Proclaimer Blog
Preachers in goatland
I have been re-reading parts of William Still’s classic The Work of the Pastor and came across this wonderfully robust exhortation to preachers to make sure they feed the sheep:
It is to feed sheep (on the Word of God) that men are called to churches and congregations, whatever they may think they are called to do. If you think you are called to keep a largely worldly organisation, miscalled a church, going, with infinitesimal doses of innocuous sub-Christian drugs or stimulants, then the only help I can give you is to advise you to give up the hope of the ministry and go and be a street scavenger; a far healthier and more godly job…
The pastor is called to feed the sheep, even if the sheep do not want to be fed. He is certainly not to become an entertainer of goats. Let goats entertain goats, and let them do it out in goatland. You will certainly not turn goats into sheep by pandering to their goatishness.