Leadership

The Local Church

Philosophy of Ministry

by Pastor Henry Stewart

What is success in Your eyes, O God? We long to do things Your way and minister for Your glory. Make our efforts conform to the perfectness of Your nature and the revelation of Your Word. We pray. Amen.

When speaking of a local church's "Philosophy of Ministry" what we are really asking is: "How do we know when we are doing ministry successfully?"

Implied in the question is the need to define a standard for identifying "success" in ministry. The very notion that we have a responsibility to define success in ministry may strike some of us as vaguely unspiritual. Is not success a worldly concept?

It may be of some comfort to examine Nehemiah's prayer in Nehemiah 1:11. Nehemiah asks the Lord, "Make thy servant successful," as he prepares to lay before King Artaxerxes his plan to begin a rebuilding work in Jerusalem.

Most of us, to one degree or another, find ourselves to be "repairers of broken walls" in our IFCA International churches. Most of us face "broken walls" of inertia and passivity that keep us simply maintaining time-honored (and often archaic) organizational structures rather than advancing in intentional ministry. It is therefore entirely appropriate that we ask what success in ministry might look like and our answer to that question is what we mean by a philosophy of ministry.

Obviously if success in doing ministry is a legitimate goal, we need our standard for success to be defined for us from God's Word. Without scriptural standards for success in ministry we easily fall prey to unworthy standards. The "Five F's" traditionally used to measure ministry success: Figures, Finances, Facilities, Feelings and Faithfulness. All of these, as we shall see, come short of a fully biblical description of ministry success. (We will shortly return to these.) Let us begin, however, by dwelling on the positive side of this issue. We need to focus on the true measure of ministry success.

PHILOSOPHY OF MINISTRY DERIVED FROM BIBLICAL MISSION AND PURPOSE

A philosophy of ministry for a local church is a concept that is derived by asking prior questions: "What is the primary mission or purpose of a local Christian assembly? What does the risen Lord tell us the mission of His body is to be?" A philosophy of ministry will be derived from the answers we glean about church mission and purpose from God's Word.

To this author it is scripturally apparent and obvious what local Christian assemblies are to be about: the Great Commandment and the Great Commission. The local church is to do all to the glory of God out of a hot-hearted devotion to His person. Being so motivated, the church is to be a part of the world wide program of disciple-making. We will be incapable of discerning a scriptural philosophy of ministry until we have an overall grasp of God's purpose for the local church. That purpose or mission is making disciples to the glory of God.

One summer while on vacation my grandsons and I had a great time sitting on a huge inner tube with paddles. As we all paddled furiously we never moved ahead. We simply went around and around in circles. Until a local church leadership group "owns" (through thorough study of the Scriptures and prayer) the biblical purpose and mission of a local Christian assembly, that local church will also expend a tremendous amount of energy going around in circles with different groups and sub-groups acting on largely conflicting agendas of "what we ought to be doing."

Mission and purpose agreement and ownership among the most influential leaders of the church (official and unofficial) must precede developing a church philosophy of ministry. Philosophy of ministry development is always "step two," because a philosophy of ministry simply describes how people are equipped and deployed to carry out the mission. Are we, in fact, "making disciples" in our churches? The transition from biblical mission and purpose to discerning "what is a biblical philosophy of ministry" takes place by asking the following question, "What does Jesus mean by making a disciple?"

THE SCRIPTURAL DATA SUPPORTING A BIBLICAL PHILOSOPHY OF MINISTRY

The following scriptures offer important data that bears upon this question. In John 15 verse 16, what is the fruit of which Jesus speaks? The best probable answer is that fruit in the context of Jesus teaching means "disciples making more disciples." Next, in Matthew 28:18-20, Jesus' audience is disciples. He is commanding disciples to "make" more disciples. Therefore a key to understanding making disciples includes the concept of reproduction and multiplication: disciples making more disciples. Also notice in Matthew 28:18-20 that "making a disciple" involves winning, baptizing, and teaching them to observe. This implies that making a spiritually reproductive disciple is a process of winning, equipping, and deploying people.

Second Timothy 2:1-2 also indicates the existence of a process: Paul passes the Word of God to Timothy who teaches faithful men, who in turn teach others also. What we learn from this is that disciple-making is a process of transmission of truth and ability to serve Jesus Christ, multiplying the effect of service for His kingdom. Further we learn from Ephesians 4:11-14 that the whole point of spiritual leadership in the local church is to "equip the saints" for this very purpose.

Conclusion: When are we being successful at ministry in the local church? When we are making disciples through an intentional, organizationally defined process of winning, equipping and deploying people in ministry.

With this in mind lets return to the traditional and non-biblical success measures of local church life, the five F's:

Figures: Good numbers do not necessarily mean good ministry. We can have impressive attendance figures, membership figures, baptism figures, and growth rate figures and not be effective at making disciples.

Finances: Meeting the church annual budget is nice but it is not a measurement of effectiveness.