The Office of Pastor

[Withdrawn]

Originally Posted by Felicity

I was responding to MPs question of how the position of 'pastor' developed over time. I believe there have always been men who had the position of overseer/pastor/elder whatever you want to call it since the early church. Timothy was sent to the church in Crete to oversee and far as I can tell from Scripture his position was ongoing and long term.

Hi, Sis. Felicity.

You may be making an assumption here that isn't necessarily correct. Timothy was sent, true. But does that mean that he was sent as a pastor? I've heard preachers incorrectly refer to the Apostle Paul as the "pastor" of the Corinthian church. Paul was an Apostle. He was NOT a Pastor. I did a cursory study of the New Testament, with the help of a Greek lexicon, and found that there were actually around 26 (or so, can't remember the exact number) that are referred to as Apostle in the New Testament. The KJV doesn't necessarily allow that to come across, but Timothy was one of them, as I recall.

I believe, from my studies, that churches had MANY pastors - they were the elders who mentored and discipled the saints. It certainly was not a paid position, but it WAS every bit as full time as my calling to be a saint and walk uprightly is a full time calling.

Be blessed.

[Digging4Truth]

Originally Posted by jaamez

Hi, Sis. Felicity.

You may be making an assumption here that isn't necessarily correct. Timothy was sent, true. But does that mean that he was sent as a pastor? I've heard preachers incorrectly refer to the Apostle Paul as the "pastor" of the Corinthian church. Paul was an Apostle. He was NOT a Pastor. I did a cursory study of the New Testament, with the help of a Greek lexicon, and found that there were actually around 26 (or so, can't remember the exact number) that are referred to as Apostle in the New Testament. The KJV doesn't necessarily allow that to come across, but Timothy was one of them, as I recall.

I believe, from my studies, that churches had MANY pastors - they were the elders who mentored and discipled the saints. It certainly was not a paid position, but it WAS every bit as full time as my calling to be a saint and walk uprightly is a full time calling.

Be blessed.

Wouldn't that be great to see in our day.

A church operating with multiple pastors... several spirit led prophets with a word from God... a number of evangelists who are gifted to reach out into the local community with the good news of Christ, teachers who have a gift to open and share the word of God on a very basic and foundation building level...

All working together in union and equality for one purpose... the growth (both internally and externally) of the Body of Christ.

[Felicity]

Originally Posted by jaamez

Hi, Sis. Felicity.

You may be making an assumption here that isn't necessarily correct. Timothy was sent, true. But does that mean that he was sent as a pastor? I've heard preachers incorrectly refer to the Apostle Paul as the "pastor" of the Corinthian church. Paul was an Apostle. He was NOT a Pastor. I did a cursory study of the New Testament, with the help of a Greek lexicon, and found that there were actually around 26 (or so, can't remember the exact number) that are referred to as Apostle in the New Testament. The KJV doesn't necessarily allow that to come across, but Timothy was one of them, as I recall.

I believe, from my studies, that churches had MANY pastors - they were the elders who mentored and discipled the saints. It certainly was not a paid position, but it WAS every bit as full time as my calling to be a saint and walk uprightly is a full time calling.

Be blessed.

Timothy was sent to oversee. This is what a pastor in his role as we understand it today does. A pastor oversees. A pastor evangelizes or he should because Paul told Timothy to do the work of an evangelist. So ought all pastors to do this. A pastor prophesies. A pastor teaches. A pastor does all these things. And many pastors are apostles as well.

I personally like the way the church is set up today with a leader elder or pastor. And the pastor can appoint other men in the church to lead along with him as elders or board members or whatever you want to call them.

I think God's blessing is on the structure of the church as it's set up now. It has been very effective overall.

[Digging4Truth]

Originally Posted by Felicity

Timothy was sent to oversee. This is what a pastor in his role as we understand it today does. A pastor oversees. A pastor evangelizes or he should because Paul told Timothy to do the work of an evangelist. So ought all pastors to do this. A pastor prophesies. A pastor teaches. A pastor does all these things. And many pastors are apostles as well.

Then God was quite redundant in his placing of the other ministries. Per your post here the pastor can do pretty much all of it and the others are needed if the load gets to big that one man can't handle it anymore.

I personally like the way the church is set up today with a leader elder or pastor. And the pastor can appoint other men in the church to lead along with him as elders or board members or whatever you want to call them.

I think God's blessing is on the structure of the church as it's set up now. It has been very effective overall.

If one believes that baptism in Jesus Name is required for salvation then the church has reached less than 1% of the world.

Those aren't very impressive numbers for a church that is effective overall.

[iceniez]

Originally Posted by Felicity

Timothy was sent to oversee. This is what a pastor in his role as we understand it today does. A pastor oversees. A pastor evangelizes or he should because Paul told Timothy to do the work of an evangelist. So ought all pastors to do this. A pastor prophesies. A pastor teaches. A pastor does all these things. And many pastors are apostles as well.

I personally like the way the church is set up today with a leader elder or pastor. And the pastor can appoint other men in the church to lead along with him as elders or board members or whatever you want to call them.

