Lessons from 50 Years of Pastoral Ministry - Geoff Thomas Interview

The first question:

You pastored one church
for 50 years in Wales.

What was the most difficult aspect

of the ministry for you?

Geoff: I don't think any of it was easy.

I don't think any of it
should have been easy.

I was taking up my cross

and denying myself

and following the Lord Jesus, wasn't I?

So that dare not become easy

that I was doing it on the
way to something else.

So, preaching - learning your trade.

I came out of seminary

and I was used to being with a lot of guys

my own age,

and with the tastes and interests

of 24 year olds.

And I'm here with working men

and old people and children,

and my first baby's just arrived,

and I've got to communicate then.

So that was difficult.

Having a high view of
preaching the Word of God

and going through all
the Bible to preach it.

And not having the capacity
to preach through Genesis

as I chose to in the beginning.

That was just very difficult.

And then pastoring

with such a mixed congregation.

A third hardly came to church

and we had to get rid of them.

And a third only came once,

and I didn't know where they were.

They didn't know where they were

in their spiritual understanding.

And a third were there -
the supporters were there

and they were good and they kept me.

So, the preparation of the preaching

was heavy at times

because you're learning.

You haven't got enough experience

enlightened by telling stories

of where you've been.

Like this afternoon, I could tell

the story of a man I helped,

and how his life was changed.

That was all in the future.

So learning those early
years were difficult.

But I had all the freshness then

and the zeal and a happy marriage

and that was all fun.

None of it was easy,

but none of it was impossible.

That was the situation that God

puts every preacher into.

I think pastoring also is
very difficult visiting.

When there are young couples

and they've got their children

in the evening.

The man's out at work in the day.

You're not going to visit
his wife by yourself.

They're preparing the children for bed.

They really aren't free until 8, 8:30,

and then they're getting tired.

I don't know how you get around that.

I did some visiting in the evenings

to people who didn't have children.

Question: If you could
do it all over again,

what would be the things

that you would change or do differently?

Geoff: Well, of course,

if you have a chance of
doing a thing all over again,

you might be worse the second time

than the first time.

So, you really have to accept

where God has put you at that time.

What I would do over again,

I wouldn't do a Martyn Lloyd-Jones

expository discourse in the morning

and the evening service.

I would do a Spurgeon in the evenings.

I would preach on the big
texts in the evenings.

And I would just do exposition

in the mornings.

And I wouldn't have this goal then

of needing to preach through all the Bible

on a Sunday.

I would think that's too much for most men

to preach through Jeremiah

and Ezekiel and Isaiah

and the minor prophets, for example,

and Leviticus,

and think you have to go through

all those books - and Job.

You've got to be an absolutely
brilliant preacher to do that.

And that would only come

after you'd been preaching for many years

and were familiar with the Bible

and familiar with the
history of redemption.

You know how Dale Ralph Davis,

how he makes the Old Testament preaching

and his commentaries vital

by his illustrations.

He has a keen ear and eye

for that which can illustrate.

And I would think

if you don't have that,

stay out of that.

And concentrate on the
New Testament epistles

and the Gospels.

And then, the life of Elijah

and the life of David,

Joseph's life.

I would think the early
chapters of Daniel,

the visions of Zechariah.

I don't think you have
to do the whole book.

But do that in the mornings.

Those from the New Testament

and those from the Old Testament.

And then in the evenings,

"Look unto Me and be saved,
all the ends of the earth."

"I am the Way and the Truth and the Life,

no one comes to the Father but by Me."

"The Lord is good;

a stronghold in the day of trouble.

He knoweth them that trust in Him."

You know, the big verses of Scripture

that Spurgeon preached on.

I should have done that.

I should have learned how to preach

on the big verses.

That would have been more helpful.

Question: As far as your own
personal walk with Christ,

what can you look back on

and say you wish you had done differently?

Geoff: I wish I'd got more fixed

into a routine about daily praying

and personal devotions.

Like, I have a diary,

and since 1977, I write 300 words,

every day and I'm into a routine for that.

And brushing my teeth -

I'm in a routine to do that.

I should have been more drilled

into a personal devotion period,

and not being as haphazard shamefully

as I have been.

Yeah, that's one major regret.

Question: On that note,

what's something that's
helped you in praying?

Geoff: Having a wife that needed prayer

and praying with her every day.

That helped.

And then the book,

the Bible in a year,

not the one that you don't start

the New Testament until October.

