yes Josh. thank you. I do understand what you are saying. And it makes complete sense. I agree completely with the above description, in fact, it is a very good example of the person and the function of a particular gift.
To add to it, then we can use the same analogy with 'pastor'.
Gift=nurturing
Office=shepherd
It is clear when we look at what a 'shepherd' is that we see the function of what he does. There is a good reason why God gives the gift this name.
The problem we have is that we have tried to go back to OT times to describe what 'roles' each person is supposed to play. And that is exactly what is wrong with the whole idea of the pastor. Instead of looking at the perfect example Christ gives us, we look to what Christ destroyed with His death on the cross. He was constantly trying to get people to understand their 'traditions' were a misconception of what God's purpose for His people is.
This is not found any clearly said then when two of His disciples really wanted to 'excel' at being an disciple and approached Jesus about it. The desire was a 'good one', just like what Paul says in 1Timothy, but the fact is that only God can determine who 'gets' what. So, Paul lays out the description of what an 'overseer' and 'minister' looks like so that they will not be fooled by people who come along desiring to be in positions of authority.
And so also, Jesus makes it EXTREMELY clear that those who God does decide to 'gift' in certain areas should NOT think of the gifts as authority like we normally do. But rather they should use the gift to serve even more.
Great. I'm glad we can agree on a common understanding of this. So though, I want to understand more about what you are getting at. I get the idea of how tradition might sometimes be viewed as "bad" in a sense, and how we may unnecessarily make "carefully defined roles" out of naturally more liberal gifts. However I do no think, if that is the idea, that we can however just say that making a role or office for particular ones who have a gift (often as leaders) is necessarily wrong. Lol, if you have been around me long you know that I'm one always to advocate a balance or some
middle-ground. Traditions are not always bad, men can make good traditions. An interesting case in point is the observance of the festival of Purim (in Esther) which the Jews enacted on their own accord (was not a feast commanded by God or in the Law) and which also Jesus attended in Jerusalem in the Gospel of John. The people decided to make their own traditional observance which was honoring something good. But I'm not wanting to go off on that particular tangent.
I don't think that a
move in the Churches to "remove the pastorate" is going to be a good one. We could end up with aimless (even anarchic) crowds of Christians with no leader (or others vieing for leadership among themselves - fair game for wolves among the sheep). I think that anyone would admit that leadership is needed in the Church and the Apostles were a good role model for that. Now sure,
if the criticism needs to be leveled that "pastors" should exercise
more of their Scriptural Pastoral duty and not
so much on traditions of Sunday/Wednesday oratory sermons and Baptist potlucks (certainly refered to in secret circles, and christened, as "lovefeasts" ;) j/k) then so be it. But actually having some heirarchy in the Church and
appointed roles
is scriptural (see further below about my point concerning the epistle of
Titus).
In my mind (
is there a grain of salt emoticon around here?), I think some come from backgrounds where their Church has had lots of problems and half-hearted pastors, and others
actually had a good experience of godly, biblical, and humble pastors who understand that their highest calling is to infact literally be a 'minister' who serves/ministers to others (just as Jesus washed his disciples' feet), and
not just on Sundays and Wednesdays, but is one who
prays and
intercedes for his flock/congregation, goes to visit the sick in the hospitals, and to "
visit orphans and widows in their trouble" which is the "
pure and undefiled religion before God"
(James 1:27). Those with the bad experiences see, indeed, that their pastors are
not following a biblical model and become "
disenfranchised" with those in the pulpit (and sometimes leave the church altogether as a result - contra the sound wisdom of
Hebrews 10:25), while those with better experiences may rather greatly respect those in the pulpit who truly minister to their people.
The issue is
to not throw out the baby with the bath water. I have been to both types of Churches. My issue is not against pastors or the pulpit, but whether one who preaches or teaches or otherwise shepherds the flock is living a sincere life toward God. But
guess what, aside from cases of abuse in which we (the church) must intervene to maintain good order in the house of God, God alone stands as their judge and those who preach and teach are held accountable to a
stricter standard. The standard is
established by God because he
wants people in His body to exercise such gifts but because of its manifest
importance he will
judge those that wrongfully lead the body astray. Nonetheless this only points all the more to how much stock God puts into those gifts and roles in the body, and even leadership.
My grandparents' Church also has adopted a good model of letting others in the congregation, and outside of our church, speak often so that it is not always our head Pastor speaking. Men and women have given messages, and pastors from other Churches which they partner with, share messages to all of God's people (the universal Church, united in the Spirit). So I have had the good fortune of seeing in the Church the
freedom of the exercise of the gifts and allowing
equally the different members/limbs of the body to minister
according to the gift given them. I also (and who am I, but one who loves Christ?) have even been invited to preach on a Sunday before (at a different Church).
So it's not so much a focus on a 'traditional': "We must have a
single pastor, he
must lead us (
as if we did not have Christ as a shepherd), and he
must preach to us every week!" That honestly is the
lazy, 'pew-sitter' philosophy of many in the Church.
And one last dwelling on the value of leadership and roles in the body, and even the 'roles' that all individual members in the body play, and not just being "pew-sitters" (and also I think that deacons classify in this area too - which is a position/office/role in the Church - which is a word which literally means 'servant'):
In
Phillipians 4:8 Paul leaves us with some positive things to dwell on in the body so that we would be edified and built up together: "
Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things." These same virtues of honor, purity, and being of 'good repute' are all qualities that Paul wants to be exhibited
especially in the leadership of the Church (particularly elders) but also of course
in everyone - which he elaborates on in detail in
Titus. A simple quote will not do justice to everything Titus says here (just
read the whole epistle) but Paul says in that epistle, "
in all things show yourself to be an example of good deeds, with purity in doctrine, dignified, sound in speech which is beyond reproach, so that the opponent will be put to shame, having nothing bad to say about us." These are the things which we, for
anyone exemplary that we see in the body of Christ (young, old, male, female), should praise them and "dwell on these things" of "good repute" done in the body, as Paul said, so that all may "praise your Father in heaven"
(Matthew 5:16) for the good they see.
And though this applied to
all those in the Church, there are
yet set roles for some as examples to lead the rest. Elders are good example (and if you want a more biblical model for the church then
every church should have recognized elders [and I
don't mean
elderly people "attending" ;)] - which Baptist churches [my background] do not typically have). Paul said to Titus that he should "
set in order what remains and appoint elders in every city as I directed you"
(Titus 1:5). We could apply this in principal to the gift of pastorship (whether you have one or several pastors - some churches have many), and the elders are also supposed to be there for accountability of the pastors of the flock.
Anyway, I feel that this had been almost a "
buck-shot" post (:D) in which I have tried to hit on many topics so hopefully one hit its target (and unfortunately buck shot is far less effective against a metal anchor than an unsuspecting buck in a field Nathan ;) ...
er.... not that I was
aiming at
you.... and is likely to ricochet back at me
[yay, for bad jokes!]). I hope at least some part of it hit on a relevant topic, and if not then
fetch me a grain of salt emoticon!
God Bless,
~Josh
