Michael D. Warren
RLGN 489: Ministry Praxis Capstone
Ministry Leadership Profile Assignment
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Immediately following our Wednesday evening service, I caught up with the lead
teaching pastor at my church, Tadd Anderson, told him about this assignment, and asked if I
could asked him a few quick questions about ministry. He was happy to help, so I started off
asking him what he wished he had known about ministry before he became lead teaching pastor.
He said he thought preaching and teaching was going to be the hard part, but it has turned out to
be the easiest part for him. The hardest part turned out to be trying to provide Biblical, pastoral
counseling to people in and out of the church. When I asked what books he is currently reading,
he said has parked in Proverbs in preparation for each Sunday’s sermon because that is our
current series, but outside the Bible he is currently reading “Counseling the Hard Cases: True
Stories Illustrating the Sufficiency of God’s Resources in Scripture” by Heath Lambert and
Stuart Scott as a part of his M.Div program with Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, and
he has found it to be monumentally encouraging and insightful.
He said that his biggest challenge is becoming too busy. He clarified that being busy is
not always a bad thing, nor is one person’s proper amount of busyness appropriate for everyone,
but each person can only be so busy before they start to take their eyes off Jesus and, like Peter,
begin to sink in the waves. Following up that answer with a fitting question, I asked what tools or
technology has helped him make the most of his time. He said he uses an app that limits screen
time, and when his wife says it is family time he always trusts her. Lastly, I asked him what,
aside from sermon preparation, he has found to be the most consistent task in ministry, to which
he responded that prayer is by far the most important, praying before, during, and after
everything he does.
After interviewing my pastor, I set up my HandShake account and visited the Career
Center. Handshake was thorough yet concise in gathering my details, so it was humbling to see
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my life experience so far summed up on one page. There was no shortage of resources to read or
watch to learn about getting situated in my dream career, and “live events” provided more in-
depth advice to those preparing to enter the workforce. The most eye-opening tool I saw was
under the “employers” tab, which can be used to see many churches all over the U.S. looking for
pastoral positions to be filled.
