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Rekindling the Call for Pastoral Ministry
Interview with Thomas E. Trask, Charles T. Crabtree, James K. Bridges, George O. Wood
God has placed within the Assemblies of God leaders who have a passion for spiritual renewal and ministry. General Superintendent Thomas E. Trask, Assistant General Superintendent Charles T. Crabtree, General Treasurer James K. Bridges, and General Secretary George O. Wood desire to see the Assemblies of God become a dynamic, spiritual force in God’s kingdom. These men also understand the need for effective pastoral leadership in the local church and the need to replenish leaders now and in the years to come.
Enrichment’s executive editor, Gary R. Allen, interviewed the four top executive leaders in the Assemblies of God about rekindling the call to pastoral ministry. In this interview, they share their wisdom, insight, and passion for current and future ministers in the Assemblies of God.
What factors are affecting the decrease in the number of pastors in the Assemblies of God?
Trask: There are several factors. First, we have an aging Fellowship. Many of our ministers are coming to retirement age. Second, we need an increased number of ministers if we continue to plant churches. And third, as a church grows, it needs multiple staff. Presently our schools are not producing the number of ministers to sufficiently address these three factors.
Wood: A sizable number of our credentialed ministers are being trained through Global University correspondence courses. Over the last decades, as our schools have broadened in their curricular emphasis, there is a move from a ministerial training-only program. We’ve reached a point where the issue of ministerial preparation is critical.
Bridges: At this point our crisis has not reached the proportion that other denominations are experiencing. But we need to be concerned. George Barna states that 40 percent of pastors today will not be in the ministry in 10 years. We also need to look at more than numbers. We need to look at vision, passion, and fire. When these are in place, they attract people who desire to become involved in ministry. A rekindling of vision and fire will do a great deal in helping us fill our pulpits.
How does a person know God has called him or her?
Wood: I have several responses based on scriptural analogies. Some people are called with a tremendously overpowering sense of God’s revelation—His presence. Isaiah certainly had that kind of call. Paul had such an experience on the road to Damascus. John, at the end of his life, had a call to write the Book of Revelation.
Some have experienced a call through others who saw their potential and recognized their gifts. This is what happened to Timothy. Paul said, "Join me." Timothy didn’t have the same kind of call that Paul had, but he had a legitimate call. There were ministry gifts that were obviously functioning in Timothy’s life. Paul recognized them and drew them out.
When I was a young pastor, I asked Morris Williams, then field director for Africa, to come for a missions convention. I asked him, "Brother Williams, how did you get your call?"
He looked at me and said, "I never had a call."
I asked, "What do you mean, you never had a call?"
He said, "Well, I read in Scripture that Jesus was taking volunteers, and I up and volunteered."
But talking more with Morris Williams, I recognized that he overstated his case to make a point. Obviously there was a resonance in his heart. It wasn’t just a mechanical, "Well, I volunteered." There was the gifting and the inner sense that this is what the Lord wanted him to do.
On a continuum there are these ranges—people who receive a revelational call generally suffer greatly later. That is why they receive that kind of call. Then there are people like Timothy in whom others see potential and nourish the gifts in them. Finally there are people like Morris Williams where their call doesn’t seem to be highly supernatural, and yet their call is obvious as they step into God’s call. God blesses the desire of their hearts and the desire of their hearts becomes a way of manifesting the call.
Crabtree: Philip’s ministry grew out of a task within the church. He was not called to the pulpit ministry at the beginning; he was called to be a deacon. We need to raise the level of service in the church. Doing this opens doors for the call to ministry.
Bridges: It first has to be an inward call. Jeremiah said it was a burning fire. But there is also outward evidence. One of the things that helped me was the affirmation of my pastor and other ministers.
It’s interesting how we have defined the call from our beginning. We have called it the call to preach. It was a call to proclaim, which involved not only preaching the gospel, but also feeding, nurturing, and shepherding the sheep. Pastoring became a part of that call.
