Our Pastor’s Character & Oversight
The Core of his Character
Vision and Example
The vision of First Presbyterian Church (FPC) is to be a church deeply formed by the Good News of Jesus Christ – a community that experiences God’s grace together and reflects that grace to others. Central to the responsibilities of the Senior Pastor is to advance this vision.
To advance this vision, he must himself be deeply formed by the Good News of Jesus Christ, and he must ever grow in experiencing and expressing the grace of God together with God’s people. He must not only proclaim this vision, but he must also live this vision. He announces the good news of God’s grace, and he exemplifies the good news of God’s grace.
Peter urged Elders to “shepherd the flock of God…not domineering over those in your charge but being examples to the flock”. Paul urged Pastor Timothy to be an example to the church and Paul set forth himself as an example.
The Gospel forms us
When we come to know and believe the love God has for us, we love because God first loved us. As God’s beloved children we become imitators of God, walking in love as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us.
We have the mind of Christ and therefore we count one another as more important than ourselves; we pour ourselves out for one another as Christ poured himself out for us. As we experience God’s grace in worship, in fellowship and in ministry we increasingly express that grace in our love for one another and for all people.
The Gospel lived out by our Pastor
The Senior Pastor of FPC is called therefore to live out an example of kindness, patience, gentleness and humility with all members and those outside the church, and particularly in all his interaction with the staff, officers and leadership in the church. Especially, he must continually strive to live out this kindness, patience, gentleness and humility with his wife and children. He must consider others as more important than himself.
Therefore, he is highly approachable. He is teachable. He is open to constructive criticism. He can laugh at himself. He does not take himself too seriously. He is a good listener. He enjoys and values people and he enters into their stories. He is warmly sympathetic. He really does consider others as more important than himself.
The Structure of his Oversight
“Oversight” of course, means not micro-managing and not hands-on involvement in every aspect of the church’s life. In most cases, it means making sure that particular people and teams are taking care of the various ministries of the church, whether staff, ordained and non-ordained leadership, or the ever-widening involvement of every member of the church as they increasingly use their gifts in the ministry of the church.
Also critical to our leadership, the Senior Pastor shares with the Elders this responsibility of oversight, as they all are the Overseers of the church. For the Elders as a whole, it is their joint responsibility along with the Senior Pastor to make sure that the ministries and responsibilities are “being overseen” whether by them or others.
The Context of his Oversight
Further, this oversight is in the context of the primary work of the Senior Pastor, which is to be a man of faithful, regular, joyful prayer on behalf of the church; and a man who has a passion for God’s Word after the heart of the Psalmist throughout Psalm 119. He stores up the Word in his heart, he meditates in the Word, delights in the Word, longs for the Word and loves the Word. He is marked with humility as he comes to the Word, recognizing his own blindness and prejudices and so he prays earnestly that God will teach him and give him understanding in the Word, that God will open his eyes to see wonderful things in the Word, that God will incline his heart to the Word.
It is expected that the Senior Pastor will labor diligently in the Word so that he “rightly handles the word of truth”, and that he preaches “in season and out of season” to “reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching”.
In “rightly handling the word of truth” it will be expected that the Senior Pastor’s preaching, whether OT or NT, will always ultimately be the preaching of the Lord Jesus Christ. It will always be gospel centered. With Paul, the Senior Pastor will preach “the unsearchable riches of Christ”. He will preach the “gospel about the glory of Christ”.