Thursday, December 28, 2006
The Ecclesiastical Ladder of Success
I cannot resist commenting on this post at Monday Morning Insight which is ostensibly about youth pastors growing up to become "real" pastors. As a former youth guy, I feel for this guy, there is a sense that being called to youth ministry is just a temporary stop on the road to real church ministry. Our compensation models certainly reflect that and I think such needs to be addressed. As long as the only place you can "grow old" in youth ministry in the para-church, things are not as they should be.
That said; however, I want to talk about that wonderful phrase he has coined "The Eccesiatstical Ladder of Success" I think it hits on one of the biggest problems we face today. How do we, as Christians, measure our success in Christian growth? After all, are we not supposed to be growing all the time. How do we know we are, and at what rate? Are we succeeding in being a good Christian?
So often when we attempt to answer these questions, we look at some sort of ecclesiastical ladder. Even if we manage to avoid the desire to grow to the point where we can "go professional" with our faith, there are the lay offices - "I've made it to Deacon, but soon I can grow up to be an Elder!"
I am sure every serious Christians sees the folly in that kind of thinking, particularly as I have written it here, and yet if we are honest with ourselves, such thoughts do occur to us from time-to-time. But the worse part is that our ecclesiastical institutions are organized in such a way that it almost forces us to think in such terms.
Obviously, the metric of Christian growth is not institutional office, but character traits - love, joy, peace, patiene, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control. This presents a challenge for our ecclesiatistical institutions - how do we organize those institutions so that these metrics apply?
For one thing, of course, we should insist on evidence of such character in those to whom we grant office. This is something at which we are increasingly bad. Most notably we fail to discipline those with office that fail at some point. I wonder if someone had been holding Ted Haggard accountable on these character traits if things would ever have gotten as far as they did?
But I think there has to be more, even persons of this wonderful character are not always suitable for institutional office, lay or clerical. Should not such people be the standard held up for the rest of the church? How do we do that?
The ladder we seek to climb is not an ecclesiastical one, but a personal development one. Somehow we have to make that ladder evident.
Related Tags: Christian success, fruits of the Spirit, metrics, growth, maturity
That said; however, I want to talk about that wonderful phrase he has coined "The Eccesiatstical Ladder of Success" I think it hits on one of the biggest problems we face today. How do we, as Christians, measure our success in Christian growth? After all, are we not supposed to be growing all the time. How do we know we are, and at what rate? Are we succeeding in being a good Christian?
So often when we attempt to answer these questions, we look at some sort of ecclesiastical ladder. Even if we manage to avoid the desire to grow to the point where we can "go professional" with our faith, there are the lay offices - "I've made it to Deacon, but soon I can grow up to be an Elder!"
I am sure every serious Christians sees the folly in that kind of thinking, particularly as I have written it here, and yet if we are honest with ourselves, such thoughts do occur to us from time-to-time. But the worse part is that our ecclesiastical institutions are organized in such a way that it almost forces us to think in such terms.
Obviously, the metric of Christian growth is not institutional office, but character traits - love, joy, peace, patiene, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control. This presents a challenge for our ecclesiatistical institutions - how do we organize those institutions so that these metrics apply?
For one thing, of course, we should insist on evidence of such character in those to whom we grant office. This is something at which we are increasingly bad. Most notably we fail to discipline those with office that fail at some point. I wonder if someone had been holding Ted Haggard accountable on these character traits if things would ever have gotten as far as they did?
But I think there has to be more, even persons of this wonderful character are not always suitable for institutional office, lay or clerical. Should not such people be the standard held up for the rest of the church? How do we do that?
The ladder we seek to climb is not an ecclesiastical one, but a personal development one. Somehow we have to make that ladder evident.
Related Tags: Christian success, fruits of the Spirit, metrics, growth, maturity
