The road to the pastorate is filled with men who had hoped to arrive a long time ago. Many years have passed since they first felt the seed of a desire to shepherd Christ’s church. But for any number of reasons — life circumstances, personal immaturity, the need for training — no church has called them as shepherd. Not yet.

I think of one friend whose aspiration has quietly burned for over a decade. I think of another man, barely out of his teens, who recently started pursuing the pastorate and likely has years ahead of him. I think of my former self, traveling that road through my entire twenties. Such men may feel ambitions as big as Paul’s — but then remember, with a sigh, that they are not even a Timothy yet.

What can a man do on that road, especially when he can’t see the end of it? Well, quite a lot. Bobby Jamieson offers a couple of dozen ideas in his helpful book The Path to Being a Pastor. My colleague Marshall Segal boils those down to seven worthy ambitions. But lately my mind has been focused on a passage from Paul to Timothy. Timothy was already a pastor at the time of Paul’s writing, but he was a young pastor, not far removed from the road of aspiring men. And Paul’s counsel applies wonderfully to those preparing to join him.

“Do we enjoy Jesus before we preach him, and preach him because we enjoy him?”

We might capture the heart of Paul’s burden in 1 Timothy 4:6–16 with the words of verse 15: “Practice these things, immerse yourself in them, so that all may see your progress.” Let them see your progress, Timothy. Don’t grow discouraged. Don’t remain stuck. Instead, by God’s grace, gain ground. Hone your character. Develop your competency. Become more godly, more fruitful, more zealous, more skilled. Make progress — the kind of progress that others can see.

To that end, consider a two-part plan: Train privately. Practice publicly.

Train Privately

Most of Paul’s commands in 1 Timothy 4:6–16 focus on Timothy’s public ministry. “Command and teach” (verse 11); “set the believers an example” (verse 12); “devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation, to teaching” (verse 13); and so on. At the same time, Paul knew just how easily public ministry could outpace private piety. He knew how tempting it could be to “keep a close watch on . . . the teaching” without keeping a close watch “on yourself” (verse 16).

It is frightfully possible to preach in public what you disobey in private. It is sadly common for men, even pastors-in-training, to lose delight in God’s word, and neglect the prayer closet. So, behind, before, and alongside Timothy’s public ministry, Paul says, “Train yourself for godliness” (verse 7). Explain publicly what you have experienced privately. Let all your teaching be plucked from the orchard of your soul. Remember that all God-pleasing progress in public flows from God-centered progress in private.

Enjoy His Words

“Train yourself for godliness”: the command takes us into an athletic spirituality, a pursuit of Christ that doesn’t mind the uphill climb, that relishes some sweat, that is willing to beat disobedient feelings into submission. Give yourself, Timothy, to the long, gradual, difficult, joyful process of becoming more like Jesus — or what some Puritans called “the great business of godliness” (The Genius of Puritanism, 12).

Such training may take many forms, but Paul leaves no doubt about the central content of Timothy’s regimen: he would progress in godliness by “being trained in the words of the faith” (1 Timothy 4:6). Reject “deceitful spirits and teachings of demons” (verse 1); sidestep “irreverent, silly myths” (verse 7). Instead, give yourself to God’s word.

If there is a secret to public progress, surely it lies in private soul-dealings with the God who speaks. I for one have felt chastened lately by Andrew Bonar’s description of the young Robert Murray M’Cheyne, who would often ride outside town “to enjoy an hour’s perfect solitude; for he felt meditation and prayer to be the very sinews of his work” (Memoir and Remains of Robert Murray M’Cheyne, 56). Meditation and prayer are the sinews of ministry. Without them, we may have the muscle of charisma and the bones of orthodoxy, but the body hangs loose and weak; we stagger rather than run.

In one way or another, the depth of our private dealings with God will become evident in public. Our faces will shine like Moses’s — or they won’t. Our spontaneous speech and conduct will “set . . . an example” (verse 12) — or it won’t. We will hand others the ripe fruit of our own meditations — or we will deal in plastic apples and pears.

As aspiring leaders, we know God’s word forms the soul and substance of our public ministry. But over time, has our private life come to betray that conviction? Do we still read God’s word with anything like athletic obsession? Do we enjoy Jesus before we preach him, and preach him because we enjoy him? Do we treat meditation and prayer as the indispensable sinews of ministry?

Examine Your Soul

As Timothy devotes himself to “the words of the faith,” Paul calls him to turn his attention inward as well. “Keep a close watch on yourself,” he writes (1 Timothy 4:16). Timothy was an overseer of souls, but the first soul he needed to oversee was his own.

“The gifts of God are not only given, but cultivated; not only bestowed, but honed.”

