Set Your Hand to the Plough: Practical Advice for Gospel Ministers
#1 Embracing the Cost of Ministry
Ministry Isn’t a Job—It’s Your Life
I remember shaking my head over a friend’s “ministry contract.” A contract—really? “Forty hours a week,” it said! What that contract did not recognise, is that the Ministry ignores time clocks. It barges past tidy work-life boundaries and plants itself at the center of everything you are and everything you do.
Ask my kids how much I work and they’ll shrug: “Pretty much all the time. That’s just Dad.” They’re right. Because when Christ calls you to shepherd His people, He hands you more than a job description; He hands you a life-consuming vocation.
Welcome to the Front-Line of Spiritual Warfare
I’ve worn other hats—business, education, commerce—you name it. Every field has its pressures in this fallen world, but ministry is in a category of its own. Your church has pushed you to the very front of the battle line. In Christ’s name you stare down Satan and the hosts of darkness. That will never be easy.
Spurgeon leaves no ambiguity about what ministry demands. In the introduction to Lectures to my Students, he states: “The solemn work with which the Christian ministry concerns itself demands a man’s all, and that all at its best.” ¹
So brace yourself. You’ll pour out energy you didn’t know you had, and still feel spent. Exhaustion will become an old friend. Days off and holidays are essential—take them!—but even on the beach you can’t switch off entirely. A pastor never truly clocks out. The phone rings, the text pings, the burden of a soul in crisis weighs on you whether the calendar says “time-off” or not.
Counting the Cost—and Paying It Gladly
Our Lord put it bluntly: “No one, having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God” (Luke 9:62). If I’m going to grip that plow, I’d better be ready to give everything—heart, mind, body, and time. If you’re hunting for an easy gig, or even a slightly easier one, don’t step into ministry. It might well be the hardest task a person can be called to do.
And yet—here’s the miracle—it’s worth every drop of sweat. Nothing compares to watching Christ transform a life, seeing light break into someone’s darkness, standing in a pulpit and feeling the Word of God do work that no human eloquence could accomplish. In the words of Spurgeon, “It is our duty and our privilege to exhaust our lives for Jesus.” ²
The Call That Won’t Let Go
So this is my straight-talk, boots-on-the-ground advice: before you sign anything, settle it in your soul. The Ministry will commandeer your schedule, invade your rest, and stretch you beyond yourself. But if the Lord has laid His hand on you, the only response is a wholehearted yes—because the privilege of serving Him and His people outshines every sacrifice.
Caleb Evans, an 18th Century Particular Baptist Minister, offered this honest and wise counsel to the students of the Bristol Baptist Academy: “Perseverance is indispensably necessary to crown the whole. Pursue and finish whatever you have, with deliberation, entered upon.” What ought to motivate such a life of perseverance? Evans helpfully states:
“Let me then advise you, my young Friends, seriously to reflect on your views in devoting yourselves to this sacred employ. Was it merely to have an opportunity of pursuing diferent branches of literature, to which you had perhaps a strong natural inclination? Was it that you might lead an easy genteel life, which you might be ready to suppose a Minister’s life to be? Was it to obtain popular applause and fame, which you might fondly hope your abilities would procure you? Or was it from a principie of unfeigned love to Jesus Christ and to the souls of men? The quetion our Lord repeatedly put to Peter, Lovest thou me? is a question I would earnestly entreat you to consider him as addresing to you; and let it be your daily concern to be able affectionately ot reply, Lord then knowest all things, thou knowest that I love thee…..You must learn to be a zealous lover of Christ.” ³
Prepare for relentless labour. Prepare for spiritual battle. Prepare to discover a joy that comes only to those who give everything for the sake of Christ and His church.
This post is the first in a ten-part series offering honest, practical advice to anyone considering the call to gospel ministry. If you’re wrestling with whether this life is for you, or just beginning to count the cost, I invite you to journey with me through these reflections.
Footnotes
¹ C. H. Spurgeon, Lectures to my Students: A Selection of Addresses Delivered to the Students of The Pastor’s College, Metropolitan Tabernacle (Grand Rapids, Baker, 1995), vi.
² Spurgeon, Lectures to my Students, 170.
³ Caleb Evans, Advice to Students Having in View Christian Ministry; Addressed to Them at the Academy in Bristol (April 12, 1770), 6.
Oliver Allmand-Smith
Pastor of Trinity Grace Church, UK;
Trustee of International Reformed
Baptist Seminary, Mansfield, TX
