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About the Book
"The Top Ten Mistakes Pastors Make" by Dag Heward is a practical guide for pastors, highlighting common pitfalls they may encounter in their ministry. The book offers insights and strategies to help pastors navigate challenges such as neglecting personal development, failing to prioritize family, and lacking in vision and planning. The author provides valuable advice on how pastors can avoid these mistakes and improve their effectiveness in leading their congregations.
Kathryn Kuhlman
Kathryn Johanna Kuhlman was born on May 9, 1907, in Concordia, Missouri. Her parents were German and she was one of four children. Her mother was a harsh disciplinarian, who showed little love or affection. On the other hand, she had an extremely close and loving relationship with her father. She would describe, as a small child how, her father would come home from work and she would hang on his leg and cling to him. She often said that her relationship with God the Father was extremely real because of her relationship with her own father.
Kuhlman was converted, when she was 14, at an evangelistic meeting held in a small Methodist church. When she was 16 she graduated from high school, which only went to tenth grade in their town. He older sister Myrtle had married an itinerant evangelist, Everett B. Parrott. They spent their time traveling and asked that Kathryn could join them for the summer. Her parents agreed and she went to Oregon to help out. She worked with them, and often gave her testimony. When the summer was over she wanted to stay, and the couple agreed. She ended up working with them for five years.
The evangelistic team was made up of four people, Everette, Myrtle, Kathryn, and pianists named Helen Gulliford. In 1928 Everette missed a meeting in Boise, Idaho. Myrtle and Kathryn preached to cover for Everette. The pastor of the church encouraged Kathryn to step out on her own. Helen agreed to join her. Her first sermon was in a run-down pool hall in Boise, Idaho. The team covered Idaho, Utah, and Colorado for the following five years. In 1933 they moved into Pueblo, Colorado. They set up in an abandoned Montgomery Ward warehouse. They stayed there for six months.
Denver, being a much bigger city, was the next stop. They moved several times but ended up in a paper company's warehouse, which they named the Kuhlman Revival Tabernacle. Then in 1935 they moved once more to an abandoned truck garage they named the Denver Revival Tabernacle. Kathryn was seeing a lot of success in Denver. The church grew to about 2000 members. She began a radio show called "Smiling Through" and invited speakers from all over the country. One of them was Phil Kerr who taught on divine healing. In 1935 another invited evangelist was Burroughs Waltrip.
Waltrip was bad news for Kuhlman. He was a charismatic, handsome man several years older than she was. There was an immediate attraction, and one family claims to have seen the couple embracing in 1935, but he was married and had two children. Waltrip left Denver and went home to Austin, Texas, but the relationship simmered between Kuhlman and Waltrip. In 1937 he was invited back to Denver to take the pulpit for two months. Shortly after he divorced his wife and abandoned his two sons. He then spread the story that his wife had left him. He moved to Mason City, Iowa, where he told everyone he was single, and started a new ministry. Waltrip raised pledges of $70,000 to build a ministry building called Radio Chapel. It was state of the art with a disappearing pulpit and an art deco style. He appeared to be a successful and dynamic preacher.
There was an ongoing relationship between Kuhlman and Waltrip, and they married in September 1938. Kuhlman was naive about the consequences of her choices and the marriage was a disaster. She announced to her church that she and Waltrip were married and they would go between Denver and Mason City preaching at their two churches. Most of the people in her congregation left due to her relationship with Waltrip. She gave up her church in Denver, lost some of her closest associates, and moved to Mason City. Waltrip's success turned out to be a pipe dream as well. The Radio Chapel was completed in June of 1938. By October 1938 Waltrip could not meet his debts. In December Waltrip was demanding a higher salary, even with the shortfall in income. His Board of Directors quit and left him to deal with the finances. His solution was not to pay the mortgage or debts on the Chapel. Radio Chapel went into bankruptcy. Waltrip's last sermon was in May 1939. The Waltrips were on their own. Kathryn's happy vision of she and her husband flying back and forth between Denver and Mason City with a successful preaching careers was utterly demolished.
The next few years were very hard for the couple. They embarked on the road as traveling evangelists, primarily staying in the Midwest. They were not accepted in many places due to their marriage history. Initial advertisements listed Waltrip as the primary evangelist. Then occasionally Mrs. Waltrip was also mentioned. By the early 1940s Kathryn Kuhlman Waltrip was given equal billing. Finally by the mid-1940s Kathryn was using only Kathryn Kuhlman in meetings where she was the primary speaker. In 1944 Kuhlman went on an evangelistic tour on the east coast without Waltrip. It may have been a conscious decision to leave him, or she may also have taken the opportunity to reassess her life. It appears to have been more gradual as Waltrip wrote about them as a couple as late as 1946. Kuhlman never returned to Waltrip and they eventually divorced in 1947. She left her marriage behind and from then on acted as if it never existed in the first place.