How can we help ministers who have become sidetracked from their call to ministry?
Crabtree: First, I would encourage those who feel a call from God to have faith in the God who called them. Many times people look at their own abilities or circumstances and see that it didn’t work out. But they need to stand on the fact God has called them.
Many times those who are looking for a place of ministry miss opportunities. We are not talking about faith to believe that God called them. They are looking to denominations to help them fulfill that call. But God may be testing them to see if they will respond to His call. At other times, they may not see the opportunities in front of them.
After I was called to preach, I learned to preach in a Sunday School class. As I taught this class, I took it as an opportunity to prepare a message and I grew. Many times people want the ministry handed to them, but ministry is a process of development.
Wood: Exactly. I tell people, "Don’t go looking for a ministry."
People come to church and ask, "How are you going to use me?" If you’re looking for a place to serve, you will always have a ministry. If you’re looking for a ministry, you probably won’t have a place to serve.
People need to bloom where they are planted. A person’s gifts make room for him. If a person is functioning in ministry now, then to the one who has, more will be given. To the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away. That’s a principle of Jesus.
People say, "Give me a place; I have a call." But that is not how ministry functions within a biblical or a practical setting.
When a person says, "I have a call to the ministry," that call needs to be confirmed by other believers. The reason some people who feel called to the ministry are not in the ministry today is because the body of Christ never recognized their gifts.
None of us function in ministry without the affirmation and confirmation of other believers. A person can say, "I have the gift of prophecy," but his words never console, encourage, or correct. He can talk about his gift all he wants, but there has to be an affirmation.
When someone drops out of the ministry, is the reason internal, or is it because the body of Christ did not confirm his calling? That’s critical.
Then there are those whose calling is confirmed by the body of Christ. Say, for example, a person had a call, but is not now in full-time ministry. When he teaches a Sunday School class, things begin to happen as he teaches. Is there a confirmation building that attests to his ministry? And if that’s happening, that’s the kind of person we need to encourage to get back into the ministry.
Some people see the will of God as a fork in the road. If you take the wrong turn you never get back. You’re always going the wrong direction. I see it as beaching your canoe and going for a walk in the woods. You got out of the river. But come out of the trees, get back in the canoe, and get back in the river. You won’t be as far downstream had you not banked your canoe, but at least you can get back in the river and keep following God’s direction for your life.
Bridges: We fall short in helping those who have a call or have become sidetracked in ministry. Any number of things can lead people into disobedience—discouragement, pressure, failure. But once a man is called of God, I cannot see him ever being content in anything of this world.
How can pastors help others who feel called to ministry develop their call?
Trask: When a pastor recognizes a young person in his congregation has a call, he needs to give this person opportunity to preach. That is what happened in our Fellowship in years past. And once someone gets that feeling of God’s anointing as he preaches—even though he might think he bombed out—there comes a fulfillment and joy that nothing can compare with. The mechanics of preaching will come as this person develops his skill. Young people need to have opportunities to preach and be involved in the other aspects of ministry. We encourage our pastors to let that happen. Pastors need to recognize the call of God on young and old alike, and then provide opportunities to nurture that call.
Bridges: Brother Trask, to do what you have described, a pastor needs a deep appreciation for the ministry. He needs to love preachers. When I became district superintendent I found that some ministers caused problems. But you needed to love them anyway. When you love them, you want to help them. That’s what we see in the apostle Paul. He had a special interest in younger ministers.
In the closing chapter of 1 Corinthians, Paul wrote to the Corinthian church, knowing Timothy was going to be there. He told the church, "Don’t you intimidate him, now. Don’t you do anything to harm him. Listen to this pastor" (paraphrase mine).
In 2 Corinthians 2, Paul said that God had opened the door for him at Troas, but he was concerned about Titus because he was not there. Titus should have been there. What did Paul do? He left Troas and looked for Titus.
