Category: Leadership

What does ordination mean?

United Methodist clergy are asked 19 historic questions at the beginning of their ordination. A good friend just asked me which of these are binding, and which are simply a nod to our history.

That’s a difficult question to answer when you look at them. I’ve just said that the biggest lie told at every UMC Annual Conference is when ordinands respond to the question, “Will you visit from house to house?” As I look at these other questions, I wonder how many of these we are telling the truth about.

How many pastors recommend fasting or abstinence by both precept and example? How many have avoided massive debt? How many actually approve our church polity and government?

Are any of these still standing but the first: “Have you faith in Christ?”

By winking and grinning at the other 18, are we compromising even the expectation of faith in Christ?

How do you think these historic questions should be used? Binding? Nod to history? Should we consistently evaluate whether clergy are adhering to any/all of these? Which ones?

The historic questions:

  1. Have you faith in Christ?
  2. Are you going on to perfection?
  3. Do you expect to be made perfect in love in this life?
  4. Are you earnestly striving after it?
  5. Are you resolved to devote yourself wholly to God and his work?
  6. Do you know the General Rules of our Church?
  7. Will you keep them?
  8. Have you studied the doctrines of The United Methodist Church?
  9. After full examination, do you believe that our doctrines are in harmony with the Holy Scriptures?
  10. Will you preach and maintain them?
  11. Have you studied our form of Church discipline and polity?
  12. Do you approve our Church government and polity?
  13. Will you support and maintain them?
  14. Will you diligently instruct the children in every place?
  15. Will you visit from house to house?
  16. Will you recommend fasting or abstinence, both by precept and example?
  17. Are you determined to employ all your time in the work of God?
  18. Are you in debt so as to embarrass you in your work?
  19. Will you observe the following directions? a) Be diligent. Never be unemployed. Never be triflingly employed. Never trifle away time; neither spend any more time at any one place than is strictly necessary. b) Be punctual. Do everything exactly at the time. And do not mend our rules, but keep them; not for wrath, but for conscience’ sake.

Subscribe by e-mail to get regular updates on theology, ministry, and life with God.

For more UMC-specific posts, go to my UMC Posts page.

The Modern Pastor and the Reformed Pastor

“There’s really only time for two things in ministry. Lead a fine worship. Visit the people. The program, leave to volunteers and gung-ho seminarians.”

Several years ago, I came upon that provocative advice from a man named Sam Stanley. It has constantly challenged me regarding the duty of the pastor.

Then a couple years ago I discovered Richard Baxter’s brilliant book, The Reformed Pastor. George Hunter calls it “the most influential book that most pastors today have never read.” That book probably influenced Sam Stanley considerably, whether or not he ever heard of it.

I wish the modern pastor could look much more like Baxter’s Reformed Pastor.*

The Reformed Pastor doesn’t have time for running a big enterprise. Only two things: worship and visit.

The Reformed Pastor can’t be consumed with climbing the career ladder or making more money. If they were unable to visit all of their people, Baxter told pastors they better cut their salaries and hire enough assistants to do the job. Here’s one of his not-too-subtle challenges for anyone whose congregation is too large to visit them all:

If you have but a hundred pounds a year, it is your duty to live upon part of it, and allow the rest to a competent assistant, rather than that the flock which you are over should be neglected. If you say, that is a hard measure, and that your wife and children cannot so live, I answer, Do not many families in your parish live on less? Have not many able ministers in the prelates’ days been glad of less, with liberty to preach the gospel?

Tell us what you really think, Mr. Baxter. The work is so good that I’m fighting to control myself from copying pages’ worth of direct quotation.

The value of visiting from house to house seems utterly lost. I heard almost nothing of it in seminary. I haven’t seen “model pastors” celebrated for it. I’ve practiced it far too little myself.

Before people are ordained in the United Methodist Church, they are asked, “Will you visit from house to house?” They affirm that they will. My friend Aaron calls it the biggest lie told at Annual Conference each year.

Why forsake more study, more sermon prep, more e-mails or strategic planning meetings, more church administration so that we can visit more?

A few reasons to focus on visitation, taken rather directly from Baxter:

  1. Evangelism – We have the best opportunity to convince people of the truth when we speak to each one’s particular questions and situation. We need to be able to say to the sinner, “You are the man!” and plainly mention his particular case. Too direct? Perhaps more later on our terrible inability to identify sin with clarity and care.
  2. Education – Visiting from house to house comes from Paul’s example in Acts 20. He says he taught in public and from house to house. Our people need personal instruction in the faith, not just public preaching. By the way, Baxter used a catechism for this.
  3. Preaching – Our preaching is much better when we know the people hearing it. This is the Word of God for the people of God. We preach best when we know both. I fear that more sermons now originate in the boardroom (the strategic direction speech) than a living room. I even worry that too many sermons originate only in a pastor’s study (the academic treatise or the personal reflection that misidentifies where others are).

