Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in . . . conduct. (1 Timothy 4:12)

My brother pastor, this tragic world has no idea how much you’re worth. But in the eyes of the risen Christ, you so matter. You carry weight with him, and you can carry weight with the people in your church. And this gravitas has nothing to do with your age.

If the ministry makes you feel inadequate, welcome to the ministry! Even the prophet Jeremiah felt that way. But the Lord told Jeremiah to stop his defeatist thoughts: “Do not say, ‘I am only a youth’; for to all to whom I send you, you shall go, and whatever I command you, you shall speak” (Jeremiah 1:7). And then God reached out and put his own words in Jeremiah’s mouth (Jeremiah 1:9). Why? Because what matters more than your mouth is whose words are in your mouth.

And, remember, your calling is to pastor, not only to preach. These two primary tasks are inseparable but distinguishable. Preaching declares gospel doctrine, and pastoring nurtures gospel culture. When the pastor’s message is good news, and his manner is gentle warmth, “church” can start feeling like an experience of Jesus himself. And it’s exemplary pastoral conduct, surrounding both preaching and pastoring, that leads people into those green pastures and beside those still waters.

You don’t have to be brilliant, but you must be exemplary. First Timothy 4:12 says so. And how could it be otherwise? We can think of gifted ministers whose shameful conduct has discredited them and grieved us all. The whole world, along with the entire Christian church, has every right to expect us to be surprisingly exemplary in this age of corruption. Brother, let’s stand tall with Christlike integrity, as true-hearted men of God. If we corrupt ourselves, we, like King David, will give “great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme” (2 Samuel 12:14 NKJV). So much is at stake right here: “Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in . . . conduct.”

Pastoring in ‘Little’ Moments

Conduct, in the original text, suggests your multifaceted lifestyle, your many moments on many fronts, your total way of life in all its variety. This word covers all your interactions with people, all aspects of your job performance, all occasions of family life and leisure. George Abbot-Smith’s Manual Greek Lexicon catches the sense with “a wheeling about” — that is, a turning from one moment to the next as each day unfolds.

The whole-life-ness of conduct reminds me of one way I’ve changed over the years. Back in college, all my friends were reading The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien. So I took it up too. But I couldn’t stick with it. The story unfolded so slowly, with one subplot after another slowing the onward movement of the drama. I started thinking, “Get to the point!” In my impatience, I gave up. That was in the 1970s.

Then the summer before the first LOTR movie came out in 2001, I tried again. I wanted my own imagination to paint the pictures. And this time, I couldn’t put the books down. Why? Tolkien hadn’t changed. I had changed. I had come to realize, by my fifties, that my real life is just like Tolkien’s portrayal — one tiny subplot after another, but each one meaningful within the larger story. I now understand that all my tiny moments are building toward the final denouement promised by God. So, I get it. Many small moments are how our lives actually work. They are where our conduct is formed and displayed. They matter.

The Book of Common Prayer gets us praying that “among the swift and varied changes of this world, our hearts may surely there be fixed where true joys are to be found.” Exactly. That’s the realism, and the hope, empowering exemplary pastoral conduct.

Your Life Can Persuade

Let’s admit it. In lots of moments, ministry can feel insignificant. But your little moments are not little. Each one fits meaningfully into your story, as told by the Lord Jesus. Every meeting, every conversation, every quiet minute of study — all of it constitutes your conduct, declares your character, and can inspire your congregation. So, think long-term, and be patient. If God isn’t rushing around in a hurry, why should you? Over time, your exemplary conduct, growing into a magnificent totality, is convincing. You will win the respect of good people.

“Over time, your exemplary conduct, growing into a magnificent totality, is convincing.”

Yes, sadly, some church people will never respect you. But most others will be reasonable and will admire your example. They will feel proud that you are their pastor. You will prove the wisdom of saintly old J.C. Ryle: “Your life is an argument that none can escape.”

Now let’s get practical. As in my last article on exemplary speech, let’s see how Titus 2:2 can help us: “Older men are to be sober-minded, dignified, self-controlled.” The “older men” are the grown-ups in the room. Your conduct can make you one of those heroes right now. Whatever your age, you can help set the tone for everyone else.

