Welcome to Douglas Wilson's The Plodcast, presented by Canon Press. Yes God, God don't never tune.

Welcome to the plodcast. This is episode 217. I'm Douglas Wilson. I'm glad you

decided to join me. It's good to have you. So I want to talk a little bit

about the principle of keeping pastoral

distance keeping pastoral independence and this is something that has to be

observed on a local level in local congregations and it's something that has to be observed

when we consider the broad big issues of cultural engagement.

A minister is big issues of cultural engagement.

A minister is ordained set apart to the Ministry of Christ, the Ministry of God, and as a minister,

he is there to represent God to the people.

His job is to open the word of God and say, thus saith the Lord.

Peter says, the one who speaks, let him speak is the very oracles of God.

A pastor is supposed to speak with authority and it's supposed to be an authority that goes far beyond any human authority.

So a minister is not invited up to the pulpit

so that you can share a few insights from his own life,

or tell us his story or things that he has learned along the way.

His task is to open the Bible, read the passage, say something like, thus sayeth the Lord, let me tell you what God wants

us as creatures to hear.

Now this means that a minister, when he's executing his office, is occupying two stations.

He is the minister, he is the messenger, he is the Herald, who is trained to announce from the

word of God what God wants the people to hear and he's also one of the people.

He's, if I may speak this way, he is supposed to be sitting under his own preaching.

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