The vast majority of Christians attending church regularly encounter a church pastor at least once weekly, but I've learned that the pastoral ministry is a poor way to organize church worship. This post is not intended to cast aspersion on anyone in particular. I've had some great pastors in the past 30 years, many of whom are sincere in their approach to ministry and have a heart for the people of God. However, none of them were perfect. After much reflection, I believe the modern pastoral office is due for a restoration.
Here are 5 reasons why.
- It's a poor model for church leadership - The role of the pastor is an important role within the church. It always has been, but the modern pastoral role isn't like the pastoral ministry you see in scripture. Early pastors were men who received their training for the pastoral ministry by serving in the local church. It wasn't a paid position, nor was it an administrative function where the pastor served as a manager over a pastoral staff. Many modern pastors get their leadership training from business courses and military service, which teach worldly leadership principles based on a top-down hierarchy. This is the opposite of what Christ taught in Matthew 20:20-28 and elsewhere. A careful reading of scripture regarding the qualifications and duties of the pastor shows that the pastoral role is not about "leading from the front" so much as it is serving from the bottom.
- Pastoral training has been divorced from Christ's original intent - Almost every single pastor of a church today received their training from seminary or Bible college. This is a poor way to receive pastoral training. Men are raised in a church then sent off to sit in a classroom for a number of years, bury their noses in books, and then are sent to another church (many times, in another part of the world or country than where they originated) to serve as pastor. As a result, many pastors are not familiar with the local cultures where they are serving, and they may spend an inordinate amount of time learning about those cultures before they can be effective (if they learn at all). Pastors should receive their training for ministry at the local church where they can be mentored by a local peer. This allows the pastor to build relationships from the ground root and become a part of the local culture prior to attempting to influence it through ministry.
- The pastor-lay member divide puts all the pressure on the pastor to perform - The Bible never uses the term "laity". It's a human concept that has served to divide the people of God between professional ministers, or clergy, and everyone else. In 1 Peter 2:9, however, the church is called a "holy nation" and a "royal priesthood". The indication is that all believers are equal in status and importance. The only distinction beyond the priesthood of all believers is that Jesus Christ is our High Priest. As priests, each of us has the power of the Holy Spirit to exercise the spiritual gifts that edify the body and administer grace to each other and our neighbors. Pastors are special gifts to churches whose primary function is to equip the saints to deliver their priestly duties. The modern church has moved beyond these distinctions to give a special status to pastors and other clergymen that would be foreign to the early church. 1 Corinthians 14:26 shows that the Apostle Paul expected all the members of a local assembly to participate in the worship service, not sit passively to be "ministered to" by a professional.
- The modern pastor does too much - Pastor burnout is a real thing. One reason for this "burnout" and lower job satisfaction is that pastors are under too much pressure to perform. In many churches, pastors are the only people who visit the sick, minister to couples experiencing marital problems, and carry the ministry load at the local church. As noted above, their primary function is to equip the rest of the church for ministry. When all the pressure is on one man, or a few, to carry the weight of all of the ministry of a church, we should expect some burnout. It's not surprising that many pastors are falling under the bricks. It's surprising that it doesn't happen more often.
- Pastors are either overly revered or overly criticized - In almost every church today, there are people who revere their pastor too much, and there are often people who criticize their pastor too much. Both put undue pressure on the pastor to be something he is not intended to be, or to pretend to be something he isn't. Pastors must walk a thin line between challenging the status quo and encouraging rebellion. The position has become a human-centered ministry rather than a Holy Spirit-guided occupation. In some churches, the Holy Spirit is quenched because either the pastor or some of the lay people in the church exercise too much control over the worship service, its direction, and its execution from week to week.
I am not suggesting that the church not have pastors. Nor am I saying that the church model itself should be nixed. What this post is intended to convey is that the modern pastoral office has led to a dysfunctional church that is losing its influence on the culture primarily because it is focused on human-centered concerns that stifle its effectiveness. That isn't to say that God isn't moving among His people nor that there aren't churches performing excellent ministries. But ... Christians must come to grips, here in the 21st century, with the reality that fewer people are taking the church seriously and the modern pastoral ministry is a huge contributor to that reality.
Allen Taylor is the author of I Am Not the King.
This post was first published by Author Allen Taylor at Paragraph. Image from Pexels.
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I was watching something on a sermon the other day that talks exactly about this topic....The main message I got was...The church should not conform to the world.
It's fine to reach people where they are, but too many times we see churches compromising the gospel, for the sake of being politically correct.
I have no problem with churches trying to reach out but bending to the ways of the world is a recipe for disaster.
The flipside to "compromising the gospel for the sake of being politically correct" is being overly critical of those in civil leadership because we don't want to be politically correct. Whether to be politically correct or not should never be the measure of our posture toward unbelievers. We are to be kind to each other, pray for those with civil authority, and live in peace with everyone.
