Self-conscious clergy. . .

When I was in seminary, I was encouraged never to speak to the congregation as "you" in the sermon but to speak in the "royal we" in which you include yourself -- especially when you are calling your people to repentance.  Unspoken is the idea here that it is somehow unseemly and causes an unhealthy distance between pastor and people.  Curiously enough, I think that pastors are far more likely to be self-conscious about this than the people of God.  Most of God's people are smart enough to know that the pastor does not serve them as nor does he preach to them because he has a better or more personal righteousness than anyone else int he congregation.  My people know me.  They know my weakness, temptations, and sin perhaps even better than I do.  But they also know that I am not preaching myself or my own righteousness to them or before them but the Word of God that endures forever.

My point is less about what pronouns you use in preaching than the weakness of pastors who are too self-conscious about their role and vocation as pastors.  If your people know you are not called pastor because you have the highest cumulative righteousness quotient, why can't you as the pastor get over it and come to the same realization?  Sometimes we pastors are our own worst enemies.  We parade a false humility by suggesting that a clerical collar is just not me or Eucharistic vestments are too fancy or self-communion is too Catholic, a suit is too formal, or because we too are sinners we dare not call God's people to repentance.  Baloney.  God has not called you to a spirit of timidity.  Act like who you are as those shepherds whom the Lord has made overseers (bishops, for Pete's sake) over the flock in that place.  

We pastors worry that people will not figure out that we are just people, just sinners, and so we feel the false need to remind them and ourselves of this reality.  Our churches are not cults of personality even though we act as if this were a real danger among us Lutherans.  That is hardly a real danger among us.  There is a real danger, however, that our people will capitalize upon our false humility and our rejection of our role and vocation in order to dismiss what we preach and teach.  The pastor's role and vocation are challenged not by pastors who presume that they are Jesus but by the pastors who refuse to be Jesus to their people and who act as if they would prefer to be on the other side of the pulpit instead of in it.  The humility which says you need to be just a normal guy to your people is no humility at all but an excuse to cover up your own discomfort at being called not to be a friend or buddy to God's people but their shepherd in Christ.  Honestly, I have seldom met a person who was offended by their pastor acting like a pastor but I have heard many complain that their pastor was no different from them and therefore not worth listening to.  Pastors, be the pastor and if you are not interested in being the pastor to God's people, do them and us all a favor and get out of the ministry until you are ready to assume the mantle of office the Church confers.