“Hireling!” A sour epithet to hand a preacher; but the word is not mine. Look at it, if you will, in its original setting and judge for yourself:
“I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep. But he that is an hireling, and not the shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, seeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth.... The hireling fleeth, because he is an hireling, and careth not for the sheep.”
So spake the Man of Sorrows, who, as he went about preaching the Gospel of the Kingdom, spake as never man spake. And nineteen centuries of unbroken Christian usage look down upon “pastor and flock” as an almost perfect characterization of preacher and parish. Passing quickly through the gateway leading up to the porch of my tale, let me in a few words taken from “Town and Country Church in the United States,” set before you the pastor-and-flock-hard-luck story in rural America:
“The total number of communities within the town (town refers to places of 5,000 people or less) and country area is 73,230.”
“There are 33,808 communities, or 42 per cent. of the total number, that have churches, but do not have within them any resident pastors.”
“It would require 34,181 more ministers giving their full time to the work of the ministry to provide one for each community, if they were evenly distributed.”
“The great advantage of the town over the village, and of both town and village over the country, in the matter of resident pastors, is a characteristic of all regions and of virtually all counties. Thus, while 78 out of every 100 town churches have resident pastors, and 60 out of every 100 village churches, only 17 out of every 100 country churches have them, and less than 5 out of every 100 country churches have full-time resident pastors.”
In a nutshell, this is the inglorious fact: 30,000 flocks in rural America have no shepherds. Thirty thousand rural flocks are open to the wolf—because (for it so appears) American preachers care not for country sheep.
Sentenced to Purgatory
An eminent rural-life leader a few weeks ago came back from a country-life conference of rural ministers, reporting that these ministers had a saying among them, “A country charge (pastorate) is a sentence to purgatory.”