I teach adjunctly over at Lancaster Bible College. I've been doing that for 20 years, although I haven't taught the last three semesters because everything is moving online. And so they don't need as many adjunct professors. And so they're anticipating that in the next five years, right now, 35% of their students are online. In the next five to 10 years, 65% of their students will be online. An amazing shift is taking place, not only at Lancaster Bible College, but in other colleges too. And so, some years ago, Lancaster put out a paper called, The General Principles for Church Work. 77 of those principles were pertaining to the type of man a pastor should be. And we're gonna go through all 77 of them today. So get your lunch out. Now the question is, when you think of that, you can't go through all those 77, but I thought it would be very appropriate to look at the Scriptures today, particularly one section of the Scriptures in Nehemiah, and to look at one person, Nehemiah, as an example of what we should be looking for in a pastor. And so that's going to be the focus of what we're dealing with today. What do I as a member of the church, what should I really look for in a pastor to come here and serve and be our shepherd? Should I look for his executive power? Should I look for his organizational power and abilities as such? Should I look to see how innovative he is? Now these are all good qualities, and we would hope that a pastor has some of these qualities to go along with his shepherding of the flock, but are there other things that kind of rise to the surface, you might say the cream of those principles? And I think there are. I think we could go to the New Testament and certainly look at Paul's letters to Timothy regarding what the pastor is like, what leadership in the church is like. But I've chosen to go to the Old Testament, and that is the book of Nehemiah. So I'm going to ask you to turn to the book of Nehemiah this morning. And we're going to be looking at the beginning of Nehemiah, chapter 1. Chapter 1, the first 11 verses. And then we're going to be looking at chapter 2, and we're going to be looking at verses 11 through the end of the chapter. So I'm going to read all that, so hopefully you'll bear with me as I read this, and we'll look at God's Word this morning to gain four principles for what I should look for in a pastor. Nehemiah chapter 1 verse 1. The words of Nehemiah, the son of Hakaliah, Now it happened in the month of Chislith in the twentieth year while I was in Susa the capital, that Hamai, one of my brothers, and some men from Judah came, and I asked them concerning the Jews who had escaped and had survived the captivity, and about Jerusalem. They said to me, the remnant there in the province who survived the captivity are in great distress and reproach, and the wall of Jerusalem is broken down and its gates are burned with fire. When I heard these words, I sat down and wept and mourned for days and I was fasting and praying before God, the God of heaven. I said, I beseech you, oh Lord God of heaven and the great and awesome God who preserves the covenant and loving kindness for those who love him and keep his commandments. Let your ear now be attentive and your eyes open to hear the prayer of your servant, which I am praying before you now day and night on behalf of the sons of Israel, your servants confessing the sins of the sons of Israel, which we have sinned against you. I and my father's house have sinned. We have acted very corruptly against you and have not kept the commandments nor the statutes nor the ordinances which you commanded your servant Moses. Remember the word which you commanded your servant Moses, saying, if you are unfaithful, I will scatter you among the peoples. But if you return to me and keep my commandments and do them, though those of you who have been scattered were in and the most remote part of the heavens, I will gather them from there and will bring them to the place where I have chosen to cause my name to dwell. They are your servants and your people who you redeemed by your great power and by your strong hand. Oh Lord, I beseech you. May your ear be attended to the prayer of your servant and the prayer of your servants who delight to revere your name and make your servants successful today and grant him compassion before this man. Now I was the cupbearer to the king." We jump over to chapter two. and begin reading in chapter 11, verse 11. So I, Nehemiah, came to Jerusalem and was there three days. And I arose in the night, and I saw a few men with me. I did not tell anyone what my God was putting in my mind to do for Jerusalem. And there was no animal with me except the animal on which I was riding. So I went out at night by the valley gate in the direction of the dragon's well and on to the refuge gate, inspecting the walls of Jerusalem which were broken down and its gates which were consumed by fire. Then I passed on to the fountain gate and the king's pool, but there was no place for my mount to pass. So I went up at night by the ravine and inspected the wall. Then I entered the valley gate again and returned. The officials did not know where I had gone or what I had done, nor had I as yet told the Jews, the priests, the nobles, the officials, or the rest who did the work. Then I said to them, you see the bad situation we are in? That Jerusalem is desolated and its gates burned by fire. Come, let us rebuild the wall of Jerusalem so that we will no longer be a reproach. I told them how the hand of my God had been favorable to me, and also about the king's words, which he had spoken to me. Then they said, let us arise and build. So they put their hands to the good work. But