Raising up leaders in the church

When I served as a Resource Minister for our Region I frequently heard complaints about the lack of leaders in many of the churches I served. Sometimes it was an issue with the quantity of leaders while others complained about the quality of the leaders in their churches. However, I noticed few of these churches did anything except complain. They offered no training for their current leaders and no training for potential future leaders.

During my life I have worked a number of different jobs as a bivocational minister. In every one of those jobs there was training. As an electrician in the Navy I had to be trained to qualify to stand switchgear watch aboard the carrier I was assigned to. In the various jobs I had while working in the factory I had to be trained for each job I had. Although I began my ministry with no education beyond high school, I soon enrolled in a Bible school to learn how to better serve my church, and I continued that education until completing my doctorate. When I decided to become an auctioneer I had to fulfill 80 hours of classroom instruction and pass an exam to be licensed. But, what training do we offer those who serve in our churches?

We ask someone to teach a class. In many churches the person is handed a teacher's book and told where their classroom is located. But, how many churches provide training for that teacher? We ask someone to serve as a deacon or elder, and we tell them when the meetings are held. What training is ever offered them? In many churches, the answer is none. In most smaller churches the youth leaders are volunteers. Are they ever provided with the training they need to do a good job? Young people today have a host of challenges that many of us never faced growing up, and our volunteer youth workers often feel overwhelmed. They deserve our support and the best training we can offer. We ask people to serve in our churches and fail to provide them with any training and then complain when they don't do a good job. This needs to end.

There are many ways to provide leadership training today. Churches can find good training programs on video or in published materials. As a bivocational pastor of a small, rural church I led on-going training for our Sunday school teachers using some books produced by a denominational publishing house. I offered deacon training for our deacons, and led several similar training events for the deacons in the churches I served as a Resource Minister. There are often seminars and training opportunities offered that you can take advantage of. The church should pay for these events for their leaders and potential leaders. it's an investment in the future of your church.

Every church needs a leadership pipeline where potential leaders are identified and trained so they are ready when needed. How much time does your church leaders spend trying to identify such persons. If you wait until new leaders are needed, it's too late. Identify them now, train them now, and they'll be ready when needed.

One final note: don't forget about your pastoral leadership. They need ongoing training as well. Every church should have continuing education funds available for their pastor. Many corporations pay for coaches for their CEOs and other senior leaders. This is a good model for churches to follow. I'm currently serving as a mentor for a young pastor to help him navigate the transition into a larger church than he has served in the past. His church wants him to succeed and is willing to invest in him to make that happen.

If a church complains about a lack of qualified leaders, they are usually admitting they have failed to raise up the leaders they need. Instead of complaining, let's begin to identify those God has called to leadership in the church and begin equipping them for that work.

Expect future church leaders to come from within their church

As a regional minister for 14 years I assisted a number of churches in their pastoral searches. When I began we continued to use a model that had worked reasonably well for many years, but by the time I retired it was obvious that model was not as effective in some churches as it once was. In the old model I would take a number of profiles of potential candidates that seemed to match the needs of the church to the pastor search committee. As the years went by it became obvious that the number of profiles generated through our denomination was getting smaller and smaller. Many of our smaller churches began seeking bivocational leadership, and those individuals were virtually absent in our official system.

Finding bivocational ministers is a challenge for smaller churches and the denominational people who assist them. As I shared with many churches, the bivocational pastor you seek is going to be someone near your church geographically. Someone is not likely to move from New Jersey to Indiana to serve a bivocational church.

One very healthy, smaller church was struggling to find a bivocational pastor when a lay leader approached me. He said he felt led to serve in that position although he lacked any kind of ministerial training or education. He was a local farmer with a college degree, but he was also a respected person in the church and community. I recognized that he would come into that position with something someone new would not have: instant respect and a knowledge of the area. He did become the pastor of that church and continues to serve it very well. He went through our Region's Church Leadership Institute to get some basic ministerial and theological training. His success inspired me to suggest to other churches to look within their congregation for their pastoral leadership. This has worked out well for many of them.

