We at Blessing Point Ministries sometimes face resistance to the idea of hiring an “outside consultant” to come alongside a church or ministry in pain. Many factors drive this resistance, both cultural and personal. But, as with all things, pastors, elders and lay leaders of ministry must understand their biblical responsibility for seeking help when things get “over their heads” and they don’t know what else to do. There is a Scriptural basis for doing so.
In my morning devotions I’ve been studying Philippians 4, and I recently grappled with Paul’s handling of a situation taking place in their church, something that gets passed over because of the powerful and arresting theological truths in the verses around it. He speaks to a conflict between two women:
I urge Euodia and I urge Syntyche to live in harmony in the Lord. Indeed, true companion, I ask you also to help these women who have shared my struggle in the cause of the gospel, together with Clement also and the rest of my fellow workers, whose names are in the book of life. (Phil. 4:2-3)
Here is a conflict sharp enough, public enough to motivate Paul to call them out publicly. If the conflict were private, I don’t think he would have done this. The whole church is aware and probably witnessing this conflict every time they gather. This is real-life! I recently consulted with a church with exactly this kind of event in their history.
Paul beautifully balances the exhortation to both women as he calls them out. He “urges” them to “live in harmony,” a phrase in the original language which means to “share the same attitude/way of thinking,” something he used earlier in Philippians to describe the “attitude” which should characterize all disciples, saying in 2:5: “Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus”. It is a “value-system word,” the value we place on certain things that affects our way of thinking or attitudes toward them.
What does this have to do with consultants? In Phil. 4:3, Paul indicates that he knows his exhortation to these women may not work! The nature of their conflict may be of such long-standing, or maybe so sharp or embedded in such things as their history, their class or their cultural differences, they may not be able to figure out how to arrive at “one attitude” about it. We see this level of conflict in churches all the time. Therefore, he asks his “true comrade” (probably Timothy) to step into the situation and “help” these believers in conflict. It is this word “help” in the original language that captured me as I pondered it, so indulge me as I get technical and talk a little Greek to you.
The word “help” here has some highly unusual meanings. It can mean to “seize, grasp, apprehend” someone, to take them into custody, and is used of soldiers coming to arrest Jesus. It can also mean “to conceive, become pregnant” (!) and is used of the conception of Jesus in Luke. But then the third meaning is “to help by taking part with someone in an activity (lit. ‘take hold of together’), support, aid, help.” It is used of the fishing partners of Peter coming to help him when his nets were breaking at the size of his catch. As someone who studies Greek, that is a highly unusual set of meanings for the same word!
The picture of “help” Paul asks his true comrade to give here is not a band-aid or book to read, but to become deeply involved in helping these divided believers to lay hold of the issues which are driving their conflict and help resolve them. He does this “together” with them. The stakes are too high, the spiritual dangers too great, to let such conflicts continue.
That is exactly what good consulting ministries seek to do for a church. It is certainly our commitment at Blessing Point. We do not come in with easy-peasy, superficial solutions, but with a determination to listen, both to a church’s pain and for what the Spirit is saying to a church about what has caused its pain. If your church, or a ministry you know, is in trouble, encourage them to overcome their resistance to help and reach out to someone who will take hold of the issue together with them and work to resolve it with spiritual sensitivity.
Dr. Kenneth Quick serves as Director of Consulting for Blessing Point Ministries. Blessing Point helps churches experience breakthrough moments in ministry that can transform their future impact for the Kingdom of God. Ken authored Healing the Heart of Your Church – How Ministry Leaders Can Facilitate Corporate Healing. He is Professor Emeritus of Practical Theology at Capital Seminary and Graduate School in Greenbelt, Maryland. You can reach Ken at Ken@blessingpoint.org
Another great article from Blessing Point! I believe there are lots of examples of consulting in the scripture. There is wisdom in the counsel of many. An outside counsellor is one of the many that God places in the lives of corporate bodies to give them another perspective and an opportunity to hear His voice in their troubled situations.