The most confused group of people in the average Southern Baptist church is the deacons.

They have no idea what they are to be and do. Depending on the whims of the deacon chairman for that year, they become servants or managers, program heads or administrators. Helpers or bosses. Activists or inactive.

The church’s constitution and bylaws are usually vague on who they are, what they are to do, how they should function.

And, let us admit up front, Scripture does not give us a lot of guidance on this matter either. At every deacon ordination I’ve ever attended–and in a half century of ministry, that’s quite a few–Acts 6:1-7 has been read. But there’s not a word in that passage about those seven men being called deacons.

In fact, let’s quit calling them deacons and start calling them what the name means: servants.

Calling them “deacons” is sort of a hedge someone must have erected to prevent them from having to do what their name implies. The word diakonos literally means servant. Furthermore, in almost all the places where the New Testament uses that word, it refers only to servants, to people doing the lowliest jobs in a household or an estate, and not to a class of officers or leaders in the church.

We pause for a moment to list the places where diakonos refers to people simply serving: Matthew 20:26; 22:13; 23:11. Mark 9:35; 10:43. John 2:5,9; 12:26. Romans 13:4; 15:8;16:1. I Corinthians 3:5. II Corinthians 3:6;6:4;11:15,23. Galatians 2:17. Ephesians 3:7;6:21. Colossians 1:7,23,25;4:7. I Thessalonians 3:2. I Timothy 4:6.

Did you notice the omission of all the references in the Bible to diakonos as official positions in the church? There are three: Philippians 1:1 and I Timothy 3:8,12.

Rather overwhelming, wouldn’t you say?

In the well-known passage from I Timothy 3, Paul gives all kinds of qualifications for the church’s deacons, but not a single word concerning their specific assignment. Either all his readers knew what deacons were to do and did not need direction from him, or, more likely, their work was open-ended, whatever the church needed at the moment.

I think we are safe in concluding that the needs of the church at a given time will dictate what the deacons are to do.

In some churches too large for the congregation to keep up with all the various ministries, they turn the oversight to the deacons. If that works for them, who’s to say it’s wrong? Not me.

In my church, the bylaws specifically state that the deacons are not a program-oriented force, but servants of the congregation. (And my oldest son is the chairman of the deacons.)

The word diakonos itself, which literally means “through the dust,” carries a hint as to the work of deacons.

In the biblical world, homes which could employ servants frequently were built as rectangles surrounding an open courtyard, which allowed for air circulation to cool the rooms. When family members moved from one section of the house to another, they stayed inside the shaded areas. The servants, however, cut straight across the courtyard, hence the “through the dust” allusion.

From that, we may conclude that servants were those who did not mind getting dirty in fulfilling their tasks. They literally “did the dirty work,” and took care of the lowliest jobs.

The implications for deacons is strong.

Incidentally, even though Acts 6 does not use the word diakonos, for my money this is a wonderful picture of how a deacon group should function: at the request of the ministers, chosen by the church, problem-solving, people-ministering, proclamation-helping.

Here are further (and random) thoughts on this matter for your consideration….

1. Whether a church even has deacons or not (as an official group) is strictly its decision.

Scripture does not instruct churches to choose deacons in order to fulfill the work of the Gospel. There is no one-size-fits-all organization for the Lord’s churches. Jesus called His people to be “new wineskins,” and thus flexible, adaptable, with plenty of give and take, as opposed to rigid, unbending, stiff, inflexible.

2. What a church needs from its deacons may change from one year to the next. Thus, the body’s “official assignment” should not be carved in stone.

This may be expecting a lot from men who like their tasks clearly delineated so they can build on their accomplishments from year to year. But ideally, they should be sufficiently flexible to vary what they do according to the church’s situation. One year, they may be caring for widows, another year they are assigned to get the food pantry up and working, and the next to care for members in hospitals and nursing homes.

Sometimes, deacons are trouble-shooters within congregations. When dissension arises, they deal with it.

3. I strongly suggest tossing out the name “deacons” and going with “servants” to clear up all confusion as to their identity and purpose. Strictly speaking, we could call them “the lowliest of servants,” this being the thrust of servanthood given us by the Lord Jesus all through the Gospels. Doubters should read the first half of John 13. (Explanation: scholars tell us the task of washing the feet of guests who have just arrived fell to the lowest servant on the household staff. And yet, Jesus washed the feet of the disciples and then commanded that they follow His example.)

4. If a church chooses to have a deacon body, because of the multitude of abuses of their role over the years, it should be spelled out in the constitution and bylaws that they have no authority over anyone in the church. They are servants or nothing.

To be sure, many calling themselves deacons who take pride in their prominence will take offense at the notion of servanthood and leave in a huff. When that happens, the church is vastly better off. Only those with a heart for Christ and a desire to serve His people should be deacons.

It’s high time we began taking Jesus seriously when He said, “Whoever wishes to be great among you shall be your servant” (Matthew 20:26). We either believe it or we don’t. Let those who do not decline the “honor” of election as deacons.

5. Some will insist that the church needs an accountability group of one type or other to deal with the pastor and staff. I agree. But not the deacons.

Let the church select a small group of the most mature and Christlike men and women–do not miss that!–who are willing to rotate regularly. Let them meet with the pastor from time to time in a priestly function.

Say what?

In Bible times, the priests represented God before the people (proclamation, witness) and represented the people before God (intercession). A small accountability group– Christlike men and women, rotating annually–will represent the congregation to the ministers and then, as needed, will speak to the congregation on behalf of the ministers.

Such a task force will have no authority to do anything. They are helpers for both groups.

6. There must be written guidelines for the deacons. But they cannot write them themselves.

In one church I served, when the deacons wanted to draw the requirements tighter as to who was eligible for service on their “board,” they proceeded to amend their own bylaws. I insisted that they were “deacons of the church,” and that only the congregation should make such decisions. Finally, over my objections–I did not like the new rules they were enacting–they took their plan to the congregation.

The members were not happy with what they had done, and told them so.

A deacon said to me afterwards, “I’m upset with the congregation. They didn’t support their deacons.” I said, “What do you think about the deacons not supporting their pastor? I told you not to do it, and you did it anyway.” He had no answer. In time, he and I became great friends in Christ.

Did you notice that he expected the congregation to support the deacons, instead of the other way around?

To repeat: the deacons are a body selected by the church to do whatever the church decides is needed. Therefore, the church itself (meaning, those it selects) will write the bylaws for deacons, then bring it back to the congregation for approval.

7. Let the deacons work in anonymity. It will do them good. (It does us all good!)

There’s not a word in Scripture that says deacons take up the offerings or serve the Lord’s Supper or lead in prayer before passing the plate.

In a typical Baptist church, if you took away those three tasks–prayer before the offering, passing the plates, and serving the Lord’s Supper–the deacons would have nothing to do.

And that tells us how they get into trouble. With nothing to do, one or more deacons begin looking around for something to occupy their time and fill their monthly meetings. Sooner or later, they begin to focus on someone’s complaints about the preacher. (There are ALWAYS complaints about the preacher if he is doing anything! Never, ever lose sight of that, friend.) Before long, they have turned the monthly deacons’ meeting into a call-the-preacher-on-the-carpet session. One thing leads to another, and well-meaning deacons soon find themselves caught up in a power struggle between the pastor and a few deacons. Nothing good will come from this.

This could have been averted had the deacons been assigned specific serving jobs in the congregation and been busy doing them. They would not have had the time or energy or inclination to meddle in the preacher’s work.

8. There is a great way to put a stop to a church’s deacons who, instead of being trouble-shooters, have become the source of the trouble themselves: disband them.

Almost every week, I receive a phone call or email or Facebook message from pastors telling me how the church was flourishing, new people were joining their congregation, and they were so happy–and then a delegation from the deacons came calling to straighten him out on a few things they found objectional. They threaten the preacher with termination (explicit or implied) if he does not adapt to their wishes.

One pastor was told by the deacon chairman, “We want you to preach from the King James Version of the Bible.” The pastor said, “When the church interviewed me, I told you then the Scripture versions I use and you said there would be no problem.” The chairman said, “Well, that’s changed. You see, we have these expensive pew Bibles in the KJV and they need to be put to good use.”

Trouble-makers.

At any business meeting of a Southern Baptist church, a member may stand and make a motion that “Since the deacons of this church are no longer fulfilling their assignment to serve the body, and since they are in violation of their promise to support the pastor, I move that the deacon body in this church be dissolved.”

