Ordination Questions?

IF a person graduated from a respectable Bible college or seminary certainly they wold be familiar with the technical wording.

If the candidate gives his doctrinal statement certainly he will understand what they mean.

The most important thing is, Can they explain them to an unlearned community sitting in a pew? That is what concerns me.

His doctrinal statement will confirm his theological soundess. If a man graduates from any school and has a confirmed view on eschatology, I shall have grave doubts about his standing. He has just followed his professor. I want everything in pew language. As I was instructed by one professor, "Jim, keep it simple in presentation. Profoundess is not defined in big words, it is clearly taught simply so a child can understand the essentials."

We are testing a person for their calling to ministry, not asking for a lifetime's experience in two hours.

Cheers,

Jim

 

What does that mean?

 

I worry about the man who has all the answers. He usually also makes up the questions.

I am not denying a proper and full education. I am not denying an essential knowledge of theology and Bible.

I am asking for a man who can preach the word of God simply and understandably to the average congregation.

I don't give invitations after a service, thank you very much.

Cheers,

Jim

 

If this is a reference to what I have said previously, please note that I did not intend to imply that I think ordination is not biblical. The primary reason I did not submit to ordination years ago when I was in vocational ministry was because the church wanted to do it in a way I believed was unbiblical. Furthermore, they attached certain beliefs to ordination that were in error, and I wanted to demonstrate to them that ordination does not make a person an authority regarding scripture (although persons who are ordained should be persons who both know and live the word of God).

Agreed.

15 pages seems to be a little thin for a doctrinal statement!

"Like-minded"? Do you believe that a candidate for ordination (as well as the ordination committee) should be completely doctrinally-consistent? For instance, what about differences regarding alien-immersion baptism, spiritual gifts, the "doctrines of grace" or eschatology? What about philosophies regarding cooperative missions or the relationship between church and state?

What kind of leeway would a committee in your church allow a candidate for ordination?

 

I have to agree.

sag38, if a candidate for ordination has not run across these terms, they have not been involved in serious study of the scripture, at least to the point where they are ready to teach a congregation. These words are used in theology books and articles, and in thoughtful, educated discussion. An ordination candidate who cannot be troubled to learn the basics of theological discussion is someone who is obviously not interested in being a lifelong student of scripture.

As a person who gained the most intensive knowledge of scripture as a college student studying the Bible for 4-6 hours each day over the course of 16 months, mostly late at night, without the aid of any human teacher guiding my studies, I ran into those terms by following up on questions raised and answered as I carefully studied each book of the Bible and established the framework of my theological understanding. By the time I actually began the seven years of my formal theological education, I had already learned the meaning of most of those words through my independent study.

It's not the same thing as demanding that a candidate learn Greek and Hebrew before being ordained!

 

Remember, it is a summary, and has to be defended in a couple of hours. It certainly won't be exhaustive.

These are certainly things to be explored in the questioning. Some are intramural debates, where good men differ, and some are not. In our church, I doubt we would ordain a man who denied the doctrines of grace, because of our commitment to what we believe the Scripture teaches about the matter. If he was a "four-pointer" however, that would not be an issue. I would not lead the church to ordain someone who was not pretribulational, or someone that believed in infant baptism, or someone that believed sign gifts were for today, or someone that believed only one translation was the word of God. These are matters on which I think the Bible is sufficiently clear that we would not put our stamp of approval on his ministry.

Other matters leave some room for disagreement. It is hard to list out what the deal-breakers would be. If a specific issue was mentioned (as it was above), I would state what I think I would do. But in a nutshell, I think a candidate for ordination should be a member of the ordaining church and be in substantial agreement with its doctrinal statement.

 

You would make eschatology a test of fellowship???

If we did that we wouldn't have a fellowship of some 550 churches.

Cheers,

Jim

 

Neither are the terms...Trinity, Bible, hymnal, worship service, evangelical, or theology. But we use them...that argument isn't awfully good.

