Five Questions for Jim Lee
Interviewed by Justin Nash
Rev. Jim Lee has pastored Calvary Advent Christian Church in Lenoir, NC for the past 41 and a half years. He came to faith in Christ as a young college student at Aurora College through the evangelistic efforts of several Advent Christian students there. Several months after being baptized at the Aurora Advent Christian Church he felt a call to pastoral ministry.
Rev. Lee was mentored and encouraged by a number of more established pastors and church leaders during his early years in ministry. This made a profound impact on him and his outlook about ministry. As he recalls, “It was one thing back early in my ministry, I asked God to show me something that maybe I could do that would be different than just a regular pastoral ministry or just ministering in the local body, maybe something beyond that. And the Lord really opened up the door early on where I felt like I could go alongside younger pastors, encourage them, help them along.
I believe that one of my gifts is the gift of encouragement. And I felt like with that gift of encouragement I could utilize it very much in helping these young pastors or people that are sensing a call in the ministry to help them along. To maybe be there to answer their questions and that type of thing.”
He has been faithful to that calling having mentored between 20 and 25 ministers, many of whom he identified and cultivated within his own church. Jim and his wife, Nancy, have been married 46 years. They have two daughters, two sons-in-law and eight grandchildren.
What's the one thing that you have gotten right so far?
I can actually tell you and I’ve thought about this a lot and I appreciate the question. I’ve learned that it is God’s grace that has put me where I am and that might seem simple. But when you enter the ministry when you are young, you really tend to rely on yourself and maybe your tendencies and maybe what you feel are your abilities and maybe your giftedness and the Lord is there but it’s almost like he is on a back burner.
I have learned through the years that now my reliability and my trust is so much of the Lord. My prayer life is much better, stronger. I’m in the Word much better than I’ve ever been and I’ve realized that I’m totally dependent on God in the ministry and I tend not to lean on my own understanding. I think that I have gotten that right in the degree that I’m ending up the ministry hopefully passing this on to the other guys where maybe they will understand that they don’t need to rely on their own abilities or their own strengths or that type of thing. They need to rely on God’s grace because he is the one that has got us where we are.
What's the one thing you got wrong?
The thing that I got wrong is that I probably did not develop administrative skills like I should have. I am not an administrator. I am more of a pastor. I feel like my strengths are in pastoral ministry and I wish that I had been more gifted in delegating responsibilities through the years, had more administrative skills. That has been, I don’t want to call it a disaster, but people in the church know it and the wonderful thing that has happened is that the people have realized my weaknesses and have come alongside of me with their strengths in administration and it has helped me greatly. I tend to not spend a lot of time in the office. I did put studying as my priority, preparing sermons, prayer meetings that type of thing and visiting. But as far as other type of administrative skills, I didn’t do very well with that. So that would be the one thing that I didn’t do well.
What brings you the most joy in ministry?
Probably the most joy in my ministry is seeing in myself leading somebody to Christ. I feel like a pastor has a tremendous opportunity not only to teach evangelism and discipleship but to show it in their lives. And I’ve had the privilege through the years of leading people to Christ in some very unique situations, some very beautiful situations, some tough situations. But just being able to see a person’s life change. Sometimes they were just instantaneous others it took some time. But the joy I have is still leading somebody to Christ.
What advice would you give someone in a situation similar to yourself?
I think when you develop the leadership from within its going to be much better and stronger as time goes on and perhaps there might be a pastor or two or a missionary or two that might be right there in your own church.
I would advise them to develop the leadership of their own church as strongly as possible. And to make sure you are looking for people who have maybe the giftedness of ministry. I read not too long ago that, that if you have pastoral leadership in your church then by all means try to develop it from there because those people know the church and the church knows them. And by bringing somebody in from the outside it might take them time and development through the years whereas you’ve got maybe a person within the ranks who can maybe step into the pastorate once the pastor leaves or whatever. And so my advice would be to develop leadership within your ranks and to really through the Holy Spirit see people who have the spiritual dimensions of maybe being called into them ministry and helping them to develop that. See what their skills are whether it be in accounting or teaching or anything like that. But I think it’s important that you see it early on maybe in their teen years or early college years. But within the ranks within the church itself. I think when you develop the leadership from within its going to be much better and stronger as time goes on and perhaps there might be a pastor or two or a missionary or two that might be right there in your own church.
What's the one thing you wish you were better at as a pastor?
I think the one that that I think I would say as a pastor it goes back to what I said earlier about the administrative skills. I still wish that I had taken more time in developing that aspect of the ministry. I think it would have helped me in being more organized in visitation and in other things. One of my concerns in the ministry is the wasting of time versus utilizing your time to the fullest. And perhaps when I didn’t do the administrative part of that there was time wasted in some other areas because I had to catch up or had to do this when I should have been doing that.
So I think sometimes you get so busy in maybe one facet of ministry that you maybe let something go. I really enjoy the pastoral ministry but to the detriment of administration. Not being more organized I kind of let that go and I think I could have been of an effective pastor by the better use of my time in that part of it.
Learn more about Calvary Advent Christian Church.
Justin Nash, “Five Questions for Jim Lee” The Advent Christian Witness, Spring 2019