I have a Baptist pastor friend...
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Object:
I have a Baptist pastor friend who is so proud of the fact that he has a job on the side and gets no salary from his members. He feels that he is like Saint Paul.
I was also proud to serve as a missionary to Nepal, supported by my retirement pension. I couldn't live on what a Nepali pastor makes over there -- about $30 a month which has to cover not only his parsonage and food and clothing for himself and his family, but also the rent of the church and the cost of furnishings, Bibles, and hymnals, and so on. A few have a job on the side, but most survive on the donations from outside their country.
Yes the missionaries that are paid to go to the mission countries get their income from the churches back home. We support them through our offerings.
There are temptations on the field. Those temptations are seldom temptations to make us money. They are most often the temptations to accomplish our goals and make life easier for ourselves in the field by paying bribes to the local government officials.
I talked with an American businessman in Nepal, and he said that you just had to accept the demand for bribes as a normal business practice. We did not go along with that, and as a result we suffered the lack of some things we needed to accomplish our goals for the Lord. On the plus side, those who wanted the bribes were very impressed by our honesty. They began to learn that we Christians would not stoop to anything illegal.
We tried to be examples to the people for them to follow. We wanted to be proud of those who accepted the Lord we came to proclaim.
We won more people by the lives we lived there than by the doctrines we preached. Those doctrines are important, but only followed their conversion. Our children have to know us before they are willing to obey us.
They were not just accepting our word. We knew they were accepting the word of God since they were still strong in their faith after we left -- and are bringing others into the fold.
There are always a few who make you think you are god and that they can't survive without you and your support. Our job is to help them grow up. They are still children until they take God's word and follow it and not just ours.
Your pastors are also teaching members to grow up and listen to God speak and not just the words of men.
I was also proud to serve as a missionary to Nepal, supported by my retirement pension. I couldn't live on what a Nepali pastor makes over there -- about $30 a month which has to cover not only his parsonage and food and clothing for himself and his family, but also the rent of the church and the cost of furnishings, Bibles, and hymnals, and so on. A few have a job on the side, but most survive on the donations from outside their country.
Yes the missionaries that are paid to go to the mission countries get their income from the churches back home. We support them through our offerings.
There are temptations on the field. Those temptations are seldom temptations to make us money. They are most often the temptations to accomplish our goals and make life easier for ourselves in the field by paying bribes to the local government officials.
I talked with an American businessman in Nepal, and he said that you just had to accept the demand for bribes as a normal business practice. We did not go along with that, and as a result we suffered the lack of some things we needed to accomplish our goals for the Lord. On the plus side, those who wanted the bribes were very impressed by our honesty. They began to learn that we Christians would not stoop to anything illegal.
We tried to be examples to the people for them to follow. We wanted to be proud of those who accepted the Lord we came to proclaim.
We won more people by the lives we lived there than by the doctrines we preached. Those doctrines are important, but only followed their conversion. Our children have to know us before they are willing to obey us.
They were not just accepting our word. We knew they were accepting the word of God since they were still strong in their faith after we left -- and are bringing others into the fold.
There are always a few who make you think you are god and that they can't survive without you and your support. Our job is to help them grow up. They are still children until they take God's word and follow it and not just ours.
Your pastors are also teaching members to grow up and listen to God speak and not just the words of men.