The point here is not that the candidate needs to use these terms on a daily or even frequent basis but that they understand them and can explain them. God calls pastors to be teachers and theologians. Explaining difficult questions of faith and theology goes hand and hand with a pulpit ministry. To be able to explain something complicated in simplicity requires being able to have an understanding of it in its complicated state.

The issue here isn't intellectual snobbery but that we can fulfill God's call for our lives.

That is just mean spirited and you need to apologize.

 

I didn't say that. I said I would make it a test of ordination, which is a higher level than "fellowship." There are various levels of fellowship. I can have a cup of coffee with just about anybody. I can participate in a conference with fewer people, but still a wide variety. But I will work hand in hand in local church ministry with a more select group. As the relationship gets closer, the need for doctrinal agreement becomes greater.

Think about it this way: Ordination is a church saying that they find a man qualified to teach and minister in that church. Ordination is not really done for the sake of another church. Why would a church ordain someone who thinks that the church's doctrinal position/statement is wrong? They shouldn't.

If a church has no official position on eschatology, then I suppose they might ordain someone who holds to just about any position. But if a church is convinced that pretribulationism is biblical (as they should be), then why would they ordain a man who denies that?

Remember, ordination is different than fellowship.

 

Fair enough.

Thanks for letting me pursue that line of questioning.

 

Sometimes I think we get to caught up in the edumacation and not the Word that we should study. I think it is admirable that some folks can translate from the Greek and Hebrew. I have even found it helpful to know the history of the time and what was likely meant when a particular word was used at that point and time. It not only helps me defend my beliefs, but most importantly, it creates a confirmation within me for the way God deals with me thru his word.
Reading the Word of God, along with prayer, meditation, fasting, fellowship with other Christians, worship, exaltation in private and with alike believers, all these do more for my Christian walk than any degree that is to be had.

I think we hold too high those who obtain these degrees without proof that they even understand them. What is even worse is when the person with the degree holds themselves in a higher accord.
I hope we never forget that, in the church, the most high hierarchy are to serve subordinates.

Mark 9:35 And He sat down, called the twelve, and said to them, "If anyone desires to be first, he shall be last of all and servant of all."

When the Holy Spirit is feeding my understanding with the Word of God, no amount of degrees or mans words can give me a greater a understanding of what I am reading and praying about.

A higher formal education has a place in God's will on earth but just like different gifts, the higher formal education is a calling of an individual and not a people.

The higher the calling, the more the servant serves. That is where we learn the real defining characteristics of a Christian seeking the walk with God.

 

Don't you know that the more degrees one has, the more one is qualified to serve. Seriously, while that was intended to be an attempt at humor, it seems that certain circles in Baptist life have embraced that thinking. How ofter do you see a pastor without a D.Min or Ph.D pastor a church with 1,000 members or more? Is that because that is what God desires or is that a man made standard?

 

Truthfully, probably quite often. But even at that, it may simply be that a person with greater education is a better leader and a better preacher and therefore attracts more people to the church.

 

:thumbs:... Personality and attitude have more to do with one's ability to lead than higher education. You can have a great education, but if you are a bitter, angry, negative person you will never truly inspire people to follow.

 

My point is that people who pursue higher education are the type that are more typically gifted and driven to be leaders. Secondly, those who pursue higher education are typically better equipped to be good preachers of the Word.

So my point is that not that education makes one a better leader (though in some cases it certainly equips gifted people). My point is that leaders are certain types of people.

 

On education: Get all you can when you can, but don't let a lack of education hold you back. An education can be formal schooling or it can be self instituted. Both have been successful, and both have made fools of themselves. It all boils down to what we do with learning, even more than how much schooling we have had.

I am 81 and I still take one course each year from somewhere. Bless the computer which has made this possible for me.

One such course even used the computer as a classroom. It was a chatroom. I had trouble keeping up from a typing standpoint, but the young people were very gracious to me and we all shared what we were learning.

Cheers,

Jim