Mega-churches do the same thing. A few years before the senior pastor retires the church often names his successor. When the retirement does come, the person has been preparing for the position for a period of time, he or she has already bought into the vision and ministry of the church and is familiar with the members and the community. A new person would spend years learning these things.

As the number of seminary students continue to decline I believe more churches will begin to look within their congregations for future pastors and ministerial staff. We have many pastors nearing (or past) retirement age, several denominations have an emphasis on starting new churches, more and more churches are seeking bivocational leadership, and all of these factors are going to make it more challenging for churches to find qualified people to lead them. It may well be that God is raising up someone from within your church to fill that pastoral role.

Personally, I think this can be a good thing for many reasons.

• The person has existing relationships in the church.
• The person is already a trusted and respected leader in the church.
• The person is familiar with the area and its needs.
• The person has a track record with the church so they know exactly what they are getting with him or her.
• The person has bought into the mission and vision of the church or he or she would not be there.

If you are in a church that will likely be looking for new pastoral leadership soon I would encourage you to begin now looking at who within your congregation might be called to that position. This might be a good time to begin giving this person additional ministry opportunities to see how he or she responds and to learn from the experience. The church might want to invest in ministerial education for the individual.  There are ministry assessment centers the church might want to use to see if the individual has the personality and passion to serve in ministry. There is nothing wrong with planning ahead for your future pastoral needs.

Church growth and the single-pastor staff

 A few years ago I became aware of a new church start that was different than most I had heard about. It was located in a nearby larger city with a vision of reaching the two wealthiest neighborhoods in the community. They understood that wealthy people need a relationship with Jesus Christ just like everyone else does. They were then meeting in a school gymnasium in one of those neighborhoods and raising money to buy land on which to begin building. In about five years they had grown to about 400 people attending their services. What amazed me even more was their staffing. If I remember correctly, they had 14 people on staff and were looking for a senior pastor. They didn't have a Youth Minister. They had a Jr. High Girl's Minister, a Senior High Girl's Minister and others with a focus on special age groups. They were staffed for growth.

Contrast that will how many churches staff their churches. They begin with a single pastor and then add more staff when he or she can no longer handle the growth of the church. The problem with that model is that the church will seldom grow beyond the ability of that individual so additional staff is never added. Seldom does a single-staff pastor church grow beyond about 120 people. The reason is that is the number that most leaders can reasonably relate to. Some pastors might grow the church to 150 or even 175 people, but that number may not be sustained because he or she cannot maintain that many connections. People will begin to leave through the back door until the number gets back down closer to that 120 mark. This is why few churches ever grow beyond 200 people. The single pastor cannot connect to that many people, and the church does not feel it has the finances to hire additional staff.

An old model of church staffing used to believe that staff would be added at about 150 attendees. A much better model today would add staff at 100 people. A church with a very aggressive growth strategy, like the one mentioned above, might add staff at much lower numbers to help facilitate that growth. It's important that churches understand that their staffing decisions will impact their growth strategy.

The church mentioned above had some very wealthy individuals who shared their vision for ministry. They had the funds to support their staffing. Many churches would struggle to have that many fully-funded persons on staff with the number they had attending at the time. One solution to that is to bring bivocational people on staff. Many churches have bivocational pastors who provide excellent ministry. Imagine what might happen with bivocational ministers with very limited ministry responsibilities! Their areas of responsibility might explode due to their focused ministry.

If churches want to grow in the 21st century they will need to rethink their staffing needs. Single-staff churches have already placed a lid on their potential growth. To grow beyond that lid churches will need to add additional staff and engage its members in ministry. Perhaps a model worth considering would be having bivocational ministers leading ministry groups of trained lay leaders. That model would considerably raise the lid of potential growth in the church.

Giving ministry to the people

 Someone wrote that the first reformation gave the Bible to the people. The second reformation will give ministry to the people. I totally agree. Too many churches expect their pastors and staff to provide all the ministry for the church while they sit back and evaluate how well these leaders are doing. The Bible teaches that the role of the pastor is to equip the saints for the work of ministry. In other words, the work of the pastor is to teach the congregation how to minister to the people they encounter every day.

