In our eighth episode, Aaron Prelock sits down with Brian Croft of Practical Shepherding to talk about what no seminary can hand a man: staying. Staying when the church wants you gone. Staying when no one will mentor you. Staying long enough that your body breaks before the church turns. Brian and Aaron talk about why wolves in sheep's clothing and wounded sheep look alike until you stay long enough to tell them apart, the lonely nature of pastoral work, having no category for shepherding as its own work, and how the celebrity preaching conference circuit can overlook faithful, ordinary work.

00:00 — Brian Croft, Practical Shepherding, and thirty years in ministry
02:03 — From the Christian music world to a call to pastor
04:38 — Why eighty percent of pastors don't last ten years
06:13 — Four pastors who refused to mentor him
09:35 — Taking a dying church at twenty-nine
14:17 — Three firing attempts, threats, and a body that shut down at thirty-four
15:10 — Year six: the church turns
18:37 — Haunted by Hebrews 13:17
19:41 — Wolves in sheep's clothing and wounded sheep act alike
22:24 — Every pastor needs an older pastor and a younger one
24:47 — The isolation of the pastorate
26:50 — Lament versus complaining
31:20 — How Practical Shepherding began
37:54 — The lost art of pastoral theology
43:43 — Content to be an ordinary, faithful shepherd
49:43 — "Show me the army"
53:14 — Stop measuring ministry by numbers and money

Learn more about the Frontier Shepherds conference at newgenevaacademy.com