Lost Influence: The Lasting Fallout of Leadership Failure 

Looking at our large back yard last night with family members, it occurred to me that a half century ago, I was 14 years old. That was a somber thought.  

I also thought that in those days a yard this size would have been filled almost everyday with neighborhood kids playing softball, even if it was with a stick sometimes, or football. But that was before video games.  

My thoughts then drifted to my childhood. I became a Christian when I was 5 and surrendered to the ministry when I was 17. But I missed having essential temperament needs met at home in my early life (especially for validation and affection), and as a result, I was not only left broken, but also unsupported later in life for meeting the redemptive leadership needs of others - especially my family. 

We can recover from some failures. For example, our bodies can recover from the foolish choices we make that break our health. We can also recover financially, vocationally, and even psychologically. And sometimes, elements of a relationship can also be repaired. I can give testimony to all of these.  

But recovery of lost leadership influence with those God gives us to serve is very difficult. It has something to do with the addictions and anger those relationships fall into because of the pain of their unmet leadership/support needs.  

Of course, this is not the same as codependent (make-me-feel-better) relationships. Those relationships seem to never be lost because they do not depend on effectual leadership to meet redemptive needs but on performance (also handouts) to accommodate superficial pain relief needs.  

Even if the support leadership is good, those it serves may still temporarily drift away. We see this in the Gospels during Christ's ministry on earth, and also in the New Testament account of the first century church. Paul expressed grief in his letter to some he had pastored at Galatia.” What happened to you!” he lamented. “You have fallen from grace (the grace message).” 

But, as a rule, the falling away is because of poor leadership, not regardless of good leadership. 

The support we offer in our counseling to parents warns about this – that we may not get but one chance to get it right. This means the fallout of our failure to meet the redemptive needs of our children (lost leadership influence/opportunity) can be passed on to several generations (become a "generational curse").  

But if we do get it right - that is, if we are enabled by our experience of Christ to provide effectual leadership to those we serve, it will support them for getting it right with those they serve. 

This is included in the meaning of  

"Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen."- Ephesians 3:21-22 

DonLoy Whisnant/Journey Notes 13C21/The Grace Perspective 13D03

The Baptist Tabernacle Legacy: Ministry from the Overflow

My life will always bear testimony to the experience I had as a young minister at the Baptist Tabernacle in Danville, Virginia. After I moved from there to work in ministry with churches around the country, the Tabernacle was the standard for me wherever I went. Although I knew God used ministries in different ways to accomplish his purpose, I found no church which impacted their community in the way I had experienced it at the Tabernacle. I heard a lot of good teaching and preaching along the way, both in the classroom and from the pulpit, but too often it seemed to come from men who had not fully experienced their subject. In those times I sorely missed Brother Bob’s preaching from the overflow of his walk with God.

I remember crossing paths once with someone who attempted to explain for me why the Tabernacle was so unusual. He had visited several times in his travels, and said he thought it was because the people in that part of the country were different. I said I was there long enough to know that it was because the ministry to the people was different.

Don Loy Whisnant/Journey Notes 10D12

R.J. Barber, Jr.

Today, Tabernacle Time, “the nation’s oldest daily radio program” celebrate its 78th anniversary.  

As a young minister, I had the opportunity to accompany Brother Bob to a luncheon with a group of preachers at a hotel restaurant. I have two standout memories of that meeting. The first was the response those ministers had to Brother Bob. When he spoke they listened. Through the years, I have often thought of the words said about Jesus, "No one ever spoke like this man."

But I also remember walking with him toward the entrance of the hotel when a young woman came toward us dressed for the pool. Without performance or comment, Brother Bob quietly turned his head to look away, setting for me, intended or not, a life-long example. He was always consistent to be who he was - a man of integrity.

It was said about a past well-known preacher that the explanation for his many years of integrity was that God had placed a hedge around him. But more than a hedge around Brother Bob, I believe he was filled within to "the measure of the fullness of Christ" who makes men holy (Ephesians 3:19; 4:13).

