Monday, April 10, 2006

The role of "pastor"

This is from a blog I discovered over the weekend— The M Blog (thanks to The Heresy for the link). This is only a brief excerpt from a lengthy post by a missionary to Ecuador, the whole post is here:

"In many of the house churches shepherding/leadership is shared amongst several without anyone filling the role of 'the pastor.' Responsibility is mutual amongst ALL the church, not just the pastor. Our team does not have any problem with churches selecting one of their own and calling them to be one of their pastors/elders. But we have noticed a pattern that has emerged within those church plants where they have singled out and called a pastor.

"Of the 4-5 house churches we relate to where they did name an official 'pastor', all are suffering right now. Not because they called a pastor, but becuase the church looks to their named 'pastor' as the one to do all the work of teaching, leading, evangelism, preaching, etc.

"Everyone of these pastors has come to me complaining that they cannot get the church to do the 'work of ministry'. They expect the pastor to do everything (sound familiar?) Quite a number have even left because their 'pastor' was not as dynamic and educated as some of the others around in the more established churches. The work of "being the church" has been replaced by "going to church.""

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