Paul had spoken such words to pastors before. “Pay careful attention to yourselves,” he told the elders in Ephesus (Acts 20:28). And he had good reason to warn: “From among your own selves will arise men speaking twisted things” (Acts 20:30). Pastor or not, if a man does not keep a close watch on himself, he will lose himself. He will not only fail to progress; he will regress, sometimes beyond hope. And Timothy was no exception.

So, Paul says, keep a close watch. Regularly tour the city of your heart to see if any enemies have breached the gate and now threaten the throne. Stand sentinel in your soul; know the weak spots on the walls, and study the enemies you are likely to face. Pray and then patiently review in God’s presence your speech, conduct, love, faith, purity (1 Timothy 4:12). As you read God’s word, ask him to search you and save you, to reveal you and rescue you (Psalm 139:23–24). “Lord, discipline me, correct me, expose me, confront me — and whatever it takes, keep me from destroying myself.”

True, we do not make much progress in godliness by looking inward. But we may notice the enemies that keep us from progress — enemies that, unmortified, would ruin all our progress up till now.

Practice Publicly

If private progress relates mostly to our character, public progress relates mostly to our competence. And in our passage, Paul cares about Timothy’s competence a lot. When he writes, “Practice these things, immerse yourself in them, so that all may see your progress” (1 Timothy 4:15), “these things” refers mainly to “the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation, to teaching” (verse 13). Timothy was already “able to teach” (1 Timothy 3:2), but Paul wanted him to become more able, to increasingly look like “a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth” (2 Timothy 2:15).

Paul recognized in Timothy a pastoral gift (1 Timothy 4:14). But Timothy’s gift was not a static endowment: he could “neglect the gift” he had, or he could “practice” and improve it (verses 14–15). For the gifts of God are not only given, but cultivated; not only bestowed, but honed. And here men like us find hope. However gifted we may feel (or not), we are not at the mercy of our present attainments. We can handle God’s word with more care. We can apply it with more power. We can develop a greater readiness “in season and out of season” (2 Timothy 4:2). That is, as long as we practice.

Embrace Unspectacular Opportunities

Few men receive a ready-made gift of teaching, a gift with no assembly required. God’s kingdom has its occasional Spurgeons, of course, who preached better as a teenager than I ever will as an adult. But most of us become proficient only through repeated practice over years, and then most of us progress further only through more practice still. And if we’re going to practice as much as we ought — as much as Paul’s “immerse yourself” suggests (1 Timothy 4:15) — then we likely will need to embrace opportunities that seem pretty unspectacular.

We might, for example, lead a group of guys in middle-school ministry. We might pour more thought into family devotions. We might find a lonely, suffering saint, listen to his heart woes, and practice the complex art of pastoral counseling. We might gather a few men committed to exhorting and encouraging each other. We might spend time with the sermon passage before we hear it preached, developing our own ideas and applications, drafting our own outline. We might snatch up every realistic opportunity to open the Bible and say something about it.

Perhaps we feel tempted to despise these small, unspectacular opportunities. But small, unspectacular opportunities form, for most of us, the indispensable path toward progress. There is no progress without practice — and practice sometimes feels utterly ordinary.

Fail Well

Those who practice enough, of course, eventually discover an uncomfortable truth: with practice comes not only progress, but failure. Open your mouth often enough, and you’ll say something foolish. Exhort others enough, and you’ll damage a bruised reed. Counsel enough, and you’ll speak too soon or too late. Preach enough, and you’ll leave the pulpit disheartened.

In the aftermath of such moments, we may feel like practicing a little less; rather than immersing ourselves in ministry or devoting ourselves to teaching (1 Timothy 4:13, 15), we may feel like retreating to a safer place. We may want to dig a hole and bury our talents in the dirt of our failures.

Yet precisely in such moments, we need to hear Paul’s word to Timothy in verse 14: “Do not neglect the gift you have.” Yes, your effort ended in embarrassment, but do not neglect the gift you have. Yes, taking another public risk feels daunting, but do not neglect the gift you have. Yes, to fail again like that would feel shameful, but do not neglect the gift you have. In some cases, of course, repeated failure may suggest that we don’t actually have the gift we thought we did. In so many cases, however, the failure was just part of the practice.

So, hold your failures in open hands, and learn all you can from them. Remember “the words of the faith” that have been your private strength, your secret delight. Take courage that if “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners” (1 Timothy 1:15), he can certainly restore and use failures. And then get back in the pulpit, back before the small group, back on the streets, back wherever your ministry lies, and use the gift that God has given you.

And in time, all will see your progress.

