Others like the skills of a shepherd Features >>
-160.webp)
.epub-160.webp)
-160.webp)
About the Book
"The Skills of a Shepherd" by Dag Heward-Mills is a practical guide for Christian leaders on how to effectively pastor and care for their congregations. The book outlines key skills such as teaching, counseling, leadership, and communication that are essential for shepherding a flock and nurturing spiritual growth. Heward-Mills uses biblical examples and personal anecdotes to illustrate these skills and provide guidance for pastors seeking to better serve their communities.
Calvin Miller
Calvin Miller was a pastor, professor and storyteller, best known for The Singer Trilogy, a mythic retelling of the New Testament story in the spirit of C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien. Miller passed away on the afternoon of August 19, 2012, due to complications after heart surgery. He was 75.
A prolific artist and a writer's writer, Miller garnered respect and praise throughout his career from peers like Luci Shaw, Max Lucado and Philip Yancey. He was the author of more than forty books of popular theology and Christian inspiration including such recent books as Letters to Heaven, The Path of Celtic Prayer, Letters to a Young Pastor and his memoir Life Is Mostly Edges.
In addition to his twenty years of pastoral service at Westside Church in Omaha, Nebraska, Miller was also a great mentor to many students and leaders through his preaching and pastoral ministry classes at Beeson Divinity School. Calvin Miller, never one to multiply words, used just four to describe his rule of life: "Time is a gift."
RESCUE FROM THE SLUSH PILE
In October 1973 one important book was rescued from the slush pile (the stack of unsolicited manuscripts every publisher receives) by assistant editor Don Smith. He read a manuscript by a little-known Baptist pastor in Nebraska that was a poetic retelling of the life of Jesus—portraying him as a Troubadour. Both he and Linda Doll excitedly encouraged Jim Sire to take this imaginative manuscript seriously. In February 1974 Sire wrote the author, Calvin Miller, that IVP wanted to publish his book The Singer.
Months before, Miller had been waking up nights, stirred to write this tale, perhaps unconsciously inspired by the recent Broadway hits Jesus Christ Superstar and Godspell. Later Miller wrote:
When the manuscript was done, I sent it to Jim Sire at InterVarsity Press. “It’s good,” he said, “but we want to think about it a couple of weeks before we give you an answer.” So I waited until finally the letter came. They were going to do it. Jim Sire had done his Ph.D. on John Milton, and the fact that he liked it was joy immeasurable to me. “But,” he cautioned, “we’re going to print five thousand of these. They may not do well—in fact we may end up with four thousand of them on skids in our basement for the next ten years. Still, it’s a good book and deserves to be in print.”
Far more than a thousand copies sold. Actually, over three hundred times that amount sold in its first decade. It became “the most successful evangelical publication in this genre.” The Singer was followed in two years by The Song (paralleling the story of the early church in Acts) and two years after that by The Finale (inspired by the book of Revelation). Publication of The Singer changed Miller’s life. Even though he stayed in the pastorate for many years, it set him on a course of writing and speaking that he could not have imagined.
How God Impacts Our Money and Stuff
The love of money is more than dangerous — it’s spiritual suicide. The consistent warning of Scripture is that the people of God better watch their backs when it comes to the allure of financial gain (Matthew 6:24; 1 Timothy 6:10). Earning a stout salary can be a good thing, but what we do with those earnings is all important — and the writer to the Hebrews can help us. In a list of practical exhortations, he writes, Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” (Hebrews 13:5) This is a simple verse, but the line of argument is astounding. Notice the first two lines. The commands parallel one another: keep your life free from the love of money and be content with what you have. Contentment and Freedom The commands look like different angles on the same posture. We are exhorted to free ourselves from the love of money (and its siren call to acquire more), and then, in the same spirit, we’re exhorted to be content with what we currently have. This latter command (“be content”) functions as a sort of development from the former. In order to really keep ourselves free from the love of money, we have to sincerely believe that what we already have is enough. There’s food on the table and clothes on our back. We’re going to be all right (1 Timothy 6:8). If we lack contentment — if we are always thinking about what we want next — then our orientation on money creeps along from value to veneration. Money becomes our ticket to more. It becomes our gateway to that thing that will give us what we think we’re missing, which means it becomes a hero. And anytime we attribute savior-like qualities to something, however subtle it might be, our affections are sure to follow. If we keep dreaming about what we don’t have, we’ll soon be doing an adulterous rendezvous with the revenue. The most vehement traction against this slippery slope is too simply be okay with what you have. The writer to the Hebrews says to be content. We’re good. We’ll be okay. We can pause our panting for more. And then he tells us why. He Is There Keep your life free from love of money and be content with what you have, for [God] has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” The command for us to be free and content is grounded in God’s promise to always be there. The quotation here is taken from Joshua 1:5, but now carries an amplified meaning after the ascension of Jesus. In the Commission to his disciples, Jesus says clearly, “I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20). And as he told us about the Holy Spirit, “I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever” (John 14:16). We have the Trinitarian surety that wherever we are, God is there. Whatever circumstance, whether we have abundance or want (Philippians 4:11–12), God is there and he’s not leaving us. This might seem like a strange influence on our financial situation, but it’s really not. The presence of God, as with so many other things, drastically alters our perspective on money and stuff. We don’t love money, and we are content with what we have, because we have God. We don’t love money, and we are content with what we have, because we have God. We can always say, no matter the state of our earthly assets, that “we have a better possession and an abiding one” (Hebrews 10:34). God is our portion (Psalm 73:26). He is a feast for our souls (Psalm 63:5). “I will never leave you nor forsake you,” he says. Our treasure — the most desirable Being in the universe — is irreversibly committed to keeping us close forever. So yeah, money is just money, and what we already have is plenty. Article by Jonathan Parnell
