Martin Bucer On 5 Main Tasks of the Pastoral Office

Martin Bucer, the Reformer of Strasbourg and mentor to John Calvin wrote in 1534 a book which was intended to help coordinate and develop a direction for the role and duties of the Minister (and Ruling Elder and Deacon, Bucer was a proto-Presbyterian) now that the Protestant churches had grown enough to need to begin ordering the election and placement of Ministers in these new Protestant congregations. This book was really the first of its kind regarding how the Minister was to behave and what role he would have in the life of the Church. Listed below are what Bucer considered to be the 5 main tasks of the Pastoral Office concerning the true love of souls under their care.  To purchase the book (which I highly recommend, especially for young Ministers, those considering Ministry, and probably more importantly for search committees) see this link.

 

1) Lead to Christ our Lord and into His communion those who are still estranged from Him, whether through carnal excess or false worship.

2) To restore those who had once been brought to Christ and into His church but have been drawn away again through the affairs of the flesh or false doctrine.

3) To assist in the true reformation of those who while remaining in the church of Christ have grievously fallen and sinned. 

4) To Re-establish in true Christian strength and health those who, while persevering in the fellowship of Christ and not doing anything particularly or grossly wrong, have become somewhat feeble and sick in the Christian Life.

5) To protect from all offence and falling away and continually encourage in all good things those who stay with the flock and in Christ’s sheep-pen without grievously sinning or becoming weak and sick in their Christian walk

November Pastoral Letter

Greetings in the Name of the Lord!

 

This Lord’s Day will be my one-year anniversary of joining you here in Ellisville. It has been a blessing to my family and I that you all have received us so warmly and made our transition to life in southern Mississippi so wonderful. Over the Thanksgiving holiday many of our relatives made comment on how much our daughters have taken a liking to letting it be known that they live in Miss-ippi. J It really has been a privilege to serve as your Pastor this last year and I look forward to more years serving you and your family here in Ellisville.

This Lord’s Day we will also continue in our study of John 17. One of my purposes in starting in the middle of John’s Gospel (we will turn to the 1^st Chapter of John at the first of the year) is so that we can have a better understanding of the relationship between God the Father and God the Son. There is much confusion in our own day as to what the Father does and who the Father is and what part He plays in our Salvation and I believe this is at the center of much of the discord and loss of Biblical fidelity we see in churches in the United States. It is very easy for us to become self-centered when it comes to our own faith and it is even more difficult for us sometimes to come to grips with the idea that Christ died not so that we might be saved if we would only turn to Him, but that we have been saved because Christ died for His Church and then only because the Father gave us to Jesus as the gift given to Christ by the Father as the reward for His life of perfect obedience and His perfect death on the cross. As Jesus says in John 10:29, “My Father, who has given [the Church] to me is greater than all and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father’s hand.”

When we come to understand this Gospel truth it reminds us of how blessed we are to be able to rest and trust in the strength and the comfort of God’s hand. We are reminded that if our salvation was up to our own doing we would all fall short of what God requires, but since we have been saved in Christ Jesus we can rejoice in the forgiveness and grace bestowed upon us by our loving and merciful Father, because of the love Christ has for His people that he would undergo the ignominy of life and death so that we may rest in the peace of the knowledge of our Salvation.

I again want to welcome you to join us for Sunday evening Bible Study at 5:00pm in the Pastor’s Study. We have been enjoying the study and hope that you will consider meeting with us. I also encourage you to invite friends and family to join with us here at the Ellisville Presbyterian Church. We have a stock of brochures (I have included one with this letter) for your use in helping others know more about your church. As always if there is anything I can do for you do not hesitate to give me a ring or stop by the study during the week.

In God’s Love,

Rev. Benjamin P. Glaser, M. Div.

Pastor, Ellisville Presbyterian Church (Independent)

www.ellisvillepres.org

Calvin On Good Pastors

From John Calvin’s commentary on Jeremiah 3:15:

 

We hence learn that the Church cannot continue without having faithful pastors to shew the way of salvation. The wellbeing of the Church then is secured, when God raises up true and faithful teachers to proclaim his truth: but when the Church is deprived of sound teachers, all things soon fall into ruin. For God, no doubt, intimates by this promise that he would not only be the deliverer of his people, so as to restore them from exile, but that he would be also their perpetual guardian after the people had returned to their own country. It hence follows, that the Church of God is not only begotten by means of holy and godly pastors, but that its life is also cherished, nourished, and confirmed by them to the end. As it is not enough for civil order to be once set up, except the magistrates continue in their office, so nothing is more ruinous to the Church than for God to take away faithful pastors.

It cannot indeed be, that people will return to God, unless prophets be first sent: but God speaks here of a continued course of instruction, and of a well regulated government in the Church, as though he had said, “I will not only give you prophets to lead you from your wanderings to me, and to restore you to the way of salvation, but I will also continually set over you sound and faithful teachers.” But we must notice, that those who preside cannot rightly discharge their office unless they are endued with wisdom. God also intimates his paternal love, when he says, that good pastors would be dear to him.