when Samballot, the Horonite, and Tobiah, the Ammonite official, and Geshem, the Arab, heard it, they mocked us and despised us, and said, what is this thing you are doing? Are you rebelling against the king? So I answered them and said to them, the God of heaven will give us success. Therefore, we his servants will arise and build. But you have no portion or right or memorial in Jerusalem." Heavenly Father, when you call a man to be your leader in these days in a particular church, We want to see a man that is godly. We want to see a man that has a vision. We want to see a man that has people at the center of his heart and their needs. And so, Father, as we look at Nehemiah this morning, we will see those characteristics, those principles of ministry. Help us, Lord, to put that into our hearts and our minds. As we understand that this church needs a pastor, you will provide one, and he will need to be a man somewhat like Nehemiah, Lord. So bless us this morning as we look at this text and as we glean an understanding of what I should look for in the pastor that you will send us. I pray this in Jesus name. Amen. The book of Nehemiah is a relational book. It's a book that talks about the relationship that people have with their God and that they should have with their God. It talks about relationships that the leaders of God should have with their people, and it talks about the relationship of people and their God with their leaders. And we come here to this particular beginning of this book where we see a remnant people that have been led back to Jerusalem from their captivity in Babylon. In Jerusalem, the people were faced with very difficult circumstances. If you look at verse three of chapter one again, the remnant, the people there in the province who survived the captivity are in great distress and reproach. And I like how Nehemiah puts that. Well, it wasn't him that put it, but the rem to these people that came back that he questioned. You'll take notice as we get a little further down here in verse 2 and verse 3, it's the people that are up front on the heart of Nehemiah. Jerusalem, yes, Jerusalem's in reproach, its walls are broken down, and in those particular days and time in history, if you were a mighty city, you had a mighty wall. It was a sign of prosperity. It was a sign of protection. It was a sign of power. But these walls were destroyed. But even with that in mind, that the city needed this wall rebuilt, as Nehemiah would say later, so that they wouldn't be in reproach. Even with that in mind, it was the people who were at the heart of Nehemiah. And that's the first thing we really want to take notice of. We're going to look at four principles this morning of what to look for in a leader, what to look for in a pastor. And so the first one here, Nehemiah in verses one through three had a heart for people. Up there in verse two, he gets this report back from the brothers who had just come from Judah, where Jerusalem was located. He's in Babylon, these brothers come into Babylon to report, and he runs to them almost, the context of the Hebrew year, He's really anxious to hear, how are my people doing in Jerusalem? And he asks concerning the Jews who had escaped and had survived the captivity, and about Jerusalem. You see that sequence there? You know, there's a lot of pastors that are interested in buildings. and having a nice big building with a lot of people in it and so forth. Nehemiah here was concerned about the people. The people were on his heart. You can tell me about Jerusalem, I want to know about Jerusalem, but tell me about the people. Tell me about the condition my people are in. I want to know that. Richard Baxter, who was a 17th century Puritan scholar, wrote still a book that's really a treatise today, really an impressive book on the pastor. It's called The Reformed Pastor. And in it he says this, It is, you see, all the flock or every individual member of our charge. To this end, it is necessary that we should know every person that belongs to our charge. For how can we take heed to them if we do not know them? We must labor to be acquainted, not only with the persons, but with the state of the people. with their inclinations and conversations? What are the sins of which they are most in danger? And what duties they are most apt to neglect? And what temptations they are most liable to? For if we know not their temperament or disease, we are not likely to be successful physicians to them." What a great statement. A leader, an elder, a pastor, needs to be concerned for people. Nehemiah, first of all, had people on his heart and was concerned for their condition. So principle number one, if you want to take note of these, principle number one, look for a man who pays attention to people, who's a people man, or a person man, or personable, however you want to say it. But look for a man that pays attention to people. Secondly, Nehemiah just didn't have a heart for people, but he had a heart moved into action when he saw people in need. Look at verses 4 and then 6 and 7. When I heard these words, what did he hear? He heard that the people were in distress. They were in reproach. Jerusalem was broken down. When I heard these words, I sat down. He couldn't even stand. The implication here is he couldn't even stand any longer. His knees got weak probably. When he heard this, he was so moved within that he sat down. And what did he do? He wept and mourned for days. And I was fasting and praying before the God of heaven." You know, our greatest example of a heart moved for people is Jesus Christ himself, okay? At Lazarus' grave, he goes to the gravesite. And what's he do? He weeps. He weeps. But he just doesn't