Letters to a Young Pastor [Paperback]

Calvin Miller (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 2011

 

Much has changed over Calvin Miller’s decades of pastoral ministry, but he believes two things remain the same: God is love and people are broken. Now God is calling young pastors to stand in that gap. And in this honest, warm and humorous series of letters, Miller shares his wisdom and experience so you can flourish in your future ministry—without ever wanting to resign on Monday.

 

 

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Calvin Miller has long been one of the most creative voices in the church. As a best-selling author and poet he has enabled believers to flourish. As a pastor and educator he has equipped countless thousands to know and serve God more fully. And he’s got the battle scars to prove it.

 

Having survived these tumultuous decades, Dr. Miller now shares his well-earned wisdom with the next generation of pastors—including you, or someone you know.

 

Miller acknowledges much has changed over his years of ministry, as we’ve moved from switchboards to smartphones and from big-haired evangelists to cigar-smoking emergents. But two truths remain the same: God is love and people are broken. In this honest, engaging, and humorous collection of letters, he encourages you to fight the good fight, stay the course, and keep your eye on the Author and Finisher of the faith…to serve well every Sunday so you’ll never feel the urge to resign on Monday.

About the Author

 

Calvin Miller was pastor of Westside Church, Omaha, Nebraska, for twenty-five years. After teaching seven years at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, he joined the faculty of Samford University’s Beeson Divinity School in Birmingham, Alabama, where he is Research Professor and distinguished Writer in Residence. He is the author of more than forty books.

 

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: David C. Cook (September 1, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0781405777
• ISBN-13: 978-0781405775
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #315,335 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars So Much Sarcasm, November 28, 2011

By 

MasterAP (Maryland, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Letters to a Young Pastor (Paperback)

Coming from a pastor of twenty-five years, you'd think Calvin Miller would have plenty to share with the new generation of pastors.

This book is stocked full of his anecdotes and insights of what it takes to be a minister, the sort of people you will come in contact with, how to interact with them and what he believes to be wrong with Christianity and its leaders.

You will not be missing any of Miller's sarcasm as these letters are full of it. I'm talking every single letter has the sarcasm included. At times this is confusing because I wasn't sure if he was trying to be serious about a complaint or just making light of it.

For example, he thrashes the megachurch pastors pretty hard. He claims megachurch pastors don't read books unless they deal with church growth.

Then he rips into Christians who don't end their prayers with "in Jesus' Name". As if saying those three words invokes some supernatural authority. (You'd have to understand what it means to do something "in the name of Christ" - it's along the same lines as taking God's name in vain)

He states that Rick Warren's prayer at President Obama's inauguration seemed to give Jesus the right to, "the nation of faith He forged at a terrible price."

See, I'm not sure if he's doing the whole tongue-in-cheek act there or if he is serious.

All in all, this book is a fun read for new preachers. It'll provide some fun insight and humorous stories from a seasoned minister.

I could have done with less sarcasm.

This book was provided for review, at no cost, by David C Cook Publishing.

5.0 out of 5 stars So much wisdom for leaders, January 28, 2012

By 

Joshua Reich - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Letters to a Young Pastor (Paperback)

Letters to a Young Pastor by Calvin Miller is one of those books I wished I had read several years ago. Miller is in his 70's after spending most of his life as a pastor and writes about the things he's learned, what he'd differently. It reads like sitting with an older mentor at Starbucks. Each chapter averages 4 pages and are written as short emails or letters from Miller to a young pastor.

I was struck by how much time Miller spent talking about character. Most books on pastoral leadership and church growth center on techniques, but it was refreshing to see him spend such a bulk of time on character. Without character, you won't last in ministry. I also appreciated how by the time you are Miller's age, in your mid-70's, the things that used to matter don't matter like they used to.

The other thing he emphasized was tenure, gutting it out when being a leader or pastor becomes difficult. The average pastor now stays at his church 18 months. This is one of the main reasons for a lack of effectiveness among pastors and churches. I am 3 and a half years into Revolution and we are more effective and healthy than we've ever been. I thought back to my 18 month mark and it was one of the hardest seasons of my leadership, but on the other side of that came a lot of vitality.

Here are a few things that jumped out, some of the best advice if it were:

-"People will endure anything in a church except an absence of vitality."