It has happened before. And when it is done, the congregation will usually make several discoveries:

a) There is peace within the fellowship, the first time in a long time.

b) They will lose a few members. The disgruntled power-brokers cannot take the humbling the congregation hands them. Few things reveal their spiritual immaturity more than how they handle this comeuppance.

c) The church will finally be able to keep a good pastor for years.

I am not anti-deacon. I am for deacons living up to their names. Period.

For that to happen, the typical deacon group will need a complete overhaul.

Let the conversation begin.

This article was posted earlier from joemckeever.com, and is reposted here by permission of the author.

By Joe McKeever, Preacher, Cartoonist, Pastor, and retired Director of Missions at the Baptist Association of Greater New Orleans.

And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’’ doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread and in prayers…. So continuing daily with one accord in the temple and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people (Acts 2:42-47).

When a church of 120 members set out to assimilate 3,000 new additions into the life of the congregation, they ranked “fellowship” toward the top of the list as a critical step in accomplishing the task.

Koinonia is the Greek word. Literally, it refers to a sharing of life, or a partnership, which doesn’t tell us a lot about what it meant in the follow-up program in the early church. So, in the absence of anything definitive from Scripture on the precise meaning of the term, I submit for your consideration my own definition: Hanging out.

The “fellowship” quotient of a church–whether the members love the Lord and one another–is one of the most telling features of a congregation, one of the most dependable indicators of the health of the church, and one of the best predictors of its future usefulness in the Kingdom.

Here are 10 aspects of the fellowship of your church worth carving in stone, or better, engraving on the hearts of your leadership and membership.

1. Fellowship is the heartbeat of your congregation.

Simply stated, it is the life of this church family. Do the people enjoy one another?

In a church where I was visiting recently, some 15 minutes after the benediction, I said to the pastor, “Listen to that.” The noise level in the sanctuary was high, as people were standing around talking and laughing and carrying on. I told the pastor, “What you are hearing is the sound of fellowship.”

As a doctor places his stethoscope up to the chest and listens to a patient’s heartbeat, the pulse of a congregation is that sound after church is over. Listen closely, friend. It will tell you a world about your church.

2. Fellowship may not be why people are drawn to your church, but it’s why they stay.

Most people who are church-hunting can give a dozen things they are looking for in their next place of worship. Usually, that involves location, type of preaching, strength of ministry, and various types of ministry (“We want a strong children’s ministry” or music or missions or youth or senior adults). But more than anything else, what they want is fellowship.

I’ve had newcomers tell me they were looking for a house of worship with features which my church did not offer. My heart saddened a little because I knew they would be going elsewhere. And yet, in many cases, they joined our church. When I asked, they spoke in terms of friendliness, our making them feel welcome, and the spirit of the church. Rarely if ever did they use the actual word “fellowship,” but that’s what it was all about.

My strong suspicion is that 95 percent of first-time visitors to your church are looking for fellowship, whether they know it or not.

3. Fellowship is composed of three layers, each one vital.

a) At the heart of everything is a commitment to Jesus Christ as Lord. This is personal (each must do it), private (it takes place in the hidden depths of the heart), and ongoing (yesterday’s commitment needs to be reaffirmed today and again tomorrow).

b) The believer committed to Christ finds himself automatically loving fellow disciples. In fact, Jesus said this is the very mark of a believer (John 13:34-35).

c) We welcome newcomers into our midst. This is hospitality, of which Scripture has much to say (see Hebrews 13:1-2 and III John 5ff.).

4. The newcomer sees these in reverse order: Hospitality first, then Joy, and lastly Commitment.

a) Did you welcome the newcomer? Were they made to feel wanted? This is the first thing the outsider will notice, for good reason.

The stranger who dwells among you shall be to you as one born among you, and you shall love him as yourself; for you were strangers in Egypt. I am the Lord your God (Leviticus 19:34). Hospitality has been in God’s plan from the beginning.

b) The second thing a visitor will notice is the members’ relationship to each other.

Do the members enjoy one another? When church dismisses, do they hang around greeting and talking and laughing? Do any of them go to lunch together afterwards? Do they do work projects and are their classes enjoyable?

c) Do you see a quiet, solid faith in the Lord Jesus Christ?

This will normally be the last thing you see in a church you visit. But without it, nothing else matters. In Romans 12, Paul’s blueprint for a healthy church, believers are called to “present your bodies a living sacrifice,” afterwards to use their spiritual gifts and then to take care of one another. First things first.

5. Outsiders usually have no idea they are craving fellowship, but they do.

God made us for Himself, ‘tis true. But He also made us for fellowship with one another. When God’s creation lives in isolation, life becomes warped and turns inward and people become far less than He intended. We crave love.

People who feel something missing in their lives–call it love, a purpose, friendships, whatever–often find that missing element when they walk into a church where the fellowship is alive and well. Only after they find it do they realize this is what they were hungering for and even seeking.

6. A wise church will make fellowship one of their primary goals and will work for it, in both planned and unplanned ways.

Planned fellowship takes place in Sunday School classes, at church dinners, receptions, and on work projects. It’s important to note that only secondarily does fellowship take place within the typical worship service. So, the people who come only to worship and leave immediately after are missing out on a basic element of church life.

Informal fellowship occurs prior to scheduled meeting times, as well as immediately afterwards. Informal koinonia is what happens when several believers play golf or go out for pizzas or drive to the next town for dinner. Where two or more believers congregate, fellowship should take place.

We who are church leaders often speak disparagingly of  “meet-and-eat” events, but there’s a lot to be said for them. In fact, I suggest that pastors schedule the occasional church dinner where no program is planned, just to see what happens among the fellowship. (It should be announced that no program will follow, that the main event is what happens around the tables. Otherwise, our people–as conditioned to expecting a program as Pavlov’s dogs were to the sound of the bell–will not know how to behave.)

7. The greatest enemy of fellowship in the church is the sinful heart.

All have sinned and come short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). If I could add anything in Scripture, it would probably be: “and given half a chance, they’ll do so again.”

The heart is a rebel. That is true even of those of us redeemed by Christ, cleansed by His blood, and born into His eternal family. The human heart grows cold quickly, turns inward naturally, becomes selfish easily, and is responsible for most of the problems in the world.

A great church with a living, loving fellowship must protect that “family life” from all that would destroy it. In our selfishness, we tire of togetherness and experience giving fatigue and begin wanting to spend God’s resources on ourselves. We find our hearts resisting the newcomers, particularly if they’re different from us in any way.

There is a strain of individualism in the Christian faith that leads some to think the only thing that matters is “just Jesus and me,” that church life and worship are secondary and relatively unimportant. Nothing could be further from the truth. This is surely the reason our Lord did not let His questioner walk away thinking the only commandment that mattered was to “love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and soul and mind.” He called after the man, “And the second is a lot like it. Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself,” a quotation from Leviticus 19.

8. A dying church will begin dying here first.

It’s hard to spot the exact moment when a dead church began that sad descent into oblivion. But, if you were able to rewind the tape (an expression rapidly on its way out!), you would frequently see that when leaders began to bicker among themselves and it spread to the congregation (that’s always the order), at that moment the process had its inception. Unless a strong leader called the attention of others to what was happening and called them to repentance and recommitment, the virus took hold and began its deadly work.

A smart leadership will always value the church’s unity (see Ephesians 4:3,11-16) and will know that a key ingredient to achieving that harmony is mutual submission (and that’s Ephesians 5:21).

9. Leadership must value fellowship highly and protect it, otherwise it will be supplanted by lesser things.

We’ve been saying this repeatedly above, so I’ll not belabor it here. Except to point out that those “lesser things” which will crowd out the fellowship will all be good things–festivals and pageants and concerts and revivals. When we get caught up in the busyness of church life to the point that we no longer have time to meet another couple for coffee or invite another family over for pizza, we’ve become too busy for our own good.

10. God loves it when His children laugh.

It is not good for man to be alone, He said (Genesis 2:18). I suggest He had more in mind than marriage. We need one another.

Recently, when my wife and I celebrated our golden anniversary, we gathered our children and their families for a long weekend. Several times over those four days, as everyone milled around in the back yard or on the patio, I was struck by the delightful noise of the laughter and fun. The love was so thick you could cut it with a knife. As the father of this terrific family, that was better to me than any present on earth.

Throughout the New Testament, our Lord and the apostles emphasized the one-anotherness of our discipleship. We are to love one another, encourage one another, edify one another, teach and instruct and rebuke and correct and affirm one another. In their book One Anothering, Al Meredith and Dan Crawford identified 31 different commands of this nature throughout the New Testament and gave us a chapter on each.

