work of the ministry

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At 11:42 AM 5/6/97 -0400, you wrote:

>The gifts of the five fold ministry is to build up the body of Christ
>and to perfect the saints and to equip the saints to work in the
>ministry.
>
>I have been taught that the five fold ministry is for the perfecting of
>the saints, to do the work of that ministry, to build up (edify) the
>Body. It now occurs to me that these gifts are to be used to equip the
>saints for the ministry, to bring them into the ministry that GOD calls
>them into.


Yep....This is a concept that is missed by many the last generation or
two... a lot of the people with these talents....or to word it so it will be
recognized by todays frame of mind....in these positions....have somewhere
assumed the premise that they are few and far between who will actually turn
out to be ministers.  For ministering in the church....being an
evangelist...a pastor etc...has become something that is a position...not
simply the work of the God through His people...ALL of His people.  Hence we
no longer hear the phrase spoken as oft as we did fifty years ago..."They're
ALL preachers."  The church has now relegated itself to a heirachal system
of positions in which the ministry is in such a place above the "lay" people
that few ever even aspire to attain such a "high and lofty calling" as
someone in the "ministry".  And because of this we seem to have lost the
memory that we were all to be in the ministry...some wise and prudent with a
Godly wisdom that made them able to lead and shepherd people through paths
they were, at the moment, too young or weak to circumvent...some with a
knowledge and. even better, an ability to impart that knowledge in a manner
that others can hear and understand the things of God that they previously
could not quite grasp...etc etc..

Oh for the day that the church realizes that we are ALL in the ministry and
God has called us ALL to be a part of that ministry and to learn from those
who have already had the opportunity to learn and grow in Christ so that we
may soon work right along side them and one day take up the slack when those
who have lead us have gone on from this world.

Joe W. Chancellor
Spring Tx
browser@wt.net
http://web.wt.net/~darty/