Who not to please - Gal 3:10

For a Pastor the tension between loving God’s people and becoming one who seeks to please them is difficult.

We love them and so want their best. But what God’s people want may not be what is their best. Leading them to put themselves under God’s word, as His servants, Pastors cannot do what pleases, but only what God says is best. And it is by this that we truly love them.

In doing so we will be hugely misunderstood, maligned and maybe even hated. But love leads in God’s pathway, not our own. It’s a hard calling, but so worth it when the fruit of God’s work in the lives of His people is seen.

But there is also a further tension. As a Pastor seeks to stand upon God’s word and not be a people pleaser, it is easy to become harsh, demanding and impatient. Just as parents easily lose patience with a child who refuses to walk safely on a footpath and instead walks constantly on the kerb, so we can be impatient and unwise in our desire to lead in God’s way. It is easy to use ‘I’m not being a people pleaser’ to excuse loving action taken in an unloving way.

This is why Pastors need to be prayerfully dependent on God, daily led by His Spirit and reliant upon His power. Who is able to do such a task? Only by God’s grace, wisdom and strength and the prayerful support of God’s people.