Thomas Road Baptist Church Pastor Jonathan Falwell initiated the 2010 InnovateChurch Conference on Tuesday morning with a message designed to encourage attendees to take their focus off of the bigger pictures of church growth and personal success in order to reconnect with personal ministry to one person.

Falwell opened his message with a series of statistics showing that many modern pastors are in a state of discouragement. Using a variety of studies, he pointed out that about 50 percent of today’s pastors indicate that they would leave the ministry if they could. Other findings include: 50 percent of pastors’ marriages end in divorce; 70 percent of pastors say they are depressed; 1,500 pastors walk away from ministry every month; 80 percent of all seminary and Bible school graduates will leave the ministry within the first five years of ministry; and a staggering 90 percent of pastors say they feel they are not equipped to cope with the challenges of ministry.

“Something is wrong with ministry today,” Falwell concluded, as about 2,000 attendees listened intently.

He went on to say that the contemporary push for success in ministry may have much to do with the problems in modern ministry. Falwell cited a string of recent lists, which included phrases such as “most influential” and “fastest growing,” as part of the cultural problem with today’s ministry. Too many people, Falwell said, are focusing on seeing their names on these lists instead of getting down to the basics of personal ministry. “I believe we have self-imposed measurements of success that are wrong,” he stated.

Falwell spotlighted Acts chapter 8, in which Phillip, who had been preaching to multitudes with great achievement for Christ, was called by God to the desert, where a man with many questions awaited him. “Phillip walked away from the masses and went to a secluded place to minister to just one,” Falwell noted.

“I believe the answer to our exhaustion is to begin focusing again on just one who is desperate for the Gospel,” Falwell declared. To give credence to his point, Falwell displayed an old photo of his father, Dr. Jerry Falwell, in a large, empty auditorium. In the photo, he has his hand on the shoulder of a man with whom he is conversing. The younger Falwell noted that the photo was a perfect example of who Jerry Falwell was in that, after he had spoken to a large crowd, Dr. Falwell had taken the time to minister to one solitary man.

Falwell, who has served as pastor of Thomas Road Baptist Church for three years since his father’s passing, then referred to Luke 15:10, noting that there is great rejoicing in heaven over the salvation of one. “God called me to preach and to minister to the one,” he said.

Falwell concluded by recounting a story about visiting a man who was dying of cancer in his home. When Falwell walked into the living room, the dying man, with tears in his eyes, told Falwell how much he hoped the young pastor would visit him. “That visit impacted me in ministry more than anything in the last three years,” he said. “I became convinced of the importance of ministry to one.”