Not that one.

I don't think that's helpful.

I don't think nine months of every year

should be just in reading
the Old Testament.

But there are others which you read

portions from the Old and New Testaments,

Psalms and Proverbs,

and just set out every day

and that's helpful.

I'm glad about that.

And that I used as well.

And then a card with the days of the week

and the people in the church

and missionaries and friends

and needs that you add to,

and those practical helps

so that you are not repeating.

I like what Don Whitney writes

on praying Scripture.

That you find something that strikes you

and then you pray through it

phrase by phrase.

That's helpful.

If you want to humble a minister,

you talk to him about his praying.

And that's true for me.

Question: How can a pastor

deal with discouragement

when he has to keep preaching

through times of difficulty?

Geoff: Well, I've always
found that preaching

is the thing that you preach to yourself.

Systematic expository preaching -

it's so frequent in the Bible -

there are people that are discouraged

who go to God.

I don't just mean in the Psalms

or in Paul to the Philippians.

But again and again,

there are challenges.

In the life of Moses,

many discouragements.

Life of David and Jonah.

The Lord Jesus,

and people not understanding Him

and opposing Him.

So, you find that in the Bible.

And when you preach about it

to people in the congregation,

you discover how many of them

are often discouraged

and fiery darts are there,

and how they were delivered.

How Jesus says,

"Nevertheless, not My will,

but Thine be done."

How He chose as His first calling

to accept the Father's will -

whatever God's will is for Him is right.

And I think it's that movement

in our lives to submit.

I don't think I've had problems

when my wife died.

I never questioned God's
right to take her.

Yeah, submission to God's will.

I think I didn't have to be tested.

There were tests earlier on.

I had to make some costly choices

to show that I was
prepared to give up things

for the will of God.

And when God tested me

and I came through those tests,

He didn't continue to test me.

There were other challenges then

in the Christian life.

So, discouragements I think,

you preach to yourself.

And so often, at the end of a Lord's Day,

you are blessed.

You've met with the people of God

and you've heard them pray.

I can't think of any other way

than not neglecting assembling yourself

with other Christians on Sunday

as the prime way of
dealing with discouragement.

Question: What would be some of the common

fiery darts of the enemy

that have attacked you in your own life?

Geoff: Greed,

laziness,

lust,

covetousness,

pride...

oh, especially pride.

Question: What specifics about pride -

the subtleties of it - have you seen?

Geoff: You've had help on a Sunday.

You've had invitations to speak

and you've been helped

in addressing conferences.

And you've got a whisper in one ear

saying, "You're a great guy."

And then you've got a
whisper in another ear

saying, "If they knew your heart,

how sinful you are,

you wouldn't be talking like that."

So, it's the 2 Corinthians 12 situation

of the thorn in the flesh

given to him to prevent
him being puffed up.

Because a puffed up minister is useless.

So he's humbled

and he knows he can only get by

and do what God wants him to do

by God's grace.

And so all the time,

God resists the proud,

and then God gives grace to the humble.

And God humbles you to receive grace.

Question: If you could go back in time

to the first day of your ministry

and speak to a young Geoff Thomas,

what would you tell him

and most stress to him?

Geoff: I'm glad of this opportunity

that I've got now to be in a new church,

and I'm preaching regularly there.

And I'm preaching with the coolness

and experience that could
only have come to me

by my history until now.

And so I'm a better preacher.

Sanctification is effectual

in all the elect of God.

And so I'm a wiser, humbler,

holier, more loving, happier Christian

than I was 50 years ago.

And so I love that young man.

I love his priorities, his zeal.

The things he wanted to do,

he wanted to make
this an evangelical church.

He wanted to make it a reformed,

confessional church.

And it took a long time,

but I would say to him: go for it!

That's a great vision to have.

It can be done.

It was worth it for Wales.

It was worth it for Aberystwyth

and this chapel in particular.

It was worth sacrificing anything

and everything to serve that end.

And I would encourage him to keep going.

God encouraged me

and I'm just putting myself back

and seeing how God did keep me going

on that narrow path

and fulfilled these things for me then.

Question: At the prayer
meeting on Wednesday night,

you mentioned that there were
some areas in your life

that you felt like were really critical

to not let slip.

What areas were you referring to

and what are you doing to not slip

in those areas?

Geoff: The discipline of time.

That's the real challenge.

I haven't got any hours now.