In my seminars to small church leaders I give this illustration. No matter how good the pastor may be, he or she can only be in one place at one time doing one thing. Let's say this pastor is serving a church of 70 people, the median size church in America, who have been trained to do ministry wherever they go. Now you have 70 ministers in 70 places doing 70 things. Would you rather grow your church by addition, 1+1, or by multiplication, 70X1? Which do you think will be most effective for the kingdom of God?

If this is the biblical method of ministry why do we not see this happening in more of our churches? There are several reasons.

• Some pastors do not want to share the ministry with members of the congregation. They enjoy the appreciation and accolades too much when they minister to people. Although they may complain about being stretched too thin, they want to be a one-man show.
• Many churches will not change their expectations of the pastor as the ministry-provider. "This is what we pay him for," will be their response to what I'm writing about.
• For too long we have bought into the pastoral care concept when we should be moving towards a congregational-care style of ministry.
• Pastors do not know how to train people to do ministry. Some may believe that it is only in seminary one can receive this kind of training, and it's not really the role of lay people anyway.
• The church is so busy with committee and board work that there is no time for lay people to actually be involved in ministry. While some committee and board work may be needed, this is mostly maintenance work. Much of this can be done without requiring a group of people to give up an evening to discuss things that really do not need discussing and trusting the leadership to make these decisions. Now people have time to minister.

You can probably find other reasons that exist in your church. Regardless of the reason, the church must move towards equipping its members to do ministry. There is simply way too much work that needs to be done to expect that one minister can do it all.

Sharing the work

A pastor friend of mine recently wrote of the challenges he has in trying to balance the various things he needs to do. This is especially a problem felt by bivocational ministers, but it's one that affects all ministers. As he wrote, trying to serve the church, be an active presence in the community and be present with his family makes it hard to maintain a sense of balance.

We will never find a balance in life and ministry if we never learn to share the work with other people. For too many years we have emphasized a pastoral care model of ministry that isn't biblical, expects too much of our clergy and ignores the gifts God has given others in our congregations.

God has given gifts to every believer which are to be used to serve others. When the pastor reserves ministry for himself or herself that pastor is robbing others of the joy of service. Such a pastor keeps the church from being the church and deprives individuals from using the gifts God has given them.

A more biblical model of ministry has the pastor and other ordained persons in the church equipping the saints for the work of ministry. Our role as pastors is not to try to figure out how to get everything done. Our role is to help equip all those in our churches to be engaged in ministry using the gifts they have been given.

In my pastoral seminars I often tell people that no matter how talented and gifted their pastor might be, he or she can only be in one place at a time doing one thing at a time. However, if there are 50 people in the congregation who see themselves as ministers and who have been equipped to use their gifts you now have 50 people in 50 places doing ministry. Which is going to be most effective for the Kingdom of God? The answer is a mathematical one. Do you prefer 1X1 or 50X1? I'll give you a hint: the most effective will be the one with the most people involved.

As we enter a new year let's take a look at how ministry is being done in our churches. Are we expecting the pastor to take the lead in doing ministry, or are we expecting the pastor to help equip us to do ministry? Your answer will tell a lot about what the future holds for your church.

Three dollars worth of God

For years I have been haunted by the quote from Wilber Rees: "I would like to buy $3 worth of God, please, not enough to explode my soul or disturb my sleep, but just enough to equal a cup of warm milk or a snooze in the sunshine. I don't want enough of Him to make me love a black man or pick beets with a migrant. I want ecstasy, not transformation; I want the warmth of the womb, not a new birth. I want a pound of the Eternal in a paper sack. I would like to buy $3 worth of God, please."

Does this sound like anyone you know? Maybe someone in your church? Maybe you?

In my book The Healthy Community: Moving Your Church Beyond Tunnel Vision I wrote about the problem of a lack of discipled believers. In my 14 years serving as a regional minister I saw too many pastors leave their church due to members who had no interest in growing in their faith. As one pastor told me, the majority of his congregation was content to attend worship service on Sunday morning if nothing interfered, and that was all they felt was expected of them. They had no interest in any type of discipleship training, and he had been unable to turn that around.

