Equipping God's People...Starting With the Staff

It's popular these days for growing churches to hire someone responsible for equipping people. They give the new person a title such as Equipping Pastor or Director of Lay Ministry and assume that this person will create a successful gifts discovery process, find numerous volunteers, train them, and send them- equipped and empowered-to the ministry field for effective service. The problem is that this rarely happens successfully, and the equipping person finds himself or herself frustrated, attempting to push this boulder up the hill alone. As a result, leaders and staff members sense frustration and failure, and come away thinking, "We've tried that lay ministry thing, and it didn't work for us."

The reality is that the majority of pastors and staff members have no idea how to equip people, and therefore don't know how to support an equipping culture. Seminary didn't prepare pastors for equipping, empowering, and releasing God's people. So when faced with a new process in the local church to make this happen, most pastors respond with blank, confused looks. They become a part of the problem.

As church leaders, we need to acknowledge and proactively deal with this barrier. God has called us in Ephesians 4:11-16 to "equip God's people," and that starts with the leadership. Staff and pastors need training on working in teams, understanding unique giftedness, empowering people, acting as coach and cheerleader, and releasing ministry to the people of God. Otherwise, the idea that pastors alone do the work of ministry is perpetuated, and people are set up for confusion and failure.

Why not create a training process for your ministry staff to assist them in understanding and discovering their role in an equipping culture? Provide opportunities for them to learn how to build ministry teams and how to partner with people for lasting success. When we do this, the leaders become the solution to their own frustration, and the culture of equipping others becomes imbedded into their DNA. Hiring an equipping director can be a great thing, but only if that person comes into an environment in which the staff understands and embraces an equipping culture.

Sue Mallory is executive consultant to Church Volunteer Central, author of The Equipping Church, and co-author of The Equipping Church Guidebook. She is also a frequent contributor to Rev. magazine.

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