I think we've total bastarized the role of pastor in our churches today. At the Church Institution that I attend today, We've got one guy who preaches from a remote location who we don't know at all, and a local guy (I get the feeling they'd be horrified having a women in that role) who is more like business man than a spiritual leader. In fact, during a heated discussion with him regarding my concerns for shepharding he emphatically stated to me he is NOT a shephard. Since he isn't preaching, I can't figure out what else he could be doing with his time and what else could be more important. There are only about 200-250 adults in his location and isn't the primary role of a pastor to shephard?
Misty1965
· 9 months ago
I feel you on this one. THE ROLE OF THE PASTOR CHANGED BUT NO ONE INFORMED THE CONGREGATION. A lot of these pastors have redefined their roles. Excuse me but..., I thought the role of a pastor was to be a shepard to the sheep. I attend a church with nearly 50 members including kids. When the pastor or his wife finishes preaching they walk off the pulpit, go into the office and close the door. They will not return your phone call and have stated that they have a church policy where they don't deal with the people so I have a new policy too. Where I leave and not give any money . It's really distressing looking at the condition of the churches today and I'm sure that if the people are not happy with this poor service that God can't be happy with it either and video preaching is out. Why would I get dressed and drive all the way to church to see a video? I can stay home for that.
monts
· 1 year ago
How is video any different than the apostle Paul sending letters? He wasn't at every church all the time... he used the technology of his day to communicate the gospel to the largest audience possible.
I certainly have my questions about video teaching and I'm not 100% sold on it, but to say that we've bastardized the role of pastor is a total misstatement when looking at the whole of church history.
Lead Pastors take more of an apostolic role in our churches than that of a shepherd... there are far many more people in the church today that function as shepherds... we truly do need to recover the apostolic.
Jonathan Brink
· 1 year ago
But Monts, isn't it fair to say that what we think the role of pastor is has changed over the last 20 years?
unorthodoxology
· 1 year ago
Thanks for adding the "her" in there.
I think part of the distance is the professionalization of the ministry, which many evangelical/mega churches are just recently sponsoring in full-force.
I think the development is both good and bad, but I can't help but wonder perhaps if pastors should become counselors and we should become pastors. If we really believe in a narrative theology, shouldn't church, then, be about learning from each other's stories instead of listening to painful exegesis or a slick techno savvy feel-good message about being a good friend.
I think the only part of church I still get anything out of is the time when we sit around afterwards and share our lives.
Just thoughts.
Jonathan Brink
· 1 year ago
Pretty good thoughts Unortho.
Alan Knox
· 1 year ago
This may sound simple, but a pastor who doesn't know and spend time with people is like a doctor who doesn't know anatomy or a mechanic who doesn't spend time with cars. It just doesn't make sense.
-Alan
Daniel
· 1 year ago
San Jose? You never by chance met a guy by the name of John Byrd did you? He may have even been the pastor at a baptist church there but probably before even your time. (I don't know crap about my family history...) Died some time in the mid '80s.
As for my opinion on the role of the pastor, and/or church leaders, I agree with Jimbo's pastor, he may not be a Shepherd. But someone better be. I'm of the same mind as Alan Hirsch, that a church needs 5 gifted men (women?), one in each area: Apostle, Prophet, Evangelist, Shepherd, teacher. These roles do overlap but all 5 are needed.
For example, I'm a ATSPE.
Jonathan Brink
· 1 year ago
Alan, I agree.
Daniel. I have not met John Byrd.
Chris Marlow
· 1 year ago
I think the role is changing. Therefore its created both good and bad issues. I don't think there is a right way to do church. I do think we need to do church multiple ways to increase our effectiveness.
I'm not a fan of video venue-but I do think It can be effective. I think our frustration is trying to locate a "center" and when we do church outside of how we think it should be done-we start criticizing that process.
However I think we need to see evangelism, discipleship and proper theological training take place no matter what style of church.