Discipleship is difficult because it's messy. The easy thing to do is to provide age-graded classes, have a promotion Sunday each year, and order slick, multicolored literature with a teacher's guide to make it easier for the teacher to lead the class. The only problem is that we have proven over the years this does not necessarily lead to discipled believers.

As I point out in the book, discipleship is caught, not taught. Education alone does not make a disciple. Jesus taught His disciples and then sent them out to minister. Did they do everything right? No, but they learned from their mistakes, and their faith was deepened. The church must give people an opportunity to do hands-on ministry if we expect them to grow. Sitting in air-conditioned classrooms hearing another take on Daniel in the lion's den won't produce disciples, but letting them in the lion's den might.

Pastor, how many people in your church are engaged in actual ministry outside the church? I'm not talking about serving on some board or committee but involved in real ministry that impact the lives of those they serve. Are there people in your church who can fill the pulpit for you if you need to be absent?

When I was pastoring two of my deacons took turns sharing the pulpit when I was on vacation. One evening in a deacon meeting one of them suggested the other deacons should also fill the pulpit to see what was involved in preparing and delivering a sermon. Two other deacons volunteered to do so. Dates were set for them to preach. When they had an idea for their message they came to me to borrow some study helps, and both delivered great sermons. It was a growing opportunity for each of these men.

Challenge your people to do more than show up on Sunday morning. It has been said that the first reformation gave the Bible to the people and the second reformation will give the ministry to the people. As people become more involved in ministry they will grow as disciples and they will never again be satisfied with $3 worth of God.

What do leaders do?

The answer to the question of what do leaders do is simple. They lead. They don't stand in the way of progress. They don't play to a particular constituency. They are not influenced by polls. They don't check to see which the way the wind is blowing. They lead.

There is a serious lack of leadership in our nation today. Any thinking American has to be appalled at our elected officials who long ago gave up even appearing to represent those who elected them to office. There are few incumbents who should be returned to office, but the majority of them keep getting re-elected despite their abysmal failure to lead. We keep hearing people tell President Trump to "drain the swamp." The fact is, we can drain the swamp by putting new people in office and holding them accountable. If they don't produce, if they don't lead, we vote them out until we find people who will lead.

Unfortunately, the situation is not much better in many of our churches. We have lay people in leadership roles who spend more time protecting their sacred cows and traditions than in leading their churches towards a better future. During the years I've spent in ministry, especially in denominational ministry, I saw many church controllers who did everything possible to keep the church stuck. People walked around them like they were walking on eggshells.

 A leadership team in one church called me in to discuss a problem they had with two families in the church. Although the church attracted new people it was not growing. The reason it wasn't growing is that the new people usually left within a few months because of things members of these two families would say or do to them. When I asked the "leadership" what they were going to do about it they responded there wasn't anything they could do. I then told them to learn to live with their problem.

I explained that as the leaders in that church they decided who would stay and who would go. If they decided to keep toxic people in the church and not hold them accountable for their actions, they they should expect to see good people leave. The choice was theirs to make, but until they developed a backbone and confronted these controllers about their bad behavior nothing would change. To their credit, they did confront these individuals who then left the church, and the church began to grow.

It's not easy to say, but there's a lot of weak pastoral leadership as well. Many pastors don't want to lead. They've not been trained to lead. Some churches won't allow them to lead. As I've said many times in this blog, everything rises and falls on leadership. If the pastoral leadership is weak, the church is going to be weak.

If your church looks the same at the end of this year as it did last year, it has weak leaders. If your church has not developed new ministries in the past 12 months, it has weak leaders. If your church has the same problems it did a year ago, or five years ago, it has weak leaders. The church has been given one mission: to reach people for Jesus Christ. If that isn't happening, there is a problem with the leadership.

If you are a leader, lead.

Bullies in the pulpit

When I served as an Area Minister a good friend of mine called one day saying their new pastor did nothing but beat them up every Sunday from the pulpit. My friend attended a healthy small church, but I had been hearing there were problems there since this pastor arrived. Their long-term treasurer had been removed by the pastor when he refused to pay a bill that was not budgeted and had not been approved by the congregation. Several members had already left the church. The church had stopped supporting its denomination because the new pastor didn't like the denomination. Evidently, as tensions escalated in the church the pastor was using the pulpit to try to beat the congregation into submission. I decided to visit the church.