The day began bright with hope and promise. This day was the nearest to Eden man had been since the fall: the dwelling place of God was again with man.

The tabernacle stood within Israel’s camp, and now Yahweh was set to appoint his priests. Israel gathered in breathless expectation as Moses publicly ordained Aaron and his four sons — Nadab, Abihu, Eleazar, and Ithamar —to serve as priests of the Most High God.

In that first appointment to holy service, blood was spilled, animals fell slain, anointing oil was poured, special garments were bestowed, a covenantal meal was consumed. The proceedings kept in careful step with the drumbeat “as the Lord commanded” (Leviticus 8:4, 9, 13, 17, 21, 29, 36). So far, so good.

The first worship service in the tabernacle then commenced immediately after the ordination. Turning to the people, Aaron and his four sons offered sacrifices for themselves and for the people, and he blessed them. The Lord added his “so far, so good” by providing the grand finale:

The glory of the Lord appeared to all the people. And fire came out from before the Lord and consumed the burnt offering and the pieces of fat on the altar, and when all the people saw it, they shouted and fell on their faces. (Leviticus 9:23–24)

The Lord approved the ordination and showed his pleasure at their worship.

But the weather soon changed.

Wailing in the Camp

Imagine the scenario. As you sit by your tent with your family later that day, you begin to hear what sounds like loud cries heading your way. You hear shrieks and screams. As the crowd comes closer, you wonder: What could possibly bring such sorrow on a day like this?

Sobs swell in your ears as the entourage draws near.

Is that Mishael and Elzaphan from Aaron’s family? Why is their walk belabored? What is that they’re carrying between them? The smell of burnt flesh begins to fill the air — a bull?

Then you see it, the motionless heap they carry slowly through the camp and out to where the scraps of sacrifices go: the garb that so recently dazzled in the sunlight — the coverings, the sashes, the hats of a priest. It cannot be! Nadab? And Abihu too?

These — no, not these.

These just celebrated this morning — ordained of God; these, the eldest sons of Aaron, next in line to lead us; these, who went up by name to sit with the elders and see the very face of God upon the mountain (Exodus 24:1)? It could not be these who had just assisted Aaron as the glory of the Lord fell and we all collapsed in worship.

No, not these, who were just washed clean with water, clothed with coats, tied with sashes, bound with caps; not these, who so recently laid their hands upon the offerings; no, not these, who were just touched with the blood of the sacrifice upon their ear, thumb, and big toe, consecrated unto Yahweh. Not these.

Were they ambushed? Had someone defiled the tent with murder? Or has the Lord himself, so recently setting them apart, now dismissed them with fire?

Sins of Nadab and Abihu

Many wonder what exactly Nadab and Abihu’s sin entailed. Some think, with the immediate reference prohibiting drunkenness (Leviticus 10:8–11), that they offered incense while intoxicated. Others wonder (perhaps in addition to this) whether they attempted to go into the Holy of Holies (Who Shall Ascend the Mountain of the Lord?, 147).

Whatever the list of crimes, we know that Nadab and Abihu offered “unauthorized fire before Yahweh, which he had not commanded them” (Leviticus 10:1). Which the Lord had not commanded them. The sevenfold refrain of “as the Lord commanded” came to a fatal halt. They went forth of their own initiative to draw near to God as they saw fit.

And the retribution was swift, and nothing less than just. They took liberties as they gripped their censers of incense, “and fire came out from before the Lord and consumed them, and they died before the Lord” (Leviticus 10:2).

Worship Is Not Safe

With many today, it appears, worship of the Almighty is slight and carefree. Some women give more thought to their makeup, and men to the game after service, than that we have gathered to meet with God.

The assumption seems to be that the Deity is content — thankful even — that we have set aside our precious time on our Sunday to give him some of our attention. He is ever-smiling, even when some barely bother to rise from their beds, happy to “worship” virtually week in and week out with their “online churches.” They wouldn’t engage with the mailman with so slouched and slovenly a disposition, but here they are worshiping before God. Many approach the burning bush every Sunday with their sandals (or bedroom slippers) still upon their feet, spiritually and otherwise.

“With many today, worship of the Almighty has become slight and carefree.”

What happened to reverence? When did it become an endangered species? Has God not the right to ask many professing Christians today, as he did the negligent priests of Israel, “A son honors his father, and a servant his master. If then I am a father, where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is my fear?” (Malachi 1:6).

And I ask this not to the bizarre outliers given to almost unbelievable forms of irreverence, like spraying the congregation with water guns, drive-thru “means of grace,” and dance contests in the worship service. I ask this to the normal, seemingly respectable church-attender, flippantly going through the motions: Do you approach the Lord with fear and trembling? And I ask this of myself, Do I consciously worship every Sunday before the Holy God, the untamable Lion of Judah?

