Philosophy of Ministry

Philosophy of Ministry
My philosophy of ministry was first drafted in 1993, some thirteen years before I entered full-time ministry. At that time our church did not have a pastor and as church board chairman I needed some principles that all lay leaders could agree on to guide our development during a difficult phase in the life of our church. By God’s grace those simple statements by a seminary student have not strayed too far off the mark and needed only fine-tuning with the passage of time.

We are goal or vision/strategy oriented rather than event or maintenance/activity oriented. We will at all times have an intentional strategy to accomplish each aspect of our purpose.

Our church’s mission is to turn non-believers into disciples of Jesus Christ who are committed to:
• Love God,
• Love one another, and
• Love those still outside the Lord’s fold.

In other words, we base our mission on:
• The Greatest Commandment ,
• The New Commandment , and
• The Great Commission .

My role as a pastor also incorporates this three-prong approach:
• Teach the flock God’s Word so that they can love God by obeying His commands,
• Love and care for the sheep in their physical, emotional and spiritual needs,
• Coach God’s people to be effective witnesses of Jesus Christ so that more will glorify God.

This vision and strategy is worked out in the following statements:

1. Evangelism
The church is people, not a building. We are an evangelistic church, but not an evangelistic meeting place church. We do not bring the world into the church buildings to be saved, but we send the saved into the world to evangelize. We believe in “we’ll go to you” more than “come to us”. We thus place more emphasis on exhorting the household of faith than on being “market-driven” in our worship, while trying to be sensitive to the needs of the seeker.

We are committed to the principle of multiplication of ourselves by evangelizing, discipling, training, and delegating ministry to others who are faithful. We will multiply ourselves and train others using the method of apprenticeship.

We aspire to be a reproducing church, not a mega church. We aim to reproduce locally and worldwide. We aim to plant new churches. Each branch of our church will reach to its own community.

2. Discipleship
The purpose of every activity of our church is to produce and further develop disciples. We define a disciple as a believer who is becoming more like Christ by obediently growing in character, ability to minister to others, and in helping to make more disciples.

3. Ecclesiology
We are a Bible church, not a tradition church. We believe structure follows ministry, not ministry follows structure. We try to hold a healthy balance between being traditional and contemporary in our worship and music.

4. Role of the Pastor
We are a lay ministry church, not a staff-centred church. We believe every member is a minister, not a spectator. The ultimate work of the church in the world is to be done by the saints. The pastor’s role and commitment is primarily to inspire, give guidance, to train leaders, and be a model disciple.

5. Equipping
We will primarily make disciples as a team, not just a collection of independent individuals. The primary method of making disciples is the small group. Reasonable accountability is an indispensable method in making disciples.