Pastoral Supermodels

Supermodels are super-paid because they are super-effective at making people copy them. Fashion and design gurus know that the way to sell their clothes is to get them on Kate Moss, Naomi Campbell, Giselle or whoever the latest coat-hanger is. Young (and not-so-young) people see the clothes on the model and say, “I want to be/look like that!”

So how would you like to be a Pastoral Supermodel? Well, if you’re a pastor, you already are. Your life, character, and conversation, are super-influential. And although you’re never going to get super-pay for it, to see people being impacted for good by our life, character, and example should be more-than-sufficient reward.

But that raises the question as to whether we are modeling for good or for evil. Just as many have followed Kate Moss into drug abuse, and Naomi Campbell into prima donna mood-swings, likewise many people have suffered by copying the bad examples of their pastors. So let me pose some questions:

• Are you demonstrating the need for a weekly Sabbath rest from work? (Or does “six days you shall labor” only apply to non-pastors?)
• Are you treating your body as a Temple of the Holy Spirit?
• Are you drawing wise boundaries in your relationships with other women in the congregation?
• Are you taking reasonable vacations and really vacating the office – leaving it behind mentally as well as physically?
• Are you exercising wise time-management?
• Are you setting reasonable working, resting, and sleeping hours?
• Are you modeling a godly family by spending quality and quantity time with your wife and children?
• Are you showing your spiritual need to hear good preaching and to read good books for the good of your own soul?
• Are you guarding personal devotion time as jealously as you guard your children?

To put it bluntly, is the overall message of your life: “I am so indispensible, unstoppable, and incomparable that I don’t need to care for myself.”

Or are you communicating: “I am so dependent, so vulnerable, so fragile, so needy that unless I take care of myself and my family first, I won’t be able to take care of anyone else.” Now that’s a Supermodel.