WATCH DRURY WRITE A BOOK.  – THIS IS A TEMPORARY POST   Writer’s first draft of a book to be published by The Wesleyan Publishing House. as  an introduction to the ministry.  This web-posted copy is an early draft of the manuscript and not intended to be used as a final document.  While the editors will catch  minor errors if you see something significantly wrong or missing drop Keith Drury a note at kdrury@indwes.edu   © 2003 Keith Drury

 

 

FAQ

FAQ—Frequently Asked Questions

for further thought

 

 

Q: After reading this book I’ve decided I’m really not called at all—what should I do?

A: Seek God’s direction for how you should invest your life.  Don’t feel badly that you investigated the ministry as a life calling.  It is better to seriously investigate it and find you are not called, than to never seriously consider it if you were.

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Q: I was ordained as a minister decades ago but now am out of the active ministry due to health problems—am I out of God’s will?

A: Not at all!  Find a way to meaningfully contribute to God’s kingdom and move on.  Your “early retirement” still will provide an opportunity to minister—act just like you would as a retired minister.

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Q: My denomination appoints pastors to churches without the people’s vote or asking the minister—I’m not sure I can submit to this system

A:  If you can’t submit to your denomination, and God won’t change your heart, then you’ll have to find another denominational home.

 

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Q: I’m more of a group type leader—I want to help a group find out what God is calling the group to do, rather than being a Moses-type leader who goes up to the mountain and gets a vision from God then comes down to cast it before the people.

A:  Great!  We need more of your kind in the church.

 

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Q: Are there any sort of special ethical things I should be thinking about in the profession of the ministry?

A:  By all means—whole books are written on the subject.  The place to start is to look up your own denomination’s statement of ministerial ethics—it is probably posted on their web site.

 

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Q: I met several ministers who were taking courses so they could get ordained because they said it would reduce their income taxes.  Is this true?

A:  Yes it is true that in the USA a minister can save a bundle on their taxes but it is a wrong wrong wrong reason to be ordained. Not just wrong, it is outright shameful.  Getting ordained to save taxes would be like getting married to save taxes.  It is simply the wrong reason to do a right thing.  However, get ready to meet ministers who do all kinds of things that are beneath their dignity—in every profession there are a few bottom-feeders who give the rest of us a bad name.

 

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Q: My friend isn’t going into the ministry but loved this book.  Are there other Christian books about other professions like this one deals with the ministry?

A:  There are a few—but more will be coming.

 

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Q: Can the church nix the call of God? That is if I know I am called and my church won’t ordain me does that mean my call is rejected?

A: Only if you cannot find any church anywhere in the world that will recognize your calling and ordain you—a minister with no congregation to receive the ministry is like a tree falling in the woods with nobody around.  If you are truly called some denomination should recognize that call—otherwise you may have misunderstood God’s voice.

 

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Q: Who can they call a “pastor” in a church—just ordained people or any staff in the church?

A: They can call anyone the want to a “pastor” from the senior preacher to ordained staff people, to part time lay staff, to Sunday school teachers, for “pastor” really means “shepherd” and thus anyone could hold this title.

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Q: My denomination rejects women’s ordination so that part of this book is totally useless to me, and I  strongly disagree with your position.

A: That’s okay, your denomination will eventually see the light—so will you I hope.

 

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Q: I think I want to go into itinerant speaking work and travel around and do youth conferences and large events—my dream is to some day speak to thousands of people in large crusades in major cities.

A: Be faithful with little things and God could make you famous some day.  But be careful of dreaming too much of greatness as a speaker—this is a great snare for ministers.  Instead focus more of your vision on the people hearing you in the future than your speaking—picture their changed lives in your vision instead of your own impressive preaching and fame.  If this vision is from God be faithful and it could happen.  However, do not wander away from the local church on your way there—for the local church is God’s primary tool for bringing his kingdom to pass on earth. 

 

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Q: I would like to found a Starbucks® and run it as a ministry—I can really get into that ministry.

A: Starbucks® makes great coffee; but a coffee shop does not a ministry make.  Do your Starbucks® thing—just don’t try to pretend it is the ministry—just do your ministry while running the coffee shop like every other Christian should do.

 

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Q: Hospitals and nursing homes make me sick—if I have to do into those places as a minister I couldn’t bear it.

A:  Either seek the gifts of compassion, mercy and love from God to enable you to do this or find another life calling besides the ministry.    

 

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Q: You say that a minister should have a “desire” to do ministry—I don’t have that desire, I never did, and yet God has called me to the ministry.

A:  The desire may yet come—especially as your love for God and His people increases.  Occasionally God calls people with no desire to serve Him, but this is rare.  If He did this with you he must have something mighty interesting in store for you.  You may say “let this cup pass from me” but you’d better follow it with “Nevertheless, thy will be done.”

