Beleaguered?

"For if I preach the gospel, that gives me no ground for boasting. For necessity is laid upon me. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!" 
~ 1 Corinthians 9:16

"But you, dress yourself for work; arise, and say to them everything that I command you. Do not be dismayed by them, lest I dismay you before them." 
~ Jeremiah 1:17

Let's take a moment to reflect on the following passage from "The Unnecessary Pastor"... 

"Contrary to popular opinion, pastors are not jacks of all trades. We have been bullied long enough by well-meaning but ignorant demands telling us what we must do, telling us why we are necessary to this or that program, this or that life. Everybody and his dog has a job description for the pastor. Everybody knows what a pastor must do to be a real pastor. That's a problem, but what complicates and compounds it is that it's nice to be so needed, nice to have culture and congregation alike interested in defining our work and giving us instructions on how to go about it. It's nice to be so much in demand ... until we find that none of the job descriptions seem to agree. It's even worse when we discover that virtually none of the people who write our job descriptions seem to have ever read or even heard of the text, the Holy Scripture, that orients our work, or to have been present at the ordinations that define our work. Necessity is laid upon the glorious but beleaguered life of pastor." 

~ Eugene H. Peterson, The Unnecessary Pastor

As one who has experienced all of the above and more, I encourage you to keep your eyes on the skies, "And when the chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory." ~ 1 Peter 5:4. Beleaguered as you may be today, keep the call of God on the front burner!

 Because His grace is sufficient, 

~ PJVS