Don Loy Whisnant/Journey Notes 10D01

A Passion for Preaching

When I was 16 years old, evidence began to surface that God was calling me to preach. I began to write sermons and preach them to an imaginary crowd when I was alone. I also loved to hear good preaching. Once I borrowed a reel-to-reel tape recorder and recorded a mock radio program, complete with music and preaching. When I got my first Sunday School class at the age of 17, it was only three boys, but I preached to them. In only several months that little class grew to 30.

Soon, while I was still in high school, God brought a preacher buddy into my life and we preached everywhere we could. We went to the jails, to little churches, and once we started preaching in an empty house to neighbors who came to find out what was going on.

I also preached at camps, at youth rallies, and even a revival or two. (Last year we moved back to North Carolina within several miles of a church where I preached a revival when I was 18 years old. The church had put my picture in the paper to invite people to come hear me preach like I was the real thing. I remember preaching my heart out during that week.) One of my favorite memories during that time was at a New Year’s Watch Night service. I came in about ten o’clock just as they were inviting the preacher boys to stand and give their testimonies. I stood with fire in my heart and told about the work of Christ in my life. My mom told me later that the service had been a bit dead, but that my energized testimony brought it to life.

Once I went to a youth rally to participate in a preaching contest. (Well, it was actually a speech contest, but I didn’t know the difference.) When it came my turn, I let it rip like a voice crying in the wilderness. I was almost embarrassed that I was so much better than the other contestants who only knew how to give little talks, or so I thought. When the time came to announce the winners, I prepared to go forward to get my first place award. I was almost out of my seat when they called someone else’s name.

When I showed up at Bible college several months later, I went with a group of older students on a Saturday night to preach on the street corner of a busy intersection in downtown Fort Worth, Texas. I had no fear. When my turn came, I stepped to the curb and raised my Bible. I still remember the words I called out. “This is the Word of God! In this book, God tells us how we can go to Heaven.”

Toward the end of that school year, I entered the annual first-year student preacher’s contest. It was an elimination process with the students getting the most votes advancing to the next round. I don’t remember how many rounds I preached – it was several at least – but I preached my heart out and won.

During my years in Bible college, I was passionate about preaching. I did not date, although several girls seemed to have an interest in me. I also did not watch television. Those were the two things about me, a college buddy later told me, that seemed to set me apart from the other students, along with my aggressive soulwinning, loud praying, and John the Baptist style preaching (which the Fundamentalist magazine noted when I preached at the state Fellowship meeting).

After my Bible college days, I preached a few revivals, but mostly worked on church staffs providing ministry to young people. In the 5 or 6 churches where I served, I preached to the teens on Sunday, then several times during the week on the ball fields, in gyms, and at rallies and camps. The youth attendances at each church doubled and tripled.

During these later years of ministry, God has called and prepared me to provide individual counseling - so, while I am still passionate to communicate Truth, I have adopted a conversational style for my counseling which I also use for my talks and presentations to groups. But occasionally, especially from the pulpit, the preacher in me shows up. I do not mean hollering or sermonizing, but setting forth with deep conviction and clarity the message of grace which God has burned in my heart. Preaching was my first calling. I don’t expect my passion for it to ever go away.

Don Loy Whisnant/Journey Notes 10C27

Thinking About M

I recall a minister friend telling of having a fun conversation with several other ministers at a restaurant. He said they told funny stories and laughed a lot, but before leaving, a man approached their table to say he did not appreciate them talking about him.

Who was it that said (I forget), “We would not be so concerned what people thought about us if we knew how little they thought about us.”

Then I remember M in one of our ministry stops along the way. He was a different sort of fellow, mostly because he seemed to always be happy and grinning. He didn’t drive a car, so caught the city bus to most places he went. He worked hard, so had a little money to give to others, but also to buy a few things for himself. He loved his white sport coat, yellow shirt, loud colored ties, black pants, and black patent leather shoes. Once he told me he had a problem. He said it was pride because he was sure people looked at him when he was waiting at a bus stop. Then he bought an off-white London Fog overcoat. It made him so proud that he started running to some of the places he went. Once when he was downtown he said he was stopped by the police. He said they told him that he looked suspicious running and grinning all over town. I asked him why he ran like that. He said his new coat made him proud and he couldn't help it.