I've learned that I can't just assume my way is the right way.
monts
· 1 year ago
I agree the role of pastor has changed, and for the better. Twenty year ago, growing up in the church, the pastor did everything and there was no belief in the priesthood of all believers... the pastor did it all. Now that we're recovering a sense of the apostolic and allowing those pastors with that gift to spread their wings, we're complaining that they're not pastoral. Well, that may not necessarily be their gift. I myself do not have that gift, at least it's not a main gifting... but I do have the gift of teaching and apostleship. Please don't fence me in to a role that God has not designed me for.
Dana
· 1 year ago
Hi. I've been following your blog for quite some time, but I think this may be the first time I've commented! Interestingly enough, my home church has recently been exploring options with video technology. In fact, tonight we listened/watched a sermon via video as part of the One Prayer thing. I think it can become very difficult for pastors to navigate, define, and re-define their role, especially if the church is growing quickly. I think pastors still shepherd...but they shepherd other shepherds who, in turn, shepherd the flock. I can't say if that's good, bad, or neither. Personally, I think it would be good if instead of just expanding and expanding and becoming a HUGE (and potentially impersonal) church, churches would *multiply*. Something like cell division. Don't know how well that would work out, but maybe it would close the gap between pastor and the flock.
knightopia
· 1 year ago
Jonathan, you wrote, "Has the role of pastor changed in the era that we currently live in? Has the role morphed from essentially shepherds of a flock to presenters of spiritual information?"
I think you asked and answered your own question right there. Obviously there are still churches (thousands of small- and medium-sized churches) where there is someone serving as "pastor" who is friendly and accessible, who doesn't spend all his (or her) time in an office somewhere planning to present a sermon on Sunday morning.
The shift that I see happening is a consolidation of professional preachers on the higher end of the spectrum (e.g., mega-/multi-site churches). There will be more and more churches that gather more and more Christians, with fewer and fewer "teaching"/preaching pastors -- because the "rock stars" will be piped onto more and more screens.
At the opposite end of the spectrum will be the continuing growth of house churches, neo-monastic intentional communities, and other "post-congregational" expressions of "church." That's the end of the spectrum that I'm personally more in tune with, but I'm still encouraged by seeing God at work everywhere along the spectrum. It takes all kinds, right?
So, yes, I see that the role of the pastor has changed and is still changing, and technology plays quite a big role in that shift. And that will always be the case (as my 3D "virtual pastor" post over at the DigialLeadNet blog hopefully illustrated).
amoslanka
· 1 year ago
thats one of my biggest dislikes of mega churches. of course, thats when those churches tend to have lots and lots of associate pastors, for the sake of still providing that service, but for me personally i'd like more than anythign to be a part of my leader's life.
Jonathan Brink
· 1 year ago
Monts, I hope I didn't give the impression of boxing you in. The purpose of my post was to point out exactly what you were saying. I wouldn't be surprised if over the next twenty to fifty years the role of "pastor" completely dies out and we morph into an APEST model that supports the priesthood of all believer.
Jonathan Brink
· 1 year ago
Steve, I wonder how long it will take before we truly see a franchised model of the virtual pastor, or are we already there.
Jonathan Brink
· 1 year ago
Amos, I just had a conversation with a good friend about the "pastor's life" and it can be brutal. I have many friends who feel a tremendous weight about the role and it can be crippling.
Jonathan Brink
· 1 year ago
Nice Dana. Thanks for joining in.
I think you touched on one of the issues here is the sense of leadership and having a touch point with someone who can lead someone through discipleship and growth. Sunday's don't work for me anymore. I've been ruined by an intentional community process that is deeply rewarding. But what I have found is that it didn't require a pastor. It required me following someone who could teach me the love and trust.
What was funny is that my pastor was in my original group specifically with the intent of being a participant, not a leader. It was his discipleship experience in a lot of ways and it was good for a lot of people to see that.
Yolculuklar
· 1 year ago
Jonathan (and all the commentors), It was interesting to read your discussion. I felt like the remoteness of the pastor is associated with the possibilities that advanced technologies provide for us, i.e. multi-campus churches with central video-sermons. For my experience this is a very extreme form of remoteness, and I would not necessarily call the person in the video a pastor, but maybe a preacher, or I guess apostle also fits into that picture. However I try to think about it, this video-sermon concept is beyond my non-western mind and church/cultural setting!