When the Lord saves us, He puts us into a church fellowship. When we love Him, we treasure His people and enjoy being with them. When we grow resistant to the Lord, we find ourselves resenting other believers, growing critical of them, and drifting away.

This article was posted earlier from joemckeever.com, and is reposted here by permission of the author.

By Wes Kenney, currently a student at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary

A proper understanding of the role of the individual Christian in the fulfillment of the Great Commission of our Lord Jesus Christ is absolutely necessary to the well being of the church and to the faithful fulfillment of that commission. Essential to this understanding is the recognition of the church’s place within the biblical witness as the guardian of truth. With this understanding in place, this paper will argue that the Great Commission is not given for individuals to fulfill, but to the church. This distinction is an important one, and much error is avoided when it is understood and embraced.

“These things I write to you, though I hope to come to you shortly; but if I am delayed, I write so that you may know how you ought to conduct yourself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth” (1 Tim 3:14–15, NKJV). The Apostle Paul’s words make it clear that the church itself is the guardian of the revealed truth of God’s Word. The repeated Pauline commands to churches to guard against error strengthen this idea. The church has a responsibility to guard the truth, and the authority to speak definitively concerning what is true. A true church, seeking the will of God and the mind of Christ, will never lack an understanding of the truth, and cannot shirk its responsibility to defend it. This especially is true with regard to the Great Commission.

Baptists are generally united in the belief that the ordinances of Christ, baptism and the Lord’s Supper, are commands given to the church to carry out. Though individuals and small groups sometimes seek to carry out these commands on their own, the consistent witness throughout church history has been that they are to be carried out within the church, and Baptist history has located this responsibility within local churches, and for good reason. Order is not maintained when individuals baptize converts outside the authority of the local church. The fellowship is not strengthened when small groups within the congregation observe the Lord’s Supper on their own, apart from the larger congregation. The eleventh chapter of First Corinthians makes this abundantly clear. It is just as important that the Great Commission commands to make disciples and to teach be closely associated with the authority and oversight of the local church.

“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Mt 28:19–20, ESV). In this account of the Great Commission given in Matthew’s Gospel, baptism is integral. Disciple-making and teaching are presented on the same plane with this church ordinance, which is in itself a strong argument in favor of tying all these responsibilities to the local church. But this is not the only argument. In the complementary account of the Great Commission given in Luke, the disciples are not told to immediately get busy in making disciples, but rather they are to “stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high” (Lk 24:49, ESV).

The event for which Jesus commanded them to wait was, of course, the coming of the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost, widely regarded as the birth of the New Testament church. Had these commands within the Great Commission been intended for every individual to carry out on their own, they would not have needed to remain together to await this promised power. But these commands, the work of the Great Commission, are not given to individuals, they are given to the church.

The objection may be raised that this understanding of the nature of the commands relieves individuals of the responsibility to share their faith with the lost. That objection is understood, and rejected, for what is the church, if not individual, repentant, redeemed, and baptized sinners? No, the obligation remains upon all, but the local church must be at the center of all Great Commission activity.

Some may ask what harm may come from an individual carrying out this work apart from the local church. While many could be cited, two examples will suffice to demonstrate the great danger present when individuals carry out Great Commission activities, including disciple-making and teaching, apart from a relationship of accountability to a local church.

The first example offered is that of Joseph Smith. The founder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints began his work with the contention that all churches then in existence were apostate, and that to him alone God had revealed the true gospel. His mission of “restoration” has led millions astray, but it could not have originated had he been accountable to a local congregation who could have disciplined him for his errant teaching.

A more modern example is that of Oklahoma rancher and television Bible teacher Les Feldick. This writer came in contact with the aberrant teaching of Mr. Feldick during the process of candidating for the pastorate of a local church. This church had members who had come under the influence of Mr. Feldick, and through them many were being led astray to a modern day version of the ancient heresy of Marcion. Mr. Feldick is very candid in expressing his appreciation for all churches and his connection to none of them. Again, this kind of pervasive error would be easily corrected were Mr. Feldick to come under the discipline of a local congregation. Absent that discipline, he is beyond correction.

It is because of our fallen, sinful nature that individuals need the church, and the accountability it provides, especially as we seek to be obedient to the Great Commission. Not only must baptism and the Lord’s Supper be carried out under the authority of the local church, but also our teaching, and even our disciple-making activities must submit themselves to this authority. Our fallen nature is prone to error, but the church, the “pillar and ground of the truth,” is able to guard us from error, allowing us to honor our Savior as we obey his commands.

Dr. Dorsett is a bivocational pastor and church planting missionary in Vermont. He is the author of Developing Leadership Teams in the Bivocational Church and Bible Brain Teasers: Fun Adventures through the Bible. He also serves as a church planting catalyst with the North American Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention. He has a passion for helping the next generation discover a meaningful faith and become leaders in sharing that faith with others.

This series looks at the importance of bivocational ministry and bivocational ministers in today’s church. The previous articles in this series are:
Part 1: Bivocational Ministry is a Growing Method for Ministry.
Part 2: Lay People Are Willing to Help Pastors – But Only If They Are Trained.
Part 3: Rethinking Our Perception of Bivocational Ministry.
Part 4: Bivocational Ministry is Normal.
Part 5: Bivocational Ministry Is More Common Than Most People Realize.
Part 6: Bivocational Pastors Must Learn to Delegate.
Part 7: Bivocational Pastors Sharing Leadership Results in Healthier Churches.

Pastors who work a job in addition to their church are often referred to as bivocational pastors because they have two vocations: the church and something else. Though few pastors would choose to be bivocational in a perfect world, the majority of pastors will spend at least a portion of their career in bivocational situations. Therefore, all pastors should learn how to handle the challenges of this type of ministry so they will be prepared for it.

Since writing the book, Developing Leadership Teams in the Bivocational Church, I have had ample opportunity to discuss both the advantages and the challenges of bivocational ministry with pastors, denominational leaders, and ministerial students. Based on those discussions, as well as my own experiences as a bivocational pastor, I have developed this list of challenges that bivocational ministers face and some ways in which those ministers dealt with those challenges.

Challenges bivocational pastors deal with regularly:

1. Bivocational pastors frequently discuss not having enough time to do as much ministry as they would like. They often feel like they are not available to the congregation because of their second job. This causes them to feel frustrated with and/or guilty about their perceived lack of accomplishment in ministry. Though I have not yet met a bivocational pastor who has successfully overcome these feelings of unavailability, a number of pastors have expressed that when they trained some of the church members (usually the deacons) to do some of the visitation, it helped relieve some of the stress they felt regarding this issue.
2. Bivocational pastors often find it difficult to spend as much time studying and preparing their sermons as they would like. This often makes them feel inadequate in the pulpit and robs them of the confidence they would like to have when they preach. Many bivocational pastors list this as their greatest challenge to ministry. The pastors who seem to have overcome this challenge the most effectively have told me that instead of trying to prepare the entire sermon at once, they work on it a little each day. Though they still need to find a large block of time near the end of the week to pull all the stray thoughts together, those that did a little study each day expressed that it was much easier than waiting until their day off and trying to do it all at once.
3. Bivocational pastors are often so busy they do not have adequate time to do the administrative duties incumbent on pastors. This often leaves them feeling overwhelmed. Some pastors have said that they were blessed by lay people willing to pick up this part of their ministry. Pastors who were able to release these things to lay people often felt freer from administrative stress.
4. Bivocational pastors seldom feel they have enough time for their own families. This results in them feeling an enormous sense of guilt, especially in regards to how much time they spent with their children. Though I have yet to meet a pastor who said they spent as much time as they wanted with his family, the ones who blocked out time on their calendars for children’s sporting events and birthdays felt better about this issue than those that did not.
5. Bivocational pastors often feel they do not have time for their own personal growth. This is a particularly challenging issue. Only a small minority of bivocational pastors have developed systems for personal growth that they feel are adequate. That minority simply said they somehow learned to carve out time that they did not have, and that it was always worth it.
6. Bivocational pastors often feel they do not have the time to be involved in servant evangelism or to take part in volunteer work within the community. This is also a challenging issue. Only a small minority of pastors felt they had the time to do this. Most of those that were able to find time for this were the owners of small businesses who were able to set their own schedules. Many of them were in fields in which their secular skills could be used in servant evangelism projects, such as electricians, plumbers, carpenters, or mechanics.
7. Bivocational pastors often feel the need for breaks from ministry because of the constant stress, but seldom have time to take such breaks. Though it might sound difficult to find the time for such breaks, the pastors who have addressed this issue have said that something as simple as an overnight getaway with their spouse was enough to recharge their energy levels for another few months.
8. Bivocational pastors frequently are unable to attend seminars, conferences, and denominational meetings because those meetings conflict with their other jobs. This made pastors feel disconnected from their peers. The pastors who were best able to overcome this sense of disconnection picked one significant event a year which many of their fellow pastors attend and made it a priority to participate in that event every year.
9. Bivocational pastors often express a sense of being out of balance when trying to reconcile work, family, and ministry. They frequently mention the need for quiet moments in which they can think clearly about what they need to do next. The pastors who found an afternoon to devote to quiet reflection were most likely to re-establish a sense of balance in their lives. However, most said that in a few months they would be out of balance again. Therefore, afternoons for quiet reflection had to be found 3-4 times a year in order to continually rebalance their lives.
10. Bivocational pastors often find it difficult to keep up with simple chores around the house, such as making minor repairs or cutting the grass because of the time demands of their two jobs. Though there is no easy answer to this issue, some pastors shared that deacons from their churches had been willing to help with some of these chores and that this was a great blessing to them.
11. Bivocational pastors sometimes feel that their social lives have to revolve around church members and church activities. The pastors who feel this way express that this gives them a smaller social network than they would like. These same pastors feel that they are not able to be as transparent as they would like in such relationships because of the danger of becoming too close to church members. I found it intriguing that not all bivocational pastors feel this way about their social lives. Some pastors actually felt this was an advantage instead of a disadvantage. It really comes down to the pastor’s personality and leadership style.

