A danger of bivocational ministry

Let me begin by apologizing for no recent posts.  Last week my wife and I took a week's vacation, and I promised her I would not do anything ministry related.  I kept my promise.  We went on a picnic, spent a couple of days visiting our daughter and her family, and got some work done around the house.  The week before that I was tied up with several activities that just didn't give me the opportunity to post anything on this blog.

This evening I want to address a danger that we often do not think about when considering bivocational ministry.  I saw it mentioned in another blog I was reading earlier today, and it really got my attention.  The danger is using bivocational ministry to keep a church open when it should really be closed.

Many, not all, churches call a bivocational minister out of economic necessity.  They simply do not have the money to afford a fully-funded pastor so they call someone who is bivocational.  Obviously, I don't think there is anything wrong with that since I am so supportive of bivocational ministry and served as a bivocational pastor for 20 years.  But, there are some churches that call a bivocational minister to keep the doors open for a church that essentially died years ago, and that is a problem.

We make a mistake if we believe that there is never a time when a church should close its doors.  In fact, if a church has no vision for ministry and people's lives are not being changed as a result of the ministry of that church, I believe that church needs to make some serious decisions.  Is it good stewardship of God's resources to spend what little money comes in just to keep the lights turned on and the building heated?  There are many churches that has survival as its only vision, and I would argue that survival is not a worthy goal for a church.

Such churches barely raise enough money each week to keep their utilities turned on.  There is never money available for ministry, and if such a church did have extra money come in it would likely want to put that money in a savings somewhere in case giving decreased even more.  Some of these churches own property worth thousands, even hundreds of thousands of dollars, that is being used for a small number of people to huddle together each week so they can remember how things used to be.

These churches often can only remain open because they call a bivocational minister to come in and serve as a chaplain to the membership.  That can be appropriate if such a pastor serves as a hospice chaplain who provides excellent care while the final days of the church's life is lived out.  Such a person can provide a valuable ministry if he or she can honor the ministry that has existed in the church for many years and lead the church to close its doors with dignity and make its resources available to new ministries that may rise up in the community.  But, the danger is that too often a dying church calls a bivocational minister to come in and lead them in pretending that everything is OK when everything is not OK.

Of course, how do we know when a church has reached the point in its life when its time to close?  How far down the decline side of the life of the church can a church go and still be able to come back to life?  I must admit that I don't know the answer to that.  I've seen some churches that I thought were about to close their doors, and they came back to life under new leadership.  I'm not sure anyone on the outside can ever know for certain how much life is left in a church.  That's why I believe it is very important that those in leadership in some of these churches take a very honest, hard look at their churches and decide for themselves if there is any life left in their churches.  If not, then perhaps the best thing that such churches can do is to recognize the impact they have made for the Kingdom of God and close down so newer ministries can come in and continue that work.  This may well be the hardest decision a church ever has to make, but it might be the decision that brings the most honor to God.