Last week I prepared a lesson for Sunday morning of the tendency to hire out Christian responsibility – youth ministers, involvement ministers, education ministers, growth consultants, ad nauseaum. Don’t get me wrong, at the heart of the matter, there is nothing wrong with them; I like many of these people. I do not like what they have come to stand for.
The mindset with many of our congregations is that when a need arises, we need to hire someone to take care of it. Of course, this is a natural extension of our consumer-drive economy which thrives on niche services. To the dismay of general handymen and Jacks-of-all-trades everywhere, many have made a living by carving out their special place in the market. Used to when my car needed work, I could take it to one guy; now there is the transmission guy, the brake guy, the tire guy and the ding and dent guy.
More specifically, as we get busier, we hire out more of our responsibilities – the yard, housekeeping, child care, taking care of the pool, washing the dog. This hits closer to our situation in many churches. Rather than treat church like family – where each member has his or her role and challenges are faced in-house before being hired out – we have turned the church into a business. Instead of rearing a church-culture in which members serve, we have promoted a country-club mentality where services are rendered to the members. And on we go.
As I thought about these things, I remembered something I once read in a book on education – “Don’t do anything for the student they can do for themselves.” Yet, so much of the modern minister’s life is caught up in doing what others can do (should do) for themselves. What would happen if we cut through all the personal (read, “selfish”) expectations, opinions, traditions and “the way we have always done it” and put the entirety of our faith in God’s plan and pattern for his family?
What if the sick were visited by “the church” only when the church had visited them, not just the preacher? What if we each decided to take seriously our responsibilities to live for Christ instead of pointing at our leaders when church growth fails to happen? What if we all joined in with our ministers, deacons, elders and church leaders to serve instead of looking at them and asking, “Why don’t they do more?”? What if we took seriously our role as servants and priests in God’s kingdom?
For me, this has been an engaging thought. I believe much of the heartache and hassle of church life could be avoided if such a view were taken. However, it involves each of us expecting from ourselves and one another what God expects from us, and this is uncharted water for most of us. May God bless us as we try.
