Equipping the Saints

…to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up…

Ephesians 4:12

When we compare present-day churches to the original blueprint, we see that many deviations have been permitted which are detrimental to the life of the church. The church has gradually turned away from the simple provisions which made it such a powerful force in its early years, and terrible distortions entered into the church which continue to weaken the church. Popular thinking fastened onto the church building as the identifying symbol of the church. Emphasis was placed upon massive ornate cathedrals with stained glass windows and flying buttresses.

In the beginning, working in the church meant to exercise a gift or perform a ministry anywhere within the far-flung body of Christ, in a home, out on a mission field, or in a hospital. Gradually, however, working in the church came to mean performing some religious act within a specific building called the church. At the same time, there was a gradual transfer of ministry responsibility from the people, whom we now call the laity, to the few pastors, whom we now call the clergy. The scriptural concept that every believer is a priest before God was lost, and a special class of super-Christians emerged who were looked to for everything. Somehow, the church lost sight of the concept that all Christians are in the ministry.

When the ministry was left to the professionals, there was nothing left for the people to do other than come to church and listen. They were told that it was their responsibility to bring the world into the church building to hear the pastor preach the Gospel. Soon Christianity became little more than a Sunday morning spectator sport, much like the definition of football: twenty-two men down on the field, desperately in need of rest, and twenty thousand in the grandstands, desperately in need of exercise!

This unbiblical distortion has resulted in an impoverished church which has made little impact on the world and increasingly withdraws into irrelevance and isolation. We desperately need to return to the dynamic of the early church. We can no longer defend our ivy-clad traditions which leave no room for the original, power-packed strategy. Pastors must restore to the people the ministry which was taken from them with the best of intentions. The work of the ministry belongs to the entire body of believers, who should be equipped by those who are gifted by God to expound and apply His Word. The entire body has received gifts from the Spirit, and it is the task of those in the pastoral ministry to encourage the entire body to use those gifts. When we have given all Christians in the body their God-given role as ministers of God's eternal plan, then lives are changed. And the church begins to make a difference again.

Lord, forgive us for neglecting the original blueprint of the church. Bring us back to the plan you want and help us live according to it.