In chapter 7, Paul found Titus. Paul’s spirit was refreshed because this young minister was OK. That’s powerful.
In Colossians 4, Paul sent a message to Archippus, urging him to go forward in ministry. This is the heart of a pastor who wants to help. We must restore that in our Fellowship.
In earlier days pastors supported and mentored young people. More of our preachers have probably grown up in smaller churches than larger ones because nurturing comes from personal relationship.
An example of this is something we have in common—all of us here in this room today are PKs. We had input from our fathers. My father was a pastor and presbyter. He died at 85. He was supposed to have been retired, but he never retired. A large group of young ministers were at his funeral to honor him. He had meant so much to them, had pastored them, and had helped them in the ministry. That impressed me. Even in his old age, he was still influencing.
Wood: A pastor recently told a parishioner that his two most important goals for that year were to see his daughter graduate from high school and for him to complete his master’s degree. Now these are important goals. But what was absent was any passion for the church, any passion for reproducing himself in the people surrounding him, any passion for preaching God’s Word, or any passion for seeing the church grow.
We live in a self-centered age. If we are not careful, that same spirit of the age will seep into our lives and become our career instead of His career, or our church instead of His church. We need to be careful as we look at our passions and our priorities. What we live and what we preach is what we’re going to get. If we’re not seeking to exalt Christ and put His concerns first, we are going to get self-centered congregations, people concerned about their own agendas rather than Christ’s agenda.
Crabtree: We need to realize that our greatest resources are ministers themselves. Churches that reproduce themselves are the strongest way to build new churches. But historically, future pastors and leaders have been inspired by motivational pastors who saw the ministry as the highest calling. We need to get back to that and challenge our finest students to come into the highest and best calling. Our ministers can raise the level of the worth of the pastorate and the ministry.
Jesus spent most of His time reproducing himself into His 12 disciples. Our pastors need to catch a vision of the wonderful young people who are in their churches and the calling of God that is on them.
When I pastored, I took guest preachers out to lunch to learn from them. I once took the late James Hamill to lunch. He preached to me for an hour and a half. At the time I had a church of 150. He asked how many staff I had. I said, "I have a secretary who comes in 3 days a week."
He replied, "Don’t you have any Sunday School teachers? Don’t you have anyone working in the music ministry? The next time I ask you, I want you to say at least 75 staff people." He said it bothered him that pastors are so nice to people they pay and forget they have many assistant pastors—people who are ready to work for nothing—but who are treated wrong by the pastor. This changed my life. People who are not fulltime and paid are still called of God, called to ministry.
How can a pastor create an atmosphere in his church where God can speak to people and call them into the ministry?
Trask: We live in a fast-paced society, and many times we do not give God opportunity to speak to us because we are always running from event to event. As pastors, we must be sensitive to the time demands we place upon our people. It is essential that when we do meet in corporate settings that we provide an atmosphere where God can speak to His people.
Wood: I think back to the churches in which we grew up. We all grew up in similar kinds of churches. But there were several components that nourished the call for me. One is preaching on the call. Another component is the example of a call.
My father pastored small churches. At times he had to take secular employment to supplement his income, but he never thought of walking away from the ministry. That was his call.
Another element was the altar service, giving young people a chance to respond. Another thing was an opportunity for practicum. I felt called to preach when I was 11 years old. Within weeks I was preaching my first sermon in the youth group. I’m sure it was a terrible experience for the listeners, but at least there was an immediate effort to get me going and encourage me. And finally, people came along and affirmed me. I think of H.C. Ball, my Sunday School teacher when I was 15. He was in his late sixties. He called his Sunday School class every Saturday night and asked, "Are you going to be in Sunday School tomorrow?" At the end of every Sunday School class, he would put his bony hand on every one of our knees and pray that God would use us. This had a powerful impact on my life.
