Post date: Oct 21, 2016 4:49:37 AM

The pastortute is a good man

Abraham Lincoln said about the men of the South, fighting to defend slavery in the American civil war: “Never have so many good men fought so valiantly for something so bad".

This is true for many, if not most pastors.

Good men, trying very hard, to do something, that is inherently wrong.

One on the biggest problem in church today is the pastoral system. The notion that one man, plants and then controls a congregation indefinitely is not visible in the Bible. An easy test is to try and find out who the “pastor” of the church of Ephesus was.

· The answer is: “we don’t know”.

· The reason is, there was no “pastor”

This applies to each church mentioned in the bible. You cannot find one person who has authority over or in a congregation like the modern pastor does for any of the 40 odd churches mentioned in the New Testament.

A Big Departure and a Big Mistake

The introduction of the “pastor” is a big departure from the original church model and a very big mistake. It is like taking a father or a mother out of a family. The family can limp along and try its best but we must acknowledge that this not the natural order and certainly not God’s original design.

Pastors are one of the five main equipping gifts we see in Ephesians 4, but neither pastors not the other four equipping gifts are ever seen to rule or have sole authority over congregations. Pastors are not to operate without the involvement of the apostle, prophet, evangelist and teachers. This is in fact like removing the father and leaving a single mother in charge of a family.

Malfunction in church life

Due to this departure from the Biblical pattern there are now a huge number of unforeseen malfunctions in church life and even more bad strategies to fix or compensate for these malfunctions.

Control & Fear

The most obvious one is the use of control and spiritual manipulation though fear. Seeing as the pastor is convinced he must remain in control of the church he will resist, derail or mame boys who are becoming men.

The only control in the Bible is self-control and mothers who control young babies. Even God does not control us.

Modern church administration models are used to control and manipulate Christians into submission to this so-called “pastor”. In such cases, elders often do not have real authority but live in fear, subjugation, and spiritual manipulation to the pastor. The supposed elders in severe cases are handpicked for submissiveness and for being “yes-men”.

Superstition and witchcraft

Many strategies for keeping saints inline involve the notion that God will curse you if you don't submit to the pastor or the pseudo-elders one finds in typical charismatic churches.

Diotrephes

It is sad to realize that often the man we call pastor is in fact a usurper. This is especially confusing if God used them to plant the church but they now intend to control it permanently

9. I wrote to the church, but Diotrephes, who loves to have the preeminence among them, does not receive us.

3 John 9

Where did this one-man controlling pastor come from?

Some elders and FiveFold minister in the first few centuries started promoting themselves and their careers into the clergy system. Also, in modern times it’s quicker and easier to outsource things to professionals. The problem with the pastor it is a bit like outsourcing your relationship with your wife. It just does not work. Each man must love his own wife and raise his own boys into manhood. School helps, but the bulk of the work and all the authority remains with the father. We cannot have a human being as intermediary in our relationship with God and His church.

Mothers heart

The mother's heart of a good pastor is nurturing, protective kind and gentle, and this is why pastortution is so successful.

Most Christian appreciate the gentle support and mild encouragement of the pastor. Pastor’s usually don’t expect much from Christians other than tithing and church attendance. We all start as spiritual babies according to Hebrews 5:13 and need a mother (pastor) to nurture us through those few early years.

The problem is however that for some odd reason pastors dominate church leadership today and the mothers heart (nurture and control) is not designed to make men out of boys (spiritually speaking). Most people have great respect for the pastor but this goes too far and often ends up in spiritual abuse and control.

Some boys submit to this maternal manipulation but many men tend to leave.

Either way this is a problem. Boys who do not grow into “spiritual men” by proper FiveFold ministry and community are not powerful in the Spirit and tend to just engulf themselves in their careers without much guidance or understanding of the Spirit or of their real role in church. Money ultimate begins to dominate their thinking and ironically this suits pastortutes who preach tithing.

Raising boys is critical

Raising boys is tricky. They start small and vulnerable but should grow into powerful adult males relatively quickly. When they are spiritually mature within a healthy church community they are the backbone of everything and the community flourishes under and around them. If the pastor however does not embrace the balanced of FiveFold ministry in conjunction with elder rule, then he would tend to “mother” and create a pyramid scheme. Emotionally healthy men tend to reject this and leave, either physically or emotionally. They just go elsewhere emotionally and the church is spiritually and emotionally impoverished.