Bivocational ministry has many challenges, but it can be done effectively. Pastors in bivocational settings need to be aware of the challenges and intentionally develop thinking processes and patterns of behavior that will help them continually address these challenges. Lay leaders also need to look for ways to help bivocational pastors with these types of challenges so that their pastors can be healthier and so their churches can be more effective. Church leaders that express care and concern to their pastors tend to keep their pastors longer and see more fruitful ministry from them. Churches that can develop a team mentality in regards to church leadership were usually able to help their pastor be healthier. When the pastor was healthier, the churches tended to be healthier too.

By Joe McKeever, Preacher, Cartoonist, Pastor, and retired Director of Missions at the Baptist Association of Greater New Orleans.

Evangelism and spiritual harvesting are not for everyone calling themselves followers of Jesus. Fruitbearing is for the obedient. Believers aiming to obey the Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-10) should not miss one huge fact: No one not living as a faithful disciple himself can make someone else a disciple of Jesus Christ. Only disciples make disciples. Only the faithful can bear fruit. Put another way: No one can teach others to “obey all the things I have commanded you” who is not obeying those things himself.

The church which is rebellious or wayward or chronically immature or systemically sick has no business trying to convert outsiders to what they are doing and how they are living. (Note: “Systemically” is not “systematically.” When the sickness is throughout the body, we say it is “systemic.” The problem is not with one person or two, but throughout the body.)

The sick church should get well first and then it will be able to help others.

Here are several churches that have no business sending soul-winning/visitation teams into their community or hosting evangelistic crusades.

1. Until Clearview Church leaders and members stop fighting and learn to love one another, they need to cancel all outreach.

I saw Clearview Church run off a pastor and half its members. They then proceeded to call a new preacher who walked in, saw all those empty pews and announced, “We need an evangelism program around here.” They scheduled a meeting, brought in an evangelist, papered the town with posters, and held their gatherings. All to no avail. Even if the new preacher did not know the character of his congregation, the community did. They wanted none of what that bunch had to offer.

Jesus prayed, “I pray not for these (disciples) alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word, that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me and I in You; that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that You sent Me” (John 17:20-21).

The Savior who redeemed us and reigns now as Lord has laid down a fundamental law here: if we expect people to believe in Him, we must live in love and unity.

No wonder our efforts fall pitifully short.

2. Until Park Ridge Church stands up and deals with a few cancerous leaders, they need to call off all evangelism plans.

Few things kill the spirit of love within a congregation and the spontaneous atmosphere necessary for outsiders to respond to the invitation to step forward and follow Jesus more quickly than a few strong-willed leaders who keep their thumb on everything within the body lest it erupt into something they might not be able to control. One thing we know: The Holy Spirit will not be controlled by anyone. (See John 3:8).

Until there is freedom and liberty within the fellowship, God’s Spirit is going to be inhibited from doing any work and sending any blessing. Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty (2 Corinthians 3:17). No liberty, no Spirit — and no Spirit, no evangelism, no harvest, no births.

What part of that do we not understand?

3. Until Causeway Church clears up its terrible reputation in the community, their evangelism efforts will be fruitless.

The members of Causeway Church, most of whom joined in the last couple of years, do not understand why the citizens in their town seem completely unmoved by their good works, their impressive growth, and their attempts at recruitment.

Let them ask around; they’ll find out soon enough.

Sometime in the past–last year, last decade–that church was a cancer in the community. Its leaders were sick, its ministries self-serving and harsh, and its bills unpaid. When the pastor ventured out into the community, it was only to berate the city commission over its failures or the school board for their wickedness.

God got rid of that pastor and some of its worst troublemakers died or moved away. But the reputation lingers. The memory of that ugly little congregation made a lasting impression.

I heard a woman pastor ask for prayer for her church one day. “We have found that we are located over a toxic site. Underneath, there are poisons that were buried in the soil a long time ago. We are going to have to deal with it–which we can’t afford–or move.”

Causeway Church needs to dig down and locate the source of the toxins and deal with them. There are groups and businesses and individuals in the town who need an apology and then evidence of repentance. Furthermore, they will need time. Causeway Church leaders need to humble themselves before their community and find what it means to become servants. In time, if they remain faithful, God will send them a harvest. But it will be in His time. The question remains whether they will be patient and steadfast in their works.

4. Until North Howard Church opens its doors to everyone, they do not need to be inviting anyone.

North Howard’s sign is lying. The two feet by four feet board out front says “Everyone Welcome.” They aren’t.

Certain minority groups are not welcome at North Howard Church. The leadership first, and eventually the membership, has shown a prejudice against African-Americans, Latinos, the homeless, illegal aliens, and the chronically poor. Don’t miss this: it’s not just non-whites they reject; they are suspicious of anyone not like themselves.

We may rejoice that the Holy Spirit will not be sending converts to this bunch. The last thing the world needs is more like them.

5. Until Chateau Boulevard Church begins a foundational work of ministry which will legitimize its evangelism, they need to hold off.

A church has to earn the right to be heard in the community when it speaks of spiritual things.

Jesus told Nicodemus, “If I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe when I tell you heavenly things?” (John 3:12). What we do and say in the earthly realm lays the groundwork for us to be heard regarding the spiritual.

This week, a woman I know who is highly critical of what she calls fundamental Christians (people I call “Bible-believers”) posted on Facebook a photo of a preacher handing out Bibles to children in Haiti. She lambasted him for not giving them food and clothing. In the comments which followed, some of her “friends” resorted to profanity to condemn such misguided ministries.

I’m usually conflicted as to whether to risk posting a comment into such an atmosphere. What I said was, “No doubt from your comments you are heavily involved in feeding and clothing Haitians.” (I hoped she would get a feel for her own hypocrisy. Not very likely, I know.) What I wanted to say and didn’t was that no one knows all that evangelist may have done to feed and clothe those children of Haiti. All the article showed was him distributing Bibles. I’ll tell you this, Christian groups have fed and clothed a thousand Haitians for everyone helped by skeptics and hostiles.

We feed and clothe for a hundred reasons: it’s the right thing to do, it meets a genuine need, it’s basic compassion, Jesus would have done it, the Spirit within us commands it, and so forth. And, let us not hesitate to admit that one reason we show our concern for their welfare is that afterwards we’re usually given a hearing to present the gospel. Even if we’re not given such a hearing, however, we still hand out food and water and our love. That’s the Christian way.

Got time for a quick story?

I was in my first church after seminary, Emmanuel Baptist in Greenville, Mississippi. This collection of members had come in from other churches, I had been told, and many were unhappy and disgruntled. Being young, idealistic, and ignorant, I scheduled a revival and invited Don Womack of Memphis to preach a weeklong meeting.