Crabtree: We have been talking about the importance of the call. The call starts with the importance of preaching. We’ve seen a diminishing in the last few years of the preaching ministry. And we are now into programs with a lot of specialization. The pastor has to understand that he is a general practitioner. He cannot leave preaching on the call only to the children’s pastor, youth pastor, or district youth directors at the youth camp.
Someone said, "You get what you preach." There has to be a desire to preach on the call of God for ministry. Pastors need to preach on this a minimum of once a year. I did that. I preached fervently on the call and then had an altar call. I asked missionaries and others who were coming to emphasize the call to the ministry. As pastor, I had personal theology classes with scores of young people. I believe in the importance of the preaching ministry; it’s the highest calling. Pastors need a rebirth of the importance of preaching itself. We’re losing that. We’re moving more in the direction of worship and programs. We need to get back to the pulpit.
In the last number of years the ministry has taken a beating. Many look on the ministry as second-class. But it is the highest and best calling in the world. I encourage a revival in our pulpits to preach this, believe it, and seek to reproduce young people for the ministry.
What can pastors do to facilitate the call in children?
Trask: The emphasis our churches are placing on children’s ministries today is good. The philosophy is this: If you can reach children, then you can reach their parents. We are seeing an increased number of churches hiring a children’s pastor. This is good.
We must never minimize the fact Jesus touches children and calls them when they are tender. Who knows what God has in store? As a pastor, when I was dedicating babies, I prayed that God would lay His hand on them for ministry, particularly if the parents had a heart for ministry. God can set children apart at an early age. A great number of our ministers probably received a call from God at an early age.
Bridges: Brother Trask, I’m wondering if Pentecostal ministers are failing in the area of mentoring their own children. As ministers, we must create and nurture an atmosphere in our own homes so our children can respond to the call of God. I have two sons in the ministry whom I trained both at home and in the churches I pastored. My greatest joy was investing in our children from their youth up. When they got to the age where we could use them in the youth group and the college group, we trained them in these. Today it is a great joy to see the products of that mentoring. My concern is that our pastors are not investing time in their own children who may be called to ministry. When you look at the number of PKs and MKs, that’s a valuable source we may be overlooking.
Also, the place of the baptism in the Spirit in the lives of young believers draws them much closer to the call of God. When children and youth are open to the fullness of the Spirit, they are much more open to the call of God. That in itself is another reason why pastors need to be preaching the Baptism, providing a place for young people to receive the call.
How can we better facilitate the call to the second-career person?
Crabtree: I was in a church recently and the pastor said, "You see that man over there. He is a brilliant businessman; God’s hand is on him. I’m training him to take this church when I leave." This pastor had put him in leadership. Pastors need to recognize the importance of ministry and then provide ministry opportunities and encouragement for the laity. Facilitating the call in second-career persons is all about releasing and encouraging. Pastors need to tell their people it’s exciting to be called of God, and we’re going to help you. We’re going to make room for you and believe in you.
Trask: Pastors should not view business people who feel called to ministry as threats. They should see them as individuals who possess great potential for the kingdom of God and then begin to mentor them. The best staff members you can get are those you raise up from within the church. They are great candidates for ministry positions in your church because they understand your passion, vision, and goals. They are committed to you as a leader because they may have been saved under your ministry. They are known by the church and understand the ministries of the church. Pastors need to mentor laypeople as they feel called into the ministry.
Wood: In the church I pastored, we always sought to staff from within the congregation. We would ask: Who is on the cusp of transition from lay ministry to professional ministry? Some wonderful people who were called of God came into ministry. One young man who was teaching school had a tremendous gift for working with young people. We invited him to be our junior high pastor. Within a year he had 200 teens in his junior high group. He was an incredible evangelist.
One of the mistakes churches make is to say, "We’re not going to add a staff person until we have a certain amount of money." You have to look at staffing a church like a mission field. We send a missionary before there is a church. I made it a rule of thumb that we didn’t add staff because we had money or resources. We added them because there was a frontier that needed to be addressed. We had to take some steps of faith.