-Not everyone seems to believe it, but at the center of this minor formula for success is tenure. So many of the letters in this book focus on the long haul and the power of sticking to one thing: tenure.

-Every call makes one statement: One preaches because one must.

-"Pastoral care is a world of unbearable pain. However high we lift our spirits in personal or public worship, it is good to remember that many in our congregations come and go from our worship with broken hearts. In some ways this is what is most wrong with public invitations. We ask all those who are shrinking back from life to come forward. But they are refugees from sociability. They want to hide; they do not want to come forward. They want to hide out, so pastors must go to their hiding places. We must come down from our soaring worship and agree to enter the world of unbearable hurt."

-Churches that ignore their communities will not grow, and churches that will not globalize don't matter much.

-When you can't find Jesus, just play Jesus for someone else, and you'll soon have all the Jesus your errant heart can hold.

-Theology only really matters when it is affecting and changing the culture.

-Read the Bible as though the faith depended upon it.

-Never ask your people to do anything you have never done and wouldn't do. Never ask them to run a play you consider beneath your dignity.

-Visions should always be bigger than our life span.

-One of the things I wish I had learned earlier is that my sermons do not have to get better week by week. This would seem an easy thing to know. But we get caught in a trap for approval. We are so eager for our people to keep bragging us up, and so we work even harder, to keep getting better. This is a snare. Avoid it.

-Anytime you speak over people's heads to exhibit your own brilliance, you injure the gospel.

-People will sooner or later guess by the powerless life you live that you've lost your openness with a holy God.

-Never go into the pulpit without a definite plan to change the world in some way. Preaching is to change.

-The apostle Paul was more famous for his trials than his successes, I suppose.

If you are a young church planter or leader, then this is a book that should move up your reading list.

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4.0 out of 5 stars Wisdom from a Seasoned Pastor, January 16, 2012

By 

Darryl Dash "DashHouse" (Toronto, ON Canada) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Letters to a Young Pastor (Paperback)

The first rule of pastoral preparation should be that you don't get to pastor until you've apprenticed under a godly, seasoned pastor. I'd bend the rule occasionally for special cases like Spurgeon, but the rule would apply to the rest of us. And my second rule would be that you have to read a curmudgeon or two. I recommend Carl Trueman. But I think Calvin Miller might be up to the job as well.

In Letters to a Young Pastor, Calvin Miller shares from decades of pastoral ministry on almost every topic possible. I love it. I don't agree with everything he says, but I sense that he wrote more than a few sentences in this book with his tongue firmly in his cheek.

Miller is so out of step with contemporary Christianity that he's willing to call the emperor naked. He's played many of the games that young pastors play, and he's no longer interested. He's brutally honest, even when it rubs against the evangelical grain.

Here are some samples.

-On being a pastor and a father: "If the church suddenly came up with a critical meeting on circus night, I'd go to the circus."

-On ministry in a megachurch world: "One of our chief sins is that we school our students in the works of preachers with large churches and then brutally send them into the world of small churches where they remain until retirement."

-On theological mushiness: "The world is looking for answers. If you have some of them, for goodness' sake spit 'em out. The world is looking for servants of God whose yes is yes. How elementary, how refreshing."

-On hell: "I confess I miss hell ... a lot! What Jesus saved us from is no longer perfectly clear."

-On the mission of the church: "What does your church offer that's missing at the YMCA? ... When you read your church's bulletin and determine the invitation you offer, you will know whether your church is a community center or the globalizing, wounded arm of the Savior."

-On pastoring small churches: "Trust no theology that doesn't work where the crowd is small and the pay is inadequate ... If your church is small, it will likely more approximate the ministry of St. Paul than Dr. Megachurch."

-On church business meetings: "Baptist business meetings were my nemesis for all thirty-five years of parish life. I have always lived in fear of them and have always despised those five little words from hell: 'Is there any new business?'"

I have to confess that Miller almost lost me in the introduction when he said, "I led only a couple of people a week to Christ. Anybody can do that." Over 25 years, that led to 2,800 people. But I'm glad I kept reading.

Miller is out of sync with some of what's wrong with me and with the church, and that is one of his greatest gifts. There is no substitute for training under a seasoned pastor, but reading one will do in a pinch. This book is good for young pastors - and middle-aged ones too.