MINISTERIAL HUMILITY

'If it's possible to look at creation and not see the glory and presence of the one who created it all and controls it to this day, then it is also possible to look at your ministry and forget that every good thing there is the work of the hands greater than your own.' 

Paul David Tripp, Lead, p.212.

LIMITS TO GRACE?

'Everybody believes in grace until a leader needs it.'
Paul David Tripp, Lead, p.180.

IDENTITY IS FOUND VERTICALLY NOT HORIZONTALLY

'Since the fall, people have looked horizontally for what they were designed to find vertically. They ask people, places and things to do for them what only identity in the Lord can.' 

Paul David Tripp, Lead, p.164.

CHRISTIANITY IS COMMUNAL

'...an isolated, independent, separated, and self-hiding Christian life is alien to the Christianity of the New Testament. Biblical Christianity is thoroughly and foundationally relational. No one can live outside the essential ministries of the body of Christ and remain spiritually healthy.' 

Paul David Tripp, Lead, p.148.

DON'T IGNORE THE WARNING SIGNS

'...whenever there is a public fall of a well-known leader, my first question is, "Why didn't the surrounding leadership community see it and address it before it got to this horrible place?" I ask because there are a couple of assumptions that seem safe to make. First, you know the leader has changed because if he had been in the early days who he now is, he would never have been called, hired, or appointed to the leadership position. Second, the changes did not occur overnight. They happened in bits and pieces over a period of years. This means that there are not only many evidences of a shift taking place in his life, but a growing body of evidence of a shift in heart sensitivities and heart allegiances.' 

Paul David Tripp, Lead, p.110.

IDOLATRY IN MINISTRY IS MINISTRY

'Here's the scary reality. In ministry, the way you pursue your idols is by doing ministry. This reality should be in the thoughts and conversations of every ministry leadership community.' 

Paul David Tripp, Lead, p.90.

LEADERSHIP - ACCOUNTABILITY = DISASTER

'...it is my experience, as I have dealt with fallen or lapsed pastors, that around them was a weak or dysfunctional community that failed, in pastoral love and care, to protect that leader from himself.' 

Paul David Tripp, Lead, p.83.

A CALL TO CHRISTIAN LEADERSHIP IS A CALL TO SUFFER

'...when God gives you ministry and leadership gifts, he is calling you to be willing to suffer. Because of your gifts you will suffer a kind and severity of temptation that others don't face. Because of the public nature of your gifts, you will suffer dangerous adulation and harsh criticism. The demands of your ministry life will tempt you to neglect your own personal devotional life. That attractiveness of public ministry will tempt you to neglect the private ministry of marriage, family, and friendship. Your gifts will tempt you to be demanding, irritable, and impatient with people of lesser gifts or who happen to be in the way of what you want. You will be tempted to confuse your giftedness with your level of spiritual maturity. Yes, it is true: your gifts mean you have been called to suffer for the sake of the giver and what he intends to do through you (see 2 Cor.1:3-11).' 

Paul David Tripp, Lead, p.76.

A DANGER OF MINISTRY SUCCESS

'Sadly achievement can turn humble servant leaders into proud, controlling, and unapproachable mini-kings.' 

Paul David Tripp, Lead, p.49.

HOW THE GOSPEL SHOULD TRANSFORM LEADERSHIP

'Because of what God has done for us in the person and work of Jesus Christ, our leadership communities have been freed to be the most honest communities on earth. We are free to confess weakness because Jesus is our strength. We are free to confess failure because all of our failures have been covered by his blood. We are freed from taking credit for what God only can produce. We are free to respectfully disagree with one another because we get our identity and security from our Lord and not from one another. We are free to confess wrong attitudes toward and against one another because grace allows us to reconcile. We are freed from the allure of power and position because we have been freed from looking horizontally for what can only be found vertically. And we are free, because of Christ's work, to talk about these things and confess how we struggle with them.' 

Paul David Tripp, Lead: 12 Gospel Principles for Leadership in the Church, p.41.

MINISTRY

'The Devil wants you to think that your ministry is particularly difficult. He wants you to think you have been singled out for unique suffering. He wants you to begin to believe that your ministry situation, location, and relationships are definitely more difficult than what others face. He wants you to buy into the lie that while you're suffering, they're thriving; while you're being questioned, they're being respected; and while your work is hard, their work is easy. He wants you to carry around the burden that somehow, someway, you've been singled out.' 

Paul David Tripp, Dangerous Calling, p.220. 

GOD

'The fact of the matter is that we will never figure God out. He will never do all the things that we were expecting. He will never stay on our agenda page. He will never be comfortably predictable. If we rest in God's care only when we understand just what he's doing, there will be many times and places where we won't rest in his care.' 

Paul David Tripp, Dangerous Calling, p.127. 