One of the problems our churches get into—boards especially—is the status quo mentality of we are going to stay where we are. We can’t afford that. Churches must keep pushing the borders of faith. And one of those borders is adding people on the staff of the church, not to become stars of the team, but to become coaches and to release more and more laypeople for ministry. That was the whole idea when I brought this young schoolteacher on staff. We had almost no laypersons involved in junior high ministry. But if you’re going to have 200 teens in a junior high ministry, you need laypeople working with them. There’s a mushrooming effect that comes when you add staff that empowers others for ministry.
Talk about taking risk with young preachers.
Trask: This Fellowship has taken a risk with all of us and given us credentials. I mean there are no guarantees.
Wood: Absolutely. I hadn’t thought of that. That’s right. One of the functions of those in ministry is to help people to the next level. When I graduated from Evangel College I was heading to Fuller Seminary for further education. I wanted to find a local church, but I had never been in Southern California. I wanted a ministry position to help pay some of my tuition. I came over to Headquarters and met with Charles W.H. Scott, assistant general superintendent. I said, "I know you don’t know me well. You know my dad. I’m graduating from Evangel College. Do you know anyone in Southern California who is looking for a youth pastor? If you could help me, I would appreciate it."
He said, "Sure, George, I’ll help you." So he wrote letters to Southern California pastors. Arnie Vick, pastor of Bethel Temple, Los Angeles, wrote back and said, "Brother Scott, if you recommend this young man, I’ll hire him." So Arnie Vick hired me sight unseen based on the recommendation of somebody who didn’t know me. That’s a risk.
Bridges: When I was a young man, my pastor contacted other pastors and said, "I want you to use my boy." That used to be a common thing. If you were called to preach, get out there and yell it. Every Saturday night several of us were on the street preaching to drunks by an old bus system that served the outer limits of Houston. We would get a bunch of winos on their knees, and it created a congestion. But we had them praying and seeking God.
Please share a final thought on rekindling the call to pastoral ministry.
Trask: The Scripture says to pray that the Lord of the harvest would send forth laborers. I would like to ask our pastors to have their churches pray that God will raise up ministers. We don’t call people. God does. This Fellowship only recognizes the call, and we grant credentials as a recognition of their call. If we as a church will pray, "Lord, raise up laborers," God will answer. I see evidences of that. Assemblies of God World Missions has more applicants for service today than any time in their history. There’s a trend and we see more coming. We’re not there yet, but as we pray as a church and then nurture those who are called, God will help us.
Wood: Regarding the Lord of the harvest, it is interesting to put Matthew 9 together with Luke 6 and Mark 3; you get a collage. After Jesus said "pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest," He went up to the mountain to pray and continued all night in prayer. When it was morning, He called to Him the disciples from whom He chose 12. There was obviously a larger group than 12 from whom He chose. What was the criteria for the final cut? My guess is that these were the ones who took Him seriously when He said "pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest." Perhaps He observed them praying and chose the 12 who took Him at His word.
We also have another source of workers for the harvest. There are 650 Assemblies of God students in non-Assemblies of God seminaries, and approximately 350 students in our own seminary. This provides 1,000 potential ministerial applicants in seminary alone at this point. This is going to be a primary area for future leadership. We need to take every effort at the district, sectional, and national levels to embrace and welcome these who are presently going through graduate theological and ministerial training. They are a tremendous resource for us.
Bridges: The Lord has put a principle into life from Genesis that you only reproduce after your kind. What you want to see reproduced is not more of a lackadaisical kind of ministry, but one of character. If we are going to reproduce preachers, there has to be a commitment to preaching. We’re not going to reproduce what the church needs until we ourselves have that in our own lives. I’m praying that God will help us reproduce those who are compassionate and deeply committed and who will stay in the trenches.
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