Weekly Message from Bishop WIllimon 1.15.2007

THE AUTHORITY OF PASTORAL MINISTRY

When we preachers are ordained, the bishop says to us, "Take thou authority to preach the word, administer the sacraments.." It was said of Jesus that he "spoke as one who had authority."

I've got the issue of authority on my mind this week of the Martin Luther King celebration. Of Dr. King it can be said, he spoke to us with divinely inspired authority. When he spoke, a whole nation sat up and took notice. He reinterpreted our situation, framed it for us in a new way, and gave us a vision that we could do better. His words and deeds formed a community of people who dedicated themselves to the cause of racial justice. He empowered the powerless and changed the soul of a nation.

In other words, Dr. King performed the most important functions of ministerial authority, as defined by my friend Jack Carroll. I have long been instructed by friend, Jackson W. Carroll's, book on pastoral leadership, As One with Authority: Reflective Leadership in Ministry.(Abingdon, 1984) Carroll describes three "core tasks" of pastoral leadership that have continuing relevance for us as pastoral leaders:

Meaning Interpretation - Pastors work with the congregation "to reflect on and interpret their life, individually and corporately, in light of God's purpose in Jesus Christ." A pastor is an intellectual leader who helps people to read their lives through the peculiar lens of the story of Jesus Christ. One of the reasons why people come to church is to make sense of themselves and of the world. That is an intellectual, theological task. The pastor, as the lead theologian in the congregation, is the lead interpreter of meaning.

Community Formation - Pastors are uniquely "community persons." One of the chief functions of pastoral leadership is for us pastors to keep concerning ourselves with the character and the contours of the Christian community. The gospel is about the creation of a community, a family, the church. In pastoral work, we become embodiments of that gospel dynamic of family formation through the word and work of God in Christ. Jesus gathers a crowd, a people, a group that enables us to be more faithful than we could be without the power of that holy community.

Empowering Public Ministry - Christians are to share in Christ's work in the world. The church is called not only to "make disciples" but also to "go into all the world" doing what Christ did in the world so that the world might come to know itself as under the judgment and redemption of God. Witness, evangelism, justice work are all ways that the church testifies to the power of God in Christ. The pastor has a responsibility to model that public ministry and to empower the laity to fulfill their baptismally mandated ministry in the world.

William H. Willimon