Don Loy Whisnant/Journey Notes 10B26

The Orangutan Story

One night during the early 1980's, I turned the radio on while lying in bed. (Don't remember doing that before or since.) By chance, I caught a segment on a well-known talk show which I have never forgotten. I laughed so hard I fell out of the bed. Through the years, I have occasionally googled to search for information someone might have on that segment. Only recently did my search produce any results.

Big Privilege for Tiny Part in Tabernacle Time Broadcast

I listen to each day's broadcast of Tabernacle Time. Begun in 1932, it is the nation's oldest daily religious radio broadcast. I listen because Brother Bob (R.J. Barber), even after all these years, communicates his walk with God better than anyone I know. Also, he is my birth father in the ministry. He turned 82 on December 21, and is amazingly strong.

During my time on staff at the Baptist Tabernacle, I substituted on the broadcast maybe 10 times. I remember hearing: "This morning sitting in for Brother Bob is Brother Don!" It was usually on short notice. Once on a very early morning, I heard a knock at my door. Brother Bob was standing there not dressed yet for the day, asking me to fill in for him that morning. It was like a coach sending me into the game. I was always excited, always ready, and felt privileged.

Actually, he was on two stations every day in the morning. One, I think, was a five minute broadcast at 6:30, and the other was for 15 minutes at 7:00, both live, of course, when I filled in. I would go to one, then hurry to the other. The longer second program was rebroadcast over a big watt North Carolina station at night. I remember standing in line at a Roy Rogers restaurant one night listening to Tabernacle Time. In those days, it was a big deal (still is) because Brother Bob was pastor of the beloved Tabernacle. He said in church once that someone called to ask who that old man was substituting for him. I was 21.

Don Loy Whisnant/Journey Notes 10A11

Back in the Days of the Old Baptist Tabernacle in Danville, Virginia

I have had the wonderful privilege of knowing and experiencing old-time gospel ministry. When I read about some of the revivals in church history, it has always occurred to me how fortunate I am to be among those who will never need to wonder what revival is like.

When my father died in 1966, I was a junior in high school and had little direction for my life, so I could have ended up anywhere. But in God's care, my mother moved from Roanoke to the old Baptist Tabernacle in Danville, Virginia. The move uprooted me from my circle of friends and athletic hopes for my senior year, but put me in the midst of a work of God that became the foundation for anything else God might later do in my life.

The old “Tabernacle” could hardly hold the Sunday School attendances or the crowds that came for the preaching there three times a week. Sometimes, even on Sunday evenings, ushers would line chairs down the aisles. I also remember people standing along the walls at the back and down the sides of the large auditorium. The music was not worldly loud or sensational, but sanctified and appropriate. There were no high tech sights and sounds of today's entertainment world, no performances or standing ovations, but only the man of God calling us to Heaven and to holiness through Christ, and perhaps a white-haired old saint or two quietly weeping and waving a white handkerchief. How privileged I was to be there!

God has used me several times through the years to birth revival ministries which have had a tiny resemblance to my own earlier experience at the Tabernacle. I have a hope - maybe it is only a dream - that God will once again raise up ministries which will provide the opportunity for broken lives to experience the work of grace in the way I experienced it as a young man many years ago.

"I remember the days of long ago; I meditate on all your works and consider what your hands have done. I spread out my hands to you; my soul thirsts for you like a parched land." - Psalm 143:5

Don Loy Whisnant/Journey Notes 10A08

Running Out of Gas Out Running God's Provisions

I remember my first days of ministry as a kid preacher. Actually, it was the summer before my senior year in high school. Brother Bob gave me a little Sunday School class of 3 junior boys and told me to grow it. I set out to win junior boys all over our town.

Soon we had ten boys in our class on Sunday morning, then twenty. In several months we had over thirty junior boys attending our Sunday School class every Sunday. But it took work.

I usually drove my little Corvair 100 miles or more each Saturday. I would start out early, visit my regular boys, and knock on doors to find more. Then I would go back on Sunday morning to pick them up. I would pack as many boys into my little car as it would hold without losing someone out the window or blowing a tire, drop them off at the front steps of the church, then go back for more, sometimes making three or four trips. I remember once seeing some of the deacons standing at the top of the steps and thought I saw them smiling big at me to cheer me on. No football player running for a touchdown in a packed out stadium ever had more fun.