Coming back to remoteness, one can be pastoring (or maybe leading is a better word?) a group of 50 people and still be remote from his/her congregation. Elias Canetti says secrecy/isolation is one of the ways to keep power in one's hands (in "Crowds and Power"), and Jonathan, when I thought about your question, I immediately connected it with the need to hold power in one's hands. I believe a pastor who is not open, transparent and vulnerable to his/her flock cannot really be 'part' of that flock. However, as Henri Nouwen suggests in "In the Name of Jesus", I believe pastors (and all church ministers) are also called to be part of their flocks rather than be apart from them. Then I wonder if it would be too much to assume that a pastor who is not part of the congregation has some power related issues that need to addressed?
In my opinion, a church where the congregation do not know who their pastor really is is far from the ideal church, and in this kind of a setting I would expect the community to have some natural pastors/shepherds to take care of the flock, men and women who are not necessarily 'ordained' or 'appointed' as such, but who have the gift of shepherding.
Thanks for making me think on this interesting topic.
Tracy Simmons
· 1 year ago
Jonathan, you and Bill and Brant have gotten me all riled up!
Got me latop back from the 'doctor' so I can quickly read thru all the interesting stuff- then I am away for a week on business!!
Pastors - have we not misinterpreted the role altogether and whether they are virtual or real life does not really matter as we have moved them into a role that is not biblical?
Citing Paul as using technology is, IMO, out of context - Paul was an apostle and in any event he did not write a letter a week to each church. Also, these were all reletively new churches and so they needed a lot of instruction.
I prefer the concept of the 5 fold ministry working in team BUT BUT BUT it is still to train THE SAINTS to do the work of the ministry!!
So, whether by email, video or up front - pastors are not what they are supposed to be and perhaps your question is actually the wrong one and should rather be: Are pastors fulfiling their biblical mandate? But then why just ask that of pastors?
Brett Marko
· 1 year ago
Interesting.... There are a lot of dimensions to this question. If we look at what a pastor truly does versus how those of us in Western civilization has distorted it to be today, we find that you shouldn't have a pastor videotaped in. I challenged a friend I grew up with who became a pastor about evangelizing. He look at me matter of factly and said that evangelizing directly wasn't his primary job as a pastor, though he had personal responsibility to share his faith. His primary job was to equip those in his flock to share their faith and grow in their faith.
So in the megachurches, just because one fellow's name is on there as the head pastor, is he really? Most chances he is not. We have gotten pastor mixed up with being a teacher and/or being an administrator. I think it is fine to video in a teacher. However the pastor should be local as he does have a responsibility to the congregation.
In some ways, I think the Lutherans may have it right on this as they only allow their churches to grow up to 1000 people before splitting off a new church. They say that this is the upward most range for a pastor to "know" his congregation. I know this is true because I had my faith restored to me at a "megachurch". The pastor were unavailable due to the sheer volume of need. Many in fact withdrew from the press of the crowd as it overwhelmed them.
I look around at many of the pastors I know. Some are gifted counselors, some are gifted administrators, some are profound teachers, and others are profound pastors. Since I go to a United Methodist Church now, we don't get too many prophets.... Needless to say, I don't know too many that are good at all 5 points. Usually it's 1 or 2. So in conclusion, I do think part of the problem is the congregation. We think bigger is better. We also look for a one size fits all person when it usually is best as a team as you stated.
titlesareunimportant
· 1 year ago
Ditto to Steve K.'s comment consolidation. Back in the 90s I listened to a teaching by Bill Hybels where he talked about having things like Teaching Pastors, and Administrative pastors.
Personally, I'm torn between the pragmatism of specialization within pastoral care and the chaos that comes with our traditional understanding of pastor.
The old school pastor/shepard did a lot of things poorly and maybe one thing well. Nowadays you can have one person who is excels in preaching and a host of supporting individuals doing things as varied as finance to hospital visits.
