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EPISODE NOTES
In his recent podcast episode, Pastor Derwin discusses key insights he wishes he had known before becoming a pastor, particularly on the topic of engaging in difficult conversations. He emphasizes that ministry is about transforming lives, and leaders must be willing to tackle tough discussions, which are essential for fostering healthy relationships within the church community. Drawing from his own experiences, Pastor Derwin advises that effective pastoral leadership encompasses much more than preaching. It requires a character rooted in humility, self-control, and a deep understanding of the gospel. Pastor Derwin outlines practical strategies for approaching difficult conversations, such as never raising one’s voice, ensuring a supportive presence, and cultivating maturity rooted in Christ’s security. He highlights the importance of approaching these conversations from a place of love and humility rather than fear or power. By embodying the fruit of the Spirit and demonstrating effective communication, pastors and leaders can not only navigate
challenging discussions but also help transform the church and, by extension, the world.
Here are a few of the practical things you’ll learn in this episode:
- Pastor Derwin emphasizes the importance of effective leadership within the church by sharing insights from his own journey in ministry.
- The necessity of engaging in difficult conversations with love and humility, reminding leaders never to raise their voices or handle such discussions alone.
- The focus is on character development over productivity, stressing that true leadership stems from a secure identity in Christ.
- Ultimately, he believes that a transformed church can lead to a transformed world.
QUOTES
- “What’s most important about you, ministry leader, is not your gifting to teach or
preach or to lead or to strategize. It is your holiness” – Derwin L. Gray - “The more secure you are in Christ, the more mature you can engage in difficult
conversations.” – Derwin L. Gray - “Never raise your voice when having a difficult conversation, particularly if you are in a
position of power.” – Derwin L. Gray
PODCAST RESOURCES
• More from Derwin: www.derwinlgray.com and www.transformationchurch.tc/podcast
• Subscribe on Apple Podcasts
• Subscribe on Spotify
• Subscribe on YouTube
• Subscribe on Amazon Music
• The Transforming the Church Podcast is part of the ChurchLeaders Podcast Network.
CONNECT WITH DERWIN
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/derwinlgray
• Instagram: @derwinlgray
RATE, LEAVE A REVIEW, & SHARE
If you’ve been impacted by this podcast, please leave a rating and a review, and share with someone in your life.
SHOW TRANSCRIPTION
Hey, what’s happening, guys? This is Pastor Derwin and welcome to Transforming the Church podcast. If the content from my podcast has encouraged you, has strengthened you, would you subscribe, would you share it with your friends, and would you write a review? Hey, listen, time is precious and it is running out every single day and you want to spend it wisely. So by you tuning into my podcast, that means that you value this as a wise investment.
And so I want to give you a return on your investment. So my team and I are working hard to equip you, because when the church is transformed, the world will be transformed. And what is the church? It is not buildings, it is not institutions. It is you, it is me.
It is the body of Christ. And I want to see you stand in the victory of King James Jesus. So we’re walking through a three part series on Transforming the Church podcast and it’s entitled what I Wish I would have known before I Became a Pastor. Now, the principles will transcend whether if you are a lead preaching pastor, a, a small groups pastor, or whether if you’re just in any kind of ministry role or if you are a follower of Jesus, not on a church staff, but you want to disciple people, you want to mentor people, like you’re getting after it for the kingdom of God, all these things will transcend and apply to your current situation. So the subset 1 was effective pastoral leadership.
If you didn’t listen to that, go check that out from last month. It will encourage you. This month we’re going to look at this. Now you’re like, I want to be an effective pastor. Let me just preach.
Well, preaching is about 5% of what I do, but here’s something that I do a lot. We’re going to learn how to effectively engage in difficult conversations, effective ways to engage in difficult conversations. We’re talking about what I wish I would have known before I became a pastor, and we’re looking at effective ways to engage in difficult conversations. Let me pause here. Even before I jump into our primary scripture, we’re going to draw life from.
If you do not want to engage in difficult conversations, please do not get in any form of ministry. Please do not get in any form of ministry. If you are still struggling with people-pleasing, do not get in any form of pastoral ministry. Because this is what you’re going to do. You’re going to talk one way to one person, talk another way to another person.
That’s called being fraudulent. That’s called being a hypocrite, and it’s spiritual cowardice. And you’re going to cause training wrecks because you’re not willing to engage in difficult conversations as a ministry leader. As a pastor, we have to engage in difficult conversations. But coming into this thing, guys, I had no idea.