Pastors are not "living in peace" when they criticize civil authorities from the pulpit. They shouldn't be using their position to politic. Their charism is to equip the saints for ministry and discussing politics, especially ranting about all the things they don't like about this or that, does nothing to equip anyone for ministry.
I really wish to go to a church which is located like 15 km away from my house and may be meet a pastor as he is a very important person for the whole society.
You too are a very important person for all of society.
Not really cause I am not an intellectual like a doctor, a lawyer, a real book writer, any important public figure in the society but thanks for the appreciation though.
All of us have value. You don't have to have specialized knowledge to be valued in the eyes of God. He created you. You represent him. That's valuable.
I would really be a hypocrite if I am an actual representative of god like you say my friend sorry you got the wrong guy here, Not only I am a sinner (yes I repent) however my biggest crime is that I am a lemming and a slave so I follow the horde (masses) rather than having my own objective/critical thinking am afraid I will die as a slave I have lost 666 is written all over me my friend am gone case sorry :(.
You sell yourself short. No one is too far gone for God.
I'm not Christian, but am old enough to have been bought up in an era where Christianity was more prevalent than it is now, at least here in the UK.
But I think I have seen what you are describing; that churches run themselves as if they were supermarkets. The senior clergy (Archbishops, Bishops, Vicars) are like the management. The pastors are the ones doing a lot of the work, in the same way that the cashiers and shelf-fillers do in a supermarket. Then you have a huge gulf between those professional staff and the "customers", a congregation who may be relatively passive, absorbing services each Sunday but having to be pushed to do much more.
In the same way, in the UK churches (including their congregations) are rarely integrated into their local communities any more. They are something where elderly relatives go for a cup of tea on a Sunday morning, and maybe do some work with the homeless, but that's about it. Some of the Baptist churches try to do more, but it's often greeted with the same kind of mild suspicion as a door-to-door salesman.
I think this is a problem because it breaks down social cohesion in what was once a country with shared values that (even for non-Christians like myself) once had a basis in Christian principles.
You nailed it!
I think the UK is further along in the post-Christian era than the U.S., but we are getting there fast. The surrounding culture is suspicious of Christians and, many times, outright disdainful toward us. Some of that is natural as there is a natural enmity between Christian values and pagan values. However, the church has exchanged its core mission of preaching the gospel and helping the poor with ranting about politics. So, a lot of non-Christians just see the church as against abortion, gay marriage, and transgender rights, none of which have anything to do with being a Christian and serving our Lord. Although, to be fair, the Christians pushing that agenda the hardest believe they are serving the Lord by doing so. The problem is, that's what they're being told to do by their pastors who preach about those things on Sunday morning rather than preach the good news of the gospel and the million other topics they could touch, such as greed, spousal abuse, and charity.
Bottom line, I think you got the picture.
Thanks for your thoughts Allen, I agree with points 3, 4 & 5 but would challenge 1 & 2. 1 & 2 may be true for your experience or context but aren’t for mine. I was able to study online whilst serving in my local church and received mentorship there. I was definitely taught Christ came to serve and so should we from my local church, mentor and Bible College as opposed to a top down model.
The laity/staff divide is causing ineffectiveness from the church.
@elsh, thanks for commenting. It's great that you received mentorship at your local church. Was that mentorship from your pastor while you were training to be a pastor?
Being able to study through online courses is a great opportunity, and vastly different than the way most people have been educated historically. I've got no beef with online education (or education in general). The issue is that whatever doctrines you learned from the online course could have been taught to you by the local church, by your mentor. If they taught you those doctrines, what was the point of getting the formal online education? Was it a certification course, or a degree course? Was it a requirement before you could serve in a ministry? If it was, that's the heart of the problem. Mentorship includes teaching in all matters related to the faith. If you get that from your mentor through the local church, you should be well qualified to serve as a pastor ... if that is your calling.
The advantage of training through a formal institution is specialised teaching in each area you learn about. The avg church size in Australia is under 100 so often there is limited options of being trained in anything let alone everything you want to be trained in.
A large disadvantage of being trained by the local church is the amplification of false beliefs. With no other opinions than the lead pastor - who is to verify if what they teach can be trusted. This is a fast track to cultish tendencies.
I recognise Jesus wasn’t a registered training organisation and mentored the disciples Himself- but there knowledge of Scripture going into the training probably exceeds most degree level pastors coming out of training.
False beliefs can originate anywhere, even seminary and Bible college. If you read carefully what I've written, you'll see that I'm very much against a "lead pastor". It's not scriptural. Christ set up His church as a decentralized network of believers, all of whom were to minister to each other. Knowledge comes from the Holy Spirit, most often through other believers and not necessarily the pastor. Any other source of knowledge is false.
I understand the idea of a priesthood of all believers- look forward to being a part of that hopefully before heaven.
If you are against a lead Pastor how then do you interpret Gods continual appointment of a lead person throughout Israelite history? Moses, Joshua, Nehemiah, David, Solomon……
God has called special people throughout history to fulfill a specific purpose in his kingdom plan.