Ordaining Every Member
D. Elton Trueblood
The pastor as coach is not satisfied with good ritual and good buildings; he is satisfied only when people are being recruited into the ministry of daily life.
—D. Elton Trueblood I meet hundreds of strangers while traveling, and I nearly always ask, "Are you in any church?" The usual answer is "Sometimes I go to such and such a church." It sounds like going to the theater or the ballpark. Once in a while someone will say, "Yes, I'm deeply involved in …" but it's rare. I'm afraid the majority still think the church is something you go to. When we look at the state of Christians and the church, at our values, beliefs, and lifestyles, there is certainly room for holy dissatisfaction. We are too easily satisfied with conventional success. We fall into an Old Testament mind-set in which we look mostly at how many people come to the temple for the ritual. Meanwhile we forget Jesus' words in Matthew 12:6, "I tell you, something greater than the temple is here." Cheap Christianity can usually pull a pretty good attendance on Sunday morning. It is cheap whenever the people think of themselves as spectators at a performance. I'm always shocked when I hear Christians talk about being "in the audience." Audiences are fine at the opera or the symphony concert, but worship is another matter. In Christ's clearest call to commitment, he didn't say, "Come join the audience." He said, "Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me." The yoke refers to the operation of a team. Early Christians called each other yokefellow (Phil. 4:3) in order to signify a practicing Christian engaged in a team effort. So when leaders ask how the general operation is going, they must not be too easily satisfied with numbers. You can always get a crowd if you demand little ...
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