The Pastor: His Qualifications and Duties

by H. Harvey

In the pastor’s plan of work, how large a place should be given to pastoral visitation?

The pulpit, without doubt, has the highest claim. The pastor is there surrounded by his whole flock, and stands forth before the world as God’s ambassador, the accredited expositor and defender of the Gospel. No private duty can rise to the dignity and responsibility of this great public work, and no plea of pastoral exigencies or pastoral usefulness can excuse an habitual neglect of thorough preparation for the sacred desk. This is primary and essential.

But in the pastor’s plan he should also aim to secure the visitation of every family and, as far as possible, every person in his congregation. In most churches this could be done at least as often as once a year; in some, doubtless, more frequently than this. By employing system, laying out the work carefully, and rigidly devoting fixed seasons for its prosecution, a large congregation can be readily visited. Suppose that, in addition to those made in cases of sickness and special urgency, six visits in regular course are made every week, even this, small as the number is, in half a year would reach more than a hundred and fifty families—a number above the average of households in our congregations. For this two or three afternoons each week would ordinarily be ample, and the pastor, by thus placing himself in living sympathy with the life of his people, would gain far more than that for his study by the increased facility with which his sermons would be prepared and their individual adaptation to the needs of the congregation. Dr. John Hall says: “I think a minister in good health, and doing his work easily and naturally, should visit some on at least five days in the week. I have done that for months together. . . . A few hours a day spent in visiting gives exercise, bodily, intellectual, and moral. One studies better for it.”

There are, indeed, positions in the ministry in which, from the extent of the church and the pressure of outside duties, the pastor can do little in this department beyond the visitation of the sick and cases of special religious perplexity. But these instances are rare and exceptional, and in such churches provision ought always to be made to supply the lack of pastoral visitation either by an assistant to the pastor, devoted to this work, or by delegating it to competent committees charged with its accomplishment. When the Baptist Tabernacle of New York, then worshipping in Mulberry street, numbered over a thousand members, widely scattered over that large city, the late venerated Deacon William Colgate organized a plan by which the congregation was divided into convenient districts, each placed under the care of a competent brother, and it long proved a most effective organization for church watch-care and visitation.

There is here a further inquiry: Does the pastor’s duty of visitation extend beyond the limits of his own congregation? The answer to this must depend on the number of his flock, his special aptitudes, and the amount of his own strength. The Lord does not require impossibilities. But whoever carefully considers that even in the rural districts of New York more than one-half the population attend no evangelical church, I think, will anxiously ask how this mass of neglecters of the Gospel shall be reached; and the pastor who looks down Sunday after Sunday on a half-filled church may well inquire whether it might not be crowded if, instead of waiting for these careless souls to come to him, he should go to them and carry the message of the Gospel, with the urgencies of an earnest, prayerful heart, into the bosom of their families. Or if this is not possible for him, ought he not to train and organize Christian workers in his church to make this aggressive movement on the mass of indifferentism around him? The inspiring and organizing of such aggressive Christian labor as faithful visitation from house to house are among the most important duties of the pastor, and no form of Christian activity is more fruitful in blessed results, both in the higher Christian development of the visitors and in the awakening and conversion of those who are visited.

II. The Method.

Here no single method can be suggested that will be adapted to all positions in the ministry, but the following general views may be considered.

The pastor’s visits should be distinctly understood as designed for religious conversation. There are other occasions for visits of mere courtesy and personal friendship, but here his object is to place himself in religious contact with his people—to learn their experiences, to remove their perplexities, to comfort their sorrows, to stimulate their religious activities—and thus, as one entrusted with the care of souls, to help them heavenward. The minister who passes from house to house conversing only on topics of mere secular interest neglects the great business of his life, and in the eye of the Master fails in the care of souls committed to his charge.

The visit should be religious, but it ought to be divested as far as possible of stiffness, formality, sameness. A sour visage and a formal style are not necessary to religious conversation. The pastor comes as a Christian friend deeply, tenderly interested in the religious welfare of the family, and while dealing with their souls in all fidelity, he should use a natural, genial, winning manner such as to put them at ease and invite their confidence. He is to study character, and to employ his utmost tact and judgment in adapting his words to those addressed. Some pastors have a few stereotyped questions and exhortations which recur in every visit. A process so stiff and unnatural lacks all moral power; it is soon felt to be mere formal professionalism. No duty is more delicate or tasks more fully the minister’s resources than the successful management of a pastoral visit, so as to leave a strong religious impression, and yet secure from old and young a hearty welcome for its repetition.

In visitation the pastor should overlook none. Domestics and children, as well as the heads of the family, should share his attention and be made to feel that he cares for their souls. Nor should any family or person be overlooked or passed by, but the visit should be strictly impartial, made alike to the rich and the poor, the converted and the unconverted. For this reason, it is better to have a regular course in visitation. Then all know that there is no favoritism, and in their turn, they will alike share the regards of their pastor.