord or Baal” or “Jesus or mammon” is deadly. To put an “either/or” on questions of divine providence versus human freedom, truth versus love, faith versus obedience, gospel versus justice, and so on, is too. |
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6.) Early on, I assumed that rigorous theology was the answer to cultural, nominal Christianity. I assumed that people who were steeped in theology were spiritually mature. I found, quite often, just the opposite: Many of those who were deep in theological systems turned out to be hacks, selling out what they believe for politics or denominational belonging or money. And some of those I thought were “pragmatists” or “mystics” turned out to be those who really stood by what they believed. |
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7.) My mind was often wrong, but my gut rarely was. When I thought, “This person gives off a creepy vibe, but I seem to be the only one who notices” or “This person is filled with rage but is so important to the kingdom, so I should overlook it” or “This leader is, behind closed doors, talking about crazy things, but he’s smarter than I am, so I shouldn’t question it”—I should have trusted my gut and would have avoided much heartache. Once, 30 years ago, I attended a purportedly “Calvinist” meeting at which I said, “This seems to be more about neo-Confederate ancestor cultism than about the grace of God, but that must just be my immaturity.” My first intuition proved to be true. |
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8.) Because as a child, my father—growing up a pastor’s son in a parsonage—had such a bad experience seeing the darker side of church tensions, I resolved to do my best to keep my children from seeing such. I realized just how successful I was at this when one of my adult sons called, preparing to give his “spiritual autobiography” to a new church in the faraway state where he had moved, and asked me, “One thing: looking over this, I realize that we were always in Southern Baptist churches, and then we were at a nondenominational church; is there any backstory to that?” |
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9.) Consider a complementarian who believes that certain biblical texts differentiate a few offices between men and women and an egalitarian who believes the full authority of the Bible but believes the texts in question don’t say what the complementarian says they do. These two have more in common with each other than either does with the “complementarian” who thinks everything is about gender wars or who has a creepy psychological problem with women or with the “egalitarian” who thinks Paul and Peter were misogynists. The “two-party” system on this stuff—which I once accepted at face value—is nonsensical and dangerous. |
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10.) I assumed as a youth pastor that I would “grow out” of youth ministry, but I have learned it is all youth ministry. Getting a group of teenagers to Glorieta, New Mexico, for Centrifuge—while dealing with who refuses to sit next to whom, who is hiding marijuana in the bottom of the Doritos bag, and who is jealous that so-and-so is talking to somebody else—is all the exact same skill set as leading a church, a faculty, a nonprofit, or organizing a coalition in the Oval Office. |
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11.) I’ve counseled lots of couples through one cheating on the other. In most of those cases, the cheated-on spouse assumed that he or she was partly to blame for not being attractive enough or sexy enough. I have literally not once ever seen that to be the case. In almost every case, the cheater wasn’t looking for sex but for the feeling of being an adolescent again, with the hormonal rush of “I like you; do you like me?” |
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12.) The most dangerous and damnable heresy is treating Jesus like a means to an end—political mobilization, marketing a product, financial blessing, or whatever. It doesn’t matter what the “end” is or how theologically sophisticated one is in getting there. The way of Simon Magus (Acts 8:18–23) always leads to hell. |
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13.) You can’t avoid criticism. Decide in advance what kind of criticism you would want to be said and remembered about you at your graveside, and then don’t let it crush you when it comes. |
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14.) Everybody talks about “standing on their convictions” or “having a countercultural Christian worldview.” Most of this is fake. You can usually only see it’s fake when the “convictions” cost membership in the tribe. If you don’t adapt, you will find that many people—even those who privately agree with you—will urge you to lie, to apologize for what you don’t think was wrong or to throw out red meat to the base in order to divert their attention. |
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15.) Praying is easy for some people while, for them, reading the Bible is hard. The reverse is true for me. I need to write down my prayers or to offer them while walking, alone. That’s not any more or less spiritual than anybody else, just what works for me. Finding that out about oneself is important. |
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16.) When guest speaking somewhere, there will almost always be someone who wants an ahead-of-time call to go over how to use the microphone or to tell you that the question-and-answer session will follow the message, not precede it. This makes them feel better, but is a waste of their time and yours. If you're performing a concert, arriving an hour early for a mic check and sound check is probably necessary. To preach a sermon or to give a lecture, it is not. |
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17.) Wisdom is not optional, and it’s about more than knowing facts. Solomon demonstrated wisdom by knowing human nature generally and “reading” specific people’s actions and motives particularly (1 Kings 3:16–28). Solomon’s greater son did too (John 2:23–25). You need to get to know psychologies very different from your own. Along with immersion in the text of the Bible, paying attention when counseling people will help, as will reading good fiction. |
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18.) Most things you think are cul-de-sacs or dry times in your ministry turn out not to be. They are almost always the points where—much later in your life—you will look back and see that God was most at work, preparing you for something else. |
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19.) Keep notes of encouragement that come to you over the years. You will need them later. Sometimes keep notes of criticism. I can think of one of them that helped me: “You always look to the right side of the sanctuary and never over to the left when you’re preaching.” And I have framed one of them: “Russell Moore is … a nasty man with no heart,” which makes me laugh sometimes. |
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20.) Keep a journal, if you can. It will help you to remember ordinary graces you will forget, and it will also show you that almost everything you worried about turned out to be either something that never happened or something that was bearable. |
