Role Duties of a Pastor
In biblical times, a shepherd carefully tended to the flock of sheep in his care, providing for the sheep's needs and guarding them from dangers. The role a pastor or the leader of a local gathering of believers during that time is compared to shepherding to illustrate the duties a pastor is charged with. A pastor's primary role is to care for the spiritual and emotional well being of people who make up a local church congregation. Other duties include counseling, mentoring, teaching and leading individuals or groups of people in a local congregation.
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Counselor
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Pastors counsel individuals during difficult life circumstances such as divorce, deaths or helping someone understand meaning behind scriptures. Pastors also provide one or more pre-marital counseling sessions to those considering marriage. During these sessions, a pastor may either offer prayers, blessings, impart life wisdom or just help the person see the circumstance from a different perspective. Pastoral counseling is limited by local laws and does not include clinical or psychological counseling.
Mentor
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Pastors often enter into relationships and find themselves mentoring those who may want to follow various ministerial career paths. As a mentor, the pastor becomes an example to the mentored on dealing with decisions, spiritual habits, such as regular praying and learning patience during difficult life situations. The pastor may have the mentored accompany him to learn hands-on preaching, officiating marriages or counseling others. The mentor-mentored relationship also takes on a coaching attitude on the pastor's part, where he also spends time drawing talents and abilities out of the mentored through time and helps the mentored develop and grow those skills.
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Teacher
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Pastors teach to congregations, at classes, seminars or other types of events and may be in charge of developing curriculum. Pastors may expound on potentially confusing or seemingly conflicting biblical information, give insight to biblical history, biblical culture and how aspects of each relate to today's environments.
Leader
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Pastors are leaders of the congregation and the local church as a whole. If the church organization is large enough, there may be a board of directors or other corporate type of structure dictating the budgetary constraints the local pastor can work within. In those cases, the pastor is usually required to provide quarterly or annual reports to the board of directors. In some denominations, the pastor may be required to consult with different church department leaders but ultimately makes the final decisions on how the allowable budget is used. In other denominations, the board of directors may pass down a budget and a congregational meeting is held where the congregation and the pastor all vote on how the budget is spent; the majority vote wins. Pastors sometimes alone and other times in conjuction with other church leaders decide which way the congregation leans when it comes to learning and seeking biblical truths.
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References
- Photo Credit Country church image by CSimmins from Fotolia.com