stand there and weep. He goes from a heart that's moved to action. He walks up to the front of the tomb, says, take that stone away. Lazarus, what? Come forth. Come forth. His heart was moved in such a way that he had to do something. You know, when you look at him approaching Jerusalem, coming over the Mount of Olives, he looks down into the city and he weeps again, doesn't he? Why? Because the people were lost. Not because the city wasn't in disarray or anything at that time. The city was rebuilt, it was fine. But he looks at the city and he sees people, people who are lost without the Savior. And what does he do? He keeps moving forward into action. And where does he end up? On the cross. To die for their sins. When you come to Matthew chapter 9, which is a powerful passage, I'm going to be preaching on that in our opening keynote address next Monday at our conference. Matthew chapter 9, verse 35, it says, and seeing the multitudes, he felt compassion for them. That word compassion in the Greek is a word that is a deep-seated understanding of something that needs to be taken care of. Your move so, it actually refers to our bowels, okay? Now it's before lunch, so I don't want to get into all that, okay? But it's that deep-seatedness in us that moves us, again, to do something. In this particular case, in Matthew chapter 9, Jesus raises up a lame man, he heals a woman who's hemorrhaging, he exercises demons from an individual, he heals blind individuals, and yet he goes and he says, but that's not the compassion focus. My compassion focus is on their spiritual need, because right after verse 35 he says, look, the harvest is white. It needs to be harvested, you know. So, I just want to know two things before I give you the second principle. Nehemiah and Jesus Christ are transparent, and they assimilate. They're transparent, and they assimilate. Jesus didn't feel ashamed at crying. He cried in public. He cried at Lazarus' tomb. He cried with his disciples coming down off Mount Olivet. And he assimilated into the hurt and the pain, showing a deep-seated compassion for those who were lost. Principle number two. Principle number one was, look for a man that has a heart for people. Principle number two, look for a man that is moved by people's lostness. By people's dilemma. So you look for a man that has a heart for people. You look for a man who has a heart for their lostness, compassion. Okay, thirdly, Nehemiah was a man who had God at the center of his heart. Look at verses five through 11 here. I said, I beseech you, O Lord God of heaven and great and awesome God who preserves the covenant. Down there in verse six, I am praying before you now day and night on behalf of the sons of Israel. Down there in verse 10, they are your servants and your people whom you redeemed by your great power and by your strong hand. Jonathan Edwards wrote a paper to himself. It was called Resolutions. Jonathan Edwards was, of course, the great preacher in New England during the Great Awakening, and he wrote this paper of 70 resolutions that he wanted carried out in his life. The first and foremost resolution read like this, resolved that I will do whatsoever I think to be the most to God's glory. I will do whatsoever I think to be the most to God's glory." You see, a servant of God, a shepherd of a church, a pastor, needs to do all to the glory of God and not to himself. Nehemiah was a man who went directly to God. I was fasting and praying. As soon as he heard the news, he knew what to do. I'm going to you, God. You know, a pastor takes the wise counsel of his fellow leaders. He's going to be, he's an elder, co-elder with your other elders here of equal status as such and so, and he'll need to take their information, their counsel on different issues. And he weighs the opinions of others, but first and foremost, he goes to God. First and foremost, he bows his knee and he goes to God. Nehemiah was a man who also knew his God. Verse 5, we read it, I beseech the awesome God who preserves covenant. He knew God was faithful. That word covenant, that goes back to Genesis chapter 12, where God made his covenant with Abraham. And God was always faithful to that covenant, even in spite of the unfaithfulness of his people. He knew God would always be faithful. Nehemiah was a man who knows God, and obviously, you know, a man who knows God is a man who's born again. You know, we kind of take that for granted sometimes, you know, that when we're interviewing candidates and so forth, we take it for granted that, well, he's been a pastor, he's been involved in that and so forth. Let me hear how God saved you. Tell me how you were born again. What a wonderful testimony should come from the lips of an individual who's candidating for a pastoral role, but not always the case. So when you're looking for a pastor, make sure he knows God, first of all, by being born again, and then make sure he knows God and how God is so faithful in covenant relationship with his people. The pastor needs to be a man who knows God, obviously a man who's born again, but also devoted to God's word and the preparation of that word for the feeding of the flock. Thirdly, under this second point here, Nehemiah was a man who trusted God's word. Look at verse 10 and 11. They are your servants. and your people when you redeem them by your great power and by your strong hand. Oh, Lord, I beseech you. May your ear be attentive to the prayer of your servant and the prayer of your servants who delight and revere your name and make your servant successful today and grant him compassion before this man. Nehemiah was a man who trusted God. He calls upon God's promises. God promised to redeem a people unto