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21.) Friendships matter. You will find that there are a lot of people who will use you for your gifts. If you can find that small group of people who will love you even if you were to leave ministry entirely to work the night shift at the mortuary, these are the people you need to keep close to you always. If you’re married, the most important of these is your spouse—who must be, of course, much more than a friend but not less. |
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22.) People will tell you to separate out your Bible reading for devotion and for preparation to teach. Take the truth of what they mean, and then discard this advice. If you separate these two strictly, you are secularizing. If you’re not reading the Bible because it fascinates you and motivates you, you are not going to teach it well. And while reading the Bible on your own, if you don’t start thinking about how you would communicate it to others, you aren’t really a teacher. The goal is to be so in the Bible that you forget whether you’re reading it because you love it or because you’re preparing a sermon or a lesson. |
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23.) If you’re in a “lower church” tradition, people will tell you that you should space out the Lord’s Supper because if you do it too often, people will get bored with it. If people are bored with being fed by Jesus—of having a sign enacted of his communion with his people, of his death, burial, and resurrection, of the oneness of his body—then that’s the emergency. You don’t solve this by serving the Lord’s Supper less often but more often. |
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24.) Cynicism feels self-protective and sophisticated. If you always assume the worst, you will, in a fallen world, often end up right. But it’s just fear—and it will deaden you. When you start to become cynical, you are hearing the Devil. Fight like hell against it. |
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25.) We tend to overreact to the last bad thing. When we decided evangelism programs were overly programmed, we stopped training people—and left people without the mental “hooks” they needed to maintain conversations about spiritual things. When we decided altar calls could be manipulative, we ended them, and ended with them the ability to rehearse for people every week how to communicate the free call of the gospel. |
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26.) It’s important to have a Christian view of the world, but most of the stuff that goes under the name worldview is just somebody’s secular political program—which they would hold even if Jesus were dead—with Bible verses attached. Pay attention to what’s not talked about. |
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27.) As a matter of fact, the most dangerous ways that one is conformed to this world (Rom. 12:2) are almost never about issues now being debated. They are almost always about things so ubiquitous that no one questions them or about things so far ahead that no one is ready for them. |
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28.) The miracle that many skeptics around you find most incredible is not the Resurrection or the Virgin Birth but the New Birth. They’ve seen lots of Christians who have given no evidence of having been born again, of walking in the Spirit. Lots of people are watching you—people you have no idea are doing so—and they are asking, “Is it real?” |
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29.) The “slippery slope” argument is a logical fallacy, but slippery slopes are real. It’s just that they go in all directions, not just in one. |
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30.) The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not, the darkness will not, and the darkness cannot overcome it. Don’t give up. |
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31.) For a lot of us called to ministry, math is hard. That’s okay. |
A Music Recommendation from a Reader |
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A Canadian reader (I’m not sure if I have permission to use his name, so I’ll err on the side of caution here) wrote in to one of my staff members the following note: |
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Over the past few years, I have been listening regularly to Russell Moore’s podcast. I am hurt and confused by my Christian brothers and sisters falling under the spells of false leaders and their messianic promises. Dr. Moore is so consistently a sane and calm voice, wise, measured, and rooted. I am deeply grateful for his work. |
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I want to recommend to Dr. Moore the music of friend Steve Bell, a widely respected and beloved Canadian musician. Steve is well-known in Canada, but less so in the US. I think he might help provide a bit of an antidote to the unsettling, unholy entwining of triumphalist Christianity and political bullying. |
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Steve has a deep catalogue and sings with warmth, kindness, and wisdom. His music and writing have been faithfully and consistently shaped by a careful reading of Scripture, liturgy, poetry, and modern-day prophets. I think of him as a musical companion to Eugene Peterson, whose insistence on the “long obedience in the same direction” has clearly marked Steve and his own work. |
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Let me recommend his song “The Glad Surprise,” the title track from his newest album. For more than a decade, Steve has also been championing the work of Malcolm Guite, setting many of Malcolm’s poems to song, including “A Lovely Longed-For Blue,” also on The Glad Surprise album. |
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Steve’s gracious, beautiful music is especially poignant for these times, and more than once I have thought, “I want Russell Moore to hear these songs!” |
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Thank you, reader! I am listening to them now and enjoying them. What about y’all? Anyone else with any music recommendations you think I might like? Let me know. |
Why Character Still Matters |
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This week over on the podcast, I talk to General Stanley McChrystal, former commander of US and coalition forces in Afghanistan and the author of On Character: Choices That Define a Life. We talk about the article in Rolling Stone that ended the general’s military career, prompting President Obama to demand his resignation. We discuss why his wife’s single-word reaction changed the trajectory of his entire life. We also talk about what he’s learned about how character is shaped and formed and how one can tell if somebody has it. |
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Along the way, we discuss the role (or lack thereof) of character in US politics right now, and how to turn that around. We also talk about what we should do about political polarization, the mess in the Middle East, the role religion plays in the American military currently, and how to cultivate character in the next generation. Lots of really interesting stuff for any of you interested on the connection between integrity and decision-making. |
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You can listen to it here. |
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