SOBER-MINDED

The exemplary pastor’s conduct is calm. He strides forward with gentle confidence. It isn’t bravado. It is sober realism. You are, in fact, serving the One who has all authority in heaven and on earth. You have no right to be inflated with pride or crippled with fear. The Lord of the universe called you into the ministry. He has been preparing you all your life for the duties and challenges of this very day. You’re more ready than you feel. Dare to believe it. And go do the next right thing.

“The exemplary pastor’s conduct is calm. He strides forward with gentle confidence.”

You can be a mature father-figure in your church. And good fathers know what to do, what to say, as the occasion requires. Then the other family members feel reassured, safe, grateful. What a wonderful calling your Lord has given you! You don’t have to deserve it, but you do have to receive it. Your exemplary conduct proves to your people that “Papa’s home.”

DIGNIFIED

The exemplary pastor’s conduct is noble. The longer I live, the more I desire this in my own life. That title “Reverend” before your name calls for this very quality of dignity, nobility, honor. I have no respect for pompous grandiosity in a minister. But gravitas — I revere it, and I expect it.

Is there laughter in the ministry? Oh, yes! How lovely a sound is the hearty laughter of the saints! But infantile silliness, common in our declining culture, deserves no place among the blood-bought people of God. We worship here below in harmony with “angels and archangels and with all the company of heaven,” as the Book of Common Prayer reminds us. Please, brother, show your church, by your exemplary conduct, what that dignity can look like — even this Sunday.

SELF-CONTROLLED

The exemplary pastor’s conduct is steady. Maybe at times you notice some unruly emotions inside you, as I do inside me. That bad neighborhood between our two ears can be a crazy place to dwell in. Our dark thoughts and feelings can dominate us, even defeat us. But godly men fight back. They dare to live in Spirit-given self-control.

Why not go to a trusted friend at church to talk and pray through together what most unsettles you? No one grows in isolation, not even pastors. But all of us can walk in newness of life by going to a wise friend with this humble request: “Help me see myself.” Who wouldn’t benefit from that? Your vulnerability itself will be exemplary conduct. And you will grow in the steady self-mastery that adorns the gospel you preach.

Exemplary or Cool?

The great thing about being 73 and half-dead is that I’m not cool anymore. It’s freeing. I don’t have to project an idealized false Ray. I can get over myself and love others. And here is my plea to you, my brother pastor: Why not enter that freedom right now, at your younger age? You can be exemplary in your conduct, by God’s grace, at a level that surprises even you.

Rolling Stone magazine interviewed Billy Joel back in 1990. Here’s a snippet of what he said:

I need substance in my life. And the world needs substance. The world doesn’t need any more hip. Hip is dead. The world doesn’t need more cool, more clever. The world needs substantial things.

The world needs substantial pastors too. That’s what I believe. It’s what you believe. Okay then: set the believers an example in your conduct.

John Piper is founder and teacher of desiringGod.org and chancellor of Bethlehem College & Seminary. For 33 years, he served as pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis, Minnesota. He is author of more than 50 books, including Desiring God: Meditations of a Christian Hedonist and most recently Providence.

Audio Transcript

On Friday of last week, in APJ 1869, we looked at the terrible things Satan can do to people and to us. We saw that Satan can bring on physical suffering. He’s behind much sickness. We know Satan brought a thorn of physical pain into Paul’s life. He can even throw Christians into prison. Satan got Jesus arrested, beaten, and thrown on a cross. And just as he sought to destroy our Savior, Satan seeks to destroy our faith today. He’s very powerful. But he’s not all-powerful. Where Satan acts, he only acts “by permission,” and never with “ultimate control.” Nevertheless, he’s real. “He’s strong. He’s evil. And he’s on a long leash.” And even on that “long leash” of God’s providence, “he does terrible damage.” Those were the points from that recent episode. Satan is no joke.

But there’s another reality we must add to the mix. And it’s this: there’s only one “finally destructive weapon in the artillery of Satan.” Only one — one lethal weapon he can wield over you and over me. What is it? Here’s Pastor John’s answer in a 1996 sermon.

All the old high priests, remember what they did in the Old Testament. They had bulls and they had goats and they had doves, and they’d go into the Holy of Holies, and they’d take blood and spill it on the altar, covering the sins of the people for a year, perhaps, on the Day of Atonement. And they had to do it for their own sins too.

