Who are the ministers of the Church? If you say bishops, priests and deacons, you’re only partially right. The correct answer is that we all are ministers of the Church, each and every one of us. If you don’t believe me, look it up on page 855 of the Book of Common Prayer:
The ministers of the Church are lay persons, bishops,
priests, and deacons.
This month, I want to speak of the ministry of lay persons. We
feel like we have a handle on the ministry of ordained clergy, but what about
the ministry of the largest number of the members of the Church? Again
from page 855 of the BCP:
The ministry of lay persons is to represent Christ and
his Church; to bear witness to him wherever they may be and, according to the
gifts given them, to carry on Christ’s work of reconciliation in the world; and
to take their place in the life, worship, and governance of the Church.
This very broad “job description” is fortunately matched up with a
multiplicity of talents. As St. Paul wrote, there are a multitude of
spiritual gifts that the Holy Spirit gives us and when we use them to build up
the Church, that is ministry. When our organist and our choir
provide that glorious music that enhances our liturgy, that is ministry.
When our young people serve as acolytes that help make our liturgy work, that
is ministry. When the Flower Guild use their gifts to create great beauty
around the altar, that is ministry. When the Altar Guild use their gifts
to prepare for our liturgy, that is ministry. When we provide Christmas
in shoeboxes for women and children in refuge from abusers, that is
ministry. When the Vestry give of their time and talents to manage the
temporal affairs of our parish, that is ministry. When people volunteer
at Attic Treasures to both provide articles at a reduced price and funding for
the Church’s work, that is ministry too. All that we do to build up the
Body of Christ is ministry.
Our ministries are not limited to our corporate worship in a building
on Macon Road on Sunday mornings. While it is essential that we
gather together to worship as a community of faith, it isn’t sufficient.
We are called upon to exercise our ministries in all that we do, all of the
time, at home, in the workplace, the store, wherever. We don’t get to be
Christians on Sunday morning, park our faith in the narthex and re-claim it the
next Sunday. So, when you are doing something on Tuesday afternoon, stop
and consider whether what you are doing is consistent with your obligations to
God. Tuesday afternoon really isn’t any different from Sunday morning.
Many Episcopal churches have a problem in that they over-rely on their
ordained clergy. (In many cases, clergy assist in this.) We and
they need to remember that the finest priest in the world is but one man or
woman who truly can’t do everything and in fact, mustn’t do everything.
When we withhold our own ministries, we place a priest in an impossible
situation. I have described my ministry as a verger as doing the things
that don’t have to be done by the priest, so that the priest can better do those
things which only the priest may do. As we move forward at St.
Christopher’s, can you say that you are doing those things which don’t have to
be done by a priest, so that our next priest can may fully exercise the
ministry of the ordained clergy?
Finally, why, as people of God, do we do these things? Indeed why
must we do these things? Bishop N.T. Wright writes in Surprisedby Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church:
Every act of love, gratitude and kindness; every work
of art or music inspired by the love of God and delight in the beauty of his
creation; every minute spent teaching a severely handicapped child to read or
to walk; every act of care and nurture, of comfort and support, for one’s
fellow human beings and for that matter one’s fellow nonhuman creatures; and of
course every prayer, all-Spirit-led teaching, every deed that spreads the
gospel, builds up the church, embraces and embodies holiness rather than
corruption, and makes the name of Jesus honored in the world—all of this
will find its way, through the resurrecting power of God, into the new creation
God will one day make.
When we “do ministry”, ultimately we are providing some of the raw material that God’s power will use to create the transformed creation. What can be more important than that?