It's blindingly efficient, but is it how the church should be run? Well, as of now, that's the kind of church I attend, and it's good. Better than the old way? Jury is still out.
Chris Salzman
· 1 year ago
FYI: that last comment by titlesareunimportant was by me (forgot to sign out of my other blog...).
Also, I forgot to mention thanks for linking to TC!
Zirk
· 7 months ago
Wow... How sad that pastors are doing keeping themselves from what they are there for in the first place... SERVING THE PEOPLE. I am a pastor myself and the "preaching on a video trend" have not started here, well not that I know of, but l would like to give my thoughts on the subject. The Afrikaans word used for ministry is "bediening" and that might not be anything to your understanding but it means to serve. Ministry is about doing what Christ did, being with people and teaching them the Will of God. More than that it is showing them the love of God manifested here on earth. True love , friendship and support is needed to ensure that any congregation reaches spiritual maturity and somehow I dont think a video can replace time spent with God and the people to be there when they need the pastor...
mamacup
· 4 months ago
As my brother says "when we go to church we hear a mini rock concert & motivational speech, the pastor quotes a lot of well known figures and then seasons it with some scripture for good measure."
All Comments
In fact, during a heated discussion with him regarding my concerns for shepharding he emphatically stated to me he is NOT a shephard. Since he isn't preaching, I can't figure out what else he could be doing with his time and what else could be more important. There are only about 200-250 adults in his location and isn't the primary role of a pastor to shephard?
I certainly have my questions about video teaching and I'm not 100% sold on it, but to say that we've bastardized the role of pastor is a total misstatement when looking at the whole of church history.
Lead Pastors take more of an apostolic role in our churches than that of a shepherd... there are far many more people in the church today that function as shepherds... we truly do need to recover the apostolic.
I think part of the distance is the professionalization of the ministry, which many evangelical/mega churches are just recently sponsoring in full-force.
I think the development is both good and bad, but I can't help but wonder perhaps if pastors should become counselors and we should become pastors. If we really believe in a narrative theology, shouldn't church, then, be about learning from each other's stories instead of listening to painful exegesis or a slick techno savvy feel-good message about being a good friend.
I think the only part of church I still get anything out of is the time when we sit around afterwards and share our lives.
Just thoughts.
-Alan
As for my opinion on the role of the pastor, and/or church leaders, I agree with Jimbo's pastor, he may not be a Shepherd. But someone better be. I'm of the same mind as Alan Hirsch, that a church needs 5 gifted men (women?), one in each area: Apostle, Prophet, Evangelist, Shepherd, teacher. These roles do overlap but all 5 are needed.
For example, I'm a ATSPE.
Daniel. I have not met John Byrd.
I'm not a fan of video venue-but I do think It can be effective. I think our frustration is trying to locate a "center" and when we do church outside of how we think it should be done-we start criticizing that process.
However I think we need to see evangelism, discipleship and proper theological training take place no matter what style of church.
I've learned that I can't just assume my way is the right way.
I think you asked and answered your own question right there. Obviously there are still churches (thousands of small- and medium-sized churches) where there is someone serving as "pastor" who is friendly and accessible, who doesn't spend all his (or her) time in an office somewhere planning to present a sermon on Sunday morning.
The shift that I see happening is a consolidation of professional preachers on the higher end of the spectrum (e.g., mega-/multi-site churches). There will be more and more churches that gather more and more Christians, with fewer and fewer "teaching"/preaching pastors -- because the "rock stars" will be piped onto more and more screens.
At the opposite end of the spectrum will be the continuing growth of house churches, neo-monastic intentional communities, and other "post-congregational" expressions of "church." That's the end of the spectrum that I'm personally more in tune with, but I'm still encouraged by seeing God at work everywhere along the spectrum. It takes all kinds, right?
So, yes, I see that the role of the pastor has changed and is still changing, and technology plays quite a big role in that shift. And that will always be the case (as my 3D "virtual pastor" post over at the DigialLeadNet blog hopefully illustrated).