I've not no deadlines.

I haven't got to get two
sermons ready by Friday.

Not filling my time with
things I like doing

and choosing the good

as over the best.

I've got to have that.

I've got to really go for the best use

of my last remaining years.

Those are my chief concerns just now.

So that I am still studying

and still honing my skills

in communicating, in writing,

being concerned for my family

in a new sphere now in which my wife

will not be the mother of these children

and so will not have the
same intimacy with them

that their mother had
who died two years ago.

I could easily drift into neglecting

those who will always be my daughters

and my sons-in-law and my grandchildren.

My responsibility to, in every way,

be a model to them in old age

of joyfully serving the Lord

and walking humbly with God to heaven.

That's what I wish to do.

That's what I want to do.

I want to be on guard.

I don't want to throw my weight around

because now I'm older than everybody

and can pontificate

and expect to be listened to

simply because I'm older than them.

As a young man,

I had older ministers talking down to me

about that sort of thing.

They were saying, "You learn."

I know they had compromised morally

and they had compromised theologically

and spiritually.

I didn't want to be like them.

I'm not the young, frustrated man now.

I don't want to throw my weight around.

I believe every minister's
on the same level,

and that I can learn from
all the young men here

who befriended me and talked to me.

They have much to teach me

and I can teach them too.

So, all preachers on the same level

and elders - helpful.

And in the lottery of who you
sit next to at the table,

and talk to people, you learn from them.

That's just such a
blessing of a conference.

The messages are a
bonus this week, aren't they.

The real benefits come from
our rubbing shoulders with

and influencing and advising

and learning from men,

and especially the women that are here.

Their concerns and compassion.

Question: What are the biggest dangers

confronting the church today?

The reformed church specifically?

Geoff: Well, the reformed church

is in middle age in Britain.

And the mid-stream of any river

is the deepest and the most challenging.

When you start off, it's shallow

and you can paddle in

and you can resist the current.

But the deeper you go,

the more powerful it is,

and the more you've got to resist it.

And at the end when you
come out the other side,

then it gets shallower

and you can see the end

and a few more steps and you're out

and that's a great encouragement.

Mid-stream you don't have those things.

And we are in middle age now.

We're established.

University towns have
got free grace pulpits -

six of them in Wales,

and there is the Bible belt

that stretches right across South Wales

where the majority of the people live.

There are churches you can go to.

It's the enticement of the new.

That's the challenge -

that is a challenge.

Then, new songs and the neglect

of the whole riches of hymnology.

Moses' psalm written
1,400 years before Christ.

And then the paraphrases
of the New Testament.

Bernard of Clairveaux, Luther,

John Mason of the Puritan period,

and then Wesley,

and then Watts -

the whole vast riches;

the words so wonderful.

There have been lovely tunes written

that have revived some of them - overdone.

But that's been the case.

They're jazzed up a bit.

We've moved to listening
to a group singing

and then our own voices drop.

That's a danger.

Worldliness and personality cult.

Those are the sorts of dangers.

We haven't got the big
personalities any longer.

Now that Dr. Lloyd-Jones has left us,

there is no one person

who you can announce he's preaching

and people will come and hear.

Those days have gone.

God's way now for the reformed church

is a very modest way, but very powerful.

We've got our congregations smaller,

unknown by the world.

We've got Christian families -

children are taught and raised

in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.

There's homeschooling,

Christian schools.

There are websites.

There are magazines.

There are publishing houses.

There are Christian conferences

and ministers return those in conferences?

And we meet together and
arrange our next meetings

and speak, discuss moral
and theological issues

confronting the church.

And it's all done -

it's very, very big,

right across England, Wales,

Scotland, Ireland.

There are these networks

and there is this work going on.

And it's the same in America too.

Just the same.

There are one or two famous people,

but there aren't many,

and that isn't God's way.

God's way now is just protecting us

by our smallness

and encouraging us in
our strengths of conviction.

And He's preparing us for a time

when blessing might come.

And there's a network
of men and ministries

that can address sudden insurge

of hungry, convicted
people - old and young.

Question: What book or person

has made a great impact on your life

and why?

Geoff: That's an interesting question

because you asked for one

and that's good.

And most men answering that question

would say, well, let me give you three.

And that's okay too,

but I like the challenge

of just giving you one name.

I would probably say Iain Murray.

Iain Murray's friendship

and that I write to him most days.

Now that I'm here,

telling him everything.