In light of Nabad and Abihu, it stands to reason that, for thousands who gather every Sunday, the safest place for them to be would be absent.

Reverance Lost

The lightning strikes of judgment — in the old covenant with Nadab and Abihu, and in the new with the likes of Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5:1–11) — ought to cause the same response it did for the early church: “And great fear came upon the whole church and upon all who heard of these things” (Acts 5:11).

I sigh that I don’t often have this fear or due reverence in the worship of God. In his presence, Isaiah cried, “Woe is me! For I am lost” (Isaiah 6:5). Job cried, “Now my eye sees you; therefore I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes” (Job 42:5–6). Peter cried, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord” (Luke 5:8). The beloved disciple writes, “When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead” (Revelation 1:17).

Granted, these are not to be the only or primary experiences of God day-to-day — but do we ever respond this way?

Sermon of the Dead

How would our worship services change if the Nadabs and Abihus of our day were struck dead and carried out through the aisles of our churches?

If wails of horror resounded and scorched sermons read,

Here, O Christian churches, are two corpses of those who trifled with the Consuming Fire of heaven and earth. Two men of high rank, two men of great promise, two sons of Aaron himself, consumed in judgment. Behold them. Wail for them. Learn from them.

Read the sermon text written upon their lifeless frames:

“Among those who are near me I will be sanctified, and before all the people I will be glorified” (Leviticus 10:3).

Ministers, you who draw near to God in service today, behold them drunk upon my wrath. Will you dare toy with the shepherd’s crook? Will you wander before me with the strange fire of false teaching? Have you not been warned of stricter judgment? Have you not been commanded to watch over yourself and your doctrine and my sheep carefully? Have you not been charged — in my presence — to preach my word, not your own? The pulpit is a false hope for protection.

Or to those strolling into worship every Sunday with an irreverence, a negligence, a fatal familiarity that I did not command: Behold the bodies of my chosen servants. If I treat these with righteous impartiality, shall you escape?

With Fear and Trembling

The towering love of God, the warm compassion of Christ, the blessed name “Immanuel” (God with us), does not permit creatures to approach him with irreverence. Boldly we can approach the throne of grace through our better High Priest, Jesus — but never apart from him and never in ways disobedient to his command.

“Do we worship a Holy God, the God of Nadab and Abihu?”

Worship today is to be no less weighty than in Israel, because the God we worship has not lessened in holiness. Joyful, triumphant, consoling — but never flippant. He will be glorified. As Matthew Henry soberly comments on this text, “If God be not sanctified and glorified by us, he will be sanctified and glorified upon us. He will take vengeance on those that profane his sacred name by trifling with him.”

So, as the bodies pass us by in Leviticus 10, making their way out of the camp, they press on us a question to consider today: Do we worship the Holy God of Nadab and Abihu?

Audio Transcript

On the morning after the crazy November 2020 election here in the States, several cultural commentators observed that amid all the confusion over who won the presidency, there was no mistaking who won the night: marijuana. Four additional states passed ballot measures to legalize recreational use of pot for adults, and none of the votes were close. Those states included Arizona, Montana, New Jersey, and South Dakota, bringing the total to fifteen. And many remaining states have decriminalized it, showing where the cultural trajectory is headed. Thirty-seven states have legalized medical-use marijuana — something you support, Pastor John, if governed by appropriate physician oversight and prescriptions (as you explained way back in episode 77). But just a decade ago, I believe recreational cannabis was illegal in all fifty states. That is being overturned quickly. And each year this is growing as a bigger and bigger issue for Christians and pastors and parents and churches. Do you have anything new to say as recreational use gains widespread support in red and blue states across our country?

It’s not exactly new, but I do have something I want to say in regard to the fact that ten years ago, recreational cannabis was illegal in all fifty states, whereas this is increasingly not the case today.

Ethical Overlap

And what I want to draw attention to, by way of exhortation and encouragement, even though it may sound pessimistic to some, is that this fact, the legalization of pot, draws attention to something that we need to be aware of and we need to adjust our thinking about — namely, that the church for a long time has leaned too heavily on the overlap between the state and the church for the strength of our conviction concerning what is right and wrong.

“The church leaned, you could say, on the culture for its catechism, its teaching, its inspiration, its conviction.”

In other words, if the state has regarded something as wrong or illegal, then the church hasn’t had to work very hard to teach any deep roots for the conviction or any thorough biblical argumentation or any conviction-strengthening inspiration, because everybody just assumes that the behavior is out of bounds. The state expectations and the cultural mores overlap with Christian ways, and so we can just coast.

