Alistair Begg on Pastoral Ministry

Although I am happy to be a Southern Baptist, I enjoy looking outside the SBC landscape for both sermons and books. One of my favorite preachers is Alistair Begg. Begg is senior pastor at Parkside Church in Cleveland, Ohio. He also has a radio ministry at Truth for Life. You can download and/or listen to Begg's sermons by clicking here.

I recently completed reading a book about pastoral ministry that Begg co-authored with Derek Prime. The title of the work is On Being a Pastor.

This book is an excellent overview of pastoral ministry within the traditional church setting in both Great Britain and the United States. Since it is co-authored, the text contains many different concrete examples of what pastoral life and ministry is like.

This book is the best that I have read on the subject of pastoral ministry. The reasons for this are that the authors have years of experience, have a high view of biblical authority, write in a humble manner, deal with theoretical and practical issues, and seem to really love the people they are under-shepherding. The book is also engaging and fairly easy to read.

Another positive about this book is that I will be able to use it as a resource in the years to come. For example, if I cannot remember how I should deal with a certain issue, such as church discipline for example, I will pull out this text and read over the section dealing with that. In this way, it is a resource book.

I would recommend this book to anyone involved in pastoral ministry. Even if you do not read it from cover to cover, it will be good to have around for dealing with specific issues.

By the way, if you have never heard Begg preach, listen to some of his sermons. It will be a good investment of your time.