PREACHING

'...a war rages, and wounded soldiers sit before you.'
Paul David Tripp, Dangerous Calling, p.139. 

MINISTRY

'There are few things that will reveal to you the full range of your sin, immaturity, weakness, and failure like ministry will. There are few things that will expose your weaknesses to others as consistently as ministry does. There are few endeavors that will put you under public expectancy and scrutiny like ministry does. There are few things that are as personally humbling as ministry is. There are few endeavors that have the power to produce in you such deep feelings of inadequacy as ministry does. There are few things that can be such a vat of self-doubt as ministry is. In your ministry there is a great temptation to be sidetracked and harmed by fear of you.'  

Paul David Tripp, Dangerous Calling, p.129.  

MINISTRY

'...we have forgotten that pastoral ministry is war and that you will never live successfully in the pastorate if you live with a peacetime mentality. Permit me to explain. The fundamental battle of pastoral ministry is not with the shifting values of the surrounding culture. It is not the struggle with resistant people who don't seem to esteem the gospel. It is not the fight for the success of the ministries of the church. And it is not the constant struggle of resources and personnel to accomplish the mission. No the war of the pastorate is a deeply personal war. It is fought on the ground of the pastor's heart. It is a war of values, allegiances, and motivations. It is about subtle desires and foundational dreams. This war is the greatest threat to every pastor. Yet is a war that we often naively ignore or quickly forget in the busyness of local-church ministry.' 

Paul David Tripp, Dangerous Calling, p.98. 

YOUR PASTOR

'Know this: if your eyes ever see or your ears ever hear the sin, weakness, or failure of your pastor, it should never be viewed as a hassle or an interruption; it is always grace. God loves that man and will expose his needs to you so that you can be part of his instrumentality of change and growth.' 

Paul David Tripp, Dangerous Calling: The Unique Challenges of Pastoral Ministry, p.95. 

SUFFERING

'Suffering tends to do two powerful things to us. First, it alienates us from the people nearest to us. It puts a big gulf between us. It makes us feel that there is no way anyone else could ever understand what we are going through. And if they could, they would be just as overwhelmed as we are and be looking for the quickest means of escape. We feel as if we have been swallowed up by suffering, and even though we are in the same room with others, it feels like we are more distant from one another than we have ever been.

Second, the shadow of suffering looms so large, it clouds any sense of God's presence. Suffering is like walking down into a windowless basement on a bright sunny day. The longer we stay in that subteerranean darkness, the harder it is to grasp that the sun is still shining. So suffering creates a double alienation. We not only experience the horizontal alienation from freinds and family, but we also experience a vertical alienation from God. This is where the promise of forever and its guarantee of God's presence in the here and now are so vital. When our souls are in the darkness, we need to keep telling ourselves again and again that the sun is still brightly shining. God is with us, even though the present darkness has blinded us from his nearness. We are not, nor will we ever be, alone. The God who has promised us forever has invaded our present so that nothing can get in the way of what he has stored away for us. He is near, and we are not alone.'

Paul David Tripp, Forever, p.116.

SUFFERING

'I am persauded that the the deepest of suffering for a human being is not the suffering of physical, relational, or pesonal loss. No the hardest part of suffering is the the emotional/ spiritual suffering we go through as we suffer the loss of those things. It is the pain of not being able to make sense of life, the pain of feeling that God is distant, or the pain of utter powerlessness.'

Paul David Tripp, Forever, p.110.

TEMPTATION

'Every day you have to be willing to listen to the things you say to yourself as you interact with the temptation to step over God's boundaries. Are you one of sin's best salepersons, able to point yourself to sin's pleasure without ever mentioning its pain? Or are you one of sins's best watchperson's, always warning yourself that on the far side of God's boundaries is danger, destruction and death?'

Paul David Tripp, Forever, p.63.

GOD

'The temporary pleasures of this present world are meant to point you to the lasting pleasure of knowing God. The rising of the sun each morning is meant to remind you of his faithfulness. The crushing power of a devastating storm is designed to make you reflect on his power. The sweetness of a human kiss is meant to remind you of his tender care. The dependency of a baby is there to remind you of your constant need of God. The fading beauty of the daffodil is meant to help you see his eternal beauty. The imperfect justice of the human community is designed to make you thankful that God will be perfectly just. The tender moment of human mercy is there to cause you to rest in his mercy. That five-course meal is an opportunity to reflect on and be grateful for the spiritual food you need and that God graciously gives. The shifting stars in the night are created to remind you that Jesus is the Light that never shifts or fades. Every experience of love is meant to point you to his love. Every moment of grace is there to cause you to run to his grace. All of creation is a finger pointing to God. It was not meant to replace him.'

Paul David Tripp, Forever, p.50.