I love golf, and I hate golf. Many find the sport about as thrilling as watching glaciers form. But rightly understood, I think golf may be the most formidable of all our games. Why? After all, aren’t you merely hitting a little white ball with a big fat club, and the ball is—unlike in baseball—sitting still right in front of you? Yes, but that’s much easier said than done. Here’s why I find golf both challenging and scintillating (and why I sometimes hate it): It’s you against yourself. You are both the offense and the defense. Think too much and you’re likely to hit the ball into the water or the woods. Think too little and you may swing and miss altogether. It’s a mental chess match, and you are moving for both sides. To excel, you have to get yourself out of the way, an extremely difficult task.

Pastoral ministry is a lot like that.

Of course, fruitfulness in ministry comes by the grace of God alone. But from a purely human perspective, the pastor is often his worst enemy. Why? Because he thinks. And some of those thoughts are devilish and can lead him to triple-bogey in leading his flock: How do I stack up against other pastors? How can I fix my congregation? How can I please my more peevish members? Will I ever preach like Lloyd-Jones? In his article, 8 Shackles Every Pastor Should Shatter, Christopher Asmus sheds light on some of those thoughts. He helps pastors move beyond that frustrating mental game toward the freedom from self and fullness of joy that really can be yours in shepherding God’s people.