I think you touched on one of the issues here is the sense of leadership and having a touch point with someone who can lead someone through discipleship and growth. Sunday's don't work for me anymore. I've been ruined by an intentional community process that is deeply rewarding. But what I have found is that it didn't require a pastor. It required me following someone who could teach me the love and trust.
What was funny is that my pastor was in my original group specifically with the intent of being a participant, not a leader. It was his discipleship experience in a lot of ways and it was good for a lot of people to see that.
It was interesting to read your discussion. I felt like the remoteness of the pastor is associated with the possibilities that advanced technologies provide for us, i.e. multi-campus churches with central video-sermons. For my experience this is a very extreme form of remoteness, and I would not necessarily call the person in the video a pastor, but maybe a preacher, or I guess apostle also fits into that picture. However I try to think about it, this video-sermon concept is beyond my non-western mind and church/cultural setting!
Coming back to remoteness, one can be pastoring (or maybe leading is a better word?) a group of 50 people and still be remote from his/her congregation. Elias Canetti says secrecy/isolation is one of the ways to keep power in one's hands (in "Crowds and Power"), and Jonathan, when I thought about your question, I immediately connected it with the need to hold power in one's hands. I believe a pastor who is not open, transparent and vulnerable to his/her flock cannot really be 'part' of that flock. However, as Henri Nouwen suggests in "In the Name of Jesus", I believe pastors (and all church ministers) are also called to be part of their flocks rather than be apart from them. Then I wonder if it would be too much to assume that a pastor who is not part of the congregation has some power related issues that need to addressed?
In my opinion, a church where the congregation do not know who their pastor really is is far from the ideal church, and in this kind of a setting I would expect the community to have some natural pastors/shepherds to take care of the flock, men and women who are not necessarily
'ordained' or 'appointed' as such, but who have the gift of shepherding.
Thanks for making me think on this interesting topic.
http://tinyurl.com/3hs68e
:)
Tracy
Got me latop back from the 'doctor' so I can quickly read thru all the interesting stuff- then I am away for a week on business!!
Pastors - have we not misinterpreted the role altogether and whether they are virtual or real life does not really matter as we have moved them into a role that is not biblical?
Citing Paul as using technology is, IMO, out of context - Paul was an apostle and in any event he did not write a letter a week to each church. Also, these were all reletively new churches and so they needed a lot of instruction.
I prefer the concept of the 5 fold ministry working in team BUT BUT BUT it is still to train THE SAINTS to do the work of the ministry!!
So, whether by email, video or up front - pastors are not what they are supposed to be and perhaps your question is actually the wrong one and should rather be: Are pastors fulfiling their biblical mandate?
But then why just ask that of pastors?
So in the megachurches, just because one fellow's name is on there as the head pastor, is he really? Most chances he is not. We have gotten pastor mixed up with being a teacher and/or being an administrator. I think it is fine to video in a teacher. However the pastor should be local as he does have a responsibility to the congregation.
In some ways, I think the Lutherans may have it right on this as they only allow their churches to grow up to 1000 people before splitting off a new church. They say that this is the upward most range for a pastor to "know" his congregation. I know this is true because I had my faith restored to me at a "megachurch". The pastor were unavailable due to the sheer volume of need. Many in fact withdrew from the press of the crowd as it overwhelmed them.
I look around at many of the pastors I know. Some are gifted counselors, some are gifted administrators, some are profound teachers, and others are profound pastors. Since I go to a United Methodist Church now, we don't get too many prophets.... Needless to say, I don't know too many that are good at all 5 points. Usually it's 1 or 2. So in conclusion, I do think part of the problem is the congregation. We think bigger is better. We also look for a one size fits all person when it usually is best as a team as you stated.
Personally, I'm torn between the pragmatism of specialization within pastoral care and the chaos that comes with our traditional understanding of pastor.
The old school pastor/shepard did a lot of things poorly and maybe one thing well. Nowadays you can have one person who is excels in preaching and a host of supporting individuals doing things as varied as finance to hospital visits.
It's blindingly efficient, but is it how the church should be run? Well, as of now, that's the kind of church I attend, and it's good. Better than the old way? Jury is still out.
Also, I forgot to mention thanks for linking to TC!