The Care of Souls Quotes

“That's what it means to be a servant of Christ. You get your hands dirty among his earthly-and earthy-people. But you do it because you have life in your hands to give them. pg 25”
― Harold L. Senkbeil, The Care of Souls: Cultivating a Pastor's Heart

“This love of Christ and for Christ impels us day after day, taking up our tasks one after another, in full knowledge that our work no matter how tiring and repetitive is really his own. We have nothing to give to others that we ourselves have not first received. His gifts of forgiveness, life, and salvation are inexhaustible.”
― Harold L. Senkbeil, The Care of Souls: Cultivating a Pastor's Heart

“Impatient shepherds are their own worst enemy. We certainly don’t want pastors to be slackers. All the same”
― Harold L. Senkbeil, The Care of Souls: Cultivating a Pastor's Heart

“Don’t worry. When I come to church, I don’t come for intellectual stimulation. I come as a sinner to hear the word of God.”
― Harold L. Senkbeil, The Care of Souls: Cultivating a Pastor's Heart

“The gospel and the sacraments are not static entities—mere object lessons by which we advertise and promote the kingdom of God. Rather, the gospel and sacraments throb with vitality. They are filled to the brim with the energy and life of God’s own Spirit. The actual words that originated from the mouth of Jesus are the instruments and tools of the Holy Spirit to create and sustain faith. And just think: Jesus has given those very words to you. He has entrusted into your all too human and very flawed mouth and hands the gospel and the sacraments by which the Holy Spirit continues to call, gather, enlighten and sanctify his church on earth. You might fail; in fact, from my own bitter experience I have to say you most certainly will fail—repeatedly and spectacularly. But we believe in the forgiveness of sins also for pastors! So let me tell you this: Though you will falter and fail, God’s Spirit will not.”
― Harold L. Senkbeil, The Care of Souls: Cultivating a Pastor's Heart

“The perennial error is to equate holiness with morality and good works. Whenever sanctification is equated with good works, spiritual mischief follows. Then people are directed to their own inner disposition and spiritual preparations in order to achieve the level of sanctity that God demands in his law.”
― Harold L. Senkbeil, The Care of Souls: Cultivating a Pastor's Heart

“Though the Bible originated in multiple ancient cultures spread over thousands of years in widely diverse languages, one central thrust is woven through all its genres and literary forms: “God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not counting their sins against them” (2 Cor 5:19).”
― Harold L. Senkbeil, The Care of Souls: Cultivating a Pastor's Heart

“He was the agent of the shepherd, working for a scheme which was not his own and the whole of which he could not grasp, and it was just that which was the source of the delightedness, the eagerness and also the discipline with which he worked. But he would not have kept that peculiar and intimate relation unless he had sat down and looked at the shepherd a good deal.”
― Harold L. Senkbeil, The Care of Souls: Cultivating a Pastor's Heart

“Reliable sources narrate how in his dotage the elderly apostle John, no longer able to ambulate or preach, was carried into Christian assemblies where his exhortation consisted of a mere five words which he simply repeated—the main theme of his first New Testament epistle: “Little children, love one another” (1 John 3:18).”
― Harold L. Senkbeil, The Care of Souls: Cultivating a Pastor's Heart