You or Us?

When I entered the full time Christian ministry in the early 1970's, the emphasis was on becoming the best minister you could become.  The emphasis was on the ONE being prepared for the ministry.  The outward emphasis was that which, once you were trained, proceeded from the minister.  Then there would be this ongoing, lifelong ministry of improving and becoming better at what you did.

During this time there was teaching on the Priesthood of the Believer and there was some activation of others into ministry.  But deep in the heart of many of those preparing this new "priesthood" was an abiding attitude that still saw the believer, the church member as being second rate in ability.  History would reveal that much of those ministry efforts were shallow but a closer evaluation of the cause was a lack of ministry development within the ranks of the church.  The primary reason?  A wrong focus on developing the believer by the "full time ministers".  This was true primarily because their focus was on "their ministry".  Paradigms are slow to change.  Examples of slow changing paradigms are racism and gender prejudice.  While society smiles and says the change has occurred, practice reveals that total change takes generations.  The same is true within the church.

One of the primary differences between Old Testament and New Testament ministry patterns is the difference between "me and us".  The old testament has many examples of singular leaders ("me")who do exploits, stand out as champions and are held in high esteem by those following them.  It is so tempting to want to be one of those dynamic leaders.  After all, Hollywood doesn't make movies about teams and if they do there is always one hero who stands head and shoulders above all the rest.  The new testament leadership pattern is one of TEAM("us").  I have said this many times before in this blog and other venues but it is a slowly embraced concept in a culture of hero worship.  People in the church have got to change their thinking about sitting and watching a show but it will never happen until the one behind the pulpit is willing to change their ministry mentality and take their primary focus away from Me and put it more on US.  The "Show" has to change.  Rather than our main group gatherings being centered around production it must move to training, preparing and activating the people in the crowd, the CHURCH.  Oh yeah, by the way, people can come to know Christ in that setting too!