The meeting was awful. Our attendance grew weaker and weaker. Wednesday night, one child responded to the invitation and joined the church. Other than that, nothing.

At the same time, there was bickering among members, and rumors were flying about their new young preacher (me!) trying to stir up racial strife in the community, and such as that.

Following the final sermon and the fruitless invitation time, Evangelist Womack handed the service back to me.

I remember what I said like it was last week.

“People, I don’t know what to do. Brother Don and I have worked so hard this week. But you have not supported this meeting with your attendance and support. I’m looking around at quite a few people who have told me you intend to join this church and several of you who need to walk this aisle and give your life to Christ. But you did nothing today.

“And I just want to say, I don’t blame you.

“I wouldn’t join this church either.

“There is a bad spirit in this congregation. And God is not going to send revival until we get our hearts right with each other and then make things right with one another.

“Folks, the Bible says ‘It is time for judgment to begin at the House of God’ (I Peter 4:17).”

And, little by little, day by day, God broke through that log jam and sent a spirit of revival to that church. People who belonged to Emmanuel Baptist Church in 1968-70 still talk about it.

This little writing goes forth with the prayer and hope that you find something here that will help your church.

This article was posted earlier from joemckeever.com, and is reposted here by permission of the author.

Dr. Dorsett is a bivocational pastor and church planting missionary in Vermont. He is the author of Developing Leadership Teams in the Bivocational Church and Bible Brain Teasers: Fun Adventures through the Bible. He also serves as a church planting catalyst with the North American Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention. He has a passion for helping the next generation discover a meaningful faith and become leaders in sharing that faith with others.

This series looks at the importance of bivocational ministry and bivocational ministers in today’s church. The previous articles in this series are:
Part 1: Bivocational Ministry is a Growing Method for Ministry.
Part 2: Lay People Are Willing to Help Pastors – But Only If They Are Trained.
Part 3: Rethinking Our Perception of Bivocational Ministry.
Part 4: Bivocational Ministry is Normal.
Part 5: Bivocational Ministry Is More Common Than Most People Realize.
Part 6: Bivocational Pastors Must Learn to Delegate.

Many small churches have become accustomed to a single-pastor model of church leadership. Though this model can be effective, it does limit the size of the church because one leader can only accomplish so much regardless of how great a leader that person may be. In larger churches this model may be modified somewhat because there may be a staff of pastors who serve under a senior pastor, but the basic concept is still that the senior pastor has a great deal of authority over the church.

This single-pastor model is especially evident in the preaching and pastoral care ministries of the church. In a small church the pastor is often expected to do almost all of the preaching and pastoral care. Since most pastors enjoy those ministries, they do not mind doing them. But in situations when the pastor is bivocational and has to work a second job, having all of the preaching and pastoral care duties can be challenging.

Not only can preaching and pastoral care be overwhelming for bivocational pastors; but if the pastor does all of these ministries on his own, it creates the impression that the pastor has more authority than the New Testament grants. Once the congregation perceives that the pastor has all the authority, it follows that the pastor also bears all the responsibility for getting everything done. This tension between authority and responsibility can be significant. Yet this is exactly what many bivocational pastors face in their churches. The church expects them to provide most of the leadership in the church as well as to accept most of the blame for any faults in the church. This is not how the church was led in the New Testament; and it often puts bivocational pastors in unrealistic situations.

In the life of the New Testament church there was an equal sharing of leadership by a group of people. One example of this multiple leadership approach is found in Acts 13:1-3:

Now there were in the church at Antioch prophets and teachers, Barnabas, Simeon who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen a member of the court of Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them. Then after fasting and praying they laid their hands on them and sent them off.

This passage demonstrates that five people were serving together as the prophets and teachers of the church in Antioch. There is no distinction made between the leaders, which indicates a joint sharing of duties and responsibilities between these five individuals.

This plurality shows that the church should not rise and fall on the leadership of just one person. When pastors find themselves in churches that do not have multiple leaders, developing leaders should be one of the first priorities. Paul’s young protégé Timothy found himself in such a situation while he was serving as pastor of the church in Ephesus. Paul wrote a letter to Timothy instructing him in how to lead the church. Part of those instructions is found in 2 Timothy 2:1-2:

Timothy, my dear son, be strong through the grace that God gives you in Christ Jesus. You have heard me teach things that have been confirmed by many reliable witnesses. Now teach these truths to other trustworthy people who will be able to pass them on to others.

In this passage Paul instructs Timothy to teach other individuals the truth of the gospel. But they were not just any individuals; they were individuals who must be able to share in the teaching ministry of the church. They were to be trustworthy people who would pass the truth of the gospel on to others. The emphasis was on Timothy training others who would join him in his teaching, preaching, and leading ministries in the church. This should be a goal of all pastors, especially those serving in bivocational roles.

Ministry is never easy. And training leaders to help lead is a lot of work. But in the end it is worth it because more laborers in the field will produce greater results. Pastors should look for people who they can develop into deacons, or elders, or pastoral staff members, or whatever other structure the church is comfortable with. The titles are not as important as the concept, which is that churches that use a multiple leader approach will be healthier than churches with only one leader.

Adapted from the book, Developing Leadership Teams in the Bivocational Church, written by Dr. Terry W. Dorsett and being used in nearly 3000 churches across North America.

By Joe McKeever, Preacher, Cartoonist, Pastor, and retired Director of Missions at the Baptist Association of Greater New Orleans.

The number one reason most church problems do so much damage is that the people in the know, those charged with leadership, have not anticipated these things and done the hard work necessary to head them off.

Good preparation will end most church problems before they arise.

Here are 10 rules–principles, suggestions, guideposts, lifelines, call them whatever you wish (except “laws”)–which, if implemented, can stop the next church split in its tracks and allow this healthy church to go chugging on down the tracks while the devil sits there scratching his head, wondering, “Wha’ happened?” (Old comic book image there).

1. Get your people serious about prayer.

Prayer is not brackets with which we open and close meetings. Prayer is not tipping our hat to the Almighty to let Him know we are aware He is eavesdropping the proceedings. Prayer is not a formality to be gotten out of the way so we can get on with the good part.

Prayer is calling on the Lord of Heaven and earth to help us, to guide us, to protect and fill and use us. Prayer is accessing Heaven’s power and God’s wisdom for earth’s work.

Once a war breaks out, it’s not too late to pray. But it almost is. It’s never too late to pray, but far better to have been earnest in our praying when matters were in hand and nothing ominous loomed on the horizon.

Prayer for believers is like weightlifting for athletes: you do it faithfully in the inner room so when you face the opponent you are strong and ready.

This is not a one-time act by a preacher to turn his church into a prayer/powerhouse. It will require many sermons, his example, changes in the order of worship, constant teaching and reminding, and creative plans and challenging reminders for his people.

2. Bring your church constitution and bylaws up to date.

The constitution and bylaws is not a straitjacket to limit the church. It is not a shackle to hamper a congregation from doing what it wishes. It is not simply a legal document, and should not be turned over to the lawyers in the congregation.

It is a plan to allow the Lord’s people to do what they wish and should. By setting the plan in writing and formally adopting it, a congregation establishes an order for how work and ministry will be done in the foreseeable future.

The constitution and bylaws keeps a church from hit-or-miss, scattergun, impulsive, or misguided leadership. A new pastor comes in and, without waiting to earn the trust of the members, begins to dismantle ministries and end programs in order to install his pet projects. A constitution and bylaws will put the brakes on this and keep the church on track.

The constitution and bylaws are simply the agreed-upon plan as to how the church will run its business. Sometimes it will protect the pastor from errant deacons or impulsive members; sometimes it protects the members and deacons from wrongheaded pastors.

At all times, when done right and kept current, it is a good servant of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

3. Adopt the Romans 12 model as the standard for how your church will operate.

Romans 12 is an excellent blueprint for the operation of a church. It divides into three sections.[1]

a) Vs 1-2 RELATIONSHIP TO GOD. (His Lordship)

Each member of the body is to be committed to the Lord. This is foundational. Unless each leader in particular is committed to Christ, nothing else matters and all bets are off as to what will happen.

No one not daily committed to Jesus Christ will be considered for a leadership position for this church.

b) Vs. 3-8 RELATIONSHIP TO HIMSELF. (Our Discipleship)

Each member is to be . . .