himself. Nehemiah trusted the history of God, that God was faithful throughout all of history in his plan and his narrative of redemption. He calls upon God's promises and actions of the past. Nehemiah here, when he talks about redemption, whenever someone in the Old Testament, after the deliverance from Egypt, talks about redemption, They usually are referring to the redemption that was received at the time they were delivered from Egypt. So when Nehemiah is saying here, you redeemed us, he's looking to that time when Moses rose that staff, parted the waters, and Israel was set free. That's the power of God that a man of God needs when he goes into the pastorate, to know that Redemption is of the Lord. Deliverance of the Lord. Freedom is of the Lord. And God is faithful. A pastor is totally reliant upon God by faith. By faith. The pastor is God's man. He prioritizes God in his life, he devotes himself to an ongoing study and knowledge of God, and his faith grows experience by experience. That's why when we interview men to be in the pastor, I sit on our ministerial candidate committee who takes men through the credentialing process. What's your experience? What's your story? Tell us how you've depended upon God. Tell us how you put your faith in God. Tell us how you've seen God work in your life, in bringing forth his fruit in your life as such. So principle number three. Okay, principle number one, look for a man who has a heart for people. Principle number two, Look for a man whose heart is moved by people's needs and concerns. Number three, look for a man, a pastor who has proven faith, can give evidence of time with God through his preaching, teaching, family and life. Look for a pastor who has proven faith, can give evidence of time with God through his preaching, teaching, family and life. Fourthly, we're not going to go through 77 today, okay? Here's our last principle to look at. In Matthew chapter 4 verse 19, I don't know if you've ever taken note of this before, hopefully you have, but whenever Jesus called somebody to follow him, he called them with a vision for what they will do. In Matthew chapter 4, 19, he says to Simon and his brother, Andrew, he says, follow me. And then what? And I will make you fishers of men. They were given the vision by God. Follow me. And here's the vision I'm giving you. I'm going to make you fishers of men. You're going to be fishers of men. Now, maybe they understood it. Maybe they didn't understand it at that time. But when God calls someone, he gives them a vision for what he wants them to do. God gave Nehemiah a vision in verse two, and now we're flipping over to chapter two and looking at verse 12. I arose in the night, I and a few men with me. I did not tell anyone. What didn't he tell anyone? He didn't tell anyone what my God was putting into my mind. What did God put in his mind? A vision to rebuild the wall. In spite of any attacks on him, any attacks on his people, God gave him a vision, you can rebuild the wall. Right before that, in chapter 2, verses 1 through 10, we saw how the king had given Nehemiah everything needed from a human standpoint to go and rebuild the wall. He had given him papers so that he could get through the lands to get to Jerusalem. He had given him resources to be able to rebuild the wall. But now, this was God putting in Nehemiah's mind what he wanted him to do. He wanted him to rebuild the wall, but not just rebuild the wall, but to reestablish the spiritual lives of the people in Jerusalem too, to reestablish their worship. We heard earlier when we read it in chapter one how Nehemiah, well even here, how Nehemiah confesses his sin and the sins of the people. I didn't make that another point, but that's a good point for when you're interviewing a man to be a pastor. You know, do you confess your sins? Do you sin? What sins are you still dealing with in your life? We ask that when we credential men. Is there some sin in your life that you haven't dealt with? Or that you're still dealing with? How can we pray for you about that? Are you handling that? Do you need counsel with that? It's a good question. Nehemiah was a man with God's vision. Don't tell any, I didn't tell anyone what my God was putting into my mind. What was he putting in? A vision to reestablish Jerusalem as God's city. A pastor takes the, I should say this, God does not call a man to be a pastor without giving him a vision. When I was called to the Reading Church to be a pastor there, Didn't want to go back there. That was my hometown. And I had all kinds of haunts and bad stories in my life before I got saved. I got saved at 28. And then God calls me back to Redding where I never wanted to go. I wanted to go to any mission field in the world but Redding. Pennsylvania, I'm talking about, Redding, Pennsylvania. I didn't want to go there. But through my wife and through God's leading and prodding and opening every door, we ended up going to Reading. Before we got there, though, I said to the Lord, I said, Lord, if I'm going to Reading, you're going to have to open doors for me to win souls. Now, was that my vision? No. That was the Lord's vision. Because every pastor should be a soul winner, too, according to Charles Spurgeon. But when I went back there, I had the wonderful, wonderful pleasure of leading a lot of people to Jesus Christ. And I was there for six years, and then God calls me to Quakertown. I said, well, I'm gonna do something different now. I'm gonna look at the Quakertown church and see what their needs are. And so I did. And I took notice that it was a church that was stagnant. You know, it was a good church, solid church. They were comfortable, very introverted, mostly. Didn't see salvations