 

John Calvin On the Need For Admonition

John Calvin on 2 Peter 3:1-2

To make this more evident, he shews that they could not be beyond danger, except they were well fortified, because they would have to contend with desperate men, who would not only corrupt the purity of the faith, by false opinions, but do what they could to subvert entirely the whole faith.

By saying, I stir up your pure mind, he means the same as though he had said, “I wish to awaken you to a sincerity of mind.” And the words ought to be thus explained, “I stir up your mind that it may be pure and bright.” For the meaning is, that the minds of the godly become dim, and as it were contract rust, when admonitions cease. But we also hence learn, that men even endued with learning, become, in a manner, drowsy, except they are stirred up by constant warnings.

It now appears what is the use of admonitions, and how necessary they are; for the sloth of the flesh smothers the truth once received, and renders it inefficient, except the goads of warnings come to its aid. It is not then enough, that men should be taught to know what they ought to be, but there is need of godly teachers, to do this second part, deeply to impress the truth on the memory of their hearers. And as men are, by nature, for the most part, fond of novelty and thus inclined to be fastidious, it is useful for us to bear in mind what Peter says, so that we may not only willingly suffer ourselves to be admonished by others, but that every one may also exercise himself in calling to mind continually the truth, so that our minds may become resplendent with the pure and clear knowledge of it.

Excellent Post On the Problems With Contemporary Worship Music

Read the Article Here

The catholicity of the Church demands that we not sacrifice our heritage for a passing trend, that we continually strive to make our tradition ever-vibrant through a deep knowledge of the past. It demands sacrificing our fickle desires on the altar of our Fathers’ wisdom

The author of this piece, Evan McWilliams, is the son of PCA Teaching Elder David McWilliams, long-time pastor of Covenant Presbyterian Church in Lakeland, Florida. Evan is working on a PhD in architectural history with a focus on church design and the practical implications of liturgy on planning and decoration.

The Problems With the Current Way We Educate Our Pastors

This is from an excellent little article from Colin Hansen at the Gospel Coalition asking a couple leading administrators and scholars about what would they change about seminary education.

Richard Pratt says,

“Can you imagine what kind of soldiers our nation would have if basic training amounted to reading books, listening to lectures, writing papers, and taking exams? We’d have dead soldiers. The first time a bullet wizzed past their heads on the battlefield, they’d panic. The first explosion they saw would send them running. So, what is basic training for the military? Recruits learn the information they need to know, but this is a relatively small part of their preparation. Most of basic training is devoted to supervised battle simulation. Recruits are put through harrowing emotional and physical stress. They crawl under live bullet fire. They practice hand to hand combat.

If I could wave a magic scepter and change seminary today, I’d turn it into a grueling physical and spiritual experience. I’d find ways to reach academic goals more quickly and effectively and then devote most of the curriculum to supervised battle simulation. I’d put students through endless hours of hands-on service to the sick and dying, physically dangerous evangelism, frequent preaching and teaching the Scriptures, and days on end of fasting and prayer. Seminary would either make them or break them.

Do you know what would happen? Very few young men would want to attend. Only those who had been called by God would subject themselves to this kind of seminary. Yet they would be recruits for kingdom service, not mere students. They would be ready for the battle of gospel ministry.”

Matthew Henry, Commentary On Ezekiel 44:24

See More at This Link.

 

V. Concerning their preaching and church-government. 1. It was part of their business to teach the people; and herein they must approve themselves both skilful and faithful (v. 23):They shall teach my people the difference between the holy and the profane, between good and evil, lawful and unlawful, that they may neither scruple what is lawful nor venture upon what is unlawful, that they may not pollute what is holy nor pollute themselves with what is profane. Ministers must take pains to cause people to discern between the clean and the unclean, that they may not confound the distinctions between right and wrong, nor mistake concerning them, so as to put darkness for light and light for darkness, but may have a good judgment of discretion concerning their own actions. 2. It was part of their business to judge upon appeals made to them (Deut. xvii. 8, 9); and in controversy they shall stand in judgment,v. 24. They shall have the honesty to stand up for what is right, and, when they have passed a right judgment, shall have the courage to stand to it and stand by it. They must judge, not according to their own fancies, or inclinations, or secular interests, but according to my judgments; that must be their rule and standard. Note, Ministers must decide controversies according to the word of God, to the law and to the testimony. Sit liber judex—Let the judge be unbiased. Their business is to keep courts in God’s name, to preside in the congregations of his people. And herein they must go to the statute-book: They shall keep my statutes in all my assemblies. God calls the assemblies of his people his assemblies, because they are held in his name, to his glory. Ministers are the masters of those assemblies, are to preside in them, and in all their acts must keep close to God’s laws. Another part of their work, as church governors, is to hallow God’s sabbaths, to do the public work of that day with a becoming care and reverence, as the work of a holy day should be done, and to see that God’s people also sanctify that day and do nothing to pollute it.