And here comes Jesus. He has in his mind, “I’m going to do a high-priestly work one time, and it’s over. No more temple sacrifices when I’m done because the blood I’m taking is not the blood of a bull, the blood of a goat, the blood of a lamb, the blood of a dove. It’s my blood. It’s infinitely valuable blood, and I’m going to pour it out one time.” Or another image would be, “I’m going to go in there, and I’m going to lie down, and I’m going to die. I’m going to do that. I’m going to finish this whole system of sacrificial offerings once for all by laying down my life that I might propitiate sins.”

“Christ strips the devil of his power in death by propitiating sins.”

So, the aim of his death is to make propitiation for the sins of his people (Hebrews 2:17). And the aim of his death is to destroy (or nullify) the power of the devil and his power over death (Hebrews 2:14). Christ strips the devil of his power in death by propitiating sins.

Propitiating Just Wrath

Now, we’ve got to deal with that word propitiate. It’s okay if you don’t know that. It’s not common parlance in American vocabulary. You won’t hear it on TV, probably, you won’t read it in the newspaper, and even Christians have pretty much dropped it, but let’s get it. Let’s just get it. Stick it in so you can use it now and then with people you ought to use it with. To propitiate, in the context of judgment and punishment for broken law, is to take away the wrath and the anger of the offended party. You propitiate their wrath.

So here’s God, the lawgiver, in justice and holiness, who has the expectation that people will love him, honor him, trust him, obey him, delight in him, and the whole world falls short of that expectation. And therefore, the justice of God kicks in, and he has a legitimate, just anger against sinners.

Now the solution to that is to deal with not only the guilt of sin, but the anger of God. We’ve got to get rid of his anger. We can’t. There’s not a thing in the world you can do to do that. Only one person can take away the anger of God: God. And since he’s just, he doesn’t just say, “Well, we’ll let bygones be bygones. I’ll sweep my anger under the rug. Sin is okay, and it’s not a big deal. My honor is not worth dying for.” Instead, what he says is, “I love you so much, and I love my honor so much, that I will send my Son as the high priest to absorb my anger.” That’s what happened at the cross.

He put his Son forward, and the Son willingly, in love to us and in love to his Father, lays his own life down on the altar of the cross — as a high priest and as the offering of the high priest — and God pours out on him the curse of the law. He became a curse for us (Galatians 3:13).

And in doing that, he drains every drop of the wrath of God against his elect dry. In Jesus Christ, “there is therefore now no” — what? — “condemnation” (Romans 8:1). This is glorious. This is what was meant when it said, “Oh, don’t neglect your great salvation” (see Hebrews 2:3). This is a great salvation.

Now we’re right on the brink of answering our question. We’re not there yet. We haven’t got it solved, but we’ve almost got it solved. The question was, How is it that the death of the Son of God, Jesus Christ our high priest, by propitiating sin, defeats the devil? How is it that the devil loses his power to destroy you through death because of that?

Satan’s One Lethal Weapon

There is only one lethal weapon in the artillery of Satan. If you’ve ever thought about this, listen carefully. There’s only one lethal, deadly, final, destructive weapon in the artillery of Satan. You know what it is? Your sin. Nobody goes to hell because of being harassed by the devil. Nobody goes to hell because of being possessed by the devil. Nobody goes to hell because of being oppressed by the devil. Nobody goes to hell because of seeing green apparitions on their ceiling at night and hearing weird noises under the bed, which are real. Nobody goes to hell because of that. People go to hell for one reason: unforgiven sin. Period. That’s all.

“People go to hell for one reason: unforgiven sin. Period. That’s all.”

Satan has one way to get you to hell: heep you from a savior and get you to sinning. That’s all. He can’t scare you — I mean, let’s get rid of our fear of this guy. He has one deadly weapon. Sure, he can rough you up. He can kill you. “He has thrown many of you into jail. For ten days you will suffer, and you’re going to die” (see Revelation 2:10). Satan can kill you today. This text does not mean that Satan’s hands are bound and that he can’t make you sick or he can’t make you dead.

It means the one who had the power of death to destroy you no longer has that power. “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” (1 Corinthians 15:55). It’s gone. Why? Because the law is satisfied, and sins are forgiven. And all Satan can do is look you in the face and just rage at you. And if you’re covered by the blood of Jesus, if you’re clothed with the righteousness of Jesus Christ, you can look him right in the face and say, “Be gone, Satan.” Or, if he rages against you such as to put you in jail, or to make you sick, or to kill you, you can smile back at him and say, “I’m free from the fear of this thing.”