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Training lay counselors in the church by Paul David Tripp |
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 People with ministry vision, ministry commitment, and ministry skills will have no lack of opportunity and will have great potential for helpfulness in the lives of people near whom God has placed them." Paul David Tripp, president of |
We were designed for community. Now that makes sense because the God who made us in his likeness isn't just committed to community, he is a community! You and I were never designed to figure out and live our lives on our own. We were carefully constructed to live in a dependent relationship with God and interdependent relationships with one another. Yes, sin has made those relationships much more difficult and much messier but hasn't diminished their importance. Here is the inescapable fact of everyone's life; we need one another in order to be what we are supposed to be and to do what we were supposed to do.
Now what does this mean for a pastor? It means that God never called you to shoulder all the ministry needs that will exist in your congregation in any given week. No, the Bible is very clear that God has a total involvement paradigm for the local church. God intends for all of his people to be involved in what he's doing in the lives of the people he's placed them near. God's people grow and change as each member of the body of Christ does its work. (See Eph. 4:1-16, 1 Cor. 12, and Col. 3:12-17.) That means God really does want the church to be a community of counselors. No, that doesn't mean turning your church into a network of mini-therapist. But it does mean teaching people to be more thoughtful and more intentional in their ministry to others.
If you're going to teach people to be more intentional, then they need three things. First, they need vision. They need to see the ministry opportunities that are right before them in everyday life. Ministry wasn't designed by God to be a formal program, but rather, the lifestyle of the body of Christ. Second, they need commitment. The people in your church need to know that they've been called to ministry, and they need to be challenged to approach their relationships with intentional ministry. Third, people need training. If you're giving people vision and calling them to commitment, they need to be given the understanding and skills necessary to be part of what God is doing in the life of another.
People with ministry vision, ministry commitment, and ministry skills will have no lack of opportunity and will have great potential for helpfulness in the lives of people near whom God has placed them.
Perhaps you're wondering what skills help a person to be one of God's tools in the lives of others. Let me suggest four, summarizing each with one word:
1. Love. Love has to do with intentionally building a relationship with another person in which the work of God can thrive. I want to incarnate the love of Christ in your life. I want to identify with your suffering. I want to accept you the same way Jesus has accepted me. And I want to do all of these things, not just so we can enjoy one another, but so that when you need help, you have someone in your life that you know you can trust and you know is willing to be involved.
2. Know. Most of our relationships are trapped in the terminally casual. We tend to know a lot about people, but we don't really know people's stories or struggles. So, people need to be taught to be dissatisfied with casual fellowship, to seek to get to know the people in their lives, and in so doing, discover where change is needed. How? People need to be encouraged to be interested in the story of others, to ask good questions, to listen well, and to invest the time to do all of these things.
3. Speak. Personal ministry isn't about making pronouncements, but about helping a person see what God wants them to see. Four terms help here. Consideration: How can I help my friend see what God wants them to see? Confession: How can I help this person admit what God wants them to admit? Commitment: How can I help this person see God's call to a better way? Change: How can I assist my friend to bear the burden of concrete change?
4. Do. Here I am, standing with the person as they begin to implement the changes that God is calling them to. People need to be taught to ask: Does this person need guidance, assistance, encouragement, warning, or comfort? The question here is, "How can I help this person to do the new things that God is calling them to do?"
So, what is the body of Christ? It's a God-assembled network of people, who're in need of change, helping people who're in need of change. It is pastors who believe that God has called all of their people to ministry; because of this, they are looking for every opportunity that the life and ministry of the local church can mobilize, thereby bringing people of vision, commitment, and skill to be part of what God is doing in the lives of others.
Wouldn't it be nice if your church wasn't just a place where ministry could be found, but was itself a vibrant ministering community?
For further reading on the subject, see Instruments in the Redeemer's Hands by Paul David Tripp.
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Paul David Tripp is a gifted communicator who has more than 15 years of pastoral ministry. Paul is the president of Paul Tripp Ministries whose mission statement is "connecting the transforming power of Jesus Christ to everyday life." He is on the pastoral staff of