I'll tell him tonight in my letter

that we had this interview.

I might not tell him that I said

he had the most influence.

But Iain's been a counselor.

He has insights that are so very helpful.

I've read everything that he's written

and find him so fresh always,

and so disciplined.

He's now 87 years of age,

and yet he has the physique

and the thinking

and the joie de vivre

of someone sixty years younger.

Always the new books that he writes -

invaluable.

And Dr. Lloyd-Jones can bless God

and the members of Lloyd-Jones' family

can bless God

as Dr. Johnson has
Boswell to write his life,

so Lloyd-Jones had Iain Murray

of all people.

To give those two volumes -

that should never go out of print

until the return of Christ.

And they present Lloyd-Jones

and his single volume on Lloyd-Jones,

his afterthoughts,

and his theological criticisms,

so graciously and kindly stated.

And they are very valuable too.

So, you know, all of us

are good in knowing the moral issues

that face a Christian.

And all of us are good
in the doctrinal issues

where error and heresy are,

the dangers we have to avoid.

You and I would be in 99.9% agreement

on those things.

And Iain is excellent in those things.

But where he is very good

is in his judgment of people;

in his evaluation of men.

And his generosity of spirit towards men.

And in his willingness
to train young men

and his seeing of a talent

and his appreciation.

He's brought men there

and he's appointed men.

Reformed Baptist now.

Jonathan Watson and John Rollinson -

two Reformed Baptists.

They were running the office manager

and the general editor of Banner of Truth.

The ones who choose the books and so on.

Reformed Baptists.

And some are on the trusteeship.

Trustees only meet once or twice a year

for a day or two.

But the practical work day by day.

Iain doesn't absolutize Presbyterianism -

he's a presbyterian, and he defends it,

and believes it very much.

But he's also generous in his spirit

and discerning,

so that we are so glad of him.

Joel Beeke has much the same spirit.

They've done me so much good.

People are always saying to me,

how is it that you went as a Baptist

to Westminster Seminary,

and after three years,
you came out a Baptist?

I say, well, it was a
gut instinct at first.

It was that I was so thankful

to the tradition that I'd grown up in,

that didn't allow me to
think I was a Christian

until I was converted.

They didn't confuse me by
saying I was a covenant child.

But it preached a summons

to repentance and baptism.

When I asked Ian D. Campbell,

I said to him - he was speaking

and I was chairing the meetings.

We had a question session afterwards.

I said to Ian D. Campbell,

"Now, you have three children

and I have three children.

And when your three children were born,

days after they were born,

you baptized them all.

One by one you baptized them.

And I had three children,

and I never baptized them,

until they showed new covenant faith;

until they confessed Jesus Christ

as Lord and Savior,

then I baptized them

and allowed them to the Table

at that time to covenant fellowship.

What advantage did your children have

from being baptized by you

that my children didn't have?"

And Ian Campbell's reply was,

"None whatsoever."

They had no spiritual advantage

in being baptized

when my children were not baptized.

And it was really that conviction

that helped me to be wary

of this enormous division

that has caused our dear brothers -

oh, the great, great men in the church

who have been presbyterians

and paedobaptists.

They're wonderful men.

The Puritans.

Calvin and the Reformers.

The martyrs.

Whitefield.

Men we've talked about this afternoon.

Ichabod Spencer.

The pastors.

So many men today

who lay down their lives for Christ.

So, I wish that this
division had not occurred.

And I hope that we can write persuasively

to show them their error.

And that they too can see

that the baptism of believers

is what you get in the New Testament.

And it's that hermeneutic

that we take back with us

into the Old Testament,

and not impose upon the New Testament

the old covenant legislation.

Question: Was that your new
book you're working on?

Geoff: No, no, no... it's not.

I'm not smart enough to write that.

The men here who've written on it.

The number of books that Baptists

have written in the last 40 years...

Very good. Let's pray together.

Lord, this is so dangerously
ego reinforcing

to be treated as though

I was the fount of knowledge and wisdom

and even self-knowledge

and self-analysis,

and all these things are muddled

and corrupted by my sin;

come from lack of seeking Thy face

and walking closely with Thee to heaven.

Forgive, I beseech Thee,

and if there are things that
are going to hurt anyone,

then don't let this go any further.

But Lord, if it can be a help,

then do bless it to the good of souls

unto the church of Jesus Christ

and the cause of the King of Kings.