I’ve always found it hard to describe my job.
You’d think it would be easy enough to just say that I’m an ‘Anglican Minister’.
But the problem is that this creates the impression that only paid and ordained people ‘do’ the ministry in the church.
Yet, when we look in the Bible at Ephesians chapter 4, we see that all of Jesus’ people are servants (ministers) who work to build Christ’s church:
11 So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, 12 to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up…
So, if you’re a follower of Jesus, then you’re a minister!
There are so many ways to minister: you can do the Bible reading during a church service, or set up the chairs, or do a talk in the kids’ ministry, or provide morning tea to our seniors.
After all, we’re all in the ministry!
But as we also saw in Ephesians, God uses some particular ministers to speak the gospel in order to equip all Christians for ministry.
And that’s why we still need some specific leaders in the church… and some of them will do it as their ‘job.’
So what do we call this kind of work?
At last weekend’s ‘MTS Mission Minded’ conference, I became convinced that the best description is ‘gospel work.’
So, for people who have their ‘job’ as a ‘worker’ who speaks the gospel to believers and unbelievers, this describes the heart of the task.
Should you be considering gospel work?
PS – I’m still looking for an apprentice gospel worker to train in our church as an MTS Apprentice… let me know if you’re interested…!