My friend was right. I had attended this church numerous times in the past and always enjoyed the service. Not this Sunday! The pastor spent 45 minutes blasting the congregation. I almost walked out a couple of times and could not imagine why anyone would accept that week after week. Since I represented the denomination he didn't like, there was nothing I could say to him. I watched the church dwindle down to where there are now less than two dozen attending there now. Of course, he left some time ago. This once healthy church is in serious danger of not surviving.

I'm not sure why some pastors believe they need to beat on their congregations. As shepherds, pastors are to lead their sheep, not beat them. Something is seriously wrong with a pastor who feels the need to constantly criticize his or her congregation.

There is also something wrong with a congregation that accepts such pastoral leadership. Congregations are to respect their pastors and allow them to lead, but that does not mean they are to allow their pastors to abuse them. That is what this was: pastoral abuse. No congregation should have to endure that.

I'm sure my friend who called wanted me to intervene and either stop the pastor's misbehavior or have him removed from the church. In our tradition, we do not have the authority to do that. The congregation calls the pastor, and only the congregation can remove the pastor.

The problem in this particular church is that people would talk to the pastor individually. When he refused to listen or respond to them, they would leave the church. I suggested that if the bulk of the lay leadership were dissatisfied with this pastor's behavior that they confront him together and make it clear that they were not going anywhere and they were also not going to tolerate abusive behavior. Unfortunately, they did not do that which is why the church is in danger of closing now.

There is a fine line here. On the one hand, Scripture is clear that we are to follow those in authority over us. At the same time, Scripture is also clear that shepherds are not to abuse those placed under his care. When such abuse happens a congregation must be willing to confront the pastor and demand that it stop. There's been a lot of talk lately about stopping the bullying that goes on in our society. Let's also stop it in the pulpit.

What should a layperson do?

Almost every church has a job description for the pastor, but few have one for its lay people. Maybe this is why many lay people really don't know what their job is. A few years ago I read an excellent book by Randy Pope titled The Intentional Church: Moving From Church Success to Community Transformation. I'm in the process of reading it again and am finding it as helpful as it was the first time I read it.

Pope suggests that a biblically-based job description for lay people should include

1. To discover and develop their spiritual gifts. Although there are many tools available to help a Christian understand his or her spiritual gifts, many Christians have no idea what their gift(s) might be.
2. To view themselves as the primary ministers of the church. I often say that the church must move from a pastoral care model to a congregational care model.
3. To spend the time needed to be equipped adequately to use their spiritual gifts. The pastor's job is to equip the saints to do the work of ministry (Eph. 4). The layperson's job is to be equipped, and that takes time.
4. To commit the time necessary to use their gifts in ministry. There is little value in knowing one's spiritual gifts and be equipped to properly use them if one doesn't take the time to do so. (Page 132)

This a far more challenging job description than it might first appear. For one thing, it does demand time from a lay person, and time is a precious commodity in our day. It takes time to identify our gifts, it takes more time to be equipped to use those gifts, and it requires even more time to actually use those gifts in ministry.

This job description also flies in the face of how many Christians view the roles of pastor and lay person. Many believers have adopted an entitlement mindset. They expect the pastor to serve their needs, to entertain them, and to provide a worship experience that will meet their preferences. As one lady told a pastor friend of mine one Sunday, "That's what we pay you for." (He resigned a few weeks later.)

But, think of what would happen if your church members began to view themselves as gifted ministers. Instead of having one minister your church would have numerous ministers involved in many different ministries throughout the community. This will allow your church to have a much greater impact on the community which will also make it more likely that your church will grow.

An added benefit is how this job description impacts the lay people in a church. We all want to feel that our lives make a difference in the lives of others, and living into this job description makes it far more likely that we will have a positive impact on other people.