In 1946 Kuhlman was asked to speak in Franklin, Pennsylvania. She was well received and decided to stay in the area. Kuhlman began preaching on radio broadcasts in Oil City, Pennsylvania. These became so popular they were picked up in Pittsburgh, and she was preaching throughout the area. She began to preach about the healing power of God. In 1947 a woman was healed of a tumor while listening to Kuhlman preach. Several Sundays later a man was also healed while she was teaching on the Holy Spirit. She was now convinced of God's healing work. One important thing to note is the context and timing of this breakout period in Kuhlman's life. 1947 was the beginning of the Healing Revival (sometimes referred to as the Latter Rain Revival) that would last for the next 10 years. What was happening in Kuhlman's meetings was breaking out across the United States. It was in this time frame that the Voice of Healing Ministry was established and men like William Branham, Oral Roberts, A.A. Allen and many others were propelled onto the public stage. Kuhlman was not associated with those groups, but stepped into the flow of what God's Spirit was doing across the nation and the world.
In 1948 Kuhlman held a series of meetings at Carnegie Hall in Pittsburgh. She eventually moved to Pittsburgh in 1950, and continued to hold meetings at Carnegie Hall until 1971. She was used by God to bring the charismatic message to many denominational churches, including the Catholic Church. (She received a lot of criticism over this and was accused of being a closet Catholic.) These were her best known years. Her style was flamboyant. She would hold her famous miracle services and the auditorium was filled to capacity every time. She was on radio and television shows. She was ordained in 1968 by the Evangelical Church Alliance. Hundreds of people were healed in her meetings, and even while listening to her on the radio or television. People she prayed for would often be hit with the power of God and be "slain in the Spirit." Kuhlman never claimed that she was the healer. She always pointed people to Jesus as their healer.
Kuhlman had been diagnosed with a heart problem in 1955. She kept a very busy schedule and overworked herself, especially in the 1970's. She traveled back and forth from Pittsburgh to Los Angeles frequently, as well as taking trips around the world. Her heart was enlarged and Kuhlman died on February 20, 1976, in Tulsa, following open-heart surgery. Videos of some of her services are still available and continue to be popular today.
weakness may be your greatest strength
How well are you investing the weaknesses youâve been given? Perhaps no one has ever asked you that question before. Perhaps it sounds nonsensical. After all, people invest assets  in order to increase their value. They donât invest liabilities . They try to eliminate or minimize or even cover up liabilities. Itâs easy for us to see our strengths as assets. But most of us naturally consider our weaknesses as liabilities â deficiencies to minimize or cover up. But God, in his providence, gives us our weaknesses just as he gives us our strengths. In Godâs economy, where the return on investment he most values is âfaith working through loveâ (Galatians 5:6), weaknesses become assets â we can even call them talents  â to be stewarded, to be invested. It may even be that the most valuable asset God has given you to steward is not a strength, but a weakness. But if weâre to value weaknesses as assets, we need to see clearly where Scripture teaches this. The apostle Paul provides us with the clearest theology of the priceless value of weakness. I have found 1 Corinthians 1:18â2:16 and, frankly, the entire book of 2 Corinthians, to be immensely helpful in understanding the indispensable role weakness plays in strengthening the faith and witness of individual Christians and the church as a whole. Paradoxical Power of Weakness Paulâs most famous statement on the paradoxical spiritual power of weakness appears in 2 Corinthians 12. He tells us of his ecstatic experience of being âcaught up into paradise,â where he received overwhelming and ineffable revelations (2 Corinthians 12:1â4). But as a result, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited. Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. But he said to me, âMy grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.â Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:7â10) In these few sentences, Paul completely reframes the way Christians are to view weaknesses, even deeply painful ones that can appear to hinder our calling and that the powers of darkness seek to exploit. What at first seems to us like an expensive liability turns out to be a valuable, God-given asset. Weakness and Sin Before we go further, we need to be clear that Paul does not include sin  in his description of weakness here. The Greek word Paul uses is astheneia , the most common word for âweaknessâ in the New Testament. J.I. Packer, in his helpful study on 2 Corinthians, Weakness Is the Way , explains astheneia  like this: The idea from first to last is of inadequacy. We talk about physical weakness [including sickness and disability] . . . intellectual weakness . . . personal weakness . . . a weak position when a person lacks needed resources and cannot move situations forward or influence events as desired . . . relational weakness when persons who should be leading and guiding fail to do so â weak parents, weak pastors, and so on. (13â14) But when Paul speaks of sin, he has more than inadequacy in mind. The Greek word for âsinâ he typically uses is hamartia , which refers to something that incurs guilt before God. Hamartia  happens when we think, act, or feel in ways that transgress what God forbids. âWeaknesses manifest Godâs power in us in ways our strengths donât.