But it was hard work. On Saturdays, often I would work until dark and rarely stop to eat. After working hard all day on one Saturday, I ran out of gas in my car on the way home. I got a little mad, not with myself, but with God. I sat there in the dark in my little stalled car fussing with God because I had run out of gas. I couldn't understand considering how hard I had worked.

"Why did you allow this to happen to me?" I asked God.

"Because you didn't take time to stop for gas," he answered.

Don Loy Whisnant/Journey Notes 9E18

GracePoint Counseling

Moving On Up: A Highly Over Rated Experience

Years ago, a friend called to ask if I were interested in a staff position in a prominent church in northern Ohio. I hinted that I might be. He asked if I wanted him to call the pastor. I said not for my sake, but only if he wanted to make a recommendation to the church.

He made the call, and several days later, I received a call from the pastor inviting me to interview for the staff position, which I did. The church then offered me the position, which I accepted. It was a good fit and the work was fruitful as it always is when God gives birth to an opportunity.

But the church sat in the shadow of a much larger ministry (one of America's largest) in a neighboring city. The following year, I was invited to teach elemental theology and youth ministries in their college - from which vantage point, I admired the work and staff of the bigger church.

"One day maybe..." I caught myself sometimes thinking as I cast a wistful eye about me.

A year or so later, when a staff position opened in the larger church, I could not help myself. I took the opportunity to tell an associate that I was available. Never mind that God was already using me in the place where he had placed me.

A few days later, the hoped for call came for an interview and was followed by an offer, which I accepted. I thought my "time had come" and was excited. The work was good, but in time, I realized that whatever increased excitement or usefulness I was looking for, it didn't happen, and that bigness and prominence are highly overrated and cannot add to the happiness and contentment of just being in the place where God puts us.

Don Loy Whisnant/Journey Notes 9A24

History of Knocking on Doors and Remembering Best Buddy, Donnie

Before moving recently, I had knocked on every door in our community of 112 homes at least three times to meet neighbors and introduce myself with the hope of connecting to them for ministry. In my lifetime, I may have knocked on as many doors as anyone ever. I remember in my earliest days of ministry in a southern Virginia town of about 50,000 population that, for two years or so, I went door to door almost five days a week for four or five hours a day meeting people, presenting Christ, and also introducing our ministry. On church visitation night once a week, the Sunday School teachers and staff followed up on the people who showed interest.

Of course, I met all kinds of people and had many memorable experiences, especially of those folks I had the opportunity to pray with, some for salvation.

I remember also some adverse circumstances. I have been attacked by dogs and once pushed into a swimming pool. The worst may have been the guy who came to the door with a threat that I needed to leave or else he had a shotgun to persuade me. So I left.

But being the prankster that I am sometimes, I listed his name among those who were interested, and then at visitation that same night, I asked my first and best ever preaching buddy, Donnie, to go with me to visit the home again for a follow up.

After we arrived at the home, Donnie didn't seem to hesitate when I suggested he make the visit alone.

"I already met him once today," I explained, "so just tell him who you are, where you are from, and that you just wanted to briefly stop by to thank him for his interest in our ministry."

While I sat in the church van parked on the street in front of the house, I watched good-natured Donnie amble up the front steps of the small white framed house to knock on the screen door, step back, and wait to flash his big smile.

Sure enough, the agitated man came to the door.

"Well, hello!" Donnie called out with his best happy face. He then introduced himself and announced where he was from. The remainder that happened was sort of a flash. I remember a moment of quiet and then thunder. The screen door flew open and I watched surprised Donnie jump off the porch and hurry across the yard and into the van with the angry man standing in the doorway cursing and swinging a broom.

In my moving around the country, I haven't seen Donnie as much I as would have wanted, but we have talked on the phone every so many years and are still buddies.

Don Loy Whisnant/Journey Notes 9A10

GracePoint Counseling

They Threw the Bum Out: A Hurting Church and a Pastor's Confession

Twenty-five years ago, after about 15 years of fulltime ministry, my ministry fell apart. At the time, I was confident the problem was not I, but adverse people and circumstances.

I certainly knew how to motivate workers and develop programs in order to generate numerical results. From my earliest ministry, I had the "whatever it took" to fast grow a half dozen ministries to record numbers. Even at the time of my implosion, I was leading a church which had averaged 115 in a mountain town of about 4,000 to over 400 in less than a year.