Finally, this job description gives permission to lay people to do ministry. Some seldom do much ministry because no one has asked them to. Lay people do not need the pastor or others in church leadership to ask them to become engaged in ministry. God has already called every lay person to do ministry. We are all ordained at our baptism to fulfill the ministries that He has gifted us to do. No one has to wait on another person to ask them to do something. Find a need and meet it.

Your church likely does not have a written job description for its lay people. That's fine. Create your own job description using this as a model. If enough people in your church does this you will be amazed at the difference it will make in the church and in those your church is serving.

When only a few seem to care

Seldom do I lead a conference that I am not asked the question, "How can I lead my church forward when only a few people seem to be willing to do anything?" Usually, when the question is asked several heads begin to nod indicating they face the same problem. When I began my pastoral ministry I faced the same issue, and what I learned continues to be the advice I give to those who ask the question.

You have to ride the horse that wants to run. Whipping a dead horse won't make it go any faster. You have to dismount from a dead horse and find one ready to run. Climb on that one and let it take off.

What do I mean? There are some people who will never engage in the work of the church. Unfortunately, some of them will be in positions of leadership. No matter how much you challenge them, how often you cast the vision to them, no matter how much you urge them to become involved, they are not going to do anything.

At that point, you have to find those persons in the church that share your vision for ministry and who have a heart to see the church develop a more effective ministry to the community. When you find those individuals you begin to invest your life into them. They may not be in current leadership roles, but you can help prepare them for the time that they will be.

What do you do with the others? You love them, you pastor them, but you invest yourself in those who are going to work with you to lead the church forward. As the Pareto Principle teaches us, we invest 80 percent of our time in the 20 percent of the people who will provide the greatest return on that investment.

Admittedly, this will probably cause some problems for some pastors. People will accuse you of having your clique in the church. Church gossips will talk about how much time you spend with your "friends" while ignoring others in the church. When such talk begins remember that while Jesus had many disciples he spent most of his time with twelve. In some instances he purposely reduced that number to three. He understood that some people would do more for the Kingdom than others, and he reserved the majority of his time and his greatest lessons for those few. We need to do the same.

It doesn't take great numbers to do great things. A few passionate people who own the vision and have been trained to use the gifts God has given them will accomplish more for the Kingdom of God than a hundred of people who want to ensure the church has a worship service every week. Identify those people and pour yourself into them...then watch and see what God will do.

The second reformation of the church

In yesterday's post I discussed how each Christian is ordained for ministry at the time of his or her baptism. Every believer has been called to minister and given spiritual gifts by the Holy Spirit to enable us to do ministry. The role of the pastor is not to do the ministry of the church but to equip each member of the church to minister according to the gifts given to that person.

Greg Ogden, in his book Unfinished Business: Returning the Ministry to the People of God wrote "It has been broadly observed that the first Reformation of the early 1500s placed the Bible in the hands of the people and that the Second Reformation will place the ministry in the hands of the people." This is occurring in churches across the country, especially in those served by bivocational pastors.

In a bivocational setting there is a lot of ministry that will not get done if the pastor is expected to do it all. There simply isn't enough time. By definition, a bivocational pastor has another job. It may be a part-time or full-time job, but in either case this pastor is not always available to do "church work." In my experience I have found that in healthy bivocational churches members of the congregation are willing, and even expect, to minister when the pastor is not available.

However, returning the ministry to the people is not merely a pragmatic action because the pastor is not always available. It is the biblical model for ministry. Unfortunately, for a variety of reasons we have not emphasized the ministry of the laity for the past several decades. As a result we have perpetuated an unhealthy family system.

Ogden explains, "In the healthy family, the goal of parents is to grow children into responsible, self-initiating, caring, and serving adults. The church, on the other hand, has more often that not viewed the role of pastor as parent and the people of God as dependent children who need to be constantly cared for. As a result, the children remain perpetually children."

He goes on to note that too often the church and the pastor have entered into an unhealthy conspiracy of dependency which has been equally unhealthy for both. Pastors are burning out and leaving the ministry at frightening rates, and churches are continuing to decline in attendance, finances, and impact on their communities. It is vital that we rediscover the equipping role of the pastor and the ministry role of the congregation.

How would a pastor go about equipping his or her congregation to do ministry?

