Various Concepts of Ministry
Every congregation and every member of a congregation needs to ask what image of the church governs its life, because our images can be idols that keep the church from being the instrument of God’s action, and because that image can keep us from being persons in whom the Spirit of God can be incarnate. Such an examination calls for that sort of rethinking of our conception of the ministry that the Reverend Mr. Gates called for in our first chapter. The conception of the ministry held by both ministers and laymen will naturally reflect their conception or image of the church. Here both the ordained member and the lay member are caught in the grip of stereotypes that threaten to stifle the vitality of the church’s ministry. Especially is this true in a time like our own, when the social order is undergoing radical changes.
All too often lay people assume that the problems of the ministry and of the church belong to the clergy alone. Many conscientious ministers today, erroneously assuming this responsibility, are confused as to what their role is. The problem of ministerial roles belongs to the whole church. It is not easy in this time of transition for ministers to be sure of what is expected of them. They sense or see clearly that the old images and patterns of the minister of the gospel do not fit the present time, and, therefore, are not safe ones to follow. Nor do the unsettled conditions of our civilization give very clear-cut clues for the formation of new and relevant concepts of the ministry. Consequently, many ministers, including far too many young ones, seek refuge in different stereotypes which fail to serve the church, and only provide them with the means of evading the real challenges of their task. What, then, are some of these stereotypes?
First, some ministers settle for a stereotype of the priesthood. They seek to recapture and transplant in our age an earlier and109 relevant priestly vitality that succeeds today only in assembling the dry bones or external forms of that role. Or, they may succumb to the preacher stereotype. Under the influence of that image, they think of the preacher as a performer, a sermon as a performance, and the congregation as an audience. That image is partly a product of the monological understanding of communication, and partly a result of the human need to justify oneself by an oversimplified function. The proclamation of the Holy Word as mere content and without dialogical intent is not true preaching of the gospel. Holy words were never meant to be used to justify ministerial function. The Word of God justifies us, but our words about the Word of God do not justify us. Furthermore, the Living Word did not enter the world imperialistically, and that Word should not be preached presumptively now, but with the expectation of having to engage the world responsibly. Still other ministers try to find a contemporary concept of ministry by modeling themselves after one of the respected patterns of our society: the business executive, the physician, or the group therapist. But as controlling images of the church’s ministry, these are not comprehensive, and they too tend to become constricting stereotypes.
Then there is the stereotype of the local church, which is still thought of as a parish in a nineteenth-century neighborhood sense. In most places the parish community is no longer the center of people’s common life. The neighborhood in which the church is located is an area to which people come home from their varied activities in order to sleep. And for an increasing number of men whose work keeps them on the road, even sleeping at home occurs only on occasional week ends. These and other stereotypes stifle the full power of the ministry and keep it from being equal to today’s task. Too many ministers, in consequence, feel alone and separated from their people, and are bewildered by the complexity of their work and the ambiguous results of their efforts.
Lay people, on the other hand, receive little help in overcoming their stereotypes of the ministry and gravitate to a concept of the110 church that is hard to distinguish from a middle-class country club or a social service center. Another complicating influence is the current emphasis on the lay ministry. The general stress on the priesthood of all believers had made both clergy and laity less sure about the role of the clergy, even to the point, figuratively speaking, of seeming to unordain the ordained, and without clearly defining the ministry of the lay member.
Is there an answer to these confusions and ambiguities? What can clergy and laity now do to find their present and new role in the life of the church and world? There is an answer to these questions which, if followed, will open the ministry of the whole church to the renewing vitality of the Holy Spirit.
First, the role of the clergy and the concepts of it are the responsibility of the whole church. But the clergy are more conscious of the problems of the church and of the ministry, and they should, therefore, share them with the laity. Ministers make the mistake of keeping “their” problems, which are really the problems of the church, to themselves, instead of making sure that the rest of the church members are aware of and assuming responsibility for them.
Second, if the clergy are to share these concerns with the laity, they must break through the stereotypes held by both groups as described earlier. There is evidence that both ministers and laity are suffering restraints as a result of their false images of each other. The question is: Do the clergy dare to reveal themselves as spiritual leaders who do not always know the answers, and who themselves need desperately to be a part of a church that is a supportive and accepting fellowship? When asked why they do not discuss problems of the church within the church, ministers often reply: “What would my people think of me? I’m supposed to be the answer man.” The truth is that many laymen welcome being released from false images of the clergy.
Third, ministers, therefore, need to be dialogists rather than monologists. This might turn out to be the appropriate concept of their role for this day. As representatives of the gospel, which111 was born of the full meeting and full interchange between God and man in Christ, the minister must learn to engage in dialogue with his people, and to participate in that dialogue with God which goes on in their living. The great questions of the church and the ministry are not going to be solved by the ordained ministers alone, but by the clergy and the laity accepting communication with each other as a part of their common ministry, and together bringing the gospel into dialogue with the world.