The Art of Being Really Helpful
The Art of Being Really Helpful
April 19, 2010
I had the pleasure and privilege on Saturday of attending a shepherding seminar conducted by my colleague, Tim Witmer, for the session of my local church. The material (found in his recent book) was outstanding, and the Q and As excellent: six church officers quizzing a seventh about the practicalities of pastoring a church.
What struck me more than anything was how much of this usefulness was rooted in the fact that Tim's church is analogous to the one to which I belong. A little larger, perhaps, but we are dealing here with churches where the pastor and elders can all know everyone's first name, marital status, number of kids etc. And that meant that when we asked Tim practical questions, he was able to give realistic, practical answers. If you can persuade Tim Witmer to do a seminar for your church session, do it. The man is an inspirational master of ordinary pastoring.
OK, it's been some years since I've beaten this drum, but this really did highlight for me once again the manifold problems and shortcomings of the megaconference with the megapastors phenomenon. Such are inspiring and encouraging shots in the arm for those working hard in struggling churches; but the pastor of a church with, say, 1000 or more people has almost nothing of any practical usefulness to say to the session at a church like mine vis a vi day-to-day shepherding. It's a just a different scale of operation, when you cannot know all your people by name, and have a team and a budget to keep everything running.
This is not a criticism; there is no `biblical' norm for church size (though I do think, as a rule of thumb, if the pastor can't remember every member's name, it might be time to think of splitting and planting); but it is to say that pastors of very large churches are actually of inversely proportional use to the wider church simply because the world in which they live is not the world in which the vast majority of pastors, elders, deacons, members and adherents exist; and the specific questions big church pastors, and solutions they can offer, are often of an entirely different order. So here's an appeal: let's organise some big conferences where all the speakers are pastoring churches of three hundred people or less. It may well be that the lectures and Q and As prove less inspirational but far more useful to normal churches and pastors in ordinary circumstances.
Of course, nobody may attend; but that's a different problematic story.....
What struck me more than anything was how much of this usefulness was rooted in the fact that Tim's church is analogous to the one to which I belong. A little larger, perhaps, but we are dealing here with churches where the pastor and elders can all know everyone's first name, marital status, number of kids etc. And that meant that when we asked Tim practical questions, he was able to give realistic, practical answers. If you can persuade Tim Witmer to do a seminar for your church session, do it. The man is an inspirational master of ordinary pastoring.
OK, it's been some years since I've beaten this drum, but this really did highlight for me once again the manifold problems and shortcomings of the megaconference with the megapastors phenomenon. Such are inspiring and encouraging shots in the arm for those working hard in struggling churches; but the pastor of a church with, say, 1000 or more people has almost nothing of any practical usefulness to say to the session at a church like mine vis a vi day-to-day shepherding. It's a just a different scale of operation, when you cannot know all your people by name, and have a team and a budget to keep everything running.
This is not a criticism; there is no `biblical' norm for church size (though I do think, as a rule of thumb, if the pastor can't remember every member's name, it might be time to think of splitting and planting); but it is to say that pastors of very large churches are actually of inversely proportional use to the wider church simply because the world in which they live is not the world in which the vast majority of pastors, elders, deacons, members and adherents exist; and the specific questions big church pastors, and solutions they can offer, are often of an entirely different order. So here's an appeal: let's organise some big conferences where all the speakers are pastoring churches of three hundred people or less. It may well be that the lectures and Q and As prove less inspirational but far more useful to normal churches and pastors in ordinary circumstances.
Of course, nobody may attend; but that's a different problematic story.....
