A pastor is called to love, encourage, and build up his people. He must lead the way in this. But this will be a joy to him, and sustainable, only if the people self-consciously reciprocate that love and encouragement. Orr offers this important book out of a heart for the members of a church to hold up the hands of their spiritual leader, like Aaron and Hur holding up the hands of Moses (Ex. 17:12).

In his kindness, God has given us pastors to teach us God’s word, to rebuke us, and to encourage us. Your pastor has the most rewarding job—serving the Lord Jesus by leading God’s people by teaching them God’s word. Your pastor also has the most challenging job, because so often the opposition that the devil aims at the church is focused on the pastor. If a pastor stops preaching the truth or stops calling for genuine repentance, the devil wins.

Fight!

The person who is under more satanic attack than anyone else you know is your pastor. The person whose faith Satan wants to derail the most is your pastor. The person whose marriage Satan would most like to wreck, whose kids he most wants to cause to rebel, whom he most wants to discourage is your pastor. You need to fight in prayer for your pastor.

we often adopt a consumer mentality toward our pastors. We pay them and they serve us. So when they don’t satisfy our wants in our time frame, we complain like we would in a restaurant if a meal were delivered slowly or not cooked well.

However, this is wrong on both fronts. My pastor is my leader, under God. My relationship to him is not the same as my relationship to my waiter in a restaurant (though I should also be considerate with my waiter). I give money to support the work of his ministry, but that does not make me his boss. I am also not passive—like a diner waiting to be served at a table. No, a better analogy is that the pastor is the headwaiter and I am also a waiter. All of us as Christians are meant to actively serve, which includes loving and encouraging other Christians, perhaps especially our pastors.

Encourage!

We often adopt a consumer mentality toward our pastors. We pay them and they serve us. So when they don’t satisfy our wants in our time frame, we complain like we would in a restaurant if a meal were delivered slowly or not cooked well.

However, this is wrong on both fronts. My pastor is my leader, under God. My relationship to him is not the same as my relationship to my waiter in a restaurant (though I should also be considerate with my waiter). I give money to support the work of his ministry, but that does not make me his boss. I am also not passive—like a diner waiting to be served at a table. No, a better analogy is that the pastor is the headwaiter and I am also a waiter. All of us as Christians are meant to actively serve, which includes loving and encouraging other Christians, perhaps especially our pastors.

Sometimes we think that people have to earn our respect and admiration. They have to prove themselves. God’s economy differs: the pastor he has placed over us is, from the beginning, worthy of a respect and esteem that needs to translate into how we speak about and to him. We need to intentionally encourage him.

Listen!

Those who actively listen, engage, and approach Jesus for explanation are rewarded with insight. Those who half-heartedly listen to what he says and then wander off are left outside. Therefore, we need to listen well—attentively and prayerfully—remembering that as our pastor preaches the word, it is the Lord who is speaking (1 Pet. 4:11).

Listening well to God’s word means hearing it eagerly and letting it confront you—that is, allowing it to challenge and rebuke you. Listening badly means putting pressure on your pastor, whether indirectly (by lack of attention) or directly (by unfair criticism). This pressure can lead him—perhaps unconsciously—to preach to please his hearers.

Listening well is a spiritual discipline. We should go to church with an expectation that we will meet with God in the preaching of his word. All of us on occasion arrive tired and distracted, and when we are in that frame of mind, there is every chance the sermon will bounce off us. But if we are hungry, expectant, and ready to engage with God, then our experience will be much more positive. So we need to listen actively, not passively. It is easy to listen to a sermon without really hearing it. But it is better for us, and more encouraging for our pastor, if we engage carefully with the Scripture passage being taught and go away reflecting on both the passage and the sermon.

Of course, there is listening that engages and understands, but does not obey. We need to heed James’s warning to “be doers of the word, and not hearers only” (James 1:22). There is real spiritual danger in loving good preaching for its own sake rather than as a means to meeting with the living God and responding to him with faith and repentance.

Give!

The Bible encourages generosity—for the sake of our pastors, as well as for the ministry as a whole. Congregation members should be as generous as possible and trust that the pastor will, in turn, be as generous as he can.

As well as calling for generosity, Paul lays down the principle that giving should be willing and cheerful: “Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Cor. 9:7).

Forgive!

We saddle our pastor with unreasonable expectations. Here the problem is with us, not with our pastor. It has been a week and he has not visited me. It has been an hour and he has not responded to my message. I made a suggestion that has not been implemented. He thanked another member but not me.

However, between these extremes of our unreasonable expectations and his major sins are the kinds of failings and minor sins that require no formal action, just the understanding and forgiveness that ought to mark every Christian relationship.

The pressures of the job mean that our pastor—who is human—sometimes behaves less than perfectly. The choice we face is to gossip or complain (which are ruled out by Scripture), to lovingly speak with our pastor (which can help in certain circumstances), or to lovingly overlook the offense (which is often the best course of action).

Submit!

The New Testament is clear—there is a right and proper submission to those who are in spiritual leadership over us. Paul tells the Corinthians to be subject or to submit to “every fellow worker and laborer” (1 Cor. 16:16). Peter tells those who are younger to “be subject to the elders” (1 Pet. 5:5). Hebrews widens it to every Christian, commanding them to “obey your leaders and submit to them” (Heb. 13:17).

The challenge comes when we are asked to do something right and appropriate, but we don’t want to do it. We readily submit when asked to do something we’re glad to do, but it becomes much harder when it is something we don’t want to do.

Check!

As members of a church, when a complaint against the pastor arises, we may not (and probably should not) know all the details. As difficult as it may be, we need to reserve judgment. This means we should relate to any complainants as if they are telling the truth and relate to the pastor as if he is innocent. The inclination today toward an unbiblical understanding of power dynamics (anyone with power is automatically more suspect) means that the default is to favor the complainant. However, we cannot prejudge a case, but must love and support both parties until the matter is resolved.

This article is adapted from Fight for Your Pastor by Peter Orr.