THE WORK OF THE PASTOR
By William Still
Rutherford House & Christian Focus
152 pages. £3.99
ISBN 0 946068 63 1
Written by an outstanding modern pastor, this book is for ministers, would-be ministers - and anyone who wants to know what the Christian ministry is really about.
It consists of five addresses given to theological students in 1964 and 1965. The style is readable, informal and direct. Every important aspect of the pastoral ministry is covered - the pastor's calling, his walk with Christ and his work. He is to feed Christ's sheep by teaching them the whole Bible. He must discern what kind of help people need from pastoral counselling. He must recognise why people oppose his efforts to teach all the Bible. He may value the Reformers and the Puritans, but he must not apply Scripture to the issues of their day but of ours. His task is 'to evangelise the community and edify the church, not Christianise the state'. In his work he must keep a balance - on the one hand not being so preoccupied with the niceties of doctrine that he goes all academic and dead, and on the other hand not mistaking activism and noise for the work of the Spirit.
Mr. Still exposes weaknesses in the evangelical churches. 'Too many people today pin their faith for fruitful evangelism on harping for ever on a few gospel facts from the broad and full context of the whole Bible'. He describes how an emphasis on such evangelism, without teaching, can lead to evangelical churches being full of grown-up babies. He has a passionate confidence in the long-term teaching of the whole of Scripture to produce spiritual Christians who are effective in the world.
