Review: The Vulnerable Pastor: How Human Limitations Empower Our Ministry

The Vulnerable Pastor: How Human Limitations Empower Our Ministry by Mandy Smith
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

The tone and vocabulary of the book are spot on for the target audience; pastors, even those without a theological education, would fine it easy to follow Smith's train of thoughts. In the opening chapter of the book, Smith states that she did not want the book to seem to be centered on her, and that it not be simply a book for women pastors. Unfortunately those are two attributes that I feel would aptly describe the book. This is not to say that it is entirely not useful to non-women pastors/ministers, but it would appeal to better to women pastors, especially those from a charismatic/pentecostal background. Indeed, if there was a woman lead pastor I wanted to bless, this book would be high on my list of books to consider as gifts.

Having read to the end of the book, I was disappointed that the authentic-oozing title (which was what prompted me to request this title for review) did not quite aptly describe the contents. Other issues I have with the book would be her scarce quotation of Scripture, and when she did, it was usually with the eisegetical lenses (i.e. putting a meaning contrary to what the original biblical author had intended). An example of Smith's eisegesis would be the application of Revelation 3 on page 190.

A suggestion of improvement (which would persuade me to give it 4 stars) would be to reword the book's title to something along the lines of "The Woman Pastor" or "A Woman in God's Service" and to market it for the charismatic/pentecostal audience (not just woman lead pastors, but women serving in their local churches). For readers looking for a book on the topic of serving in ministry (especially pastoring) through great difficulty/feelings of inadequacy/hurts, see Gary Preston's Pastors in Pain, which is out of print (you can try finding a copy on bookfinder dot com).

I received this book from InterVarsity Press for the purposes of providing an unbiased review. All views are my own.

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