By Mike Glenn
The typical corporate structure is a pyramid. The base of the pyramid is wide and made up of all the workers in the organization who do their work in service of the organization and its leadership. The CEO is on top and responsible for providing the vision and the strategy required to accomplish the corporate vision. Everyone below the CEO works to serve the vision, mission and strategy. In many churches, this corporate, secular view of leadership is brought into the church structure. This brings an enormous pressure on the pastor no pastor should ever have to endure. This unbiblical view of leadership also absolves the congregation from engaging in their God given ministries.
Photo by anthony mcgee on Unsplash (flipped upside down)
Jesus was very clear on this. In the world, He said, those in power lord it over those they control. This isn’t the way it’s supposed to be in the church. The pastor, the leader, is the servant of everyone. The pyramid is upside down. The pastor is the point at the bottom of the upside pyramid and the wide top of the upside down pyramid opens up to the world as the church moves into the world to love and serve their neighborhoods and communities.
Christ, not the pastor, is the head of His church. This isn’t up for debate or discussion. The pastor isn’t the leader of the church. Jesus is. If the pastor is at the head of the line, the pastor is there as the first follower. They are closest to Jesus leading everyone to come closer to Christ.
The pastor serves the church as the church serves the world.
Whenever I talk with pastors, one of the first things most of them say is they are overwhelmed. There’s simply too much work to do. They are overworked and overtired. I remind them they were never supposed to do the work of the church. The church should be doing the work of the church. The pastor teaches, trains, disciples, encourages, corrects and supports the congregation in their work. The ministry of Jesus should be the template of the pastor’s ministry. Jesus called the disciples, trained them and sent them out. While every disciple was given the attention of Jesus and His teachings, three were given special attention – Peter, James and John – and these three became leaders of the newly formed church. Jesus didn’t do the work of the disciples. He commissioned them to go and make disciples of the world.
Two things happen when pastors insist on doing all the work of the church. First, pastors burn out. There aren’t enough hours in the day to do all that needs to be done. Second, the congregation is robbed of the opportunity of deepening their relationship with Jesus by serving Him. They never get to deploy their gifts in service of their Lord.
I can hear the pastors laughing at me. If we didn’t do everything, the pastors say, nothing would get done. I know how they feel. I was there for over forty-five years. Here’s what I wish I had known earlier.
First, a lot of what the church does simply doesn’t need to be done. Pastors get rewarded for running successful programs. Success for most of our programs is measured by attendance. Attendance, not life change, is the sign we look for to validate our ministries. If a lot of people come to our event, then it was a good event and we’ll do it again next year. If you have enough well-attended events during a given year, the pastor is given a raise. Before you know it, the event becomes a tradition and no one can change it, much less cancel it.
For most churches, too many programs have long since lived past their expiration date. Church leaders demand way too much of our congregations in time and money for things that don’t make any difference in their lives, the lives of their families, or the lives of their communities. Our churches and the lives of our congregation would be better off if we stopped doing ineffective and time consuming programs who’s only measure of success is attendance.
Next, pastors should begin focusing on the gifts of their congregation. Understanding how the Spirit has dispersed His gifts among the congregation will first, focus the church on its ministerial identity and second, show the congregation where to engage their community. We are the church that does these things (vision) because this is the way God has gifted our congregation(strategy). In this way, Christ says “yes” to the church’s calling and ministry.
The pastor is called to spend time with believers discerning their gifts, training them to use those gifts in ministry and then releasing them to that ministry. The obvious objection is shouldn’t a pastor be spending more time with lost people than members of the congregation? That will come in the natural course of events, but the pastor must see time training the congregation as multiplying their ministry. You’ve seen the math before. A pastor disciples ten who disciple ten who disciple ten. Before you know, tens of thousands have become disciples. The multiplication of ministry happened without overwhelming the pastor.
The hectic confusion of our world demands the church return to a simpler approach. Churches don’t need to add to the clutter of the world. Keep it simple. Churches should worship, make disciples, and be involved in mission and ministry. That’s it. Pastors should make disciples who make disciples. Every pastor should pour themselves into the lives of a handful of disciples who will pour themselves into others. Before you know it, the whole world will be reached. The math works.
We shouldn’t be surprised at this. After all, it's worked before.
Thank you Mike
THIS is so good that I'm gonna borrow it. OK?