And frankly, I didn’t grow up in a church. And so I became a Christian at 26. I was launched into ministry at like 28. And I’ve had healthier conversations with unbelievers in the club than I have with believers in Jesus’s club. So I think this can help us tremendously.
As a matter of fact, I may need to do a sermon series at our church on this very topic. Matter of fact, this actually may become a sermon series outline. Thank you for the help very much. Let’s dive into our text. All right, so 1 Timothy 3 is the apostle Paul writing to his protege Timothy, who was a half breed Jew and Gentile who built multiethnic churches.
And he’s talking about qualified leadership. So this is more pastoral leadership. But every believer should aspire to this type of gospel character. He says this, this is a trustworthy saying. If someone aspires to be a church leader, he she desires an honorable position.
So it’s an honorable position. It’s you know, honor. Think regal, think humility, think statesman. Stateswomen think someone who has discipline and self control, who’s not an emotional roller coaster. So a church leader must be a man whose life is above reproach, a woman as well.
He must be faithful to his wife. That’s what the text says. He must be faithful to his wife. He must exercise notice this self control, live wisely, have a good reputation. He must enjoy having guests in his home and must be able to teach.
Notice everything so far is about character. Only able to teach is a spiritual gift. Let me, let me pause here. Notice how much of this is about character. I want to talk to the Gen Z’s and the younger millennials that want to go into ministry.
This isn’t about celebrity, this isn’t about fame. This is about God developing your character unto the image of Christ Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit so that you can be a good man or a good woman through the power the gospel. What’s most important about you, ministry leader, is not your gifting to teach or preach or to lead or to strategize. It is your holiness. Holiness is synonymous with this.
Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness and self control. We need more godly men and women who understand that leading is not about productivity. It’s about God producing the fruit of the Spirit in us so that we can lead healthily and beautifully and powerfully. He must not be a heavy drinker or be violent. He must be gentle, not quarrelsome and not love money.
He must manage his own family well, having children who respect and obey him. For if a man cannot manage his own household, how can he take care of God’s church? A church leader must not be a new believer because he might become proud and the devil will cause him to fail. I think we’ve seen a lot of that in the years recently. Also, people outside the church must speak well of him so that he will not be disgraced and fall into the devil’s trap.
Okay, so here’s what I wish I would have known before I became a pastor about Effective ways to engage in difficult conversations Never raise your voice when having a difficult conversation. When you’re meeting with someone, maybe they have a complaint against a church, maybe it’s staff, even in your own family, your own home. But specifically for ministry, never raise your voice when having a difficult conversation, particularly if you are in a position of what’s called power. Right? Don’t raise your voice.
The text says to be gentle. You can be firm, you can be truthful, but don’t raise your voice. There was a time early in ministry where we had someone that was on staff, and for probably about a year, there was a performance issue, there was a character issue. But instead of addressing it with a difficult conversation, I raised my voice, thinking that putting on football coach mode would motivate the person. And it didn’t.
And so immediately I apologize. But here’s the thing. Because I didn’t engage in a difficult conversation early on, I blew up later on. So here’s the deal. You’re going to choose hard.
There has to be a hard conversation on the front end or a harder conversation on the back end. So you get to choose the hard easier hard or harder harder later. But we can have these hard conversations with the gospel, the heart of Christ, but don’t raise your voice. I also learned that as a black man who is fairly large and who comes from an NFL background, I would be in meetings with the staff and I would envision myself in a locker room and we’re gonna go take the game. And I would raise my voice and I would be passionate, and it was intimidating people because they didn’t come from an NFL locker room.
They wasn’t used to that intensity. And sometimes people thought I was mad, but actually I was just being passionate. So for example, a cultural context. If you’ve ever seen black people play dominoes, dominoes are hitting the table, people are loud, people are talking, noise. But it’s all in fun, right?
So I’ve had to learn that in certain contexts, if I raise my voice passionately or get excited like I’m an NFL player, again, people don’t respond to that. So as a leader, you have to adapt. So let’s be adaptable. We can say the hard truth in a loving way, in a gentle, calm spirit. That doesn’t mean you lose who you are.
It means that we become a better version of who we are as servant leaders. Next, never have a difficult conversation alone. I remember early in ministry, my co pastor and I met with a person from a previous church, our first church plant, and they had, they had some concerns. And man, we talked for an hour and we thought it just went great. We hugged and prayed afterwards.