But the church, wonderful people all, could not survive my using and abusing them to promote superficial church growth. They didn't exactly throw me out, but they packed up and left, then came back to fight for their church. (Good for them!) So I left.

But I didn't learn much. I organized another church which was recognized by Moody Monthly magazine the following year as the fastest growing Sunday School in our state. But by this time, my wife, dutiful as she was through the years, could not survive my neglect, so she left.

Since that time, I have been learning a little about investment leadership, that it is illustrated and modeled to us by the work of the Father to sow his Life into our innermost being - also, by the care of Christ for his bride, the Church, and that, in turn, we parents, husbands, and pastors are to live out this investment by our investment into the lives of those we serve.

I was an ignorant pastor, husband, and parent not enabled to make the investment essential to the health and happiness needs of those I served, but expecting a good outcome anyhow. It didn't happen.

Don Loy Whisnant/Journey Notes 9A03

GracePoint Counseling

When East was West and North was South: Sending Warm Thoughts to Strangers, or My Confused Years as a College Youth

After graduation from high school in Virginia many years ago, I boarded a Greyhound bus and headed west to Arlington, Texas for college. Early in the morning hours of the next day while I slept, the bus bypassed Dallas and Arlington and continued on west. I woke up when we stopped in Fort Worth. After a brief stopover, the bus then headed back east toward Dallas to drop me off at Arlington. Only in my mind, we were still traveling west. It never occurred to me that the bus had doubled back east after arriving first in Fort Worth. So for those years in Texas, I assumed Arlington and Dallas were west of Fort Worth. This meant on those lonely nights when I went out to look up at the stars and think about home that I was not waving and throwing kisses at family and friends back east, but to the folks out in California.

I finally got east and west cleared up in my mind, but not north and south really until on the occasion of my first visit back to the college in Arlington ten or so years later. Flying into Dallas, I knew to drive west, not east, to Arlington, but was not prepared to find the college on the wrong side of the road.

Don Loy Whisnant/Journey Notes 8I27

GracePoint Counseling

Donald: Preaching Pal and Prankster Dad

Wayne has been an evangelist in his denomination for many years. But I remember him when he was a just a little boy. Donald, his proud dad, was my first preaching buddy and one of my all-time favorite persons.

Wayne, like his dad, was a hoot. Fiesty mom and wife, Carolyn, had her hands full with those two, for sure. One evening after a preaching service, we stopped for Carol to do some quick shopping in one of those five and ten cent stores (today’s dollar stores). Parked just outside the door, Donald, three-year-old Wayne, and I waited in the car. After only a short time, fellow-knucklehead prankster Donald sent obedient Wayne to "hurry up" his mother. Struggling to open the entrance door, Wayne stuck his little towhead inside the store and yelled out, “MOMMY, IS YOU IN HERE?” In an instant, mommy showed up wagging her finger in wide-eyed Wayne’s face, then sternly directed him back to the car where Donald and I sat looking innocent. After climbing back into the car, the exasperated little fellow announced to his dad,

“Don’t never let me do that again!”

Don Loy Whisnant/Journey Notes 8I20

R. J. Barber

When my father died, Mom moved our family to Danville, Virginia to work in the day school at the Baptist Tabernacle. I was a rising senior in high school and angry about leaving behind friends and athletic opportunities. As it turned out, I came under the influence of R.J Barber who pointed me to an intimate relationship with Christ through his Word. I got something at the Tabernacle which I have never gotten over. Several years later I received a phone call from Brother Bob inviting me to serve on staff. That calls remains one of my favorite memories.

Don Loy Whisnant/Journey Notes 8I06
gracepointamerica.org

Getting Ready to Meet Jesus

Years ago in Texas, I asked a young boy and his sister if they had ever asked Jesus to "save" them. They said they had. I asked when. They said one day when they were in a boat that was sinking. I said I meant had they ever asked Jesus to come into their hearts and take them to Heaven when they died. They said yes. I asked when. They said that day when they were in the boat that was sinking.

Don Loy Whisnant/Journey Notes 8D22

gracepointamerica.org