• Begin by casting the vision for such ministry. Be sure to begin with the why before you go into the what or some people will think you're just trying to get out of work. Because the church has operated in the old, incorrect model for so long this initial phase will take time in most churches.
• Change your role from teacher/caregiver to that of a coach. This may be a difficult change for the pastor, especially one trained in seminary for a very traditional form of pastoral ministry.
• Train your leaders. Ogden suggests a pastor should spend 80 percent of his or her time with 20 percent of the congregation who has the greatest ministry or leadership potential. I agree with this. In the old model we often spent 80 percent of our time with the 20 percent of our congregation who had the most problems. We need to reverse this.
• Help people identify their spiritual gifts. There are numerous surveys to help you do this. Challenge them to work most in the areas where God has gifted them.
• Model ministry to those you are equipping. Invite them to go with you and participate in various ministry activities. In time, you will be able to send them to minister to these needs. In fact, they will be able to take others with them to help develop them as ministers as well.
• Demonstrate your trust in them as ministers. Believe in them. They may not do things the same way you would do them, but that's OK. 
• Do not underestimate the desire of the church to want to go back to the old way of doing things. Remember, it's what they knew for decades, and there is always a pull to return to what we've known. Don't allow that to happen. Keep this vision before them. Celebrate and publicly recognize those in the church who are doing good ministry.

Ordained at baptism

In 1982 a group of pastors and lay leaders met to ask me questions about my beliefs  before making a recommendation that I be ordained to the ministry. The recommendation was made and a couple of weeks later I was ordained by my church and our association.

The truth is that I had been ordained years earlier, but it was an ordination that is not often recognized. We don't usually associate ordination with baptism, but in reality God does ordain us to ministry at our baptism.

One of the tenets of my Baptist tradition is "the priesthood of the believer." We believe that we have all been called to minister and have been given spiritual gifts through which such ministry can occur. However, this is often talked about more than actually done.

Far too many in our churches are willing to sit in their pews every week and evaluate the work of the minister rather than engaging in ministry themselves. The mindset in these churches is to call a seminary trained pastor who will them be responsible for the ministry of the church.

The problem with this mindset is at least two-fold. One, there is far too much ministry that needs to be done for one person to do it. The second, and more serious problem, is that such a mindset is not biblical. The Bible is clear that the work of the pastor is to "equip the saints to do the work of ministry."

Each of us who call ourselves Christians are called to be engaged in ministry. This responsibility cannot be satisfied with us providing financial support for a professional to do that work for us. We are each called to be on the front lines of ministry.

This does not mean that we are all called to preach or lead a church. As mentioned above, we have all been given unique gifts to enable us to minister so our ministries will each take on different characteristics. One may have the gift of teaching while another has the gifts of mercy and healing. Their ministries will look different, but when each are serving in the areas of their giftedness it adds to the overall ministry of the church.

Even when some churches emphasize lay ministry the idea too often is that lay members are to be helpers to the pastor. That thinking is wrong and needs to be turned around. The pastor is to assist the lay persons in the work of their ministries. The role of the pastor is to equip each person in his or her church to perform their ministries in their daily lives.

I am convinced that each believer is Jesus Christ was ordained for ministry at their baptism. The pastor's role is to help each person fulfill their calling as ministers. Until the church recaptures this biblical mindset it will continue to limp along relying on the professionals to do the work each believer has been called to do.

Pastor's Prayer Team

In 1997 men from across this nation came to Washington DC to participate in Promise Keeper's "Stand in the Gap." Estimates of the size of the crowd vary widely, but it's probably safe to say there were one million or more men in attendance. I was there that day along with my son who had recently moved to the area and three men from our church. It was an incredible experience as we spent the day listening to various speakers and praying for our nation.

The next morning the group we were with left the hotel on our rented bus and after driving a couple of hours stopped for breakfast. The three men from our church was sitting at a table with their food when I sat down. They said they wanted to talk with me.

After the event our son had taken me to their apartment where we had dinner. By the time I returned to the hotel room I shared with the three men from the church they were all asleep. Evidently, as they had returned from the Mall they began talking about the day's activities. During that discussion they realized they all had been thinking the same thing: they needed to have a regular time of prayer for me as their pastor. That next morning over breakfast they asked if I would be interested in meeting with them each Sunday evening before our service for a time of prayer just for me and my family. Of course, I was more than agreeable!

The following Sunday morning I announced that at 6:30 each Sunday evening there would be a time of prayer for me. my family, and the church. These men shared their conversation that led to this decision and invited anyone who wanted to participate to join us in a back Sunday school room. From that time forward, every Sunday evening 4-8 people would meet to pray. They would ask what prayer concerns I had and then each of them would begin to pray.

This had an incredible impact on me, my family, and our church. There were times the evening service began late as we spent extended times in prayer. There's not enough space in a post to describe the many ways this impacted my wife and me personally as well as the impact it had on the church.

John Maxwell often talks about the prayer team that surrounded him when he was a pastor and the impact it had on his life and ministry. I experienced the same impact, and I believe any pastor will as well when people begin to intentionally pray for him or her.

Do you have a Pastor's Prayer Team who meet with you regularly to simply pray for you and your family? If not, I would encourage you to develop one. Ask some of your prayer warriors if they would be part of that team. If you can only start with one person, begin there and let it grow naturally as people begin to understand its value to you and the church.

If you are a layperson in a church that does not have such a prayer team, begin to ask God if you should begin one. Talk to your pastor to determine his or her interest in meeting with a prayer team on a regular basis. My guess is your pastor will be as excited as I was to have a group of people meeting for the express purpose to pray.

Pastors are often under a lot of pressure today. They need the support and prayers of those they lead. Sometimes, their families need it even worse. A Pastor's Prayer Team can make a big difference in the lives of your pastor and his or her family. It can also make a difference in the life of your church.

If I ever returned to pastoral ministry, one of the first things I would do is start a Pastor's Prayer Team. I encourage you to do so as well.

Pastoral visitation part 2

A few commented on my blog post yesterday in which I was critical of pastors who refuse to visit members of their congregation. One person responded that he understood the importance of pastoral visitation but wondered whatever happened to the responsibility of deacons to do visitation.

It's a fair question and one that I considered including in yesterday's post. However, I don't like to make these posts too long or people won't read them so I can't always cover everything I might want to in a single post.

In a couple of my books I write about the need for churches to practice congregational care rather than relying on pastoral care. Ephesians 4 teaches us that the primary role of a pastor is to equip the saints to do the work of ministry. Not only should the deacons (or similar group in your tribe) be involved in visitation and congregational care, everyone in your church should be trained to minister to one another.

When I was a pastor I introduced the Deacon Family Care Program to our deacons and congregation. We assigned every family who attended our church, whether they were members or not, to a deacon. Each deacon had 8-10 families assigned to them. They were given a book where they could record information about their families and the visits/contacts they made with each family.

In the training I encouraged them to contact at least one family a week. That is very doable and would mean that each family in the church would have at least one contact each quarter. That's four contacts a year. The contact could be in the form of a personal visit, a phone call, a card or letter depending on the situation at the time. For instance, if a family member was in the hospital the deacon would normally make a visit to the hospital. On the other hand, a birthday card might suffice as one contact.

We discussed how to make hospital visits and home visits. We talked about proper boundaries such as not visiting a single woman at home by themselves. Either a spouse or another deacon should accompany them if calling on a single woman. We talked about the need for confidentiality.

As a result of this training, our deacons began to handle the bulk of our visitation. When a deacon rotated off and someone new replaced that deacon, the book was given to the new deacon who would take up where the previous deacon left off.

However, none of this precluded me from doing visitation as well. A deacon might call to tell me about a visit that probably needed my follow-up, and I would do that. If someone was in the hospital I would normally visit that person even if their deacon had already been there.

Every bivocational minister struggles with time issues, and having trained lay people who can do much of the visitation can help ease some of that pressure. That does require training them, and it requires training the congregation to accept ministry from the deacons. However, that training time is time well spent. It allows the pastor to focus on other pastoral chores and on being with those who have more critical needs while still providing on-going ministry to the entire congregation.