• humble (vs 3)
• appreciative of the other members of the body (vs. 4-5)
• using his or her spiritual gifts in Christ-honoring ways (vs. 6-8)

No one not humbly using the spiritual gifts the Holy Spirit gave for the benefit of the entire Body will be considered for a leadership position in this church.

c) Vs 9-21 RELATIONSHIP TO OTHERS (Our Behavior)

This passage refers mostly to “one another,” meaning other believers. Verbs are throughout: love, hate, cling, rejoice, continue, bless, pray, etc.

This passage directs our relationships to one another (vs. 10, 16), the saints (vs. 13), persecutors (vs. 14), rejoicers (vs 15), weepers (vs 15), the humble (vs 16), all men (17,18), and your enemy (vs 20).

God’s people are to be active in their love toward one another, responsive to anyone in need, and patient with people trying to destroy them. They are to be prayerful, faithful, peaceful.

No person not demonstrating love and kindness will be considered for a leadership position in this church.

4. Schedule periodic church business conferences and plan them well.

Get every church leader present. Make them aware that they may be called on, on the spur of the moment, to share their work, answer a question, or even defend some charge.

Now, there is such a thing as having business meetings too often and making them too detailed. For the most part, select good and godly leaders and trust them to do their work well. But there has to be accountability and there should be a time for each leader to report to the authoritative body, whether that is the pastoral staff, deacons, or the congregation as a whole.

We suggest that you build in plans for people to ask questions and have answers ready. In order to be prepared for anything, role-play situations in which a divisive church member asks key questions. Politicians role-play for their public debates; it makes them ready for surprises and on guard for low-blows.

5. Keep all leadership informed.

No pastor can guarantee that every church member will be up to snuff on everything, even when regular mailings go out with all the data. People quickly tire of that and ignore it. Best to work with your key leadership on a regular basis, and give only periodic reports to the whole congregation.

A pastor’s best protection against a member with inadequate knowledge and a burr-under-his-saddle attitude is a church leader with the facts. Someone is slandering the preacher based on his poor understanding when the person in-the-know steps into the conversation and says quietly, “Could I tell you what that’s all about?”

This is a thousand times better than the preacher having to do this on the floor of the church when called down by someone with only half the facts. Even when the pastor answers correctly and the dissenter sees how wrong he was, the church leadership is now faced by another problem: how to help him save face and not leave an opening for Satan to work (see Paul’s approach to this in 2 Corinthians 2:5-11.)

6. Institute a plan for dealing with charges and attacks as soon as they arise.

A former deacon chairman, Rudy Hough, used to counsel all incoming deacons on a plan which we advocate strongly.

“Now that you are a deacon,” Rudy would say, “from time to time, people will be calling you to complain about the preacher or one of the other leaders. I want to tell you how to handle that. You say to them, ‘Thank you for telling me this. Come on with me now and we will go see that person.’ If they’ll go with you and deal with the matter, that should end it. But if they refuse to go with you, you should say, ‘All right, I’ll go. But I’m going to use your name.’ If they let you use their name, that should be sufficient. You deal with it and get back to them. But if they say, ‘No, leave my name out of it,’ then you are to say, ‘Then that ends it. I refuse to take anonymous criticism to our ministers.’“

I will add this: if, after rejecting your attempts to settle the matter, the individual persists in spreading his/her unhappiness, then they themselves become the problem and warrant a visit from that deacon and one other. Keep Matthew 18:15-17 as your standard of solving this.

7. Preach the Romans 12 Church-Operations Model from time to time. Keep it before your people.

Pastors cannot preach a great plan for anything one time and expect it to take hold. It must be preached from the pulpit, taught in classes, and spread by word of mouth. Sometimes, it will be one point in a sermon, and sometimes only a reference to Romans 12’s plan will be made.

In committee meetings and in sessions with the larger leadership body, pastors will remind them of this divinely given plan for a healthy church.

Use posters, powerpoint, and the church bulletin to keep the principles before your people. Role-playing, dramas, and testimonies will further reinforce the church’s commitment to God’s Word and church health.

8. Rotate leadership.

The surest way to set your church up for trouble is to allow a few people to occupy positions of great influence for many years. Human nature being what it is, unseating them will present major headaches, something most pastors will not want to tackle but will leave for their successors (I can hear a pastor say, “I’m not ready to die on that hill.”).

The constitution and bylaws should spell out how committees, deacons, and other influential church bodies will be filled and rotated. Furthermore, it should be stated how the chairs will be chosen with some kind of limitation in place. (Without that, a powerful personality can insinuate himself into the chair and retain it for decades.)

9. Preach, practice, and insist upon transparency in all leaders.

We have nothing to hide. That’s transparency.

Transparency is what Jesus had in mind at His trial. Asked to tell what He had been teaching, Jesus replied, “You may ask anyone who heard me. I had no secrets. Everything I had to say, I said in the open” (John 18:20-21).

If you are the treasurer, insist on regular audits or the financial committee taking a look at your books. This is for your own protection. If you have fears that money may be being handled carelessly, insist on a financial review from a respected accounting firm. They will come in, study how money is handled, then make suggestions.

If you are the pastor, demonstrate transparency yourself. Have no secret bank accounts, no funds to which you alone have access. Be willing to explain every request for checks. (I used to tell our bookkeeper Susan Ash, “If I ever ask you for a check and you have a question, don’t write it. Get back to me. If my answer is not satisfactory, ask the chairman of the finance committee. But you must always protect yourself.”)

Rules for transparency are for the protection of everyone involved.

10. Respond to infections immediately.

Your body does this. Scratch your finger and within seconds the white corpuscles inside your bloodstream get the message and head in that direction. The Creator built in this amazing failsafe system to protect you from infections that can do so much damage.

The laissez-faire attitude among some leaders is, “Well, leave it alone, and it’ll go away. People are always complaining about something.” Bad wrong. This should never be tolerated or ignored, but respected for the potent influence it is.

Rebellious staff members who criticize the church members or even the preacher himself must be dealt with severely and promptly. This must not be tolerated and can be grounds for dismissal.

Now, I am not one who believes that all dissent is evil. Sometimes leaders go astray and church members have lost any ability to call them back to reality. Complaining is all they have left. The pastor who interprets all complaints as of the devil may be playing right into the enemy’s hand. If he has given the membership no means of registering their unhappiness, he’s asking for trouble and going to get more than he ever wanted.

I once included an index card in the Sunday church bulletin. “If you have a question as to how things are done around here–even if it’s a criticism–we need to hear. Write it down here, sign your name, and drop in the offering plate.”

My chairman of deacons said, “Preacher, are you sure you want to do that? You’re just asking for trouble.”

I said, “Mike, if we don’t give them an opportunity to express their unhappiness in a healthy way, they will create unhealthy ways.”

We got a few questions, answered them fully, and went forward without a ripple.

What did we leave out? Give us your comments and additional principles below. Thank you.

This article was posted earlier from joemckeever.com, and is reposted here by permission of the author.

Dr. Dorsett is a bivocational pastor and church planting missionary in Vermont. He is the author of Developing Leadership Teams in the Bivocational Church and Bible Brain Teasers: Fun Adventures through the Bible. He also serves as a church planting catalyst with the North American Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention. He has a passion for helping the next generation discover a meaningful faith and become leaders in sharing that faith with others.

This series looks at the importance of bivocational ministry and bivocational ministers in today’s church. The previous articles in this series are:
Part 1: Bivocational Ministry is a Growing Method for Ministry.
Part 2: Lay People Are Willing to Help Pastors – But Only If They Are Trained.
Part 3: Rethinking Our Perception of Bivocational Ministry.
Part 4: Bivocational Ministry is Normal.
Part 5: Bivocational Ministry Is More Common Than Most People Realize.

There are an increasing number of pastors experiencing burn out. Bob Wells has done extensive research on the health of American clergy. In a 2002 article in Pulpit and Pew, Wells concluded that “doctrinal and theological differences aside, North American churches have in common not only the Cross and a love of Christ, but also a pastorate whose health is fast becoming cause for concern.” Pastors are not as healthy as they should be. This lack of health contributes to the higher burn out rates currently being experienced by pastors.

Though all pastors are prone to burn out, bivocational pastors, who work secular jobs in addition to serving churches, are even more likely than fully funded pastors to experience burn out. Bivocational pastors seldom have as many resources at their disposal to help them recover from burn out, so it is particularly important that they avoid this syndrome altogether. One of the best ways for bivocational pastors to avoid burn out is for them to delegate some of their duties to others. It is simply not possible for a bivocational pastor to work full time at the church and also work a full time secular job without paying the price physically and emotionally. As bivocational pastors learn to share the burdens of ministry with an entire team, they will no longer feel as overwhelmed. Building pastoral leadership teams can help pastors avoid feeling burned out.

