Transforming Presence: Reimagining Ministry

All of those exploring the possibility of ordained ministry in the Chelmsford Diocese are asked to do the priesthood project. This involves interviewing a selection of Church of England ministers from across the church traditions, reading a particular book on ministry and then exploring the nature of priesthood in an essay drawing on the interviews and your reading.

When I did this at the end of the 1990s I took Ephesians 4. 1 – 16 as the key text for understanding Church and ministry. So I am very pleased that Bishop Stephen has chosen the same passage when he writes about ‘Reimagining Ministry’ in Transforming Presence:

“I would see my role, as vicar in a parish church, as being one of serving the royal priesthood in that locality by identifying, developing and co-ordinating the gifts and roles of the people within the priesthood so that we become a fully functioning part of the body of Christ able to reveal Jesus clearly in practice. Ephesians 4: 11-16 describes this as the task of every leader within Christ’s body:

“It was he [Jesus] who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to prepare God’s people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.

Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.”      

The differing roles of leaders mentioned here combine to realise the same aim – preparation of God’s people for ministry (works of service). It is God’s people who minister - who serve and are served - and it is the leaders of the church who prepare God’s people for that service. Both serving and being served build up the body of Christ until the whole measure of the fullness of Christ is attained. Such service will include the priestly sacrifice of whole lives, possessions, praise, money, and evangelism.

The corporate nature of full and effective ministry is vital because God as Trinity is corporate. Jesus does not exist as a sole entity but as part of the Godhead, a distinct part of an inter-related whole that is God – Father, Son and Spirit. As this is the nature of God so it must also be the nature of the Church. Diversity within unity and unity within diversity with God and the Church seen fully as they are seen whole. This is the gift of Jesus, to be drawn into and to reflect corporately the inter-relationship of God himself.

The kind of ministry which I am attempting to describe draws heavily on the example of David Watson and the church structures and approaches that were introduced under his ministry at St Michael-le-Belfrey, York. Watson describes their model and approach in his book ‘I believe in the Church’. In his preface to this book, Michael Green isolates the key characteristics of the approach taken at St Michael-le-Belfrey:

“It is a church where the leadership is shared, where prayer is central, where the sacraments are dynamic, where art and drama and dance adorn the worship. A church where the gifts of the Spirit mingle with His graces of character – and also, no doubt, with many failures! But it is a church which does not depend on its minister. Indeed, it tends to grow when he is away. It is a church that has learnt the pastoral value of the small group, the renewing power of the Holy Spirit, the mutual caring of members one for another.” 

Green argues that Watson’s approach involves “the rediscovery of biblical precedents and principles which are often enough forgotten”. Watson points to six principles of Christian ministry:

1.         No distinction either in form, language or theory between clergy and laity was ever accepted by the New Testament Church.

2.         The ministry is co-extensive with the entire church (1 Corinthians 12: 7).

3.         The local church in the apostolic age always functioned under a plurality of leadership.

4.         There are no uniform models for ministry in the New Testament; the patterns are flexible and versatile.

5.         In the New Testament church can be found both leadership and authority, but no kind of hierarchical structure.

6.         There is one, and only one, valid distinction which the New Testament appears to recognise within the ministry, apart from the different functions to which we have been alluding, the distinction between local and itinerent ministries.”

Much of that remains what I try, very inadequately, to do as your Vicar and much of it overlaps significantly with Bishop Stephen’s vision for reimaging ministry.

Here are the basic principles which Bishop Stephen thinks, with our agreement, could form the basis of a more radical forward thinking look at the ministry of God’s church in our diocese:

·    Ministry belongs to the whole people of God. Every person, because of their baptism, has a ministry. We must nurture an expectation that every Christian gives expression to this ministry in their daily life and in their participation in the life of the Church.

·    Stipendiary priests will need to be more episcopal in the way they understand and express their ministry. They will become much more obviously those who have oversight of the ministry of the church in a cluster of rural communities, or in a town or suburb. Their role will be to lead and facilitate ministry in that area, not provide all that ministry themselves. They will, of course, be involved; but their main task will be to animate the ministry of the whole church.

·    For this to work, there also needs to be a huge flourishing of authorised lay ministry (especially youth and children’s workers, authorised preachers, catechists, pastors and evangelists) and ordained self-supporting ministry. And of course we already have many Readers. Alongside some priests being more episcopal we need many others who will be more diaconal, taking on a pastoral, catechetical and evangelistic ministry at the local level.

·    Each local church needs to have some sort of ministry team and, preferably, some minister to whom they identify as the worship leader and pastor of that community. Sometimes this will be a lay person, such as a Reader, and we should encourage lay led worship and ministry in many of our churches. In many cases I hope it will be an ordained self-supporting minister, so that the sacramental life of our church continues to flourish. But where there are lay led services of the Word it will still be possible within the cluster of communities under the oversight of the (probably) stipendiary priest, for there to be regular Sunday by Sunday Eucharistic provision. Some Self-Supporting Ministers will themselves be the leaders (‘episcopal’ priests) in these benefices.

Hopefully you can see the overlaps between these principles and Ephesians 4, as well as seeing that this is not radical for St John’s Seven Kings as it has been our direction of travel over the time that most of us have been here.

It stands or falls, however, on the understanding that ministry belongs to the whole people of God and on there being a real flourishing of authorised lay ministry. That is why it is so relevant to preach on Transforming Presence during our Stewardship month. Such service includes the priestly sacrifice of whole lives, possessions, praise, money, and evangelism or, as we put it in our Stewardship packs, time, talents and treasure.

All this is so that our churches can be a transforming presence in our community as: places of prayer; places where people learn about the faith and are active in discipleship; places where there is a ministry of evangelism; places where ministry is shared and developed; places which serve the local community; places that are inclusive and welcome to all; places which are seeking the unity of all God’s church and working with their neighbours locally and globally.

Next week, in our Patronal Festival Service, we bring our reflections on Stewardship and Transforming Presence in our annual recommitment of ourselves in the service of Christ by saying together:

I have a part in God’s great work; I am a link in a chain, a bond of connection between persons. He has not created me for nothing. I shall do good, I shall do his work; I shall be an angel of peace, a preacher of truth in my own place. Deign to fulfil your high purposes in me. I am here to serve you, to be yours, to be your instrument. May it be so for each one of us. Amen.

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The Staple Singer - Pray On, My Child.