A personal example: In a pastoral visit I made a while back, I ended up being able to confront someone very directly, yet lovingly, about some sin in his life. I also learned that he doesn’t read Scripture because he doesn’t feel like he knows how to, and I was able to give some instruction. I ended up standing in his doorway answering his questions about what sanctification is and how we receive it.

Yes, I believe visiting from house to house is one of the most important things for me to do as a pastor. I also know I do it far too little. My challenge is to find a way to give it the pride of place it deserves on my agenda. How about you?

So much more to say about The Reformed Pastor, visiting the people, Church discipline, etc. But I’d also like to get to some other topics. How interesting is this to you? Stay here or move on?

* George Hunter argues that Baxter was “a major source of error” and that John Wesley properly damned his work with faint praise and mainly ignored it. I get what Hunter is saying – that it shouldn’t just be the ordained acting as pastors – but I disagree with him on the value of Baxter’s work and how Wesley handled it. I think John Meunier gets it right on this.

The Modern Pastor and Seminary Debt

I got a good comment in my last post on the modern pastor and money. It reminded me that several pastors come out of seminary with as much as $30-50k in debt.

Seminary debt is a more convincing argument than most for paying pastors more, although I’ll be honest and say I’m still not convinced.

I think seminary debt is a big problem. A few places where we need to think more about what we’re doing:

  1. I’d love to see churches and denominations investing more. If a church sees someone they’d like to encourage in the ministry, it would be great to see them put some money behind that person. Some may say that the denominations can’t afford any more. And yet they keep giving raises to some of their highest paid…
  2. You don’t have to take on 30-50k in debt to go to seminary. It might mean going slower and finding a job (how about getting a ministry position while in school?), but it can be done. Seminary took me 7 years, but I came out of it with no debt despite no scholarship or church help — and that was at Asbury, one of the most expensive. You can do it!
  3. Is it really fair to throw your debt burdens on the Church after seminary? You may say, “It’s the only way for me.” First, I’m not convinced. Second, even if you convince me, it doesn’t mean that any church is obligated to take you on and pay you more so that you can pay off your loans.
  4. Your debt burden limits your options. Come out of seminary with significant debt, and you’re not only looking for the right place to serve, but the right place to serve that can also support your debt load.
  5. The American Church is changing. You may offer incredible leadership to the future of the Church, but it’s quite possible that it will be for little or no pay. I celebrate that coming probability, but it makes it more problematic to take on huge debt and assume that a church paycheck will take care of it on the other end. This also means that you might be considering developing some other competencies if ministry work doesn’t pay the bills.

I know I’m going to cause some trouble by saying this, but here goes… I’m concerned when I see people going to seminary entirely/mostly on debt. I’ve seen several people come out ready to get a ministry job and pay off their debt, only to find that no one is too excited to bring them in. A church may have given them a placid endorsement to go to seminary, but that doesn’t mean they would hire that person on the other end.

This really shouldn’t come as a shock. No one was excited enough to pay their way through school, and no one was excited enough to hire them while in school. Why do we think someone is eagerly waiting to hire them and their $50,000 debt burden right out of school?

NOTE: This is NOT me saying that all of these people are unqualified. If that’s what you’re hearing, please hear something else before you start throwing things at the screen. But what I’ve just said certainly is true for some (many?). I don’t think you can deny that. The person who I see getting church support, or working in a pastoral position while in seminary, never seems to have trouble finding a place to serve after seminary.

For potential seminarians

A word for people considering seminary: Think long and hard before you debt-finance the full thing and assume you should get a big-enough salary on the other end to pay it off.

Consider doing school slower and working.

Ask your church or denomination if they’ll help you financially. If they won’t, press them a bit on just how much they believe in you going to seminary — not to guilt them into paying, but to be sure people aren’t smiling and nodding but thinking something else.

This may be the place that we pull the “It’s my calling, and I don’t care what they say”-card. I’d be slow with that one. I remember a girl who was adamant that she was called to the Christian music ministry. Yet everyone else kept telling her they just didn’t see it happening. It didn’t. But she spent a lot of time and money chasing it. Let the community have a place in discerning calling. And remember that we may be making too much out of this whole “vocational calling” thing in the first place.

For churches and denominations

If you really believe in someone, put your money behind them on the front end. Don’t do them and the Church the disservice of a huge debt to pay off for years to come.

And if you don’t believe in someone, be honest with them before they get $30-50k in debt.

I know this one won’t go over well with all of you. What do you think? Be honest.

Subscribe by e-mail or RSS to get regular updates on theology, ministry, and life with God.