Monday, November 19, 2007

Dynasty

In some ministry circles, there is such a thing as a "dynasty". Let me explain the scenario and how a dynasty is formed...

So a pastor gets called. In some present day circles, when a pastor is called, the congregation believe the wife is called too... to co-pastor with the pastor the church. So often you will see the husband and wife pastor team with not only the husband having the title " pastor" but the pastor's wife gets it too. So they get children and they raise their children in church, and so they become adults. When the husband-wife pastors retire, the baton is passed to one of the children. So one of the offspring becomes the pastor of the church, he/she has a spouse and the spouse gets the title pastor too. Thus, the cycle continues.

It is a church dynasty or some call it ministerial dynasty. Fascinating practice, no?

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

I have noticed that many churches that engage in such a pracitice tend to be "non-denominational". These churches are identified more by their pastor than their theology. For example where I live, I see billboards with the picture of the pastor or the pastor team (with wife) for a given church, however I have no idea what the particular church believes.

The issues is this: If a pastor starts to teach and preach something that is unbiblical, will the church has the means of correct this?

LPC said...

Yes, Steve,

in fact many of these non-denoms are charismatic congregations. They do not have a confession, may be just 16 points of faith statements.

LPC

Anonymous said...

If one can reduce the Christian Faith to 16 points, then the question that must be asked "So what did you leave out?".

Anonymous said...

Joel Osteen is an example of an individual who as assumed the office of the Pastor but has not training to be a pastor. Pr. Osteen became the pastor of his church due to the circumstance of his father's illness.

If you look at Robert Schuller's son, the younger Dr. Schuller has a MDiv from Fuller and has been an ordained minster since 1980.

While there is much I disagree with both Schullers' on, at least they follow a tradition and biblical means of calling pastors.

LPC said...

Absolutely Steve,

The Hagins and Copelands and mainly those in WOF are like these. On the 16 points - ahh, ahem, well, so long as you are not hitting upon any of those 16 points you are ok, which means you can preach heresy that does not negate them.

Flexible huh? I am being silly.

LPC

Doorman-Priest said...

Dynastic Pastoring. Sounds a nightmare. What happened to the discernment process?
D.P.

LPC said...

D.P.

Discernment process? There appears to be none, so long as you are nice, that is ok.

BTW, do you see this in some circles in the UK?

LPC

J. K. Jones said...

I long for the days when we all ahd confessions we could disagree over.

LPC said...

JK,

That is absolutely deep!

As we say in the catechism ...this [what you said] is most certainly true.

BTW, you are reading a book that seems to say that science has proved there is no God, right? My question is -- was that real science or pseudo?

LPC

Past Elder said...

You mean you guys don't dig Rexella Van Impe or Melissa Scott?

LPC said...

P.E.

Nope, I pass.

Matthew blogged about Van Impe saying that Jesus did not come to be Messiah.
http://teardownthehighplaces.blogspot.com/2007/11/its-official-john-hagee-is-heritic.html

BTW, Runza is on the missus list of things to cook this week end. We will see how we go.

LPC