Now stop and think of the number of behaviors that were once illegal and are no more.

Divorce was once illegal.
Adultery and fornication were illegal.
Homosexual practices were illegal.
Indecency was illegal, in such a way that what’s considered acceptable in movies and on beaches today would have been forbidden.
Sabbath-breaking was illegal.
Abortion was illegal in every state.

And the list could go on and on.

Catechized by Culture

Now, the point is not that these things should or shouldn’t be illegal. The point is that because they were illegal, the church didn’t have to think very hard or work very hard or teach very deeply or inspire very effectively to inculcate convictions and attitudes and behaviors in our young people or in new converts. We simply could assume that our people wouldn’t do these things because they were taboo and illegal in the culture.

The church leaned, you could say, on the culture for its catechism, its teaching, its inspiration, its conviction. So the church assumed so much overlap between cultural convictions and Christian convictions that you didn’t often hear teaching or preaching that taught the church how to be alien or strange or weird or maligned. And I used the word maligned because that’s the word Peter uses in 1 Peter 4:3–4, when he says,

The time that is past suffices for doing what the Gentiles want to do, living in sensuality, passions, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties, and lawless idolatry. With respect to this they are surprised you do not join them . . . and they malign you.

In other words, for most of American history, there has been so much overlap between cultural mores and outward Christian behaviors that this text in 1 Peter 4 seemed designed for another world — like, “What does that text have to do with anything in America?” For centuries, many Americans would go to church, not in spite of being maligned, but because not to go would be maligned.

Deep Moral Roots

So the so-called Judeo-Christian ethic shaped laws and churches to such an extent that the culture, as much as the church, discipled our young people. I grew up in that world, anyway, when I was a kid. And little effort went into cultivating a mindset that Christians are not of this world but are sojourners and exiles and will be maligned if they walk in step with Jesus. Little effort went into helping Christians sink their moral roots deep into Christ and the gospel and his word and his way, such that we would be able to take a stand for some truth or some attitude or some behavior when no one else is standing with us.

That’s a biblical, spiritual, parental church responsibility that has been significantly neglected. And that neglect is now being exposed by the speed and flagrancy of the cultural normalization of sin. So, the destigmatization and legalization of attitudes and behaviors that are out of step with Christ can be, I think, a roundabout way of something good for the church. We should not have been leaning so heavily on the culture for support of what we held to be right and wrong.

America tried — Christians included — to use the legislature to banish the misuse of alcohol by making alcohol illegal. Prohibition lasted from 1920–1933. It failed. My guess is that a better case could be made today to outlaw alcohol than to outlaw cannabis. Forty percent of all violent crimes involve alcohol, and forty percent of all fatal motor-vehicle accidents involve alcohol. We may find that the legalization of pot puts it in that category, but maybe not. In fact, from what I read, it’s probably not going to work that way. It doesn’t have those same kinds of effects.

Raising Miracles

My point is this: the focus and the moral energy of the church, the great majority of our effort, should not be on pursuing political and legal and cultural support for behaviors and attitudes we want to see in our children and in our churches. That is a misplaced focus. I’m not saying there’s no role for Christians in politics or legislatures where they can make their case for what they consider to be healthy for society. But I am saying that effort should never, never even come close to being the primary focus of pastors and parents.

“Our primary focus should be to do what only the Bible and only the gospel and only the Holy Spirit can do.”

The primary focus should be to do what only the Bible and only the gospel and only the Holy Spirit and the truth and Jesus can do in transforming human beings into the kind of Christ-exalting, Spirit-dependent, God-glorifying people who freely choose not to use drugs — whether caffeine or alcohol or cannabis or cocaine or meth or heroin — to escape into a world where Christ is less clearly perceived, and the Scriptures are less understood and precious, and the Spirit is less personal, and the glory of God is less satisfying, and the way of righteousness is less defined, and the path of obedience is less compelling. We want Christians who freely reject anything that would put them in that kind of mindset.

To be a Christian, a true Christian, is a very radical thing. It’s a miraculous thing. It’s a supernatural thing. It requires not a little bit of effort while we try to get the world on our side — which, by definition, is never going to happen. It requires the whole focus of the pastoral ministry — evangelizing and preaching and worshiping and counseling and teaching and setting radical examples for the people. It requires focus — Spirit-dependent, Bible-saturated efforts of parents to call down the miracle, through their parenting and through the church, of the creation of young people who are joyfully willing to be out of step with the world.

That’s the message, I think, God is sending us in the destigmatization and normalization and legalization of behaviors and attitudes and drugs that we think are out of step with the gospel. It’s a call to be the church and to be the home.