Be a Good Servant of Christ Jesus (1 Timothy 4:6a)

How do you know if you’re doing a good job as a pastor? By measuring church growth? Altar calls? Sermon complements? Building projects? Pastor appreciation gifts?

It’s hard to know, isn’t it?

This is why pastors like mowing. You do the work and, behold, a mowed yard. Ministry just isn’t like this. You study, teach, and preach and, behold, everyone looks the same as before you did all that work. You pray for your people and nudge them toward Christ in countless conversations; but you often don’t see a lot of progress in their lives.

Add to this the fact that many of our pastors serve in declining communities where young people are moving away to find jobs and nothing is vibrant and growing. If you are in such a community and your church is shrinking over time, does that mean you are a bad servant of Christ Jesus?

Let’s look at 1 Timothy 4:6a.

If you put these things before the brothers, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus…

Here is how a pastor’s goodness or badness can be measured. Good service to Christ is putting “these things” before the brothers. Bad service is not putting “these things” before the brothers. It’s the same way we evaluate waiters. If they put the right food in front of us, they’re doing a good job. If they don’t, they’re doing a bad job.

What are “these things”?

Remember, this is just one paragraph out of a full letter from the Apostle Paul to his delegate, Timothy. He’s talking about the things he’s writing about in the rest of the letter. Things like “the stewardship from God that is by faith” (1:4), “love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith” (1:5), the lawful use of the law (1:8-11), proper behavior in the household of God (chapter 2), the qualifications for elders and deacons (chapter 3), etc.

So, for Timothy to measure his success as a servant of Christ Jesus, what question should he ask himself? He should not ask, “Is the church in Ephesus growing,” or even “Are my people accepting these truths.” He can’t control any of that and therefore Christ Jesus wouldn’t measure him by those outcomes.

He should ask instead, “Am I putting these things before the brothers?” “Am I faithfully and accurately taking what the Apostle has given me and placing it under the noses of my people for them to see, hear, and consider?”

This is the measurement for you as well. Are you putting these things—the things God has delivered to you through the prophets and the apostles in his holy word—before your people? They may receive it, or they may reject it. Your church may grow numerically, or it may shrink. You can’t control any of that. Attempting to control those outcomes leads to all kinds of manipulative practices that put great strain on you and your people. You can control the “putting”—the placing under their noses.

You can’t give the growth, but you can plant and water. So don’t measure your work by the growth. Measure it by the planting and watering. There will be seasons of evident growth. There will also be seasons of evident decline. Either way, your work remains the same. “Preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort with complete patience and teaching” (2 Timothy 4:2).