The Ministry Reset

It has been great meeting so many Commissioner Ruling Elders and Pastors in the Synod with our monthly “Brown Bag” Zoom meetings every third Tuesday at Noon. This meeting is open for any CPs currently serving and for those currently in process. Here is the link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82621805284?pwd=Q8fgtouOvW6w4k6w7YyzibMSwu3Kbj.1

Our next CP/CRE Brown Bag on Sept. 17 at Noon will be focused on “Training for the Ministry of the Future.” This is not a conversation around our training to be pastors, but a recognition of the need for continuing education and professional development as we look to the shape of ministry in the next 5, 10, or even 20 years. We are hoping to have a fruitful conversation around areas to be developed and possible training workshops and seminars for pastors and church leaders.

These kinds of conversations can be quite exciting and anxiety inducing. Exciting to think about new ideas and approaches to ministry. Anxiety-inducing because it can feel like all of our experience and training up to this point does not help us with the future. I think in the midst of these conversations, we need a ministry reset.

A ministry reset is a way to ground and center us before we begin the conversation. Much like a reset option on a phone, it is a way for us to return to our “default” setting and to re-build from the ground up. For me, my go-to ministry rest verse is Acts 2:42 “They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.” I use this verse for myself and for the session I lead to ensure that we are working from a biblical frame and to remind us of the essentials to ministry. I love this verse because it comes as a follow-up from Pentecost and the baptism of 3000 people. It is a window into the first church and how their ministry grew. The focused on four essentials: the apostles’ teachings, the fellowship, the breaking of bread, and the prayers. I love how there are no details given of how this was done, just that it was a focus for ministry and congregational life.

When we are talking about training for the ministry of the future, we are not really talking about new ministries, but new ways and approaches to the four essentials of Acts 2:42. With this ministry reset, we begin to see that we are not creating something new, but innovating and responding to our current and future context, just like the early apostles, just like the many innovators of the early church, just like the reformers of our faith tradition. To borrow a phrase from the 80s film, we are going “Back to the Future.”

Again, our next Brown Bag is Sept 17 at Noon at this Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82621805284?pwd=Q8fgtouOvW6w4k6w7YyzibMSwu3Kbj.1

If you would like to be on the CRE/CP Synod email list, please contact me (Tim Pollock) at tim@synodofthecovenant.org