Pastors often start running programs staffed by zealous young men. The system tends to increase in control and decrease in real community.

What is a pastortute?

As with everything in life, there is a spectrum of things.

Some pastors are really committed to fathering the saints, which means to equip them for adulthood and to become peers and brothers in the fullest sense of the word. Many pastor however don’t get this right.

Prostitute

Some pastors seek money and that is obviously prostitution (strong tithing messages are an indicator of this) . Please note neither Jesus nor Paul or any other apostles made any effort at collecting money from other Christians to cover personal expenses, ministry or other. Check the Bible out for this. also see Luke 10:1-16 on how to fund evangelism. (Take special note of what to eat.)

Substitute

Other pastors love power and fall into the trap of “the man of God syndrome”. They will position themselves, not as a brother and helper to you in your relationship with God but as an intermediary, a “substitute”. The strong emphasis on the Sunday sermon is an indicator here. If an adult Christians need the sermon as integral in his relationship and growth with God there are serious problem, and the pastor is typical functioning as proxy-Christ.

In both cases the word pastortute aptly describes what this man is busy with.

Sincerity does not solve the problem

One again, some of these people are sincere, gifted and anointed people. Good intentions is still not a substitute for the teamwork God describes in scripture.

The sad reality is that the pastors grew up in the pastortution model and really believe its God's system. Bad examples of the pastors own youth and a dose of pride has distorted their understanding of their own role and they have now become like Diotrephes.

Many pastors are overworked and struggle along like a single mother. The are often exhausted and in financial despair. This still does not make pastortution Gods plan or acceptable.

Discerning good from evil

If your pastor is not confusing the issue of money and his own role in ministry and is not substituting himself for your relationship with the Word of God and the Spirit of God then he is possibly not a pastortute.

The easiest test is to see if the pastor is more “spiritual” and preaches more that the rest of the elders. If there is group of strong elders and if the pastor’s death would not make a big difference in church life, then he is probably fathering the men around him, allowing them to eclipse him that is possibly a good sign.

The boy pastor

This is just an insecure self-promoting little man. Sad to say these boy-pastors often had bad experiences with their own fathers and are now trying to give something they never received themselves. Very dangerous, especially if he has a theology degree.

The Biblical pattern of equipping but not controlling

With Paul, we see him planting churches and then leaving within three years. He then sends other ministers like Timothy to equip the saints and though they have spiritual authority they do not control and dictate the day to day functioning of these local churches.

Scripture is clear that the local churches are ruled over by elders, who are per definition successful family men. Ongoing equipping happens by gifted people but not control.

Elders & Deacon’s

1. This is a faithful saying: If a man desires the position of a bishop, he desires a good work.2. A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, temperate, sober-minded, of good behavior, hospitable, able to teach;3. not given to wine, not violent, not greedy for money, but gentle, not quarrelsome, not covetous;4. one who rules his own house well, having his children in submission with all reverence5. (for if a man does not know how to rule his own house, how will he take care of the church of God?);6. not a novice, lest being puffed up with pride he fall into the same condemnation as the devil.7. Moreover he must have a good testimony among those who are outside, lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil.

8. Likewise deacons must be reverent, not double-tongued, not given to much wine, not greedy for money,9. holding the mystery of the faith with a pure conscience.10. But let these also first be tested; then let them serve as deacons, being found blameless.11. Likewise their wives must be reverent, not slanderers, temperate, faithful in all things.12. Let deacons be the husbands of one wife, ruling their children and their own houses well.13. For those who have served well as deacons obtain for themselves a good standing and great boldness in the faith which is in Christ Jesus.

1 Timothy 3:1-13

The FiveFold

There should be a number of gifted individuals equipping the saints, and a number or elders ruling over the congregation and keeping the good order, but never one man. Some elder’s could be FiveFold but beware for the clergy system. Don’t outsource anything to “spiritual professionals”.

Pastors should be part of this team

10. He who descended is also the One who ascended far above all the heavens, that He might fill all things.)11. And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers,12. for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ,13. till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ;14. that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting,15. but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ—16. from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.

Ephesians 4:10-16