 

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Q: I think I have been experiencing a “testing” of my call recently, but I don’t know if it is from God (who is trying to test my commitment) or the Devil (who is trying to destroy my future as a minister) – can you help me decide?

A:  What does it matter?  In either case what you should do is the same right?

 

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Q: I have had some serious sins in my life in the past and wonder if God is making a mistake calling me into the ministry—how can I lead others when I did so many terrible things before I was a Christian?

A:  Welcome to the club—you are in it with people like Moses and St. paul.

 

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Q: I have never been a leader in my life but I think God is calling me to the ministry—how can I be a minister when I can’t lead?

A:  You can learn to lead just like you can learn how to play basketball.

 

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Q: I am not sure if I should become an ordained minister or just serve as a lay person on the staff of a church—how can I decide?

A:  When in doubt take the ordination courses—you can always chose to not take ordination later; but if you bypass the ordination courses now and go to work in a church then after years pass you want to be ordained you’ll have to go back to school all over again to get the training.  Taking the ordination courses doesn’t mean you have to be ordained, but you can’t get ordained without the required course.

 

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Q: How has the appearance of so many maga-churches changed the ministry?

A:  It has blurred the line of ordination and (lay) staff ministries.  Churches don’t like to make distinctions between their staff members so they tend to title all full time workers pastor or “Reverend.”  New positions as a minister in the church where the minister never presides over communion or preaches at all have emerged.  Some ordained ministers serve on staff and preach only every few years.  Most denominations are expanding their idea of ordained ministry from the notions they had when most every church had only one pastor.

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Q: How does all this apply to missions and intercultural work?

A:  Same way.  You can be an ordained minister as a missionary or a lay missionary.

 

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Q: I would like to found a para church organization where I could develop soccer teams that raise support then go around the world and play soccer as a witness for Christ.

A:  Okay, but make sure this is not an attempt to make your hobby into your calling.  And be careful of becoming a “fund raising scheme” draining your relatives and the local church of money that ought to be used for other things.  And also, be careful of the lack of accountability that sometimes is a snare in founding your own para church organization.  Finally, serve a half dozen years in a local church first—after all you have no right to be “sent out” unless you are first in the church.  For the next five years get involved in a church and start organizing soccer teams with kids in a church—then after you have been faithful in these little ministries you might start thinking about launching a big worldwide para church ministry—but see what the body of Christ say about it after you’ve given five years to that ministry first.

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Q: I know a teacher who was filling in at an independent church  and they ordained him even though he never planned on being a minister full time.  He kept his job teaching and when the church got a preacher he went back to being a layman—is this kosher?

A:  To that church it might be, but not to most denominations.  Churches do things frivolously and do not always understanding what they are doing.  So do individuals.  Probably in the case you cite the person experienced an “ordination of convenience” that meant only what it meant at the time—“we want you to be our temporary pastor pro tem.”   You would have to talk to the teacher to find out if he really had been called to lifetime ordained ministry or really was just filling in as a “lay preacher” at the time.  Remember, many independent churches do not have a denomination to guide them in such matters—if the majority of the people want to do something they simply do it.  While well-run independent churches have careful bylaws or are connected with an informal association of similar churches, a few are lone ranger churches where to do just about anything they please.

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Q: I plan to be a children’s worker (or children’s minister if I went for ordination) the rest of my life—should I go for ordination or be a lay staff worker?

A:  It is up to you—ask the ordination board of your denomination.

 

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Q: I am about to graduate and should be ready to enter the ministry but I feel more inadequate than I did when I was called as a high school senior.

A:  Welcome to the club.  You will always feel inadequate.  And if you ever lose that sense of reliance on God’s strength—then you will really be in trouble.

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Q: I was raised on one denomination but I went to school in another denomination’s college—now I can’t decide which denomination I should settle into.

A:  Start praying about this for a few weeks.  Find five people who know you well and ask their advice—God often speaks through others.  Perhaps go talk to leaders in both denominations and get their advice.

 

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Q: The guy I am dating says he could never be a “minister’s wife” but I really love him—and I am certain I am called.  What should I do?

A:  Well, he could be a minister’s husband!  Seriously, you either need to get a new calling or a new boyfriend.  You could wait for him to change, but don’t get so entangled that you abandon your calling in the process.  The central question is this:  are you really called?  Once you answer that question the rest is simple.

 

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Q: Do ministers really work 50-55 hours a week?

A:  Most do, some more and some slackers work only a few hours a week even though they look busy the rest of the time.  But it is true that most ministers work 50-55 hours a week—but remember, when a minister attends worship or Sunday school it counts that as “work,” so the average lay person who works 40 hours at their job then get highly involved at church may easily work 50 combined hours too.