Delegation will be a challenge for some bivocational pastors to practice. The very fact that bivocational pastors are willing to work two jobs to follow the call of God demonstrates their work ethic. They are the kind of people who get the job done, even if it means they must do it themselves. But this type-A personality can be as much a curse as a blessing if not channeled in healthy ways.

Delegation is not just about passing off a list of tasks to others. Delegation means giving up control and sharing leadership with others. While some pastors may fear this, delegation actually helps pastors be more effective because it helps them see the blind spots in ministry that they have missed on their own. Raising up effective pastoral leadership teams makes the entire church more effective than what any individual leader, no matter how gifted, can do on his or her own.

Delegating menial tasks may be easier to do, but for delegation to really help, pastors must also be willing to delegate some of the preaching and pastoral care duties. Because these are two of the most time consuming and emotionally draining aspects of ministry, a failure to delegate a portion of these duties will result in pastors still not having time to rest. Alexander Strauch has written a number of excellent books to help pastors train deacons and elders in their churches to share the load of ministry. Strauch notes that “it is a highly significant but often overlooked fact that our Lord did not appoint one man to lead His church. He personally appointed and trained twelve men” (33). These were not twelve men who helped with menial tasks but men Jesus sent out to preach, teach, and address the needs of people. Pastors need to follow the example of Jesus and recruit help in their preaching and pastoral care efforts. As pastors learn to give away part of their ministry to others, they will have less stress. Less stress will help them avoid burn out and stay in their ministry positions longer.

When pastors are unhealthy, they tend to change churches more frequently in an attempt to relieve stress and/or rediscover joy in ministry. But if the pastors’ work habits are the real problem, then they take those problems with them to the next church and experience those same difficulties all over again. As pastors build relationships with others in the church, those relationships serve as bulwarks against loneliness, depression, and a dangerous “I can do it all myself” attitude. As pastors become healthier, churches become healthier. When churches become healthier, then pastors do not feel as overwhelmed. A pattern of health for both pastors and churches emerges when pastoral longevity is increased.

Pastoral burn out is a real issue in modern church life, but it is an issue that can be addressed. It was this issue that prompted me to write my book, Developing Leadership Teams in the Bivocational Church. This book focuses on helping pastors learn to train up multiple leaders so they can delegate some of their preaching and pastoral care duties to them. It is my prayer that this book will help pastors avoid burn out and have long and happy ministries in their churches.

By Joe McKeever, Preacher, Cartoonist, Pastor, and retired Director of Missions at the Baptist Association of Greater New Orleans.

I am not a professional counselor, not an adviser of churches or denominations or pastors as such, and not an expert on problem-solving or conflict management. What I am is a retired preacher and a blogger who sometimes gets asked, “What is your take on this? What do you recommend we do about that?”

Out of that experience, and spurred on by the two most recent situations–one by phone last night and the other from an email this morning–here are three “case studies” or problem scenarios that occur with alarming frequency in our churches. And my suggestions on what the leadership should do in handling them.

As always, I do not claim to have the last word on any of this. But if it turns out this is the first word, something that gets readers to thinking deeply and acting courageously, it will have been worth the effort.

Problem One:

A little group of unelected lay leaders is running the church behind the scenes.

In most cases, the new pastor learned of the existence of this cabal only after he had arrived, set up his office, began his ministry, and then decided to try something. He was told there was a small group of people–almost always it’s a group of men–who would have to clear this before he could proceed.

How those few men came to occupy this lofty perch of “The Church’s Board of Directors” is irrelevant. The issue before us is what to do now.

If you are the pastor, go slow. They are in the driver’s seat and you are the new kid on the block. If you force them to a showdown, the congregation does not know you well enough to back you. So you lose.

If you are a layperson in the church, you are in a stronger position—at least at first—to do something about this group. So, let’s approach it from that position, that you are a layperson wishing to put a stop to the control of a small group of unelected church members.

a) Be naive. Do not meet with other concerned members and plan an attack. You will be more effective if you simply act on your own at first.

b) Stand up in a business meeting and ask (about something pulled off by that group), “How was this decision made?” And sit down.

If the pastor is moderating the meeting–and if he is being victimized by the group–he will appreciate the question. This is what he has been hoping for, that some church member or members would finally begin to question the behavior of that bunch.

At this point, the pastor should turn to any member of the (ahem) ruling group and say sweetly, “Would any of you care to respond to this question?” And wait. As long as is necessary, pastor. Wait.

They do not care to respond to that question, I can tell you. The group’s power has been predicated on the passivity of the congregation, on the unlikelihood of anyone holding them accountable.

c) Regardless of the answer you receive from the church’s self-appointed czar, be ready to respond to him. You will be expected to explain whether this answer satisfies you or not.

d) Therefore, be praying for the Father to lead you, to put the words in your mouth. Whether your response is “No, this does not satisfy me. I thought we had a pastor to make that decision” or “I’m sorry. No, this is not satisfactory. What about the church constitution and bylaws? Why weren’t they followed?” or something else, listen to the Spirit and speak or be silent as He leads.

Church czars want to end all accountability for their actions. What you will want to do is to make sure structures are in place for each leader at every level to be accountable. Without accountability in anything–school, stores, churches–nothing good will happen. The saying goes, ‘People do not do what you expect; they do what you inspect.’

Problem Two:

A little group meets in the foyer before and after the services to blast the pastor or another leader.

They are unhappy with the pastor or a staff member and would love to get him/her terminated. There are structures in place for dealing with any minister failing in his/her responsibilities, but they do not choose to go that route. They may be planning to take actions to bring down the leader or not. This could just be a griping session.

In either case, our proposed remedy is the same: Go over and stand beside the group. Don’t say a word. Silently insert yourself into their little gathering. Just your presence will be sufficient.

They will do one of two things: either disband and guiltily slink away, or turn to you and insist that “this is a private meeting.” Your response is to say sweetly, “Sorry, but it’s not. You’re in the foyer of our church and you are attacking our minister. There is nothing private about it. I could hear you all the way over there.” Then, they will slink away. Don’t be surprised if they are now angry at you. But the problem is not between you and them. It’s with them and God. The group is working to create havoc in the Lord’s church and that is a huge matter to Him.

I am amazed at the brazenness of some church members who think they can do anything they please and no matter how disruptive it becomes to the work of the Lord and how it destroys a minister’s ministry, feel no personal responsibility for their actions. Some people are going to have quite a comeuppance at Judgment. Do not envy them; pity them and pray for their souls.

Problem Three:

The church has a problem of ingrained, entrenched leadership. That church secretary or finance chairman or deacon officer loves to rule and refuses to be retired.

If you are the layperson wanting to replace such a leader, you absolutely must have the support of the pastor and a few key leaders. Otherwise, the effort fails.

If you are the pastor, likewise, you will not be able to pull this off by yourself. Unless key leaders stand with you, leave the matter with the Lord and bide your time.

If you are a new pastor and have a death wish, try to replace that longtime leader on your own. Then, get your resume out because you will soon be job-hunting. Cool it, friend. This problem did not happen overnight and will not be remedied this week.

However, assuming you are the pastor and have the support of a good group of leaders, here are some suggestions:

• Compile your reasons for wanting him or her replaced.
• Gather your forces (i.e., pull your team together to make sure everyone is on board).
• Prayerfully choose the best person(s) and way to approach the individual. You will not want to send in a dozen people, which can be intimidating, overwhelming, and self-defeating.
• Honor the worker. Unless he or she is guilty of gross malfeasance, presumably they have done some things right and deserve some suitable recognition for their longtime service.
• Plan for an appropriate way of showing appreciation, assuming the individual is willing to be retired.
• Then, set in motion plans to prevent a recurrence of this situation from ever happening.

Question: What if he or she refuses to go quietly?

That happens frequently, it pains me to admit. One would think each church worker sees their ministry as a privilege, themselves as servants, and their time as limited. In a perfect world, that’s how it would be. But even in the church leadership team, egos can sometimes call the shots.

What to do if the entrenched leader refuses to go quietly and begins to raise a ruckus:

• Be Christlike. Do not retaliate, do not respond in kind, do not get angry.
• Bring in a godly advisor to hear both sides and suggest a path to resolution.
• Stand firm. Do not give in to threats or abuse.
• Expect some members of your leadership team to weaken. Some people have no stomach for conflict and will jump ship the first time the targeted person explodes in anger or breaks down in tears.

