Here are some of my thoughts from a recent class that I took at the Training Center. We talked about the life of Paul and how he went about doing ministry. In the essay below, I take a look at his methods of ministry and some thing that we can glean from them. These are not doctrinal issues but simply looking at ideas of how we do ministry!
As missionaries, we can often be at a loss of what the definition of our job is. Is our job to save souls? Is our job to disciple people? Is our job to start churches? Is our job to train men? How are we going to do these jobs? What is our process by which we get these done? What does it look like? How much control should we give the native pastors? How much oversight do they need? These are all questions that we as missionaries are going to have to answer. I will endeavor to explain some of my thoughts on the issue in this essay.
I think the first question we should ask is, “Did Paul have a plan or strategy for how he evangelized and planted church?” Paul is the most frequently mentioned apostle in the Bible. He would be the apostle to learn from if we are going into missions. If he had strategies for how he planted churches, I think we should try to learn from him and find out what the Bible has to say about it. It would be the common sense thing to do. If you are a football player, you would want to learn from Vince Lambardi. You are going to try to learn from the guy that has a method that works. On top on this, Paul’s method not only works, but also is the one that God put in the Bible to show us how we should go about reaching the world. This may seem trivial but notice that God did not give us the history of Peter’s ministry. He did not give the account of John’s methods of evangelizing. Although He mentioned theses other apostles several times in the book of Acts, He never gave us the full account of their ministry. I think that we can deduce that God wants us to learn from Paul’s methods because I believe that there is a reason that God has put everything in the Bible. I think that the way Paul did ministry is a example that we should follow.
The first thing that we can notice about Paul’s ministry is that he went to strategic places to start churches. He didn’t just go anywhere to do ministry. Think about the places that he passed by to get to the cities where he spent a majority of his time. I am sure that there were people who said that he was passing by the lost people that were right around him. I am sure that there were Christians who said that he should stay in Israel and not go to the Gentiles. However, God was leading Paul to just the right places. You see, Paul spent a majority of his time in influential cities! You may be wondering what that means. It simply means that Paul went to the cities that were most influential to the surrounding areas. In every country there are a few cities that exert a massive influence on the surrounding areas. These are usually places where there is a large amount of merchandise that passes though. These cities are the trade centers. These cities are places where the people from miles around will go to get supplies. Back in Paul’s day, they would also go into town to hear the news. If Paul went to these cities and people got saved then everyone from the surrounding areas would hear that there was this new religion in town. When Paul did a miracle in one of these towns, everyone would be sure to hear about it. I think the same is true today. We should try to go to places of influence. If we go there then we can make a greater impact on the places around us. If we start churches in a important city then our influence with spread father. I have heard it put this way. “Cities are like the mountain tops from which all the rivers flow.” Meaning that if we can get a foothold in the major cities then our influence will naturally spread to the other regions of the country that we are in. I think we should strongly consider this fact when we go to start our first church or before we firmly establish ourselves in our country. We need to follow Paul’s example and go to the influential cities to start our missions work.
Another thing we can learn from Paul’s example of ministry is not only where he went, but also whom he went to. Some people will argue that Paul did not go to a certain class of people but simple preached to everyone. In the Bible we do see that there are rich women who get saved as well as slaves like Onesimus. There were poor Christians and rich ones. However, I think if we take a look at a majority of the Paul’s converts we can see that most of them were from lower commercial and working class. Some people might say that this means nothing, but I would like to argue that if we want to see the Gospel have the greatest impact on the lives of others we should consider what class of people we are spending a majority of our time witnessing to. I think we must consider the future of our ministry when we think about the people that we are trying to reach. If we go to a very wealthy area and start a church there it will probably be very difficult to find a replacement pastor. I can say from experience that most young guys from wealthier homes are far less likely to want to go into ministry. It is simply looked down upon compared to other occupations. It does not offer much pay and only gives a lot of work. Young guys from wealthier families also tend to already have their lives planned out. Their parents will be much more likely to be resistant to them going into the ministry. If you are not going to be able train pastors your ministry will be severely limited. At the same time, if you go to extremely poor areas, you will have a much harder time finding a reliable, hardworking pastor. You will constantly be dealing with pastors who are not as focused or committed. Neither of these thing are a hard fast rule and I am sure that there are areas where the case may be different. However, as a general rule, I think these things are true and so if we want our ministry to have the greatest impact we should consider the people we are trying to reach. We should try to find the upper-lower class and the lower-middle class in our country and spend a majority of our time working there.
Even though Paul worked with people, his final goal was not to simply see people saved. He went to start churches. I think this fact is something that many people miss and are ignorant of. In fact, most missionaries have gotten so far away from planting churches that many Christians don’t even think about church planting when they think of missions. They will think of a nurse in Asia, a well digger in Africa, or a soccer coach in Morocco. Everything in the world is passed off as missions and most people never even realize that our primary goal should be to start churches. If we simple go to see people saved, then there will never be a lasting work planted. You see Paul would of never had such a lasting impact if he didn’t establish strong churches. Paul was able to write back to churches in Galatia, Ephesus, and Philippi. His primary goal was not to see hundreds of people saved but to leave a church that could continue on without him. I think this should change the way we look at missions! Although it may take us much longer to leave an established church than it took Paul, I think that we should have the same goal. This means that we are going to need to spend as much or more time training leaders than we are going to spend witnessing. We are going to need to spend time discipling and training! We are going to need to get men trained to lead the church in our absence. We should be able to leave the country and the churches should be able to stand without us. Sure, we should be there to give the churches and pastors guidance but at the same time we are going to need to teach the churches to stand on their own. Paul spent a majority of his time training and teaching. We need to follow his example if we want a lasting work.
A final thing that we can learn from Paul’s example is how he handled his relationship with the church. He was not like that annoying boss who stands right beside you and watches your every move. However, at the same time he was there for the churches and made sure they stayed on track. Paul found a way so that the churches were not dependent on him but at the same time he had influence on them. If you notice, in some of the letters that he writes Paul is pretty commanding and direct on what he wants them to do. At the same time, he tells them that they are the ones that need to take care of the problem. He is not going to step in and fix the problem but tells them what they need to do. By doing this he empowers them to address the issue and handle it among themselves. He made sure that the churches were indigenous. Meaning that they were self-sustaining, self-propagating, and self-governing. By giving these churches their own leadership, Paul enabled them to continue on with out him. You see Paul realized that it is not about just what the churches did while he was alive but also about what they did after he died. By empowering the churches he enabled them to continue on. We need to have this same attitude! If we follow Pauls example we will plant indigenous churches that can continue on after our deaths.
In conclusion, I think there is much to learn from how Paul did ministry. I think we should follow his example if we want a Biblical ministry that will last. God has given us this pattern of ministry for a reason! If we take a close look at Paul, we will see that he had a reason and a purpose for everything he did . I think following the Bible example would be the best thing that we could possibly do if we are going to have a lasting ministry!
Kason Bloom