 

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Q: How much does a minister get paid?

A:  It is all over the map from part time country pastors to senior pastors of multi-million dollar suburban churches.  Few ministers get rich off the ministry, we can say that for sure.  But few starve either.  (Many part time ministers also have full time jobs doing other things so their total income is not so bad as it may sound if you hear only their church salary.)  A good rule of thumb some churches have for their minister’s pay is this: “We will pay our minister the average of the full time workers in our church.”  Their idea is to have the minister “fit in” economically with the people of the church.

 

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Q: I saw an ordination service last summer when I was traveling with a singing group and it was nothing as nice as you suggested in your book, it was kind of frivolous actually—why is this?

A: Like weddings or communion services, those presiding at ordination services don’t always understand its importance. This is why some denominations require that ordinations be presided over by a denominational official—to ensure that it is not depreciated or becomes frivolous. But people sometimes do sacred things frivolously.  Some Christians have even taken the Lord’s supper frivolously. I once observed a youth retreat where a youth pastor served communion by tossing croutons and grapes from the communion table to each member in the audience while the whole group cheered as each caught their crouton and grape.  When a person missed catching their grape and it fall to the floor sometimes a neighbor would squish it under foot causing them to call for a fresh grape—just because Christ instituted a sacred rite of Holy Communion does not mean someone “trying to be relevant” won’t desecrate it.  Your denomination is the guardian of this sacred service and it often reflects their low or high view of the ministry itself.  However occasionally even some denominational leaders and boards lack the ability to make this service be what it ought to be.  If you get stuck in such a situation you might even offer suggestions yourself.  Or, if all else fails, get on that committee in the future and make a future difference!

 

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Q: You keep saying that the call and ordination are for life, but I heard somewhere that half of all ministers drop out in the first ten years of ministry.

A:  And many marriages end in divorce too.  Ordination and the calling should be for life, but people fall away.  However the statistics you heard often count all people in “ministry tracks”—that is all people preparing for ministry.  Many drop out before their ordination, which is why most denominations delay ordination for a while: to give you a chance to drop out before you take your ordination vows.

 

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Q: My granddad was a minister and he says that the ministry is a lot harder today than it was when he was a minister before he retired.

A:  It is harder today but there is more help than your granddad had, and ministers are paid a lot better today than he was I bet.

 

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Q: I don’t ever want to preach but I want to be ordained anyway—is that okay?

A:  Some denominations will ordain you but many will not—you may not enjoy preaching, and it may scare you to death, but most denominations will expect you to preach in some from or another if they ordain you.  On the other hand, many denominations understand that young people often can’t imagine themselves doing things they later learn to love.

 

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Q: I don’t know if I can fit into the ministerial mold—I’m a farm boy who likes putting up hay and messing around with tractors; I am bashful and quiet and can’t be the life of the party, I stutter when I speak and fell totally inadequate for the ministry God seems to be calling me to.

A:  There are a thousand churches looking for a person just like you—you will be a perfect match!

 

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Q: I am scared about the toll the ministry could take on my family life—can you help me see the positives?

A:  There are far more positives than negatives, otherwise so many minister’s kids would not be answering the call.  But there are challenges, like any career.  Attitude seems to matter—an attitude of resentment can poison a minister’s kids.  Humor seems to be a factor too—ministers’ homes that are places of laughter seem to produce lots of positive children who also enter the ministry.   Setting careful family time seems to be a key too—not the amount so much as carefully guarding family time and not using it for “collapse time.”  There are several other factors of course, but those will get you started.

 

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Q: Can a person get a call by looking at their own gifts and abilities, then looking at the need in the world and seeing that their gifts match up with the ministry to meet the needs of the world?

A:  Sure that is how some calls start—but eventually you will need to come to an inner surety that this is what God wants you to do—sure enough to get ordained.

 

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Q: Does God call people as He needs them in his work, or does God know before we are born that he will call us?

A:  Who knows?  To us it appears He calls us as life goes on.  But is it helpful to consider that the ministry was my ”destiny” from birth in doing life planning.  Perhaps both are true in some way.

 

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Q: Several people in my church have pointed out to me that they thought God may be calling me into the ministry but I have not had any specific feelings myself yet—what should I do?

A:  Wait and see.  If God is calling you He will give you more evidence and eventually an inner surety.  Don’t hurry Him.  Until then get involved in ministry and see if anything happens.

 

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Q: Why do I need to submit to a denomination’s ordination requirements—why can’t I just go out and start my own church and be the pastor of it.

A:  You could, but remember this is how most cults get started.