A threat you may expect to hear in this situation is, “I have a lot of friends and family in this church. If you fire me, they’ll all leave and take their tithes with them.” If the individual does not speak those words, do not be surprised if a member of your leadership team does. “You know, Pete has a huge family. And they have many friends and supporters throughout this church. If we fire him, they’re going to be angry and leave. And we can’t afford to lose that many people and that much offering.”

Therefore, there’s one more suggestion: “Bring in one of Pete’s closest friends to the leadership team.” Find the friend or family member with the coolest head and sweetest spirit and help them to see the situation, and get them on board. Help them to see that what’s at stake here is the ministry of the church and its reputation for Christ in the community. We cannot afford to have this turn into a disaster. “So, Bob, we need you to help us on this. Help us find the best way to retire Pete so as to honor him and to bless the church.”

By the way, never ever give in to the threat that someone will leave and take their family and all their tithes. This is a form of blackmail that only the weakest of pastors and leaders will bow before.

I started pastoring in 1962 and served seven churches, six of them as senior pastor. Over these decades, I heard those very words on several occasions: He will leave and take his tithe and we can’t afford that. And, more than once we watched as the disgruntled members walked out the door in a huff. However . . . Never once did the church suffer financially as a result.

It was as though the Lord took it as a matter of personal pride not to let that little bunch of “workers of iniquity” damage His church.

So, be courageous, leader of the Lord’s congregation. God is not honored, His church is not blessed, and His people are not helped by weak and cowardly shepherds who refuse to stand up to those who would use His church for their personal satisfaction.

This article was posted earlier from joemckeever.com, and is reposted here by permission of the author.

Dr. Thomas Douglas
Pastor
Parkway Baptist Church
Kansas City, KS



This is the fifth article in the series on the importance of small churches. The previous articles are:
The Introduction (an overview and rationale for the series)
Part 1: Truth (an overview and rationale for the series)
Part 2: Mature Love (the imperative of having a loving fellowship)
Part 3: Unity (the importance of unity)
Part 4: Joy (the importance of joy)

One of the greatest challenges small churches face is fulfilling the Great Commission. Many members struggle from time to time wondering, “How can so few of us make the huge impact on the world that the Great Commission implies?” Can a church with more members make a larger impact on the world than a smaller church? Yes, but when we look at church size as the definitive measure for eternal impact, we fail to qualify our statements. First, a larger church can potentially have a greater impact if they faithfully share the gospel where they live and send missionaries into the world. Being part of a large church does not guarantee the advancement of the gospel into the lost world, nor does it mean more of their members share with people the good news of Christ. Large churches fill too many American cities with huge church complexes where crowds come to hear and trust others to do the work. When James tells us to consider the high position the brother in humble circumstances possesses (1:9), we can apply that to churches that lack the resources and the manpower. Instead of being envious of what large churches can accomplish with greater resources, small churches should praise God because what they cannot match dollar for dollar or even person for person, they can match in faith.

Second, God calls specific churches to reach specific people. Now, I believe God gives more opportunities to churches that are found faithful in sharing the gospel, but the truth remains that Paul believed the churches he planted had an obligation to reach their communities for Christ. He repeatedly calls them to witness (Phil.1:18) and celebrates their evangelistic footprint (Phil.1:5; 1 Thess.6-8). Small churches do not need the size of other churches to make an eternal impact. Instead, they need faith in God to work through them to reach first the community they are in and then the world.

Small churches are great churches because what they lack in size, they can make up for in faith. They possess exactly the right amount of people to achieve everything God wants them to do. An obedient faithful few always trumps a disobedient many. Perhaps no greater example can be given in the Bible than the story of David and Goliath in 1 Samuel 17. Today, we explore what one shepherd boy armed with a slingshot and faith can do against a giant. God does not want small churches to use their size as a reason for a lack of faithfulness or a cause of discouragement. Instead, the size of a small church should motivate them to do great things for God and increase their faith in Him.

Christ’s Church faces the Goliath size task of taking the gospel to the ends of the earth. This challenge, first uttered to His closest disciples, has been given to everyone who has called upon the name of Jesus. The task seems impossible when a person considers the scope of the task: 7 billion people, 3,629 unreached people groups. Beyond the scope, add the obstacles of the sin and evil that pervades our culture, the passion in which people seem to pursue the wide path of destruction, and the spiritual battles with the devil and his demons; and one quickly senses the enormity of the Great Commission. Finally, add the multiple excuses Christians give for failing to share the gospel. “I’m not trained.” “We don’t have enough money.” “What if they reject me?” “What if they make fun of me or hurt me?” “What if I can’t answer a question about God?” Sometimes we make the Israelites hiding from Goliath look brave (1 Sam. 17:11).

To whom does Christ turn to succeed in this impossible task? God’s plan for reaching the world hinges on an improbable victory from an improbable source. He calls Christians to reach the world with the good news. To succeed in this we must possess 3 qualities seen in David that gave him the victory over Goliath. The first quality is that we must possess courage. Our courage derives from two sources: (1) our past encounters with God (vv. 34-37) and (2) our faith in God (vv. 41-47). David tells King Saul that God delivered him from both the lion and the bear, and that God would deliver him from Goliath. In addition, David did not care about the size of Goliath because he firmly believed in the “size” of his God. David so believed in God that when Saul gives him permission to fight Goliath, David sprints to the battle line (v.48) and takes the first shot.

Courage to share our faith comes from the super-natural power given to us when we witness. Christians cannot wait to feel the power before they share. In the midst of sharing is when the power comes. Then, when you experience His power it propels you to keep on sharing. Small churches need to see the power of their God and pursue opportunities to share the gospel in their communities. We do not wait for the world to come to us. We sprint to the world with the gospel through service, through acts of mercy, and through faithful proclamation.

The second quality is that we must be prepared. David could not defeat Goliath as a skilled swordsman because he was not a skilled swordsman. David looked foolish in Saul’s battle armor, and he quickly decided to fight the battle with his skills. Small churches will not make the impact God desires if they try to imitate large churches. We look goofy trying to put on large cantatas and can easily use up our entire outreach budget on some Easter egg hunt or Fourth of July celebration that exhausts every working member and still pales in comparison to what the large church down the street can do.

If small churches can’t follow the large churches’ pattern for growth, then what can they do? Discover the skills God has implanted in them and use them to His glory and the advancement of His Kingdom. In our church that meant holding a science camp with hands-on experiments using people with science degrees, a real vet, and live animals to teach children about intelligent design instead of doing a traditional VBS with no workers and less resources than other churches in our area. In our science camp, we had more men workers than women and more science than Bible stories. We used what we had and didn’t say we had to be someone else.

God uses our natural abilities and skills to reach the world. David grabbed his slingshot and five smooth stones. He didn’t ask God to turn him into a navy seal. He went with what he knew. Small churches must discover their passions, and once they do, they find fulfillment in sharing their faith instead of exhaustion and feelings of failure.

The third quality is that we must possess faith. All of a person’s skill and courage amount to nothing if his or her faith is in the wrong person. David’s faith had to be in his God, not simply his abilities and past experience. His faith drove him to the battle, gave him the courage and confidence to take his slingshot. If David lived in fear, he would have listened to Saul and taken a sword or worse ran from the battle. Instead, he said, “Give me what I know. I have been slinging stones for years. With God fighting for me, this giant doesn’t stand a chance.”

Any church hoping to accomplish the Great Commission must believe God is the source of its abilities, skills, and gifts. God is the one who arranges the divine appointments and missions. God is the one who changes hearts. A church’s faith to accomplish the impossible comes from Jesus’ impact on their lives. Jesus’ death and resurrection did the impossible by making sinners righteous; by washing sinners clean through His blood; and by bringing sinners into God’s family. Once a person experiences this reality it ought to propel them to lead others to Jesus.

Remember, faith in God is not seen in numerical size but in obedience. David’s overwhelming faith caused him to sprint toward Goliath. His obedience gave Israel the victory. A small church must so believe God has works specifically for them that they sacrifice their energies, their resources, and themselves to achieve it. A church’s greatest failure is to base their approval simply on who shows up and not on who goes out and changes the world.

Biblically-based, mature loving, unified, joyful, faith-filled small churches are great churches because what they lack in size, they make up for in faith. They make an eternal impact in the world because they live out the truth that God has made them “ambassadors for Christ” (2 Cor.5:20).