I think God's blessing is on the structure of the church as it's set up now. It has been very effective overall.

I wonder sometimes if it would be easier to just opperate in ones gift and not worry about TITLES.

[Felicity]

Originally Posted by Digging4Truth

Then God was quite redundant in his placing of the other ministries. Per your post here the pastor can do pretty much all of it and the others are needed if the load gets to big that one man can't handle it anymore.



If one believes that baptism in Jesus Name is required for salvation then the church has reached less than 1% of the world.

Those aren't very impressive numbers for a church that is effective overall.

I agree with you about the numbers. I don't even want to think about that. So much I could say about this in particular, but perhaps I'd better not get started.

In regard to the five fold ministry, I believe that there are men more gifted in one ministry than another. It's pretty apparent that there are men especially gifted in the ministry of evangelism or in the prophetic or in teaching, etc. But it's also true that many pastors operate in many of these ministries. It's just the truth.

There are men who are 'evangelists' who can also teach and are prophets and who've been apostles as well although these may not be their main giftings. See what I'm saying?

[Felicity]

Originally Posted by iceniez

I wonder sometimes if it would be easier to just opperate in ones gift and not worry about TITLES.

I hear you, but labels and titles are a given, and are necessary too.

[Withdrawn]

Originally Posted by Felicity

I personally like the way the church is set up today with a leader elder or pastor. And the pastor can appoint other men in the church to lead along with him as elders or board members or whatever you want to call them.

I think God's blessing is on the structure of the church as it's set up now. It has been very effective overall.

I would agree with this statement as well, and I hope you understand that my purpose is not to be contentious, my dear sister. My purpose is just to encourage non-traditional thinking that is open to the notion that how things are setup TODAY may not be how the first century church was setup. I've heard sermon after sermon of preachers saying that we should be seeing the same results that the first century church did because WE ARE the Book of Acts church. Well, in doctrine we probably are - I sure hope so. But in organization... not so much. We are not just a contemporary clone of the first century; we can't expect the same results if we're not willing to look deeper into what they really did and how they really operated.

I'll admit that the current structure of the church is very comfortable to me. It's familiar to me and I like it...and that makes me happy. But God's blessing does not always equal his endorsement or pleasure with something. He's blessing the current structure, I believe, because there are sincere hearts that are diligently seeking Him. But how much more COULD He bless, or WOULD He bless, if we were truly operating in the structure of the five-fold ministry that they had in the first century.

I posted this in another topic, but the theme of it applies here as well. God still blessed the people with water from the rock when Moses disobeyed. But His blessing clearly was in spite of disobedience.

Originally Posted by jaamez

Not trying to revive a dying thread...LOL

But the Lord spoke this to me yesterday morning while I was preparing for my Bible lesson, and my mind raced back to this post.

In Exodus 17, when the Israelites were grumbling because they were thirsty in the desert, the LORD told Moses to "smite the rock" with his staff and they would have water. This was, no doubt, a notable event in Moses' life that he probably considered a landmark. An "old path", if you will. God showed him that day that He could use him to bring waters of refreshing to God's people by striking a rock with his staff.

Later, in Numbers 20, the people are grumbling again because they are thirsty again. But this time, the LORD told Moses to "speak to the rock" and water would flow from the rock. But the "old paths" caused Moses to remember that the last time they needed water, God told him to hit the rock with his staff. So, here's a decision. Should I listen to what I feel God telling me to do now? Or should I go with what the "old paths" tell me is the right thing to do? It worked then. It was good for my dear mother, it's good enough for me. So, let's go with the old path. After all, it brought water back then, and everyone needs this water.

The people still received the water, and they drank from it. The miracle was still provided. But we can't confuse what God permits with what is His will. The problem is that Moses' disobedience cost him the privilege of leading God's people into the promised land. There's no doubt that Moses remains highly lauded as one of the greatest men in the Old Testament. But he missed out on a great opportunity, and the people of God missed out on a great opportunity to see God work in a new and different way.

This is what can happen when we become married to the "old paths." Our old landmarks, if we're not careful, can become idols to us. If we are leaning more on past experience than on the voice of God, we're going to end up in disappointment. We need to take some direction from Hezekiah sometimes and break the "brasen serpent" (2 Kings 18) that has become idolatrous. It was an old landmark that God used to bring healing to those who had been bitten by the fiery serpents (Numbers 21), but they ended up burning incense to it. They confused the landmark with God Himself.

Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today, forever. God never changes, but how and where He leads is always changing. We need to be agile if we're going to follow Him. If we entrench ourselves in tradition, we might make it to the promised land in the end, but we'll miss out on a lot of new and exciting experiences along the way.

[iceniez]

Originally Posted by Felicity

I hear you, but labels and titles are a given, and are necessary too.

True when they are not abused or misused.

[Digging4Truth]

Originally Posted by iceniez

I wonder sometimes if it would be easier to just opperate in ones gift and not worry about TITLES.

I think that was the original intent.

The terms are simply descriptions of the accomplishment of each ministry.

It is we who have made these simple descriptions become viewed as titles of some sort.