Dear Pastors,

I am one of you. For 39 years, I have served as a pastor of a local church. The last 29 of these years I have served the same church. Even though I began when I was very young, God was and has been faithful to protect me all the way.

In the past few weeks, I have felt compelled to write you this letter. These are words that any local church pastor can identify with in life and ministry.

Please consider these words, place them before the Lord, and then apply as needed or as He desires:

1. Put Jesus first in your day. Start your day early with God and if early is not your deal, at least start your day with God first. Yes, first things first. If we do not begin our day with Jesus, then we forfeit the privilege to lead His people. Please begin your day with God; otherwise, defeat in life and ministry will become normal for you.

2. Renew your belief in the power of God. He can do anything, anytime, anywhere with anyone. He can do this with you and through your church. Refuse to dissect what He can and cannot do. Receive what He is able to do with you and through you. Begin to teach and preach about the power of God to your church. They need to begin to believe again.

3. Bring prayer back into the worship services of your church. Get beyond the, "Bless me prayers", into appealing to the God of Heaven to manifest His presence to the people of God. Weekly, call out to God before your people. They need to hear you pray with both confidence and conviction. At times, move your people to pray together in groups around the room. At other times, call them to their knees in humility. Pray for revival to come to the people of God and for the next Great Awakening to occur in America. Prayer always precedes great works of God.

4. Prioritize evangelism again into the life of your church. Celebrate the reaching of the lost and the baptizing of new followers of Christ. Discover places in your community where the gospel has never been shared. Resolve to take the gospel into these places. Study the demographics of your city. Strategize how to win your city to Jesus Christ. Then, you will not cease evangelizing.

5. Call your people to support God's work financially. Unashamedly, model and teach God's people about giving the first 10 percent of their entire income to their local church. Call them to give beyond this and challenge them to live life in the lane of generosity. Then, as a church, give to advance the gospel across the world exponentially. Give sacrificially and generously to forward the gospel throughout the entire world by planting gospel churches and supporting missionaries globally.

6. Stand upon the Word of God courageously. Our biblical Christian worldview is in constant conflict with the culture. Do not cower to our culture nor cuddle with it. Stand strongly and courageously upon the Word of God. This will call you to be against some issues, when it does, communicate it in love.

7. Value each person in the world today. Stand for the dignity of each person and for the sanctity of life. Reject racism in any form. Renounce abortion in every way. Stand for the dignity and the sanctity of human life from the womb all the way to the tomb.

8. Learn from criticism. It will come. Count on it. Determine to outlive it. Refuse to become bitter toward any person being critical of you. Do not let anyone outside of your circle of love.

9. Lead cross-generationally. Do not be influential with just your generation; develop relationships with the generation before you and the generation behind you. Otherwise, your leadership will be limited and any potential legacy you may have will become short-lived. Invest in all generations. This is biblical.

10. Be humble before other people. When you are humble, God will raise you up. The way up is down. When you humble yourself before God, you can more easily humble yourself before others. God is not attracted to pride, but He is to humility. He lifts up those who are humble before Him.

Thank you, pastor for living for Jesus. Fulfill the calling God has given to you in your life. Please know I am with you in this battle and praying for you daily.

Dr. Ronnie Floyd has been a pastor for over 37 years. Since 1986, Pastor Floyd has served as the Senior Pastor of Cross Church. His next book will be FORWARD: 7 Distinguishing Marks For Future Leaders which will be released in 2015.

For the original article, visit pastors.com.

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