Pastors manage churches as much, if not more, than leading them. Making disciples requires pastors to be involved in the day-to-day operations of a church.
Adobe Stock Photo. Do not publish.
It’s tempting to imagine that legendary ministers like E. M. Bounds or Andrew Murray or someone known as “Praying Hyde” were simply born to pray. Along with the likes of David Brainerd, Leonard Ravenhill, Armin Gesswein, Bertha Smith, George Müller and so many others, there is a group of Christians who are primarily remembered for their prayer lives or their teaching on prayer. But no one was ever born praying. The men and women most known for prayer were not members of a spiritually elite corps the rest of us weren’t invited to join. They learned to pray.
iStock
One statement from the introduction of Katie McCoy’s book To Be a Woman sets the stage for the conversation our culture is afraid to have but can’t afford to avoid.
iStock
About four years ago, I was a student heavily involved in collegiate ministry, growing in my understanding of Scripture, and being discipled by a woman in our church. However, even as I grew and learned more about the church, I remember asking myself, “Where do I fit in to all this?”
If my life could be marked by copies of Scripture, it would look something like this:
