For many years my wife, Kat, and I were involved in a legalistic church. We kept the Sabbath, Saturday, and the Holy Days listed in the Old Testament. We did so legalistically. After 17 years of trying to keep the law I found that I had not changed except that people could see by my actions that I could do those things. Inside I was still the same.
When Kat and I left that church we began to go to a church where freedom was taught and practiced. Freedom to become what God wanted us to be not freedom to sin. We were encouraged and trained to use our Spiritual Gifts and without restraints except to do so in a Biblical way. We did not have to have the pastoral staff giving us the okay to minister to others nor did they have to be involved. The results was growth in our physical, emotional and spiritual lives.
During my pastoral training I was tuaght my job as a pastor is to help people discover their gift(s), equip them and then empower them to do ministry. Part of equipping was to work along side of them first teaching, then showing and then letting them do ministry. Once that cycle was complete and they exhibited sound Biblical approaches to ministry we were taught to get out of their way and let them minister.
Most church models is designed around the senior pastor either doing everything or controlling everything. From my experience this produces a climiate of people who will go around those who have been given the office of ministry and directly to the senior pastor. They will report to the senior pastor everything taking place and the result is a lack of ministry because people will become fearful that they are not performing according to church rules.
When Kat and I were in the Worldwide Church of God we were restricted by pastors in what we could do and with whom we could do it. When we left the WCG and started attending the other church we were trained for ministry and then released to total freedom to minister.
The question is not organization but of restriction. Sometimes pastors do not trust their people to minister freely and some fear giving too much power away. Some pastors have been trained in a church model that has all ministry flowing from the pastors and then through a selected group of members. None of these are necessarily sinful models but each restricts what the body can do. I have experienced a model of total restriction and one that reflects a model similar to the beginning church. The apostles commissioned the body to ministry and allowed them to minister. If you read acts and the following letters it sometimes resulted in some abuses but more often than not it led to church growth.
My question for you is what type of church do you attend? Pastors what type of leader are you?
2 comments:
Larry I totally agree with your methods for empowering leaders to be able to do their field of ministry. The problem that I have found here at my church is that people are afraid to step up to be leaders, they tend to feel inadequate and that they might fail. My theory is that the only way to learn is to go for it. If you fail the first time, learn from your faults and go forward. If a person is truly called to minister in a particular area, then God will provide the passion and fuel the fire.
I am not a public speaker by any means, I am a behind the scenes kind of guy, I am the Media director for our church, this is what I feel that I have been called to do. In running sound, lighting, and video I have found that some people think that it would be fun to twist the knobs and move the slides, until they find that you have to actually pay attention to what is going on. Sorry for rambling. ===Skid===
Skid,
Thanks for your comment.
I have also found that people are afraid to step out in leadership or even in serving. Often it is because of wounds they carry. Wounds resulting from harsh leaders, wounds from failure, wounds from leaders who were not confident in their abilities. Sometimes people do not serve or step up to leadership roles because they are battling sin and do not feel they are qualified.
As a leader it is my job to help those folks find healing for their wounds and overcome their fears.
I first have to become confident in my own skills and get healing for my wounds so that I can empower and release them once they are healed and equipped.
Larry
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