How Can Pastors Motivate Their Church To Serve?
Q: As a pastor, I don’t get much feedback, and I feel like my congregation is not really into doing things for God. How do I get them motivated?
A: God bless you, Pastor. I know what it’s like. I’ve been there. There is a wonderful fraternity among pastors. Being a pastor is such a unique experience that I think it’s difficult for people who have never been pastors to really know what it’s like. But I hear you all the way.
You mention that you don’t get much feedback. I don’t know if you’re stating that as a problem or an observation but let me give you three suggestions on feedback. First of all, maybe your wife would be a good person to provide feedback for you about how you’re doing in the ministry. I don’t know; it depends on your wife, your relationship with her, and how spiritually mature she is, but that’s a possibility. A second option would be to find somebody in the congregation who is mature and wise and knows their stuff and ask them if they can be your feedback person. Maybe that’s going to be the key. My third suggestion is to simply provide your own feedback. I don’t know if you’re in the habit of listening, or even worse, watching yourself preach, but you should do it. It’ll make you a better preacher. It’s traumatic. You’ll hate it. You’ll gasp when you first see yourself on a video, but it’s good for you. Be your own feedback.
How do you motivate your congregation? You don’t motivate your congregation by nagging them and continually pointing out their underperformance. Now, there are certainly times and places to call out sins of laziness or neglect or uncaring and all those things, especially when the biblical text that you’re teaching through speaks to it. Yes, there is absolutely a time and place when that’s great.
At the same time, we cannot nag our congregation into maturity. It’s possible to give pointed exhortations when appropriate, but you need to avoid any sense that you’re nagging them into it Focus on teaching them well. Teach them the love of God. Teach them the grace of God. And pray for them. That’s really what I would say. I assume you’re doing all those things already, so don’t become weary in well doing. God bless you, brother.