{"id":699505,"date":"2020-02-19T02:00:04","date_gmt":"2020-02-19T08:00:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thomrainer.com\/?p=696371"},"modified":"2020-05-19T12:57:27","modified_gmt":"2020-05-19T16:57:27","slug":"three-unreasonable-expectations-pastors-have-of-their-churches","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/three-unreasonable-expectations-pastors-have-of-their-churches\/","title":{"rendered":"Three Unreasonable Expectations Pastors Have of Their Churches"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><b><i>By Sam Rainer<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">I have high expectations of my church. Church members should worship together often, give generously, serve sacrificially, and make disciples of all nations. There are no exceptions to these high expectations. The mission of God requires an all-in effort from every believer in every church.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Of course, plenty of low expectation churches exist. The come-and-see consumer mentality is an unfortunate church culture that is far too prevalent. Good church leaders expect more of their churches. However, in this post I want to address unreasonable expectations pastors have of their churches. I\u2019ve seen these unreasonable expectations in churches with a low view of membership, as well as churches with a high view of membership.<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li><b>Agreement is the same as unity<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">. I doubt you ever experience a moment in your ministry where everyone in the church agrees with you at the same time. Let\u2019s be real: The only place total agreement exists is in dictatorships, where \u201cagreement\u201d is forced. As a pastor, good people will occasionally disagree with you. If you lead a church with over a couple dozen people, then at least one of them will disagree with you about something at any given point. Agreement or disagreement occurs over specific decisions, and you will not always get everyone to agree with you. However, I do hope your church is <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">unified<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> at all times. Unity is a Spirit-led culture in the church that should be exhibited by everyone.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<ol start=\"2\">\n<li><b>Passion is often contagious<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u201cPassion is contagious!\u201d Sure, I\u2019ve said it many times. Passion <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">can be<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> contagious, but it is not <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">often<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> contagious. Some areas of the church self-generate passion. Most others do not (Who wants to help stack chairs?). That\u2019s why it takes more than passion to lead and disciple people. You cannot expect passion to be contagious.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<ol start=\"3\">\n<li><b>The bulk of leadership can be done in the pulpit.<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> A common piece of pastoral advice floating around is, \u201cJust preach the Word!\u201d I appreciate the spirit of this statement because I have a high view of Scripture and preaching. But telling someone to \u201c<\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Just<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> preach the Word\u201d is kind of like telling a politician to \u201c<\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Just<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> give good speeches.\u201d Preaching is critically important, but you can\u2019t rely on the pulpit for the bulk of your leadership.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Agreement, passion, and preaching are three important areas of church leadership. Just don\u2019t have unreasonable expectations of your church with them.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Sam Rainer I have high expectations of my church. Church members should worship together often, give generously, serve sacrificially, and make disciples of all nations. There are no exceptions to these high expectations. The mission of God requires an all-in effort from every believer in every church. Of course, plenty of low expectation churches&#8230;","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":699458,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"publish_to_discourse":"","publish_post_category":"","wpdc_auto_publish_overridden":"","wpdc_topic_tags":"","wpdc_pin_topic":"","wpdc_pin_until":"","discourse_post_id":"","discourse_permalink":"","wpdc_publishing_response":"","wpdc_publishing_error":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1,175,178],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-699505","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-church-answers","category-grow","category-membership-and-assimilation"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Three Unreasonable Expectations Pastors Have of Their Churches | Church Answers<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In this post I want to address unreasonable expectations pastors have of their churches. I\u2019ve seen these unreasonable expectations in churches with a low view of membership, as well as churches with a high view of membership.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/three-unreasonable-expectations-pastors-have-of-their-churches\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Three Unreasonable Expectations Pastors Have of Their Churches | Church Answers\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"In this post I want to address unreasonable expectations pastors have of their churches. I\u2019ve seen these unreasonable expectations in churches with a low view of membership, as well as churches with a high view of membership.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/three-unreasonable-expectations-pastors-have-of-their-churches\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Church Answers\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-02-19T08:00:04+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2020-05-19T16:57:27+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/Featured_Image_02_19_2020-1.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"801\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Sam Rainer\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Sam Rainer\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/three-unreasonable-expectations-pastors-have-of-their-churches\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/three-unreasonable-expectations-pastors-have-of-their-churches\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Sam Rainer\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/#\/schema\/person\/2f0912bee8a19725429a51e837b0b4bd\"},\"headline\":\"Three Unreasonable Expectations Pastors Have of Their Churches\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-02-19T08:00:04+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2020-05-19T16:57:27+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/three-unreasonable-expectations-pastors-have-of-their-churches\/\"},\"wordCount\":411,\"commentCount\":6,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/three-unreasonable-expectations-pastors-have-of-their-churches\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/Featured_Image_02_19_2020-1.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"Church Answers\",\"Grow\",\"Membership &amp; Assimilation\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/three-unreasonable-expectations-pastors-have-of-their-churches\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/three-unreasonable-expectations-pastors-have-of-their-churches\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/three-unreasonable-expectations-pastors-have-of-their-churches\/\",\"name\":\"Three Unreasonable Expectations Pastors Have of Their Churches | Church Answers\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/three-unreasonable-expectations-pastors-have-of-their-churches\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/three-unreasonable-expectations-pastors-have-of-their-churches\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/Featured_Image_02_19_2020-1.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-02-19T08:00:04+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2020-05-19T16:57:27+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/#\/schema\/person\/2f0912bee8a19725429a51e837b0b4bd\"},\"description\":\"In this post I want to address unreasonable expectations pastors have of their churches. 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