A Final Challenge to Churches and to Pastors

We’ve been working on a series about pastors and depression. We’ve discussed how the people of the church can come to the aid of their pastors. In this post, we offer a few conclusions. Christ, the head of the church, rules His church through the written Word and through spirit-called and spirit-led men. That’s a…

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What Can Church People Do to Help Their Pastor?

We’ve discussed the fact of depression in pastoral ministry and outlined some of its causes, both from the nature of the task and from the weakness of the flesh that all men experience. Today, I want to look at ways in which God’s people can help bring encouragement to their pastors. The prayers of God’s…

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The Unique Nature of a Pastor’s Work

Ed. Note. In the most recent installment of this series, Pastor Sweatt discussed areas of pressure unique to pastoral ministry. In this post, he describes aspects of pastoral ministry that can add to a load of worry and care. The nature of a preacher’s work opens the door to depression. What is a preacher’s work?…

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The Unique Pressures of Pastoral Ministry

Ed. Note: In the first post in this series, Pastor Sweatt introduced the topic of affliction and depression in Pastoral Ministry. Many issues may be the immediate cause, God’s grace is sufficient, but the preacher will need to turn to God for that grace. In this installment, Pastor Sweatt identifies areas of pressure that are…

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The Peculiar Pressures on the Pastor

The failure of pastors is sadly too much in the headlines in recent months. The reasons are many. Our culture is increasingly hostile to our message so that many are skeptical of organized religion. Even church members, hurting from their church experience, create discord by careless criticism and self-serving divisiveness. These and many more factors…

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What a Pastor Wants from the Music Ministry

Danny Sweatt Music in the church is often seen as either an end in itself or as merely a means to an end. Some people, particularly musicians, consider music the most important component of a church service. The modern, contemporary movement certainly seems to encourage that viewpoint, in practice if not in creed. It is…

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