Wednesday, December 16, 2015

Tripp on formal and informal ministry

As a bible student with just 1 year left to go to graduate with a degree, I look back at the past three years when I tried (and probably am still failing miserably) to balance a business with studies and other responsibilities in life, I often think about the notion whereby Christian ministry seems to be unique in that many things we do in lay capacity are not remunerable. Many a service is done "unto the Lord" which is all good and nice, but when the realities of school fees, bills and textbooks (and commentaries and other books) come into the equation, it really eats into you. When two of your classmates have all their school fees and textbooks paid for by their church, even having a monthly allowance, but most importantly, are given the blessing by their leadership to attempt to apply whatever they have studied, one cannot but think about why do I make so many sacrifices just to complete a theological degree.

I personally have been the recipient of the grace and love of many lay leaders in church, most significant of a full time staff member of another church, who mentored and journeyed with me through the days I was anti-Christian, until today when I am about to venture into ministry for my beloved Jesus Christ. If the tithes and offerings of his church did not allow him to provide for his family, I do not know if I still would be still not too different from the angry and bitter teenager I was.

I guess that if God has truly called a minister, then he would be gracious to provide the means necessary to carry out the call, be it in family blessing, finances or opportunity for ministry. It is the working out toward the end goal (in my case, a church plant) that requires faith from on high to keep the workman going.

As I reflect on Tripp's short discourse, I would like to add that some churches have large full time staff because their members somehow do not minister to one another, so they pay others to take care of them. But if a person has truly been taught and captured the heart of the gospel, all followers of Jesus by nature would minister informally, whether or not they are paid by the church. 

I often point out the dilemma why the sunday school teacher or the cell group leader is not paid, whereas the air con or the elevator repair man is. If we want to use a ministry of helps as a basis of comparison, we can consider whether the sound, light, money counters, security volunteers should be paid. I do recognise that when a church starts paying her congregation for certain tasks, like for editing an announcement video, that would be precedent for every other ministry volunteer to receive pay. That would not be an issue for a church which has a culture of giving generously (in terms of tithes/offering and to one another), but for a church that is barely balancing the accounts, that would not be possible.

So to go back on topic, in reflection to Tripp's stance, a church possibly should ask itself whether is its paid staff equipping its lay leaders to minister informally to one another or if they spend most of their time ministering to its congregation.


From Pages 19-20 of Instruments in the Redeemer's Hands

"The only metaphor that captures God's plan for the church is the metaphor of a body. Christ has given his church leaders, not to bear the full ministry load of the body of Christ, but to equip each member to join in God's work of personal transformation. Remember: no local church could hire enough staff to meet all the ministry needs of a given week! In the biblical model, much more informal, personal ministry goes on than formal ministry. The times of formal, public ministry are meant to train God's people for the personal ministry that is the lifestyle of the body of Christ. Reflect on your own life. Isn't it true that change has not come only through the formal ministry of the Word? Hasn't God also used ordinary people to change your heart and transform your life?"

Thursday, December 10, 2015

Blanchard's careful preparation for public reading of Scripture

In the two decades or so of attending church, I have rarely seen many people read Scripture with much passion, reverence and definitely such extensive preparation. Blanchard has challenged me to reconsider who we should choose to read the Holy Word aloud in service, and also the importance of the posturing of one's heart for this precious privilege.


From pages 190-191 of Worship by the Book

British evangelist and Bible teacher John Blanchard describes how he has prepared for the public reading of God's Word and the powerful results:

There are times when I have felt that the Bible was being read less preparation than the notices—and with considerably less understanding. I hesitate to use the following illustrations because of my part in it, but I do so as a reminder to my own heart of the seriousness of the issue. A year or two after my conversion I was appointed as a Lay Reader in the Church of England, to Holy Trinity Church, Guernsey. There were two other, more senior, Lay Readers on the staff, with the result that on most Sundays the responsibilities could be evenly shared out. As it happened, the Vicar almost always asked me to read the Lessons, following a Lectionary which listed the passages appointed to be read on each Sunday of the year. My wife and I lived in a small flat at the time, but I can vividly remember my Sunday morning routine. Immediately after breakfast I would go into the bedroom, lock the door, and begin to prepare for reading the Lesson that morning. After a word of prayer I would look up the Lesson in the Lectionary, and read it carefully in the Authorized Version, which we were using in the church. Then I would read it through in every other version I had in my possession, in order to get thoroughly familiar with the whole drift and sense of the passage. Next I would turn to the commentaries. I did not have many in those days, but those I had I used. I would pay particular attention to word meanings and doctrinal implications. When I had finished studying the passage in detail, I would go to the mantelpiece, which was roughly the same height as the lectern in the church, and prop up the largest copy of the Authorized Version I possessed. Having done that, I would walk very slowly up to it from the other side of the room, and begin to speak, aloud: 'Here beginneth the first verse of the tenth chapter of the gospel according to St. John' (or whatever the passage was). Then I would begin to read aloud the portion appointed. If I made so much as a single slip of the tongue, a single mispronunciation, I would stop, walk back across the room, and start again, until I had read the whole passage word perfect, perhaps two or three times. My wife would tell you that there were times when I emerged from the bedroom with that day's clean white shirt stained with perspiration drawn from the effort of preparing one Lesson to be read in the church. Does that sound like carrying things too far? Then let me add this: I was told that there were times when after the reading of the Lesson people wanted to leave the senäce there and then and go quietly home to think over the implications of what God has said to them in his Word.

