You can't decide in abstract what workers a church must have -
you have to begin by looking at the needs of the actual group of people and potential leaders that God has given you.
Any church leader's role (male or female) is to help
the pastor lift up the whole congregation, to prepare the people for acts of
service. This is generally done by calling on people's shared humanity. There is no longer male or female for we are all one in Jesus, and we are to use our freedom to serve one another in love. I think that this is the best way of affirming any one category of people within the church, whether women, singles, internationals, or the elderly. It's something I love about my church - we know that we should each do our bit, as we are able, so we pitch in and help each other.
As part of lifting up the whole church, a particular leader can be given
responsibility for a specific group - say the women (as in Titus 2). In this situation, the leader is not the "older woman" of Titus 2, but a pastor. Their goal is to see the older women of the church training the younger. The pastor may explicitly disciple and ready the older women for their role, or they may simply model the teaching of younger women. (There may also be times when they forget all this and just get on and do the work, because it needs doing.)
The person taking on this 'women's pastor' role can be a man or a woman. It may be better for a woman
to do it because of her unique insight/experience, or because people aren't ready for a man to take on
the role. Again, I like it how at Crossroads we uphold women - and expect men to be competent at traditional women's roles. So we have one man heading up our children's ministry and another managing our weekly mums' Bible study. It wasn't planned this way: they were just the best people for the jobs at the time.
H/T Dan
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- fional
- Fiona is a proud Tasmanian who now calls Chile home. Both Hobart and Santiago sit beneath mountains, but the mountains are very different and their cities too. With God's help, Fiona will help her Chilean sisters make sense of the Bible, get to know its Author better and learn what it means to live as loved, forgiven people.
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5 comments:
Any church leader's role (male or female) is to help the pastor lift up the whole congregation
I don't know about that.
It might just be semantics. But this sounds like you're saying that the Pastor is the focal point of the lifting up and that other leaders are there to help him. That he has people working for/under him. I don't reckon that this centralised view of ministry is healthy. If that's what you man.
And as for a male women's worker. It it sounds like a missed opportunity.
I'd love one.
Hey there Al :) Maybe it will help if I say that I'm all for a group of leaders/elders jointly leading a church. I think that's what the biblical presentation of elders/overseers is about. But I also think that the Bible anticipates a key leader.
But I'm not really talking about elders here - I'm more talking about 'ministry workers' . . . But I think the Bible depicts a key leader in this context too.
Where are we disagreeing?
Oh and I'm afraid I didn't understand your last point - a male women's worker is a missed opportunity cos a woman could've done it? But you'd love a male women's worker? Sorry, I might be being slow :/
Thanks Fiona.
I'll take the last point first seeing as it's there that I'm at my most dreadfully unclear.
I'd say that appointing a male to be a female ministry worker would be a missed opportunity. A female should get the job. And what I meant to say is that I'd love to have a female ministry worker who is a woman.
I'd be interested to know what part of the Bible anticipates there being a key leader. I think in practice we all operate on the basis of there being a key leader and certainly we expect the minister to be that person. But it's not his ministry. And neither is it healthy or fair. I do my very best not to talk about "my" church (I remember seeing a web page for Mars Hill that once described it as "Mars Hill: The Church of Mark Driscoll). Yikes.
If anything, and maybe this is where we will see ourselves coming together in agreement, the "key leader", to use your terminology, is simply the one who is best placed in time and space to be the main encourager of other peoples ministries. He is doing all he can to make sure that people outshine him in their usefulness to God's people. And so "lifting up" then becomes an act of sacrifice. And to "help the pastor to lift up the whole congregation" is to be part of a team of self deniers.
is that what you mean by leadership? It's a bottom up rather than top down approach. The church is bigger (much bigger) than it's leader.
Ah, now I get your point! I dunno though - I wasn't talking about a general 'women's ministry' position, but a parttime children's ministry job and (an even more parttime) coordinating role. Crossroads has a fulltime female women's worker: me! But I do other stuff :)
As for the key leader, I do agree this is largely just what works well in practice. And the Bible certainly focuses on leadership by a group of elders. But as I read through Titus and the Timothys, I get the impression that they had higher authority (2 Tim 2:2, 14; Tit 2:2f, 15; 3:1). This may of course have more to do with their preaching role than with a unique leadership position.
As to the nature of the leadership, I absolutely agree that any authority is given not so that that person will bask in glory (though leaders are worthy of honour), but so that they will give up their lives for the sake of their flock.
Gotcha.
I probably read too much into your title.
Loving these posts btw. Keep them coming.
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