â Though Paul was aware that hamartia  could lead to astheneia  (1 Corinthians 11:27â30) and astheneia  could lead to hamartia  (Matthew 26:41), he clearly did not believe âweaknessâ was synonymous with âsin.â For he rebuked those who boasted that their sin displayed the power and immensity of Godâs grace (Romans 6:1â2). But he âgladlyâ boasted of his weaknesses because they displayed the power and immensity of Godâs grace (2 Corinthians 12:9). In sin, we turn from God to idols, which profanes God, destroys faith, and obscures God in the eyes of others. But weakness has the tendency to increase our conscious dependence on God, which glorifies him, strengthens our faith, and manifests his power in ways our strengths never do. And thatâs the surprising value of our weaknesses: they manifest Godâs power in us in ways our strengths donât. Thatâs what Jesus meant when he told Paul, âMy power is made perfect in weaknessâ (2 Corinthians 12:9) â âperfectâ meaning complete  or entirely accomplished . Our weaknesses are indispensable because God manifests the fullness of his power through them. Asset Disguised as a Liability At this point, you may be thinking, âWhatever Paulâs âthornâ was, my weakness is not like that.â Right. Thatâs what we all think. I have a thorn-like weakness, known only to those closest to me. If I shared it with you, you might be surprised. It dogs me daily as I seek to carry out my family, vocational, and ministry responsibilities. It makes almost everything harder and regularly tempts me to exasperation. Itâs not romantic, certainly not heroic. It humbles me in embarrassing, not noble, ways. And most painful to me, I can see how in certain ways it makes life harder for those I live and work with. Often it has seemed to me a liability. Iâve pleaded with the Lord, even in tears, to remove it or grant me more power to overcome it. But itâs still here. Paul also initially saw his weakness as a grievous liability and pleaded repeatedly to be delivered from it. But as soon as he understood Christâs purposes in it, he saw it in a whole new light: a priceless asset disguised as a liability. And he gloried in the depths of Godâs knowledge, wisdom, and omnipotent grace. âGod, in his providence, gives us our weaknesses just as he gives us our strengths.â I have been slower than Paul in learning to see my thorn as an asset (and honestly, Iâm still learning). But I see at least some of the ways this weakness has strengthened me. It has forced me to live daily in dependent faith on Godâs grace. It has heightened my gratitude for those God has placed around me who have strengths where Iâm weak. Beset with my own weakness, I am more prone to deal gently and patiently with others who struggle with weaknesses different from mine (Hebrews 5:2). And I can see now how it has seasoned much of what Iâve written over the years with certain insights I doubt would have come otherwise. In other words, I see ways God has manifested his power more completely through my perplexing weakness. The fact that we donât know what Paulâs thorn was is evidence of Godâs wisdom. If we did, we likely would compare our weaknesses to his and conclude that ours have no such spiritual value. And we would be wrong. Stewards of Surprising Talents Paul said that his weakness, his âthorn . . . in the flesh,â was âgivenâ to him (2 Corinthians 12:7). Given by whom? Whatever role Satan played, in Paulâs mind he was secondary. Paul received this weakness, as well as âinsults, hardships, persecutions, and calamitiesâ (2 Corinthians 12:10), as assets given to him by his Lord. And as a â[steward] of the mysteries of Godâ (1 Corinthians 4:1), he considered his weaknesses a crucial part of the portfolio his Master had entrusted to him. So, he determined to invest them well in order that his Master would see as much of a return as possible. If youâre familiar with Jesusâs parable of the talents (Matthew 25:14â30), you might recognize that Iâm drawing from its imagery. Jesus has given each of us different âtalentsâ to steward, assets of immense kingdom value, âeach according to his abilityâ (Matthew 25:15). And his expectation is that we will invest them well while we wait for his return. Some of these talents are strengths and abilities our Lord has given us. But some of them are our weaknesses, our inadequacies and limitations, which heâs also given to us. And heâs given us these weaknesses not only to increase in us the invaluable and shareable treasure of humility (2 Corinthians 12:7), but also to increase our strength in the most important aspects of our being: faith and love (2 Corinthians 12:10). But our weaknesses are not only given to us as individuals; they are also given to the church. Our limitations, as much as our abilities, are crucial to Christâs design to equip his body so that it works properly and âbuilds itself up in loveâ (Ephesians 4:16). Our weaknesses make us depend on one another in ways our strengths donât (1 Corinthians 12:21â26). Which means they are given to the church for the same reason they are given to us individually: so that the church may grow strong in faith (1 Corinthians 2:3â5) and love (1 Corinthians 13) â two qualities that uniquely manifest Jesusâs reality and power to the world (John 13:35). Donât Bury Your Weaknesses Someday, when our Master returns, he will ask us to give an account of the talents heâs entrusted to us. Some of those talents will be our weaknesses. We donât want to tell him we buried any of them. It may even be that the most valuable talent in our investment portfolio turns out to be a weakness. Since âit is required of stewards that they be found faithfulâ (1 Corinthians 4:2), we would be wise to examine how faithfully we are stewarding the talents of our weaknesses. So, how well are you investing the weaknesses youâve been given?
