Mike Edmisten Follower of Jesus. Husband of Nicki. Father of Ryan & Brock. Communicator of the Word.

The Fastest Way to Unimpress Me

I learned early on that a lot of people want to impress their pastor. Speaking for pastors everywhere, I think it's time to give you this cold, hard fact…

We're not impressed.

I can't tell you how many people try to impress me. When I'm around, they completely change the way they talk. They work all kinds of religious sounding verbiage into our conversation. They want to turn every interaction with me into a grand theological conversation. They make sure to show me  how much Bible they know. It is nearly impossible to have a normal conversation with them. And it's all done for one purpose…to impress me.

The irony is that this is the fastest way to unimpress me.

For one thing, I don't talk like that. When I talk, I don't sound like I'm reading from a King James Bible. Except for a few Pharisaical years when I was younger, I have never felt like I have to use religious catch words in conversations. Thankfully God saved me from my legalism.

A second, and much more important, reason that this doesn't impress me is that it's usually all talk. I've learned that the more a person has to talk a good game, the less game they've actually got. In other words, if a person has to go over the top to impress me in a conversation, it's most likely an attempt to throw me off the trail of who they really are. And it's usually a pathetically easy smokescreen to see through. The Bible says it so simply: "Fools multiply words." (Ecclesiastes 10:14)

As I said earlier, we pastors are unimpressed.

But that's not to say that we are impossible to impress. I'm impressed by people every single day. But it's not the religious-talking suck up that impresses me. I'm impressed by people that demonstrate who they are by their actions instead of their words.

These are people that I can actually have a real conversation with. People who, instead of trying to impress me, are very real about their brokenness and sin. When I ask them a question, I get a real answer…not a church answer. Trust me…there's a big difference.

These people don't use a lot of religious words. They might even use an occasional "bad" word. But it's all part of a package of real spiritual authenticity. These are people who are completely committed to becoming more like Jesus, but they also realize that they aren't there yet. And they are too busy taking care of business on the field to worry about talking a big game.

To put it simply, the person who impresses me the most is the person who isn't trying to impress me at all.