Clowney on Paul's Christ-centered marriage advice

Clowney comments on the the oft quoted yet often not very well understood passage from Ephesians. Probably the common interpretation would be that the husband demands that the wife submits to him and because she does not, then he does not have to give up his life for her. And the vicious downward spiral ensues.

The simplicity and profoundness of Clowney's exposition makes me want to study the text more, and perhaps meditate on what other commentators have to share with us...


From pages 99-102 of: How Jesus Transforms The Ten Commandments

Paul starts with the supremacy of Christ, and the reality of his presence in the Spirit. From this, he speaks of Christ and his church, then makes that reality the master model for our roles in the families that are "in the Lord." Does it seem that the role of the husband is exalted too much, that he should be likened to Christ? Ah, but that likeness offers no autocratic rule like that of the kings of the Gentiles. Christ is no dictator, but he is the Head of his body the church—in organic union with her. He is the Savior of the church. He loved the church and gave himself up for her. His purpose is "to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless" (Eph. 5:26-27).

Marriage counselors ... prefer to start with specific sources of irritation mentioned by a typical couple. Why did the new husband get so upset to see his wife looking through his wallet? Why does she find total lack of sensitivity in a husband who bangs out his toothbrush without rinsing the basin?

To be sure, men—and women, too—have seized on the idea of submission with no understanding of the transformation brought through Jesus. They miss the sun in the solar system of Paul's commandments. Submission is a meaningless concept in a Christian marriage if the one to whom we are all submitting is left out of the picture. The center is our being "in Christ." Paul's words could not be clearer. "In the Lord" determines everything. Making the husband the head of the house will not yield a Christian marriage or a Christian home. Some poor wives are painfully aware of this, as they try to live peaceably with husbands who take Paul's words, distort them, and impose their own selfish demands on their wives in the guise of Christian submission. Likewise, women can misuse their expectations of husbands by refusing obedience to them until they have "shaped up" and are looking like Paul's ideal model of selflessness. Such women forget that their submission is not ultimately to their husbands, but to Christ, who strengthens them and enables them to submit to a sinner in honor of Christ.

Are Paul's words too theological to be of practical help? Paul certainly knew and understood the teaching of the wisdom books of the Old Testament, which are full of practical applications of godly wisdom. He taught that wisdom, while coming from the Spirit, must be tested and sharpened in experience. But Paul understood why our being joined to Christ through the Spirit is the secret of Christ's union with his body the church. "This is a profound mystery," he says, "but I am talking about Christ and the church" (Eph. 5:32). Paul seems to realize that one might take his words off into a realm of bodiless theology and speculation. Immediately after recognizing the mystery of which he writes, he brings his readers back down to earth with a thump. "However," he adds, as a final word on the issue of marriage, "each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband" (Eph. 5:33). There is no room here for someone who wants to spiritualize away the responsibilities incumbent on husbands or wives.

The husband who imitates the Lord by giving his life for his wife; who has before him Christ's perfecting of the church as his holy bride; who claims her not as his possession, but as belonging to the Lord—that husband will show his wife something of the love of Christ, who calls them to be one flesh. They will together show the world something of the family of God. And the wife who gladly follows her husband; who seeks only his honor and his good; who seeks to bring all things under the headship of Christ by bringing the elements of her own world under the headship of her husband; who longs to accomplish the desires of her husband's heart and to apply those desires to all areas of her authority—that wife will show something of the full submission with which the Son honored his Father.

Such a couple will indeed experience no sense of loss, but the gain of glory. For the wife is the glory of the husband as she submits to him, and the man is glorified and lifted up by the wife who honors him. Both are glorified by the Father and the Son, just as the Son himself is glorified at the last day by theFather to whom he has submitted. Such Christian submission may seem humiliating. But it is the way of Christ, the way of the cross, and the only way to true glory and satisfaction.