for a long time, didn't see baptisms for a long time. But they were good, solid, internal type, introverted type church, you know. And the Lord said to me, not in any audible voice or anything, but as I looked and I investigated, the Lord said, they need to reach their community. they need to reach people with the gospel of Jesus Christ. And so that was my vision. When I went there, I went with the vision that I would lead and train people to witness and evangelize. And from the 200 people that we had when I went there, we grew to close to 400. And that numbers aren't everything, but I'm just using it as an illustration, okay? because God gave me success to the vision he gave me to go to that church and pastor. So God gives his man a vision. God does not call a man to be a pastor without also giving him a vision for the ministry. And as we look at men here to be your pastor as such, we'll ask them, what's going to be your vision for this church? for working with this church, growing this church, leading this church. What's going to be your vision? See what they come up with. Secondly, under the same topic of God calls a pastor with a vision, is God is faithful to the vision that he gives. Look at verse 18, chapter 2. I told them, Nehemiah speaking here, I told them how the hand of the Lord had been favorable to me, and also about the king's words. Nehemiah wasn't just given a vision in his heart to rebuild Jerusalem and rebuild the spiritual lives of the people in Jerusalem, but he also was given success in it. I told him how the hand of my God had been favorable to me. See, God gives success to the vision that he gives to his man. You've heard the old adage, God's work done God's way will never lack what? God's supply. In this case, God's success. God's favor, that word good at the end of that verse 18 there. So they put their hands, knowing that Nehemiah had a vision, that God was favorable to that vision, that God was bringing him success, they put their hands to the work and it says good work. And that word in the Hebrews mean prosperous work. There was prosperity in the work because it was God's vision and God was bringing favor to it. Third point under this last one before we get to the fourth principle here and That is God brings his results to his vision, which I just alluded to in my second point there But verse 20 look at verse 20. So I answered them and said to them the God of heaven is will give, you know, he's answering these pagans who don't want him to rebuild the wall. They don't want Jerusalem to be, you know, a recognized, powerful city any longer. And so they're going to do everything they can, as the story goes on, they're going to do everything they can to try to dismantle his efforts to rebuild the city. But verse 20, Nehemiah knew who was behind him. So I answered them and said to them, the God of heaven will give us success. What's he saying? You want to stymie me, you want to thwart me, you want to distract me and my workers here and so forth. That's not who's going to do this. You can do all that you want to distract us, to thwart our efforts and everything, but God's going to give the success. God's going to do it. You see, in the church, it doesn't depend on the power of the pastor. On the ability of the pastor, those are good things to have in a pastor. You know, like I said in the beginning, it's good if he's innovative, it's good if he's a good worker and powerful man, and so forth. But it all depends on God. Success comes from the Lord, and Nehemiah knew that. He answered them and said to them, the God of heaven will give us success. Therefore, we his servants will arise and build." God produces results. God ordains the pastor and the flock to carry out the work from the results. Arise and build. Principle number four. Look for a man with a godly vision who depends upon God for his results. Look for a man with a godly vision who depends upon God for his results. How many times, I've been in ministry now 30, 16 and 23, 15 and 23, what is that, 38 years, right? 38 years. The greatest successes I've had in ministry have been when God did them. The worst situations I've ever had in ministry have been when I did them. Nehemiah understood God's vision and who was going to bring the success to it. And that takes a lot of patience sometimes. to wait upon God to bring the success to the vision that you have. So four things I encourage you to consider when you're looking at a pastor. First, that he has a heart for people. Secondly, that his heart moves him to be transparent and assimilate with their needs and concerns. Thirdly, a pastor who has a proven faith that can give evidence of time with God on his knees, depending upon God in his preaching and teaching and family and life. And number four, look for a man with a godly vision and is going to work to gain God's success to fulfill that vision. The Book of Nehemiah just gives us a glimpse into the way that God wants a leader to be. There's plenty of other places in scripture, 70, we have four, 73 other places in scriptures that we could go to look at. What do you want to look for? But I think these are kind of the cream that rises to the top, you know, that God wants a leader who loves people, is sensitive to their needs, particularly their need for salvation. We can't assume anymore that people are saved. Just can't assume it anymore. We have too much of that all all roads lead to heaven mentality today. We need to be unabashedly, unashamedly witness for Jesus Christ. And secondly, God wants a leader who loves him and will carry out his vision for building the kingdom and give him all the glory. Look for a man who loves Jesus and loves his children as himself.